It had been a difficult couple of years for Kurt Hummel. He was currently living in a small apartment in Bushwick, the same one he had lived in with Rachel. She had moved out a couple months ago and the rest of his friends seemed to drop by less often now. His relationship with Blaine was strained. He didn't know how to describe it. They had drifted apart and tried to remain friends, but it seemed that even Blaine was too busy to check in on Kurt.
It's not that he was complaining about his friends' success. He was there on opening night when Rachel landed Maureen on Rent. Sure, it was off-Broadway, but it was still a huge step for her career. He went to open mic nights to listen to Blaine perform his original songs. When Blaine had been signed to some small record company out in LA, he was sad to watch him go but knew it was for the best. Santana would stop by to update Kurt on her life, with a different girl each time. She was always travelling and could only see him once or twice a year. Oh, the life of a professional dancer. It wasn't as if he wasn't busy with his own career himself. He was a writer for Vogue magazine, had been for the last five years. He was working his way up, slowly, very slowly, but surely. He had sketchbooks full of his own original designs, but he couldn't get anyone to pay any attention to them. For the time being, they occupied the drawers of his desk, waiting to be noticed by someone important.
As he sat on his couch, scrolling through options on Netflix, he tried not to think back to his college years when his apartment was always full of people and commotion. He was 25 now and staying in on another Friday night. His father had called him earlier to check in as he always did. It was a nice replacement for Friday night dinners. Burt and Carole were always happy to hear about his day and any news in his life, exciting or not. He had turned down multiple blind dates set up by Jess, one of his fellow writers at Vogue. After years of meaningless boyfriends who were ultimately afraid of commitment or had some other nonredeemable flaw, Kurt had given relationships a break. His excuse had always been that he was too busy focusing on his career to date, but here he was on a Friday night, finding nothing worth watching on Netflix. He exited out of Netflix and moved to YouTube. He was in the mood to watch some bootleg musicals. He hardly had time to go see live performances, and he couldn't afford to go watch his favorite shows. He found the most recent The Book of Mormon performance and hunkered in for a night of singing along to his favorite songs and judging the actors who would never replace the original cast (No one could be better than Andrew Rannells in Kurt's eyes).
He listened to the opening notes, rather doorbells, of Hello and that's when he saw him. Or at least he thought he saw him. No. No, it could not be. It could not be fucking him. Kurt sat up and leaned closer to the screen. Oh God, it was him. Sebastian Smythe. Kurt continued watching just to make sure. Maybe he was just a background Mormon. Yeah, that was it. That was the only reasonable explanation for why he was on stage.
No. No, no, no, no, no. He was Elder Price. Sebastian Smythe was Elder Price. How the fuck did he land that role? Rachel was still doing off-Broadway shows and Meerkat was Elder Price. That made absolutely no sense. Kurt checked the upload date for the video and read the description. It had been recorded around two weeks ago. He stared at his TV screen in a mixture of awe and pure jealousy. He had paused the video just as the camera was zooming in on Sebastian's face. He had never really pictured Sebastian as a performer. Yeah, he was captain of the Warblers, but he didn't think that he took that role very seriously. Kurt assumed he would go to an Ivy League law school and ruin other people's happiness for money. Apparently, he was wrong. Sebastian was living out teenage Kurt's dreams of being a star.
Kurt reached for his phone, thinking of someone who would be just as shocked to learn of this revelation. He thought of texting Rachel, but he didn't want to bring her down by letting her know that one of their rivals was doing better than she was. She would never believe him anyway. Blaine would be ecstatic for his old friend rather than shocked and jealous. Blaine had forgiven Sebastian a little too soon for Kurt's liking after the other boy almost blinded him. Santana would just make some crude remark about the past Warbler. Though after she decided singing wasn't for her, he doubted that she would care that much. When he found that he couldn't share this news with anyone and receive the same reaction he had had, Kurt slumped back into the couch. Sebastian Smythe was a fucking Broadway star and Kurt had no one to tell. Instead, he called Santana and waited for her to pick up.
"Hey, Satan. Remember that favor you owe me? I want to cash in on that. I want Book of Mormon tickets." Kurt said, a smile forming.
A/N: Been a long time since I wrote something. I apologize for any mistakes.