Disclaimer: This is a work of fiction and solely meant for purposes of entertainment. I do not know, nor do I presume to know anything about the private lives of the depicted people in this story.
That said, enjoy! (:
They are awful, Kristin thinks as she watches them from backstage while trying to convince herself that that was her sole professional opinion. That stage chemistry everyone always complimented her and Idina for – those two did not have it. Which was fine, often enough you had to make do without it, but particularly sad because they were married.
But it wasn't just their chemistry that was off, or nonexistent for that matter, it was his voice too. Everyone who managed to get on Broadway was talented, sure, but Fiyero didn't suit him at all. Kristin always believed herself to be a person incapable of hate, until Taye ran along and proved her wrong, for which she only hated him more. And to make matters even worse everyone here knew he had only gotten the part because he knew someone who knew someone (which was just the way the industry worked as Kristin had painfully become aware of time after time ever since she had left Broken Arrow). In the process, he had invaded what was priorly only hers and Idina's, and as if that wasn't enough, now he did not even possess the talent to make it believable.
They kiss on stage and Kristin has to look away, because she cannot stand it. That they are in full costume and Idina painted green does not make it any easier to watch. Which she shouldn't even be doing in the first place, but she physically can't tear her eyes away. She should be getting ready for her next scene, she should change in her bubble dress for God's sake, and people are beginning to look at her funny. They are obviously annoyed and rightly so, after all it is an unspoken backstage rule that you know your place and you stay there, or else the organized chaos that runs the show from the background crumbles. But Kristin can't.
She hasn't kissed Idina for weeks now, not really, not more than a few stolen seconds whenever Taye was safely occupied elsewhere. Not for the first time she wishes that Elphaba and Glinda kissed on stage, just once, for maybe that would help prevent her from going insane. She never imagined herself as the kind of person who relied on kisses from their significant other, but then again, sometimes she barely recognizes herself in front of the mirror anymore.
They part from their kiss and Taye begins to sing, and somehow he's grinning as smugly as if he knows, knows about them and knows that she's standing there, watching. He strains to hit the notes, and Kristin smirks, but only until she remembers who she is and that she does not do that. Not to mention that his lack of talent to even remotely live up to Norbert's performances wasn't just his problem, but theirs as well.
They hadn't altered much of Dancing through life, so Kristin isn't as affected, but As long as you're mine is almost unrecognizable. He drags Idina down with him, forces her to change the harmonies so his voice can keep up with hers, and it's awful.
That is her professional opinion. For the most part.
It doesn't help that unlike the audience, she had been forced to witness them fighting about it, their screaming voices even reaching her own dressing room. At one point, Idina must have stormed out because seconds later she appeared in Kristin's dressing room, eyes puffy and voice sore. Kristin couldn't do more than make her tea and hold her in her arms, whispering that it wasn't for long. Norbert would return and Taye would disappear. She didn't know whether that fact was more comforting to Idina or herself.
Idina giggles as they finish the song and it's so fake, not just acted but fake, it hurts her ears.
Someone tries to speak to her, probably eager to coax her back where she belongs and put her damn dress on, but she shoos them away with a wave of her hand.
"It's not lying. It's looking at things another way," Taye says then and she's close to snarling.
She had always hated that line. Idina was always beautiful, even in green, especially in green, and she didn't want him to make her think any differently, even though they were just in character.
When someone touches her shoulder, she flinches, but when she turns around, it's only Michelle. It only takes one good look at Kristin for her to know, and the quiet understanding in her eyes is almost too much for her to bear.
She and Idina had never planned on telling anyone, instead they had done their best to keep it secret, but from some people secrets are impossible to keep. But they didn't have to tell Michelle, for some reason she just knew. Which had saved their asses often enough already, given the many times they had been close to being discovered in their respective dressing rooms, on the piano bench in the rehearsal room or even on Galinda's bed, only poorly hidden behind some curtain.
Michelle had managed to draw their unwanted spectators' attention another way or close the door quickly enough.
And now, she's the only one who manages to snap Kristin back into reality far enough to get her to move.
"It's not for long," she says the exact same thing Kristin tells herself on a daily basis while helping her dresser to undo her corset and put on another wig. "Only two more weeks."
Kristin is too lazy to try and count how many more shows that means, it just seems like too many. Not only did she have to watch Idina kiss her husband every night, but she herself had to kiss him too. She deserves a Tony for not gagging every time—even though this is far from the first time she has to kiss someone she doesn't like on stage, he is by far the worst one of them.
Not to mention that scene. Not the one she had just witnessed from a safe distance, but that other one she had just gotten over with before disappearing backstage.
That scene where Elphaba and Fiyero ran off together only to leave her behind, alone and heartbroken. Where she has to stay on stage and sing about how she's not that girl and act like her world is falling apart, and it is, it really is, but she can't show all of it. Her emotions run deeper in that scene than she could ever dare to show, because someday the strangers in the audience could figure out that she doesn't have to act to be heartbroken at all.
Maybe she doesn't deserve a Tony. No one had ever gotten one for not acting.
Her microphone gets tangled in her wig and Michelle curses under her breath. Kristin hears the music and knows that she has to be on stage in mere seconds. Another scene with Idina and Taye both.
The prospect makes her sick and she's close to faking a faint to get them to call her understudy instead, but then Michelle forces her to grip her wand and shoves her on stage, and it's too late.
She gets through the next scenes, barely. She's not awful, but she's not really there, and when she catches Idina's eye halfway through For Good, she knows that Idina notices it too. Their hug lasts a second too long, and Kristin doesn't realize that she's crying until she clutches Elphaba's hat close to her chest.
In the end, when she's up floating in her bubble and Elphaba chooses Fiyero over her, she barely gets the notes out. Two more weeks of watching Idina leaving her behind for Taye.
Only that it aren't only two weeks. Two weeks of having to watch, perhaps, but here on stage she at least gets the safety of hiding behind Glinda. But it wouldn't stop here.
Idina would have to choose again. And as she sees her character making the same choice just as every show before, she suddenly knows who Idina would choose as soon as it came to it.
The lights go out and Kristin closes her eyes.
It would not be her.
