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To Sebastian,
You’re probably surprised that I’ve left you a letter after everything that’s happened. You’re probably surprised that anything’s happened at all. Until I’m gone, until it’s too late.
I’m not sorry. I can’t be sorry for this.
I’ve been sorry for so many things in my life, Bas and none of them were things I should’ve been apologising for. It’s taken me three years to realise that every apology was what drove that knife in my chest.
Sebastian came home late from work that day. He had to put his phone on silent after Blaine’s excessive calling earlier that morning and therefore missed the alarm going off. Usually, he’d leave at five and be home by six, but today he barely made it to seven.
The lights were on, and scented candles were lit, Kurt’s doing, and Sebastian inhaled the scent of home. He dropped his bag by the door and wandered into the kitchen where there was an opened bottle of wine in the fridge calling his name.
But it wasn’t there when he opened it.
Scrubbing his hand over his eyes, Sebastian made the mental note to talk to Kurt about drinking too much during the day. He knew his partner (boyfriend was so teen, he and Blaine liked to tell Kurt) got lonely but drinking obsessively could lead to a downward spiral.
He paused. He listened.
The house was eerily silent.
Blaine wouldn’t be home until eleven, an afterparty for the last night of his play. But Kurt should be here, bright blue eyes and soft skin waiting for him. Cleaning, cooking…
Oh, wow. Kurt was becoming a regular old housewife, huh?
When Blaine first introduced you to the relationship, part of me wanted to leave immediately. He was mine, Bas, but… but you were nicer, softer edges and softer words. And I thought, God I hoped, that they would be for me as well.
They weren’t.
I don’t blame you, how could I? You always hated me. You always wanted Blaine. That wouldn’t change just because I lived in the same house as you. It was the convenient option for all of us. I got to keep Blaine, you got to have Blaine, and Blaine? Well, Blaine has always loved attention.
Have you noticed that? He thrives on it, like a peacock with his tail-feathers. I used to think it was cute, used to indulge him like the doting boyfriend I was. Yet, I had hoped he’d grow out of it, mellow down as the years went by…
(We’ve both seen the opposite, haven’t we?)
(Like a fucking peacock…)
Kurt wasn’t here.
It took Sebastian longer than he wanted to admit to notice. After the initial confusion, he had shrugged and decided to watch something on TV whilst he waited for Kurt to come through.
He’d got through half an episode of Criminal Minds before the silence in the rest of the house became deafening.
“Kurt?”
No reply.
Sebastian stood quickly, not even bothering to pause the show as he wandered down the corridor. The door to their bathroom was closed, but there was no sound when he pressed his ear to it.
“Kurt?” He called. The name echoed with no reply and Sebastian was truly worried.
If Kurt wasn’t home, like he sometimes wasn’t, he would’ve told them. Left Blaine a text or a note on the table. But there was nothing.
Nothing.
It didn’t take me long to realise that you were both embarrassed of me. In fact, I remember the date I realised. It was June 13th when Blaine graduated NYADA. His parents were there, and Cooper. I liked Cooper.
You were there as well. Two weeks into the relationship and I knew that you liked him more than a fling, because you were there. I was there. Not that either of you noticed.
His name was called, and he walked across the stage. You stood up to clap along with his parents. So, I did as well. But you pushed my arms down and back into the chair.
Like I was a dog.
I hated you then.
I hated you more when you didn’t invite me to dinner with your parents. You told me that they didn’t understand polyamory. I knew it was a lie – you can never look me in the eye.
Sebastian sat on the bed in their bedroom and took in the barren landscape. They had let Kurt decorate the bedroom after the fiasco with the living room. He had seemed so happy when he did it.
“Shit,” Sebastian murmured and buried his head in his hands. That day had been awful, the biggest argument the three of them had ever had.
Kurt’s taste was so eccentric that sometimes both Sebastain and Blaine would cringe at the thought. The day after graduation when Sebastian’s parents had asked if they could come visit, Kurt had got excited and gone overboard.
Bought things that just seemed gay. Like a pink rug and hand embroidered cushions and… Sebastian had taken one look at the cushion in Kurt’s hand (‘I’m not gay but my boyfriend is’), thought about the look on his parents’ faces and flung back into his face.
“Absolutely not!” He’d yelled. (Why’d he yell?)
Kurt hadn’t said anything. Just nodded and taken the cushions away. That should’ve been it, would’ve been it, but Sebastian told Blaine about it, and he’d gone ballistic.
Back then, Sebastian had agreed. They were adults now, didn’t need all this stuff about being out and proud. He hadn’t wanted his parents to see.
See what?
Blaine had torn the curtains from the railings and smashed the hand painted (did Kurt do that?) photo frames that had the three of the smiling. Back then, Sebastian had taken it all in with a smirk – seeing Blaine angry was a guilty pleasure, but he could remember the look on Kurt’s face.
The glassy look.
Blaine had asked Sebastian to buy less eccentric decorations for the living room, patted Kurt on the arm (which Kurt had flinched to) and told him he could decorate the bedroom because, “Noone goes in there anyway.”
And Kurt had done just that. The bedroom was the nicest room in the house (not that Sebastian would tell Blaine that). Well, it was. All that was gone now.
Then Sebastian’s parents met Blaine and he couldn’t even bring up Kurt without Blaine glaring, like these were his parents and not Sebastian’s and then, and then…
You know, I had a job. I was working. Even if I couldn’t make it on Broadway, I could make it somewhere (not that you or Blaine cared, at all). But Blaine made me quit, said it was taking up too much of my time. What time? I had nothing but time.
And he had you.
Do you remember when we sit on the couch together and you would go through my sketchbook with me? You would tell me which cut you thought worked, which colour palette you liked, which outfit you thought I would suit.
I loved doing that.
But Blaine didn’t.
He thought it was stupid and childish. Said that I needed to grow up. I heard it all before, so I ignored him. But what really got me, do you remember? What really got me was when you agreed.
“It’s time to grow up, Kurt.” You said. “There’s a reason people call you a girl.”
I know. Okay. I know. I’ve always known why people called me girl; it was the same reason they called me fag. Because I don’t pass – not like you and not like Blaine. I’m gay, Bas.
I’ll always be gay.
There was one sketchbook on the dresser. Kurt’s beautiful painted flowers shone in the dimming orange sunlight. Sebastian ran his fingers over the pink and purple petals, the green leaves and the little red heart in the corner that Sebastian had painted.
He’d thought Kurt would’ve painted over it. But he hadn’t.
“Oh, darling,” he whispered as he opened the book. Out of all the sketchbooks Kurt had, this had been the only one Sebastian hadn’t seen.
The lines of charcoal that shaped his chin and the dashes of blue that coloured his eyes stood out to him. Some of the sketches had sharper, scratchier lines and some had soft curves and they were all of him. Every single page was Sebastian, Sebastian, Sebastian.
Sebastian cooking. Cleaning. Sitting. Standing. Sleeping. Laughing. Smiling. Frowning. Every action, every expression captured by the beautiful lines of beautiful Kurt Hummel.
The page that he rested on was his face staring directly forward. He recognised this day. It was their date, just him and Kurt. Sebastian had taken him to an art gallery and ice cream afterwards. It was the largest and most detailed drawing in the sketchbook.
The face was marred by a water droplet. Sebastian quickly shut the book before anymore tears could ruin it.
Do you remember the date? It was January 17th and we had been together for over six months. It was the only time you had asked me to be alone with you. I thought you were going to ask me to leave.
But you had looked so nervous and shy, so I sat down like you asked. You had slid the tickets for the ‘Mayflower’ exhibit over to me and refused to look me in the eye. I had been eyeing that exhibit that week and I think that was the moment I fell in love with you.
You were so engaged with it, and I was engaged with you. You held my hand, introduced me as your partner and it felt so good. Too good. I don’t know why I expected it to last forever. But I did.
I wanted it to last forever when you held the door open for me.
I wanted it to last forever when you kissed me by the chocolate fountain.
I wanted it to last forever when you remembered and bought my favourite flavour of ice cream.
But it didn’t. Because we went home, and Blaine was waiting for you. You went to the bedroom, and I slept on the couch.
How sad is it that that was the happiest I had been for a while?
Sebastian paced around the house with shaking hands. All of Kurt’s belongings had disappeared apart from the sketchbook and the calendar. The calendar that Kurt had kept meticulously updated for both Sebastian and Blaine.
Across the room, Sebastian’s phone rang, and he dove for it even though he knew it wasn’t Kurt. It wasn’t Kurt’s ring tone.
“Hello?”
“Hi, babe,” Blaine said cheerily down the line.
“Oh, hey?” Sebastian swallowed down the disappointment and tears, putting on a familiar tone of voice that he recognised in Kurt. “What’s up?”
“Well, uh- I don’t think I’m coming home tonight. You know? This party is a lot bigger than I though-”
“Why?”
“You sound like Kurt.”
Sebastian felt a rush of burning anger but tried to answer calmly, “I just meant that I missed you and thought you were coming home.”
“I know that Kurt is a bit boring by himself,” Blaine replied like he hadn’t just insulted his supposed soulmate, “but I’m sure you guys can entertain yourselves.”
Like they were children. Dogs.
“I’m sure we can,” he replied coldly and hung up. Seemed like Blaine didn’t know Kurt was missing so there was no point in trying.
His reflection stared back at him, eyes wide and scared. But he had to do it, didn’t he?
I think I might hate Blaine.
“Hello?”
And I think he hates me too.
“Kurt?”
I can’t stay in that house Sebastian.
“Sebastian.”
I’m alone even with two other people.
“Why’d you go?”
I move like I’m a ghost.
“Why did you call?”
I haven’t seen my dad for months. Blaine hates it when I call him. I think he’s jealous that my dad still loves me.
“Because you’re gone, Kurt! All your stuff, the cushions, the clothes, the sketchbooks!”
Is it wrong that I’m glad that I have something he doesn’t? That’s not very healthy is it?
“I couldn’t stay, Sebastian. I think it would’ve killed me.”
You know I lost weight? And my hands shake constantly? My head aches and I can’t leave the house because I’m an anxious, nervous wreck. I was scared that Blaine will get angry and that you’ll just stand and smirk like you always do.
“How? This place is great, Kurt. And we – I love you.”
There was one thing the kept me alive during high school and it was the thought that ‘anywhere was better than here’. I was wrong. So wrong.
This is so much worse.
“No, you don’t. You love each other.”
Sebastian swallowed briefly and then choked out. “Where’d you go?”
Kurt was silent on the other end. Sebastian closed his eyes and tried, desperately, to picture the expression on his face. It was probably the tight-lipped, hard eyed expression that had a frequent appearance whenever the three of them were alone and Blaine was –
Oh.
“I don’t want to tell you.” Kurt’s voice was soft but firm. No room for argument.
If he truly wanted to, Sebastian could guess where Kurt was. His dad’s place because Kurt loved his dad and hadn’t seen him in so long. Because Blaine didn’t like it.
Instead, he asked, “Are you safe?”
“Yes.”
Good.
“When – uh – when did you leave?”
“Around four. I started packing this morning.”
Kurt’s voice was detached, almost clinical in the way he was talking. Sebastian had known Kurt long enough to recognise the defence mechanism. Kurt shut down like this when he was hurting, when the fear was overwhelming, and he didn’t want anyone to know.
Kurt had left for a reason, and Sebastian played a big role.
Do you know how it feels to spend your whole life with people telling you to kill yourself, only to find that the people who’ve hurt you the most are the one’s just like you? I’m used to homophobia, Sebastian, I’ve grown up with it.
Toxic masculinity from straight guys is familiar, and it stopped hurting a long time ago.
Toxic masculinity from gay guys? That’s a whole different hurt.
When I had straight guys making fun of the way I dressed, I laughed it off, I understood why they were saying it. But you hurt me in ways that I don’t think I can even comprehend.
Gays are supposed to protect gays, isn’t that what you always tell me? Then why didn’t you protect me.
It took Kurt hanging up on him for Sebastian to realises that he wasn’t coming back. That it was serious. That holding his hand and watching ‘The Devil Wears Parada’ or ‘Legally Blonde’ wouldn’t fix this the way they fixed the previous arguments.
Or was it that they didn’t fix them at all? Did they put a band aid over the festering wound so Sebastian could pretend he’d fixed it?
For the first time in a while, Sebastian Smythe began to cry. Deep, guttural sobs that ached in his chest and burnt his throat. The phone was pressed against his heart in a desperate attempt to send this beat to Kurt, miles and miles away from him.
The furthest he’d ever been.
Why? Was Sebastian such a terrible partner?
He was, wasn’t he.
He’d pushed Kurt to the side and degraded him, hurt him, pushed and pushed. Pretending that Kurt was a rubber band, not a person who could only bend so far until he snapped.
And, like the quiet way he’d entered his life, Kurt had quietly exited as well. Snapped in a way that could not be mended. Not right now.
Because it was a quiet snap that had happened slowly, so slowly that Sebastian hadn’t recognised the signs.
“Why’d you leave?” He whispered through his tears.
I forgive you, Sebastian Smythe.
Blaine tried to call him an hour later. Sebastian’s tears had not stopped in that time, but he’d been sitting numbly, staring blankly at the wall where Kurt’s large floral painting had been.
“What?” He answered.
“Don’t take that tone with me!” Blaine snapped back immediately. “I was just calling to say that I could get home earlier if you really wanted me to, but now I don’t think-”
“I don’t care.”
He really didn’t. He didn’t care about Blaine right now. Couldn’t care. Kurt was gone and it his fault.
Their fault.
“What do you mean ‘I don’t care’? Is Kurt being bitchy? You can come here if you need to get away!”
“Kurt’s gone.”
There was a terrible part of Sebastian who had considered not telling Blaine about Kurt, letting him come home and discovering their missing partner the same way Sebastian had. But he’d blurted it out and felt something vicious curl in his chest at Blaine’s stunned silence.
“He’ll be back,” Blaine replied. “He always says he’ll leave if I keep ignoring him or yelling at him or ruining his stupid paintings or whatever thing he bitches at me about. All you have to do is wait him out like a house cat. He can’t survive on his own, Seb, he’s too fragile.”
Kurt. Fragile.
Sebastian let out a bitter laugh. “That bullshit, Blaine. Kurt’s the strongest person I know. He’s put up with you for how long?”
Put up with us, a nasty voice in the back of his head corrected. This is on you as well.
“Shut up.” Something was curling on Blaine’s tongue, sharp and furious. “Just because you don’t like each other doesn’t mean he hates me. He loves me, Seb, maybe it’s just you he’s left. I’ll call him later and bring him back, okay?”
His tone was condescending and that would not do. “Don’t take that tone with me, Anderson. I’ve spoken to him, buddy, he’s left us both.”
The dial tone echoed in his ear. “Well, fuck you too.”
I love you, Sebastian Smythe. I don’t think I can stop.
But I love myself more.
Sebastian went back to the bedroom and sat down on the soft covers. They still smelt like Kurt’s cologne. He’d watched Kurt put it on this morning, inhaled his scent before that and kissed him on the mouth.
Kurt hadn’t kissed him back. Hadn’t for a while. But he’d been compliant and that was all that mattered.
God. How stupid was he?
All my life I’ve waited for someone to put me first.
I’ve come to the realisation that the only person who will is me. And I haven’t for a long time.
The house was too quiet, and Sebastian needed noise to think. He turned on the CD player on the dresser and heard the first chords of Adam Lambert. Sebastian had loved to watch Kurt dance to ‘For Your Entertainment’ when he cooked.
As the first verse began, he sang along softly, imaging Kurt singing in his head. Heard the echoes of his laughter that fades to nothing. Because Kurt hadn’t laughed like that in a while.
Adam Lambert’s voice went high for the chorus, and he could hear Kurt hitting those notes in a way that made Blaine’s face scrunch up in… oh, it was jealousy.
Kurt loved Lambert, and Sebastian used to make fun of him. Said it was a crush. (He still stood by that; Kurt went too red). But Blaine would always swoop in when Sebastian’s attention was solely on Kurt and mockingly say, “Like Kurt would have a chance.”
Now that Sebastian thought about it, Kurt had stopped singing in the kitchen when Blaine had told him that there was a reason that NYADA had rejected him.
Sebastian turned of the radio. There was a bitter taste in his mouth that forced him into the bathroom to wash it out with mouthwash. Sadly, he noted that all of Kurt’s products were gone, apart from a tiny bottle of body wash that Sebastian knew, without reading the label, was the one Blaine had got him.
It didn’t smell very nice, but Blaine claimed it was his favourite. Kurt’s face a twisted when he’d got it and they avoided each other’s eyes to stop from laughing when Blaine said that now they would smell the same.
Kurt never used it. Instead, he had used the one that Sebastian bought him, pomegranate and orange.
With a sigh, he opened the mirrored cupboard that held the first aid kit to find some Tylenol for his headache. There was an orange pill bottle tucked into the corner. It had about two pills in it and when Sebastian read the name, he almost dropped it.
Anti-depressants.
Kurt Hummel.
The date on the prescription read that it had been refilled three months ago.
Was this first refill? Second? Fifth?
How did he not know?
With the pill bottle clutched tight in his fist, Sebastian marched into the kitchen.
I’ve been numb for so long that I’ve forgotten what sunlight feels like.
I want the sun, Bas. Like a flower that’s been growing in a basement. That’s how dead I’ve been. I need to bloom like I was ready to, when I was seventeen and thought that the world would hold me to the sunlight.
Let me bloom.
Kurt organised their mail. He would leave the one’s for Sebastian and Blaine on the table for when they came home. Depending on the importance and addresser, Kurt would then throw it out or put it in a neatly organised filing system that Sebastian was now just appreciating.
There was three large tabs with their names and then multiple smaller tabs, color-coded and alphabetical. Kurt’s was the smallest. His medical file was laid out in his neat handwriting, but Sebastian’s eyes were drawn to the prescription notes, neatly organised by date.
Dates. There were so many. The first back in 2017. A year after they all got together.
Oh God.
Three years and Sebastian hadn’t even noticed.
No wonder Kurt left.
My chest hurts when I think of the past years. It aches with pain and humiliation and the deep-rooted fear that I’ll never be good enough. For you or for Blaine.
But there are times when it aches with love, as well. For you. And that hurts so much more than I want it to.
I want to cut it out with a knife until my hands are red. I want to hold it close and nurture it with my warmth until it blooms into a rose. Because roses are double-edged. Like you are.
There was an unopened letter in Sebastian’s section. There was no stamp, no return address, just his name stamped on the front in familiar cursive. Kurt.
Kurt had written him something.
Taking a deep breath, Sebastian opened the letter and began to read. It was the least he could do now.
I hope you can forgive me for leaving without telling you, but I don’t think I could’ve done it any other way. If you had asked me to stay, I would’ve and I couldn’t allow that. That would’ve been the last straw, the last knife, the last everything.
I would’ve died right there, and I don’t think you would’ve noticed.
I needed to do this, and I won’t change my mind. I hope you and Blaine are happy.
With all the remaining love in my heart,
Kurt.