"So that's it then? You're just going to walk away from us? For him?" His voice cut into her worse than a thousand knifes, and it took everything inside her not to run back into his arms.
She didn't need to be looking at him to see his features flawlessly in her mind. A disgusted look would cross his face at the idea of her leaving him for Finn, and his eyebrows would pull together and release as he willed himself not to shed a tear over her. Of course, if she had been facing him he would have been able to spot the ones rolling from her own eyes, even in the pouring rain. That was how it was with them; he knew her feelings when she couldn't admit them to anyone or even herself.
Rachel knew what she had to do. She didn't want to, every thing inside her body was screaming at her not to do this, but she had to. The tiny brunette pulled in a shaky breath, glad that she didn't have to face him as she spoke. "You can't walk away from something that wasn't real, Jesse."
Instead of waiting for him to answer her, Rachel ran towards the door to her fathers house, desperate to out of the rain and away from the man she loved. The faint sound of her name passed through the rain as she stepped into the safety of her home and slammed the door behind her. As soon as the door was closed Rachel felt her knees go weak and finally collapse on her. She fell to the floor in a crying heap, her entire body convulsing.
Somewhere, in the far back of her mind Rachel was aware that she had made the right choice. She had saved Jesse from being stuck in Lima with her for another year while she attended Lima Community. The last thing she wanted was for Jesse to put his career on hold any longer than he already had, and the longer he believed that she loved him the longer he would stay. She had to lie to him to save his dreams.
"Rachel? My darling, are you okay?" Hiram's gentle voice caused Rachel to snap, almost violently out of her memory. Her body jumped just slightly, and she pulled her eyes away from the fresh fall snow out the window.
She didn't know why but this year she had decided to come for the holidays. It had been almost three years since she had last been home. Rachel always found a way to get her fathers to show up in New York, claiming that it wasn't possible with school or with work for her to leave.
"Of course," her reply came out faster and more defensive than she wished and Rachel had to quickly recollect herself in order to stop her dads' suspicion. "The snow. It's so much more beautiful to watch it fall in small towns like Lima, than in New York. All the cars and buses on the roads turn it into that black slush. Not so dreamy." Rachel hated lying to either of her fathers, but at the same time she had never spoken with either of them about the night she left Jesse. They never asked questions, almost as if they could tell their little girl was hurting.
"If you say so," Hiram offered gently but Rachel could hear the hesitation in his voice. "Would you be a dear and set the table? Shelby and Valerie will be here soon."
A very small smile began to play at the corners of Rachel's lips, and she nodded her head slightly. Before disappearing into the kitchen to gather the plates, the brunette leaned forward to place a soft kiss on her father's cheek. He didn't realize it, but he was saving her a world of heartbreak by not pushing the matter.
Rachel had admitted that she was confused when her fathers had announced to her upon her arrival that they were celebrating Christmas. Until it had been brought to her attention that they grown close with Shelby over the past few years and had been spending the holidays with her and Valerie. It took Rachel a while to process that her mother had truly replaced her, but her fathers assured her that Shelby still loved her.
As she placed the last fork next to her plate, Rachel heard the familiar sound of the doorbell. Her nerves seemed to hit her all at once and she had to take the moment to catch her breath. "I'll get it," she called out to her fathers who were both busy hustling around the kitchen.
Rachel straightened out the bottom of her black skirt as she padded through the dinning room towards the front door. She let the breath she hadn't realized she'd been holding, and wrapped her fingers around the cool doorknob. As she pulled open the front door, Rachel felt her breathing once again stop and her knees begin to wobble. "Je-Jesse" Her voice was barely above a whisper but she no doubt that he could hear her in the defining silence between the two of them. "What…what are you doing here?"