Kurt took the Ambien for a week. He was grateful for the opportunity to clear his head – he hadn't realised his mind had been in a haze, like the dream world was extending into his real life, until it dissipated. And if the sheen of the world was a little duller without that haze, well, at least it was real.
He knew he couldn't take the Ambien forever. If nothing else, it made it harder to shake off the grogginess and get moving in the morning, and he refused to end up dependent on a pill. After the week of respite, he felt he had sufficiently sorted through his thoughts and emotions anyway, and he was ready to try to stop taking it. He was still hopeful that the time without dreaming had acted as a circuit breaker, and that dream-Sebastian and his weird control had faded out of existence. A part of him suspected, though, that nothing permanent had occurred; sometimes, towards the end of the night when the Ambien was wearing off, he could still catch a few glimpses of colour like he had when the dreams were just starting.
He was ready even if dream-Sebastian was there, though. Kurt had never been the type to run away from a problem; even now, he was re-framing the choice to take Ambien as a temporary, strategic retreat. The distance had given him enough time to draw his armour back around himself, just like he would have when interacting with the real Sebastian – although he had no idea at what point he'd dropped it. If dream-Sebastian was there when Kurt stopped taking the pills, he would be superficially pleasant and polite but with a guard of steel hovering a hairs-breadth below the surface, just like he had had to construct in real life. And if Sebastian tried to strike blows at the steel, Kurt would no longer cede the power in his own dreams; he would demand Sebastian find his own exit.
The first night Kurt went to bed without taking anything he felt nerves seeping in, but then chastised himself for feeling that way. Kurt Hummel was not afraid of his own dreams, even the nightmares. He tried to mould the feeling into that sense of exhilaration that he felt before he stepped out onto the stage instead, and it helped – but still, it was a long time before he fell asleep.
It only felt like he blinked, and then suddenly he was on a boat, of all places. A boat, out on the actual ocean. He whipped his head around, clocking the two levels of deck and little clusters of people that must add up to at least thirty people – but they ignored his existence entirely just like the dream-people normally did, and they had that same indistinct fuzz to them at the edges. He'd finished turning almost a full circle before he spied Sebastian lounging on a cushion on the deck right at the bow of the ship, looking unfairly attractive with a light linen shirt partially unbuttoned, hair ruffling causally in the wind as the ship sailed out towards the sunset. His sunglasses obscured so much of what Kurt relied on to read his mood, so it was only when Kurt got up close that he could feel the moody tension radiating out of him.
Kurt half-contemplated retreating to the upper deck, and felt reasonably sure that Sebastian would not find him there before the sun went down. But he had made a choice, and that choice was not to run. And so he centred himself, took the last few wobbly steps to carry himself to Sebastian (he hadn't been on many boats before, and this one was not a very stable walking surface), and then leaned against the railing. "So, why are we on a boat?" he asked, as if nothing was amiss, looking out at the ocean rather than the boy beside him.
Sebastian's head snapped up to look at Kurt so quickly that Kurt could almost hear his neck crack. Something intense flickered across that face too quickly for Kurt to catch it out of the corner of his eye, and then it was replaced by nonchalance. "This is a sunset cruise," Sebastian drawled. "Boats, booze, and maybe boys if I'm lucky." Kurt only quirked an eyebrow in response to this, and let the silence drag out. Eventually, Sebastian cracked. "You've been gone awhile." Kurt could hear how much effort Sebastian had put into making it sound like a statement rather than a question.
Kurt gave an answer nonetheless. "I needed a break."
Sebastian huffed derisively. "My own dreams needed a break from me," he muttered.
Kurt gently kicked the cushion Sebastian was sitting on. "You're the dream, if you'll remember," he said mildly. When Sebastian didn't respond, he followed with what seemed like the safest question. "So, where is this boat?"
"Miami," Sebastian said shortly. He stared down into the champagne flute casually dangling between his long fingers, and swirled the inch or so of pale gold wine left in the bottom. "You missed all the good stuff in Orlando. Disney, Universal. Harry Potter."
Kurt faked a gasp and fluttered a hand over his heart as he teased, "I'm truly wounded that I didn't see you get your nerd-boy on." It was only when Sebastian snickered in response that Kurt remembered he was supposed to be being politely distant.
"I learned a new skill while you were gone, too," Sebastian said, tone turning bragging, but there was an odd forced feeling to it. "Turns out I can manipulate time." With a flick of his fingers, the sun, which had been half-way down the horizon, jerked back up the sky to where it had been when Kurt first arrived. Another flick, and the sun rapidly sank until just a sliver of it was still clinging to the sky, and the heavens were flooded with the oranges-blending-to-purples of twilight. Sebastian was forced to pull off his sunglasses in the low light, and Kurt barely resisted the urge to turn away from the railing to intently read his face.
"Impressive," was all he said instead.
"I know," Sebastian said, and Kurt did turn enough to at least catch that Sebastian's smirk also seemed slightly off. "There are limitations to it though," Sebastian admitted. "I can't go any further than the start or end of the sunset."
"Or what?"
The sun flashed back up into the sky so quickly Kurt was blinded, and had to squint. "It gets stuck," Sebastian supplied. "I can push and push and keep it up here, but I can't force it any higher." Just as quickly, the sun then dropped so low that Kurt knew they must have mere moments left. The rapid shifts light made him dizzy, and he had to clutch at the steel beneath his fingers to feel like the world was right-way-up. "And past this point, the dream ends."
Sebastian pushed to his feet to stand next to Kurt. He only made eye contact for a moment, and then his gaze skidded away again, looking towards the little bar inside the ship's cabin. "Well, thanks for the visit," he said. "I might see you tomorrow, I guess," and then without waiting for a response he walked away. Before Kurt had to – or could – frame a response, the sun and dream disappeared.
Kurt's day passed uneventfully, but it felt all too soon before his head hit the pillow again. While the night before he had been wired with an edge of anxiety as he tried to fall asleep, tonight was different in a way he couldn't put name to – a new sensation pulled him taut. Not fear, not quite anticipation, but a certain feeling of tension, like he was bracing himself for a crash into something that he couldn't yet see.
When he blinked and opened his eyes to a different world, the first thing he registered was green. In total contrast to the vista of the night before, which had been nothing but the stark, naked sky and the utilitarianism of the ship, tonight his vision was filled with tropical greenery. There were broad, shiny, dark green leaves all around him, and as his eyes followed those leaves up they blended into palm trees overhead, woven through with strings of exposed halogen bulbs; it was only belatedly as his eyes trailed downwards again that he realised that they were all either in pots or planter boxes. Glimmering through the gaps in the greenery were a backdrop of twinkling lights coming from skyscrapers.
The next thing he registered was brassy, thumping music, something modern with a Latin twist. One corner of his mind continued cataloguing his surroundings – the enticingly rich and spicy scents coming from a nearby kitchen, the humming of the crowd of people around him – but the rest of his mind was immediately diverted and captured by the sight of Sebastian.
The other boy was that feeling Kurt had had when falling asleep brought to life, as if Sebastian's own tension had been burning so violently it had reached through the shroud between dream and life to touch Kurt, even before they shared space. Kurt felt both repelled and inexorably pulled towards Sebastian, tossed around in his tide. He couldn't even say who approached who, but suddenly they were facing each other, partially cut off from the people around them by a wall of greenery.
"Where –" Kurt began, for lack of anything better to say, but Sebastian cut him off.
"We're in Little Havana, on a rooftop. It's not important," Sebastian said impatiently. "What the fuck, Kurt?"
Kurt reeled back. "What?"
"You needed a break? What the hell is that?"
"I… I don't…" Kurt was reeling from the sudden blows, even though he was standing still.
"Yesterday. I pretended like I was fine. But I guess I'm not," Sebastian snapped. "You're gone for a week, and then all you have to say is you 'needed a break'? Are my own goddamn dreams trying to prove some sort of point to me? Or are they just fucking with me because they can?" He brought a hand up to his hair and gripped for a moment, and then just as quickly flung that hand back down to his side.
It was that sign of frustration that Kurt anchored onto, because mirroring it felt safer than anything else. "Welcome to the club, Sebastian," he shot right back. "Now you know exactly how I felt in the days before I decided I needed that break. I'm not going to be toyed with by my own subconscious, manifested in the body of one volatile man."
Sebastian groaned, the sound bordering on a snarl. "Now is not the time to resurrect the goddamn argument of whose dream this really is, Kurt."
"I'm not trying to. At this point, I don't even really care whose dream it is. I'm saying that being snapped at, and pushed away, and then hauled through a whole night of confusing flashes just because someone decides to go on some sort of drunken riot is reason enough for anyone to call it quits."
"So what? You just decided to leave? How can you decide to leave a dream when you don't even have any of the control?"
"I took sleeping pills," Kurt said, deflating a little on a sigh. "You're right, I don't have any control here. I can only control what happens in my real life – so I did what I had to."
"Jesus," was Sebastian's only response. The fight seemed to fall out of him too, and he slumped against the edge of a planter box the greenery was springing from, scrubbing a hand over his face with a groan. The gap between words stretched out. And then - "Sometimes I could still see you. Flashes of you. But you were just a washed-out shimmer and you were gone again. And I was trapped in the sunsets alone."
Something grabbed inside Kurt's chest. "Sebastian…"
"That's how I discovered my time manipulating abilities. I had to drag through all those sunsets alone except for these shimmers of you popping in and out. The world-bending wasn't fun anymore. I just got so…" He huffs again. "My anger got the better of me, and I guess I shoved at time hard enough that it cracked."
Kurt didn't know what to say; it felt like Sebastian's tide hadn't just pushed him around, it had sucked him out into the deepest of oceans, where there was no ground beneath his feet to launch up from, and only his own flailing arms and legs to keep his head above water. He perched on the low wall next to Sebastian, shoulders close but not touching, and ignored how his hands shook as he curled his fingers over the edge.
"Do you know what it's like to miss something that's not even real?" Sebastian asked, and the edge of his voice was hoarse. "I'm not sure I've ever really missed anything before. But I missed you."
"I do. I do know," Kurt admitted.
"You needed a break from me?" Sebastian asked again. The hostility was long gone now, but the vulnerability it left behind seemed to have even more power to suck Kurt under the waves.
Kurt dug the tips of his fingers into the rough concrete beneath them, staring intently at the wash of sparkling lights that made up the Miami skyline. And very quietly, he admitted, "This was starting to feel like it mattered. And it doesn't. It can't."
Sebastian sounded almost broken as he said, "Fuck, Kurt -" Suddenly he disappeared from Kurt's side, only to crowd into the space right in front of him instead. And there were hands on both sides of Kurt's jaw, and his face was being lifted, and there was a mouth pushing down hard on his own.
Kurt gasped against Sebastian's lips. For a moment, there was nothing in his mind or body except a drumbeat; a heavy, anticipatory thud, thud, thud, thud. Like even the very ground beneath his feet was held in suspense, waiting for Kurt to make a choice.
But there was no real choice. If there was, Kurt had made it a long time ago.
Kurt surged into the kiss, and Sebastian hauled him closer. The kiss was desperate, breathless, demanding. When Sebastian eventually pulled away, his hands still on Kurt's face, he gasped out, "It matters. Of course it matters. It does."
Kurt had no answer to this but to draw this impossible man straight back in, twining his arms around Sebastian's neck and cradling his head, as he kissed him again with every violent and sweet thing that welled up inside. The closer that he pressed into Sebastian, the more tightly he was held, until even their breathing was a push-pull that never separated them, and still they kept kissing.
Kurt was so lost in it, he barely registered that the colour striking through his closed eyelids had darkened from burning orange to deep blue. But a corner of his mind shouted that it was important, so he forced their mouths apart, and their gasps fell into unison as he turned his face to the side to find that the sun has almost completely sunk out of view.
Sebastian instantly had a demanding hand back on Kurt's jawline, his green eyes incredibly dark and intense as he tipped their foreheads together, and that alone was almost enough to make Kurt forget, but… "Sebastian, the sunset," he managed.
Sebastian huffed with frustration but turned away long enough to take stock of the horizon, and with a harsh splaying of his fingers the sun was back in the sky. There hadn't been the opportunity to notice it last night, but at that moment it became achingly clear that it was not just the sun that moved – the whole world rewound around the two of them, the people and the objects and the lights in the distance. Kurt and Sebastian were the eye of the storm. Then that same hand that had pulled the sun up into the sky grabbed Kurt's, their fingers tangling, and led him to a nearby bench. Sebastian thudded down into it gracelessly and tugged Kurt down onto his lap with such command that Kurt followed without further thought.
They kissed and kissed, and then broke to just… hold onto each other. Kurt pressed his forehead to Sebastian's temple, basked in strong, sure hands gliding over his back, and admitted to himself that there was no going back. He was all in, no matter how insane or unhealthy this whole damn thing was. He was caught, and had no desire to even try to escape.
Kurt lost count of how many times Sebastian rewound the sunset that night, only that it was imperative that they stay together, kissing and enfolding and just being –
His alarm went off. It felt like Sebastian was wrenched out of his arms, they were so suddenly empty. His heart bent, twisted…
And burst into existence as something wholly new.
Sebastian was yanked into the waking world with his breath heaving, like his head had just broken through the surface after struggling up through the deepest ocean. He was disoriented for much longer than he'd want to admit; he'd never woken in the middle of one of his dreams of Kurt before, and it felt like the deeper parts of his mind were being dragged out of the dream-world kicking and screaming.
He couldn't blame them.
Once his mind felt fully integrated back into his own body, he got up without any fanfare. Skipped breakfast. Packed, got into his car. Decided to start driving. All the while, his mind was suspiciously silent. Where yesterday, after Kurt's sudden reappearance on the boat, his mind had been a roiling ocean, today it was like a lake at dawn, completely still and quiet. It would have felt almost destructive to breech the surface.
He ran on autopilot all the way to the highway, and before he knew it he was making the four-hour drive to Tampa. It was only when he was halfway there that everything seemed to sink in, and suddenly he was feeling.
His emotions were in charge, and they cycled so quickly he felt like he was running behind them. Sebastian had always prided himself on his self-control; his ability to pull himself out of his feelings, his own head, and stare down the world hard and clear-eyed. He was probably even a little too good at getting out and staying out of his own head, but it had served him well. Not today. He couldn't recall a single sight, any of the cars he passed, or if there had been any turns in the road as he travelled the rest of the way to Tampa - everything had folded and twisted inward, lingering over one man's name and voice and face.
Eventually the maelstrom stopped and the emotional roulette landed on defiance. It was so fucking typical that Sebastian could have rolled his eyes at himself. Thankfully, it wasn't the same defiance that had plagued him in Georgia, trying to shake off the power dream-Kurt held over him.
Sebastian had done a great many stupid things in his life, and he would freely admit to that, but never had he been so stupid as to surrender to a feeling. And yet, today… Today, something insisted that he surrender to whatever ludicrous thing his dreams had sucked him into. And for the first time, he did not have the self-control to say no. His self-control could, in fact, go fuck itself for all he cared.
He spent the rest of the drive lingering on everything the dream had been. The closeness, the sense of triumph from demanding something more from Kurt and to have Kurt respond just as fiercely in return. The intensity that he had always known, on some level, should be there.
He barely processed arriving into Tampa, finding a hotel, checking out some of the sights. His sketches as he drifted through the city were cursory at best. It was only just as the sun went down that uncertainty began to creep in. He belatedly realised should have picked somewhere special for the sunset; but then his pride reared back up and told him not to be pathetic – and it was almost a relief to realise that his edge of derision at all the inane things in the world had not gone away. He might have given himself over to some dream like an idiot, but he was still Sebastian Smythe.
Nonetheless, as he ate a late dinner and then retreated to his hotel room, only to find himself lingering on his balcony, staring out at the skyscrapers around him… It was hard not to wonder what his dreams would bring him tonight. They had given him Kurt, built him to be a friend, then something important… and then taken him away. The darker the sky became, the more lights that winked out of existence in the city skyline, the more he found himself wondering what would come into view as he opened his eyes on his other life tonight.
By the time he went to bed, he was making an effort to pull himself out of his head again, because it risked making him tense and unsure. At times he felt cracked open by dream-Kurt, like the boy could see everything raw about him – a product of that boy being part of his own subconscious manifested in a different body, he reminded himself. Even the mere paranoid thought that Kurt might look at Sebastian, see him for what he really was and what he wanted, and then refuse him… It was enough to make Sebastian want to pitch face-first off the balcony, if he had been any more of a drama queen.
That uncertainty wasn't given any time to take root once Sebastian fell asleep, though. As the scene of Curtis Hixon Park snapped into view, Sebastian started to look for Kurt even before his higher functions registered that he was in a dream. And as soon as he laid eyes on him, something was soothed. Because Kurt was mere feet away, hurtling towards Sebastian with that same defiance set on his face that Sebastian felt down to his bones.
Kurt all but collided with Sebastian, his arms slinging around Sebastian's rigid shoulders. "This is not going away," he said firmly, and Sebastian melted into him.
"Okay," Sebastian agreed hoarsely, cradling the back of Kurt's head in his hand. He then tipped his face down to kiss Kurt firmly. "Good."
They kissed until the sun was halfway down the sky. Eventually Kurt was the one to break it off, casually dropping his hand from Sebastian's shoulders to curl their fingers together. "Are we still in Miami?" he asked curiously, twisting his torso to look around behind him.
"Tampa," he supplied. Just as he did, the shrieking form of a small child hit them with a spray of water and he winced. At sunset, he had inadvertently found himself at one of those installations where dozens of jets of water shot up from the ground, and as expected from the summer crowd, there were children running through them with abandon.
Kurt turned around to look at where the water had come from just in time for another screaming hellion to come skidding past, splashing a huge puddle of water up against Kurt's trousers in his wake. The fondness almost overwhelmed Sebastian as he caught the look of indignance cross Kurt's face… so he did what he did best, and shoved Kurt right into the jets with a wicked smirk.
Kurt gaped at him for a mere moment before the indignance bloomed on his face with full force, and he was so adorable in that moment Sebastian only wanted to tug him close again – but then a third little demon crashed straight into them, and with both of them already standing within the jets of the water, neither man could maintain their footing. Sebastian was laughing freely even as he fell, and was quietly proud that he had the presence of mind to disappear all the people from around them and make the ground a bit softer as they well.
As they both hit the ground and rolled, becoming instantly soaked, Sebastian cradled Kurt within the cage of his arms. Kurt's face had morphed into a full-blown pout, and Sebastian leant in to kiss that pout away with a snicker, shifting to lie on top of Kurt and shield him from the plummeting rain of the water jets from above.
They wrestled and chased each other through the fountain just like the children had, and Sebastian revelled in the breaking tension. This brand of idiocy? This, he could do. Eventually, though, after Sebastian had reversed the sunset two or three times, they took a break to slump on the grass and let the baking Florida sun dry them off – or, at least, as best as it could in the oppressive humidity.
It was only when lying side-by-side with Kurt, who had his eyes closed and face tipped up to the sun, that Sebastian finally came to grips with what his defiance meant, and why it wasn't pushing Kurt away like it had before. Even as he pushed up onto an elbow to trace a fingertip down the side of Kurt's face, the self-exploration came haltingly. He really didn't want to do it, but the sting of Kurt's hurt face in Georgia was enough to remind him of the consequences of not doing so. And as he looked down at Kurt's closed eyes, the perfection in the way the boy's lashes fanned out over his pale cheeks hit Sebastian like a sucker-punch.
So he pushed himself. And out came a response that he should have expected: his defiance had turned into a rebellion against his self-control itself. His whole life, he had bucked any influence from any outside source, determined to follow his own path. Hell, this whole goddamn road trip had come from a desire to strike his own path, even when he didn't have a clue where that path should be going. But this new brand of defiance enveloped and protected the both of them, him and Kurt; he was going to enjoy this, the rest of the world – even his own head – be damned.
He flopped onto his back and laughed quietly. "This is probably the stupidest thing I've ever done."
Kurt huffed, opening his eyes to glance at Sebastian. "Likewise," he said, deadpan, but then broke into an impish smile. "That's what makes it so fun." As their eyes met they both giggled, but when the giggles faded away Sebastian's heartbeat quickened to recognise the same defiance shining out of Kurt's eyes.
"My whole life people have told me to be sensible, Kurt," he said. "Be realistic, Kurt. Don't be so silly, Kurt." His voice was taking on a harder edge the longer he spoke. "But listening to all that noise has never actually done me any good. So there might be a voice in my head telling me to be sensible, to stop being stupid, that all of this is nothing but a fantasy. But I don't think I care anymore. I'm just going to do what makes me happy. The sensible thing can go to hell."
Sebastian rolled on top of Kurt, pinning him to the grass, and pressed kisses into that smiling mouth until Kurt's hands were clutching at him. The last shadows of his self-control slipped away, and he had never been so glad to see it go.
Where Washington was their playground, the Gulf Coast became their haven. There weren't as many bustling cities or breathtaking rooftop vistas as there had been when Sebastian was making his way down the east coast, but he didn't find the slower pace as abrasive as he once had. He took to surfing again, and gave into the urge to sketch Kurt from the memory of his dreams once or twice. Needless to say, those drawings did not make it to his Instagram.
His desire to world-bend had faded away, lost in the enjoyment of being with Kurt. But then one night, somewhere in the sleepy cradle of coastline where Florida became a blur of Alabama-Mississippi-Louisiana in hazy succession, he stopped Kurt where they were walking on a beach. With a mischievous twist to his smirk, he had a cabin constructed out of nothing in mere moments. Wordlessly, he led Kurt inside and pushed him up against the door as it swung shut.
"Sebastian?" Kurt asked, his eyes searching Sebastian's still-smirking face.
"You know, I realised something today," Sebastian said conversationally, and tipped his head to kiss Kurt's mouth, then jaw, then down his neck, fluttering his breath along Kurt's skin as he went. "This is my dream."
"I… And?" Sebastian felt a tiny surge of triumph at the way Kurt's voice shook.
"This is my dream, and yet I have not had any dream sex. I am honestly kind of appalled at myself. It's almost criminal. And I think we need to fix that."
Sebastian glanced up at Kurt through his lashes, and for a split second Kurt looked like he was about to make a sarcastic comment – and then Sebastian sucked gently on the skin just above Kurt's collarbone, and Sebastian could practically see the words draining out of him as pleasure took over.
They were suddenly on the bed Sebastian had conjured without either of them really registering how they had gotten there. Their kisses were getting hotter, heavier than they ever had before, and then Kurt had them flipped so Sebastian was below him, and then their hips were moving in synchronicity…
Sebastian found his release just as he shocked awake in real life, gulping for air as sparks fired all over his skin. He practically floated through the day that followed, and couldn't even bring himself to be embarrassed by that.
The next night he pulled Kurt close again as soon as they saw each other, but even as he pressed Kurt against the nearest flat surface, Kurt protested that he thought it was the orgasm that had booted them out of the dream. Sebastian insisted on testing the theory, his hand effortlessly finding its way down Kurt's pants before Kurt could even finish his warnings about the dream ending without Sebastian finding his own release. Sebastian's hand was deft and enthusiastic, and it wasn't long before Kurt's whole body was tensing next to him, drawing taut –
When Sebastian woke rock-hard and aching, the feeling of Kurt lingering in his fingers, he was forced to admit it was probably the orgasm that kicked them out.
Being with Sebastian had brought Kurt the kind of peace that throwing himself headlong into a dream should never achieve. But somehow, the glow dream-Sebastian brought to his nights seemed to spill over from sleep and colour his waking hours with a faint tinge of gold as well. The only time something tugged at Kurt with the slightest discomfort was when Elliott caught him happy-humming as he flitted about day-to-day in the apartment; he knew Elliott was suspicious Kurt was withholding the juciest details of his life.
It didn't stop Kurt from guarding his time with Sebastian with increasing ferocity. He no longer cared that there was something truly crazy about bending his real life to fit around his dreams.
A week after Kurt returned to the dreams they were in New Orleans, lying together on a grassy hill overlooking an outdoor amphitheatre where one of Sebastian's favourite bands was playing. In real life, Sebastian had gone to the show, but he hadn't wanted to waste time with Kurt caught in a sea of other people. So Sebastian had quickly led him out of the amphitheatre when the dream began.
They had started off dancing together like loons, but as the music morphed into something slow and wistful, Sebastian pulled them onto the ground and neatly arranged them both. Kurt allowed himself to be handled by those shockingly gentle hands. Eventually he was positioned lying on his side with his head pillowed on Sebastian's warm chest; and when he focused, he could hear a deep and steady beating, more compelling than the music could ever hope to be.
It was so hard to believe this was a dream when that heartbeat was so real.
"Sebastian?" he eventually asked, and Sebastian only hummed in response. "Have you ever been in a relationship before?"
Kurt had been expecting Sebastian to tense, maybe even pull away. But the thing Sebastian had always been best at was surprising Kurt, so it almost wasn't a shock when he couldn't feel any change at all in the muscles beneath him. Sebastian's breathing remained smooth and even. Even the hand carding through Kurt's hair didn't stop its soothing rhythm.
"I… no," Sebastian said eventually. "It wasn't a particular choice I made. And it wasn't, like, an aggressive idea that 'relationships are bad'. I just never saw a reason to pursue one. I had everything I needed – friends, family, fun, education, money. Sex. So a boyfriend never seemed worth the trouble."
It took Kurt a heroic amount of willpower not to say anything in response. To let them both hover in the moment - to not even lift his head up and look Sebastian in the eye. But some part of him knew that Sebastian's vulnerability was still a fragile and flighty thing. And there was something Sebastian had yet to say.
Eventually, Sebastian continued, his voice even quieter than before. His hand stilled on the back of Kurt's head, holding it to him. "Maybe that's the point of all of this madness," he said. "If there was one. Maybe it's to make me see why I should want a relationship for real. To… open my eyes, I guess, to how something like this can make life… I don't know. So much better than I thought."
Emotion squeezed Kurt's chest vice-tight, and he wanted so badly to hold Sebastian to him just as tightly. But he knew that clutching at Sebastian in that moment would only see Sebastian pull away. And so he tipped his face up into that beautiful, expansive sky above, where his emotion could instead stretch out and never find an end. The bright sun blinded him and his body grounded him, but his heart needed neither, and grew into the endless blue.