I don't own Glee

Chapter Five: The Feuding Family of NYADA Showcase

Rachel strode confidently into Showcase rehearsal a nervous, fidgety Kurt trailing behind her. Rachel swept in confidently. Kurt stood in the doorway a moment. He took a deep breath, squared his shoulders, placed a hand on his hip and followed Rachel. She was fiddling in her bag. Is that sheet music? Kurt wondered. Rachel the sheet music for several songs and grabbing the nearest chair seated herself beside the director's chair. She glanced over at Kurt who had taken a seat in the middle row and was gesturing to her frantically to come over. She rolled her eyes. What is up with him? The director will want to discuss lesson plans and set lists and solos with me. Mr. Schue always did. As if in answer to her thoughts the Director in question sat down in the chair beside Rachel and the other members settled down in their seats. The director looked over at Rachel.

"Miss Berry, why are you over here?" Rachel sat up a little straighter and held out the sheet music.

"I thought these would be a good way to start off the season. I'll take lead of course, but as you see there are several minor solos to distribute among our other members. And that last one I thought would make a lovely competition piece, I'll be singing it of course, and everyone else can back me up with some choreography and background vocals." The director gave her a stiff smile, almost condescending.

"Ah, as the director I am responsible for song selection and solo assignment. Very rarely would we give a student an entire song to themselves, and although we hold auditions for every solo, we usually don't feature a particular soloist more than two or three times a year." Rachel stared at her. Was she serious? Obviously Rachel wasn't a usual performer so she would probably be the exception for these rules, but even then it didn't sound like she'd be getting more than four solos this year.

"Would you mind taking a seat with your fellow members, Miss Berry?" Rachel got up and made her way to the nearest vacant seat. Too stunned to do anything but follow direction.

"Right, now the assignment this week is to find a song that has to do with something starting, or the beginning of something. Bring the sheet music and a video of you performing the song you're your own original choreography to me and the winners get to choose between performing their piece for the entire group next week or getting private vocal coaching from me for the rest of the month. Whoever places second will get whatever the winners turned down. Think your piece through carefully. No more than four students may perform in each entry. Split up and decide what songs you're going to sing. As people scrambled to find someone to sing with Rachel felt a tap on her shoulder. She turned to see Kurt.

"Do you want to pair up for a duet?"

"No, I think I'll work on this solo." Kurt gave her a look like she might be crazy before turning to find someone else to sing with. Rachel pulled out her folder of emergency solo pieces. And began sifting through them for one that fit the bill. She was going to win this thing. She was going to perform for everyone and then she would get the admiration and appreciation she deserved.

Kurt sighed and turned away from Rachel dejectedly. It was silly to try to win this alone. He cast around for someone to sing with. But everyone was giving him weird looks and edging away from him. What was wrong with everyone? And the he saw Stephen smirking at him and everything clicked. I guess he does have the school under his thumb. Kurt turned away dejectedly. It wasn't like he had never experienced this kind of thing before. It's just that he'd thought of Showcase as the NYADA version of Glee, and this sort of thing didn't really happen in Glee. Kurt began to write a list of song nominees and made a mental note to call Blaine and discuss it with him. Kurt was distracted by a light tap on his shoulder. Will sat behind him and was evidently the one who tapped his shoulder.

"Looking for someone to sing with?" Kurt gave him a side-ways smile before answering.

"It would improve on singing alone." But he hoped Will could tell that he was really pleased.

Will arrived outside Kurt's dorm at the arranged time. He heard voices inside. He couldn't make out what they were saying but he waited for a pause in the conversation to knock. He ended up waiting almost ten minutes, but he didn't want to give Kurt half a reason to dis-like him. Finally someone sneezed and Will struck the door firmly with his knuckles. He heard Kurt exclaiming about "Showcase assignment", and "that Will guy", and "Just a moment, honey." And then the door opened.

"Hello. Please, come in." the formal way Kurt was treating him made Will feel both flattered and a little left-out. It felt like Kurt was both showing him quite a bit of respect, and distancing himself from Will. Will glanced around the dorm noting sheet music spread about in a similar manner to how he'd laid out the clothes during Will's make-over. There was also an open lap-top. Will edged side-ways until he could see a little of the screen. Kurt was obviously employing the use of Skype because The screen was filled by some guy's face. He looked kind of familiar. Will thought back to what he'd heard Kurt say through the door. He'd called this guy "Honey." And then Will knew who it was. His eyes flicked over to the framed photo by Kurt's pillow just to be sure. Yep, the guy in the picture looked a little younger, but this was definitely Kurt's boyfriend, Blaine. The one he went on and on bout with that dreamy smile on his face. Will's gaze swiveled back to Kurt who looked concerned. Oh, no. Had Kurt been talking to him?

"I was just going over options for songs." Kurt gestured to the papers on the floor. Oh. He thought Will was judging his room. He was worried about it being messy.

"Well you're obviously giving our project a lot of thought."

"Kurt?" a voice emanated from the laptop. Kurt's head whipped toward it.

"Oh, oh." He hurried over to the computer avoiding the surrounding stacks of sheet music with ease. Will followed stepping over and around the pages rather less gracefully. As he reached the computer Kurt grabbed his elbow and yanked him in front of the screen.

"Here he is, this is the boy I was telling you about Darling." Blaine appeared to be studying their feet but Will knew that was just the illusion of Skype + webcam. He was studying Will. Part of Will wanted to yell that he had no chance with Kurt and could everyone stop worrying for one second? Kurt just called him "that boy" and Blaine "Darling" for god's sake. Another part of him liked the idea he spooked Mr. Perfect a little.

"Hey," Will waved his hand awkwardly. How did one address one's crush's boyfriend?

"I hope you don't mind me inviting Blaine. But we need a spectacular song if we're going to win and Blaine knows all sorts of neat, unusual songs." Kurt threw the computer a look so loving Will wanted to crawl away into a hole to die because he wanted Kurt to look at him that way and deep down Will knew he never would.

"No, of course not." Traitorous mouth. Why must you always say what Kurt wants to hear? You're not making life easier ion me. Scolding not-with-standing, Will's mouth prattled on. "If Blaine's half as great as you say he is I'm sure he'll be an asset."

"Lovely." Kurt settled himself on the floor.

"So Will," Oh, Blaine was speaking. "What's your range?"

"Uh, my what?"

"Your range. What's the highest note you can sing? What's the lowest note you can sing? Are you a tenor? Baritone? Bass? Countertenor?" He shot a glance at Kurt when he said "countertenor" so that must be what Kurt was.

"I-I don't know." Blaine stared at him for a moment as if he'd just said there had never been a revolution and this was the English Colonies. Kurt looked a bit taken aback too, but recovered more quickly.

"Well, no matter. We'll just have to test you out." He scooted closer to the laptop and opened up some kind of virtual keyboard. "Let's start at middle C and work our way down. Then we'll go back to middle C and work our way up, okay?"

"Okay" Kurt clicked a key and the note sounded through the speakers. Will matched the note on an "Ah." Kurt slowly worked down the computer-generated piano half-step by half step. Down an entire octave, and the down another half-step to B but Will's voice died when they tried to go farther. Kurt jumped back to middle C, Will matched the note, and they worked their way up in the same manner Will reached B, but couldn't go farther.

"Impressive." Blaine commented approvingly. Will felt slightly smug for a moment then Kurt launched into a conversation with Blaine about people and songs Will had never heard of so he just nodded and mm-hm-ed whenever they paused to draw breath. The topic switched to choreography and he tried to get a few ideas in. Kurt wrote Will's comments along side his and Blaine's but Will lost track of what they were saying because they were using all the technical terms, like "grapevine," and "widow-maker," and he had no idea what was going on. He considered closing his eyes and getting some sleep when the conversation turned to a problem he could actually help solve.

"If only you could be here to perform with us," Kurt told Blaine wistfully. Alright, that's not something Will could make happen. "It would make a better presentation if we had at least three people. Synchronized dance moves would look better if there were more people doing them, and we could do the old Warbler thing and have one person providing background vocals to fill out the duet." Will raised his hand to get their attention, a plan forming in his mind. "And of course I just want you here. What is it Will?"

"Well, if you want a third member… There's this girl I know. She's really shy, but she demonstrated this vocal run in one of my classes and I can tell she's really talented. She seems to do well in one of our dance classes too." Kurt sighed.

"That's great Will, but she's not in our group."

"Well, why don't we ask the director if we can include her? The worst that can happen is she says no. Kurt nodded.

"You're right. Why don't you talk to this girl tomorrow, I'll talk to the director and we'll all meet back here tomorrow." Blaine spoke up from his position on the screen.

"Me too?" Kurt laughed and bumped the keyboard as if he could reach across the distance and bump Blaine via Skype.

"Of course you too, silly. How am I supposed to do this without my man?" Blaine smiled. Will felt ill.

"Well, I'd better get back to my own dorm. See you two tomorrow." Kurt looked up long enough to say goodbye and Blaine said he should be heading to bed as well. Will glanced back at Kurt in time to see him kiss the screen and then the web-cam in some sort of farewell to Blaine. He sighed as he left, closing the door behind him, it was going to be a tough year.

The next day Kurt dutifully approached the Director at shortly before Showcase rehearsal. He realized he didn't even know her name. Everyone just called her Ma'am, or Ms.

"Umm excuse me." She looked up from the stack of papers she was holding.

"Oh. Hello. And you are…"

"Kurt Hummel." She held out her hand and he shook it. "What's your name? I'm ashamed to say I don't know."

"Parvati Henderson" They smiled at each other for a moment. And Parvati couldn't help liking this kid a little more for bothering to find out her name.

"I had a question about the assignment." Kurt shifted his weight to his left leg. "If we could get someone not in the Showcase to agree to perform with us would that be allowed? I mean, as long as they didn't cause us to go over the quartet limit?" Parvati considered a moment. The minute hand on the clock moved signaling time to begin.

"Let me think about that a minute Kurt, I'll get back to you." Kurt whispered goodbye and hurried to his seat. Parvati explained the would be working on dance steps for now as this week's assignment would help decide future set-lists.. It sounded like an advanced version of the New Directions Booty Camp.

"Before we begin, a student asked me earlier if a group would be allowed to include non-Showcase members in their performance. My decision is affirmative. If you have a talented friend you'd like to include go for it, as long as your group is still four members or less after they've joined. But be warned. If your piece wins, or places, and you end up performing it… If you sway in the background backing up some star you've recruited, it won't get you solos."

That evening Kurt was going over songs with Blaine via Skype again when he heard a tentative knock on the door.

"Come in!" He called absently. Will came in leading a short Asian girl by the elbow.

"Kurt, Blaine, meet Melody Reclucio. Melody, this is Kurt Hummel, and that guy on the computer screen is Blaine…"

"Anderson" Blaine cut in. Melody gave them a shy smile. She seems very sweet. Kurt decided.

"So, Melody. What's your range?" Blaine queried, always the practical one.

"Soprano coloratura." Both Kurt's and Blaine's eyebrows shot up and Will couldn't help wondering what he was missing.

"Right. So, very high." Blaine blinked a couple times and returned his attention to his sheet music. Melody nodded, blushing. Kurt smiled at her. It was so refreshing to hang out with talented people who weren't constantly self-promoting. It was really much easier to appreciate Will's warm tone or Melody's high register when they weren't using it as an excuse to get too many solos.

"Well, Blaine?" Kurt returned his attention to his boyfriend. "Any trio pieces for a tenor, countertenor, and soprano coloratura? Or will we need to arrange it ourselves?"

Don't worry; we'll get back to Finn later.

I was planning on having Mercedes guest-star in one of the later chapters and I was wondering if there are any other character's people would like to see make an appearance. If so just say so in a review or a PM.