Notes: Enjoy the chapter and thank you for reading/reviewing.
Chapter Five
"Kurt! Kurt!"
Sebastian heard movement from inside, and it took a moment and then Kurt had the door open. He had obviously been crying, and he looked like he was only just containing his tears.
Sebastian didn't know what to say, so he pushed his way in and closed the door behind him and then didn't expect for Kurt to start sobbing, hands over his face. Not knowing what else he was supposed to do, he awkwardly took Kurt by the shoulders and pulled him into a hug wishing that Elliott wasn't in New York and he could call him to do the comforting instead.
He leaned back against the door and rubbed at Kurt's back and Kurt just kept crying and Sebastian had no idea when he stopped, but just that eventually he did and that he left a wet spot on Sebastian's shirt.
"I'm sorry," he muttered when he pulled back.
"So," Sebastian said, "he's really with Karofksy?"
Kurt nodded his head and he walked to the sink. Sebastian watched him as he splashed water on his face. It didn't do much for the redness. He fixed his hair and straightened his clothes.
"I was so stupid," he muttered, "thinking he'd be here waiting for me. And now…oh, gosh, I have to go back out there and face them again."
Sebastian could tell that Kurt would fall apart if he went back out there to talk to them, but he knew he wouldn't just leave.
"I'll go with you," he said quickly, "tell them you ran into me."
Kurt turned to face him. "You'd do that?"
"What are friends for?"
Kurt nodded quickly and took a few deep breaths and then he walked to bathroom door and opened it. Sebastian followed after him and they walked past dancing couples to the bar where Blaine and his new boyfriend were both still standing.
"Kurt!" Blaine said with surprise, "I thought maybe you'd left."
Sebastian jumped in. "Nope. He just ran into me. How's it going, killer? Oh, and bear cub."
"Sebastian," Blaine said, "I didn't realize you were here."
He shrugged his shoulders. "Old haunt, you know, had to come see it now that I'm stuck in Ohio for a few months. Anyway, Princess here promised me a dance."
"I did!" Kurt said and turned to Sebastian.
He looked a lot more like the Kurt Hummel that Sebastian knew, the small not-real smile on his lips and all the hidden emotion that he didn't want seen. The mask was well placed, but even Sebastian could see the cracks and he was sure that Blaine could too.
"You two are friendly," Blaine said.
Sebastian grinned at him, "ran into him in New York, turned out that we had a lot in common."
"That's great," Karofksy said, "running into old friends in a big city."
Then, before Blaine could say anything, Sebastian pulled Kurt away to the dance floor, remembering the last time he and Kurt had been dancing at Scandals. Blaine had been between them and he had been slowly edging Sebastian away from his boyfriend with perfect ease.
"Thank you, thank you, thank you," Kurt whispered as they walked away.
"You're welcome," Sebastian mumbled back, "but you know Elliott would have killed me if I didn't do anything, right?"
Kurt hit his shoulder. "Stop trying to pretend that you aren't half decent."
Everything was exactly how Kurt had not expected it to be. But, he should have. Blaine had moved on, and he was dating David Karofksy of all people and Kurt still didn't know how he was supposed to take that information. He was floundering in disgust, shock, hurt, and confusion. Days after the fact, after he'd made the decision to stick around despite the fact that getting Blaine back looked like it was going to be harder than expected, Kurt still wasn't over what happened at Scandals. But, he was trying to be an adult about it even if it meant holding in his feelings and making an attempt at being friends with Blaine again.
After seeing him at Mr. Shuester's for dinner, and watching how easily Blaine interacted with everyone else and made a point to not catch Kurt's eye or address him directly, Kurt was left wondering if it was even worth it.
"I love him," he told Sebastian later that same night.
Sebastian who had sprawled himself out on Kurt's bed glanced over at him, "and what are you going to do about it? You said you came to fight for him, so fight for him."
"How?" Kurt asked.
After all, he had basically already told Blaine that he was going to respect his relationship and be "adult" about the whole thing which meant that he had to be nice to Dave.
Sebastian shrugged his shoulders. "Does it look like my way of trying to get Blaine away from his boyfriend worked?"
Kurt glared at him. "He and I were in love, then. I may have been insecure about it but there was no way Blaine was going to cheat on me with you."
He didn't say it out loud, but it only reminded him of the fact that Blaine had actually cheated on him. Somehow, though, Blaine had gone and won him back despite that and despite the fact that Kurt had been more than adamant about not wanting to get back together with him.
"Well that's it, isn't it?" Sebastian said, "he was and probably still is in love with you, but I doubt he loves David Karofsky."
Kurt shook his head. "I'm not hitting on him at every turn with sexual innuendos and asking him to cheat on his boyfriend."
"Definitely not something you'd do," Sebastian said, "so, can I hit on him?"
Kurt laughed and for a moment, he remembered his first initial thought when Blaine mentioned he was seeing someone else. It had been like a reflex probably because he'd just seen Sebastian right before and they were back at Scandals.
"What are you going to do, then?" Sebastian asked.
"Wait it out? I told him, I was straight forward about it. He knows why I'm here and there's nothing more for it."
Sebastian didn't say anything, but he did sit up in the bed, "what does your best friend think about that? And I will add I'm using the term very loosely."
Kurt rolled his eyes. "Rachel thinks I should sing to him."
"Of course she does."
He buried himself in work, and catching up with all of his other friends when they were suddenly all there again. They all offered their advice and hugs and condolences but Kurt quickly realized that they weren't too interested in really listening to him. On the other hand, it was nice to have them around again, and to be in the choir room with all of them even with all the difficulties that recruitment had brought them.
By the time that they actually had glee club members, Kurt felt tired, and they hadn't even gotten enough people to join for competition. Sebastian seemed to enjoy his exhaustion.
"I could never be a teacher," he said over coffee the afternoon of the homecoming bonfire, "I don't have the patience."
"Or," Kurt added, "the filter."
Sebastian laughed. "Yeah, that too, I suppose."
Kurt had been hesitant to go back to The Lima Bean because of all the memories it held, but in the end decided that he'd need to face it all at some point. In the end, it hadn't been as bad as he'd imagined. Having Sebastian with him helped.
"So you said Berry poached a student from Dalton?" Sebastian asked.
"Yup," Kurt said and sighed, "and I defended her to Blaine. It's basically the end to friendly competition which is a shame because once again we're put against each other."
In retrospect, Kurt knew that he shouldn't have gotten involved in defending Blaine, but speaking up and fighting was like second nature to him even more so when it came to Blaine. It was the reason they had broken up, after all, all the fighting which Kurt knew, mostly from his therapy sessions, that he had been a main instigator in.
"So, I take it this means you haven't made even one step towards getting him back?"
Kurt nodded and let out a breath.
"And now tonight I have to go to a bonfire that I know they're both going to be at. Hey, what do you say, do you want to come?"
Sebastian made a face. "Not really."
"Oh, come on, we'll leave early," Kurt said, "it'll give me an excuse to leave early and I know you don't have plans."
"Fine," Sebastian said, "but I'll meet you there."
Kurt knew that Sebastian would get there late and that he would insist on leaving as soon as possible, but he was counting on that.
Sebastian was late not just because he'd left his house fifteen minutes late, but also because after he arrived, he was distracted by the sea of red people, the fire, and the fact that Blaine was cuddling with Karofsky on the hood of a car. Seeing them, and their obvious display which was probably aimed at Kurt, angered him on Kurt's behalf. It was the one thing that made him try and hurry through the crowd to find him.
Kurt was seated with Rachel Berry and a few other former students and former members of New Directions and for only a moment, Sebastian felt like he didn't belong, until Kurt looked up.
"You came!" he said and untangled himself from his friends.
Sebastian let his lips quirk up. "I said I would."
Kurt stopped right in front of him. "Thank god, I can't be here any longer."
Sebastian grinned. "Good."
"I'll be right back."
Sebastian watched him as he said goodbye to his friends, and then when Kurt returned, he was surprised when Kurt hooked their arms together.
"I saw them," Sebastian said, "I'm sorry."
Kurt shook his head. "It hurts a lot, but I hurt him too."
Sebastian noticed how Kurt averted his eyes away from Blaine and Karofksy, but Sebastian couldn't not look at them. He wasn't too surprised when Blaine was staring at them openly. Sebastian had never been good at deciphering Blaine's emotions, and he couldn't tell what Blaine might be feeling or thinking, but he knew that none of it had to do with Dave.
"Where do you want to go?" Sebastian asked.
"Not home," Kurt said quickly, "and definitely not Scandals."
Sebastian rolled his eyes. "It's Ohio. There's not much else."
"I know," Kurt said with a groan, "I really miss New York."
Somehow, they wound up back at his house instead, sprawled out in the den eating junk food and watching musicals because Kurt wouldn't let him put anything on otherwise after he found out that Sebastian actually owned a large collection of them due to his mother.
"She wanted to be on Broadway," Sebastian told him sometime after Kurt put in The Sound of Music, "she never really explained why she became a psychiatrist instead."
"I watched this with my mom every Sunday," Kurt said, "it was just me and her and we'd sing along. Her voice was beautiful."
The next day, Kurt was still at his house, and they had both fallen asleep in their own corners of the couch. Sebastian woke up first, at the sound of a ringing phone. Since his was still in his pocket and there was no house phone, he knew it had to be Kurt's.
He spotted it on the table after looking around on the couch and then nudged Kurt until Kurt woke up and he grabbed the still ringing phone.
"Hello," he said.
"Kurt!" Sebastian heard Rachel Berry exclaim even as he was trying to stretch out all his sore muscles.
"Rachel, calm down. Calm down, I'll be there in an hour. This isn't a big deal. It's Saturday, I don't even know why you're trying to have practice today."
Sebastian finished stretching, but knew that it hadn't done much good, and then when he looked over to Kurt again, he was rolling his eyes at his phone.
"I can't believe I fell asleep here," he said, "she's going to be unbearable over this."
Sebastian watched him. Kurt had bed hair. His clothes were completely wrinkled, and there were lines on his right cheek where he his face had been pressed into one of the sofa cushions.
"Um," Kurt said, "I'll text you later. I should go."
Kurt swept out of the room, picking up his few belongings and then he walked out of the room and Sebastian heard him leave the house. He dropped back onto the sofa and sighed for a moment wondering what the rest of his day would hold.
Sebastian closed his eyes and leaned back. Never once before had he considered that Kurt Hummel would become one of his good friends, or that he would even grow to care about Kurt or for that matter his relationship with Blaine Anderson. Somehow, though, he did, and Sebastian didn't understand why.
"I'm going soft," he muttered and shook his head before getting up, "and it's all Hummel's fault. Next he'll have me singing show tunes at the drop of a hat."