Rachel's patience is wearing thin. Quinn won't stop following her, won't stop trying to talk to her, won't stop calling her (even though she never answers) or texting her (even though she never replies) and won't stop apologizing (even though she doesn't want to hear it). She's on the verge of a breakdown because every time she even thinks of Quinn she feels the pain, and it's hard enough for her not to think of Quinn even if Quinn wasn't hounding her every second of every day.

When she gets home from school, she turns her cell phone off. She doesn't need to see Quinn's name lighting up her phone every minute or so. She wants to talk to somebody, her dad's aren't home (as per usual) and the only two other people she would talk to in Lima are the two people she can't. With a deep breath, she picks up the house phone and calls a number that she's memorized over the years.

After the fourth ring, Rachel worries that she's going to get voicemail, which wouldn't be all that surprising as they had a tendency to screen their calls, but she really needs somebody to talk to.

As luck would have it, it rang once more before someone picked up the phone.

"Hastings residence," Rachel heard the person on the other end of the phone say. Rachel frowns. She doesn't recognize the tenor voice with a British accent on the other end of the line.

"Um, hello," Rachel says, as composed as she can be, "May I ask who this is?"

"This is Wren," he says, "Melissa's fiancée."

Melissa had mentioned something about him the last time we talked. "Oh, hello," Rachel says. "Is Melissa there?"

"No, she and her parents went to the club," Wren says. "Can I take a message?"

"No, that won't be necessary," Rachel says. "Is Spencer there, by chance?"

"I think she's around here somewhere," Wren says. "Let me see if I can find her."

"Thank you," Rachel says.

As Rachel waits she feels tears threaten to fall as she thinks about why she's calling in the first place. She feels momentary guilt in the amount of time it's been since she last talked to Spencer or Melissa, or really anybody outside of Quinn and Noah, but before she can wallow in it her thoughts are once again brought back to Quinn. She can feel the silent tears now falling down her face.

"Hello?" she hears Spencer's voice through the phone.

Her voice is raspy as she says, "Spence."

"Rach?" Spencer says. "Are you okay?"

Rachel shakes her head no, before realizing that Spencer can't see her. "No," she says, "I'm rather emotionally deteriorated at the moment."

"Rach, what happened?" Spencer asks. Rachel feels warmth hearing Spencer's soft concerned voice.

"I met this girl," Rachel says, and she can hear the intake of breath on the other end of the line. "She's absolutely beautiful and smart and athletic. Actually now that I think about it, she's remarkably like you."

Rachel's not sure how much she likes that thought at the moment. Plus Spencer is like a sister to her, and if Quinn is just the blonde version of Spencer, then that's sort of like she was dating her sister. Ew.

"Anyway, she took my breath away. We started dating at the beginning of the summer, and God, Spence, I was falling hard for this girl. We didn't inform anyone of our budding relationship because her parents are religious extremists and it would not have ended well if they ever found out," Rachel says. "I went to Noah's house for our weekly dinner, despite that my fathers' haven't been to one in almost a year, and after dinner he was telling me about his latest conquest, which is usual even though I've protested both his promiscuous ways and his vivid retellings of his encounters. Anyway he told me he'd bedded my girlfriend. He didn't actually know that she was my girlfriend, so I really couldn't blame him, but clearly I broke up with her. I can't believe she cheated on me. And with my best friend."

"Have you talked to her about it?" Spencer asks. "I mean, what if she was at a party and somebody drugged her drink? Or what if he was too drunk to realize that she didn't want it?"

Rachel sighs. She hadn't thought of that. She hadn't actually spoken to Quinn except to tell her that they were over, and all she had said was 'We're done'. Rachel's not even sure if Quinn knows why she broke up with her, though she's smart enough to probably have figured it out.

"Everything reminds me of her," Rachel says. "I haven't really had much time to process this and she won't leave me alone."

"Maybe tell her you need some space," Spencer says. "Tell her where you're head's at. Maybe listen to her side of the story? If she won't leave you alone then maybe she's got something to say that's worth listening to. Or if none of that suits your fancy, a restraining order could work."

Rachel laughs. Leave it to Spencer to get her to smile again.

"I miss you," Rachel says.

"I miss you, too," Spencer says. "We were just talking about you the other night. Nothing's been the same since…they still haven't found her. Are you and Santana coming?"

"I don't know," Rachel says. "It's not exactly something we'd want to commemorate. And Santana and I aren't really on speaking terms anymore."

"I understand," Spencer says. "We kind of fell out here, too. Do you still talk to Hanna? You two used to be inseparable."

"Occasionally," Rachel says. "I haven't really talked to anyone this summer except for…them."

"So Melissa's getting married, huh?" Rachel says trying to change the subject. She knows that Quinn is the reason she called, but now she'd rather talk about anything but.

"Yeah, it's crazy," Spencer says. "I only just met the guy, but he doesn't seem to be a tool like her normal boyfriends. Plus his accent is seriously hot."

Rachel and Spencer talk on the phone for nearly two hours, and Rachel hangs up feeling much better than she has in a while. Maybe she should go up for the anniversary. It is a morbid sort of reason, but she thinks it would be good to see the girls again. She doesn't really have friends at home.

Rachel turns her phone back on just before she goes to bed. There's a large number of voicemails, Rachel thinks they must all be Quinn. She has fourty-seven unread messages from Quinn, two from Noah, one from her father, and one from a number she doesn't recognize.

Rachel skips over the ones from Quinn and Noah and opens the one from her father. It's yet another message telling her that they're extending their trip again, and promising they'll be back in three weeks. Rachel knows they probably won't be.

She opens the text from the unknown number.

Once again, you're not the only dirty little secret someone's keeping
~ A

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