She understands it. Not first hand, of course, but she knows what Santana is going through, to a degree. How many times has she publicly declared her feelings, only to be shot down? She serenades Finn on a semi-regular basis and he's still only talking to her when he has to. It's not fair and it feels terrible, and she knows that what Santana is feeling has to be much, much worse because there's all these other things that come with it, like confusion and realizations, and it's not a contest, but if it were Santana would win.
Rachel is not an expert. She's 16 and she knows she's very informed on a lot of issues. She and Kurt have had some conversations about sexuality and relationships and crushes and boys. That doesn't mean she knows what it's like to have feelings for your best friend like either he or Santana have felt or are feeling. She doesn't know what it's like to have people call you a dyke or a fag behind your back, and though she has been called plenty of names in the past few years, none of them were like that. And just because she's got gay parents doesn't mean she knows everything there is to know.
It's just that no one else is talking to Santana at all, and this feels all very similar to what happened with Kurt. She may not like Santana all that much, a lot of the time, but she doesn't want the girl to leave. She's very talented and, when she's not being mean, quite funny, and Rachel thinks it would be a terrible shame if Santana transferred to another school, or worse.
She approaches Santana after Pre-Calc, which they have together, and touches the girl's shoulder from behind to get her attention.
"What?" Santana snaps before even looking to see who is there.
"Can we talk for a second?" Rachel asks, looking around to see if anyone is listening. For Santana's sake, she doesn't want there to be any eavesdroppers. Since Jacob practically stalks her, she has to keep an eye out for microphones.
"Why?"
"Because..." Rachel looks at the girl's face. "Because."
Santana sighs and looks incredibly disinterested. "Fine. Go."
Rachel shifts her weight and holds her books to her chest. "I just want to apologize for what I said after your performance," she says. Santana tenses, which is silly, really, but Rachel can understand why it happens. Whether the girl wants to admit it or not, she has a heart and it's a little broken right now. "It was insensitive."
"Thanks," Santana says after a minute. She turns to walk away, but Rachel doesn't want to let her.
"Wait!" Santana turns around again, rolling her eyes. "I know we're not friends, and that most of the time you're generally annoyed by my...everything." Santana actually laughs, so Rachel smiles just a little, even though it's not funny at all. "I just...I don't want you to feel like you can't talk to anyone. I'm probably the last person on the list, but, should everyone else turn their backs on you..." She shrugs one shoulder and meets Santana's eyes. "I won't."
Santana looks confused. "Why?"
"Because," Rachel says. It's not an answer. Mostly, she just can't really pick one of the many reasons why she'll be there. And if she said one or two out loud, Santana would probably scoff at it and call her delusional or something for thinking the girl needs help.
"Whatever."
Santana leaves and Rachel takes a breath and hopes that at least one of her points landed.
Rachel watches Finn and Quinn talking and Santana watches Brittany and Artie talking, and she's pretty sure their feelings are at least close to the same level. Santana catches Rachel's eye across the room, then looks away a second later.
So maybe they understand one another more than anyone really thinks.
She's got only a day to perfect this and present it to Mr. Schuester, and she knows that if it's not the best she can make it, he'll say no and they'll do a cover of some pop or rock song and it'll be good, but nothing special. They need to be special to win, and she refuses to lose. Refuses to. This year has been mostly terrible, except for the very beginning of it, and she needs this. She needs something to make her feel like she's not wasting all her time.
She's sitting at her keyboard in her room and has just finished recording the song on her laptop. It's the best version she's put down yet, and she's happy with it. Of course, she's hoping Mr. Schue will let her perform it live for the group so they can see and hear the emotion in it, but he may not even want anyone else to hear it. She doesn't know what she'll do if he doesn't like it. Her whole life these past few weeks has been writing these songs - which has been incredibly therapeutic, actually - and she knows they're good. She wouldn't turn them in if she didn't think New Directions could win with them.
She's listening to the ballad on her headphones and the door opens a crack, so she pulls them off and looks at her daddy.
"Sweetie," he says quietly, like he's being sensitive to something. He pushes the door open all the way and Santana is behind him with red eyes and her arms folded around herself.
The way he looks at her lets her know that the normal rules of having friends over after 8:00 on a school night do not apply. Actually, they really only applied when she was with Finn or Jesse or Noah. Funny how that works.
He leaves and closes the door behind him, and Santana stands there awkwardly. Rachel feels incredibly silly to be wearing her Hello Kitty pajamas right now, but Santana isn't even making fun of her for them, so she knows something is going on.
"I don't know why I'm here," Santana says defensively, before Rachel even asks. "Or why I even remembered where you live."
"You were here two weeks ago."
Santana glares. She looks around the room like she's judging it. "I broke up with Sam. Actually, he broke up with me. You know, officially. It's not like he's really been around me all that much in the past week. Dick."
Rachel doesn't know what to say about that. Noticeably, Sam has been pulling away. She supposes that makes sense, however she thinks he should have had the guts to just end it before now.
"Oh."
"Yeah. And I'm not like, crying over him or anything. It was just kind of nice to have someone, you know?" Santana asks.
Rachel smiles, a little sadly. "I know."
"So now Brittany's not talking to me, or I'm not talking to her or whatever, and Sam dumped me, and Quinn's a bitch." Santana meets Rachel's eyes for that part. She's glad they can agree upon it. "So, hey."
Rachel laughs. She's the last person on the list, but she's still on the list.
"Hi."
"What're you doing? I thought you just fucked around on piano. You actually play?" Santana asks. It looks like the tears have stopped. Rachel doesn't mind crying, but of course, she doesn't want Santana to feel like she has to do it.
She doesn't want to switch conversations this quickly, though.
"I play," Rachel says. Actually, she's been playing since she was four, and normally she'd point that out, but it doesn't seem that important at the momen, and Santana probably doesn't really care anyway. "Did Sam say anything?"
Rachel moves to sit on the bench at the end of her bed, and Santana pulls up Rachel's desk chair, sits down and pulls her legs up and folds them together. She's wearing tight black workout pants with a red band around the waist, and a gray hoodie. She's cried all her makeup off and her hair is down. She still manages to look sickeningly beautiful. Rachel would kill to be that naturally stunning. That's not something she's going to say out loud, but she thinks it in that moment.
"Not really. He said he doesn't get me and that I need to figure myself out," Santana says. Rachel nods, because that doesn't sound all that terrible or inaccurate. "I'm not gay."
Rachel very carefully asks, "Are you sure?" and waits for Santana to scream and/or storm out.
The girl just shrugs and rolls her eyes. "No." Rachel nods and they sit there in silence for a few minutes. She can hear her clock ticking the seconds off. "I told Brittany I love her."
Oh. Rachel had heard there'd been discussions, but had no idea it went that deep, to be honest.
"I didn't know," Rachel says, because it seems like the safest thing. "Do you?"
"Yeah," Santana admits quietly. She takes a breath.
"Okay," Rachel says. She wonders what her dads would say in this situation if they were witnessing it. "What did she say?"
"She loves Artie," Santana snaps. Clearly she's not happy about it. Rachel can't blame her one bit. "It's stupid. Who falls in love with their best friend?"
"A lot of people."
"Straight people."
Rachel shakes her head. "A lot of people, Santana." She laughs at herself. "I fell in love with my only friend. What does that say about me?"
Santana laughs loudly and wipes at her eyes. Rachel doesn't mention the tears and she won't. To anyone. This is strange, Santana showing up at her house, but if the girl somehow trusts her enough to talk like this, Rachel isn't going to betray that. She wishes she had someone to talk to who she knew for sure wouldn't sell her out. She can say things to Kurt and Mercedes, but given that Kurt shares a house with Finn and everything else with everyone else, she doesn't totally trust him not to spill her secrets. And Mercedes still seems to not like her some of the time and Rachel doesn't need to give anyone ammunition against her.
"Finn's an idiot."
Rachel could comment on Brittany not being incredibly bright, but she doesn't. She doesn't think Santana is talking about his book smarts anyway. If she's hearing things correctly, that statement may have been a compliment. Like maybe he's an idiot for not loving Rachel back.
He's never said he doesn't, but at this point it's just easier to believe it.
"What are you going to do?" Rachel asks after a moment.
"Don't know," Santana says. "What are you doing?"
Rachel laughs again. She's distracting herself with music. It's what she does most often, actually. "Part of me still believes Finn and I will work it out."
"Part?" Santana asks, looking at Rachel warily.
She sighs. "Part of me thinks he'll just keep picking everyone else over me."
"What if he does?"
It's nearly a whisper. Rachel hates that her heart breaks a little, for both of them.
"Then...I guess he's not the one," Rachel admits. Santana takes another heavy breath, then laughs when she realizes that they're both crying. "I didn't mean to make us cry."
"Doesn't take much," Santana comments. "This heartbreak shit sucks." Rachel laughs again and dabs her eyes with her fingertips. "I can't believe I'm about to thank you for listening to me right now."
They both giggle and Rachel actually feels good about this. Of course, she'd rather they weren't both heartbroken and crying, but she almost feels like they're possibly...Well, not friends, not yet. But they're closer and no one has insulted anyone else or insinuated anyone's a stripper or a hermaphrodite, so she considers that progress.
"I told you I would," Rachel says. Santana nods.
"I should go. I bet your dads think I'm a psycho," Santana says, standing up. "Then again, they live with you so they have to be used to it." Rachel rolls her eyes. Well, they went at least that long without a jab. "Keep practicing or whatever."
"I wasn't practicing," Rachel says. She's not sure why. "I finished...I was writing."
"Oh yeah. You actually did that?" Santana asks. Yes, she supposes maybe a lesser person would have been discouraged when no one showed support for her idea.
Rachel looks back to her keyboard and then to her laptop, open to her recording software.
"Do you want to hear it?" she asks. No one else has, not even her dads. She thinks maybe this offer has something to do with the fact that Santana just basically spilled all her current struggle in Rachel's bedroom. Rachel's struggle is explained in this song and she wants someone to hear it.
Santana doesn't look particularly interested, actually, but she says, "Yeah. Fine."
Santana won't look at her while the piano starts, but then Rachel's voice fills the room on the recording and she glances up. She thinks it takes a lot to impress Santana Lopez, but that's the expression she's watching right now. The chorus ends and Rachel sees Santana's eyes are full again, and she looks down as the second verse starts. Rachel isn't all that great at recording or anything yet, so it's just her, and the vocal arrangement she has for the end of the song isn't represented on this version. She could have played around with it and layered her own harmonies, but she's got the notations for the choir, so they'll be okay.
She's justifying all this in her head as the song ends, because she's incredibly nervous to hear Santana's reaction.
There's dead air in the room and Santana is just sitting there, and Rachel's almost ready to start crying. Or possibly vomit.
"God," Santana says. Rachel looks up. "That's really fucking good."
She gets goosebumps. Rachel smiles and knows she looks far too hopeful, and she pulls her sleeves down over her hands because she has goosebumps. "Really?"
"Uh huh," Santana says, nodding.
Rachel breathes out her relief and closes her eyes for a second.
They're just sitting here after this kind of strange conversation and 'moment', or whatever you want to call it, and she thinks there's no better person to harmonize with her. Santana knows what all this feels like. She understands the meaning behind the song and seems genuinely affected by it. And there's something poetic about the first person to hear the song being the one to sing on it.
"Will you sing it with me?" Rachel asks bluntly.
She braces herself for a rejection that doesn't come.
She's crying when they're announced as the winners. Everyone hugs her. She remembers hugging two people. Finn and Santana. Finn because, well, he's Finn. Santana because she's got tears in her eyes, too.
They hold up the trophy, just the two of them, and Rachel laughs for nearly 10 minutes, elated or surprised or overwhelmed. Possibly all three and more.
Santana says, "This is fucking awesome," once they're back in their street clothes and ready to board the bus.
They sit together because practically everyone else is paired off, and mostly talk about how amazing they both are, and Rachel thinks that is a perfect and totally fitting descriptor.
Santana shows up at Rachel's locker before Pre-Calc on Monday wearing a short, tight skirt that matches her headband, and starts talking about something to do with her parents. Rachel is slightly confused by it, but says nothing and just starts walking to class. With Santana. They sit next to one another and Rachel is smiling.
She kind of has a friend.
Finn finally admits that he and Quinn have been seeing one another. Rachel doesn't take it very well.
"He's a cock," Santana announces, walking into Rachel's room. Uninvited. Her dads aren't home and the door was locked.
"How did you get in?"
"Doesn't matter. What matters is that Finn is a cock and you shouldn't be crying right now."
Rachel turns so her back is to the girl. "I'd like to be alone."
"Yeah, well, you can't always get what you want," Santana says, sitting down on the bed.
Rachel's first thought is of Finn and Sectionals last year.
Her second is that Santana is absolutely right. She shouldn't be laying here wallowing, with tears on her face over a boy who keeps breaking her heart. He only keeps hurting her because she keeps going back for more. She keeps letting him do it, and she knows him; he'll do it until she stops. Then he'll probably come after her because he misses it (he'll say he misses her) and he'll just assume that she's going to drop everything (and possibly anyone) to be with him again, just because he snaps his fingers.
She is no longer going to be the stupid girl who lets him do that.
They go shopping for something - or possibly not, because all they seem to be doing is walking around the mall sipping their latt s, but whatever - and as they're approaching a lingerie store Rachel is admittedly a little terrified to enter, they see Sam walking towards them holding a Hollister bag in one hand and a Gap bag in the other. She's surprised how well Sam and Santana are getting along after their breakup; it's kind of like they never dated. Actually, they only really dated for like, three weeks or something, so she figures it wasn't that important a relationship.
Santana makes him open his shopping bags to prove he's not buying another plaid shirt, and Rachel just laughs when he says, "You can't boss me around anymore, Santana," and she replies, "Uh, yeah, I can." They talk for a bit and Santana mentions the lingerie store. Rachel blushes as Santana invites him along, and he gives Rachel a little smile and says that he has to get going because he's picking his brother up from indoor soccer and his mom'll kill him if he's late again. (Rachel gathers from his tone that the last time he was late was because of Santana.)
He's barely out of earshot when Santana says, "You should go out with him. Your combined geekiness would probably make me wanna vom, and it'd be like a giant mouth convention any time you kissed, but whatever. He's a good guy."
"I'm not looking to date anyone right now."
"So?"
It takes Rachel a while to even come close to figuring out how that's anything remotely near an argument.
She's mostly thinking about how maybe Santana is right.
She goes on two dates with Sam. It's kind of miraculous that they make it to the second date, actually, considering how awkward the first one is. They go to dinner and realize very quickly that they've hardly ever talked and don't really know much about one another, other than what's on the surface. And, okay, he seems to know an awful lot of lies about her that she knows for a fact came from Quinn. Bitch.
She claps her hand over her mouth when she says that word, and he just laughs. He says, "Santana," like that's the explanation for her poor language. He's right, actually. She tries to be more comfortable with him, and he's very laid back, so it's easy. There aren't an awful lot of vegan options on the menus of the few affordable restaurants in town, but he very wisely suggests ways to amend regular items on there and customize them to her needs. It's sweet that he cares enough to think about that. Finn could never really understand that no, regular bread is not vegan, and nor is cheese or yoghurt. He always had trouble with that.
She's going to stop comparing them.
No one other than Santana knows about their date. Rachel doesn't want Quinn coming after her, because yes, the girl is enough of a hypocrite to do it. She also doesn't want expectations put on them or anything, and as much as Santana is pressuring her to 'at least make out, for the love of god' with Sam, Rachel knows she's not being pushed into doing anything out of character.
Their second date is better. He takes her to his favourite used book store and they get coffee at the little shop inside and stroll through the stacks. He tells her about his favourite books and asks her about hers. She thinks it's a little geeky that he's so into sci-fi, but she doesn't make fun of him for it, and he doesn't make fun of her for owning all the Gossip Girl books or reading a ton of biographies.
By the end of the night she's decided they're just better off as friends, and he agrees when she says that (very nervously). It's nice to have a boy friend, one who there are no underlying feelings with, who maybe she can count on for things. And she likes that it seems like he wants a friend just as much as she does. It's sweet.
Santana comes over and they sit in Rachel's room and talk about it, and Santana says, "Well, damn, no wonder you don't want to date him. He took you to a fucking book store," and Rachel laughs and insists it was actually a lot of fun. "Whatever. It's because you're both losers."
She doesn't say it because she thinks it's true anymore, she says it with this kind of fondness that Rachel likes a lot.
They watch some stupid reality show on MTV that Rachel hates and Santana loves because all these people are trainwrecks and their lives are 'more fucked up' than hers.
"It's a good thing you called me," Santana says casually. "I was like, two seconds from calling Puck. It's been so long."
Rachel is stunned and doesn't know what to say to this. Santana has been struggling with not only her sexuality, but her self esteem (she hasn't admitted it, but it's very apparent) and Rachel thought that her not having casual sex with Noah or anyone else was progress, giving herself time to figure out what she's doing and what she wants and who she is.
"Are you sure that's a good idea?" Rachel asks delicately.
"Um, hell yeah. Puck's good. Like, really good. An orgasm's an orgasm."
"But you like girls," Rachel says.
Santana shrugs. "Sometimes. I still don't know what the fuck is up with that."
"So you're bisexual?"
"Maybe." Santana rolls her eyes. "Look, whatever. I just like, need to be with someone."
"No, you don't," Rachel argues. "You're not desperate."
Santana looks at her strangely and she thinks maybe she's overstepped. Also, she kind of said that last part angrily, but that's because it's true and she wants Santana to know it. She doesn't need Noah or sex or any other person. What she needs is to love and understand herself before she really lets anyone else try. And if all she wanted was an orgasm, she could...well, there are other ways.
"I know that," Santana says defensively.
Rachel hates this argument, because it's mostly stupid. They're both kind of saying the same thing, but not saying the same thing.
"Good," Rachel insists. "Start acting like it."
Santana glares, and Rachel knows she's definitely crossed a line this time. It's really not her place to be so bossy and demanding and, well, motherly. She sounded like she's Santana's parent or something, and that isn't going to go over well.
Santana doesn't say anything rude or awful (it's a surprise) before she gets up and leaves the room. Rachel doesn't hear from her for the rest of the weekend.
Rachel is walking down the hall with Noah because he very literally ran into her in the hallway when he was walking backwards and talking to Artie, not watching where he was going. He nearly knocked her over, but spun around and grabbed her before she could lose her balance. Now he's walking with her and talking about how short her skirt is and how everyone would have seen her ass if she'd fallen.
Instead of being offended like she should be, she laughs and lets her hair fall in her face so he can't see her blushing.
She looks up and sees Santana watching them, but the girl looks away when she notices Rachel sees her.
They run into one another before glee, and Santana crosses her arms and leans her shoulder against the lockers they're standing next to.
"Look, do you like Puck?" Rachel is so shocked that she all she can do is stare at Santana, wide-eyed. "Because you got really pissed and bitchy the other night when I brought up sleeping with him, and today...It just looks like you're into him."
"Noah and I are friends," Rachel insists.
Santana shakes her head, looks at Rachel like she's not fooling anyone. "He made you all girly and shit. Like Finn used to."
To be honest, Rachel hasn't given Noah much thought since they performed together after the holidays, after she and Finn's breakup. She was using him then and it wasn't fair, but he never asked her to apologize and actually seemed pretty okay with it. Yes, she finds him attractive, especially now that he's making an effort to be a good student and person and teammate. But she doesn't have feelings for him.
"He made a disgusting comment about my skirt. That's all," Rachel says.
Santana grins and looks Rachel up and down. "That thing is short. He notices that shit."
"That's because he's constantly thinking about sex," Rachel hisses. "I did date him, remember?"
"I know. I fucking hated you for it." Rachel rolls her eyes. "Look, it's fine if you do. I'm not gonna be pissed this time."
"I don't."
"Okay."
Then they're dancing during rehearsal and Santana full on hip checks Rachel into Noah. She lands hard against his chest and his arms go around her to steady her, and she's torn between smiling up at him or glaring at Santana.
"You gotta stop making me catch you," he says low in her ear.
Santana is grinning like a maniac and Rachel hates them both.
Santana invites her to this party and will not take no for an answer, even though she has a very, very good idea of what's going to happen as soon as she arrives.
It doesn't matter anymore that she and Santana are friends. People tend to just ignore that at school. Walking into a house party in jeans and a sweater Santana insisted she borrow? That is a very different story, obviously.
"Santana, I don't think..."
"Shut up, Rachel. No one cares."
"They're staring."
"That's because you look hot. Let's find you a drink."
Santana grabs her wrist and pulls, so she ends up in the kitchen with Brittany, Noah and Sam, and she feels more out of place than she ever has, even worse than last summer when Finn took her to a party at Noah's house.
She drinks what she's told is a vodka and orange juice, but it tastes more like rubbing alcohol than anything else, and she takes tiny sips just because she knows Santana will yell at her (literally) if she doesn't.
She loses Santana to a conversation with Brittany about 45 minutes into the evening, which is unfortunate, because about five minutes after that Finn and Quinn walk through the door. They're holding hands and talking to one another like there aren't other people around watching them now, and Quinn smiles and Finn kisses her hair and then notices Rachel. The smile slips from his face, and Quinn looks immediately annoyed, which Rachel really resents, because she didn't even do anything. Suddenly standing between Noah and Sam doesn't seem like enough of a buffer. She discreetly starts taking bigger gulps of her drink, until it's all gone and Sam's offering her a refill.
Finn catches her coming out of the washroom after her second drink. She looks up at him and tries to walk away, wants to, but her feet betray her by not moving.
"What are you doing here?" he asks, like she's personally offending him by daring to spend a Friday evening in the same house as him.
And suddenly 'Santana dragged me' doesn't seem like a good enough excuse. Frankly, she's wondering where her backbone went. Is she just doing what her friend wants her to do, because she finally has a friend? Maybe there's a part of her that's worried that if she doesn't do what Santana wants, they'll drift apart again and Santana will go back to making her life hell. It's stupid, really, and she likes to think she knows Santana well enough at this point to know that won't happen, but it's there in the back of her mind. Their friendship started up so abruptly that it's hard to believe it couldn't - or won't - end the same way.
"Will you tell Quinn to stop glaring at me?" she says instead of answering him. He looks confused, like he really hasn't noticed it. "I'm beginning to wonder how it doesn't actually hurt her to do it for so long."
"Rach."
"Finn, I don't appreciate the insinuation that I'm not allowed to..."
"I didn't say that."
She rolls her eyes, which he's probably never seen directed at him, and goes to pass him, but he grabs her arm. It doesn't hurt, but it's not a welcome touch in the slightest, so she whimpers.
"Yo, don't fucking touch her." Rachel looks to the end of the hall and sees Santana standing there. She's not exactly ready to spring into action and throw punches, and obviously Finn isn't doing anything to Rachel that's incredibly offensive (other than toying with 90 per cent of her emotions). "Seriously. Leave her alone. You're here with your girlfriend, remember? She's the one in there acting like she's better than everyone else." Finn lets go of Rachel's arm, but stands there looking at Santana as though he's attempting to craft a very witty response to what she's said. Rachel knows he's incapable. "Did I stutter? Move it, Hudson."
He does, and Rachel could say thank you to her friend, but she's still not impressed that Santana would just leave her like that. Sure, she gets along well enough with Sam and Noah, but she doesn't know how to be around drunk people (unless, apparently, she's drunk herself) and she didn't agree to come here so she could be ignored by her one true friend. This whole evening has made her question just how good a friend Santana is to her. She knows she's a good friend to Santana, but what about the other way around? She hates that she always ends up giving more than she gets, and she really wants to believe it won't always be this way.
"Hey," Santana says with her brow furrowed as Rachel tries to walk past. "You okay?"
"I'd really like to go home. I'm going to call Daddy for a ride."
"You don't...I'll take you, okay? If you want to go. You shouldn't...Look, he's just an idiot."
"This isn't about him," Rachel says, looking to the floor. This top is more low cut than she's used to wearing and she can see part of the cup of her pink cotton bra poking up past the black fabric. She adjusts it while she's looking. "I didn't expect you to hold my hand all night or anything, but I was already nervous to come, and you've spent the past hour and a half with your real friend."
Santana looks confused and annoyed and kind of angry. Rachel doesn't regret what she's said, because it's the way she feels and it's also the truth. "I didn't think you'd care," Santana says.
It just makes Rachel question how well they really know each other. It's ridiculous of her to expect Santana to read her mind, but why didn't she just know Rachel would care?
"Don't worry," says Rachel, throwing on a smile and reaching into her pocket for her phone. "I'll just call Daddy. I don't want to ruin your night."
"You're not..."
"I really just want to go home."
She feels a ball in her throat and she is not going to cry at this stupid party. She swallows it down and watches Santana nod and walk away. Rachel doesn't feel it necessary to say goodnight to anyone on her way to the front of the house. It takes her daddy 10 minutes to arrive, and she pulls her coat around herself tighter before getting into the car. He asks if she's okay, and she nods her head and just says that everyone was drinking and she didn't want to. The look he gives her lets her know that not only does he see that something else happened, but that she definitely had a drink (two) herself.
She's reading in her bed when she gets a text from Santana two hours later that just reads Sorry you didn't have fun. I shouldn't have made you come.
Rachel types back that it's fine (she's not sure it is) and tells Santana to make sure she and Brittany get home safely. She turns off her phone and switches off the light.
Santana is waiting on the porch when Rachel steps outside to go to school Monday morning. She's looking incredibly bored and her car is parked in the driveway on a bit of an angle. Rachel expected to drive herself to school today, and she and Santana don't even have a schedule for this kind of thing. She's sure that if they did, Rachel would still insist on driving herself to school on Mondays. She doesn't like to be late, and she likes to set a good tone for the rest of the week. That often means getting to school early and organizing her locker, tidying up and returning library books, if she has any, before the first bell.
"So, like, Brittany is my Finn," Santana states. She's got black liner around her eyes and a frosty-looking pink lip gloss on. Rachel distantly thinks it's nice when Santana wears her makeup like this, just light, yet still accenting her best features.
But still.
"What?"
"Know how Finn jerks you around? Britt does that to me. And the fucked up thing - for both of them - is that they don't even realize they're doing it, which is kind of the shittiest thing about it, right?"
Well, yes. That is the worst part. Rachel feels like if Finn had any idea how she feels every time he talks to her solely to remind her they're not together and she's no longer really a welcome party in his life, he wouldn't be so quick to try and get her alone. He treats her heart like something he accidentally bumps into when he happens to be standing too close, and while he might apologize, it's really too little, too late.
"Where is this coming from?" Rachel asks as she walks down the steps. If Santana's offering her a ride, she's going to take it. No need to drive two cars to school when one will do. "What happened Friday night?"
"We spent like, all night talking and stuff, like...Well, whatever." Santana climbs into the driver's seat and turns on the engine, cranks the heat up a bit more. "Then like, a half hour before her curfew, she's all over Artie again."
That really isn't very nice, Rachel knows, and it's not fair of Brittany to just expect Santana to be nothing more than a friend when she knows how the girl feels. Rachel's and Santana's situations are really remarkably similar.
Even so; "Well, Artie is her boyfriend."
Santana glares before backing out of the driveway. "Yeah, thanks for reminding me, you bitch." Rachel giggles, because there's really no bite to Santana's words at all. "I should have expected it. I guess I'm the fucking idiot here."
"You're not," Rachel says quietly, pulling the hem of her skirt down over her thighs. "You just want something you can't have. Feeling unimportant is an unfortunate side-effect of that."
Santana glances at Rachel and steers them out of the neighbourhood and onto the main road that'll take them to school. "Christ, that's depressing. Well, look. This weekend there's this party..."
"Santana, I think we've learned that I do not belong anywhere outside of school where..."
"Okay, fuck that, first of all." Santana glowers at the road because there's nothing else to glower at. "Quinn Fabray can choke on a dick and die, for real." Rachel laughs despite how incredibly vulgar that sentence was. "I mean, not really, 'cause she's liable to die a fucking born again, you know?"
"That's very offensive," Rachel chuckles.
"Whatever. Point is, fuck her if she thinks she has any say in what you do and who you hang out with. She's just jealous and paranoid that Finn's gonna change his mind again." Rachel knows that. It still doesn't help ease the fact that Quinn practically wants her dead. "I was gonna say that there's a party this week, and we're not going."
Rachel smiles. She's never had a friend to make plans with for weekends before. She doesn't mention it, because it's slightly depressing, and Santana will call her on getting all sentimental or something.
"What do you want to do?" Rachel asks.
"I dunno. You pick. Nothing fucking lame, or I bail."
After school on Friday, they go to dinner together, then Rachel drives them to this little book store a few towns over. She and her daddy found it last year on one of their silly little drives, but it's become one of her favourite places. It's a nice change from the big box, huge book stores. It's an independently owned shop with a caf next door that connects through a revolving door etched with quotes from books. And every Friday night, they showcase singer/songwriters from the area.
She wasn't sure this was something Santana would like, but as they sit there and drink their latt s, Santana turns to her, smiles just the slightest bit, and then turns her attention back to the man holding his guitar and singing about unrequited love.
Things go along smoothly for a while. They spend time at Rachel's house, mostly, when they're not at school. They inevitably argue about what to watch or what to listen to or the names Santana calls other people or the mean things she says. Santana picks on Rachel's vocabulary and intense passion ("Pain in the ass tunnel-vision bullshit!") with regards to glee club. Strangely enough, when they're 'not getting along', that's when they get along best. They're never going to be the kind of friends who agree on everything and spend all their time being sweet to one another and trading compliments. Rachel thinks Santana's beautiful, but that she tries too hard. Santana says Rachel's "hot, but fuck, you really need to scale back the amount of nana-knitted sweaters you wear, 'cause I swear I'm two seconds away from just pulling strings."
It's just how they work.
Santana is going to Noah's after school one day, and they're talking about it in front of Rachel, and at some point she realizes it's just a given that she's coming with them to play some unnecessarily violent video game with them in Noah's basement. "Where the weed is," he says, and then laughs when she loses her mind, because how could he possibly jeopardize his voice that way?
They make her sit in the back seat of Santana's car in an effort to tune her out, but really, they should know by now that she's just going to speak louder.
She's, unpredictably, very uncomfortable around his younger sister, who clearly has no use for Santana (and that feeling is mutual) and eyes Rachel like she's wondering just where this new girl came from.
"I'm in glee club with your brother," Rachel says, kneeling down a bit.
Hannah scowls and crosses her arms. "So?"
"Oh god. Don't even bother trying. She's like, a bigger ice queen than Quinn," Santana says, pulling Rachel along by the arm.
"Where do you think she learned it from?" Noah shouts from the kitchen.
Rachel doesn't mean to laugh. Hannah hears her and lets out some kind of indiscernible whiney noise.
Turns out? Rachel's really terrible at violent video games, and her constantly questioning her friends on why they're playing this will eventually annoy them enough that they'll change to something that doesn't turn regular children into everyday psychopaths.
It's an enjoyable afternoon.