The Way I Loved You
Sequel to Don’t You
Pairing: Sebastian Stan x reader
Word count: 5k
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“Yeah, I mean Jess is pretty-”
“Sensible.”
“-incredible,” Sebastian finished, barely throwing Mackie a glare at his interruption.
Chris nodded slightly. “I gotta say, I’m pretty jealous. She seems like a great person. I’d love to date someone like her. What’s she up to tonight?”
“Look out, Sebastian. Evans is going to steal your girl.” Sebastian shook his head fondly as Chris and Anthony bickered gently.
“I just thought that Wednesday was date night. That’s all.” Chris raised his hands in surrender.
“Yeah, it’s supposed to be, but I told her it was your last night in LA and we wanted to have dinner.”
“And she was fine with it?”
“Yeah, she was cool with it.” Surprisingly cool, actually. Wednesday date night had been Jess’s idea at the start of their relationship. She claimed it would be a good way to make sure they were staying connected, even when work got crazy. Sometimes Wednesday night had to become Tuesday or Thursday if Sebastian had to shoot at night, but Jess always said it was fine. Really, Sebastian couldn’t ask for a better, more understanding girlfriend.
“So what exactly do you do on date night?” Sebastian had barely rolled his eyes before Anthony was throwing a napkin at him. “I didn’t mean like that. Like, do you just eat dinner together? Don’t you do that anyway when you’re visiting her?”
“Yeah, but it’s like special, I guess.” Sebastian shrugged slightly. “She normally makes a reservation at a nice restaurant and we get dressed up. I open all the doors for her. I tell her she looks beautiful.”
“And you like doing that every week?” Mackie pressed.
“Yeah, it’s fine.”
“You taking notes, Anthony?” Chris laughed.
“No, I just think it’s a little boring compared to his dates with Y/N. I feel like she was always coming up with the most random date ideas.”
“To make up for the fact that we could go months without a real date. Most of our Wednesday nights together were dinner at the apartment and then sitting on the couch together while she did work.”
“And you read scripts,” Anthony pointed out. “Besides, don’t act like some of those date droughts weren’t because you were away filming and always forgot when you were supposed to call her.”
“Yeah, yeah, I’m bad at long distance. Why do you think I visit Jess so much?”
“New York to LA isn’t that different from LA to San Francisco,” Anthony muttered, causing Chris to kick him under the table.
“I told you, we just couldn’t give each other enough attention. Y/N was busy. She’s not as willing to be as flexible as Jess.”
“More like she doesn’t let you get away with as much crap as Jess does.”
“Mackie, come on. It’s my last night in LA. Let’s not spend all night discussing Sebastian’s love life.” Anthony nodded at Chris’s request, but Sebastian could tell that he still had opinions to share. What did Anthony know, though? Sebastian’s relationship was fine. He felt perfectly fine.
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“Where the hell have you been, Y/N?”
She jumped slightly, almost falling out of her heels. And since when did she wear heels that high? Sebastian was sure he hadn’t seen those shoes in their closet.
“Sebastian?” She squinted. The low light in the apartment made it hard to see him clearly, though Sebastian wasn’t sure whether or not she could even see straight at that moment. “What are you doing here? You still have two weeks of shooting.”
He scoffed. “And I thought you were having a chill night in. What happened to takeout and a romcom?”
Y/N’s nostrils flared. They always did that when she was trying not to lash out at someone. The first time Sebastian had noticed that was sophomore year of high school, when she was trying to stop herself from going off on someone who had made an incredibly wrong point about a book they were discussing in class.
“Some people from work were going out to celebrate. It’s been a long week and we finally landed that big deal I was telling you about.”
It would be easier to let it go and just be excited about the deal. Y/N had been stressing about it all week, and even though Sebastian didn’t really understand it, he knew that it was important for Y/N. But he didn’t let it go.
“It’s 2 AM!”
“Ok? I’m an adult. If I want to stay out until 2, I can.”
“You shouldn’t go out without letting someone know. It could be dangerous. You don’t know who else is out there.”
“I was with people I’ve worked with for a year, and I did tell people I was going out. Now stop acting like my mother.”
“You didn’t tell me.”
“Because you’re supposed to be in Atlanta! Last I heard, you had to film tonight.” Y/N pressed a hand against her eyes for a moment before glaring at Sebastian again. “And besides, I would have told you if you had answered my call this afternoon. The call that we planned because you’ve been too busy to call all week.”
“I told you that I was coming to visit this weekend!”
She looked at Sebastian like he had just grown another head or started speaking Latin. “What are you talking about?”
“I told you that I was coming to visit this weekend,” Sebastian repeated, a bit quieter this time.
“Are you talking about last month when you said that they might change the schedule so you might be able to come back for a day or two?”
“Yes!”
“You never mentioned that again! You never gave me any dates! I just assumed that they didn’t change the schedule. How was I supposed to know you were coming tonight?”
“I wanted to surprise you! You said you would be here tonight .”
“If you had answered-“
“If I had answered the damn call! I know I know! Damnit, Y/N, you should have been here!”
They were both breathing heavily at this point. Y/N shook her head slightly as her mouth opened and closed as if she was trying to figure out what to say.
“I’m not just going to wait around for you, Sebastian.” Y/N’s voice was quiet, but firm. “I’m not going to sit in the apartment by myself every night because you said that you might be able to come home on some unspecified day. I have a career and friends and a life that’s separate from you. I’m not just Sebastian Stan’s girlfriend.”
“I know!” Sebastian sat heavily on the couch. He ran a hand over his face. It came back wet. Slowly, his shoulders started to shake before a sob finally escaped. “I know,” he repeated hoarsely.
There was a dip next to him, and then Y/N’s head was resting on his arm. “Ok, so what’s really wrong?”
He sighed. How had this night gone so wrong? “It was just a really bad week at work. I just heard back from a part that I really wanted. I didn’t get it. I just really wanted to see you, and when you weren’t here, I started panicking. And then you showed up and you had been having fun and your work is going well and it was just…I don’t know.”
“You needed to blow off some steam.” Sebastian nodded. “I'm sorry that you’ve been having a tough time, but next time I’d appreciate if you didn’t take it out on me.”
“I won’t.”
They sat in silence for a minute before Y/N spoke. “When do you leave?”
“Tomorrow night.”
“I think that tomorrow we need to discuss our communication problems.”
“Do you really think that’s necessary?”
“I do, Sebastian. Right now, the only reason we ever talk is because I bend over backwards to fit your schedule. I know that you’re busy, but so am I. I want our relationship to work. Like really work long term. But I can’t just not live my life because I’m waiting around for you to call. It’s not fair if you constantly reschedule last minute after I’ve gone to all this trouble to make time.”
“You’re right.”
“I know I am.” Finally, Sebastian cracked a smile. The sound of Y/N’s laughter from beside him made his heart swell up with joy. “You know, I think that was our first big fight as a couple.”
“I didn’t like it.”
“I didn’t either. From now on, no more bottling up our feelings until we explode. Deal?” Sebastian nodded. “Good. Can we go to bed now, Seb?” Sebastian didn’t say anything. Instead, he simply picked Y/N up bridal style and carried her into the bedroom while she shrieked with laughter.
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His relationship with Jess was never as explosive as his relationship with Y/N had been. Surely that was a good thing. There were no 2 AM fights. If Sebastian showed up at her house to surprise her, she would cancel any plans she had to spend time with him. It didn’t matter if he was late picking her up for a date night, she was out at his car in no time. She hadn’t even kept him waiting the one time he had gotten the times mixed up and had gone to pick her up an hour early.
If he said he didn’t want to talk about something, she dropped it. If he said he wanted some space, she gave him space. If he said he was going to call and then ended up having to hang up after a few minutes, she didn’t get mad. She was incredibly understanding about everything. He couldn’t remember the last time they had fought.
In fact, had they ever fought. Maybe? She told him she didn’t like his cologne and had been a little annoyed that he had kept wearing it anyway, but she never pushed the matter with him. Any time she seemed annoyed, she just smiled and told him to forget about it. So much easier than a 2 AM fight.
And yet, Sebastian couldn’t help but remember the 2 AM dance parties in the kitchen because he was jet lagged and Y/N decided that the best use of jet lag was making cupcakes and listening to big band music. And the times that Y/N, who somehow always knew when something was bothering him, wouldn’t let him rest until he told her. He always felt better after he did, even if she had no advice. Even if her advice was to get his head out of his ass because he was the one in the wrong.
Jess only told him to take a sleeping pill and go to bed when he was jet lagged. She wouldn’t dance with him in the kitchen late at night. And she certainly wouldn’t dance with him in the rain.
“What are you thinking about?” Sebastian was pulled from his thoughts by Jess’s voice. His girlfriend settled into the couch next to him. His girlfriend. She was his girlfriend.
“Nothing much.”
“You sure? You looked pretty intense.”
“I’m sure.” Jess returned Sebastian’s grin, but he wasn’t sure if she actually believed him. Either way, she didn’t press.
“I talked to your mom earlier.”
That seemed to come out of nowhere. “My mom? Why?” It couldn’t be anything too important or she would have called him first.
Jess shrugged. “Just to chat. She had some questions about New York Fashion Week. I think she might be hoping I can get her into shows or something.”
“I didn’t know you were going to walk in Fashion Week.”
“I’m not yet, but there might still be time. Imagine how good we’d look together there. There would be so many pictures of us together.” Sebastian didn’t say anything, so she continued. “I also talked to your stepdad a bit. I asked him if he had any funny stories about you from school.”
Why was she talking to his parents? That seemed a little strange to Sebastian. They had only been dating for a couple months, and she had only met his parents once and that was partly by accident. Of course, Sebastian wasn’t really sure when it was normal for his girlfriend to meet his parents. Y/N had already known them. She probably knew even more embarrassing stories than his stepdad did.
“You ready to watch the movie?” Sebastian asked so he didn’t have to hear her talk about his parents more.
She snuggled closer to him. “Are you comfortable?”
“Yeah,” he answered. “I’m comfortable.” And he was. That was the perfect word for his relationship with Jess. She didn’t push him the same way that Y/N had. They didn’t hit the same lows, but they also didn’t hit the same highs. It was comfortable.
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The air smelled like rain. The weather app had said there wasn’t a chance that night, but it seemed like it would be wrong. Y/N’s heels clicked on the sidewalk with each step, but the noise of the city drowned them out. They didn’t drown out the pleas from her boyfriend.
“Y/N, come on. You’re being ridiculous.” Sebastian jogged after Y/N, who could walk surprisingly fast in heels when she wanted to.
“I’m being ridiculous? I spent the weeks planning everything for your perfect birthday evening and we didn’t do any of it.”
“We got drinks like you planned.”
“Yes, but we were supposed to get drinks, then go to a different restaurant, where I made a reservation two months ago. We were not supposed to stay there to eat, then go out drinking with some random people.”
“They’re not random people. I’ve worked with them before. I haven’t seen them in forever.” They had been about to pay for drinks and leave when Sebastian had caught sight of some actors he had worked with a couple years before. Y/N had hoped that the reunions would end after some pleasantries, but that hadn’t been the case. “And they paid for everything! You should be thanking them.”
“Okay, I know that what they did was nice, and if it had been any other night I would have loved it. But it’s your birthday and you’re only home for a couple days before you have to go back.”
“I know it sucks-”
Y/N stopped so suddenly that Sebastian almost ran into her. She wheeled around and jabbed a finger at his chest. “No, what sucks is spending any free time you have researching restaurants and bars so that you can plan the perfect drinks, then dinner, then a nice walk, then desserts before heading home to watch a movie. Last year, you said that would be your perfect birthday, so that’s what I did. And now it doesn’t even matter.”
“I didn’t ask you to do all that. I would have been fine with dinner at home.”
“I haven’t seen you in person in three months. When you said that I could plan whatever I wanted for your birthday, I wanted to make it special.” “There’s still time to make it special.” Sebastian raised his eyebrows suggestively. When he tried to grab Y/N’s hand, she yanked it back before turning and continuing down the street.
“We wasted all our time clubbing. God, we’re too old to spend a birthday clubbing. It’s almost 2 in the morning, and your flight leaves at 10.”
“So we can really go crazy and pull an all-nighter. I’m sure there are still some fun activities you had planned that we can do at home.”
“I have a meeting at 11. I’ll barely have enough time to prep after dropping you off at the airport.”
“Then don’t bother dropping me off. I can call a car.”
“Sebastian.” Y/N always took him to the airport when he had to leave. It was their little way of squeezing out every second they had together.
“Well if it’s going to be such an inconvenience, don’t worry about it.” This time it was Sebastian who continued to walk when Y/N stopped to look at him.
“It wasn’t supposed to be an inconvenience. I was supposed to have time to wake up early to go over everything before taking you to the airport. If we had stuck to the plan-”
A raindrop landed on Y/N’s nose. Of course, neither of them had brought an umbrella or a raincoat. They were supposed to have been home hours before the rain started.
“Oh my god. The plan this! The plan that! It’s always about your plans.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“It’s like you’re incapable of not having a plan. Everything has to be scheduled. Everything has to have a defined next step. If anyone strays from the plan, all you can do is complain.” Sebastian ran his fingers through his hair, pushing it out of his face as the rain started to really come down.
“I’m sorry that I care! I’m sorry that I just wanted you to have a good birthday.”
“That’s not what I’m saying! Sometimes I just want to go with the flow. Like going out with some friends I hadn’t seen in forever. Or going to the first gelato place I see.”
“Oh my god, are you still upset about the gelato?” They had gone to Italy for a couple weeks that summer. There had been a small tiff about which gelato place they should go to one afternoon. “The other place had way better reviews, and it was only around the corner. You still got gelato!”
“Yeah but by then I was so annoyed that I couldn’t enjoy it.”
“Fine! Next time you can get some subpar gelato, while I go get better gelato. In fact, you can eat wherever you want the next time you go on vacation. You want seafood that’ll almost certainly give you food poisoning? Go for it. You want an overpriced salad that’s almost exactly the same as a cheaper one you could get two streets over. Waste your money. I don’t care anymore.”
“I never asked you to do any of that though!”
“Fuck you, Sebastian! I’m sorry that I care!” At this point, the rain was coming down hard enough that it was impossible for Sebastian to see the tears rolling down Y/N’s cheeks. But he could still hear them in her voice. “It’s just that I care about you so much that sometimes it feels like I’m going to explode. And I don’t get to be around you all the time, so I have to put all that energy into so much less than I want to. I know that I can go a bit far with plans, but sometimes I like having a plan.”
“It’s okay.” Gently, Sebastian grabbed her arm and pulled her towards him. She seemed to collapse into him as he wrapped his arms around her. “It’s okay. I like how on top of everything you are most of the time, but sometimes it can be fun to just see what happens. I don’t mean to upset you when I do that.”
“I know, but it feels like you don’t care about all the work that I did.”
“I’m sorry. Maybe this is something we can work on.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, remember when I was so bad at communication?” Y/N smiled slightly and nodded. “Maybe you can work on going with the flow a bit more. Do something spontaneous. Go for a walk and see where you end up, like you used to when we first moved in together. Take a vacation and don’t make any plans. I know that you like living in the moment.”
“Work is way too busy right now to start being spontaneous. I’ll basically be living at the office for the next couple months.” That was the problem with Y/N’s job. Even though she enjoyed the work and was good at it, there was always so much going on that it made it almost impossible for Y/N to have time to do anything else. “Stop making that face, Seb. I know you don’t like my job.”
“It’s not that I don’t like your job. I just don’t like how stressed it makes you. Maybe you should take the job at that startup. The one with the guy you went to school with.”
“I’m not sure a startup is the best way to be less stressed. Plus, it’s in San Francisco.”
“Yeah, but I’ll be really busy next year, so we’d probably be apart anyway. At least think about it. That’ll be spontaneous enough.”
“Whatever you say, Seb.”
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The smile on Sebastian’s face felt fake. Everything about his relationship felt fake nowadays. And Jess had no idea. She couldn’t see it.
His girlfriend sat across from him, his beautiful, kind girlfriend, and he felt nothing. There was no rush of happiness when he saw her. There was no ache in his chest when he was away from her. And worst all, he couldn’t be sure there had ever been.
Had he felt anything for Jess besides physical attraction? Deep down, he didn’t think so. She had just been a way to get over Y/N. It had worked for a while. He had convinced himself that he was happy with her. But then he had seen Y/N.
He wasn’t supposed to go to the wedding, and maybe he shouldn’t have. Y/N would have had a lot more fun if he hadn’t been there. Maybe it had been a bit selfish, but he had to see her. He missed her. He wanted her back in his life. Even though he tried to pretend it wasn’t true, he wanted her back. He still loved her.
And she still loved him. She probably also hated him, at least a little bit, despite what she said. But she still loved him. Ever since he had heard those words, his world had started to dim.
He hadn’t noticed it at first. Maybe he was slower to laugh at jokes. Maybe he started finding date night tedious, rather than sweet. And maybe he started thinking about what Y/N was doing whenever possible.
You couldn’t blame him, really. Jess was an open book. She was nice. She was, at least partly, using him for publicity. She was pretty. He could guess what she would say at any moment. As great as she was, she wasn’t very deep.
Y/N, on the other hand, was a wild card. Yes, she could be a little plan heavy, but she really shone when she let herself cut loose. When she booked flights to Italy on a whim or decided they should go skydiving during the weekend. Or even when she accidentally found their new favorite Indian restaurant because she wasn’t paying attention when walking home and ended up on the wrong street.
Did she sometimes want to make him bang his head against a wall? Yes. But she also made him a better person. She didn’t let him get away with any crap. And she was the only thing he ever wanted to think about.
“Jess,” Sebastian said, interrupting whatever story she had been telling. “We need to talk.”
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It was raining so hard that Sebastian almost walked right past the building. Of course, Sebastian didn’t have an umbrella. Wasn’t it supposed to not rain in California? Or maybe LA rules didn’t apply to San Francisco. Either way, Sebastian was drenched by the time that he stood outside of the apartment building.
The doorman raised an eyebrow as Sebastian dripped on his floor. “How can I help you?”
“I’m here to see Y/N.” Did she even still live in this apartment? He wasn’t sure. She had only signed the lease for a year, so maybe she had moved. Sebastian tried to keep walking towards the elevator, but the doorman was quick to stop him.
“She’s not available right now, but I’ll let her know you stopped by. Goodnight.” Arguing seemed pointless. It was getting late, and he was a strange man as far as the doorman was concerned. But what did not available mean? Was she out? Or did she have someone up in her apartment? If only he had been able to go up. It was his own fault for insisting she get an apartment with a doorman.
Back outside in the rain, he looked up at the window that he knew was hers. Or at least had been the last time he had visited. He had looked up at the window and watched her wave as he drove away. Every time it got harder to leave. Harder to be sure that she would still want him when he came back.
Without any other good plan, Sebastian did the first thing he could think of. “Y/N!” he yelled. Would the other people in the apartment building think he was crazy? Maybe. Did he care? No. Maybe if he yelled enough, she would come down. Would it come off as romcom-esque or just creepy? Maybe he should have brought a boom box or something.
“Sebastian?”
He spun around so quickly that he almost slipped on the wet sidewalk. There she was. She was wearing a raincoat that seemed to almost swallow her, and the hood hid her face. Some part of Sebastian’s mind pointed out that it was his raincoat. He must have forgotten it at her apartment once. She had a backpack on and takeout in one hand, which Sebastian knew meant she was just getting back from work.
“Sebastian, what are you doing here?” She didn’t sound mad, just confused. That was fair, really. After their run in at the wedding reception, she probably hadn’t expected to see him, at least for a long time.
“I miss you.” That was all Sebastian was able to choke out at first.
Y/N started shaking her head and brought a hand up to her eyes, knocking the hood of the raincoat down. She didn’t seem to notice. “No, Sebastian. I told you-“
“I know. I know what you told me.” Y/N’s eyes tentatively met his. “But I do miss you. And I do want you back. Not just as a friend. Breaking up with you was the stupidest thing I’ve ever done.”
“Then why did you do it?” Sebastian hated how small she sounded. He hated that he was the reason for it.
“I was scared.”
“You were scared? I was the one with a new job in a new city.”
“I knew that you would take it all by storm though. You always do. And it just felt like the more you settled in here, the less you needed me. I knew that one day you would realize that you had outgrown me. I guess I was trying to save myself from that pain, so I ended things first.”
“Outgrow you? Sebastian, I love you. I could never outgrow that.”
“You’re way too good for me. And you're constantly surrounded by people who are smarter than me. People you can have real conversations about your work with. You don’t have to dumb stuff down for them.”
“If I want to talk to them about work, then I’ll do it at work. They don’t make me smile like you do though. I don’t enjoy being around them as much as I enjoy being around you. Who cares if you don’t understand all of that boring business stuff? You’re still smart. And kind. And you’re the one I always wanted to come home to at the end of the day.”
She was close enough to touch now. Sebastian wasn’t sure if he had been walking towards her or if she had been walking towards him. Maybe it was both.
“What about Jess?”
“We broke up.”
“I didn’t know that.”
“Well it only happened a couple hours ago.”
“Sebastian!” Y/N swatted him on the arm, but she was laughing. “Did you break up with her and then come here?”
“I figured you probably wouldn’t take me back if I was still dating someone else.”
“Yeah. You’re probably right.” Y/N smiled up at him. Gently, he placed a hand on her cheek and kissed her. The feeling was just as exciting as the first time they had kissed. Sebastian couldn’t help but smile. When they pulled away, Y/N was smiling too.
“We’re going to make this work,” Sebastian said. “I don’t care if I have to fly here every day to see you. I’m not letting you go again.”
“Actually, I have a solution that might be a bit easier.” The sly smile on Y/N’s face made Sebastian smile too. “The startup was just acquired by a bigger company-”
“Is that good?”
“For the most part. It’s good for me because I’ll be in charge of expanding our little startup. That means,” she continued, seeing the look of confusion on Sebastian’s face, “that I’ll be doing a lot of traveling around to new offices. Whenever I’m not needed at a specific office, I can work anywhere.”
“Anywhere?” Sebastian was starting to see where she was going with this, but he tried to keep himself from getting his hopes up.
“I was planning on staying here for a couple more months before moving back to New York, but I can work from anywhere as long as I have a computer and wifi. I’m pretty sure they have both of those in places like LA or Atlanta or wherever you’re filming. I’ll still be busy, but we’ll be together.”
Whatever else Y/N was going to say was forgotten when Sebastian picked her up and spun her around. “I’ve missed you,” Sebastian whispered as he put her back down.
“So I’ve heard.” Sebastian laughed and pressed a kiss on Y/N’s wet hair. “I’ve missed you too, Seb. I have one more question though.”
“Ask me anything.”
“Do you think this food is too waterlogged to eat?” She lifted the takeout bag slightly.
“I guess we have to hope the plastic bag did its job.” Sebastian took the bag out of her hand and wrapped his other arm around her shoulders. “I hope you ordered enough for me.”
“I hope so too. I wasn’t exactly expecting you though.”
“I hope it was a good surprise though.”
Y/N squeezed Sebastian’s waist. “The best. I love you.”
“I love you too.”