Title: Choux Pastry Heart
Genre: Television
Series: Glee
Characters: Noah Puckerman, Rachel Berry
Spoilers: pre-"Mash-Up" (1.08)
Rating: PG
Summary: Puck didn't see Rachel when he threw a slushie at her, but that was okay because she didn't see him either.
Word Count: 1425
The first time Noah Puckerman threw a slushie in Rachel's face she was pretty sure he was more shocked than she was. This was before the mohawk, before the infamous reputation, before he cut himself off from every vulnerability that childhood had left within his psyche. It was the beginning of the semester, her first at this school, and if she grinned just a little too broadly in her nervousness, if her clothing was a strange combination of racy (short skirt) and conservative (sweater-set), she didn't notice. She'd yet to make any friends, or even acquaintances, and with each day that passed she began to feel more alienated.
Then it happened and that feeling, that ball in her stomach and the cold in her bones, settled in and stained her skin and her clothes and Rachel had the sudden sense that it would never go away, not completely. She blinked slowly, the thick liquid burning at the corners of her eyes sharply, and gazed incredulously at the boy responsible.
The upperclassmen behind him were laughing uproariously, but Puck wasn't. He was looking right at her face, right into her eyes, almost as if he were waiting to see what her reaction would be. This was his initiation, his rite of passage into the upper echelons of popularity, and she was just the sacrifice he had to make. It was...disturbingly impersonal. For all the intensity of Puck's study of her face, of her reaction, he wasn't looking at her. That hurt Rachel worse than the actual act.
The second time Rachel received a slushy to the face it was grape and he laughed. His friends, his own classmen this time, were startled by his sudden act of cruelty but went along with it. Rachel, on the outside, could see it was an action of power, his way of establishing his hold over others. Again, it wasn't personal. He wasn't seeing Rachel Berry, future Broadway star, when he doused her with the iced drink, and that actually made it worse. It wasn't the humiliation of being the victim of his prank, it was degrading nature of being anonymous.
By the fifteenth slushie Rachel had made a decision. Tales of Puck's actions had spread through the rest of the school and since then no one would willingly talk or interact with her on any level; most because they didn't want to risk losing what little popularity they had, and everyone else because they didn't want to join her as a target. Rachel rinsed the bright blue of a berry slushie from her hair and sighed deeply. She should've known better than to wear white, it was like she was asking for a dousing. Rachel turned her gaze to the mirror and fought the pout that was forming on her lips; there was a distinct blue tinge to her skin. This was the first time Puck had used blueberry as the flavor he was painting her with and Rachel hoped he made it a rare choice.
For the first time she could feel herself wanting to cry. There was no way she could salvage this day, not with this as a starter. Even if she changed her clothes her skin would bear the evidence of Puck's attack and she would have to hear the snickers and teasing of her classmates. Throwing the paper towel into the trash Rachel gathered her bag and jacket and retrieved her car keys from a side pocket. For once she didn't care about her attendance record; she just wanted to go home.
Tomorrow would be different, Rachel decided. If they wanted to punish her for being who she was then she would be that person unrepentantly. She would sing louder, smile brighter, laugh higher, and generally be an impervious caricature of herself. She would not let them break her spirit, she would shine despite them, to spite them.
As she made her way out of the school, Rachel didn't notice the dark eyes watching from the football field.
Puck never used blueberry again, she never thought to ask why.
The tradition continued for weeks, alternating in frequency, sometimes happening as many as three times a week, sometimes not happening at all. Rachel began to develop a system of early warning signs, small details that warned her to pack an extra shirt and wet wipes. When the time arrived, him approaching with a dark serious look on his face, her steeling herself and waiting stiffly, they played their roles with perfect aplomb. He tossed, she flinched, he laughed, she waited and when they were gone she sprinted into the restroom to clean up. They had it down to a concise ritual, taking less than ten minutes. She wasn't late for class and she didn't have to wait on edge for the slushie to drop.
It didn't make it any easier to deal with, however.
When Puck joined Glee it upset the entire balance of the equation. The entire scene they played was based on the fact that they didn't know each other, they had no classes together, didn't speak, didn't interact other than the attack of iced drink every once and while. With his sudden invasion into the sphere of non-contact she'd formed around herself Rachel was lost as to how to react.
When they spoke it was terse, unfriendly, and to the point; she didn't want to interact with him any more than he did with her. She didn't want to sing with him anymore than he wanted to play the guitar for her. The very nature of Glee Club was forcing them into a pseudo-relationship that neither wanted and it showed in every interaction.
It was no longer impersonal and she could no longer isolate and cauterize the hurt the situation was causing her.
It wasn't a brainless jock using her to stabilize his hold over his equally brainless friends; this was the boy who played the guitar with astonishingly gentle fingers. Rachel knew his hands, the long graceful lines of it, the scratched and bruised skin that stretched white around the bones when she'd pushed him too far. She loved the small details, the ones that no one else noticed.
It was why she was the first one to realize that Puck had not joined Glee Club for Finn. It was that small flinch in his eyes every time Quinn would grab Finn's arm, it was the tightening at the corners of his eyes when he spoke to her, and yes, the way his skin seemed to stretch tight enough to crack around his knuckles.
Rachel could live with knowing Puck's secret, it wasn't hers to tell. She could've pretended she didn't know anything of the way he felt but by acknowledging that he did indeed feel she crossed a line she hadn't known she'd drawn within herself. When Puck joined Glee he'd become a three-dimensional person, he gained depth that he couldn't have to play the role she'd assigned him within her life. He couldn't be the lifeless villain if he was sympathetic, she couldn't love to hate him when he so clearly hated himself already.
The recognition she felt for Puck in the aftermath of the sudden change to her world went both ways, however. Just as she finally saw him, saw the flawed mess of a boy he really was, one day he turned and saw her too. He wasn't as good at keeping it a secret, knew only harsh words and judgments that he could spit at her in the few moments they were alone.
The first time Puck slushied Rachel after he joined Glee Rachel wasn't surprised. She'd seen it coming, the dark smirk, the tight way his hand wrapped around the plastic cup. She blinked, ignored the burning as the syrup slid across retinas, and stared him in the eyes. He paused, just for a second, he paused and looked back. His friends were already laughing, patting him on the back and moving past her without looking back, but he paused. She put it all into her eyes, she wanted him to see it all.
She knew him, knew the way he hurt, knew why he needed to have someone to take it all out on. She put into her eyes and wanted him to read the way she knew him in them. His hand clenched tighter around the cup and Rachel smirked and moved to the restroom, her tongue just a flash of pink across her bottom lip, but it was always about the small details.
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