Of Moments in Time

Chapter 1

I don't hate Rachel Berry. To be quite honest, I have no opinion on her either way. I've never had a class with her, never made eye contact with her, never even had a conversation with her.

But I'm a Cheerio, and the Cheerios follow orders, be they from Coach or our boyfriends. And especially when they come from the mouth of our captain, Quinn. We're followers, not leaders. So when I'm told to snap off the heel of one of Rachel's shoes during gym…well, I do it with a smile and an evil giggle. Quinn is quite the genius when it comes to torturing McKinley High's resident drama queen. That was one of her better ideas; Rachel was forced to walk with an uneven limp for the rest of the day.

I guess you could say I'm a fan of power and the continuance of the status quo. Rachel Berry has to suffer so I can thrive. Que sera sera, and all that. In fact, I'm already third in command behind Quinn and Lara, and I only started cheerleading eight years ago. That's progress, right? Right.

Anyway, I don't know Rachel at all. All I know is that I'm supposed to tease her mercilessly and keep her at the bottom of the totem pole. Easy enough, and it keeps Quinn off my back. The glue-in-the-locker incident was a little extreme, but the results were classic and have been forever memorialized on Youtube; plus, now I'm internet-famous! And I wasn't a huge supporter of the rest of the squad when they stole those pictures of her dads that she worships in her locker. That was a little too mean for me. I never say anything, though. Why risk being the next Rachel Berry for Quinn Fabray?

However, I do know Finn. Intimately. But Quinn never needs to find out about that. You can't blame me for taking advantage of his increasing sexual frustration; what girl would pass up a drunken quarterback shoving his tongue down her throat? But even outside the corner bedroom of Shelley Pomroy's house, I know Finn Hudson. He's funny, sincere and a damn good football player. He's almost as dedicated to Quinn as I am (minus that minor incident), and he would never do anything to upset her.

Which is why I nearly swallowed my straw when I saw him dancing with that gay guy and that mildly attractive Special Ed kid in a rehearsal room on Wednesday. I believe my exact words were "GRAAAAaflllbt!" And then I coughed for a bit.

"Breathe, psycho," Quinn said as she smacked me on the back.

I leaned my elbows on my knees and took a deep lungful of air. "I…I'm good now." Quinn rolled her eyes and kept walking down the hall. Away from the rehearsal room. That was good; if she found out her boyfriend was hanging out with…those people, well, I'd never hear the end of it. 'He's supposed to love me,' she'd say. 'How could he do something so socially suicidal? Oh my god, do you think people will think I think it's okay? Ew, someone get me a macchiato.'

I straightened my back and hurried after her, stealing one last glance over my shoulder at the room. Rachel Berry sprinted down the hall carrying papers, and she didn't even notice me as she wrenched the door open and yelled something about getting out of her assigned room.

Shaking my head, I caught up to the rest of my friends. By lunch, I'd forgotten about it in the hubbub of Puck punching Andrew Murphy is the crotch.

"I'm getting it, god!" I sighed into my phone. The auditorium doors were already open, so I ran in, eyes peeled for Quinn's bright purple gym bag. The stage was still wet from our rain-covered shoes; I'm not quite sure why we didn't have our bad weather practice in the gym like we normally do, but Coach Sue was insistent that we use the theater. Something about Mr. Schuester, I think. The point was, Quinn had forgotten her stuff in the wings and I had been sent to fetch it. Typical.

I'd barely gotten backstage when the stage doors were thrown open and voices started echoing across the ceiling. I recognized one of them: Mercedes Jones was in my history class and she was always bitching about something or other. The rest were unfamiliar, and curiosity got the best of me. I poked my head out from behind the curtains.

I'm glad I didn't have a straw in my mouth.

Mercedes, along with a weird Asian chick, Rachel, Finn and the two kids he was dancing with yesterday, milled around the stage. The wetness made…Marty? Matty? Larry! The wetness made Larry's wheel's skid into a tailspin, and he went flying across the floorboards. Finn caught him with one hand and laughed softly.

"Slow down, Ricky Bobby," he said, grinning. He. Is. So. Hot.

"Why is the stage soaked?" Mercedes whined. "I will not ruin these shoes for Glee Club, no way."

Glee Club? They were starting that nonsense again? Oh, this is not good. Not for me, and certainly not for Quinn's blood pressure.

Mr. Schuester jogged in carrying a stack of sheet music. "Hey guys. I just got this music fresh from the copier, still warm." The gay kid grabbed some paper and rubbed it against his face. "Um. Anyway, I guess you've all met our newest member, Finn Hudson!" My mouth dropped open. "I know Arty and Kurt have already taught him some of the dance moves for this number, so let's see what we have."

The opening chords to You're The One That I Want floated across the room as they lined up, Rachel on one end and Finn on the other. What is going on? Alternate universe, you may see yourself out.

Finn opened his mouth and I watched in horror as up turned down, out became in and heart-shaped sunglasses stopped being ironic.

He was good. Like, super good. Weird. Rachel seemed to agree with my assessment because she smiled slightly and nodded once into her music. She looked back at him and the expression on her face was the same one I gave a pair of shoes that Quinn approved of. I felt almost like I was intruding on her moment, staring at her reactions the way I was. Which is totally bizarre because I don't care about how Rachel Berry feels.

Her papers floated to the ground as she threw them away and relaxed into the music. I'd never seen a Glee Club performance before, and hopefully this is as close as I get, but nonetheless, my toe was tapping annoyingly. Rachel's voice was much more controlled than Finn's, more professional, more Broadway. Still, they matched, in a weird kind of way.

Running her fingers through Gay Boy's hair, Rachel began a dramatic walk towards the boy at the end of the line. I couldn't see her face anymore, just the part of her legs revealed by her surprisingly cute skirt; Finn looked slightly intimidated. She made her way to his side, grabbed his hand and began the dance moves; Finn's expression didn't change much. As they moved to the beat, I felt my clench on Quinn's gym bag tighten but I don't really know why. The fact of the matter was, those two were breaking the rules. This was going to piss everyone off, and I didn't like how excited Rachel seemed at the prospect of having Finn as a partner. Even before he started singing, her eyebrows had gone up when he entered the auditorium and I'd seen her staring at him across the lunchroom once.

Mercedes cut the song off before they could finish and yelled something that I didn't really pay attention to. The group began to shuffle back into formation; I decided that I didn't want to see any more.

Still, as I turned away to exit out the wings, I saw Finn examine at the hand Rachel had grasped and frown when he thought no one was looking.

I was looking.