Inspired/Based off the poem by James Fenton, the whole of which can be found posted on my tumblr: Time-for-100-indecisions, or probably pretty easily googled. It seemes a bit excessive to quote the whole thing here though.
Don't talk to me of love. I've had an earful
And I get tearful when I've downed a drink or two...
Don't talk to me of love. Let's talk of Paris,
The little bit of Paris in our view.
- James Fenton, 'In Paris With You'
Rachel Berry was sick of men.
At thirty-two years old, she'd always imagined she'd be married by now, with a couple of kids running in the yard, as the old Beatles' song goes.
Instead she was in this sodding city – for the third time she might add- having just broken up with her third fiancé. She should have known when Lawrence had suggested the trip that it was a bad idea. When had the 'Paris Effect' ever worked for her? But it had been the last-ditch attempt to salvage the ruins of their relationship, and, perhaps because she didn't care enough to really want to save it, she reflected dryly; she had agreed.
Well, two days of champagne, world-class cuisine and walks down the Champs-Elysées had worked their magic and killed the last vestiges of hope dead. Right now Lawrence was probably tumbling into bed with some hooker in Pigalle whilst she sat here alone, outside this miserable sodding café.
Well, she amended, that was unfair. It wasn't miserable. It was downright charming. That's why she loathed it so much – too fucking Parisian.
She sighed and downed her fourth glass of outrageously-expensive-and-no-doubt-over-priced wine. She'd have to switch to caffeine fixes on the next drink if she wanted to be in with a chance of walking back to the hotel.
Half-nine, and the sun was setting across the city. Here in her tiny corner of some quaint bistro only frequented by locals, Rachel could see hundreds of terracotta-roofed houses crowding higgledy-piggledy at odd angles to each other, bathed in the warm after glow like a post-coital flush.
How fucking picturesque.
'Mademoiselle?' an alto voice husked from behind her.
She snorted. She knew very well she was of a 'Madame' age now. She turned her head to the mysterious flatterer. 'Oui?' she offered, sounding suitably bored.
The slim blonde waitress cocked an eyebrow as she paused from stacking the dirty plates on the table next to Rachel. 'Any more drinks?' she asked, slipping effortlessly into English on noticing Rachel's accent.
Rachel chuckled in spite of herself. 'Damn, I've been trying to perfect that fucking accent for so long' she tells the woman, shaking her head in amusement at her own failure, and gulping the final dregs of her wine.
The younger woman gives her a slow, sexy smirk. 'For an American, it's superb', she teases.
Rachel can't help but notice how much she loves the way that sex just oozes from every word in the French language – at least when the natives speak it. 'I resent that knock on my country-folk', she mocks, slurring her words a little.
The girl laughs, a throaty laugh that makes Rachel want to sink her teeth into the skin stretched over her clavicle. 'I don't think you care', she challenges.
Rachel levels her gaze and raises her eyebrows a little at the girl's boldness. 'You're right. I don't', she replied carelessly.
'In fact', the blonde steps closer, leaving the plates on the table to approach Rachel who begins to appreciate the diaphanous material of the girl's white ruffled shirt. 'I'd say you probably don't care about much right now', she continues, jerking her head at the empty wine bottle.
Rachel looks up at her from under hooded lids, fully aware that she is on the rebound and that this is the perfect moment for hot, French, sex with a stranger. 'Right twice in a row; what do you want, a medal?'
The woman smirks and positively purrs in anticipatory pleasure. She slides slowly onto Rachel's table, taking care that her already short black skirt hitches further up her thighs as she does so. 'I was thinking of something a little more... satisfying'.
It's a ridiculous line but nonetheless Rachel feels her thighs clench at the words, and it's enough. She looks speculatively at the blonde. She's almost certainly a student with an evening job, and can't be more than twenty-four.
'If I were a little less drunk, I'd care about your name and more especially, your age', she observes.
The girl wets her lips as Rachel moves her hands to interlock their fingers on the table between them. A smile curls her lips and it's a promise of more.
'But you're not a little less drunk', she points out, and her tongue poke out a little in a really unbelievably tempting manner.
Rachel suppresses another smirk. 'No, I guess I'm not'.
With that, the girl pushes off the table and, not letting go of the brunette's hand, pulls her into the café where she promptly closes the door, backs Rachel against it, and starts kissing the hell out of her. Apparently she is locking up tonight.
She's about a half a head taller than Rachel and uses this to her full advantage, pinning the actress' hands above her head and angling their bodies perfectly flush together as her hot lips rob Rachel of every sense but taste – and boy does this girl taste good. Espresso with a hint of chocolate. Like a sex-cappuccino, Rachel thinks, before all thought is cut off by a slender thigh sliding between her legs and pressing firmly into her centre.
Her panties begin to feel uncomfortably sticky as she rubs onto the blonde's bare leg like a cat on heat. She feels the girl smile smugly into her lips as she gasps, and gives those lips a sharp nip in reprimand for her arrogance. The girl merely swipes at the blood hungrily with her tongue and continues more fervently than ever.
Rachel fists her shirt and pulls her impossibly closer. The tangle of their legs is damp with sweat and arousal and Rachel wants the salty heat on every part of her body – legs, stomach, breasts. She wants this girl, this insanely hot student currently ravishing her in a god-forsaken cafe she's forgotten the name of. Oh well, less press-coverage she supposes.
'More', she growls, and the blonde obligingly swipes off both of their shirts so that the heat of their stomachs meet. It's not enough and Rachel savagely tears off the younger woman's bra, shortly followed by her own; sighing in relief as small, firm breasts finally mould into her own.
The blonde is getting rougher now and, slipping her hand down to join the thigh in between Rachel's legs, thrusts in with no warning.
Rachel's head hits back against the door and a guttural moan rips through her throat. 'Your name?' she gasps out, trying to make it sound more like an order than a plea.
The girl barely breaks from devouring Rachel's pule-point, merely growling in response.
Rachel squirms as the thrusts get more insistent.
'Tell me', she repeats, somehow firmer and yet more desperate all at the same time.
The girl draws back for a second to look down at Rachel, never slowing the pace of her fingers. 'Why should I?'
Rachel strains her head back once again as the supple fingers hit their mark. 'Tell me your name and I'll scream it when I come', she retorts shamelessly, a rubescence suffusing her cheeks and collar bone down to the tops of her breasts and eyes dark with lust.
The blonde grins and leans in, conspiratorially. 'Quinn', she breathes into Rachel's ear. With that, she bites into the ear-lobe nudging her mouth so temptingly, and presses her thumb firmly into Rachel.
'Oh, Quinn!' Rachel gasps, voice caught between squeak and breath. Her walls clench several times before relaxing and only then does Quinn withdraw her fingers to lick them clean, watching Rachel recover herself with a complacent and very French expression.
'My turn', she claims and, smirking, the two stumble up the stairs to her flat.
QFRB
A week later, Rachel lies in bed, white sheets draped loosely around her body as if begging to be tugged just a little lower,
Through the open French-windows, Quinn is perched on the railing of her balcony dressed only in Rachel's old NYADA hoodie and a tatty pair of denim shorts, out of which her long slim legs dangle to entwine themselves in the bars of the rail.
She reads to her lover from a book of French poetry, her voice the perfect husk of post-coital bliss as she periodically flicks the ash from the end of her cigarette.
Rachel doesn't understand a word of course, but it sounds fucking fantastic. Like slim fingers and soft tongues, only in words.
As the sun sets over the city and her young girlfriend is bathed in warmth, glowing ever more teasingly, Rachel realises she has found the Paris Effect.
And it's fucking amazing.
A/N: Realised afterwards that I switch into present tense as Quinn makes her move. Don't think it's too jarring a change though, so I've left it.
Please Review, it really does make my day like a hundred times over.