A/N: I wrote this months ago but just got around to sharing it here. One-Shot.

Ep.2: Showmance

Stolen Scene: Focus

Intro: After the glee club performed at the assembly, Finn and Rachel were shown practicing in the auditorium. They ended up kissing, but Finn saw his vision of the mailman again and ran out on Rachel.

"Please don't tell anybody about this," Finn stammers as he speed walks to stage right, still pulling his shirt down to hide his embarrassment.

Rachel was too stunned to even follow Finn with her eyes. She cups her face as she began to cry. This was a different feeling to her. She has cried a thousand times, probably, in her short life—reasons ranged from her parents not giving her what she wants to orders from directors in auditions she'd tried out—but never feeling the way she did at that very moment.

"So stupid," she mumbles to herself.

Her tear ducts won't cooperate today, she thought. Stop! She screamed to herself in her head. Stop crying Rachel! This only made her cry harder. Her sobbing echoed in the empty auditorium.

This is ridiculous! She thought as she lifted her head and scraped the tears off her face. As quickly as her body would allow her, she positioned herself to stand up. But, the best she could do was to kneel as her hands rested on her lap and tears began to flow again.

Rachel let her weakness take over her will and decided to give herself a couple more minutes to calm down as she repeated personal mantras to herself: Focus on your goals, Rachel. You're a star, act like one. Rejection is but the fuel that gives you more drive, Rachel. You're very talented, Rachel, that's what counts.

Finn slammed the auditorium door open, welcomed by the afternoon sun as it readied to set. He stopped a few feet from his exit and bent down, resting his hands on his knees. He stared at the concrete pavement as he breathed.

Rachel, he thought as he inhaled. Rachel, when he exhaled.

He straightened and looked back at the now closed door he had burst out from. He wanted to go back. Finn knew Rachel had begun to cry as soon as he was behind the curtains. I'm sorry. I'm sorry!

I'M SORRY, RACHEL! He screamed in his head as if it mattered. As if she was ever going to hear him that way. He took one step towards the door.

"Finn!" A soprano tone called to him from afar. Instinctively, he turned to look.

Quinn, several yards away, waved to him. She began to flutter towards him; and as if an invisible force controlled his body, Finn walked to her. They met half way and he was greeted with a kiss from her cheerleader, president of the Celibacy Club, blonde girlfriend.

"What are you doing?" she asked, referring to his close proximity to the auditorium.

Finn stared at her for a second before realizing that he didn't know which lie, of the many possible lies, he was going to say. "I just—"

Quinn's suspicious eyes searched his eyes but decided not to probe. "No matter. Let's go to my place. My parents are coming home late. I have pizza money."

Finn smiled and nodded, "Yeah, that's cool." She took his arm as they began to walk away.

Finn felt the urge to look back just to see if Rachel had already come out of the auditorium, but only managed a 45 degree neck movement before he turned to look straight ahead. He had Quinn beside her. It's only fair to her that I give her my full focus. She is my girlfriend after all.

When her shoulders stopped shaking, Rachel stood and began to pick up all the things she'd set up on the stage for their little picnic. Tears spilled over occasionally and stained the red throw pillows, but she didn't stop cleaning up. She took the mat and pillows backstage where she had borrowed it for that afternoon.

When she got back on stage, she fixed her things slowly and with precision, making sure that everything is in order. Rachel can't help but think about that little scene she and Finn had played out as she tidied up. She's never felt that kind of vulnerability. A hundred rejections from casting directors, though it stabbed her dreams and aspirations and left stains in her morale, were easy as Sunday compared to that. It was horrible, to say the least.

With her bag slung to her shoulder, she walked slowly down from the stage, along the aisle where she was ushered by empty seats towards the exit that would lead her back to the school halls. It was empty and quiet, of course. And it did nothing but allowed the loneliness to linger.

She passed by the empty choir room, with her eyes fixed straight, blank. Suddenly, she felt bad for Finn. And, unconsciously, she lifted her chin.

He's too much of a coward to admit it. To admit that he likes me. It must be hard to hide out like that: so afraid to take proudly the things he like because he's too worried about what other people would say.

She pondered on how much convincing had to be done for Finn to rejoin the Glee Club when he realized that Mr. Schuester was leaving. Even now that he's committed himself to juggling football and Glee Club, Rachel can still feel his aversion to the image of the group.

He thinks too much of his image. Too much, that he would sacrifice what he loved. Rachel stopped before the closed door of the school entrance.

"I get laughed at because I update my MySpace page with videos of myself," she shrugged, comparing how much more terrible she had it.

If Finn was too fearful to stand up for what he loved—music, singing—what more for what he only liked?

Rachel shook her head. I can't keep thinking about this. There are much more important things to consider. She pushed the door open and instinctively looked to the sky as she made a declaration to herself: I have to focus on my career.