Look Inside You
"So you hate yourself," Lauren asked condescendingly. Quinn was still a bit shocked that she had managed to find out about Lucy. The only reason she had told her what no one at McKinley High knew was because she had been trapped into admitting it. She thought back to the night, so long ago, when she had decided that she was going to become a brand new person.
It was like any other evening in the Fabray home. Judy was sitting at one end of the dinner table after having made a pot roast, cooked to absolute perfection. Russell was sitting at the other end listening to his daughters tell him about their days.
"My gymnastics teacher told me today that I was a shoe-in for the regional competition," bragged a thirteen-year-old Quinn.
"That's wonderful Lucy," he replied, with a feigned pride.
Quinn huffed, "Daddy, I told you I want to be called Quinn from now on." She was attempting to shed her identity as 'Lucy Caboosey" as she shed the pounds. She dreaded going to school. It seemed like everyday the other kids thought of some new way to torture her.
"Lucy," her older sister, Franny, started, "Whatever you call yourself doesn't matter. It's a small school. Everyone knows who you are anyways. Besides I wanted to tell Daddy about the Prom Queen election. The other girl dropped out because she knew she couldn't compete with me. The yearbook announced Senior Superlatives today, and I was named Most Pretty."
"And that's more important?" Quinn retorted. "Some of us actually have to work for what we get. "
Judy interrupted before Franny could get in a response. "Girls, I'm sure that's quite enough. Besides your father has something he'd like to share with you."
"Thank you Judy," Russell said. "As you all know I've been putting in extra hours at work and I got a promotion and a raise."
"That's great Daddy," Franny reacted.
"It also means that at the end of the school year we're going to be moving to Lima," Russell completed. "You'll be away at college of course Franny, but that means it'll be a new start for you Lucy."
Quinn smiled the biggest smile she had ever smiled, "Thank you Daddy." Already the wheels in her mind were turning about how to finish her transformation. She knew she deserved better than what she got, and in her barley teenaged mind she thought she saw the best and easiest way of changing it all.
"Franny, can you help me in the kitchen to bring out dessert," Judy asked. "I made something special to congratulate your father."
Judy stood up, "Of course, Mom."
As the two left the room, Quinn had her mind made up. "Daddy, I was hoping I could ask for a special present."
"Whatever you want sweetie," he replied.
"You said that if I worked really hard at gymnastics and ballet, and lost the weight I could get a nose job," Quinn asked, her voice faltering a little bit.
"Of course Quinnie," her mother answered for him as she came back into the room with a homemade apple pie, Russell's favorite. "We've been talking about letting you for so long now."
Franny, who had entered in after her, looked concerned for her sister, but said nothing. It wouldn't matter what she said to her parents anyways.
So with an agreement that the plastic surgeon would be called in the morning for a consultation, the family ate dessert. Well, Judy, Russell and Franny ate dessert while Quinn picked at her already tiny portion.
Later that evening while Quinn was looking at old issues of Seventeen and Vogue looking for her perfect nose, Franny knocked softly at the door. "Can I come in Lu- Quinn," correcting herself before Quinn could do it for her.
"Sure," the younger sister responded, "I need your help deciding." Franny came in. "I'm thinking Emma Roberts. Her nose is just so perfect. But maybe Emily Deschenel?"
"Why do you want a new nose so badly Quinn," Franny asked gently. "You're so beautiful already. Why would you want someone else's nose?"
Quinn sighed, "You wouldn't understand Fran. You've always been so pretty. Look at me. Sometimes people don't even think we're sisters."
"We share the same last name, and we have the same eyes, and it is so obvious that we are sisters," Franny told her.
"You've never had to worry about not looking good enough for people to want to be your friend," Quinn countered with tears starting to enter her eyes.
Franny laughed a little, before the sad look in her baby sister's eyes cut her off mid giggle, "You're wrong."
"When have you ever felt like that," Quinn asked point blank, before a tear could drop.
"Remember my sophomore year when Jessica and Heather decided that short hair was out?" Franny started. Quinn nodded. "I had just donated my hair to Locks of Love and I thought that my short hair was the cutest thing ever. Then a few days after that they came up to me in the bathroom between classes and told me that if I didn't have long hair, I couldn't sit at the lunch table anymore. They said that I looked like a lesbian and they couldn't let me still be a 'cool kid.'
"Well of course I wasn't going to let my reputation go down the drain like that. So that night I begged Mom and Dad to let me get a weave. Just until my hair grew back to an 'acceptable' length. And of course they said yes, just like they said yes to your surgery. So the next day, Mom let me skip school and go to the hairdresser."
"Yeah and you looked fantastic afterwards," Quinn interjected. "And you didn't have to sit at a table by yourself, which really sucks."
"Yeah, but that weave hurt so badly," Franny countered. "It itched all the time. And I had to be super careful every night to have it wrapped right so it wouldn't look terrible. I was so sick of that weave in a week and it didn't matter because I had already made the decision that I was going to let other people decide how I should look."
"What's your point?" Quinn asked. "So it hurt. It's better than being humiliated."
Franny thought for a moment before speaking, "Mom and Dad are going to let you do whatever you want here. Heck, if you keep insisting even Daddy will be calling you Quinn in another month or so. And I'm sure the kids at your new school will love you. But none of that matters."
"That's everything Franny," Quinn reacted. "All I want is to be able to be on the actual cheerleading squad and have a boyfriend and be Prom Queen someday like you and Mom."
Franny nodded, "As I said, none of that matters. At the end of the day all that matters is that you can look in the mirror and be happy for yourself. Don't forget a nose job is still surgery, so just make sure you're doing it for you because you believe above all else that it'll make you a better person. Not a prettier or more beautiful person, but someone who is a good person. Come here," she finished with opened arms.
"Thanks Franny," Quinn said as she hugged her sister.
"Besides, you'll always be my baby sister Lucy," Franny said as she went out the door. "And nothing will change that."
Quinn thought to herself, of course it's going to make me a better person. I'll be one of the popular people and I'll be able to prevent anyone from feeling the way I have felt for years. With this in mind she went to Dr. Ferrero a few days later and eventually went with a random nose out of a book. Over the summer, she recovered and made the Cheerios squad in August. When she walked into her new school she was already apart of everything she wanted to be, even if her idealistic vision of protecting the weak never came to fruition. McKinley was more cut throat Belleville ever was, and now that she had a good reputation she wasn't going to let it go. She finally had everything she really wanted.
So years after the fact, Lauren's questioned haunted her for a moment but she knew there was only one answer, "No I love myself and that's why I did all those things." But deep down in her heart she knew she had been lying to herself.
After she had ripped down the poster Lauren stapled to the bulletin board and ran off amid the laughter of her peers, she ran outside and shakily went through her contact list. Artie, Brittany, Finn, and there it was. She hit the send button and waited to hear a voice from the other end of the line.
"Hey Lucy. What's wrong?" Quinn could hear her sister's voice coming in as clear as it would from a foot away, rather than Connecticut.
"I just wanted to say you were right," Quinn said. "About the nose job, I mean. You were right."
A/N- I was inspired by the I Feel Pretty/Unpretty mashup and Quinn's back story. This is just what I hope her older sister would have said to her because I'm sure her parents wouldn't have.
Thank you for reading and please take a moment to leave a review, Jen