Disclaimer: The characters are all property of Ryan Murphy's show "Glee" on FOX. I just add little bits.

Additional Notes: This story starts off right at the beginning of Rachel's screening of her video for "Run Joey Run". It's a multi-chapter story and will follow the events up until a certain point during Episode 1x18 ("Laryngitis"), and then go its separate ways (no, that's not the reason I called it that). You may expect lots of angsty drama, a bit of mature content, and hopefully an enjoyable twist. Oh, and possibly a spoiler or two for the remaining Back Nine episodes.

Chapter 1

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„I'd like to say a few words first... "

Finn Hudson couldn't suppress the grin that stole on his face. It was so typical for Rachel, to want to give a big speech first.

"Though I understand that a motion picture should stand on its own, I do realise…"

The words washed over him; he didn't truly pay attention to what she was saying – he was focused on her instead. On her smile, her excitement, the ferocity of her every move. He knew she was satisfied with her – their – project and he was happy for her.

A little worried, too, he had to admit to himself. Nervous, considering that she'd picked him to do this with, and he wasn't sure what she'd told Jesse about that. That talk at the lockers, when he'd told Jesse he'd try to stay away from Rachel: it was times like this when it felt like it'd been just moments ago. He had tried – he really had, but it was as if something about her kept pulling him in. He couldn't get her out of his mind, Jesse or no Jesse. It was worse at night, when he had nothing left to do but lie there and wait for sleep to come: whether he wanted it or not, he kept seeing her face as she'd stared up at him that one afternoon weeks ago, when they'd sung that Madonna mash-up together. He'd looked at her, and for a moment it'd been like nothing else existed, all he'd wanted to do was to cup her face in his hands and kiss her. He'd wanted to do that so badly he still couldn't actually believe he hadn't given in to temptation then. Maybe if he'd had, then things might have gone differently. That face haunted him now, instead. It had become a constant reminder of every bad decision he'd made since then. It accused him of his own stupidity, of ever thinking he didn't want to be with her.

He was a bit slow sometimes – he knew that well enough. It'd taken him far too long to realise what his problem had been. He shouldn't have listened to Mr Schue, for starters. He had a lot of respect for his teacher, but all that talk about finding his inner rock star - that had just been wrong. The guy was a mess himself, if the rumours were true, and Finn had never needed to find the rock star in himself. All he would have needed was to open his heart to Rachel. They'd been friends before, they'd been able to talk about some … really awkward things even, and she'd been there for him. When they'd started dating it was like that sort of died. They didn't talk about anything other than couply things; she seemed so bubbly and overflowing with all this cheerfulness and plans for what to do. It had been cute, in a dorky sort of way, but he'd missed the Rachel who'd confided her problems to him. But he hadn't tried to talk to her about the mess in his heart, either. He'd not wanted to dump all these feelings of hate and betrayal and grief that festered at the bottom of his heart on her. So he'd shut her out. And it'd all gone straight to hell from there. Hurting her. Then losing her to Jesse before he ever got a chance at getting her back. And then…

With an effort, he wrenched his thoughts away from the dark hole that had pulled him in every time he allowed himself to think of the last few weeks. The grin had faded from his face. It seemed only seconds had passed, and Rachel was still talking. He stole a nervous glance at her boyfriend; Jesse was leaning back in his chair, looking at Rachel with a self-satisfied smirk that made him want to smash his face in. The guy was literally oozing smugness. It probably wasn't going to stay there for long, once he saw what they'd done.

And the longer he thought about it, the more he was starting to worry if he truly was such a great actor as she'd told him when she'd gotten him to jump on board her project. It tied into his nervousness about the whole thing; he wasn't entirely certain if he'd been able to hide his emotions all that well.

Three days previously

"Ahh Finn, I'm glad I ran into you. Have you got a moment?" She'd been standing outside his classroom for the past 5 minutes, while he'd been trying to act like he hadn't seen her and delayed leaving, hoping she'd just go away. But she hadn't gone away, and he'd had to leave eventually if he wanted to attend the next class.

There was no getting away from it. She'd obviously decided that she was going to have to talk to him in person – lately something they'd only done at Glee practice because it was getting just a bit too awkward – since a simple text hadn't been an option. Part of him cringed at knowing she'd resort to such an obvious lie about it, but another part – the part he was trying to ignore – felt extremely happy to be in her presence, outside of Glee club and without Jesse being around. Hoping he wasn't making it too obvious either, he quickly stole a glance over her head and scanned the corridor for any sight of the boy who was normally attached to her like glue whenever he saw her outside of class. There were a number of things he would have liked to do to Jesse St. James, no matter how much the other boy had been trying to be agreeable; it was for Rachel's sake that he'd kept a lid on showing just how intense his dislike of Jesse truly was. Something about him just kept the silent alarm bells in his head going off.

Suddenly he found himself pushed backwards into the empty classroom. As she advanced on him, her hands on his chest doing the pushing, he panicked. The simple contact of her hands on his clothed chest had struck into him like lightning, and made his insides tingle in a weird way. "R-rachel?" he managed to say, fearing that she could somehow feel his reaction. He had to calm down! Swallowing, he took a step further backwards, moving out of the reach of her hands, and pulled his hoodie closer over his chest by crossing his fists in the front pockets. He knew it was totally irrational, but he feared that she could see straight through the shirt to the ache in his heart if he didn't cover it up somehow.

"Sorry, but I wanted to get away from prying ears. This won't take long. I just need a favour."

He stared at the floor, to avoid having to look at her. "What is it then?" was what he said after a moment, trying to make it sound as uninterested as possible and managing to sound unintentionally annoyed as a result. He really wished he could look into her eyes, but that was too dangerous territory. Instead, he averted his gaze sideways and followed it up by turning his entire head, trying to make it appear as if there was something really interesting on the far side of the wall. His left foot tapped the floor, in what he hoped would show her that he was simply impatient to be gone.

There was a catch in her voice when she spoke again. "Look, I know things haven't been so great between us recently, but please – can't we just put that aside? We're co-captains, we need to set our personal problems aside if we ever want to reach Regionals. With all this…" – he could hear her swallow before gulping out the next word – "tension… between us, we're not contributing anything positive to the club at the moment, and the atmosphere in the club was already bad enough even before this glist came out and--- "

She wanted to give him a motivational speech, now? Anger welled up inside him, and it made looking at her bearable. So he turned his head to stare right into her face – and saw that she, too, had been and still was looking in a different direction. That threw him off-course for a moment, and he exhaled loudly, pressing his lips together to avoid saying the wrong thing.

He'd learned.

His exhale had made her stop in mid-sentence. She turned her head then, but even before her eyes could meet his he'd walled himself up, and met hers without flinching. "What's the favour?" he said, softly.

Of all things she could have asked him – her request had totally caught him by surprise. It'd taken her the remainder of that break, at least two dozen wordy texts and another break to get him to the point of even considering it. By lunch he'd been a broken man – and also a fairly content one, seeing that he'd spent almost the entire morning with Rachel, without having seen Jesse even once. During lunch she'd confided in him that her boyfriend was attending some kind of all-day dance event in his hometown that he'd not been able to get out of, and while that had added another note to the alarm bells already present in his head, he'd drowned it out with his sheer happiness of being able to be with Rachel for so long. Because by the time lunch was over, their ailing friendship had taken a turn for the better and for the first time in weeks he'd been able to relax in her company. It'd almost been like Jesse'd never happened – and while it'd also felt a bit like they had never happened, he'd been kinda glad for the break he'd been given. Yes, he wanted to be with her, but it felt good to be able to talk to her like a normal person again, not like someone who could make and break his heart at every look of her eyes. He'd told her about his mom and Burt Hummel, and how strange it still felt to have him around – and how he thought it was hurting Kurt. There'd been a moment when she looked at him, oddly like, as he'd told her about his conversation with Burt about his love for his mom, but she'd not said anything. They'd not talked about anything that would've touched on their own relationship, nor on what'd been before it. It'd been a strange feeling, a bit like floating on a gazillion balls in this ball pit his mom had once taken him to play in as a kid, being held up by nothing but air but still knowing there was all those bits of plastic keeping him from falling.

And all that time she'd been trying to convince him to do this video with her. At the beginning it'd sounded crazy – a video, of all things? – but she'd reminded him that Mercedes and Kurt had made that Vogue video with Sue and that hadn't turned out bad, and she'd told him she'd got Artie to agree to direct hers, too. In the end it'd come down to two arguments against it – he'd not thought he'd be any good at acting, and he'd been wary of what Jesse might say when he would find out she'd done the whole thing with him. Jesse, she'd said, wasn't going to have any problem with an "artistic statement", and then had quickly changed the subject and reminded him of the time he'd helped her out with her role in that Cabaret musical, and how she'd told him then that she thought he wasn't a bad actor – that it was just playing someone else – that she thought he might actually like it because he could forget about his own problems for a while and put himself into someone else's shoes. He'd kinda liked that thought.

But looking back at it now, as he heard her ask for the lights dimmed, and the numbers started counting down on the screen, fear was building in his heart. There had been moments when it'd been exceedingly difficult to remain in the shoes of this Joey person he was supposed to play. It'd been like this connection he'd always felt, the one he'd last felt when they were singing the Madonna song and that had sort of died when Jesse had joined, it was back and they could both feel it. There'd been those moments when "Julie" was no longer Julie but had become very much his Rachel who was dying in his arms, and no amount of cheesy fake ketchup blood made that feel any less weird. He'd so much wanted to kiss her and press her against him and tell her he'd always be there for her that it'd almost made him drop her as he tried to fight his own instincts. He knew it was totally idiotic but it still didn't change anything – it'd taken him a good ten minutes just to stop the shakes after the first time the scene was shot. He wasn't sure how Rachel felt about it, but she'd been acting a bit weird around him afterwards, especially when he'd rushed up to her when he'd seen her anguished face in the angel costume and had hugged her. She'd never been more desirable; he'd never felt more in love with her than at that moment, with those wings on her, looking so much like his fantasy had come alive. He couldn't even remember what he'd said to her then, although he remembered saying something before she'd gently detached himself from his arms after what seemed like forever to him, and told him his part was done. He'd barely seen her since; he'd wanted to tell her that he really appreciated that she picked him to do this with, and that it'd been great to spend time with her again. That was important, telling her that. He needed her to know. He'd tried to tell her earlier, but she'd walked in with Jesse's arm around her, and there'd been no opportunity for it. And now she was exchanging these looks with Jesse, and …

Fact of the matter was – he finally admitted to himself – that he was terrified. Not just about Jesse noticing - they'd all see how he hadn't been able to contain his feelings. When he thought about it now he couldn't remember a single take where his emotions hadn't overcome him at least in some way. No amount of editing the AV club guys might have done could possibly hide that. And yet – Rachel seemed so happy. It didn't add up.

He swallowed, nervously, and gripped the sides of his chair.

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The lights on the screen in front of him were still flickering but he wasn't seeing anything on it anymore. All of a sudden he'd found it really difficult to breathe. He'd been stunned ever since the first moment he saw Puck's face on that screen instead of his own face, and then Jesse's, but it hadn't been until he'd seen the images of himself and the other two – dressed identically – walking down that same corridor that he'd truly realised what her intensions had been in doing this.

It'd been awful, just as he'd feared. But it was a different kind of awful – he didn't actually give a damn anymore whether anyone saw how he'd felt on screen or off. He'd been played. How could she…? Had it not meant anything to her? It couldn't have been only him who'd felt it – she must have felt it, too. They'd breathed the life back into their friendship again that day, and then… and then… it couldn't have only been him who'd felt that spark between them when he held her. She had to have felt it – it couldn't just have been an act. Yeah they'd been acting, but even if she'd not said anything, even if he'd only moments ago feared that she might not have felt similarly, he'd sort of been certain, deep down, that it hadn't only been him who'd felt the connection between them returning. He could remember her heart beating against his chest when he'd hugged her, and it'd felt like it was beating just as fast as his – and she'd stayed in his arms for a while. Hadn't she?

It must have meant something more to her than… than just surrounding herself with guys who could give her reputation a boost. It must! It couldn't have been… the Rachel he loved wouldn't do that, sure she wouldn't!

Nothing seemed certain anymore. No – nothing seemed real anymore. The more he thought about it, the worse it got. She knew how he felt about her. He'd told her that day at the lockers. She fucking knew – and she'd totally used that. How could he have been such a fool?

As the lights went up his mind was still reeling. He didn't know what to think, or what to do. How could she – she of all people, she who had berated him for not wanting to be with her because of his reputation – use him like this, just to hike up her rep? And not just him, but the other two guys? What was that all about? It had to be the worst joke, ever.

"Well, why don't we just take a moment to really absorb what we've just watched…"

He couldn't hold back. He had to say something. It was just too much to take. So he blurted out the first thing that came to his mind. "It was garbage!"

That got him her attention; she looked at him and he stared right back. For a moment, the shock on her face felt good – he wanted her to feel hurt, as hurt as he was feeling – then the moment passed, as he heard first Puck, then Jesse add their bits. But neither of them seemed to get it, really – Puck seemed most pissed about his rep taking a blow for it, and Jesse apparently had an issue with having to share his star status with two nobodies.

All his anger, all his frustration, all the hurt he felt – it rose up in him, slowly, but steadily. He didn't want to throw it at her, not like this, not here; he wasn't sure how it'd all come out. He felt more like crying than shouting, like gripping her and shaking her yet at the same time he wished he could just run away and forget all about this.

"It was an artistic statement!" she was saying, trying to defend herself to Jesse.

"No!" he heard himself reply, in Jesse's stead. This didn't have anything to do with artistic, this was one thing only. And he needed her to know that he knew. "It wasn't. It was you trying to make it look like you had a bunch of guys fighting over you, so you could stop looking like some kind of outcast and be seen as some … hot slutty girl singer!"

She stared at him like he'd punched her in the face. Her eyes were like two open wounds, making his insides squirm, but he couldn't stop the torrent anymore even if he'd wanted. With a burst of energy he hadn't known he could muster right then and there, he was out of his chair and suddenly found himself staring right back into those eyes as she now stood before him, looking up. Looking at her like this made it worse; it took the anger out of him, and turned it into something else, something that made his voice crack and his heart feel like it was squeezed dry of life. "How could you do this to me? To all of us guys?" He didn't care about the other two, but they'd been her pawns just as much as he had. "Is your stupid reputation more important than your relationships?"

And at that, he couldn't take it anymore. One last look at her face, and he fled. Walked out of the room as far as the door, left it open behind him and ran. His world was fast coming apart at the seams, and he had no power to stop it anymore.

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Rachel stared after Finn, stunned by his words. How could he have said that – how could he have called her something like that? She'd not wanted to hurt anyone! Least of all him! His accusation had been like a slap to her face – it'd brought back that moment, the moment she'd been trying hardest to forget ever since it'd happened. "Is your stupid reputation more important than your relationships?" How dare he talk to her of reputation?

It was just a stupid video. It didn't have anything to do with real life. Why couldn't they see it like that?

She turned to face her boyfriend, but he was already up and getting ready to walk out, too.

"Jesse, wait!" she cried out, trying to stop him but he walked by her with such a stony face that she shrank back from it, and was left standing there with nothing but her own pain and disbelief to hold on to. Mr Schue and the others were looking at her, and they didn't look so impressed, either. She gave them a weak smile that she couldn't uphold for more than a few seconds. How could this have gone so wrong?

But as she went back to her chair and sat down on it, Finn's parting words kept on a steady barrage onto her thoughts. They hurt her the most. Because, she realised then, they were true. That's exactly what she'd let it become.

A sob rose up in her, and, realising the others had left her behind to sit in the music room all by herself, she gave in to it. Burying her face in her palms, she cried, afraid of losing Jesse – and yet she couldn't shake Finn's face from her mind.

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All done! Hope you enjoyed it so far. Sorry about the largish addition to the first chapter. I had to make some changes to accommodate some more plot twists later.

Leave a review if you liked it (or not)!

Until the next chapter – adieu!