STAND MY GROUND BY JESSA
RATING/GENRE: M/Hurt/Comfort & Suspense
FANDOM/CHARACTERS: Glee/Finchel, Puckleberry friendship
SUMMARY: After witnessing the brutal murder of her parents, Rachel is sent to live with the Puckerman family in Lima. With fear and horrific memories as her constant companions, will she be able to move on with her life?
DISCLAIMER: Rachel, Finn and all things Glee are the property of Fox. Sadly I do not own them. If I did, Rachel and Finn would make-out ALL THE DAMN TIME. This is also a very loose take on the movie Prom Night... minus the Prom. The title and lyrics at the beginning are from "Stand My Ground" by Within Temptation.
AUTHOR'S NOTE: I apologize if this story idea seems lame but I couldn't help myself. It was begging to be written! This is my first multi-chaptered attempt at writing in a long time so you should also know that sometimes takes me a while to update. My muse is, at times, not all-together cooperative. Hope you enjoy!
Stand my ground, I won't give in
No more denying, I've got to face it
Won't close my eyes and hide the truth inside
If I don't make it, someone else will
Stand my ground
Nothing seemed out of sorts when Rachel Berry came home from a long evening of volunteering at the local animal shelter. She unlocked the door and laid her keys in the dish on the table near the door, just as she always did. The soft sounds of Frank Sinatra – her daddy's favorite – filtered through the house, probably from the stereo in the kitchen. He loved to listen to music while he cooked dinner. Her stomach rumbled quietly as she wondered what he was making.
"Daddy? Dad? I'm home!" she called cheerily.
The lack of a response was her first clue that something wasn't quite right.
Her brows knitted together as she made her way towards the kitchen at the back of the house. As expected, it was the little stereo on the counter that was the source of the music permeating the air, but she was discouraged to find the kitchen empty. Supplies for dinner were laid out, waiting to be transformed into something edible. Someone had even started chopping up carrots and green onions, which now lay abandoned on the cutting board.
Rachel's heart began to pick up pace. She tried to ignore the sinking feeling in her gut and climbed the stairs with perhaps more care than usual. Her steps were hesitant, the subconscious fear of what she might find waiting for her upstairs forcing her to take her time.
Her bedroom door was open, soft light flooding out into the otherwise dark hallway. All the other doors were closed, which was unusual to say the least. As she drew closer to her room, something caught her eye. Peeking out from behind her bed was someone's leg, as if there were a person lying on her floor.
Then she noticed an angry red smear marring her plush carpet.
Blood.
Rachel froze in the middle of the hall, terror sweeping through her body and causing the hair on the back of her neck to stand on end. Her head snapped up when she heard the sound of breaking glass, like a vase falling off a table, followed immediately by the dull thud of flesh hitting flesh.
"She's not here!" she heard her daddy yell. "I swear!"
She had to clap a hand to her mouth to keep from crying out.
"Where is she then?" came another voice; this one gruff, desperate and familiar.
The sound of it made her blood run cold.
The commotion was coming from behind the door to her fathers' study and she could hear heavy footsteps coming towards the door. Instinctively, she searched for a place to hide herself, having only split seconds to do so.
She threw herself into the linen closet on her right, managing to shut the door in the nick of time. She sunk to the floor, pulling her legs tightly against her chest as she tried her hardest not to make a sound. Tears flowed down her face, hot and unrelenting, but she kept her sobs trapped safely in her throat.
"You shouldn't have tried to keep us apart! Nothing, nothing can keep her from me! We're meant to be together…"
Rachel shivered and bit back a whimper. He was crazy, absolutely mental.
"You won't be coming within a hundred feet of her daughter ever again, you lunatic," she heard her daddy say, his voice filled with conviction in spite of his situation. She ached with the desire to leave her hiding spot and do something, anything, to help him but she knew he wouldn't want her to put herself in danger.
There was a short laugh, one that held no mirth whatsoever, and then the wet sound of a blade slicing through skin again and again and again. Something heavy fell against the door of the closet and Rachel couldn't stop herself from crying out any longer.
Seconds later the door to her hiding place was ripped open and the hulking form of Dustin Goolsby stood in the frame, a triumphant smile plastered across his face.
He'd found his prize.
"I told you I'd be back for you, Rach," he said, his tone shifting to one of eerie tenderness.
He looked different than the last time she'd laid eyes on him. The past couple of months had obviously not been good to him, if the disheveled state of his appearance was anything to go by. The man she remembered had taken great pride in his clothes and hair; seeing him so unkempt only added to the horror snowballing inside of her.
"N-no," she gasped out. "You're not s-supposed to be here!"
"I know your dads didn't approve of us but you don't have to worry about them anymore, baby. We can be together now without anything standing in our way."
"What did you do?" she demanded, her tears coming on even more heavily now. "What did you do to my dads?"
"Only what I had to…" Dustin replied and stepped aside.
Rachel's daddy lay on the floor behind him, lifeless and pale, with blood seeping from multiple gashes in his chest.
An earth-shattering scream ripped through the air and for the first time since he'd found her, Dustin appeared distressed.
"Now don't be that way, baby. They made me do this."
"You're insane! I've never loved you! I hate you!" Rachel cried hysterically.
A dark shadow passed over Dustin's face, his dark, sunken eyes turning steely and merciless.
"You're just upset. I understand. You'll have plenty of time to get over it on the drive to our new home," he said in a low growl. "You're going to love it there."
Rachel rocked back and forth, shaking her head in denial. He reached down to try and pull her to her feet and her survival instincts kicked in with full force. She scratched, bit and slapped every part of his body that she could reach.
Unfortunately he was a fully-grown man and she was a teenage girl, a small one at that, and not even adrenaline gave her a chance of overpowering him.
"We were made for each other, Rachel. You'll see," he murmured in her ear.
And then everything went black.
Dr. Fairchild's office was always cold. Slumped on the long leather couch reserved for patients, Rachel tightened her arms further around herself, fingers clutching at the coarse brown wool of the over-sized sweater she was wearing.
"You've come a long way in the past few months, Rachel," her doctor was saying. "I think you're ready to get out into the real world again and starting living your life. A smart, talented girl like you shouldn't be cooped up in here."
Rachel's head snapped up, her brown eyes wide and frightened.
"Leave?" she asked, her voice barely above a whisper.
The thought terrified her. At least in a big facility like The Lennox Center, she felt a modicum of safety. There were orderlies and security guards standing between her and the outside world. The only way Dustin could get to her in there was in her recurring nightmares, which had thankfully been getting fewer and further between.
She knew he was locked up in a maximum-security prison for the criminally insane, serving a life sentence for the murder of her parents, but she had countless dreams about him breaking out of that place and finding her again. She spent a great deal of time glancing over her shoulder, waiting for him to return and finish what he started.
The idea of simply going back out into the world and trying to carry on like a normal person was completely foreign to her. She was aware that she supposed to be working towards that goal - hence the intensive therapy she was receiving at Lennox Center - and yet a part of her hadn't entertained the possibility of it happening so soon.
How was she going to eat breakfast and go to school and just live like any other teenager? Every moment of her life was tainted by fear, no matter how hard she worked to bury it.
"Yes," Dr. Fairchild replied patiently. "I'm happy with your progress and of course, you'll still come to see me twice a week for the next few months, but I think you're ready. Only time can heal the wounds you have, sweetheart."
Rachel sighed, turning her attention to the sunny day just beyond the big window behind Dr. Fairchild's desk. She hadn't been outside in a very long time. It would be nice to sleep in a real room, one without standard issue hospital bedding, and eat food that didn't come from a cafeteria.
Maybe it was the first step in feeling like a human being again.
"Okay," she said after a moment.
Her doctor looked genuinely pleased with her response.
"You're a strong young woman, Rachel. I think you're going to be just fine."
Rachel managed a faint smile, hoping against all hope that the older woman was right.
"Dude… what are you doing?"
Finn Hudson had been restocking the giant shelf of hand soaps in Sheets and Things when he noticed his best friend poking around in the sheet section, picking up sheet sets in varying shades of pink with his nose wrinkled distastefully.
Noah Puckerman, known more often than not as just Puck, also worked at Sheets and Things but it was his day off and Finn knew that no teenage boy came to a home decorating store of his own free will without a damn good reason.
Puck jumped slightly when he heard his friend's voice, dropping the package of sheets in his hand as if it had burned him.
"What does it look like I'm doing? I'm shopping for sheets," he replied testily.
"Yeah, the pink ones with the flowers will go great with your Playboy posters," Finn said.
Puck shoved his shoulder and then returned to sifting through the bin in front of him.
"They're not for me, asshole. They're for my cousin. Apparently she's coming to live with us."
"Seriously? Which cousin is that?" Finn asked, his interested piqued at this new development.
"Rachel Berry. I think you met her at that huge barbecue we had a couple summers ago," Puck said.
He finally settled on a set of striped sheets in pinks and purples. With a shrug he tucked them under his arm and turned fully towards Finn.
"Is that the really short one who chewed my ear off for like half an hour because I tried to cheat at lawn darts?"
"That would be the one."
Finn could remember Rachel Berry with strange clarity, considering he could barely recall what he had for breakfast. Then again, her affinity for clothes with woodland creatures on them and her knack for talking everyone's ears off made her sort of hard to forget.
"Well, that should be fun," he said with a little chuckle.
To his surprise, Puck's facial expression turned deadly serious.
"I doubt it, man. She's not the same as she was back then…"
Finn's eyes narrowed in confusion. "What do you mean?"
"She's been through a lot. I don't know all the details, 'cause my mom seems to think I'm still eight or something, but she watched her dads get killed by one of her teachers and then he kidnapped her and kept her holed up in this creepy house for like two days before she got away. It's some heavy shit, man," Puck told him, exhaling loudly.
"Jesus…" Finn said, unable to come up with a better response. There really were some sick-ass people in the world.
"I know. You can't tell anyone that though. My mom told me not to say anything because she wants Rachel to be able to start with a 'clean slate', like someone ever really forgets shit like that."
"Yeah, man," Finn agreed easily. "Anything I can do."
"Thanks, dude. I guess you'll meet her again on Monday at school. Ma will probably make me take her with me everywhere, at least until she gets settled in and stuff," Puck said, not looking as annoyed with the prospect of having a new best friend as he normally would have. "I've gotta get these sheets home pronto though, 'cause she'll be here in like an hour."
After a fist bump, Puck took off in the direction of the checkout line, leaving Finn to his thoughts.
He visibly shuttered when he imagined Rachel Berry going through all that. She was stubborn and strong-willed sure, but she was so tiny… He really didn't want to think about some psycho carting her around like a doll; a piece in some sick game he played in his head. He thought that kind of thing only happened in horror movies.
"That is messed up," he said to himself, returning once more to the wall of hand soaps.