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She felt rather than saw him as he leant against the locker next to hers, a long arm stretching out above both of their heads to hold his balance as he inclined his head towards hers. She felt his breath against her ear a second before she felt the soft rumble of a low voice cut through the fog in her brain, forcing her to flick her eyes to his.
"Never gonna happen." He practically sang it, with a soft smirk, casting his eyes over to the spot hers had previously been fixed upon, and then back towards her own.
She looked again, just in time to see Finn Hudson take a pile of books out of the hands of his pregnant girlfriend and offer her his arm to hold as they walked to class. It was sweet, and intimate, and she felt guilty for watching, but then she couldn't stop herself. She never could.
A hand waved back and forth in front of her face and she was forced to look back at the boy currently occupying her personal space.
"Never." He reiterated, raising his eyebrows this time for emphasis. She sighed and turned back to her locker to gather her things for her next two classes.
"I know that." She told him softly. His eyebrows raised even higher, this time in question. "I do, I know. I'm pathetic, I'm not stupid." He snorted at that and it was her turn to raise her eyebrows.
"Whatever." He tossed at her and pushed himself off the locker and walked away. She watched him go, half swagger, half lope and sighed involuntarily as she shut her locker. She took a moment to gather herself, schooling her face into an expression of what she hoped was confidence and cheer, and trotted down the hallway to her next class, hoping that her day was going to get better.
She turned the corner past the gym and found herself suddenly covered in bright blue frozen sugar. She kept her eyes closed while the slushie dripped down her face and waited for the laughter to subside before she wiped her mouth with the back of her arm and then made her way to the nearest bathroom to clean herself off. She realised as she rinsed out her hair over the sink that her day was probably not going to get any better at all.
She was Rachel Berry. What had she been thinking?
Classes were over for the day and Rachel was sat at the piano in the auditorium practicing her scales. She kept fumbling at the peaks and was getting frustrated at her fingers, and then frustrated with herself because she knew it wasn't her fingers' fault. They were nimble as ever, but she was distracted. And Rachel Berry was not supposed to allow herself to get distracted. Distractions didn't get you parts in Broadway plays, distractions didn't win you Tonies or Grammies, and they most definitely did not get you out of Lima, Ohio. But Rachel was distracted, and so she was angry.
At some point she gave up playing. It wasn't doing any good anyway, and she couldn't bring herself to care anymore. She lay her head down on the piano and let the cool, varnished wood assuage the fire in her brain. It was working, she could feel herself calming down when she heard his voice, once more cutting through her thoughts and forcing her to pay attention to him.
"Heard you got slushied." He stood on the other side of the stage, hands stuffed in his pockets, head angled downwards but eyes slanted up toward her. Standard Noah Puckerman stance. She lifted her head and met his gaze.
"So what else is new?" His eyes dropped to his feet for a moment, and she imagined that she saw in them some remorse. Remorse for having been the one who started the awful slushy ritual, remorse for making her a huge walking target. Remorse for the change of clothes and the midday showers and the damage that that much washing would do to her hair. She imagined that she saw it. And then she remembered who he was. And told herself to stop being an idiot.
When he met her eyes again he shrugged. 'Fair point', he seemed to say, and once again he left her, strolling out of the auditorium leisurely, hands still in pockets, head still pointed down. She sighed for what felt like the hundredth time that day and laid her head back down on the piano. It stayed there until it was time for Glee practice.
As she left practice and moved to her locker to get her coat and car keys she could feel him again. He filled her peripheral vision and she knew he was following her. She gathered her things quickly and steeled herself as best she could as she felt his presence behind her. She never knew what would come of their brief interactions.
He didn't try to torture her anymore; his brief interlude as her boyfriend had put paid to that particular past-time, but she wasn't sure that this wasn't worse. They weren't friends, he had made that clear, but she couldn't get at what he wanted from her, and he didn't seem to want to tell her. These days whenever she spoke, more often than not she ended up tired, and he seemed dissatisfied. So she prepared herself as best she could and turned to face her pursuer.