A/N: Part of the series 'A New Way of Looking at Love', where Sebastian and Kurt meet in college - Kurt with a disfiguring scar on the right side of his body, and Sebastian suffering from visual agnosia.

Warning for talk about injuries, scars, hospitalization, and Kurt's time in the burn unit, which, though it's not overly descriptive, might be disturbing to sensitive readers.

"Oh, Kurt…God, Kurt…my beautiful, sexy Kurt…"

Kurt almost laughs at how adorably vocal Sebastian can be when they're fooling around together. Even as they kiss, he mumbles into Kurt's mouth. The verbal diarrhea is unstemmable, like he can't keep his mouth shut. Just like he can't stop looking at Kurt, pulling away after every third kiss to gaze at his face, his neck, the skin beneath his lips and his fingertips, as if he needs to know Kurt is still there, that he's real. That their being together isn't some crazy, whacked-out dream.

Kurt understands, because he feels that way, too.

Between the sound of his name on Sebastian's lips and the kisses Sebastian places on every inch of his skin, scarred and not, Kurt shouldn't be thinking about much of anything right now – nothing serious anyway. But he is. He can't help thinking, too much thinking at a time like this, when they're about to move on from necking and heavy petting to something that requires less clothes and more physical exertion. But his thoughts are there with him whether he wants them to be or not, and they refuse to be kissed away.

Kurt should ask some other time, when they're not on the brink of making love, but he never seems to remember then – in the spaces between classes, laughing over coffee, or flirting during dinner prep, while Kurt clumsily chops vegetables and Sebastian expertly prepares the main course. Only now does it pop into his mind, when they're half-naked on Sebastian's bed, Sebastian pulling moans from Kurt's throat using whatever that trick is he does with his tongue, deftly negotiating scars and damaged tissue to caress the sensitive pink flesh in between. Sebastian knows Kurt too well, and Kurt should know Sebastian, too, but this one thing…this one frickin' thing he hasn't found the time to ask.

It seems like a long time coming. He should have asked earlier, when it mattered less, but it feels urgent now that they're coming up on their one year anniversary.

Kurt doesn't want to be a fetish to Sebastian. He doesn't want Sebastian's addiction to him marred by this physical anomaly that Kurt hadn't planned on having.

Kurt knows Sebastian isn't. He knows Sebastian loves him, it's just – this seems so odd, the two of them together. Sometimes, it's too incomprehensible to Kurt, even after all this time. It doesn't strike him when they're alone. In Sebastian's arms, a part of his life, in his bed, Kurt feels free. He feels real and complete and amazing.

It's when people watch them walk across campus, hand in hand, that Kurt notices the difference. He sees the revulsion in their eyes when Sebastian kisses him, which he does often, regardless of Kurt's objections regarding PDA, which have become fewer and farther between as time goes on.

But he needs to know, especially as the topic of the future starts cropping up more in casual conversation. Especially now that Kurt can't imagine a life without Sebastian in it.

Yup, Kurt's avoided the topic long enough.

He waits for Sebastian to pause and take a breath, then he rushes into it so he won't second guess, won't change his mind.

"Do you…does my scar turn you on?"

What is a monumental question for Kurt seems like no big deal to Sebastian, who barely flicks his eyes up after Kurt asks it.

"Do you want the truth?" Sebastian says between kisses and licks to Kurt's neck and shoulders.

"Well, I wouldn't have asked if I didn't want the truth," Kurt come backs.

"Honestly" - Sebastian nibbles down the length of his boyfriend's neck - "yes. It does. Very much."

Sebastian goes back to kissing Kurt's neck, but Kurt becomes rigid. He has his answer, clear and simple. He had suspected it to a degree, but he didn't know it was something he didn't want to hear until Sebastian said it out loud. The more Kurt thinks about it, now that he knows for sure, the more it infuriates him. This scar is, by far, the second worse thing to ever happen to Kurt in his life! How dare Sebastian find it a turn on?

"You do realize that this scar represents countless nerves damaged?" Kurt argues. "Muscles ruined? Numerous painful surgeries? Tissue that can never be replaced?"

"I know that," Sebastian says, tracing lightly over a network of smaller, silvery scars with the tip of his tongue. "But it's still attractive to me. It's like…art."

"Art?" Kurt scoffs. He tries not to get angry, but he's unable to help himself. He wriggles to break free of Sebastian's grasp. He needs a little space from his boyfriend if the man is determined to be disgusting and obtuse. "This…this destroyed me, Sebastian! It's not a work of art! It's not a statement! It's a physical deformity!"

"That's the point," Sebastian says. Kurt gasps. He almost stands up from the bed entirely, but Sebastian anticipates his reaction and grabs his wrists, gently holding him down. "It didn't destroy you, Kurt." Sebastian sits up, repositioning himself to get a better view of Kurt's eyes. "Fire," Sebastian says, "it's a powerful thing. It's like…it's like a living creature. I've heard of other people getting into accidents like yours, and rarely do they survive." Those last few words crack, and it makes Kurt stop struggling to get away. There's something in Sebastian's voice; something new that Sebastian hasn't told Kurt before, and Kurt is ready to listen. "I heard about kids when I was in the hospital, kids that had horrible…" Sebastian stops, swallows, takes a breath. "One little boy was set on fire by his father. The man got mad at the boy's mom and doused him in gasoline. I heard he had burns on ninety percent of his body, and he…he didn't make it."

Sebastian shakes with the memory, a shudder racing up his spine to his shoulders, causing him to drop his head. Sebastian never talks about his time in the hospital after his accident. Kurt wonders if he's ever told anyone about it. The way Sebastian made it sound, he fell out of the tree, was unconscious for a few days, then his folks took him home. All of his recovery took place at home, with private doctors and nurses on call. When he could get out of bed and walk around, physical therapists worked with him in a private gym his parents had built in the room beside his.

Kurt remembers his own time in the hospital, recovering in the burn unit. He knows what Sebastian is talking about. Every day, new kids came in - kids subjected to nightmarish things, usually by drunk and angry family members, some accidentally self-inflicted, but each one in excruciating pain. He remembers hearing them cry at night, unable to get comfortable, even with bags of painkillers pumping though their systems. He remembers the way they wailed when they had their bandages changed and their wounds cleaned – a torture that had to be performed daily to stave off infection. He remembers the way he cried, too. It's a sound he will never forget. As a child, it had the power to wake him from a dead sleep.

As an adult, it still haunts him.

When Kurt had finally healed enough to speak, he told his dad about the screaming. His father brought him a set of headphones to muffle the sound of agony ever present in the ward where he stayed. He only had to use the left one because his right ear didn't work properly for months. But what if Sebastian heard the screams of kids in pain while he was unconscious? What if he lay asleep day after day, those cries echoing in his ears, and no one ever thought to get him a headset? Kurt couldn't even begin to imagine the torture that would be, especially for a boy his age. Then to wake up and not be able to discern anyone's face? How did Kurt not know this? It was going on a year.

"This fire," Sebastian continues, "it tried to take you. But you were stronger. You wouldn't let it." Sebastian runs the backs of his fingers ever so lightly down Kurt's scarred cheek. "And you made it so angry, it marked you for life." Sebastian chuckles. "Probably so it'll remember not to fuck with you next time."

Kurt lowers his eyes and laughs at his boyfriend's ridiculous compliment, which quickly becomes his favorite compliment in the universe.

"You're still here, Kurt," Sebastian says. "And thank God you are. It didn't destroy you, and it didn't make you ugly."

Kurt is stunned. No one has ever spoken to him that way about his scar. Not the counselors who tried to help him come to grips with it. Not his friends, who were overly polite. Not the doctors, who tried to talk him into plastic surgery before they realized the actual extent of the tissue damage, how impossible it would be to repair.

Not his father, who tried so hard to make Kurt believe that he was still normal after the accident, still a whole human being.

He's still not the best at accepting compliments, even from Sebastian, and Kurt laughs in an attempt to belittle it.

"It sure as hell didn't make me handsome."

Sebastian can say it all he wants. It's still too fantastic for Kurt to believe.

Kind of like Sebastian falling in love with him.

"You're right," Sebastian says. Kurt's heart nearly breaks. It's one thing for Kurt to believe it, but to have Sebastian confirm it, after everything he said…

"You're handsome because that's what you are," Sebastian says. "It's a fact - scar or no scar. It's in the sound of your voice…" Sebastian carefully pushes Kurt back on the bed, toward the pillows, adjusting them quickly beneath his head. "It's in that fiery temper of yours…" He brushes Kurt's hair off his forehead to give himself new places to kiss. "It's in your fierce intelligence…" He runs the pads of his fingertips over the fine lines of Kurt's unmarked cheek, crossing over his chin, and continuing up the pathways of the scar on his right side. "It's in the hundreds of things you do and say and are every single day that made me fall in love with you, even when you chose to act like a tremendous asshole." Kurt opens his mouth, ready to defend himself, but Sebastian kisses him quiet. "You're one hell of a fucking sexy man, Kurt Hummel," Sebastian says, staying close to Kurt's lips so that he can go back to kissing him with little effort, "and I wish you'd quiet the fuck down so I could go back to worshipping you. Do you think you can do that, gorgeous?"

"I…I don't know," Kurt says, switching gears, trying to disregard the heavy for the time being and go back to being playful, "I do my best quieting down with something in my mouth."

Sebastian jerks back, shocked by Kurt's crass remark. Kurt doesn't come out with them often, but when he does, they definitely make an impact.

And Kurt loves it – loves how flustered his snarky boyfriend can get with just a few well-chosen words.

Sebastian raises an eyebrow, watching his boyfriend reach up for the fly to his jeans while he's temporarily stuck on stupid.

"What do you say, Sebastian?" Kurt asks, tugging each button free.

Sebastian watches Kurt yank open his fly, slipping a hand inside to touch him, and he can only think of one appropriate response.

"I love you, Kurt."

Kurt stops his hands. He gazes up into Sebastian's adoring eyes, and smiles.

Because Sebastian does. As inconceivable as it seems, as unbelievable as it may be to everyone else, Sebastian Smythe loves Kurt.

It isn't even a question.

"Yeah?" Kurt says, smiling back, a blush simmering somewhere behind his scar. "I love you, too."