Everybody's Got Plans (Until They Get Hit)
This story belongs to Susan who won it in the Support Stacie auction. Hope you think this response to your prompt was worth it!
Credit for the title goes to Mike Tyson. (Yes, Mike Tyson.)
Part One:
Some people like having lots of options. They like the freedom of not knowing what is going to happen and the uncertainty of a wide open future.
Rachel Berry is not one of those people.
There has never been in a moment in her life when she didn't know who she was and what she wanted to be. There is no mystery or ambiguity regarding the path of her life. Everything she does is driven by her passion to be seen, to be heard and most of all to be famous.
There are no maybes in the life of Rachel Berry.
She thought when she met Finn that he was just one more meant to be milestone along her path. What could be a better story for future press junket interviews than a tale of first love with the high school quarterback? But then Finn got Quinn pregnant and Rachel found herself making out with Puck for a few lovely days but then breaking up with him because of her feelings for Finn even though he could never be with her because of the baby but then unbelievably it turned out that Puck was really the one who got Quinn pregnant and that made Rachel feel kind of sick inside too and the whole thing just got completely confusing and muddled and when did her life turn into such a dramatic run-on sentence?
The bottom line is that Rachel Berry does not do muddled.
So when Finn finally asks her out once the aftermath of babygate calms down, she beams at him, says "YES!" and thinks to herself that she is finally on her path again.
Detours with mohawks are a thing of the past. Definitely.
*********
Dating Finn is everything Rachel thought it would be. He's sweet and kind and just so tall. He's such a leader in everything he does. There's no question that Finn is her perfect match.
(Even if some people claim that she sounds like a "lame-ass internet dating ad" when she talks like that.)
And yes, sometimes Finn might stare at Quinn's growing stomach a little too long....or buy Rachel a cherry slushy instead of grape....but at least he's making an effort.
(Cherry is Quinn's favorite flavor, by the way. Rachel knows this because Noah mentioned it one time because he thought it was "hilariously ironic". Rachel tried to explain that he'd just made a very common error about the word irony that had been propagated by a ridiculous Alanis Morissette song, but Noah walked off before she could finish.)
Sure, Finn might not have yet completely recovered from what happened with his previous girlfriend, but the fact that their relationship isn't perfect is what makes it perfect. When something has flaws that means it's real.
(Someone asked her last week why she was so obsessed with perfection. Can you imagine? As if striving for the best could ever be a bad thing! She still doesn't understand why he got so annoyed when she told him that she could never settle for anything less than the best.)
Rachel Berry is Finn Hudson's girlfriend. The world is as it should be.
***********
They celebrate their one month anniversary by going bowling. The setting is both romantic and sentimental and later that night Rachel lets Finn get to second base as a form of celebration.
(Earlier, she could have sworn that she saw Puck in the snack bar at the bowling alley. How many mohawks in Lima could there be? But when she texted him to see what he's doing -- while Finn is in the bathroom, of course -- he replied that he was in Chang's basement playing video games. Then he asked her if she was finally going to let Hudson get a hand down her pants for their anniversary. She didn't reply.)
***********
Finn asks her to the Spring Formal a week later. She's excited until he mentions that they are going to double with Puck and his date. When Finn asks her why she looks so mad, Rachel tells him that she's not mad -- just nervous about her first big formal. He grins at her, tells her that she's cute and gives her a kiss.
(Noah didn't mention that he had asked anyone to the dance last night during their online chat OR during their morning text message exchange in homeroom. She wonders why this annoys her and then she wonders who he asked and then she wonders why she cares.)
She goes shopping for a dress with Tina and Brittany (a strange little friendship that no one else in Glee seems to have noticed except Rachel). They try on lots of dresses and eat lunch at the food court and giggle until tears run down their cheeks. Rachel starts to feel like she's in one of those musical montage scenes in a high school movie. And even though the dress she found is nowhere near as lovely as she'd imagined, and the only shoes that fit her don't match the dress exactly, she still thinks this may be the best afternoon she's ever had.
(She writes a long text telling Noah about her amazing day but catches herself right before she hits send. Frowning, she changes the phone number in the "TO" window to Finn's and refuses to dwell on it. When all she gets back from Finn is a text message that reads "Sounds Cool", she frowns and wishes she hadn't sent it to him either.)
***********
Two days before the formal, Finn asks Rachel if they can talk. He tells her that he likes her, that she's amazing and that any guy would be crazy not to want her. (She wonders why it is that the "crazy" guys who don't want you are the only ones who ever say that.) He explains that he just isn't over what happened with Quinn, that he feels like he's not being fair and that he just needs to be on his own for a while.
Rachel wonders if Finn read a book about cliches to tell a girl when you are breaking up with her. She wonders if he really thinks he will stay single for more than two weeks. She wonders if she was just too much for him. But most of all, she wonders why he couldn't have broken up with her the day after the formal.
(Puck sends her a "Hudson is an asshole" text later that day. She assumes he's heard about the breakup. Rachel knows he doesn't mean it, but the text makes her smile anyway.)
***********
She goes to the dance (with a date -- maybe the one she should have had all along) and thinks that maybe the point of planning your life is to help you see the detours that you really should take.
Part Two:
People who always know what they want freak Puck the fuck out. Cause seriously .... how can you go through life with a schedule and goals and all that shit without getting bored out of your mind? The truth is, most people say they have goals and plans and dreams -- but Puck can tell you right now that 90% of them won't do shit about any of them. They'll sit around playing video games and talking to people they've never met on the internet and watching The Real World all the while talking a big game about a bunch of shit they will never ever get around to doing. So yeah, Puck may not be the most ambitious dude you've ever met, but at least he's not a self-deluded asshole.
Rachel Berry, though? That's a whole different can of crazy. The girl's got more plans and dreams and schedules and goals than anyone he's ever met -- and the thing is, she means all that crazy shit she says. She goes after what she wants and heaven fucking help you if you get in her way. And when she does that, she makes you see just exactly how unmotivated you actually are. And that? That's why people hate her. (Well, that and the fact that she is bossy as fuck.)
When he asked her out the first time, it was because of a sign from God (and yes, Puck's God did send him a wet dream as a sign. Awesome, right?). The good Lord wanted him to get in her pants -- who was he to argue? (He really can't explain it any other way.) But then he didn't get in her pants because she dumped him for Finn (which only further cemented his belief that Finn gets fucking everything). And that was that until the baby stuff blew up everywhere and for some reason Rachel became the one person he trusts to be 100% honest at all times. Everyone else has games and agendas and resentments and he thinks that life is just too fucking stressful without at least one person that may be crazy as shit but is at least honest about it.
Rachel Berry is not his friend. She's just someone he likes talking to (and looking at) sometimes. That's it. Definitely.
Finn waits about a month to ask her out. Puck's impressed Hudson is able to wait that long. One -- he's been eyeing Rachel almost the entire year. Two -- asking out Rachel is a sure fire way to piss off Quinn. Three -- well, Rachel is Rachel. She gets what she wants. And what she wants has always been Finn.
*******
Watching Finn and Rachel try to have a relationship is half comedy, half torture. Rachel's prancing around like she landed the lead role in West Side Story Does McKinley High wearing stupid "Team Finn" shirts and generally acting like she's never had a real boyfriend before. (He supposes in her mind, that is probably true.) Finn clearly likes having free reign to touch Rachel's legs anytime he wants (his hand is always on one of her knees in Glee.....always), and Puck can tell he's making an effort. But for a guy that supposedly just got the girl he really wanted, Hudson seems like he's trying awfully fucking hard to look happy.
(Rachel tries to tell him that the best things in life are the ones that require the most work. He informs her that shitty fortune cookie wisdom only works if you are Chinese. She tells him to stop being a racist. He asks how it can possibly be racist if the Chinese are the ones that invented the damn cookies in the first place?)
Rachel Berry may be Finn Hudson's girlfriend, but Puck's pretty sure no one else can strike her mute with the sheer power of awesomeness.
********
It is a total coincidence that he ends up at the bowling alley the night of Finn and Rachel's anniversary. He blames Artie because he was the one that started talking about fried Twinkies after Glee rehearsal. And once you put shit like that into Puck's brain -- you think it goes away? Artie gave him a craving. A craving that could not be satisfied anywhere else. That bowling alley snack bar is the one place that actually serves fried Twinkies in Lima. Being there had nothing to do with any stupid anniversary and everything to do with the needs of his stomach. What was he gonna do? Not fucking go just because Rachel had mentioned their plans to him a few days ago? Whatever.
(But you know, what kind of crazy face works up a "stages of physical involvement in a committed dating relationship" schedule? And then shows it to someone who is not her boyfriend? That calendar is now forever burned in his mind, and he knows just exactly what Rachel thinks 30 days of dating is worth.)
When he gets her text, he panics and ducks into the men's room -- where he promptly runs smack into Finn. It takes some talking, but Puck finally convinces Finn that it would be disaster of epic proportions for him to mention to Rachel that he ran into Puck. (He brings up scenes from Apocalypse Now, Ghost Busters, Alien vs Predator, and Band of Brothers. By the end of his damn speech, he's not sure which of them is more confused. But it works. Finn never says a word.)
*************
Going to Spring Formal is lame as fuck, but it is all everyone seems to be talking about. He listens to Berry prattle on for days about what a "fantastic night of traditional teen entertainment" it will be, and she's walking down the halls beaming more than she did after they took Sectionals.
(She asks him about fifty times if there will be photographers at the dance and if any of the pictures from the dance ever end up in the yearbook. His response of Shit Rachel, I don't know and I don't care doesn't seem to be what she's looking for. )
Puck even hears her make plans with Tina and Brittany (a weird as fuck friendship if ever he saw one) to go dress shopping. He spends most of fourth period trying to decide if he'd rather she go slutty or classy with her dress until he realizes that he's spending actual time thinking about what a chick is going to wear (without any sort of thought about what he's going to do to get her out of it).
That's when Puck realizes he's in this shit way farther than he thought.
He asks Mindy Philips to the formal forty-five minutes later. He's never actually talked to her before, so she's understandably confused, but she accepts quickly (obviously).
(When they are chatting online that night, it never crosses his mind to mention it to Rachel. Not once. Cause he's not curious what she'd think about it. Not. At. All.)
***********
Two days before the formal (and right before lunch) Puck starts to hear the whispers. He only catches snatches of conversation, but once he hears "Berry" said more than once, he's heard enough. Looking around, he dismisses a few faces before he settles on the person that he thinks will spill with a minimal amount effort and without a lot of commentary. It only takes him approximately 5 steps to reach Chang, grab his arm and pull him out into the hall.
When he hears that the inevitable has finally happened (cause let's face it, Finn stopped smiling about two weeks ago), he's not sure how he feels. He's tempted to feel happy, but then he remembers. It's two days until the fucking Spring Formal. He sighs and lets his head fall back against the wall and wonders why Finn has to be such a noble yet clueless asshole sometimes.
(When Rachel doesn't respond to his text message, he worries that maybe he made things worse. But then he sees her at Glee practice and she gives him a sad smile. He winks at her and she gives a soft laugh.)
***********
Puck goes to the fucking spring formal (and it isn't with Mindy Philips). He kind of thinks this is proof that for all the planning and plotting and scheming people do, sometimes awesome, unexpected shit just happens.