To The Closet
Disclaimer: I do not own to the rights to Glee, any of its characters, or its plot devices.
It came to her as the night fell, rustling through the remaining leaves, and pounding into her skull as some unwelcome guest lighting upon your residence in a storm and seeking refuge.
And she denied this seeker, turning her out to the rain, watching her stumble, then slamming the door to block the sight and dead-bolting against further disturbance, further trouble, further evidence that changes were soon coming and the rain would always fall no matter the front of sun being forced behind vast clouds.
Yet the seeker found the open window, crawling in, and when she thought that the seeker would strangle her, she found loving arms wrapped around her, soothing her, bringing her someplace she had never been.
Home, the thought whispered through the air, embedding itself in the psyche of the girl who had tried so hard to lose herself, lost the map, lose all sense of direction, even going so far as to lose sight of that shining star sparkling so brightly, so willing to guide her home.
She had unknowingly covered the star with ice, attempting to overpower its brightness, using words and glares to try and bring it from the sky, pull it down.
Could it be that the world has destined them to orbit, creating some celestial, other worldly, pull that would forever entwine them together, this girl and her star, her seeker, finding her in the dark?
This dream she had, this long lost wish she didn't remember attaching to a star, fell upon her in two ways: adding the stones and taking them away, crushing her chest and expanding it at once.
She imagined herself as the Grinch and the seeker whose mission it was to bring Christmas cheer back to her, for the seeker was just as short and spirited, and she would no doubt wear her hair in the way Cindy Lou Who did, never giving up on her until her most precious muscle was fit to flat line with the paces she had set.
But her father, how he despised her! Talking of her family as though there could be nothing worse, as though anything mutually loving was so far below this marriage he had looped her mother into it was worth tearing apart.
Quinn saw these things her mother put up with, saw how her father tensed with certain words, upon site of certain women, upon shaking hands with certain men in the parish; she knew her father was not the man he presented, but then, neither was she, she was not the daughter her father wanted, in both senses.
It would be better if I were not his daughter, she thought. It would be better if I was either someone else's or something else entirely.
But this is the life she had been assigned, so she would go to the city square and parade her greatest sin: being someone she was not, someone she despised, someone so vile she would never get to be who she had dreamed.
If she couldn't have her, she wouldn't allow herself any opportunity to even think to be enough, good enough, selfless enough, better than who she was portraying.
And this girl, she was all that was good, she was the light that Quinn always looked towards, but she was so very there and Quinn couldn't have her, so she began to resent this situation, though began is defining the time loosely, for she never liked the situation once she understood exactly what it was.
She thought her mother might know, might have cast a sympathetic eye towards her during certain conversations or upon receiving certain looks, might have pushed her towards dance and dresses and blonde and noses not for her own purposes, not to injure, but to save.
It was such a strange idea, her mother knowing, that someone might see her and not just the shell that she presented, that someone was looking out for her.
But she was her daughter, certainly she would see?
Her daughter was her at one point, but with different dreams, dreams of a life out of Lima remained, but they differed in what that life contained: stars and lights or planes and trains.
Resigned to put the words away, no longer lost within daydreams of different worlds but in the harsh reality of what their lives have become and it pained her to know her daughter had given in so easily, had given up, and in doing so, became invisible to her seeker.
She knew who her daughter was looking for, looking out for, indeed, protecting her from more of her husband's vitriol, for if he knew, for he could never know, the words would become more than their parts (phonemes and morphemes and things she wished she forgot she missed like a limb, a vital part of her existence, gone with a few key phrases, signed papers, and the first of two daughters on the way).
She saw these things her daughter put up with, the things her daughter did, saw how her daughter tensed with certain words, upon site of a certain girl, upon entering church and seeing the verses for the day; she knew her daughter was not the girl she presented, but then, neither was she, she was not the wife her husband wanted.
She wishes it were different, wishes her daughter didn't have to fear, and not just for herself either, but for the girl and for her and for the family and its name, wishes she could get the courage to move on and make her husband move out, but she needed something, needed proof that he was the one at fault, needed him to know that and feel the guilt, she needed to get things sorted out, and quietly, to be able to move on without him, without a man in her life in Lima, which was a very hard thing to do without a death.
But her daughter was dying in a different way, and like hell would she wait four years to set her free, for anything could happen, and her daughter would likely not wait to set her plan into action, for she certainly had one, and that plan would bring her further from what she wanted, make it near impossible to gain back all the footing she had lost.
The plan would get set into action after Winter Break, she could not put it off any longer, she could not stall, simply looking, she had to speak, had to hear that voice directed at her, any way she could.
And she had to placate her father, for he was no longer satisfied with words and empty promises, head cheerleader or president of the chastity club, she had to bring another unwanted man into her life and make her star a protagonist in the story she was writing in her head.
Her father knew he was not needed any longer, knew he was kept for his money and his name (though if he were honest, it was soon going to be worth nothing, and his wife did have an upstanding family name to fall back on, though he would certainly never admit that aloud nor to himself with full sobriety, so as the secrets became harder to keep and the truth slowly crept up on him, so too did his drinking, urging his to acknowledge faults), and so he became restless, looking for places where he was wanted, things he could do to feel needed again, like he could be enough.
He knew they weren't the best choices, he knew he would be judging himself if he were to fully think about his actions, but other people were worse than he, less subtle, and he was confident his secret would be the last to fall, giving him a path to righteousness. After all, think of all the good he did for the community, trying to rid it of those men who paraded a so-called marriage around, so that they didn't taint the children with their disease.
He knew he had to step up his work, too, because he had seen those cheerleading friends of his daughter's holding pinkies in the park one day on his way to an outing, had seen his daughter standing close to them, had seen her eyes when they walked past those men with their abomination of a daughter and he worried for his own daughter's safety.
His wife would do nothing, he knew; she would mention time and that Quinn needed plenty, but time was still moving, time never stopped running, and soon his errors would catch up to the family and they needed to stockpile protection from any other rumors, fill any faults that they could possibly have.
The time to act was now, before she got away, before things got any worse than they were, before he grew lax and slipped up, letting his wife know about his late nights at the office. The nights, she knew about; it was hard not to with the stuttered phone calls, the vague text messages, the strange perfume that would appear on his clothes and was not consistent enough to be one of his secretaries.
She knew, but refused to address the issue until she could use it to the best of her abilities, until she would be able live free from her husband, she only hoped her daughter could last that long, could hold off on her plan, hold off on landing past the point at which she could no longer turn back.
Her daughter was capable of anything, capable of inflicting damage on others, but also on herself (perhaps more so herself, for she would hate herself more for resorting to this, but would know no other way to deal, to manage with what she thought was wrong, was shameful, that it was so very wrong to just feel).
If her husband's words hadn't already done the deed, there would be something that pushed her over the edge, forced her hand to do what she truly did not want to do, what would remain the biggest regret of her life simply because it led to all the other regrets, and she would always take the blame rather than place it on her father, the root of what started it all (or was it the parishioners for questioning him, the church for suggesting these thoughts, the time, society, everything else that wasn't her or him or her).
There would be something that pushed her over the edge, just as there was something that struck her heart to flutter with flames so bright they obscured everything else, so that she wouldn't really see just what her motivation was, or so she could say she didn't know the motivation, because lying was easier when you didn't believe the truth yourself.
References:
Story title: To The Lighthouse, Virginia Woolf
