Sebastian woke an hour early for work. He showered and prepped meticulously, spending at least thirty minutes fixing his hair. Since he had no choice on what to wear, he made certain that his uniform was clean and wrinkle free, his black shoes polished, and for good measure, he splashed on his favorite Hugo Boss cologne. He realized, with a certain amount of irony, that the last time he worked this hard to look good in a uniform were during his Dalton Academy days.

God, did he ever think back then that this was where he would be now?

He shrugged off the thought as soon as it popped into his head. He wouldn't allow self-pity to push him down, not today.

Tonight, he had a date with Kurt.

After he had come to terms with the shock of Kurt asking him out for a drink, Sebastian began to relax. Sure, they hadn't gotten off to a fantastic start when they first met. Kurt had torn him down royally about his fashion sense, and called him a wannabe. But Kurt knew what Sebastian was. Kurt knew he worked for Fed-Ex. So, learning that he was barely getting by and living in the smallest studio apartment known to man would not be a surprise for him.

Sebastian didn't think Kurt expected him to be a closet millionaire, working this crappy job for life experience. He wouldn't expect much from him.

Besides, Kurt had asked him out for a drink.

Yes, today would be classified as one of those rare good days. He'd get paid, and even though he already knew his paycheck wouldn't amount to that much, after he socked away what he needed to save up for rent and to purchase food, he could make one luxury purchase, and he already knew what that purchase was going to be.

A cell phone.

Not an over the top iPhone or anything too cutting egde. Just the average, run of the mill, pay by the month phone. He did happen to find one with an Android operating system that was well within his budget. This way he wouldn't have to stop at the library every time he needed to use the Internet.

Most importantly, though, he would have a reason to ask Kurt for his phone number.

Sebastian whistled as he walked into work, even dancing a step or two as he breezed by Debbie's desk to get his truck keys and his digital pad, dodging Louis with a bright smile along the way.

"Well, well, well," Debbie drawled as he watched the tall man get ready for the day with an attitude she had yet to see, even during his interview. "Who got into you last night?"

Sebastian smirked as he gathered up the last of his things, winking, but not otherwise acknowledging the suggestive remark.

Louis, however, couldn't just let the matter lie.

"If I had to venture a guess," he said, his accent thicker than normal as his mouth rolled over the words, "I would say it was that guy on his route. Kurt Hummel."

Sebastian stopped cold, his body turned toward the door with the two of them behind him. He heard Debbie gasp, almost in horror.

"You mean, that frigid asshole that hates everybody?" Debbie sounded almost amused. Sebastian, however, was not. He was beginning to take offense to how everyone kept referring to his Kurt as an asshole. He was about to turn around and make a patented Sebastian Smythe cutting remark, when another thought hit him.

What if dating customers was against some rule?

Debbie had given him a book of rules and responsibilities, but he would be damned if he would actually read it. All the heat drained from his body. It had never dawned on him for a second that seeing someone on his route might be against some sort of company policy.

Sebastian wanted to say something smooth. If nothing, Sebastian had always been quick on his feet in a crisis. He could for sure come up with some kind of easy lie..

He didn't want to lie about Kurt, though. He didn't want to belittle something that could turn out to be wonderful by covering it up with lies. He'd rather lose his job.

He turned around slowly, preparing to plead his case, only to be met by teasing grins.

"Well, I...you know..."

Louis chuckled behind his hand at the look on Sebastian's red face. Debbie waved him away as she reached into her desk drawer.

"Look, Smythe," she said as she rummaged around the drawers contents with thick fingers, "no body cares what you do as long as we don't get any complaints and the truck's back by five."

Sebastian smiled, slightly embarrassed but recovering quickly as he headed for the door.

"But," Debbie said, the tone in her voice calling him back to her desk, "if you guys decide to, you know, do anything kinky, and you get it on film..." She held out a business card which for some reason Sebastian took, "my email address is on the bottom."

She winked at him suggestively before shooing him away with a wave of her hand.

Sebastian rolled his eyes, pocketing the business card for looks, and hurried out to his truck.

The day went by quickly. Sebastian felt more secure with his route, though after the debacle of his first day, he would have to do something astronomical in comparison in order to be worse.

He was running nearly thirty minutes early when he arrived at Kurt's house. He parked out front and cut the engine. He gathered up the envelopes, checking each one twice to be sure he got the right ones, grabbed his digital pad, and hurried to the front door.

Sebastian rang the bell and waited. When Kurt didn't open the door he rang the bell again. Sebastian tapped his foot nervously while he waited. He put an ear up close to the door and listened, but he couldn't hear anything on the other side. Sebastian started to get annoyed, which was traditionally his first instinct when he felt like he had been stood up, though the concept was mostly foreign to him. To his memory, Sebastian Smythe had never really been stood up.

Sebastian took a deep breath, deciding to shove away any feelings of rejection and 'what if he didn't really mean to ask me out and is now regretting it after having the night to sleep on it and realizing I'm just a minimum wage slob', and think rationally.

First of all, he had arrived early. He knew nothing about Kurt's day to day schedule. He knew that Kurt's letters needed to be at the house at 2 p.m., but what if he had an appointment somewhere beforehand? Sebastian wouldn't know.

Sebastian looked at his watch. It said a quarter to two.

Sebastian looked at the thick, wooden door, as if it would have an answer. Sebastian reached out slowly to touch the door. He hadn't ever put a finger on it before. Twice he came close to knocking, but always stopped just in time to keep from incurring Kurt's wrath. With gentle fingertips, he ran the pads of his fingers down the smooth wood. The sensation was a little more sensual than he had bargained for, but he let his fingers continue the trip down to the doorknob. He turned it experimentally and found that it was locked.

Sebastian sighed. He weighed his options. He could sit on the stoop till two o'clock rolled around and see what happened. He half expected that if he did, Kurt would magically materialize from behind the door. Or, he could leave, put a Post-It note on the door saying he tried to deliver the packages, and no one was home. Since they had to be signed for, he couldn't just leave them there.

He had to wait till two o'clock no matter what, so he looked around to find a place to sit.

A muffled noise caught his attention.

It sounded like a strange, syncopated thud. He heard it...and then about half a minute later, he heard it again. After the third time, it was followed by a strained, "I'm coming," as Kurt's airy voice made it's way through the door to Sebastian's ears.

Sebastian felt relief rush through his body. He bounced a little on the balls of his feet. In the deep recesses of his mind, the Sebastian Smythe from his high school days was sneering at the man he was now, ridiculously giddy as he waited for Kurt to answer the door. Right now, he couldn't care what his old self thought, though he decided to stop the bouncing since it did make him look like a dork.

Kurt opened the door slowly. The first thing Sebastian saw were two pale hands clutching the edge of the dark wood. When Kurt emerged, Sebastian's heart fell. Kurt looked tired, purple rings beneath slightly puffy eyes. His arms trembled as they fought to hold him up. Sebastian looked him up and down. His hair, still perfectly coifed, clashed oddly with the rest of his appearance. He had dressed way down in a baggy gray sweat shirt and sweat pants. Sebastian smirked when he noticed, however, that his ratty looking sweats were designer. Sebastian's eyes swept down to where Kurt had one leg bent slightly, a bulky looking cast covering his right foot.

"Oh, Kurt!" Sebastian cried when he saw the injury.

"I'm sorry it took me so long to get to the door," Kurt slurred. "I kind of had an accident."

"What happened?"

Kurt shook his head minutely, as if it hurt too much to talk. He opened the door wide. He hopped awkwardly, turning in a complete circle. Grabbing on to furniture along the way, he half hopped/half limped to the sofa. Sebastian stared at the open door for a moment before fixing his eyes on Kurt, who had settled uncomfortably on a Victorian double-end sofa, an eclectic piece of furniture, which was there for style more than for comfort. Kurt sighed and closed his eyes, leaning his head back against the scrolled mahogany, sinking into the stiff, striped, ivory jacquard upholstery.

Sebastian watched Kurt trying so hard to relax. He felt helpless. He had no idea what to do.

Kurt lifted one eyelid comically, looking at Sebastian standing in the doorway.

"I'm really not looking forward to flies in my house, so can you please close the door after you come in," Kurt mumbled.

Realizing that was Kurt's version of an invitation, Sebastian carefully removed his shoes and stepped inside. He moved his shoes out of doorway and closed the door, leaving them outside. Kurt smirked.

"You didn't have to do that." Kurt's eyelids fluttered closed again.

"It's okay," Sebastian said, setting Kurt's packages and his digital pad on a small, circular table just inside the door. "They didn't deserve to come in anyway."

Kurt giggled, and then snorted cutely.

"You put your shoes on time out," Kurt laughed.

Sebastian couldn't help smiling.

Sebastian took a moment to look around the room. The living room space flowed immediately into an adjoining dining room. Both were the epitome of shabby chic. The mismatched pieces - the Victorian sofa, the arts and crafts themed dresser, the Renaissance style end tables, the various flea market style chairs seated around a 60's era card table, all made to look as if they had been thrown haphazardly together in a manner that screamed meticulous searching of thrift stores and carefully considered planning before each purchase. Muted color schemes brought the peculiar pieces together in a single unified theme - a sponged mossy green in the living room, a color washed light blue in the dining room. Framed lithographs littered the walls - larger frames paired beside a hodge-podge of various smaller sized frames, each one housing either a full picture, or just a specific portion of a painting or photograph.

One frame housed a full reproduction of Dali's 'The Swallow's Tail'. Sebastian remembered this painting from a bullshit elective class he had taken at Dalton. It was the last of a series of paintings based on catastrophe theory. Sebastian remembered it only because of its musical element - the gentle curves of a cello - an instrument his mother loved to play.

This painting also happened to be Dali's last.

Another frame held a small square of aged parchment, with words written in the same flowery hand as the sign on the door. The parchment read, "Drink to me, drink to my health, you know I can't drink any more. - Pablo Picasso, 1973." Kurt had made this himself. He had probably aged the paper by hand as well. Sebastian had never heard the words before, but he knew their possible significance. Picasso had died in 1973.

The first and final pages of a manuscript hung from an opposite wall. Sebastian examined them carefully. The two pages sitting side by side were reproductions from the original score written in Mozart's own hand - his Requiem Mass - unfinished after Mozart's death, though completed later on by another composer.

Sebastian swallowed hard. He took a look at the pieces as a whole.

A black and white image of a tiger swallowtail butterfly, alight on a calla lily. An Ansel Adams photograph of a stark, bare tree in winter. A framed copy of a letter from Van Gogh to his brother Theo - the last letter he wrote to his brother before his death. An original painting of a Mexican sugar skull. A sepia photograph of the exterior of an adobe church, a crumbling shell with nothing left but the the outer structure and a cross.

Image after image, all spiraling in Sebastian's head as individual parts, and then finally all tying together with a single common thread. In their own way, each image had something to do with death.

Two images on the wall stood out among the rest. Sebastian was sure they fit the theme but he didn't know how. They hung side by side on the wall opposite the couch, presumably so that Kurt could look at them every time he sat down. The first was a Bible quote that Sebastian had heard a few times before, sometimes referred to as The Song of Ruth: "Entreat me not to leave you, or to return from following after you: for where you go, I will go; and where you lodge, I will lodge: your people shall be my people, and your God my God. Where you die, will I die, and there will I be buried: the LORD do so to me, and more also, if anything but death parts you and me."

The second was a photograph of a beautiful woman, young and fresh faced, with dark hair, pale skin, high cheekbones, and a small bow shaped mouth. It was a black and white photograph, but the wide, smiling eyes were tinted a spectacular shade of ice blue.

The woman bore a remarkable resemblance to Kurt.

"My mother." Sebastian heard the voice and turned, ducking his head a little, feeling a bit like he had just violated Kurt's privacy by looking at his pictures, even though they were hanging on the walls in plain view. "She died when I was little."

Sebastian's breath hitched in his throat.

"I'm sorry." Sebastian looked back at the photograph of the happy woman, staring almost at the two of them as they gazed back at her. Sebastian wondered if this photo was taken before or after Kurt was born.

"She's beautiful," Sebastian remarked. Kurt smiled and nodded.

"You look just like her," Sebastian said quietly, not missing the fact that he had, in a round about way, just called Kurt beautiful.

Kurt's smile faltered, but he blushed all the same.

Sebastian breathed unsteadily. He pointed to the quote in the next frame.

"A quote from the Bible," Sebastian observed. "Do you believe in God?"

Sebastian wanted to take the words back right as he said them. It was an extremely personal question, and he wasn't sure why he asked it that way. Most people would ask if Kurt was religious, or a Christian, but some people were very private about their relationship with God.

Apparently not Kurt.

"No," he said firmly, resting his head back on the couch and closing his eyes again.

Sebastian felt an unnerving quiet press in on him. Snapping from his thoughts of the strange images on the walls and their possible connection, he suddenly remembered Kurt's injury.

"Kurt?" Sebastian said, taking a seat beside him. "What happened to your leg?"

Kurt's eyes opened, and he regarded Sebastian with a sad expression.

"I don't really know," Kurt said. "It was bizarre. I was out for my morning run, when out of the blue, some other jogger tripped over me."

Sebastian looked confused.

"So, it was an accident?" Sebastian said.

"Yeah," Kurt replied slowly, though the look on his face said he wasn't very sure. Sebastian suspected that his doctor had given him some powerful painkillers. Kurt seemed a little unfocused, drifting in and out of whether he wanted to be awake or asleep.

"I'm sorry," Kurt said, opening his bleary eyes to look at Sebastian. "I don't think I'm being a very good host right now. I guess this kind of kills going out later, huh?"

Sebastian watched as Kurt put his head in his hands and groaned. Going out had actually been the last thing on Sebastian's mind. There was no way he wanted to leave Kurt alone like this.

"Look," Sebastian said, leaning in to Kurt with the sincerest smile he could manage. "I'll tell you what. Let me finish my shift and come back later. I'll make you dinner. We can sit and talk. No big deal."

Kurt sighed.

"You don't have to do that, Sebastian," Kurt said.

"You're right," Sebastian agreed. "I don't have to."

Kurt opened his eyes again, his expression almost incredulous.

"I want to, Kurt." Sebastian took Kurt's hands in his, holding them gently, taking advantage of this opportunity to run his fingers over the soft skin. "I want to get to know you, so let me come back and help you."

Kurt's eyes narrowed a bit, that icy look of suspicion from a few days ago returning momentarily. Those icy blue eyes, transforming to that no-nonsense gray that usually came with a biting remark or put down. But the remark never came. The eyes never changed. Kurt smiled, his face lighting up, his pale skin glowing.

"Yes," Kurt said. "Please. I would like that."

Sebastian squeezed Kurt's hands gently.

"Okay," Sebastian said. "Great!"

"But don't worry about dinner," Kurt said. "I made a lasagna yesterday and froze it for the weekend. I'm sure Friday is weekend enough to break it out."

Sebastian silently breathed a sigh of relief, since the last thing he remembered cooking gave two people food poisoning. If he was going to woo Kurt properly, he might want to learn how to cook.

"Sounds great," Sebastian reiterated. In his excitement, Sebastian reacted, raising Kurt's hands to his lips and kissing them softly. Sebastian stopped mid-kiss, looking up with apprehensive eyes to gauge Kurt's reaction. Kurt stared at Sebastian's lips where they rested against his skin, Sebastian's warm breath ghosting lightly over his knuckles as he breathed in and out.

Sebastian's lips against Kurt's skin felt sweeter than Kurt dreamed they would.

Sebastian didn't want to let go of Kurt's hands. He didn't want to leave, especially when Kurt was looking at him like he had just given him the moon.

"I'll be back in a few hours," he said softly, returning Kurt's hands to his lap.

He had to keep telling himself that in order to get up off the sofa and over to the door, where he saw the stack of envelopes and the digital pad.

"Oh, right." Sebastian remembered he needed Kurt to sign for his envelopes. "I need you..."

Sebastian turned back to the sofa to see Kurt, fast asleep.

Sebastian looked around. In the far corner of the room sat an old upright piano. On the stool, he saw a folded blanket and a pillow. Sebastian wondered if Kurt had brought these down earlier, expecting to camp out on the couch. It didn't seem likely considering how awkward the sofa was to sit on, not to mention sleep on. But for now, it would have to do. Sebastian gathered up the pillow and blanket and brought them back to the couch. He gently lifted Kurt's head and slipped the pillow beneath his neck and head. Then he covered Kurt with the blanket. Sebastian ran his hand over the end of it. It was handmade, old and worn. It smelled faintly like roses, but not fresh roses. More like the lingering scent of an old perfume.

Sebastian stepped back and looked at Kurt, sitting upright and sleeping soundly, his face calm, his lips pursed.

Sebastian wanted to kiss those lips so badly that he had to force himself to back away in order to keep from doing it, keep from pressing his lips against Kurt's.

'I'll be back in a few hours...I'll be back in a few hours...'

Sebastian left the packages by the door. He entered a code on the delivery pad to indicate the packages had been delivered to their intended recipient, but a signature could not be attained. He was actually surprised that he even remembered that code since he was more than sure he hadn't been paying any attention when they went over it.

He didn't know what he was going to do about locking Kurt's door. He didn't want to wake Kurt, and he didn't want to leave the door unlocked. He saw Kurt's keys hanging on a hook in the entryway. He really didn't want to take Kurt's keys, but he had no choice. He pulled out a post-it from the pad in his pocket and scribbled a note telling Kurt that he had borrowed his keys so he could lock up the house, and that he would be back in a few hours.

Sebastian walked out the door, closing it slowly so that he could take a last longing look at Kurt. He locked the door, and pocketed the keys. He rushed back to his truck so he could turn in his truck and head home.

The faster he got home, the faster he could get back to Kurt.