It started out with a small greeting before he whisked Kurt and her tentative friendship with him away, Rachel left to figure out how to snag their win at Sectional's against the talented group on her own once more. She had no idea that the boy Kurt had an obvious interest in would soon be the one she had an interest in, be the one who made all the drama in her life disappear with a simple touch of his lips, a soft whisper over the phone.
If she had known then what she knew now, over a year later, she might have told herself to run far, far away.
"So you guys are going through with joining the boys for the football team?" Blaine asked her as they waited in line for their coffees, Kurt and Mercedes already at the table gossiping away without them.
"Yes, we decided they need a win and this will hopefully secure my spot back into Finn's heart once and for all," she nodded, nervous at the idea. She wasn't normally into sports, but ever since Blaine had implanted the idea in her brain and she'd grown it into fruition, she couldn't put it down, and once the other girls were on board, there was no stopping them. "Thank you for the suggestion, by the way."
"You're quite welcome," he said, smiling at her with bright eyes as her coffee appeared, handing it to her so she didn't have to reach for it. Their fingers brushed as she took the cup from him, a small shock being sent through her skin, and both froze momentarily, eyes locked before she quickly retracted her hand, a small 'Thank you' falling from her lips before she tried her hardest not to run back to the table to join the others.
Because that moment, that small electrical charge between them, a fluke she was sure, was more terrifying and exciting than her entire relationship with Finn had ever even dreamed of being. And she refused to let herself fall for someone who was so far out of reach for her that it was nowhere even close to being an opportunity for her. It would have been easier to repress, she knew, if Blaine didn't keep sending her the same inquiring gaze over the course of their coffee date.
"Hello?" she questioned, answering her phone late one evening a few days after the winning football game, not recognizing the number that had shown on her phone.
"Rachel, it's Blaine," came the reply at the other end, Rachel stunned into silence momentarily before she remembered her manners.
"Blaine, hello, it's lovely to hear from you," she said evenly, trying to keep her breathing steady and normal before realizing that was a ridiculous thing to have to even worry about in the first, place, because her heart rate shouldn't have picked up at the sound of his voice. "Wait-how did you get my number?"
"I-oh," he said, chuckling slightly, sounding almost bashful and Rachel was immediately smiling in return, his voice endearing from the other end of the line. "I might have stolen it from Kurt's phone. Did you know he has you in there as 'Barbra Streisand Jr.'?"
"I did, actually, since I changed it myself from 'Enemy Number One'," She quipped, Blaine letting out a louder laugh at that, Rachel's heart fluttering slightly at the sound. They fell into a lapse of conversation, the silence comfortable and awkward all at the same time. The obvious question was fighting to leave her mouth, but she felt like once it did she'd lose any hold she might have currently held over him.
"I suppose you're wondering why I went through all this trouble," he said quietly after a few moments, Rachel lying across her bed as she hummed a 'yes' in response.
"The question crossed my mind," she responded honestly, and even though they'd only seen each other a few times, she could already imagine the look of concentration he had on his face as he chose his words carefully. "I'm assuming since you stole the number, Kurt doesn't know you're talking to me?" she asked quietly, and he muttered a quiet 'no'. "He likes you, you know. As more than a mentor, though I suppose he sees you as that as well. Someone he can look up to. It's good for him, you know, he never had that here at McKinley. If he had-things might not have escalated so badly."
"I didn't call to talk about Kurt," Blaine said in response, her eyebrows shooting up at his wary tone, as if he knew he was stepping into dangerous waters and there was no turning back. "I called to ask you something."
"Sure," she replied, her voice slightly higher than she'd have like it to sound. "What is it?"
"This is probably completely out of bounds, and Kurt's head will probably spin-"
"It would never, his hair would get messed up," she half-joked, her stomach tightening with nerves as she waited for the question.
"Do you want to hang out some time, Rachel? Just you and me?" She lay silent for a minute, closing her eyes to calm down the urge to shout a 'yes!', waiting until she had control over herself before she opened her mouth once more.
"That would be lovely."
They met in the middle of Westerville and Lima, and Rachel couldn't help the nerves that felt like she was doing something wrong, like they were sneaking around. It didn't help that he looked incredibly handsome in a simple cardigan and jeans, she was so used to seeing him in his Dalton uniform.
They went to dinner, Rachel filling him in on her life in Lima and at McKinley, though she kept quiet about Finn. If he noticed the absence of the other boys name from her lips, he didn't say anything. As they wandered around a small neighboring park, he told her about his own life-about his brother Cooper, about building cars with his dad, about Dalton. Kurt wasn't mentioned at all, almost as if it was an elephant in the room.
It felt almost like a date, and when he walked her back to her car, she was less surprised than she probably should have been when he leaned over to kiss her on the cheek, her own head turning involuntary to catch his lips in an actual kiss. The surprise part came when he kissed her back, fingers interlaced with her own before they pulled back, slightly breathless.
"I'm sorry," she said quietly. "I know I shouldn't have, I just-"
"It's fine," he said, smiling warmly at her. "If you hadn't, I might have."
They left it at that, Rachel getting into her car and biting her lip as she saw him in her rearview mirror, leaning against his own car and watching her take off.
Two things started happening at once. Rachel became both more interested in pursuing Finn, in trying to win him over once more and make him forget about the stupid kiss she shared with Noah, at the same time her relationship with Blaine carried on. They didn't speak about it, to anyone, Kurt spending evenings on the phone with her going on about what a gentleman he was, how sweet he was, how smart and gorgeous and talented. Rachel kept silent for the most part, agreeing when she could and never mentioning once all the attributes she could add to the list. How funny he was, how interesting he was, what a good kisser he was.
These were things she couldn't tell Kurt.
So instead she spent her days chasing after Finn, and her nights spent on the phone with Blaine, planning another evening out-just the two of them, of course-carrying the guilt with her every step of the way.
There was no reason to be guilty, she tried to assure herself. Blaine was single, free to pursue who he wanted, and Rachel was as well. If they were drawn to each other, that shouldn't have been a matter to anyone else. But she couldn't talk herself into this mindset, and even as she kissed him goodbye, a little more desperate, a little more hungry than the previous one, she knew she had to put a stop to whatever it was they were doing before someone got hurt.
The week before Valentine's Day, Blaine called her in the middle of the afternoon. It threw her off, because they didn't acknowledge each other outside of a few text messages here and there until later in the evening, when everything could be kept quiet, a secret, hidden away from the world. "Blaine?"
"Are we going to get to see each other for Valentine's?" he asked, sounding hopeful enough for Rachel's heart to flutter despite the consequences of what he was asking.
"No," she replied firmly, because even if it broke her heart-and it did, to turn him down and push him away-she knew she had to.
"No?" he repeated, voice a little quieter, and she could hear the familiar sounds of a bustling coffee shop around him, aware for the first time that he was probably at the Lima Bean. She knew he wouldn't be as stupid to call around Kurt, but the fact that Kurt could appear at any moment made her want to rush through this conversation as quickly as possible. She didn't know how Kurt would react to their whatever it was they were doing, but she knew it wouldn't be well.
"Valentine's day is for couples, who are dating," she pointed out, and he just let out a low laugh at her words.
"Rachel, I think that's us."
"No," she argued back, using more force than necessary as she held the phone closer to her face. "No, because couples don't sneak around and hide what they're doing. Couples tell their friends what they're doing. We go to a town where no one knows us and-"
"See a movie, go to dinner, make out for a couple hours?" Blaine offered, Rachel huffing her disapproval of his nonchalance.
"But we don't tell anyone about it!" she snapped, harsher than normal, and she could tell she had upset him before he even said another word.
"Fine, then we're not dating." He didn't say anything else before the tone alerted her to a dropped call, and as she sat there staring at the screen she realized that Blaine had hung up on her.
When he didn't call that night, or the one after, she realized she was hurt by the boy she wasn't even supposed to have feelings for in the first place. When she asked Kurt about how Blaine was, trying for nonchalance, he laughed and told her about how the Warblers performed at a Gap at the mall, trying to help Blaine woo some male clerk who worked there.
Rachel had never felt jealousy so strongly in her life.
"It didn't work, of course," Kurt prattled on, "not that I even understand what Blaine saw in the guy-he was not that cute, but Blaine managed to get him fired, and wow was he not happy about that."
"That's unfortunate," Rachel mumbled quietly, not nearly as interested in the conversation as she once had been.
"I told him today," Kurt said after a moment. "That I like him, I mean. Not in such blatant terms, but I think it finally sunk in."
Rachel closed her eyes against the wash of guilt and terror that fell upon her, suddenly freezing despite her pile of blankets on top of her. "What'd he say?" she asked, trying to keep her voice optimistic, though her wish wasn't for Kurt.
"He said he values my friendship?" Kurt questioned, almost like it was a preposterous idea, "But now that he knows, maybe he'll see the light and realize we're perfect for each other." Minus the part where he makes out with your best friend on a weekly basis, Rachel thought bitterly as she helped him come up with new ideas at stealing Blaine's heart, keeping any that might have actually worked silently to herself.
The Warblers are performing at Breadstix tonight. I hope you'll be there.
She read the text almost four thousand times before Mercedes caught up with her in the hallway, asking if she'd go with her to see Kurt perform with the rest of the Warblers. "Of course," she responded, because the truth was, even if Kurt wasn't there she was going to be. It was Valentine's day, and Quinn and Finn had been caught hooking up, effectively ruining Rachel's attempts at Finn's affections anyways, and whether she admitted it to herself or not, she wanted to see Blaine.
She sat alone in a booth until Mercedes, Mike and Tina joined her a moment later, sliding into the booth just as the rest piled in throughout the restaurant, Kurt making an introduction.
She loved watching Blaine perform, bounced along to the old Paul McCartney song despite the looks he was shooting Kurt throughout the song, tried not to let them affect her any. The Warblers energy was contagious after all, and she was here with her friends, and the boy on stage didn't belong to her in any way, shape or form.
Except then he shot a heart her way, the words 'I love you' sang throughout the restaurant and seemed to land straight in her brain, her heart, and she knew in that moment that whatever he was feeling for Kurt, whatever Kurt had implanted in his brain, he still wanted Rachel too.
She cornered him after the performance, slipping out a back door few knew about but Noah had shown her on one of their few dates the previous year, Blaine smirking as she held onto his wrist and shot him a glare that simply stated 'quiet'.
"What do you think you're doing?" she hissed, because the more she thought about it, the more upset she got.
"Well, I was singing with the Warblers and then I was probably going to come and steal some of your breadsticks-"
"The 'I love you', Blaine," she stated dryly, his eyes widening slightly but he collected himself quickly.
"It's a part of the song."
"That you sang, staring straight at me, doing your little 'I heart you' movement there towards me."
"Maybe I do 'heart' you," he grinned, leaning down as if to kiss her but she only backed away, shaking her head.
"No, Blaine, you can't-this isn't real. Whatever it we're doing together, it needs to end." Blaine's face hardened at her words, but he didn't argue her, stood there silently as she pressed onwards. "Look, Kurt is falling harder for you every day, and you're falling for him too-maybe you don't see it, but I can. And I don't want to hurt him, and even if Finn is off with Quinn again, I can't do this anymore. I'd rather be on my own and independent and not get hurt than hurt myself and everyone around me by acting on some stupid hormonal urges."
"Is that what I am? A way to get out your, what was it, 'hormonal urges'?" he asked, his tone sharper than she'd ever heard before.
"Of course not, but before I end up falling for someone that I can't have all the time, Blaine, I need to pull away. You need to pull away."
"So you're ending this," he clarified, and she nodded, firmly, keeping the tears at bay as he stormed off, leaving Rachel out in the cold to wonder exactly why she had done what she just did.
"Blaine! Kurt!" she exclaimed, not having expected the pair at the party she was hosting. It was getting harder to pretend she didn't know him as well as she did when they were out with Kurt, Mercedes, occasionally Santana even tagging along for reasons unbeknownst to Rachel, harder to pretend that she wasn't suffering a broken heart as she watched Kurt and Blaine flirt across the table from her. When Noah flew the option of a party by her, she'd first thrown it out the window, thinking it was below her, but she did need to live a little-a secret whatever-it-was she had done with Blaine couldn't be used for song writing, she hadn't gotten good enough to hide what it was she was singing about. A party though, with her friends-she thought it was a good idea.
She wanted to kill Finn for whatever Kurt was holding over him.
She avoided Blaine as much as she could, clinging onto Finn even as she felt Blaine's eyes trained on her back, slipping further and further away from sober until Finn pressed the buttons she didn't want touched, calling her needy of all things and causing her to declare a game of spin the bottle.
She never expected it to land on Blaine.
He seemed just as startled as she did, but they were good enough actors by now to go along with it, Rachel reveling in their drunken state as their mouths met, the world falling away as it always did when Blaine kissed her. It was risky, to go beyond a small peck, and yet his hand was winding into her hair in a familiar pattern, his face turning to take more of her in, and it was like they were in the backseat of her car all over again. It didn't help that it had been nearly three weeks since they last did this, and she was desperate for more, for one last chance. This might be the last time she kissed him, after all, and she let him deepen it as much as he wanted.
She demanded a duet from him as they parted, Kurt freaking out and hoping it would keep herself from launching back on top of him, her inhibitions even lower than they normally were around him. She was fighting off the desire to drag him up to her room, to forget the party, to forget her words she spoke outside of Breadstix. He seemed to be doing the same, and as they danced around the small stage her dads' had built for her when she was younger, she could feel the spark and pull between them stronger than ever.
She knew it went deeper than the alcohol.
She knew it was him, and it was her, and that despite how much she wanted to part from him she wasn't going to be able to.
Asking him out on a real date wasn't part of the plan, but it seemed to present itself perfectly. With Kurt having to witness them attached at the mouth for an entire evening, neither unable to stop themselves when she crawled over to where he lay on the floor as she climbed into his lap and kissed him again, she thought she should take the most of it.
It was different, in a good way, being somewhere where anyone could find them. Blaine's thumb traced lazy circles around her hand as they held hands throughout the movie, and even if he didn't kiss her good night-saying it still seemed risky, when they didn't know who was around, Rachel had finally let herself believe that they could have something together.
It was funny how quickly that could change.
"I just, I don't want to purposely hurt Kurt like this," Blaine said quietly, Rachel retracting her hand from his as they sat in her bedroom the day after their date. "I think-I mean, I don't know but I might-"
"Like him?" Rachel asked shortly, her voice sounding dead even to her. Blaine, for his part, looked genuinely upset at the admission, and Rachel wanted so desperately to wave it off, to comfort him, but the words were breaking her heart much more than they should have. "Well, then I suppose we'll have to put an end to this, once and for all. And-knowing Kurt, he'll continue to see me as an enemy vying for your attention unless we make sure he's certain there's nothing between us."
"He doesn't believe in bisexuality," Blaine answered, confused. "He thinks I'm fooling myself."
"Are you?" She asked, just to be certain that the feelings she felt weren't completely onesided, and when he answered with a soft but sure kiss, she knew that he wasn't. That even if he liked Kurt, he liked Rachel too, and that almost hurt more than anything else. "Then play into that," she finally answered quietly. "Tell him you're definitely gay, that I was a fluke, and then…"
"I don't want to hurt you," Blaine said. "I don't-"
"Blaine, it's fine. I have-I'll focus on Finn, again, completely and honestly now that Noah has Lauren. It's what I should have been doing all along anyways, instead of entering this whatever we've been doing," she told him, and he didn't look convinced, but she steeled herself for what she knew was to come. "You want Kurt, and Kurt is crazy about you, and-it's easier this way. For everyone."
"Not for you," Blaine reminded her, but she shook her head.
"Yes, for me too. This way, I don't lose a very tentative friendship, and I don't have that many as it is. You're happy, Kurt's happy, and I'll be happy too, once I get Finn back. It'll just take some time for me. And in the meantime, we just won't be around each other. It should be easy enough, with you and Kurt at Dalton."
"I don't know about this, Rachel," he said, and she wanted to agree. She wanted to take back all the words she had just spewed out, words she didn't believe for an instant. Instead she launched into a plan of attack, of launching herself as only she could at Blaine in public where he was to declare his homosexuality so Kurt could be confident enough that Rachel wouldn't continue to pine away for the guy he was in love with, and Blaine could eventually move in on him.
She wanted to savor that last kiss in the coffee shop, wanted to hold onto him for so much longer, and his face gave away everything she was trying to ignore-that the feelings between them ran far deeper than either had expected, but it was too late now. And after his announcement, he excused himself, Rachel fighting every urge to trail after him as Kurt appeared at her side.
She made up some excuse for herself about songwriting gold before disappearing, hoping that she'd at least have the time to move on from Blaine before he started something with Kurt.
It was hardly surprising to her when she got the text from Kurt with a thousand exclamation points that she hadn't moved on yet, that she was still silently harboring her own broken heart. Things hadn't worked in her favor in almost too long now, she didn't know why they would start then.
She didn't see Blaine, outside of Regionals, until Prom. She had done her best to avoid him, to work her way closer and closer into Finn's heart once more, to focus on that. She had let Jesse back into her life warily, knowing that even if it was a lie, he still apologized-and that in itself was a damn miracle she had never expected.
She tried enjoying herself, succeeding better than she had expected even as she heard Blaine singing on stage-she was done questioning why he was, why the song seemed eerily fitting to the two of them when he was here as Kurt's date-until Finn came along, and despite the fact that Finn had been making it clear that he didn't want her, he was the one starting something with Jesse and she found herself, in the moment between Jesse and Finn being kicked out and Quinn running off, wondering how things would be different if the boy on stage was here as her date instead.
She quelled those thoughts as best she could, even as the two of them somehow ended up dancing together, a smile on his face that she hadn't seen in so long as he spun her around, Kurt laughing along with them as he danced with Brittany next to them, and for a moment Rachel could picture so easily just how right the night would have gone with him.
It almost made her lean up and kiss him, until Kurt was cutting in to spend time with his boyfriend, and Rachel was pulled into Sam's arms for a slow song as he asked her about Mercedes, Rachel only half paying attention to his words.
It continued on like that for weeks, a stilled half-friendship between them as she saw him more and more over coffee dates with Kurt and Mercedes, occasionally at the Hudson-Hummel house in passing as she left and he arrived, always a smile on his face and only a flicker of sadness in his eyes once in awhile if they were around each other for too long. She, herself, was having a difficult enough time not grabbing him by the tie every time she saw him and pulling him into a secluded corner, not to link her fingers with his, always feeling the sharp sting of rejection stronger and stronger when Kurt would do one of the things she so desperately wanted to.
She'd almost allowed herself to wish the rumors about Sam and Kurt were true, if only because it meant she could have Blaine to herself.
New York was like a breath of fresh air for her, a reminder that she had a life and goals outside of which boy she was currently hung up on. Even as Finn made his intentions with her clearer and clearer, taking her out on a date and kissing her on stage at Nationals, she knew that it didn't really matter to her-not anymore. She would date him, once they got back to Lima and discussed it, but being in the city of her dreams reminded her of everything else she had.
She could go home, date Finn for a year, become honest friends with Blaine, stick with Kurt as long as possible until they were there singing songs on a Broadway stage once more together, and she'd do it all with a smile and a true, genuine happiness.
The road to hell was paved with good intentions, she supposed later on.
She lasted longer than she thought, being around him all the time. The four of them were constantly spending time together, going on double dates to mini-golf or the bowling alley, movies and picnics and over time it only seemed natural that they try to spend time on their own together once more. Kurt and Finn never questioned it, not even for an instant, and by the time August rolled around, when he pressed his lips against hers she was relieved, not guilty, kissing back hungrily.
Whatever they were doing went even less unsaid than before, their glances brief when around the other two and their words stilled until they were in private, until Blaine's body was pressed against hers as they lay in her bed, limbs tangled and tongues, teeth, lips trailing across one another. Words like 'I missed you,' 'I want you,' 'Please,' always transferred between them, slightly breathless and while Rachel wanted so much more of him, more than she wanted from Finn, she made sure they never took it beyond kissing, knowing if she did she wouldn't hold back. She wouldn't be able to keep him a secret anymore.
His transfer was unexpected and yet expected at the same time. He hadn't confided in her about it, hadn't told her about his plans at all, and she never once asked him to do it. He was there for Kurt, she knew, because Kurt was the one who was on his arms every day, smiling and going on about what a wonderful boyfriend Blaine was. Rachel would merely smile in response, before talking about what a wonderful boyfriend Finn was-and he was, these days, trying to much more than he had in the past that sometimes she let the guilt worm its way into her before she remembered how many times he had cheated on Quinn, how he had slept with Santana, how he had gotten Quinn to cheat on Sam with him.
She felt less guilty after that.
It wasn't until auditions for West Side Story did she realize how potentially dangerous his transfer would be, as she hid in the background to see him perform an outstanding rendition of 'Something's Coming'. She knew he'd get Tony just as much as she knew she'd get Maria, and suddenly she was faced with the problem of declaring love for him on a stage in front of all their friends, of having to kiss and touch him and pretend it was all in the sake of acting.
She nearly had a mental breakdown just at the thought.
Still, she needed the roll for her NYADA application, for her dream of New York, and the two were becoming better and better at hiding what they were doing every day. So when they landed the rolls, Rachel was confident enough in her ability to hide the secret she needed to keep and perform flawlessly as they ran through scene after scene, song after song, no one ever questioning anything more.
"I don't think I can do this," Rachel squeaked only an hour before show time, Blaine raising an eyebrow in question. "I don't think I can go on, and perform, and god I'm going to be the worst Maria, Finn doesn't even want to have sex with me so I clearly can't-"
"He doesn't want to have sex with you?" Blaine asked curiously, turning to look at her fully as she nodded her head.
"I tried to-initiate it, the other day, so that my role was more organic, and he rejected me," she said quietly, Blaine's hands falling to her hips and pulling her close before she seemed to register the action.
"He's insane," Blaine muttered, and she wanted to believe him but it stung, knowing that almost any guy in the world was willing to have sex just to get off, and Finn would push her away at a time when she needed him the most. Granted, she'd been almost insensitive, using West Side Story as an excuse, but she couldn't very well use the other one she had-the one where if Finn didn't get to her first, her restraint from Blaine was weakening more and more every day.
As it was, his hands seemed to set her on fire just from holding her steady, and she didn't push him away when he leaned down to kiss her, gently so he wouldn't mess up her make up, but she was the one who deepened it.
"Rachel, I-" he said as her hand traveled from his shoulders to his chest, looking up at him with dark eyes. "We shouldn't-"
"It's only a matter of time before we do though," she whispered, pushing him backwards until he was against a wall, her hips lined with his even through their costumes. "I want to, at least, I've wanted to for a while now and-"
He didn't let her say another word, pulling her away into a dark room where they wouldn't be found, taking away every insecurity Finn had given her in the way that only Blaine could.
Kurt being angry with her for running for class president was almost enough to make her break down and admit to what she was doing. She thought he was being silly, selfish really, for being angry about something as simple as running for class president. A part of her wondered if there was more to it than that, if he suspected anything, because at least that she could understand. Attacking her for sneaking around with his boyfriend, she'd get. Telling her off for one thing while he did the exact same seemed ridiculous.
But the anger directed towards her made her feel an overwhelming sense of guilt for the first time since they'd started their cheating, and even as Blaine held her and told her it was okay, that Kurt didn't know, asked if she wanted to stop, she knew she had no willpower. She was attached to him even more now, but she couldn't regret the moment before their performance when they had truly become one, where they had finally given in completely and unfurled in the hands of the other. Even as she faked losing her virginity to Finn, she'd already had the perfect first time, and whether it was cheating or not, she wasn't going to bring herself to feel guilty about it.
Instead, she gave up her run as class president, finding herself stuffing ballots in an attempt to over compensate for something that wasn't at all related to her current actions, and her suspension from school and Sectionals started to feel like a fair trade for giving in and running back to Blaine time and time again.
She was hurting everyone around her, it was only fair the universe hurt her back.
Rachel was slowly losing her hold on what was happening, and it seemed Blaine was too. They were more obvious than ever before, and as they sung an original Christmas song they'd managed to write together, she wondered how no one else heard it.
They hadn't even tried to hide it this time.
And yet, there their boyfriends sat, singing along with smiles on their faces as some of the girls joined the two of them to dance as they sang about sneaking around, about wanting only each other, and no one seemed to get it.
It was almost like a call for help, but even as the two of them came together once more at the end of the song, she knew that if anyone had caught on-had looked further beneath the surface, at how they were always touching, always looking, how they seemed just a little happier with each other than they did in their respective relationships, everything would implode on them. Everyone would hate both of them, immediately taking Kurt and Finn's side, and they'd only have each other.
Some days, she didn't think that'd be such a bad thing.
"Why do you stay with Finn?"
It was a reasonable question, she knew, even if it took him being drugged out of his mind on painkillers to ask it. She'd managed to ditch Kurt and Finn to come visit him on her own, having to skip out on classes to do so, but she'd missed him enough to do it.
"I-" she started, shrugging slightly. She had a list of reasons, which wouldn't differ much from his own if she questioned why he didn't leave Kurt. "It's safe,' she started, Blaine looking at her as best he could with only one eye. "We've been together so long, that it's expected. He loves me, and-separate from how I feel about you, I love him too. Not the same, maybe not even as much but I do you. It's comfortable and familiar and at the end of the day, he's probably the one I'll end up with, won't he?"
"Not necessarily," Blaine frowned, pulling her closer to him until she gave in and climbed onto his lap, burrowing her head in the crook of his neck.
"Yes, necessarily. I won't leave him anymore than you'd leave Kurt, Blaine, and we both know it. That's why we keep what we do a secret. If we thought that truly, at the end of the day, we could make it-we'd break up with them."
"I just don't want everyone to get hurt," Blaine countered, Rachel placing a small kiss on his neck as she settled herself more comfortably on top of him.
"I know you don't," she whispered. "Which is why I'm with Finn, and you're with Kurt, and you and I-"
"We're a mess," Blaine muttered, his arms tightening around her as she nodded in agreement. "I love you too, you know," he said after a moment, and while Rachel's heartbeat raced about nine thousand times faster than normal at the words, she replied with a simple 'I know' instead.
She should have said 'no', she knew, and she shouldn't have kept it from Blaine, but she didn't want to tell him about the engagement until she'd made up her mind one way or another. She hadn't wanted to tell him when he was drugged up, and in the weeks following his incident, he often was. She only hoped that no one else would find it out, would tell him, and her biggest worry was Kurt.
When he showed up at Breadstix-aptly named the Sugar Shack for the night for her Valentine's day party, her mind flashed back a year when he had sung a different song, had sung to her even if it was subtle and now he was here, singing to his boyfriend who had been receiving gifts from another for almost a week.
It was enough to make her want to give up the holiday all together.
She pulled him away just as she had previous year, out the backdoor once more, and for a moment gave in when he kissed her, wishing it was all she had grabbed him for. It took every ounce of self-restraint she had to pull away when his hands wandered lower, pulled her even closer to him, and she was breathing heavier than she'd like to admit when she did fall out of his grasp. "What's wrong?" he asked quietly, confused and a little hurt at her actions as she stood a foot away from him, needing distance before she allowed herself to get pulled under again.
"Finn proposed to me," she blurted out, unable to figure out a way to go about it slowly. "And I said yes."
He blinked at her, frozen for a moment before he muttered out a quiet "Valentine's day is just not our holiday."
"Blaine, I-"
"Married, though? Rachel, you're 17 and our sneaking around aside, you're not ready for that." She bristled slightly at his words, trying to keep her face as impassive as she could. "You have New York, and you have a whole life ahead of yourself, and Finn Hudson is in no way capable of keeping up with that."
"He's my boyfriend-fiancée, I suppose-Blaine, and I love him and-"
"You don't love him enough. Hell, you told me that!" Blaine argued back, and she tried to defend herself but found she couldn't. She didn't love him enough, didn't love him more than Blaine, but the bottom line was screaming at her-Finn would never stray again, Finn would never break her heart, Finn would never leave. She was the best thing in his life, and he wanted to hold onto her, and she'd let him.
"I do," she lied, ignoring Blaine's scoff. "Which is why that whatever it is we've been doing-"
"Sleeping with each other?" Blaine offered, his tone harsh and cold and it hurt her, but she carried herself forward anyways.
"It's over, and this time for good. I can't fall into this pattern again, I need to focus on my future, on Finn and a wedding and New York and I can't have you clouding my judgment anymore."
"I'm 'clouding your judgment'?" Blaine asked, and he sounded half-amused and half-angry, like he couldn't figure out which was more prevalent, more applicable for the moment.
"I'm not placing the blame for our situation on you, Blaine, I'm simply stating that when I'm around you I lose my sense of who I am, and what I'm doing, and I can't have that anymore."
"Because I'm the one whose making you forget who you are, Rachel. The one whose done nothing but help push you to New York, while Finn is trying to marry you into never leaving his side again. Which one of us do you think is going to hold you back, at the end of the day?" Blaine accused, his voice low as he pointed a finger at her. "This is a bed of your own making, Rachel Berry, but it's yours to make. So I'll walk away, I'll go back to my relationship and you can go destroy your own. You clearly don't need my help in that anymore."
The tears that fell immediately as he slammed the door behind him to rejoin the party blurred her vision enough so that she couldn't move, couldn't do anything but lean against the building and mourn for who she had been even a year and a half ago.
The confident, self-assured girl who would have never gotten herself into this mess in the first place.
It was a combination of everything, she supposed, that made her rush the date of her wedding to much closer than anyone had anticipated. Karofsky's suicide attempt was only one small factor in the decision that was swamped down with things like the abrupt ending of her entire relationship with Blaine, her fathers acceptance of the union, and it was like she was trying to convince herself this was the right idea more than she was trying to convince others. She wore the ring, went through the actions, but a section of her heart was dark and closed off and she had a vague feeling it would be forever.
The look of heartache etched across Blaine's face anytime someone even mentioned the wedding read loud and clear-'don't do this'.
She wanted so badly to listen to it.
Kurt had given up in his quest to talk her out of the decision. Quinn was on her way to be her bridesmaid. Blaine was even sitting there, silently, but there, and she wondered why she was still fighting the urge to throw up. It went beyond nerves, a warning bell in her head screaming that this wasn't happening, that this wasn't how it was supposed to go.
All in all, it wasn't how she planned on celebrating her wedding day.
"I need a moment," was all she could say before running out of the room, past Finn and her fathers, and she only hoped that none of them followed. Waiting for Quinn was her cover, and she didn't know if she wanted the girl to arrive or not anymore. Five minutes, she said over and over in her head. I am marrying Finn Hudson in five minutes. She didn't feel excited, or happy, or anything positive. She felt dread, and guilt, because as she tried to imagine it, picture her life as Finn Hudson's life, she couldn't. She was brought to tears with pictures of her and Blaine, of Blaine's hand interlocked with hers as they wandered through streets of New York, of Blaine's fingers trailing across the skin on her abdomen while his mouth was attached to hers, of Blaine holding her when the stress of West Side Story got to be too much.
She thought for a moment, as she tried to breathe in-between sobs, that she was just imagining him there now, because she was so used to thinking of him as a comfort. He couldn't really be there, not now, but his tone was quiet and his words were comforting as he called her name, one hand rubbing her back while the other rested on her knee, and she tried to relax herself enough to stop crying.
"My make up is a complete mess," she finally whimpered, Blaine smirking a little at her words.
"I don't really think that's the biggest problem right now," he said gently, and she shook her head 'no'.
"The biggest problem is that I'm supposed to marry someone right now, and all I can think of is you, and this isn't what I expected my life to be at 17," she whined, Blaine's fingers wiping away stray tears as they fell in a less steady stream now.
"Then change it," he said as if it was that simple. "I mean-okay, we don't really stand a real shot right now, with Kurt and Finn and everyone else still around. But that doesn't mean you should get married, Rachel. You clearly don't want to. No one wants you to, except Finn."
"I told him-"
"You were drowning," Blaine interrupted. "You both were. Neither of you knew what your life was going to hand you next, and you were desperate and scared and he proposed and you accepted. That didn't mean you had to do it now. And, if in five or ten years, you still want to marry him, I'll personally help plan the wedding."
She let out a watery chuckle, wiping away the last of the tears. "I've made a huge mess of things, haven't I?" she asked quietly, his hand still rubbing circles on her back, the motion comforting and familiar even if she was wearing a wedding dress, even if he wasn't supposed to be touching her period anymore.
"We both did, but we can fix it and-Rach, even if we have to back off for now, it's only a matter of time until we're both in New York." She looked at him curiously, his eyes earnest as they stared at her. "I don't expect you to wait, by any means, but when I get to college and you're somehow single and free, maybe we'd have a real shot then."
"But Kurt-"
"Is a big boy, and when the time comes for him and I to break up, I'm sure he'll handle it with dignity and grace." She let out a snort at that, Blaine laughing a little himself. "Or he'll throw a hissy fit and scream and shout, but either way, that's not your problem. And I'm ready to handle it whenever it comes. But you are in no way prepared for a wedding, Rachel. Not to Finn. Not now."
She nodded her head in agreement, leaning her head against his own as she stroked his cheek affectionately. "Thank you," she said quietly. "For not hating me. For saving me."
"I could never hate you," he promised, pressing a chaste kiss to her cheek, one that burned deeper than any touch from Finn had in months. "Besides, you're not the only one who got saved here." She wanted to question his statement, but her name was being called down the hall and with one last squeeze of his hand, he disappeared.
This time, however, Rachel knew it wouldn't be forever.