Rachel had honestly lost the count of times she had been left alone by the lockers, frustrated and heartbroken. This time, however, was slightly different. There had been something in Finn's expression, in his words, that scared her.

She sighed heavily as she tried to hold back the tears. She turned her head when she heard footsteps . She found it strange, since it was pretty late, everyone should be home by now.

She was even more surprised when she saw the Anderson brothers walking towards her.

"Rachel! What are you doing here? Wasn't Finn supposed to give you a ride home?" Blaine asked smiling but with a concerned tone.

Rachel forced a smile. "Yeah, he was. But he had to run to help Burt with something and uh-" she wasn't used to lying. Besides, Cooper's intense stare was quite distracting.

"Say no more. Hey, we were about to do a little something that maybe you could help us out with?" Blaine said. Rachel could tell how excited he was, she hadn't seen him like this in all week. She just couldn't say no to him.

"Of course" she agreed.

"Cool! You guys wait here for me, I forgot my bag at the auditorium" and with that, Blaine left Cooper alone with Rachel.

There was a small, awkward silence. Rachel was too preoccupied, thinking about her last conversation with Finn. She could feel Cooper's eyes on her, but she didn't feel like starting a polite conversation just then.

"You know, my little brother might be a nice friend, but he's darn oblivious" the actor said.

"I'm sorry, what do you mean?" Rachel asked, finally meeting his deep, blue eyes.

"Don't get me wrong Rachel, you are a great actress. The best one in the class" she blushed slightly at the compliment. "But you cannot fool me".

Rachel looked away for a second. Oh. So he had figured it out. How was she supposed to be Broadway good enough if he had just seen through her?

"Hey, whatever it is, I'm sure it's not that bad" Cooper placed a hand on her bare shoulder. She shivered a little bit at the touch.

"Yeah, well, apparently you forgot to mention that if you want to follow your dreams, you have to say goodbye to the people you love as well" Rachel regretted those words right after she'd said them. She didn't meant to sound that bitter. "I'm sorry I'm jumping at you, it's just-hard to feel like no one supports you, not even the one who's supposed to be the love of your life".

"Don't worry. I didn't say that in the choir room because I felt like, for my first class, I didn't want to let you guys down. But you want another great piece of advice?" he sent her that million dollar smile and she nodded. "The ones who truly love you are the ones who support you, no matter how crazy your dreams might sound like".

Blaine came to them just at that moment, and by then, Rachel's smile wasn't fake. They started heading out of the building and while Blaine started filling them with the idea he had for Michael Bay's tape, Rachel and Cooper shared a confident smile and Rachel mouthed a "Thank you".

Hi! I know this is short and I actually have a few ideas for what's next, but I felt like I really needed to get this written since the moment it came to my mind.

I loved last episode, Cooper is just awesome and I felt like he and Rachel could have really connected.

Hope you guys liked it!

-C

P.S. I apologize for any spelling mistakes, I'm Spanish and though I love English, it's not my first language!