It had been three days since Rachel had left LA. Since Quinn had slipped the engagement ring Puck had once given to her, onto Rachel's finger as a promise, after two weeks together and the media questioning Rachel's sexuality. Three days, and she hadn't spoken to Rachel once. No calls, no texts, not even an email.
The first day, Quinn had been patient, or as patient as she could be. Checking her phone every few minutes, but resisting the urge to contact the brunette first since she had promised to call when her plane had landed. She hadn't slept at all that night, and by six am the next morining, she called Santana out of worry that maybe Rachel had been kidnapped. The latina assured her, though, that Rachel was safely asleep in her bed. Quinn had quickly ended the phone call after that, not wanting Santana to hear the sniffle of her nose or the crack in her voice as she fought the tears she could feel coming.
Anger eventually replaced tears, and she vowed not to even try to get in touch with her girlfriend. She was alive and well, sleeping soundly. She had completely broken her promise to call. No way Quinn was going to reach out first.
By ten pm, she had talked herself into breaking that vow. She listened as the phone rang in her ear for thirty eight of the longest seconds of her life. As Rachel's recorded voice came across the voicemail, she once again felt her eyes begin to sting, and hung up quickly before the beep could come.
She tried one last time, sending a text around three am. She typed out three short words, 'I love you'. She pressed send right as the exhaustion from the last few days finally overtook her.
Upon waking up the third morning around eight am, after having nightmares all during her short sleep of different versions of Rachel breaking up with her, she immediately checked her phone. No new messages. No missed calls. Officially, Rachel was completely ignoring her.
As she slowly, almost lethargically, rolled out of bed, she tried to thing of anything else. She focused her mind on putting one foot in front of the other until she reached the kitchen. Every movement, every small motion, felt like it took the effort of climbing a mountain. Without Rachel, motivation for even the most minimal of tasks was hard to come by. She told herself coffee would help, knowing it would be a tiny comfort.
She flicked the button to tutn the coffee pot on after filling it with water and placing the full filter filled with her strongest brew into it. She stood staring impatiently at the pot, silence in the apartment other than the gurgle of water heating up and beginning to drip through the dark ground mocha beans. When she heard the distant sound of the first ring, it took her a moment to realize what the noise was. When the second ring came, she thought surely it was just a figment of her wishful imagination. On the third, she perked her ears up a little more. By the fourth, she was sprinting to her bedroom like she was running for olympic gold.
She was disappointed yet again, however, when she threw herself across her bed to answer her phone on its fifth ring. In her haste, she didn't even look at the caller id before answering and plunging her cell to her ear. When she heard the voice on the other line, her entire body deflated, sinking into the bed while her stomach dropped, and as her heart fell through to the floor beneath.
"Quinn? Quinn, are you there?" She heard the voice ring again in her ear.
"Yes. Sorry, Sarah." She greeted, doing her best to pull herself together quickly. "I'm here." She managed on some sort of auto pilot. "I think we had a bad connection there for a moment."
"It wouldn't surprise me. You know these cell phone companys they charge these outrageous fees, and then..."
"Sarah." She interrupted, not wanting to get lost on the other end of one of her older manager's rants. "You caught me in the middle of breakfast. No offense, but was there a reason you were calling?"
"Oh, well I'm sorry, sugar. Why didn't you just say so?" This made Quinn's palm fly to her forehead. "I was just calling to make sure you were up and at it for your flight in a few hours. Giving you your complimentary wake up call." She laughed out. Even though she wanted to try, Quinn couldn't muster a giggle back, no matter how fake it would have been anyway.
"I'm up. I'm ready. Just having some breakfast before I head to the airport." She assured her, hoping to satisfy her and end the call.
"Excellent. You've got a couple other writers flying out with you. Most everyone else flew out yesterday to do meet and greets and all that good stuff. When you get to New York, everything should be set up to start filming your first episode."
"Sounds great. I'll call you tonight and let you know how everything goes."
"Alrighty. Good luck, kid."
"Thanks. Bye." Quinn hung up the phone before Sarah could say anything else.
After laying her phone on the counter, she grabbed a mug and poured her first cup of coffee. She did need to be leaving soon, but instead of changing clothes or finishing packing, she leaned her back against the counter edge and sipped the warm beverage slowly. She should be eager to go, she thought to herself. Being in NYC in a few hours meant seeing Rachel in a few hours. She was working on her first big break, writing regularly for a hit tv show. As her stomach twisted in nervousness, however, she knew she actually dreaded her soon to be arrival across the country.
Not hearing from Rachel, her texts and calls going unanswered, had left her feeling a sense of dread about when she finally would be face to face with the brunette again. She was bound to get dumped, and that wasn't exactly something one looked forward to. Worse even, she was going to have to pretend like everything was okay for work, not just today, but for the foreseeable future as well. Yep, this was some new form of her living hell.
She glanced at the clock on the stove, letting out a deep breathe as she refilled her mug, this time carrying it to the bedroom with her so she could finish packing her bags. She couldn't put it off any longer.
Rachel stood in her own kitchen, sipping her own mug of coffee, and flipping aimlessly through the newspaper. She knew which section she was looking for, but took her time in finding it, not overly eager to relive last night's events.
When she had gotten back to NYC, she went straight to her manager, as promised. She walked in the door of the small cafe where she was meeting him feeling strong and determined. She could convince him she didn't need to break up with Quinn, that they could just be more discreet with their relationship. She would.
An hour later, however, she exited the cafe with slumped shoulders and the feeling of defeat that came along with them. She couldn't convince him of anything. In fact, he had made her question everything. He was so persistant that her career couldn't survive a relationship like hers and Quinn's, it had left her doubting it as well.
He had even given her a to do list. She was supposed to go out at night, where she usually stayed in. Somewhere photographers would be. She also had a date he assured her was absolutely imperitive to rebuilding her image. A date with her future castmate and love interest in the show.
Which brought her back to this morning, standing in her kitchen with The New York Times on the counter next to her fourth cup of coffee. She took a breath, and flipped over to the gossip section, already knowing some of what she would find.
Thankfuly, there was only one picture. It was taken as she and James left the restaurant where they had had dinner, holding hands as he walked her to the car already waiting for them. That wasn't so bad, she reasoned with herself. So she began reading the article hopefully.
After finishing it, she slammed the paper closed and threw it in the trash aggresively. The picture, she thought, was definitely the best part, and that was saying something. The article not only brought up the recent questions into her sexuality and the "unidentified blonde", but it made her out to be some kind of serial dater. She was nothing of the sort. She had only dated a handful of people her entire life. She was only really dating one person now.
Wasn't she? She had gone on the date with James, even if it had only been for publicity. And she hadn't spoken to Quinn since leaving Los Angeles. She just couldn't bring herself to tell Quinn everything her manager had said, demanded she do. How was she supposed to without making it sound like she was choosing her career over their relationship? She wasn't. She still wanted to be with Quinn, desperately, but to do that, their relatioship would have to become a complete secret. Rachel would have to fake date someone from their show. It was a lot. Cound Quinn handle it? Would she want to? She knew it was cowardly of her, but she couldn't force herself to make that phone call. If Quinn was going to break up with her, she would have to do it to her face.
She knew from the meet and greet before her date yesterday, that Quinn would be in New York today. She was supposed to meet with the writer for her story line tonight after her Funny Girl performances. Little did everyone else know, she had known the writer for almost a decade. Everyone else except for her and Quinn... and one other person, who she had completley forgotten about until she got a reminder right in her face yesterday.
"Bummer about the tabloid artices. It didn't really seem like you guys were exactly open for everyone knowing at the bar last week." Someone said into her ear at the bistro yesterday. Rachel turned around, almost going off immediately before she realized she recognized the soft voice. Avery was standing there smiling in the same flirtatious way she had back at the bar with Puck and Quinn.
"Avery, hi. I completely forgot you said you worked for the show."
"Ouch, I'll try not to take that too personally." She joked. Rachel looked around, making sure no one was listening to their conversation, and leaned in to whisper.
"Listen, no one knows the blonde girl is Quinn. I would like to keep it that way, okay?" Avery pretended to zip her lips and throw a key over her shoulder. She'd obviously had a little more to drink than Rachel herself had had.
"Your secret's safe with me, doll." Rachel could only hope she meant that. If everyone else found out Quinn was the unidentified blonde, chaos was sure to ensure. Either, or both of them, could lose their job. Not to mention, that would make their secret relationship a lot less possible.
Quinn got into the car with the other two writers once they had exited the airport. Just a couple more hours, and she would be face to face with Rachel again. Question was, what was she supposed to say? How was she supposed to act? Like a stranger or an old acquantice? She had no idea how she was supposed to play this, and there were still no clues from Rachel.
Author's Note: Sorry it took so long to update and this is such a short chapter. I've had A LOT going on. I'll try to get updates out sooner from now on, but chapters are likely to be shorter than a lot of Until Now's. I hope you guys enjoy this first little tidbit of the story. More to come. As always, thank you, and don't forget to smile.