Chapter 1

"Why am I even doing this?" thought one Rachel Berry to herself as she stared at her clothes in the cabinet she just opened. "Right. I'm going because I want to make sure Kurt and Mercedes don't do anything detrimental to their health." At least, that's what she keeps on repeating to herself. And to the people around her.

"How much again was the ticket?," were the words blared from her phone on the bed.

"Eighteen! And with free drinks. Personally, I think it's a pretty good deal. Do you think I would look good in black? Should I wear a black-colored one? What if I get lost and Kurt can't spot me? Oh god, should I wear a neon one?," shouted Rachel as she reached for her bright yellow shirt with an even brighter star printed on the center.

"It's a great deal if the drinks actually get anyone drunk. Oh, jesus! No, no no no!" was the reply. There was a bit of crashing noises before Rachel heard anything. "Sorry Rach. Someone shot me. I think wearing black is good, it can hide food stains. And sweat."

"Please don't talk about the sweat, Finn. You know how anxious I feel already. Let's not have it escalate to disgust. But you do make fine points about black outfits. It is a foam party, afterall. I don't want uneven wet spots on my shirt," nodded Rachel to herself.

"Wear shorts!," reminded Finn.

"Alright."

"I still can't believe you're doing this, though! I mean, you sing and study. That's pretty much what you do with your time."

"That is completely untrue, Finn. Singing and studying are not all that I do. I have ballet classes, dancing classes, and yes, they are separate classes! I do my exercises on the elliptical, I also would like to point out that I–"

"Goddamn it… Look, Rachel, I keep on getting shot when I'm on the phone with you," interrupted Finn.

Rachel rolled her eyes, "You should not even be doing something else because you're talking to someone. Isn't that what well-mannered people do?"

Finn laughed, "I gotta go, Rachel. I have to beat this level. Call me when you're back home so I know you're safe. Have fun, and don't get trashed, okay?"

"I wouldn't, as you eloquently put it, get trashed."

"Hm. Yeah, I don't even think you'd get drunk at all. And don't take that as a challenge." Rachel laughed at this. "Anyway, I'm going," and the call was ended.

Rachel stared at her (rare) black clothing and decided that, nope! She was not in the mood to get lost tonight.

"Hello, darling Rachel. Aren't you just dashing?," said a smirking Kurt as he scrutinized Rachel's outfit.

Rachel huffed and said, "I actually considered wearing black, by Finn's suggestion, but I remembered that I would probably have a hard time looking for my companions if I ever were lost."

"Well, we certainly won't lose you now," Kurt laughed.

Mercedes squeezed Rachel's arm and said, "Don't mind Kurt. People here will be too drunk to mind your top. " Rachel wasn't sure if that was supposed to comfort her or just placate her, but before she could decide, Kurt enthusiastically grabbed her arm and led them all to Sizzlers.

"Your legs do look good in those shorts."

Since she wasn't very hungry, Rachel didn't buy anything from the restaurant. Instead, she listened to Kurt grumble about Finn's "unresponsiveness" to his flirting. "Honestly, it just doesn't make sense. I have a keen fashion sense, I am sharp as a tack, and I have really good skin!"

Mercedes nodded, "Well, yes to all of that."

"And how could we forget my talent?," Kurt said pitifully to them. Then he and Mercedes did a gesture with their hands (Rachel was never sure what to call it), clapping their hands once, before waving it a few times around, and then snapping their right hand. It was this kind of moments that reminded Rachel of how much she herself wanted a bestfriend. She knew she was being greedy, so she shrugged off the envy and started singing faintly: We've got more than we know / My friends are different breed / My friends are everything…

"My, my! Is Rachel Berry singing…" started Kurt.

"…contemporary music?" finished Mercedes.

Rachel smiled and said, "The lyrics are fitting, aren't they?"

Kurt and Mercedes shrugged.

"So. When do we go to the party? I'm guessing it's after you've finished eating," said Rachel while looking at her wristwatch.

"You've got to chill, Rachel. No one really goes to a party this early on," replied Mercedes.

Rachel furrowed her brows, "It's 10:00…"

The line was lengthy. The three arrived at 10:40, and had Rachel not started talking about punctuality and "proper courtesy", they would have arrived even later.

Rachel found the location to be a bit odd. The space at the back of the mall was equipped with a lot of lights (Red especially, Rachel noted), and the House music seemed to be coming from there as well. The place seemed so small for Rachel's liking, but she supposed it served a purpose unknown to her. Afterall, Rachel didn't go to many parties.

"I told you so," Rachel huffed.

Kurt rolled his eyes and turned to Mercedes, "I told you she'd say that!"

Mercedes laughed, "Well, she is kind'a right to say that."

"I ain't about to wait in this long-ass line, Q," said a girl near them. She was in between two blondes, one of them nodding to her friend; the other looking bored.

Then the girl called "Q" and the girl looked to be having some sort of dispute, the girl irate at having to wait, while the other kept on rolling her eyes. Until finally, "Q" huffed and said to her friends, "You act as if we've never done this before."

"Done what?"

"Santana, really..?"

Santana nodded after a beat, "Good idea. Why tell me only now?"

Before she could say anything, the other blonde asked, "What's the idea?"

Rachel was feeling annoyed. "Did you see that? That is totally not fair! Beyond doubt it is unethical! This is a line, people. When you arrive lastly, you go in lastly! You don't just saddle up to an official and flirt your way in! That may happen in movies every now and then, but there is the fact that movies aren't typically good examples of ideal behavior! Statistics show that–"

"Oh, wow. I cannot believe you were just about to spout off statistics," said Kurt.

Rachel crossed her arms and said, "We all know the importance of statistics."

"Yeah, especially in an argument, huh Rachel?," replied Kurt.

Mercedes stepped between the two of them, "Ok, stop it, you two. It's not like we can't do what they just did."

"Really, that's rebellious of you, Mercedes. But haven't you been listening to a word I've said? A line is–"

Kurt suddenly hugged them and said frantically in a whisper, "Guys. Cute alert. Guy with the green ribbon,"

They disentangled to look for the guy Kurt was describing. Mercedes found him first. "Cute is right."

Kurt began to pull them towards the guy that had a green ribbon with his outfit. Rachel dragged herself, "What are we doing..?"

"Hi," Kurt breathed out to the guy.

"Oh, hey," the guy was smiling.

"So, the line is long, huh,"

"Yeah, it is. And it's about to get longer, it seems."

"Yes, yes. You're right. So, listen, can I take you up for a dance later on?"

"I–what?" the guy looked flustered.

Kurt raised his brow, "A dance, no..? Okay, well. How about you just let us in already? Save me from this mortifying conversation, you know? But I don't think I was wrong. I can sense when someone is–"

The guy held his hands up and then laughed, "Okay! Let me just have your tickets and I'll just stamp you.." he held out his forearm to show a mark of a mug of beer, "..like this."

Kurt never thought he'd be so attracted to a forearm. "Right." He turned to his friends and said, "You heard him, yeah?"

Rachel was hesitant at first, but she eventually gave in and gave her ticket, and got stamped.

"WELCOME TO THE BAYLA FOAM PARTY VI BY THE GAMMA SIGMA BROTHERHOOD!"

Rachel could feel her heart pound along with the bass. The center was barricaded with steel barriers. And though it had only the size of a swimming pool, it was packed. The foam machine seemed to be a bit faulty, so the foam was not yet copious. But every time it made funny sounds and spurted out generous amounts of foam, everyone hollered and cheered. They even heard one of the guys say, "Take a shot everytime it does that!" Outside of the pool-sized center, people lit up cigs and made out. There was a long line leading up to water containers that contained the free drinks. When Kurt, Mercedes, and Rachel finally got ahold of one, they decided that it was mixed drinks that tasted like boring orange juice and that it probably won't get anyone drunk. In fact, if they were here to get drunk, they would have to pay extra for actual beer.

"Well eighteen for unlimited free drinks was really too good to be a great deal anyway," said Mercedes as she drank more.

Then Kurt took out his phone and started taking selfies.

And more selfies.

And even more selfies.

And then the guy from earlier came up to them and started taking pictures of them. They posed for him and then Kurt said, "Photographer, yeah?" The guy just smiled in reply and turned to other people and took pictures of them.

Rachel was feeling a little down. The real reason Rachel forced herself to buy the ticket and actually go was that she wanted to see if she would enjoy a College party. She considered it important that she would, so she hoped she would. But she didn't like the drinks (that tasted like boring orange juice), the House music, the smell, nor the lights. She felt incredibly awkward just following her friends around and not dancing. In addition to that, her feet were stepped on twice already! She tried engaging Kurt and Mercedes in a conversation, but quickly found that this wasn't really a good place for one. Part of her wanted to stay to see if maybe she'll enjoy it as time goes by, but a bigger part of her wanted to go back to her dorm and whine to Finn and tell him how right he was about everything.

Because she didn't want to ruin her friends' fun or make them worry, she sneakily slithered away from them as they danced. When she finally made it past the dancing crowd, fire dancers ran to the stage to do, well, fire dancing. The crowd ceased dancing to watch the men manipulate the flames. The crowd hollered especially loud when a woman breathed fire. Rachel was standing at the sides, watching them, when a guy with a mohawk knocked onto her, sending her propelling to someone who of course had drinks to spill.

The guy with the mohawk's eyes widened, "I'm sorry, I'm sorry! It was an accident!"

When Rachel was able to straighten herself, she looked up to the girl and apologized, "I'm SO sorry! This young man here," Rachel gestured to the mohawked guy, "accidentally shoved me onto you. I didn't mean to have your drink spilled. If you can find it in yourself to forgive me…or us, rather…I'm sure you can also find the patience to line up again for your..orange juice. That was what was gonna happen sooner or later, am I right?"

"That was beer," replied the girl. "Maybe you can find it in yourself to buy me one?" the girl then flashed her a (charming, in Rachel's opinion) smile.

Rachel shook her head, "I didn't bring any money with me. They did say the drinks were unlimited."

The guy beside them scoffed, "Man…so much for a good deal. It tastes so bad, I can so mix drinks better."

The two girls looked at him weirdly after that. He grinned, "I'm THE Puck. I'm sure you've heard of me."

"Pretty sure I've seen your face on Google when I searched for 'Fuckboy'," replied the girl.

"You wound me." He then turned to Rachel. "Listen. I wanna make up for having drinks spilled onto your very bright shirt." He reached into his backpocket and pulled out a pack of cigarettes. "How 'bout it, yeah?" he offered.

Rachel crossed her arms, "Do I seem like someone who smokes?" Before Puck could offer something else, Rachel continued, "You really don't have to do anything. Just..go. And stop smoking..Puck. A hole in the throat won't be a flattering look on you."

"Can I at least have your number? Both of you? One of you?" Puck requested before the other girl hit her and told him to go away.

Then she turned to Rachel and said, "You owe me a beer."

"Well if you wanna be technical, Puck is actually–"

"No, I don't wanna be technical."

Rachel narrowed her eyes, "Alright. But I'm not comfortable with giving someone something detrimental to their health, so how about something else? Tea, perhaps? Or coffee..?"

Just then, another girl came up to them. "Hey Q! Who ya talkin' to?"

Rachel held out her hand, "I'm Rachel. Rachel Berry. I'm from BA Communication Arts."

The girl shoved her hand away and pulled Rachel into a hug. "I'm Brittany. I don't go here. I'm here for San." Rachel just then noticed the girl behind Brittany. She recognized her as the one who was irate at having to wait at the end of the line earlier. She asked her, "You're San?"

The tanned girl replied, "Nah I'm Quinn."

The girl whose drinks were spilled nudged the tanned girl. "Shut it." She then said to Rachel, "That's Santana. I'm Quinn Fabray. I'm currently taking up BA Sociology. And, you owe me beer. Or tea. Or coffee. Whatever."

"Can we do it some other time? I just really want to get back to my dorm now."

Brittany frowned, "Why, Rachel? Aren't you having fun?"

"It's not that–"

"It is so that," Santana laughed.

Rachel huffed and said, "Fine. Yes, parties aren't really my scene… And now my shirt is ruined. So, really, I just want to get into clean clothes and snuggle up in my bed."

Quinn nodded, "Understandable."

"So, tomorrow? Do you want to have breakfast with me? And possibly my friends?"

"On second thought, let's just forget all of this." said Quinn. "It's…honestly ridiculous. It was all an accident, you don't really owe me anything."

Rachel was puzzled by Quinn's change of mind, but she just really, really wanted to go home, so she shrugged and said, "That it true… Anyway. It was nice meeting you, Quinn Fabray. You too, Brittany and Santana. I hope you have a good semester, not flunking out and whatnot. Also, please refrain from smoking. Nothing in it could be good for you. And be sure to say hi to me when we see each other on campus, alright?"

"How will I spot someone so small?" asked Santana.

Quinn hit her friend lightly, "Shut it." She turned back to Rachel, "Will do, Rachel Berry. Be safe on your way home."

And with that, the three went to the center to join the dancing crowd. For Rachel, it was time to call it a night and to get back to her dorm.

A/N: Hello, internet! I'm on Christmas Break, and I just had a tiring semester, haha! Anyway, merry christmas..or happy holidays, if you're not Catholic. I hope you enjoyed the minimal interaction between Rachel and Quinn, ahaha.