An AU. Feel free to read the Author's Notes at the bottom first to avoid any confusion!
The show was in three hours. Kurt had a hundred and eighty minutes to be ready for his first night on Broadway. Nothing in the world could have prepared him for that night, or what would come with it.
He went through costumes and makeup, as the minutes ticked away to the beginning of the show. His costars wished him luck, but Kurt just hoped his nervousness wasn't obvious.
Kurt wasn't nervous about the performance. A thousand late night rehearsals, plus a childhood of Wicked songs had him overprepared for this night.
He was worried about being sick.
It was no secret to the directors of the musical that Kurt had ulcerative colitis. He made that clear from the very beginning, so if he ever had to miss a rehearsal or, God forbid, a performance, it would already be understood. He had so far been lucky to not have had any flare ups, but it was only a matter of time.
When he woke up that morning with a low fever and a serious stomachache, he knew it was more than some bad food he had eaten the night before.
Kurt did what he had to do. It was his debut, and he was not about to sit it out due to his stupid condition. He could make it. The show couldn't go on without a Fiyero. So, he took some Tylenol, made sure he was hydrated, and went in for what would feel like the longest day of his life.
"Ten minutes till curtain!" the stage manager called. Those four words made Kurt panic, just a little. All he had eaten that day was a granola bar and half a sandwich the company catered in for the production crew and actors, but his stomach still twisted in knots every time he moved.
What would happen if he botched his very first performance? Broadway critics were savages. He would be scarred for life. His career would for sure be over.
Worst of all, Kurt knew Blaine had invited every single one of their friends to the show. So if something went wrong, they wouldn't just hear about it later. They would be there to witness it firsthand.
The thought made him want to pass out. He had been feeling awfully dizzy, and considered eating a little more before the show started, but he didn't want it to upset his stomach. He would take a little dizziness over nausea any day.
Then, somehow, the show started, and he found himself on stage, shivering and sweating under the stage lights that he was certain gave away how pale he was, even under the cakey makeup on his face. He was miserable, but still trying to hold onto the fact that this was his first performance, and he would remember it forever.
Kurt didn't really know how it got so bad so fast. At intermission he sprinted to his dressing room to throw up, but he was certain it was over before going back out onstage. A makeup artist touched up his face without a word and sent him off to entertain the thousands of people who had showed up to see him.
But in the second act, he felt himself slipping. It was harder and harder to stay focused and in character. Kurt's stomach cramped and flipped so badly he just wanted to go backstage and curl up on his couch and sleep for twelve hours.
Kurt had nearly made it to his final scene. He was so close, but his stomach decided it couldn't wait, because the next thing he knew he was staggering, struggling to stay upright, and he stumbled into the arms of a crewmember as he got sick, no doubt ruining the show for his very first audience.
The show ended quickly, with only a few more lines to go anyways, and then things passed in a blur. Kurt was shuffled off to his dressing room, and a crew member from the costume department helped unbutton his costume, since his fingers were shaking too badly.
Then Kurt was alone, and after throwing up for a solid five more minutes, he gathered the strength to put his street clothes back on. Mostly because he was so cold.
He collapsed on his couch and shut his eyes, too weak to even cry. He was just numb, wanting to turn the world off and not think about anything.
A hasty knock on the door, then Blaine was there, kneeling in front of him, wiping the sides of his face where he had failed to rinse his mouth, and giving him kisses and praises, not shutting up even after Kurt buried his face in his husband's shoulder, sobbing hard enough for the entire theater to hear him.
"I want to go home," Kurt begged. "I just want to go home."
"Sh, okay," Blaine promised, kissing his forehead. "We'll go home. I had to fight someone to be able to get back here, and she said the director wanted to talk to you. So let's wait for him. Then we'll go home."
Kurt curled back up on his side, trying to block out how much pain he was in. Blaine took a makeup wipe and slowly removed everything from his face, until Kurt was left with raw and stinging skin, partially from the makeup but mostly from his tears.
The thought of his director coming and yelling at him scared Kurt to death. They couldn't fire him, could they? No, he had signed a contract. He was in this for the long run, if the critics didn't drive him off the stage first.
Kurt was seriously struggling to stay awake when his boss came in. Blaine squeezed his hand, but instead of yelling, he was simply told to go home. Not in an angry way. In a sympathetic, surprisingly well-intentioned way.
"We hired an understudy for a reason," Kurt remembered hearing him say. That made him feel worse than anything. They were dependent on an understudy because Kurt's health was so erratic. The guilt he had after hearing that felt like an anchor in his chest.
He mumbled out a lazy "thank you" along with an apology.
"Kid, we turned your mic off. And unless they were sitting on the very edge of the auditorium, no one saw or heard you hurl. Now go, before it happens again. No worries. Give me a call when you're better."
And then, Blaine was taking him home. Kurt still felt like dying, from both his condition, and the lingering humiliation of the night. But he was too exhausted to react any more.
His husband turned on the hot water so Kurt could take a bath. Even though he didn't want to, Blaine made him clean up, and he brought him his warmest, coziest pajamas to wear to bed.
Kurt was just about ready to pass out, but Blaine made him stay awake long enough to take his prescription and eat a few bites of soup.
"Now go to sleep," Blaine told him. "I'll be right here if you need me in the night."
Kurt slept. And when he woke up the next morning, feeling a fraction of a bit better, it seemed like everything would be okay, until he remembered the performance had been ruined. By him.
"Good morning," his husband said, too loud and too cheery as he came inside their bedroom, already dressed and carrying a few grocery bags. He must have gone shopping.
"What time is it?" Kurt croaked, not even bothering to lift his head from his pillow, where an embarrassing few drops of drool had collected.
Blaine frowned. "Almost eleven. You always sleep late when you have a flare up, though. It's okay. I went down to the store and got you some things. Do you feel any better?"
Kurt shrugged his shoulder. "I don't want to get out of bed. I don't think I can show my face in that theater again."
His husband sat on the edge of the mattress and put a hand on Kurt's back. He closed his eyes, letting Blaine rub his back as he thought about the previous night. It made him want to be sick all over again.
"Kurt, no one knows, honey. I promise. I had a feeling you weren't feeling great, so I knew when you went offstage that something was wrong. But even Sam sitting next to me had no clue. Your director isn't mad at you, and you have an understudy to take your place until you feel better. That's all that matters. I want you to be healthy above anything else."
Kurt tried to believe him. He wanted to, he really did, but he still felt like nothing could possibly be worse.
"It was my first performance," he peeped, shrinking a little bit more and burying his face in his pillow. "It was supposed to be good."
He felt Blaine move closer, and he tried to hide that he was crying again. His husband stroked his hair, mumbling something under his breath about a fever.
"Hey, it was so good. You don't even know how good it was because you were feeling so bad. I've never been more proud of you, Kurt. All those nights where I had to eat dinner alone because you had a late rehearsal were so worth it for what I got to see last night. And there'll be other performances. Hundreds, hopefully. Next time you'll be feeling better so you can actually enjoy yourself. You won't be feeling this bad after your next show."
Kurt hiccupped and moaned as his stomach started to cramp again. He didn't have the energy to be sick. He was too busy moping.
"I can't go on again if I'm not better," he worried. "No one wants an actor with a chronic disease."
Blaine must have been able to tell that he was in pain again, because he rearranged Kurt's pillows and helped him sit up before opening a bottle of Gatorade he bought for him at the store and forcing him to drink.
"You're going to get better," Blaine told him, leaving no room for discussion. "This time it wasn't even that bad. I bet you just forgot to take your medicine. That's what caused it. We'll get you started back on your prescription and you can be back on your feet by Monday, hopefully. You didn't become an actor for nothing, Kurt. They knew all about this when they signed you. They wouldn't have done that if they had a bad feeling. Now, you're going to let me take care of you this weekend. And I don't want to hear a complaint out of you, because we're going to get you back on that stage, whether you like it or not. You're just going to have to trust me."
Kurt was still uneasy. Perhaps it was his stomachache, or the anxiety of thinking about being back on that stage. But, he had no doubt Blaine would give him everything he needed to make him feel better, and then some. Because what he had said was true; it didn't matter what anyone thought of his abilities to perform, as long as he was healthy and he had Blaine, Kurt couldn't ask for anything better.
Author's Notes:
YOU GUYS ARE GOING TO HATE ME. I've never seen Wicked in my life. I felt so embarrassed as I wrote this. But thanks to lots of Google searches and my friend Jess's advice, I cast Kurt as Fiyero. I don't even know how to pronounce that.
Please someone take me to see this musical that will supposedly rock my socks off.
Anyways. I'm trying something new! Yay! My absolute favorite author Keitorin Asthore has a 'verse where Kurt suffers from a disease called ulcerative colitis. It's not pretty, guys. But she writes it very well and after reading everything of hers (probably twice) and a lot of research, that's what I decided on for this prompt. I'm working on a oneshot, too, in which Blaine first finds out about Kurt's diagnosis. It's in the works and still very rough, but hopefully I'll get it up soon.
SPEAKING OF ONESHOTS. I just wrote a new one about Daddies Klaine so go hit that up for a good time. It's called The One With the Gun. (Spoiler alert there really is a gun involved). It's angsty!
But yeah. I'm really excited about this AU. So if you want any prompts that have to do with this genre of my writing, you know where to find me! I go back to school tomorrow, so if I don't fill your prompt then I am probably dead from senior year having killed me.