I didn’t think you’d want anyone else here. He sighed. He didn’t. And he DID. But he couldn’t. He couldn’t want anyone else there, not Blaine, much less his father. In a way, even if Blaine hadn’t helped the way he’d HOPED for, he still did, distracting Sebastian from being scared about what happened, or focusing on the pain and his injuries. He filled Sebastian’s head with memories and old feelings he didn’t want, but that at least kept him from focusing too hard on the present, made facing this with a blase attitude easier.
He blinked when Blaine moved fast to get the water for him, and more at the way his hands shook as he poured it. ❝…Thanks.” He said, long fingers curling around the cup with a hesitant look up, confused, as he drank, and maybe a little annoyed. Annoyed that he had to do this, that he HAD to remind Blaine why he should be away, that he HAD to be the one to tell him those things and then see Blaine get hurt. He groaned, finishing the cup and putting it aside as he ran a hand through the side of his hair. “It’s not what I WANT that matters here, Blaine —-” was it ever?
He rested back against the bed and drifted his green eyes towards the other, lips drawn tight at the sight in front of him. How was it that he almost died, and still managed to feel like crap because BLAINE wasn’t doing okay? “What’s up with you?” He blurted out, before he could even want to shut himself up. He frowned at him. He watched him grab his coat, and swallow. A mistake. Right. It always was, wasn’t it? Sebastian knew he was right and yet, it stung on the pop of his jaw as he heard him say it. “Little too late for that now, killer.” His tone was quiet this time, almost gentle, defeated.
“…Why?” He asked, just as Blaine reached the door, between his teeth. He kept staring down at his injured hands, tugging on a loose line on the sheets until it started to unravel. “Why ARE you here? Why did you come?” Just to torture me? To rub in my face a crumb of what I’ll never have? Because he wouldn’t, would he? He’d never have anyone ACTUALLY waiting for him in a hospital. Someone allowed to, by family ties. He’d never have a worried fiancé, fretting over him, not like Blaine did and gave. Much less LIKE Blaine. As perfect as him. This, waking up alone in a hospital bed, was probably gonna be the way he’d end his final chapter one day. If this wasn’t a joke from Blaine, it was definitely a joke from the Universe.
“It is about that. I really didn’t want to make you upset. It was a stupid thing to do. I was stupid..” It couldn’t be any more clear that he messed up. In more ways than one. Getting the hell out of here would be the only way to fix things. And he was never one for staying where he wasn’t wanted or needed. Even worse? Where he wasn’t welcome. How could he have thought the opposite? That there could be any other reaction to his being here other than this one? His eyes burned, his throat felt like it was caving in and he just wanted to put as much distance between the hospital and himself than he could in as little time possible.
Flustered and with a darkening shade of crimson coloring his nose, cheeks and bleeding down his neck–Blaine laid his coat over his arm and palmed over his mouth trying to swallow the bitter pill that he’d messed up bad before he turned around and gave Sebastian a weak, wobbly smile. Their eyes didn’t meet. He kept his gaze aimed closer to Sebastian’s mouth rather instead. It was better to smile and go. Then stay gone this time. For good. No more heroics. Even if the universe, for some sadistic reason, put him on the sidewalk when Sebastian got hurt? Walking away would have been better. You know what they say about hindsight..
There’d never a mistake like this made again. Blaine made that promise to the both of them on his way to the door. When he heard the question, he had half a mind to ignore it. What help could the answer give the situation? His mouth opened but only a sigh broke free. His fingertips toyed with the cold metal handle as he pressed his lips together tight and bowed his head. A tap later and his hand fell away, turned into a small fist and was shoved into his pocket. Against his better judgement, he turned just far enough to look towards the bed and Sebastian. I saw it happen and it was terrifying. I’ll never get that sound out of my head.
“Because I got scared seeing you like that. I had to make sure you were gonna be okay. Then when I got here? I couldn’t leave you to wake up alone and hurt. You..” His teeth bit away what he was going to say against his bottom lip and he chose something safer. “I couldn’t say whatever and leave. I shouldn’t have stayed. Or came at all. I get it. But that doesn’t change that I did and for no other reason what I said. I had to because you’re you and I’m me. Do you really think I could leave you there like I couldn’t care less? Cause that’s not who I am or ever was.” He swallowed thick, trying to get his point across without saying too much or too little.
sebastian would feel bad for how impossibly wary blaine looked if he wasn’t so uncomfortable with the whole situation, himself. he knew he looked like a mess. and with his hair pointing all out, bruises on his face, dark circles under his eyes and cuts on his skin, while wearing a backless hospital gown, wasn’t exactly how he’d hoped to meet the other again, if they ever did. he had hoped in his head, not that he thought about it, as a sort of last desperate win that when they met again, he’d at least look presentable enough to give blaine some regret. the way he looked then, he probably just reminded the other of all the mornings they’d spent nursing hangovers together. not the best presentation.
he downed his head and tried to work inside it what the hell was blaine even doing there. even if by some freakish joke of nature he HAD been the one to find him, he should have gone home a long time ago, when it was clear sebastian was gonna make it. wasn’t that enough even for blaine’s standards of chivalry? he felt his stomach churn as something about the way blaine looked, told him it wasn’t. which was wonderful and meant that now all that was left was for sebastian to deal with his pity. again.
he’d be better off feeling pathetic for imagining blaine had been there to hold his hand when the world started to spin and darken from the blood seeping out of his head. it’d have been a whole inferior level of humiliation than the kind of pathetic he felt NOW, with the other standing there. the fact he had hoped somehow that kurt’s name wouldn’t come up in their first two minutes of conversation, didn’t help.
he sighed at blaine’s response, not bothering to cover up now, there wasn’t much good to it. he rubbed his face, and finally looked into the other’s eyes. ❝is there any doubt?’ he rose eyebrows. was that blaine’s way of telling him something was wrong? he heard the knock on the door right then and looked up just as a doctor walked in. he supposed he’d find out now.
Maybe he should listen and go like Sebastian was telling him he should. Maybe that was the fairest thing to do because Blaine knew Sebastian well enough to know that he wasn’t comfortable with him being here and seeing him in the state he was in. Sebastian had no idea that he’s been here from the start. Defying orders to go and even lying to stay put. All lies and falsehoods that came crashing down when the doctor walked in and broke his tightly guarded secret open.
“Mister Anderson. Still here, hm? Have you slept yet? I told you to get some rest. You’re not going to be any good here if you exhaust yourself. I doubt you want to be taking the bed in the next room, do you?” A quick chiding only shattered the illusion that Blaine somehow magically found out that Sebastian was in the hospital and somehow knew which one it was and appeared here.
What he heard next, though? That was the secret he was hoping he could skirt around until Sebastian was out of here and none-the-wiser on how Blaine was lingering far past visiting hours and being listened to when he refused to leave.
“I’m sure you’re glad to see your betrothed is awake.” The doctor strung out the word in the way doctor’s do when they’re trying to lighten the mood, make a joke you’re never going to get and just sound corny so you laugh anyway. Blaine wasn’t laughing. Only smiling awkwardly like a kid who just got busted with his hand in the cookie jar trying to pretend he was confused on how it got there. “If you would have trusted me hours ago, that sleep would have been a bit easier.”
Blaine’s heart sank, his jaw dropped and his slow turning stare landed right on Sebastian to see his reaction. The truth was out. He was here because he told them he had a right to be. And they BELIEVED him. “I–I.. I know. I was just in a panic. I’m sure you understand why.” From quiet to stuttering, Blaine shut up and sat through the doctor explaining to Sebastian that his wounds were mostly surface. The cuts and bruises were going to heal on their own. But he had broken ribs and a punctured lung. He broke down expected release dates, what would happen as far as treatment. Everything Sebastian needed to know. And when he left?
A click of a door never hit Blaine’s ears as loud. “I swear I can explain why I did that..”
sebastian sighed when blaine pulled away. both with relief for his numb hand that he flexed slowly, and in dread because he had hoped he’d be unconscious for a little while. at least until sebastian got himself situated. he didn’t know why those were his first words, they just were.
probably because the last time he’d seen blaine, blaine had sat with him at a coffee shop table ( not lima bean for once ) and told him he’d changed his mind. that he couldn’t tell kurt after all. that he’d chosen him over sebastian. that the weeks of waiting had been for nothing. that it was over.
sebastian had promised not to look back after that. to straighten his life and let blaine be happy, because once and for all he had his answer: blaine was never going to pick him. there were no doubts now. blaine had had his go at sebastian, at all of him, had learned all his secrets, tasted him numerous times, rolled with him on the bed until they both lost track of anything else around them. and now it was done.
in truth, he hadn’t WANTED to see blaine there when he woke up. because from all his injuries, nothing hurt quite like a bitch as seeing the other there. knowing… no. there wasn’t disappointment at the words. he HADN’T expected any other answer, because if blaine had dumped him for kurt, he wouldn’t leave him then for any other thing. sebastian felt a special brand of sickness in his stomach at the thought of kurt in his hospital room. he sighed at the request.
❝you should, blaine.’ you chose him, you should be with him. ‘ ‘s not like you can cure me. besides, i’m fine.’ this wasn’t his first rendezvous in the hospital by himself.
Blaine took to gripping the bottom cuff of his chinos as a means of grounding himself. His knuckles drained of color–olive turned to ivory before the rest of his fingers lengths caught up to a closer match. The edges of the fingernails on his free hand dug and plucked at the cheap plasticy-feeling leather on the arm of his chair. Worry lingered on his expression played out most in soft, wide eyes under a set of creased together burrowed brows.
This wasn’t any sort of reunion he’d ever ask for. Certainly not. Yet, here he was watching Sebastian trying to read his expression and still not able to comprehend how he was standing right there when Sebastian was hurt. Not after all the time apart. Who could expect they’d ever meet up again this way? Neither one of them. But he was here and so, so determined to stay.
If only he could figure out that look. Liar. You know why he’s looking at you like that. Your goodbye and this hello wasn’t fair. Neither were. Not for Sebastian.
Maybe he should have left. Maybe Sebastian would have forgotten everything about him being the one to rush to his side and call for help. If Sebastian were luckier–he would’ve forgot the panicked way Blaine refused to let him go to the hospital alone because it wouldn’t have happened. But it did. Or–luckier still–Sebastian would’ve been here alone and Blaine would’ve gone home. But he couldn’t
Call it horrid luck–Sebastian received none of that reprieve. Blaine had done all of those things and now, all he wanted to do was STAY. Hearing that he should go buckled in his belly and made his throat hurt. His brows lifted up and it took him a couple swallows but he managed to creak out, “I.. I don’t want to go. I might not be able to cure you but you shouldn’t be alone. I need to..,“ a thick swallow broke apart the words, “I need to make sure you’re gonna be okay.. Please?”
sebastian slept soundly through the night. better than he honestly had in months if he was being honest. blaine’s voice soothed him towards his dreams and even against his will, his battered body couldn’t help but relax completely under the spell of it.
the doctors had said he’d been lucky. as though there was anything lucky about a near punctured lung, three broken ribs, a dislocated shoulder and scrapped skin all over. he supposed in some sadist way, he was. it could have been worse. he had to at least appreciate the irony of his drunk driving not being the problem. he’d caught a cab, exactly so he’d be safe, as lydia kept telling him to be, and then his damn driver had decided to lose control and drive them straight to a street light post.
the driver, having been wearing his seat belt, was mostly fine. but sebastian had few face first into and straight through the wind shield. he remembered that. what he DIDN’T remember was the rest of it. not all at once, at least. there were bits and pieces. juggled memories. flashes of blaine’s honeyed eyes on him, and gloved hands grabbing his skin on places that HURT.
all that were confused thoughts in his head, as he laid, semi-awake, slowly gaining consciousness. it took him quite a few minutes to be able to even blink his eyes open. when he did, he glanced down at the pressure that was making his hand numb, only to find blaine’s face on it. sebastian moved it slowly, wincing at the pain, and the burns on his face when he flinched, sighing as his movement seemed to waken the other. he licked his lips as his eyes met blaine’s, and among everything he wanted to say, six words blurted out, instead.
❝does he know you’re here?’
Somehow during the night Blaine managed to shift himself around on the chair enough that with his shoes kicked off and his legs curled up underneath himself–he was able to rest his head down against the top of his hand and doze lightly. If Sebastian so much as moved–he’d snap awake. Or so he thought. In reality–once he finally closed his eyes? Sleep hit him like a ton of bricks and he didn’t notice anything about the uncomfortable chair or the sterile smell of the hospital he hated. Or the nurse checking in once then leaving them both be.
A few hours went by–maybe less? The flinch was enough to finally draw his eyes open. His head stayed put for a second–tilting just enough that he could look up at Sebastian and meet his eyes. God, his back was going to hate him when he righted himself. But Sebastian was far worse for wear than a grumpy spine and not much sleep.
Was it possible to feel worry and relief together? Because seeing Sebastian looking down at him–awake, save and alive filled him with a sense of one. While seeing how hurt he was and the memories that flooded in after it–panic, sheer panic when he realized who he was helping, Blaine was terrified–brought on the other. –He’s okay. That’s the point. He’s okay..–
Blaine knew exactly who that question was about and why Sebastian asked it. He just didn’t expect it to be the first thing to be said. Lifting his head and letting one leg shift to rest the back of his knee over the side of the opposite foot so it could hang over the chair–Blaine squirmed upright and settled into the corner of the chair. “Y-Yeah. He knows. He wanted to come down here but I told him not to.” Why and the rest could stay unspoken.
Blaine couldn’t believe how this happened. That an accident right as he left the shop would end with him rushing forward to help (of course he did, that’s how he worked) and seeing it was Sebastian in the back of the cab. Did FATE seriously have to go to that extreme? Okay– of not fate. Maybe luck or–in Sebastian’s case–unluck? Who knew? What mattered was that he was here and not leaving. Not until Sebastian was released from the hospital and he got to be the one to take him home.
He was determined to stay put. Sitting in the chair watching Sebastian with a look of worry that no feigned reassurance could completely wipe off. Crinkled brows could flatten or perk up. Only to jam back together at the slightest wince or movement. Hands were flattened out, fingers laced tight and pressed against his belly. Would soon start to wring together no matter how hard he focused on them not to.
Singing was easy enough. A simple way to comfort Sebastian and–in turn–ease his own nerves. His chair inched forward as the first few notes were hummed out, actual words following when Sebastian told him to go home. His heart squeezed hard but he shook his head, close enough as Sebastian drifted off Blaine’s fingertips rested on top of the other’s hand. Temple pressed to the edge of a hospital bed, he continued with random songs until just before dawn, golden hazel eyes began to grow heavy. The hum returned briefly before the quiet sound of his breathing was all that was left.
pianokeysandbowties 