summary: 'Quinn fights to breathe and she fights to move, but she somehow manages then walks out of Rachel's little apartment. In the Bible, they talk about the Rapture, the last day of Earth. This might as well be it.' College, break!up super-angsty fic. But Faberry is endgame, always.
an (1): this is really, really angsty. yeah. so apologies in advance for all the feels, but it needed to be written in my head. also, i promise with all of my heart that it has a happy ending. also, reviews are awesome, so you should leave one. merci! :)
an (2): recommended listening: "emmylou" by first aid kit.
an (3): this fic is dedicated to tourist season, because she gave me the idea and recc'd the music. so you all owe her. a lot. :)
with your eyes alone
.
all ashes, all ashes again
...
one. creation glistening backwards to the same grave, size of universe, size of the tick of the hospital's clock on the archway over the white door—
.
"Iowa?" Rachel asks. Her eyes are downcast and her voice is small.
"Yeah." Quinn's voice is low, a whisper, almost silent beneath the thud of her heartbeat. "They have the best Creative Writing MFA program in the world."
"And they want you to go there?"
"Yeah," Quinn mumbles again. "And I know we talked about how hard it was getting because we're in this long distance relationship and everything, even though New Haven's really not that far, so—" Quinn trails off as Rachel climbs out from her bed, standing with her back to Quinn. She's wearing one of Quinn's Yale t-shirts and nothing else, and the lights of the city make her a mere outline, black and shadowed, when she walks and presses her hand to the window. Her posture is uncertain—Quinn can tell after almost four years of being together.
It's the thing Quinn knows: There are seconds that have changed everything, mere tiny lapses of time, and this is one of them.
"You have to go," Rachel says.
Quinn sits up in bed. "I don't want to."
Rachel shakes her head, turning around, tipping her head back against the window. "You have to go."
Quinn swallows. "I applied to programs here. They're great schools, Rach, I mean, really, really wonderful, and I can write from anywhere, really, and I want to be—"
"—Don't," Rachel says. Her eyes are glassy. "You can't do it for me."
"But I—"
"Quinn," Rachel says, then sits down on the bed, takes Quinn's hand. Rachel's shaking. "You're so much better than that."
"I'm not better than you."
"You're better than staying somewhere for me."
Quinn bites her bottom lip. "You're not a consolation prize."
Rachel's lungs rattle with her next deep breath. "I can't do this. We can't."
Quinn's voice raises and octave. Her skin flushes in panic. "No. Rachel, I—"
Rachel shakes her head. "I'm—you have to—I won't let you make the same mistake I almost did."
"This isn't the same thing."
Rachel looks down. "It's not," she agrees. "But it's still your future, and I can't keep just seeing you twice a month because that isn't fair to either of us, but you—this is an opportunity you've always wanted and I have to—you have to go." It's different then before, more immediate, and its meaning is entirely concrete.
"Please don't," Quinn whispers, and Rachel presses an exquisitely gentle kiss to Quinn's lips.
"I can't do this to you."
"Rachel." It's a plea, desperate and painful. "People have long distance relationships all the time and—"
"I'm sorry," Rachel whispers.
"I love you," Quinn says.
"Oh, Quinn." Rachel turns towards the window again, her shoulders sinking.
"Please."
"I'll leave so you can get your stuff," Rachel says to the window, her voice heavy with unshed tears, making a little blur of condensation against the winter outside.
And then she does, and Quinn fights to breathe and she fights to move, but she somehow manages and throws a few of her clothes into her bag, and then walks out of Rachel's little apartment. In the Bible, they talk about the Rapture, the last day of Earth.
This might as well be it.
Rachel's sitting on the floor in the hallway, crying. Quinn says, "Rachel, please, we can try to—"
"—Goodbye, Quinn," Rachel whispers.
In the elevator, Quinn loses it, a huge sob making its way as a tsunami through her entire body. She punches the metal wall with her left hand.
Thirteen minutes later, as Quinn sits numbly in the back of a cab, she gets a text from Santana: Call me, bitch.
And New York is a blur and Quinn has to leave, so she does.
"I saw Rachel's relationship status on Facebook," Santana says as way of greeting.
Quinn can't think of anything to say.
Santana asks, "Are you okay?"
Quinn says, "I think I broke my hand."
...
(It feels like this:
When she wakes up in a white room with white walls and a white ceiling, when she wakes up with her sister slumped over by her stomach, clinging to her hand, asleep, when she wakes up but can't really wake up, the first thing she remembers is Rachel.
And then things hurt, tidal waves rushing over shores, tearing apart buildings and sweeping everything up in their flood.
So she groans in an attempt to say Frannie or Help or even Jesus fucking Christ, this hurts so much, and her sister shoots up, sees Quinn's face, and immediately says, "I'll page the nurses."
They give her morphine, lots of it, and everything is dull and uncertain. But her chest still hurts, throbs with the pulse of an ocean, and she knows that that has nothing whatsoever to do with a goddamn car accident.)
...
two. —and here i lay naked in the dark, dreaming
.
Some days are better than others. Quinn does well in classes still—by now, she could probably teach them all herself—and she's still kind to the interns working for Old Lady in Brown, Yale's literary magazine of which she's the undergrad editor, thanking them when they turn in their weekly slush reports on time and when they bring her coffee or invite her to small indie shows around town.
Some days, she gets up and doesn't notice the way her hand aches—although her cast had been removed a few weeks earlier—or the way her legs still can't feel like they had before, or the way there are picture frames with no pictures in them anymore all over her apartment.
Or the pretty April day she's sitting in the little office in the English department and she hears Rachel on the radio for the first time.
Or when she gets acceptance letters from the MFA programs at Brown. And Cornell. And Syracuse. And NYU.
Or when graduation comes and, as she turns to look out at the crowd, she can find only her mother, and her sister, and her brother-in-law, and her niece, and Santana and Brittany.
She gets so caught up in the pressure of inadequacy in that moment that she forgets to throw her cap.
At night she lays by herself in the bed. She hasn't changed the sheets yet (although, hygienically, it kind of does gross her out a little bit), because Rachel's smell is still on the left side—her side—and when she closes her eyes hard enough, she can almost still feel Rachel wrapped up in her limbs.
But the morning is always a jolt.
She spends the night after graduation getting hammered with Santana and Brittany at her apartment, and, when she wakes up sometime around 4:32 a.m., she pukes all over the bed.
She stares for a while before grudgingly throwing the sheets in the washing machine. Quinn cries for the entire cycle.
.
(It feels like this:
In her dreams, her legs still move. She can still dance and walk and run and flip and cartwheel and—Jesus—just stand.
But reality isn't like that. Instead it's degrading and frustrating and sometimes infuriating, because she needs help to do everything, like going to the bathroom or taking a shower or even getting out of bed. She can't even get dressed by herself.
So every single time she wakes up, she has to fight back the sickening urge to wish she hadn't.)
...
three. i'll go to walk the street, who'll find me in the night, in lima
.
Quinn gets a summer internship with Literary Review, so she moves to London for two months. It's far, and for a while she lets herself enjoy the city, and allowing some of her other interns to show her the surrounding (beautiful) countryside. And she enjoys her work, she does. She even rents a little apartment with Mark, who is some strange and lovely mix of Kurt and Neil Patrick Harris. They bond over awful Chinese takeout and film noir on Quinn's Netflix and the best tea she's ever had. They talk a little about past loves, but they're in different stages of relationships, really. When Mark brings guys over, Quinn simultaneously grins, introduces, and excuses herself, then spends a few hours writing or reading at the coffee shop down the street, or visiting the park, or casually shopping.
Things, for a while, are good.
But then a bunch of interns take the Chunnel to Paris one Friday afternoon, and it's perfect and wonderful and it tears each valve and atrium and ventricle of Quinn's heart apart when she stands alone at the base of the Eiffel Tower.
So she does what she's always known how to do, in one form or another. And instead of calling Santana, or her sister, or her roommate (and wonderful friend) from Yale, or telling Mark to stop her, she gets drunk, and she hits on a beautiful, long-legged French woman at a club they visit that night.
She gets really drunk, and they have sex in the bathroom.
When she wakes up the next morning (or afternoon) in their tiny apartment, back in London, and sees a few hickeys on her neck, scratches down her back, she sobs.
"Oh, honey," Mark says, then wraps her up in a hug.
It doesn't make her feel any better, but it counts anyway. She doesn't make him let go.
.
(It feels like this:
"So, it's really nice outside today, and we should go for a walk," Santana says from the stiff chair next to Quinn's hospital bed.
And in that moment Quinn can't breathe, and her face falls, and Santana's eyes grow large and she says, "Oh, Q, I'm so sorry. I didn't even—I didn't mean it like that, and I—"
Quinn shakes her head, but her face still crumples and before she can even realize what's happening, Santana's nimbly scrambling up into the bed with her, sitting on the IV line which tugs against Quinn's arm, hugging her so fiercely a lead stuck to Quinn's chest disconnects from its little plastic connection to the heart rate monitor.
Santana's legs press against Quinn's, and Santana's hug does nothing to take away the blinding, unfathomable fear that comes the second Quinn can't feel them, but she cries into Santana's shoulder anyway.)
...
four. my thirst in my cheeks and tongue back throat drive me home
.
Quinn doesn't actually end up going to Iowa, because it just feels so tainted already. Instead she accepts her spot at Brown (and it's ranked fourth nationally in MFA programs, so it certainly doesn't feel like settling).
Santana hesitantly gives her updates on Rachel if Quinn asks, and she tries not to.
She settles into a little life there that's comfortable: she teaches two undergrad Intro to Creative Writing courses and takes a decently heavy course-load herself, and she even meets a few guys in her program that play in an indie folk band, so she joins them, bringing along her battered, vintage acoustic guitar that she'd long since learned to play during her time at Yale.
She writes a lot.
And then one day, at a works in progress live-reading, Quinn reads part of a short story. It's a hit, and people come up to congratulate her afterward, some of them her students, some her classmates, some her mentors.
One very pretty woman lingers behind them all. Finally, she walks up to Quinn. She's young, probably Quinn's age, and has on a pair of skinny jeans and a blouse, flats, an infinity scarf. She's almost as tall as Quinn. Her skin is caramel-colored and her eyes are a shade or two darker than Santana's, and she has short, curly black hair.
"I'm Emma," she says.
Quinn smiles.
They start talking a little—Emma's a second-year med student; she wants to work in pediatrics; she's originally from Portland; she likes The Smiths—and then Quinn asks, "Why'd you come tonight? I mean, it's awesome and everything, but these types of things usually only attract weird English people."
"Are you calling yourself weird?"
"Oh, you have no idea."
Emma laughs. It's nice. "In all honesty? I knew you'd be here."
Quinn's heart beats a little faster.
"This is going to sound creepy, but you know my friend Jacob, and I've seen you in the library a few times and—you're beautiful."
Quinn bites her bottom lip. "Do you want to get dinner or something?"
Emma beams. "That sounds great."
.
They go on a few dates before they sleep together. It's simple and gentle and uncomplicated.
Quinn stays the night.
.
"I love you," Emma says.
"Me too," Quinn tells her, because it's not quite the same thing as saying it back.
.
They've been dating for exactly two months, four days, twenty-three hours, and seven minutes when Quinn says Rachel's name as her body breaks under Emma's hand.
.
"Quinn?"
"Yeah?"
Emma squeezes Quinn's hand. They're both on their backs in bed, in the dark, staring at the ceiling of Quinn's apartment. "You're in love with someone else."
"I don't want to be."
Emma laughs once, completely without amusement. "You're way more than she deserves. Just, don't forget that."
Quinn cries a little and Emma holds her. They spoon and cuddle until the next morning, when Emma gets up and gets dressed.
They kiss once—it tastes sweet but it tastes like an intermission, an interim—and after Quinn says, "You'll find an amazing, smart, beautiful girl to spend your life with. You deserve everything."
"So do you."
"I'm sorry I couldn't be that for you."
Emma nods, smiling a little sadly. "Me too."
Quinn hugs her. "Bye, Em."
"Bye, Quinn."
Santana's faithful text comes eleven minutes later: I saw on Facebook. You know the drill.
Quinn calls her immediately. "Do you just stalk me all the time, or what?"
She's sure Santana's rolling her eyes. "How's your hand?"
Quinn laughs. "Perfectly fine," she says. She doesn't cry at all.
...
(It feels like this:
She walks again just before Nationals. Not well enough to dance, but it doesn't really matter in the moment that she's on stage, because there's Rachel—a newly single Rachel—singing, singing.
Quinn stands when they get backstage, only for a few seconds, but long enough to hug Rachel—first—and it's the first time since February 21 that Quinn can breathe.)
...
five. in the morning: and back to my visions, i'll return to new york
.
Quinn has a voicemail after she finishes teaching a class. It's February 21, and it's been five years, and when Quinn sees the name flashing across her screen, her heart spins like a top in the middle of her chest.
Her hands shake and she has to sit down on a bench before she can play the message. Into her ear, she hears silence for seventeen and a half heartbeats before Rachel's voice says, "Hi, Quinn. I—How're you today? That's a stupid question," she reprimands herself, and it simultaneously makes Quinn laugh a little and also cry. "I—Today's hard for me too and I always think of you." There's a long pause, and then, "I think of you all the time actually. I see you everywhere." Rachel sighs, and Quinn presses a hand to her mouth. "I don't want to need you," Rachel says, and Quinn imagines the earth opening up and swallowing her whole. "But I miss you," Rachel continues. "I've never stopped."
And then the message is over, and Quinn slowly puts down her phone. She sits on the bench for forty-two minutes before googling flights to New York.
.
Kurt texts Quinn the address immediately as she hurries off the plane at JFK. It's kind of a (very) flawed plan, because—although Quinn keeps up with Rachel via Santana and Kurt and sometimes even Puck—she really never asks details, like if Rachel's dating anyone, or what exactly Rachel is doing this Tuesday evening.
Quinn hasn't been back to the city in a little over a year, but she hails a cab like a pro and tells him Rachel's address brusquely.
And then—much too quickly and slowly at once—Quinn's standing outside Rachel's apartment. She takes a deep breath before knocking.
She's not even sure Rachel's home before she hears a few footsteps.
And then the door opens—and Quinn kind of forgets how to do anything in that moment, she's so nervous—and there's Rachel, in a Yale t-shirt and an oversized cardigan and jeans, barefoot, her hair pulled back into a messy bun, her bangs grown out.
For a split second, Quinn's glad she'd gotten a haircut a few days ago (mostly due to Santana's scoffed insistence nine days ago over Skype) and that she'd remembered to put on some makeup this morning and had happened to wear one of her prettiest dresses today, because, god, Rachel's beautiful.
"Hi," Quinn says.
"Quinn," Rachel says.
"Yeah. Hi," she says again, cringing slightly.
But then Rachel smiles—an actual smile, the one that Quinn remembers—and says, "It's so good to see you."
"You too." It's the most truthful thing Quinn's said in over a year.
"Do you want to come in?" Rachel asks, stepping aside.
"Yes."
.
They talk, nothing more. They lay on Rachel's bed and talk about everything, about Broadway and The Beatles and Quinn's latest poetry collection. They talk about Emma and they talk about other people, too, and it's a painful thing but it's needed.
They talk about Brown. They talk about Beth.
They talk until they both fall asleep, but, before that, they talk about tomorrows.
.
In the morning, they wake up entangled in each other's limbs.
"Quinn?"
"What?"
"Would you—" Rachel sits up, and Quinn's heart sinks. "Would you like to get breakfast together?"
Quinn smiles. "Can we go somewhere with bacon?"
.
They stand outside Rachel's apartment.
"You know, I only have a year of school at Brown left," Quinn says. "And I've been thinking about pursing a PhD at Columbia."
Rachel smiles. "I hear that's a great school."
"Me too."
Rachel moves forward a fraction of an inch then, and Quinn meets her without any hesitation. They kiss. Because Rachel is learning to walk again, and Rachel is coming out to her mom, and Rachel is writing, and Rachel is burning up and disappearing and rising again and again and again from ashes, and Rachel is home.
"It's in New York," Quinn says, breathless.
Rachel beams. "That it is."
.
(It feels like this:
At a little park by Quinn's house early in the summer, their share their first kiss, which is the simplest, most right thing Quinn has ever done, because Rachel's hands and lips burn every inch of Quinn's body and finally, her walls are gone. She exists—a signal, moving into the sky, a beacon—as smoke.
They break the kiss to breathe, and then Rachel starts laughing a little. She leans against Quinn as they sit under a tree in the park.
Quinn asks, "What's so funny?"
"We're going to be kind of like high school sweethearts, you know."
Quinn smiles, because Rachel's already thinking of forever.
Quinn says, "I've known that for years."
references. (as this is angst-filled, i thought allen ginsberg poetry was somewhat appropriate).
.
title. "Hymmnn"
quote. "On Neal's Ashes"
one. "Hymmnn"
two. "Many Loves"
three. "Aether"
four. "Vulture Peak: Gridhakuta Hill"
five. "The Green Automobile"