Quinn finally comes clean. Just a little something. An attempt at realism. Lol.
Dunno how well it worked, but I think it turned out formidably. Agree or disagree?
"Why do you hate me so much?"
Under any other circumstance, she would have responded with a witty, split-second insult. She would have picked out the first thing her eyes fell upon and ripped it to shreds with her words. She would have torn her apart. She would have said something disarming and painful, watching in satisfaction as the agonizing insecurity began to burn through her eyes. She would have said something hilarious, something that she could brag about and spread all over campus, something that would attach itself to her persona like a tattoo, something she could never escape.
She would have said something completely untrue.
Today, staring down at her, towering over her smaller, vertically-challenged frame, she would have said, "Because you're butting in where you don't belong, gremlin. Keep your claws off my man." Or something equally as ungrounded and snarky, and she would have been satisfied. It would have been a feat, something to be proud of. 'Dwarf' and 'midget' were hardly jokes anymore. 'Gremlin' attacked both her height and her features. Short and ugly—two birds with one stone. It would have been a beautiful injury, and it would have caused irreparable damage.
Under any other circumstance, she would have called her a gremlin. She would have stayed only long enough to watch her heart shatter, and then she would have turned to leave, and she would have been sated and content, knowing that she had won another round.
But today, when her eyes are already so full of pain, and she's so vulnerable that she just might break down if she even so much as blinks, she can't force the words past her lips. She can't bear to shove another lie down her throat when it's so obvious she's been choking them down for so long that she can no longer breathe. For the life of her, she can't say a word. She can barely look at her. She can't stand to look into those eyes, knowing that all the pain they hold is her greatest masterpiece, the result of all her jealous frustration and anger and sadness.
Today, when her eyes beg a reprieve and the wounded sadness that permeates her very being grips Quinn's heart, worlds elude her.
She is still and silent for an immeasurable time, wracked with indecision. What should she do? Should she stay, and risk hurting her even more? Should she leave, hurting her still, but on accident? The decision is made for her. She can't leave. Her feet are leaden and immobile. She is paralyzed. So, she stays, but what should she say? Words do damage—irreversible, irrevocable, irremediable damage.
Insulting her would kill her, but the truth would destroy her…
She doesn't speak at all.
Rachel fills the silence, wavering, unsteady, searching for anything that might placate her. "Finn is yours." Her voice pleads, her eyes pained and earnest. "You already have him, and we both know that he's not going to leave you for me. Why do you have to make me miserable? Don't you think I'm already miserable enough, knowing that I'll never have the one person I want?" Her voice is broken and distraught, tortured, and she fights to stay strong, but she fails. Her chocolate eyes shine with passion and anguish, and Quinn can't bear it. She wants to stop her, to beg her to forgive her for all the terrible things she's done, all the times she's hurt her, but Rachel's not finished.
A glimmer of determination shows through her pain. She tries to fight her tears, restraining a sob, putting everything she has into exerting the last of her strength. "Is that what you want to hear?" she asks. "Do you want me to admit that I'm a loser? That I go home and cry every night because you taunt me and you make me feel like nothing? Everybody already knows! You don't have to prove that you're still better than me." Finally, her resolve gives in. She bursts into tears. Something in her posture shatters, maybe her will, maybe her strength, but for the first time, she drops her head and she sobs. She closes her eyes and covers her face with her hands and whispers, "Everybody already knows."
Quinn's grasp on reality is nonexistent. Standing there, dumb and helpless, ineffably guilty, she has never hated herself so much in her life. Every single self-depreciating moment she has ever had pales in comparison. Every thought about her illegitimate affairs, every thought about the steadily increasing numbers on her scale… Everything, even together, means nothing.
She isn't sure how long she stands there watching her cry. It feels like an eternity, but only just a moment. It feels as though the universal clock has stopped ticking, but time continues at a blinding pace. Apologies and self-deflagrations race through her mind.
How did this happen?
Eventually, something in Rachel's demeanor changes. Slow moments pass as she coercively fights her tears, forcing them back and wiping them away, attempting to compose herself. With her eyes on the floor, she shakes her head, embarrassed, ashamed. "You can do whatever you want, Quinn," she whispers. "I can't stop you. I can't change your mind, and I can't make you like me." She raises her eyes then, defeated, hopeless, utterly resigned, and Quinn's chest seizes. Her throat tightens, aching with the hollow warning of tears. "I just want to know why."
Guilt makes people do irrefutably ridiculous things, Quinn realizes. It makes them hide their face, it makes them cry, it makes them beg for forgiveness, but it also makes them sleep with their boyfriend's best friend on a fat day, and when they turn up pregnant, it makes them swear on their grave that the father is who everyone expects it to be, even though they never had sex. It makes them hate themselves every single day of their lives, and it makes them wonder if they'll ever get into Heaven. It makes them spill secrets they never thought they would tell, even though it would completely destroy them if anybody ever found out.
Before she can even stop to think about it, those piercing, passionate, heart-wrenching brown eyes have broken through every single carefully-constructed defense she ever built against Rachel Berry, and the words she could never bear to say flood into her mouth. From the deepest depths of her mind, hidden behind all her troubles—Finn, the baby, Puck, her parents, Glee, the Cheerios—the truth comes out.
"Why do I hate you?" she asks. Her voice is pathetic and ashamed, even to her own ears.
Rachel sets her jaw, her brow furrowed, preparing herself for the blow.
Quinn laughs at the façade of strength, quietly, hysterically, and tears sting her eyes. She really has damaged her beyond repair. Why? Why does she hurt her? Why does she hate her? She shakes her head, fixes her eyes on the ceiling to stem the tears, and swallows her pain. "Because I don't," she says.
The brunette appears confused, but the barriers have been battered to the ground, and Quinn is far too gone to stop now.
She drops her eyes, seemingly for miles, until they meet hers. She needs to see her when she says it. She needs it to be real. She needs to look into her eyes, and know that it's worth it. "I don't hate you, Rachel. I've never hated you." Doubt permeates Rachel's eyes, but it doesn't matter. She'll see. When it's all said and done, she'll see. Quinn smiles, but it's pained, and wry humor and self-contempt fill her chest. "I hate the fact that I don't hate you," she says, "that I can't hate you, no matter what you do. Take Finn, take Puck—I wouldn't hate you for it. I wouldn't hate you for taking them. I'd hate that you were with them." Tears flood her eyes. It's now or never.
"I'd hate that you picked them… over me."
When the words are out, and they hang in the silence, and an emotion so inscrutable and inexplicable washes over Rachel's face, her eyes shining and wide, and disbelief weighs her jaw, her lips parted and trembling, she feels as though it's a dream. It must be a dream. Nightmares aren't supposed to happen in real life—but it is real. She can tell by the pounding of her heart, so hard she begins to shake. She can tell by the tears on her cheeks and the breathlessness that stills her lungs. She can tell by the unnerving weightlessness that follows telling the truth.
To make matters worse, she can't stop talking. She wants more than anything to leave, to run, because if she stays any longer, she might not make it out alive; she might break down completely, and be so thoroughly shattered that she might never put herself back together, but she can't stop. In a pathetic, last-ditch effort and self-preservation, her lips continue without her consent.
"Are you happy now? You finally have something over me." She tries to smile, but the effect is fake, and the words feel forced, torn from her throat. As tears spill from her eyes, she mimics the rumor that's sure to spread, holding herself together with every ounce of strength she has left. "'Did you hear? Quinn Fabray is pregnant. President of the Celibacy Club, perfect Christian, and, oh, yeah—she's in love with a girl.'"
The truth settles in the air with the weight of a wrecking ball. She can't breathe. She can only stare into Rachel's eyes, dying each and every second, watching as the doubt drains away and comprehension settles in. She can only watch as her lips tremble, moving without sound—the lips that she's dreamt about and fantasized about, the lips that, even now, she can't help but yearn to take with her own, kissing her with all the love she has disguised for so long as hatred. She can only watch, helpless, hopeless, vulnerable and utterly alone, as the girl she's secretly loved since the seventh grade prepares to reject her, just like she knew she always would. Rachel would never want a Lima loser like her…
"Quinn—"
She's longed for so long to hear her say her name with such tenderness, with such soft emotion, but she can't stand her pity. Faced with it now, she can only shake her head, pleading with her to stop. She'd never shown Rachel mercy when the tables were turned, but she begs with her eyes for a reprieve, amnesty from the pain her words will bring. Rachel falters, though just for a moment. Her breath catches as she attempts to speak once more.
Quinn closes her eyes. Can't she see that her rejection would kill her?
She can't stay long enough for Rachel to get the hint—so she runs.
She turns from those soft brown eyes, from those trembling lips, and she runs. She wills her ears into deafness as tears cascade down her face, praying that she will be spared, that anything Rachel calls after her won't be heard.
She runs, and she runs, and she runs, but she can't escape her.
Rachel Berry flows through her veins. She beats in her heart. She races in her pulse. She invades her dreams, she plagues her thoughts, and she can feel her inside. She can't escape her, and now she'll never be able to face her again.
That button is there for a reason, so make use of it. :]
If you convince me enough, maybe I'll write a companion piece from Rachel's point of view. :P