Author's note: So, I discovered Glee like halfway through the season, but now I love it, and I just had to write something for F/R. Set during Power of Madonna (which I thought was a really fabulous episode, maybe the best one of the season). I hope you enjoy, and as always, please make sure to R&R!
Something about Finn always made the hairs on Rachel's arms pop up, made her belly tingle, made her heart beat a little faster. There was this... chemistry between them, and it didn't make sense, because he'd kissed her while he had a girlfriend, and then when she was his girlfriend he'd broken up with her, and Rachel Berry DID NOT want or need someone like that in her life. At all.
And then she had to go and sing a duet with Finn, and it all went to hell.
Like, how could she look at Finn, at his adorably awkward dancing, and the goofy smile on his face, and his really-good-but-not-quite-as-good-as-Jesse singing, and not-
not-
What was she talking about again?
She remembered the heat in his eyes when he looked at her, HER, Rachel Berry, when he was on the football team and the basketball team and he dated Cheerios, and she? She wore peasant blouses and weird animal sweaters and made kitten relationship calendars. And the way he sang open your heart, I'll make you love me, the dare in his eyes as he sang don't try to resist me, the way he'd followed her around the piano as they'd sung about love and a lock and a key, open your heart to me…
And Rachel was feeling pretty sure that her heart had never been locked in the first place, not when it came to Finn; he was what she wanted but was too scared to have, but her heart didn't care, it just went on the way it was, and she finally came to realize that after she'd been staring at Finn a beat too long.
It was her brain that had her turning away first.
Finn had done some pretty not-nice things in his past, including his not-too-recent past, but he considered himself to be a pretty good guy. He wasn't going to get in someone's face like Puck would, and he'd only helped toss a couple dorks into the dumpster, and sure he might have slushied Rachel a time or two, but it hadn't been his idea and he hadn't done it a ton, and…
Aw, who was he kidding? He wasn't that great of a guy. But dammit, he knew he was a better guy than Jesse. And that's all that really mattered when it came to Rachel.
He'd screwed up—royally, he knew—when he dumped Rachel, hurt her in a way he hadn't meant to but also hadn't cared enough to prevent. But he knew, with his guy sixth sense or whatever, that Jesse's motives for dating Rachel had nothing to do with caring about her and everything to do with screwing her—screwing them—over in some way.
He couldn't stop the way he looked at Rachel, knew it made her uneasy, but he wondered if it was completely unwelcome. After all, she hadn't told him to stop.
And now, now, she wanted him to sing this stupid duet with her, knew he'd do it because he still cared about her, and he wanted to be pissed that she was manipulating him like she was, but after all, didn't he deserve it?
But man, maybe Madonna knew what she was talking about, even if she was Madonna, because he was such a fool for Rachel, and god, he knew if Rachel just gave him a chance he could make her love him again…
There was a pause at the end that lasted a little too long, Finn staring at Rachel staring back at him, and he thought, hoped, maybe—
But Rachel turned away, so he did too. He had to save face after all.
