A little drabble, because I'm stuck in an airport and it's really lonely in here. Longer fic coming soon, I promise.
Before she slips away in Quinn's arms.
Before she kisses her fingertips and tells her that she's gotten it right.
Before Quinn tells her she loves her so many times that she weeps herself hoarse. Before one last laugh and quiet vigil with their children, before Quinn promises to visit Rachel's gold star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame and make sure fresh flowers are there on her birthday.
Before Rachel blows out eighty candles (in one breath!) and the hospital agrees to play her Greatest Hits CD over all the intercoms, even the ones in the bathrooms.
Before all the surviving Glee clubbers sing Seasons of Love at her bedside, bringing tears to her eyes, and Santana finally admits that she had a thing for Rachel in high school and Brittany and Quinn chuckle quietly together in the corner.
Before bouquets and well-wishers and black-suited lawyers to set all her earthly affairs in order.
Before Rachel was too weak to stand on her own and moved from the wheelchair to a bed.
Before Quinn sank to her knees upon seeing the doctor's grim face and buried her face in Rachel's lap, before consultations and explosive, ferocious sobbing and then, weary acceptance.
Before Artie Abrams visited and taught her to pop wheelies in the hospital hallways, leading a nurse to install pillow bumpers along Rachel's section of the ICU.
Before blood tests and brain scans and endless hours scouring medical textbooks until Rachel finally snapping at Quinn that she was still alive, damnit, and to get back to bed and hold her because they needed to make these things count now.
Before everything went black.
Before Rachel collapsed in the kitchen, reaching to open the window to let the summer breeze in.
Before a press conference announcing Rachel's retirement and a petrified Quinn clutching Rachel's waist as wave upon wave of fans bombarded the building with their cameras and Sharpies and collectibles.
Before they fought over hip replacements and flavors of tea, school reunions and Tony Awards, sperm donors and electricity bills and public displays of affection.
Before a wedding photographer from Hades and slapping Quinn with a handful of cake and hearing Quinn read her handwritten vows with a quiver in her voice and hope etched in her face.
Before Quinn came to her senses and dropped to one knee.
Before the men who abandoned her, the women who mocked her, the colleagues who envied her and the audiences who adored her. Before her sparks hit the tinder and blazed.
Before Quinn walked into her apartment, past the bottle of cold medicine and crumpled Kleenex, and back into Rachel's life.
Before she was Rachel Berry, world-famous, she was Rachel Berry, the girl who decked the stage manager for not knowing who Quinn was and turning her away at the door, the girl who ran screaming through freezing December rain to track down a blonde who had just let the subway doors close behind her.
Before she had lost her way, she had lost Quinn.
Before she had the world's heart, she had Quinn's.
Before graduation gowns and gaining ten pounds during Finals Week, and Quinn's med school exams very nearly break them up a half dozen times.
Before Nationals Runner-Up 2012, and only because Quinn decided to one-up Finn by taking Rachel into her arms, dipping her Cinderella-style, and planting one on her before the cameras of the first ever live broadcast of a national show choir competition.
Before they became more than friends.
Before she and Quinn actually become friends, and she begins to see a wholly different and wonderful girl emerge as if she had created her out of her imagination.
Before she finds Quinn crying in the janitor's closet, a picture of Beth clutched in her hands, and tangles their fingers together before wrapping her arms around her tight.
Before the end of Finn Hudson's awkward company and not giving a damn about it.
Before the hell that was high school, Slushie baths, and Finn Hudson.
Before she realizes her passion for singing and New York City and Barbra Streisand, and knowing that if she worked hard enough, she'd get there.
Before she was placed in her dads' arms.
Before she was truly living, she was alive.