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Sebastian had never been this humiliated in his entire life. This whole day felt like one of those late nights where you can’t fall asleep because every embarrassing moment you’ve experienced keeps flashing before your eyes. Except, it wasn’t late at night in bed, and it wasn’t just for a couple of minutes. It was all day. Because of every single embarrassing thing that had ever happened before, all those times his parents walked in on him blowing some guy, every time he got a bad grade on a test he thought he aced, each time the Warblers chose camaraderie with the New Directions over winning, none of it compared to this.
The worst part was that it happened just like how they always show it in movies. He literally caught he-who-shall-not-be-named in bed with someone else. And no, not just any bed. His bed. Well, their bed. The one they’d shared up until that morning when Sebastian got home from a business trip to find his boyfriend of a year in bed with a Hollywood Boulevard street performer. Yeah, the guy’s knock off Superman costume was lying on the floor in Sebastian’s apartment.
He couldn’t go to any of his usual bars. Ben knew him better than most people, and he’d tried calling Sebastian 12 times in the past two hours. Sebastian couldn’t risk the chance of him finding Sebastian at one of his favorite bars in the city. So, that’s how he ended up drinking straight brandy on the other side of Los Angeles with bloodshot eyes and the same suit he’d been wearing for 24 hours.
After a redeye on the way back from an interview in New York, Sebastian was confident that he couldn’t be more exhausted and humiliated if he tried. So now, he just wanted to get drunk. Possibly blackout. Maybe forget the whole thing ever happened. Forget Ben’s stupid face and the look on it when Sebastian caught him in bed with the fake superman.
He’d instructed the bartender to keep the drinks coming as soon as he sat down at the bar. It was obvious from the look on Sebastian’s face that he didn’t need to ask why. Anyone would’ve been able to tell he’d been through hell and back that day.
The buzz was helping, at least a little bit. But the problem Sebastian was becoming increasingly aware of was the fact that this was the first time he’d been single in a bar in over a year, and he still had no interest in hooking up with someone new. Part of it was because he wasn’t sure he had an apartment to take someone back to. Ben lived with him, and after the 12 phone calls before Sebastian blocked him, he assumed Ben would still be there waiting for him whenever he got home. It didn’t matter that Sebastian told him he needed to have all of his things moved out by the next morning. Ben was a terrible listener. He used to think it was kind of cute. God, fuck him.
When his phone lit up with a notification, he’d already decided to ignore it. It didn’t matter who was trying to contact him. There wasn’t a person in the world that could make him feel better after the day he had. When he eventually gave in and checked to see who he needed to block next, he realized it was his neighbor asking him to come home because “Ben is really worried about you.” Sebastian, angry and a little bit drunk, replied that they should tell Ben to “fuck off” and that if anyone else tried to contact him about his stupid ex-boyfriend, they’d be blocked as well.
Sebastian decided he needed to find a new bar the second the bartender announced that it was karaoke night. He just needed to finish this glass first. And maybe another because if he left at this point, he risked losing the decent buzz he already had. He very much needed to stop thinking. The more he drank, the less he could picture Ben’s stupid face using every cliché in the book.
“It’s not what it looks like.”
Really? Because it pretty much looked like he was fucking some other guy in the exact same sheets they’d slept together in two nights before.
Karaoke night was well under way. During his fourth glass of brandy, Sebastian listened to a bachelorette party’s rendition of “Girls Just Wanna Have Fun” that sounded like a chorus of dying whales. Then there was a mother daughter duo crying while they sang that ABBA song about a little girl growing up as if one of them was dying or something. Maybe one of them was. Sebastian couldn’t care less. He was pretty much done caring about anything by the time the bartender poured his fifth glass.
So, when he heard the first notes to “Girls on Film” by Duran Duran, he was ready to give up and become a recluse wandering the streets of L.A. with a bottle of liquor, just to avoid the stupidity of aspiring actors during karaoke parties.
But then the person who picked the song started singing, and Sebastian’s head whipped toward the stage so fast he almost gave himself whiplash.
Of all the days he could’ve run into Blaine Anderson, it had to be that day. It was like a message straight from Satan himself. Take away the one good thing in Sebastian’s life just to remind him of the biggest loss he ever faced. Hilarious fucking joke.
He was on stage with a guy that looked a little bit like him, but older. Sebastian assumed it was the infamous brother Blaine always used to complain about, the one who apparently starred in some overrated insurance commercials Sebastian never bothered watching. The other Anderson looked to be the epitome of pretty but stupid, and Sebastian immediately wanted to know how the two of them ended up at a dive bar in Hollywood singing karaoke.
It was the first time he thought about anything other than Ben all day.
Sebastian managed to get off the bar stool and stumble his way toward the stage by the time the song ended. The world was a little bit blurry, but Blaine was clear as day, and Sebastian wasn’t in the mood to let him get away with showing up out of nowhere and not saying hello, even if it had been a few years since they last spoke.
When Blaine stepped off the stage, his eyes immediately landed on Sebastian standing next to it. He was sweaty and breathless and so hot, and Sebastian had a thousand questions to ask, but right now all he could do was reach out for a hug. “Blaine Anderson,” he said as he threw his arms open. Okay, so maybe he was a little bit too drunk to be attempting a conversation like this, but what did he have to lose? In one day, he’d lost his apartment, his first real boyfriend and all of his dignity. Why not throw in one last reminder of how terrible his life had become? “What are you doing in L.A.?”
“Sebastian?” Blaine asked, perking up a bit as Sebastian threw his arms around him. Maybe he was a little bit too touchy when drinking but come on. It was Blaine. “Whoa, are you okay? You look a little…”
Sebastian shrugged and pulled away from the hug to take a large sip from his drink. There was no way he was getting through this turn of events if he was even close to sober. “Tired? Pissed off? Yeah, good observation. So, what are you doing in L.A.?” He repeated the question again, hoping maybe he’d get an answer this time. Maybe if Blaine lived here, it would be some sort of sign that there was something in L.A. worth sticking around for. Or maybe it would be the opposite.
“I’m visiting my brother. This is Coop…” Blaine looked to the side, gesturing to the open air left behind by his brother, who was already halfway across the bar flirting with a model that was way out of his league. “Well, that was Cooper. I needed a change of pace for a couple of weeks while I’m between shows, so I thought I’d come help him run lines and stuff. It’s the end of pilot season, and he hasn’t booked anything yet, so he needed a little bit of encouragement. What are you doing here?”
The “here” didn’t seem to necessarily mean L.A. In fact, Blaine’s eyes seemed to glance around the bar when he said it, like this Hollywood dive was the last place he expected to see Sebastian. In fairness, Sebastian didn’t expect to end up in a place like this either. But there’s something about seeing the only person you’ve ever come close to saying “I love you” to naked with someone else that changes a person.
“I live here,” Sebastian eventually said, throwing the arm holding his drink up in the air. “But as for this particular bar? I’m here because I don’t know where else I’m supposed to go, and I’d like to forget my own name by the end of the night.” He quickly drank the last bit of his glass, and just as he did, the bartender handed him another one. He knew he made the right choice when he slipped the man a 20 just to guarantee he was never emptyhanded.
He was having a difficult time focusing, even on Blaine who he didn’t think he’d seen in person in maybe five years. When he took a step toward the bar again, hoping Blaine would follow behind, he almost fell and needed to grab onto a chair to keep himself vertical. He hadn’t been this drunk in a long time, and he was honestly grateful because he didn’t think it was possible for him to make it through this awful day sober. Blaine was behind him after a second, holding onto one of his arms to help him toward the bar. Unfortunately, this wasn’t really the type of day that Sebastian wanted someone else’s help. “I’m fine, thanks,” Sebastian insisted, shoving off Blaine’s arm. Sure, maybe Blaine didn’t deserve it. But when Sebastian thought about how much of a mess he’d been that night after helping Blaine with that ridiculous proposal and how it might’ve been the drunkest he’d ever been up until right now, he didn’t have much motivation to play nice.
Somehow, Sebastian ended up seated at the bar. He couldn’t quite remember how he got there, but Blaine was sitting next to him, and a fresh glass of brandy was in front of him. His eyes landed on the glass, focusing only on that for as long he could. If he looked at Blaine, he risked vulnerability. If he would’ve known he’d be running into someone from his past that night, particularly this someone, maybe he wouldn’t have chosen to drink this much.
“Sebastian, are you okay?”
The echo of Blaine’s voice carried through his ears. It sounded like he was yelling it from across the room, but when Sebastian finally looked over, he remembered Blaine was, in fact, sitting right next to him. “Do I look okay?” He reached for the fresh glass of liquor and took a sip. Ten minutes in Blaine’s presence and he was already done pretending to be fine.
“No, that’s why I’m asking,” Blaine replied. Sebastian noticed him reaching for the glass of alcohol to take it away, so he quickly took the glass up to his lips and drank the rest of it. Blaine would not ruin his night. “You can talk to me.” Sebastian shook his head and started to lean back on the bar stool before he realized it didn’t have a back and he was about to take an embarrassing tumble to the floor. Luckily, Blaine reached out his arm and caught him before he did.
“He cheated on me,” Sebastian said finally. The world was spinning around him, and he had to close his eyes before he got too dizzy to think or stand or speak. He thought if it kept spinning, he might actually throw up.
“Who?”
“Ben,” Sebastian snapped. The name hurt coming out of his mouth, like his entire body wanted to reject any reminder of that two-faced, lying asshole he used to call his boyfriend. Not anymore. Never again. “I found him in bed with one of those pathetic fucking Hollywood Boulevard sidewalk superheroes. Screw that. Ben’s a freeloading asshole, moving into my apartment to eat my food and fuck someone else in my bed. Maybe I should take that job in New York. I’d never have to see his dumbass face again. I’d even let him have the apartment, although he definitely can’t afford the rent on his own.”
Blaine was staring at him like he was crazy, and Sebastian couldn’t quite figure out why. Maybe he wasn’t making sense and his words were jumbled in that way they sometimes got after too much drinking. He couldn’t really tell. “And Ben was…”
“My boyfriend,” Sebastian interrupted. He wanted to bang his head against a wall. This was embarrassing. Blaine knew him to be the kind of guy that didn’t settle down into a relationship, and to have his first real relationship end like this, right before Blaine’s eyes… “It was fucking humiliating.”
For a second, he considered that Blaine might’ve felt bad given Sebastian knew all too well how Blaine had cheated on Kurt way back in high school. But he didn’t care. It was completely different. Sebastian was gone for two days interviewing for a new job in New York, and Ben didn’t waste a second before jumping into bed with someone else. How was he supposed to feel?
“You know what? I’m relieved. Now I know the truth. I tried to have a relationship, and it turned out like this. So, what’s the fucking point? I’d rather be alone than ever risk feeling like this again,” he said, and this time he could tell some of his words didn’t actually sound like words. He knew what was happening in his head, but somehow his body wasn’t helping him with any of that.
Blaine was watching him, or at least Sebastian was pretty sure he was still watching him. It was a little blurry, and he kept losing track of where exactly Blaine was standing. Was he moving or was this room just spinning?
“I think that maybe we should just try to get you home,” Blaine suggested. He reached for Sebastian’s arm, but Sebastian pulled it away again.
“Nope. I’m staying here. Or…I don’t know. I’m not going home.” He wasn’t exactly sure where he’d planned on sleeping, if at all. He definitely wasn’t going back to that apartment, maybe not ever. He’d rather have to buy entirely new clothes and furniture than ever have to face Ben again.
Before Blaine could say another word, Sebastian stood up and started toward the door, confident he could make it without anyone else’s help. He was determined to never need anyone for anything ever again, especially not Ben and definitely not Blaine who’d broken his heart long before Ben ever had the chance to. He was done with all of this, the lying and the cheating and the heartbreak. Nothing about it was worth it.
But before he could make it to the door, Blaine had stopped him by grabbing onto his arm and pulling him back. “Wait, I’m getting us an Uber. You can sleep it off at my brother’s house.”
That was the last thing Sebastian remembered before he found himself lying on a leather couch in a small but relatively nice-looking apartment on the outskirts of Hollywood. There was a bottle of water next to him, and Blaine was holding out three small pills. “Take these.”
Sebastian stared at him for a long second, still confused about how he got there. “Wait, where are we?”
“I told you – we’re at my brother’s house. You kept saying you couldn’t go home, so I didn’t really have a choice. You need to get some rest and water,” Blaine explained, pushing the medication further toward him. “I promise this will help with the pain.”
It looked like Tylenol of some sort, and Sebastian wasn’t about to waste the rest of his evening arguing with Blaine, so he accepted the pills and washed them down with the bottle of water. Part of Sebastian wondered if this might all be a dream. Maybe he blacked out long before Blaine allegedly showed up at the club. Maybe he was passed out on a park bench on Sunset Boulevard or dead in jail or something, and Blaine was just some figment of his imagination. It didn’t feel real. Blaine lived in New York. There was no explanation for why he ended up at a random no-name dive bar in Hollywood the exact day Sebastian’s entire life blew up right before his eyes.
“Why are you helping me?” Sebastian asked after he swallowed the pills. Blaine looked like he planned on a fun night out, his hair messier than it always used to be but still styled to perfection. Sebastian wanted to reach out and touch it. “I thought you wanted nothing to do with me.”
Blaine looked confused, and Sebastian had to blink several times trying to figure out if that was even still Blaine sitting in front of him. “When did I say I want nothing to do with you?”
“Well, you proposing to someone else kind of sealed the deal,” he said, taking a third sip of the water. He hated to admit it, but damn it tasted good.
“We’re not engaged anymore,” Blaine admitted. It felt like Sebastian had caught him in a lie. He perked up immediately and leaned closer to Blaine to try to see if he was lying. “Besides, you were one of my best friends. I always wanted you in my life, even when I was with him. You were the one that stopped talking to me, remember?”
Sebastian couldn’t really remember what he was talking about, not after this much alcohol and certainly not when he’d tried to block out any memory of Blaine choosing Kurt over him every single time. It was hard enough watching him walk away every time they hung out, but it was even worse knowing he was leaving to be with someone else.
Thinking about it now reminded Sebastian of how much he’d flashed back to those days earlier that morning when Ben was standing in front of him yelling that he “still cared” about Sebastian and he “didn’t mean to hurt him” even though he had to have known what he was doing was awful.
“Sebastian,” Blaine said, and Sebastian could’ve sworn he was hearing things because it was so soft and distant that he assumed it was all in his head. “You can talk to me, you know.”
“He moved in with me,” Sebastian started, his throat sore and his eyes heavy. “He said he loved me, and I was so close to saying it back. He was the first person I ever opened up to like that. Well, the first person other than you. I told him everything about my dad and Dalton and Paris. I even told him about you. He insisted that he could be patient and that he understood this was the first time I’d been anybody’s boyfriend. He said he didn’t care, that he loved me anyway. He seemed to listen but turns out he didn’t care about me at all. It’s fine. Whatever. I don’t need him.”
He reached his hand out to grab the bottle of water, but he found himself focusing on the way his hand moved in the air, so steady but uneven. He’d never thought this much about how his body moved, how frustrating it was to not have complete control over it. He slammed his fist on the coffee table, just because he could, and he didn’t feel anything at all. He did it again and watched while his fist clenched and banged on the table a second time. Still, he felt nothing. It was like nothing mattered anymore. He couldn’t feel anything. So why did he still feel so stupid?
“What are you doing?” Blaine asked, grabbing Sebastian’s hand to stop it from moving. Sebastian glared at him for a second before he processed Blaine’s hand holding onto his and his eyes immediately looked down, staring at the place where their bodies connected. He couldn’t feel it, not really, but he could see it, and it made something deep in his stomach start doing cartwheels.
Sebastian’s free hand reached for Blaine’s cheek, then for his hair. Blaine’s soft curls were the first thing that didn’t make him feel completely numb, and it made him want more. He shifted to sit closer to Blaine, his hand running back and forth through Blaine’s curls like it was the only thing in the world that mattered. “You’re so perfect, Blaine, you’re so…” He paused, his eyes fixating on Blaine’s long enough that his vision almost started to clear. “Is it really you that’s here?”
“Yeah, it’s me,” Blaine said, but he didn’t look happy like how Sebastian suddenly felt. He was frowning, and his eyes were darker than normal. Something was off.
“It’s just that…well, doesn’t it seem crazy that I ran into you today of all days? You found me the day Ben ruined my whole fucking life, but now you’re here, and I don’t know what to think. Like, maybe the universe decided to make today a whole big ‘fuck Sebastian’ day. Because honestly, what are the chances that the day I catch my boyfriend in bed with some other guy is the exact same day I run into you?” He kept running a hand through Blaine’s hair, like it was the best thing he’d felt in his entire life. He still couldn’t believe it was him. Maybe it wasn’t. Maybe it was all in his head.
Blaine was still frowning, but he didn’t bother to try to stop him from touching him. “Sebastian, what happened?”
“I told you,” he said back, rolling his eyes because he was sick of bringing it up again. “He was in bed with some other guy when I got back from the airport this morning…”
“No, not that,” Blaine stopped him, his thumb brushing over Sebastian’s palm. “I mean what did I do that made you hate me so much?”
“What makes you think I hate you?”
Blaine moved a little bit closer, probably so Sebastian could actually make out his features while he spoke. “You just said the universe is using me to make your day worse. I thought I was helping. I thought maybe you’d want to see me.”
Sebastian frowned and pulled his hands away finally. He couldn’t take it anymore, the touching that wouldn’t go anywhere, the closeness that meant nothing to Blaine. He crossed his arms and leaned back on the couch, so done with this conversation and this day and this whole fucking life that wasn’t working out like he wanted it to at all. “I was pretty much in love with you back then,” Sebastian said, and he hoped it came out sounding as quiet as he intended it to because if not, that would’ve been extremely embarrassing.
“You were…in love with me?”
“Are you fucking kidding me? As if you didn’t know? God, I’ve never met anyone more oblivious than you in my life. You just walk around making everyone love you without realizing how fucking perfect you are,” Sebastian ranted. He couldn’t even look at Blaine anymore without being reminded of all of the times he screwed up and all the times he was rejected by him. This day was just one big reminder that no one would ever love him. No amount of alcohol could make him forget about that.
Blaine reached for his hand again, and Sebastian wanted to push it away, but he was weak. This all just felt so out of his control. It made him want to scream. The booze were supposed to help.
“It just felt like losing you all over again. Watching Ben choose some other guy…it’s exactly what you did all through high school. I just don’t know why I even bothered trying with him,” Sebastian explained. His head was still spinning, full of every thought about how this could possibly happen. “I mean, what did I do wrong? I know I’m new to relationships, but I was so good to him. I let him live in my apartment, we talked about everything. I just don’t understand. God, he knows my parents and my friends and everyone. Everyone is going to know.”
It hurt so much again, and it hurt even more with Blaine sitting right there. There was no way to make it better. He needed to give up on thinking he might ever find happiness in someone else.
“It’s not your fault,” Blaine said after a while. He was touching Sebastian again, first just a hand on his shoulder, then another on his thigh, then one moved to his cheek to turn his head toward him. “He’s an idiot. You’re not the one that should be embarrassed. And me? I should be embarrassed, too. You know none of that stuff with Kurt was ever about you, right? I didn’t choose him because I didn’t want you. I chose him because I was scared that everything I gave up for him would be for nothing if I didn’t. But you’re an incredible person, and you deserve to find someone that loves you back.”
Sebastian attempted a smile then felt himself leaning closer to Blaine before he processed what he was doing. It’s just that he was right there, and he looked so beautiful and perfect, and he needed to know what it felt like, just once to have this one thing he always wanted.
And somehow, Blaine didn’t pull away.
Their lips connected, and it felt like fireworks. It was the most tangible thing he’d felt all night, and honestly, it was everything. His lips seemed to have taken Blaine by surprise, because for a second, Sebastian was doing all of the work and Blaine just sat there in shock. But then he was kissing him back, and his hands were on Sebastian’s back pulling him closer, and Sebastian’s hands were back in Blaine’s hair, and it all felt so perfect that Sebastian was sure he didn’t ever want to stop. After a long day of feeling every negative feeling he could possibly imagine – anger, disgust, sadness, anger again, jealousy, embarrassment, guilt, fear – this was the first time he felt a glimpse of something more. Something happy. Something worth the pain.
Maybe it all happened for a reason. Maybe he was meant to catch Ben in bed with that Henry Cavill wannabe. If he didn’t get an earlier flight back home, if he didn’t storm out of his apartment at that exact time and spend his day strolling around L.A. in misery for hours, if he didn’t choose that particular dive bar and have exactly six drinks there, if Blaine and his brother picked any other bar in the city to sing Duran Duran…it just felt like too big of a coincidence to all be for nothing. So, maybe, just maybe, this was what it was all for.
Blaine pulled away first, and Sebastian almost lost his mind at the lack of touch. Sure, Blaine’s hands were still on his back, his leg was still pressed against his body, but his lips were gone, and Sebastian needed to know why.
“You need to sleep,” Blaine mumbled, so quietly that Sebastian had to fight to hear it. “Sleep off the alcohol.”
Sebastian knew, logically, Blaine was right. But he wasn’t in the mood to think logically. He wanted to touch him again, feel his lips pressed against his own, his tongue gently caressing the inside of his cheek. He needed him close. Now. Forever.
“Stay,” Sebastian whispered. “Please.”
Blaine sighed and pulled Sebastian into a hug. And sure, Sebastian felt drunk and numb and miserable all day long, but there was something about being in Blaine’s arms that made him completely lose it. It was proof that no amount of alcohol could make the pain stop, and nothing Blaine could say would get him through this. He was still feeling all of those same things he felt that morning. And he needed to let himself feel it.
He’d never cried in front of Blaine before, but now wasn’t really the time to care about that sort of thing. Tears were streaming down his cheeks and landing on Blaine’s sweater, hard and fast and enough for him to feel like it was time to completely give up on trying to feel nothing. Blaine held onto him tight, and he let Sebastian cry for as long as he needed. He stroked Sebastian’s back and kept whispering that it was okay, that Sebastian could let it all out and that it would eventually be fine.
It must have been a half hour, maybe longer, before Sebastian finally felt the sobs start to calm down. He never imagined himself as the type of person to lose it like this. He wasn’t a sad drunk, never had been. But nothing about that day felt normal. He’d been awake close to 40 hours by now after struggling to find a way to sleep on his redeye flight home that morning.
So after a long day that was more emotional than he ever could have imagined, he finally let himself cry, and it lasted for so long that he didn’t even notice himself falling asleep.
The first thing Sebastian did when he woke up the next morning was make a beeline for the bathroom. Luckily, Cooper’s house wasn’t very big, so the bathroom was easy to find. He immediately collapsed to the floor and threw up in the toilet, but he was grateful that he at least made it there or he would’ve needed to have another very embarrassing conversation with Blaine.
When his stomach finally started to settle, Sebastian noticed his throbbing headache telling him he desperately needed water. He found the bottle Blaine left for him on the coffee table next to the couch and he chugged the entire thing. It was hard, but it was worth it to feel better because he really didn’t need a terrible hangover in addition to the exhausting pain of the day before. He leaned back on the couch again, already ready to pass out again. The last thing he needed was sleep deprivation on top of everything else.
But before he lay back down, he noticed Blaine open a closed door near the back of the house and emerge looking much more well rested. At first, he looked surprised to see Sebastian, but then he smiled and moved to take the seat next to him.
“How are you feeling?”
Sebastian shrugged. The real answer was terrible. But if he really thought about it, he felt at least a little bit better than he did the day before. Well, not physically. But emotionally. “I’m okay,” he eventually settled on. “Although it would be nice if you could keep the blinds closed until I leave.”
He tried to sit up on the couch but felt pretty much every muscle in his body cramp. He had no idea what he did to deserve being this sore, but it must have been one of those drunken injuries you can never remember getting. The pain wasn’t limited to miscellaneous bruises, though. He quickly noticed the reason why it was so hard to hold his eyes open was because they were all puffy and practically sewn up from crying for so long. So yeah, that was even more embarrassing than everything else.
“Of course,” Blaine agreed. “Did you want to…I don’t know, talk at all?”
“I should probably go home and deal with the mess at my apartment,” Sebastian said with a sigh. He glanced at his phone which was filled with hundreds of notifications from some random number Ben was trying to contact him from. “Or, more likely, go pack my things and get on the next flight to New York.”
Blaine watched him in that same way he always did, like he was both intrigued and freaked out by all of this. Sebastian vaguely remembered seeing it the night before, but all of it was still a little blurry. “It’ll be easier to get over all of it when you get some closure. I can drive you if you want.”
“It’s okay. I should do it by myself,” Sebastian replied. As much as he wished he could hide out with Blaine forever, he knew he needed to officially end it with Ben. If anything, he needed to tell him how much of an asshole he was and finalize what they were going to do with their apartment. They were broken up already, but if the hundreds of texts were any indication, Ben wasn’t ready to let anything go. “But thank you.”
“You can always call me, you know, if you ever want to talk about any of it,” Blaine clarified, squeezing Sebastian’s hand in his.
Sebastian started to nod, so slowly that he felt like a movie villain. “So, are we just pretending that the rest of that stuff last night didn’t happen?”
“Oh,” Blaine said, probably before he’d thought through what he actually did want to say. “I figured you’d forgotten about all of that.”
Sebastian wanted to say something cheeky like “how could I forget all of that” or “kissing you was the only part of yesterday worth remembering,” but something about Blaine’s tone made him feel like maybe Blaine didn’t want to remember any of it. Maybe it was all out of pity, and the actual only good part of Sebastian’s day was based on a lie. And just when he thought he couldn’t possibly feel worse.
“I get it. You were just trying to make me feel better,” Sebastian said. He pulled his hand away and stood up. He needed to get out of there before this got any worse. His suit jacket, shoes and tie were lying on the floor next to the couch, so he started putting it all back on. The faster he redressed himself, the sooner he could escape the death trap of Cooper Anderson’s apartment. Apparently, all that happened in this godforsaken place was embarrassment and torture.
Blaine stood up and reached for his arm. “No, wait. That’s not it.”
Sebastian turned to look at him while he was wrapping his tie around his neck. “So then what is it?”
“Sebastian, you just got out of a relationship where somebody cheated on you. Last night, you said you don’t think love is even worth it anymore. You obviously need time to deal with all of that before you can trust someone else.”
It hurt to hear, even if everything Sebastian ever heard about relationships told him Blaine was probably right. Still, it hurt knowing that kiss and everything from the night before would never amount to anything. Blaine was quite literally the only person on the planet that could’ve made him feel any better that night and somehow, despite way too many glasses of brandy and the image of Ben with someone else permanently etched in his brain, Blaine helped him forget. That kiss was everything.
And the part that stuck out the most to him was that this was a crazier coincidence than anything he could’ve imagined. He remembered thinking the night before how wild it was that on maybe one of the worst days of his life, Blaine happened to be in L.A. at the same bar as him. It had to mean something. He couldn’t just let it be a bizarre coincidence. He couldn’t lose touch with Blaine again.
“I know,” he said, still not entirely sure how he should handle this whole situation. “But…I mean, do you think it will be possible? For me to trust someone else?”
He hated being this guy, the insecure relationship obsessed type that he always used to make fun of Blaine for. But the thing is, he’d changed throughout his relationship with Ben. He decided to give the whole commitment thing a chance, and he realized that he actually didn’t hate it. Sure, Ben got on his nerves, but he liked the routine of it all. He liked how it felt knowing that someone would be at his apartment waiting for him every day when he got home. And he definitely liked the idea that somebody cared about him for more than just sex. Clearly, that wasn’t the case with Ben anymore, and maybe it never was.
“Definitely,” Blaine replied, his lips turning up into a smile. “And I’ve been through a hard break up before. I’m always around to talk if you need anything.”
“Well, it does look like I’ll be relocating to New York shortly. It’s not like I have anything to stick around L.A. for,” Sebastian said with a shrug. Blaine looked at him like he didn’t quite understand. “I just got offered a new job in New York. Ben actually picked the perfect time to fuck up our relationship because I was trying to decide between staying at my shitty job in L.A. or taking this new gig in New York City, so I guess that made my decision a lot easier.”
“No way.” The small smile on Blaine’s lips was growing, and it was starting to seem like something good might come out of this terrible situation after all. “You’ll be in New York.”
“And so will you.”
There were too many coincidences tying the two of them together, and Sebastian wasn’t the kind of person to believe in fate or “meant to be” or any of that garbage, but the fact that he was put through all of the hell of a terrible job and terrible relationship just to end up at the exact same dive bar as Blaine Anderson on the worst day of his life told him that even if fate wasn’t real, their relationship was. Something was tying them together, like an invisible string that wanted them to cross each other’s paths time and time again.
He sent in his two weeks’ notice in the cab on his way back to his apartment that morning. And after a very difficult and long conversation, Ben agreed to stay in the apartment and find a roommate until the end of their lease so that Sebastian could move to New York. Sebastian did get the explanation he was looking for, eventually learning that he didn’t do anything wrong, and Ben was, in fact, just a dick.
And while Sebastian recognized it would take time, he knew he’d eventually be okay again. Now that he had the help of Blaine and a new job and the opportunity to completely start over in New York, he had hope for the first time since walking into his bedroom that morning.