Disclaimer: No, I do not own Glee. If I did, Finn would be more supportive of the obvious Faberry there, and the Queeri- I mean Cheerios, pardon my slip (hehe), would be free to show PDA every episode, and it wouldn't take winning a poll to make things happen, but before I start to really rant, lets see this story, huh? FIRST TWO SEGMENTS OF THIS, WHICH WILL NOW BE SPECIFICALLY LABELED AS TO EASE CONFUSION, ARE FLASHBACKS!
WARNING: POTENTIAL TRIGGER (RAPE)
{FLASHBACK 1 BEGINNING}
Quinn Fabray took out her keys to Rachel's house, pushed them into the lock, twisted, and upon grabbing the mail, opened the door, proceeding to make her presence known.
Looking down at the different bills for Rachel's father and tossing them on the counter, she spoke, "Hey Rach, I'm home! I know that we were supposed to head out to hang with Puck like 5 minutes ago, but Sylvester was brutal today. It's odd, we have nationals in the bag, but still she throws us into practice right after glee." A thought ran through her mind as she chuckled softly, "Well, at least she didn't call the practice while we were in glee."
She noticed that there was no response, which was odd, because normally Quinn couldn't get the tiny diva to shut up. She was being brought into conversation and for her to not speak…highly unlikely. So, Quinn began to head up the stairs, heading to Rachel's door, which she found wide open, with the lights off and the bed empty. As she headed back downstairs, looking for her friend with a little bit more concern, she stopped dead in her tracks when she was back on the first floor.
From the closed door leading to the basement, she heard what sounded like a muffled scream. Her stomach now in knots, she steeled herself, walking over to the cutlery set in the kitchen, grabbing the biggest knife that she could find, then went and grabbed a flashlight from out of the drawer.
Opening the door slowly as to make less noise, she sat down carefully, taking her shoes off, and made her way down the stairs. When she got to the last step, she crouched and looked to her left, which was pitch black, and then to her right, which at the far end, off in a corner, there was a small amount of light coming, but she couldn't see the source. As she headed over in that direction, she brought her knife arm up, ready to strike at the first sign of trouble. That is, at least, what she told herself. If she was being honest with herself, she was absolutely scared shitless.
Finally, Quinn made her way to the end of the hallway, and almost threw up. There, tied up, with tears streaming down her face, but mute, more than likely due to her voice being strained, was Rachel. She was naked, with a strap of duct tape across her mouth, her hands and feet bound, and bruises starting to form all over her.
When Quinn went to kneel in front of the girl, she heard a clearing of a throat from the dark left hand side of the basement. Upon hearing the noise, she brought herself to her feet, and willed herself to shine the flashlight on the one doing all this. There was only one option in her mind as to who could be behind this. But, when the light was cast on the offender, she dropped the flashlight in absolute shock…cause it couldn't have been…
{FLASHBACK 1 END}
-Glee—Glee—Glee—Glee—Glee—Glee—Glee—Glee—Glee—Glee—Glee—
{FLASHBACK 2 BEGINNING}
Quinn was staggering through the hallway of the berry home, holding onto her open wound for dear life. There was blood seeping through her fingertips...so much blood.
'It isn't supposed to end like this, it's not supposed to end now'.
Its coming out even faster now and she just wants to drop to the ground and rest, and shes just so tired, but she knows if her eyes shut right now, they'll more than likely never open again. so she wills herself forward to Rachel's door. Upon seeing it open just a crack, she finally allows herself to crumble, making sure that its in a forward motion as she crashes through the door, hitting the floor with a sickening thud, surprising Finn and Rachel who had been sitting on the brunette's bed, talking. Mustering up all the energy she had, she pushed down with her good arm, effectively looking at the shocked duo, before locking eyes with Rachel, managing to barely get out the only two words she could think to utter...
"Help me..."
{FLASHBACK 2 END}
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{PRESENT DAY}
Looking out the window, Quinn Fabray sat in the passenger seat of Finn Hudson's car, contemplating just how she had gotten back to a state of peace that she had not known since the first day of freshman year, when she had been hoisted to the upper echelon of the McKinley High student body.
The past two years had its ups and downs, and it had almost destroyed the close friendship that the two had, but, luckily they had managed to work things out, and were now back to where they had been when they finished ninth grade: inseparable.
Finn looked over at the blonde who was obviously deep in thought, as he parked in front of the Fabray...house?
'Can I even call that a house? Its like, huge.'
He shook himself from his thoughts, and tapped Quinn, who was still thinking back on the past, managing to get her attention.
"As much as I know you want to come home with me, I'm kind of off the market right now, so I'm going to have to ask you to leave,"he said lopsided smirk fully in place, getting the desired effect in the form of a giggle from the reminiscent blonde.
"Oh, please, Hudson. You wish. Besides, we both know the second that Santana realizes that she is head over heels in love with Brittany, that she is going to be gone so quickly you won't even realized that its happened."
Adorning a sad smile for a brief moment, he looked at her, "Yeah, I know."
Instantly feeling guilty, she ruffled his hair playfully, "You're going to make someone very happy someday Finn. I know that you probably thought that it was going to be me for a little bit last year, and so did I, but I'm honestly happier than I was last year with where we stand. Save for the brief period of my pregnancy, you've been the one constant in my life that I've always been able to turn to, and I don't think you'll ever know exactly how much it means to me."
"Aww...what would McKinley do if they knew you were that much of a softy-Ahh!"
His hand wrapped around his shoulder, holding the spot where she had just taken a pot shot at him, laughing pretty hard for someone who just got socked by his best friend, slipping out an explanation between chuckles, "Kidding, Q! Jesus, one of these days, I'm gonna get you for all this abuse that you put me through."
"Yeah, you say that every time. Well, as much as I would like to stay and chill, I have to get inside, my folks are probably going crazy right now."
They would look back on that statement in the years to come, knowing that it was all too true, but for all the wrong reasons.
"Okay, tell your Mom I say hi. Not your dad though, he scares the everliving shit out of me."
"Will do, Hudson, see you Monday."
As she shut the door, she walked up to the door, but she couldn't help but shake the feeling that something was incredibly wrong. Everything looked to be in its proper place, the windows were closed, the door was locked, both cars were here. She shook it off, and opened the door.
Immediately she knew where the feeling was coming from, as she heard shouting coming from the upstairs bedroom. The only difference was the chill that his voice was sending up her spine tonight, she didn't know what it was, but it carried a lot more malice and hostility than she was used to when he went off like this.
"You worthless whore! I know about the act of depravity that you partook in."
Her mother was a sobbing mess as she was trying to explain something to him, but in the midst of all of her crying, Quinn couldn't make anything out.
"You're probably still seeing her aren't you, that's where you're really at when you say that you're at a business trip, huh?"
Heading up the stairs, she quietly made her way to the source of the commotion. She was completely off-put by how low his tone got after that, "You know what homosexuality is, Judy? Filthy, that's what homosexuality is. They are trash. You, are trash. Do you know what happens to trash, Judy?"
Quinn didn't like where this was headed at all, he was taking it way too far, and she was telling herself to run, but for some reason, she kept going forward, toward the first of two events that would alter her life forever.
Opening the door, she has to cover her mouth with her hand and bite down on her tongue so that she doesn't make a sound, as she sees her father with a knife pressed against her mother's throat, "Trash gets removed, it gets discarded, but more pertinent to you, trash gets disposed of."
With the final word coming out of his mouth in a calmness that was just terrifying, he, without hesitation, slides the blade across the column of her throat, and she watches her mother fall, lifeless, to the side.
Unable to control herself at this point, she shrieks, and runs out the house. She, thankfully, has half a mind to slash all four tires of both of her parents' cars.
Her body on auto-pilot, running to the closest glee member's house, she shuts down mentally, telling herself that she needs to keep running, needs to move as fast as humanly possible. It's pitch black outside as she is bounding down the sidewalk, the roads are quiet, and once she finally thinks to check her watch, knowing that she left the house sometime around 10:37pm, she sees that it is 11:10 and that she has been running for a good half an hour straight. Surprisingly, she isn't even feeling tired. She isn't allowing herself, however, so even if she was, she wouldn't acknowledge it.
Finally letting herself slow down, she goes into an alleyway, completely deserted. She rests against the wall, and takes in everything that has just happened.
Her father is now a murderer, and her mother is gone. She has no home, and a long shot at finding somewhere to stay. She begins thinking about seeing the light in her mother's eyes go out as the glistening blade made its way against her skin, and she loses it, lying sideways on the ground, every emotion that had been ignored for the past forty-five minutes, which is a pretty big amount.
She has half a mind to go straight to the police, but she's too tired to do anything that serious.
After about twenty minutes, she gathers her wits again, and wiping her eyes, she continues out on her way to safety. To the one place where she knows she will be let in, maybe not without questions, but she has always been good at having to lie on a moment's notice. To the one place that she never thought she would willingly be going. To her second life-altering moment in just under two hours. To Rachel Barbra Berry's house.
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She finally reached the house, and started making her way up the walkway. When she reached the door, she realized that the front door was slightly ajar, and there were no cars in the driveway, which made her brain go into overdrive.
Without thinking, she headed into the house, immediately noticing the ridiculously loud music coming from upstairs. She knows that Rachel would be too worried about her hearing being affected by the loud volume to listen to it that high. She walked straight to the kitchen to grab a knife, when she noticed that one of the slots was empty already. She was praying to god that this wasn't going to play out like she thinks it might.
As she begins to ascend the stairs, she starts to hear a faint banging, and an almost drowned out, but not completely muffled, "Stop, Jesse! Please stop," with crying accompanying her words, and she sounded absolutely frantic. Quinn, then shortening her assumptions about the situation while praying even harder that it wasn't.
She reached the door, and went to open it, but saw that it was locked after twisting the handle twice. She then backed up to the back of the hallway, and harnessing all of her sadness, anger, guilt, and overall pain, she sprinted forward, and crashed through the door. When she rose, the sight in front of her made her stomach churn and had her reaching out for something to hold herself up.
Rachel was on her stomach, with Jesse St. James on top of her, one of his hands holding her head down, the other on her back keeping her down. She also noticed the knife on the dresser next to the bed. Unfortunately, they had heard her, and Jesse righted himself, pulled out of the brunette, and grabbing the knife, held the blade at her throat, just like..."Hello there, Quinn, how nice of you to join us. You are quite lucky that I managed to finish before you burst in here, or else I would have had to kill the both of you."
When she paused to gather herself, he acted, pushing the sobbing girl towards her, and catching the girl offguard, but Quinn still managed to wrap her arms around Rachel and take the brunt of the fall herself. She looked up at Jesse, who was currently heading out of the window, seeing as it wasn't too big of a fall to the backyard. "Don't worry, Rachel, this isn't the last you'll see of me."
With a simple blink of her eyes, he was gone. As she picked Rachel up and got her to the bed, then began to head off to find Jesse, she felt a hand circle her wrist. She looked behind her and saw the brunette, eyes opened wide, frantic look in her eyes, as she whispers, "Don't go, please don't leave me alone."
Quinn is instantly sitting next to the girl, looking her in the eyes. "What do you need me to do Rachel?"
Rachel starts crying again, "Hold me?"
Before the brunette knows it, Quinn is right next to her, wrapping her arms around the shorter girl, turning her so that Rachel is facing her, and lets the girl cry on her shoulder. "Shh...he's gone now. He's gone." As much as she was saying that to Rachel, it was also for herself, because she needed to make sure that she kept her emotions and what had happened with her family in check when she was near Rachel. She began to let herself drift off, telling herself that she would deal with everything in the morning.
AN: So I know this is dark as hell, and you're possibly looking at what I put poor Quinn and Rachel through like, "Wow, he's an asshole!"
While the truth might be on your side, I wanted to start this off with a bang. That is how I usually operate with my fics.
Me and RiverKirby hope that you enjoy this ride that we are constructing for you, and if you review, shoutouts will be issued at the end of the next chapter!