Title: When Secrets Come Out to Play
Chapter 2/? : Our Lives in Motion
Fandom: Glee
Pairings: Rachel Berry /Quinn Fabray Side Brittany/ Santana Rachel/Others Quinn/OC
Rating: NC-17 for sexual themes and eventual smutt.
Word Length: 2000+ per chapter.
Summary: Quinn puts her quest to find herself on hold in order to figure out the suddenly more mysterious Rachel Berry. She soon finds that there is more to the little brunette than she ever thought possible. Perhaps she'll even figure herself out on the way. Punk!Quinn Simi-Baddass!Rachel.
Spoilers: All aired episodes, only a few things from season three as it's AU for the most part. NO LUCY CABOOSY!
Thanks to t8kmybreathaway for doing some great beta work.
Disclaimer: I don't own "Glee", if I did it would be even gayer if at all possible. I do own the OC's.
It took most of Saturday for Quinn and Santana to decide that they needed more information. Santana felt like as the top of the school social latter, she should be informed on all things remotely enticing. It wasn't cool that Berry had all this shit going on outside of school and she had no idea. She needed to know all the details.
Quinn just wanted to knock miss perfect goody goody off of her pedestal. They all thought the girl was such a nice clean girl, yet there she was drinking and partying. Not only that, but she was flirting with woman after woman like it was nothing, but when it came to school and glee, she acted like she was the sweet virgin girl, who never did anything quite like the things she did the Friday before. Okay, so she was perhaps giving herself false reasons to nose her way into the diva's non-school life, but that didn't matter.
Brittany was meeting up with Tina to start working on their song, while Quinn and Artie had met up on Saturday and then agreed to meet again Monday at lunch. So she elected herself to accompany Santana to Rachel's house. They went two hours earlier than planned. Santana said she wanted to catch the singer off guard.
Santana rang the doorbell, while Quinn fidgeted next to her in the cold October air. Santana impatiently rang the bell again. "Stop that," Quinn hissed. "She isn't expecting you yet, just chill."
"I got it," they heard from inside the house. The door opened revealing the DJ from the night before. The young woman looked the pair up and down with a neutral face. One Quinn had been used to giving, not receiving. "Can I help you?" She almost looked board. "Selling girl scout cookies?"
"Pssh, like I was ever a damn girl scout," said the Latina incredulously.
"Excuse her," Quinn quickly cut in. "She's got a filter issue."
"I keeps it real," Santana shot back.
"Anyway, we're looking for Rachel. They have a school project to work on and I'm just tagging along," stated Quinn.
"Right," the DJ drawled. "Ray, you got two girl scouts at the door. Something about a project for school," yelled the woman.
"That's not until two," Rachel hollered from in the house.
"Well come tell her that, she brought a little friend with her, she says she's tagging along."
"Fine," Rachel's voice rang out again. "Tell Santana and Brittany to have a seat in the living room. I'll be down in a minute."
"Or ten," another voice said loudly as Dakota stepped aside to let the two girls in.
"Babe you better not be backtracking up there. Get your tongue away from Rachel so we can eat already," Dakota yelled.
"That's what I'm trying to do. She's the best cure for a hangover." the woman laughed from upstairs.
"She is doing no such thing," Rachel yelled down the stairs. "Behave, we have company." The diva began to descend the stairs slowly. She was nervous and biting down on her lip.
Seeing the change in her friend's demeanor, Dakota gave the little brunette a quick peck on the cheek and whispered something into her ear before disappearing into the kitchen. Rachel shyly looked to the floor for a few seconds before finally looking to the Latina, "Hello Santana." She turned to see Quinn and said, "Oh, I assumed you would be Brittany. Hello Quinn." She looked back to Santana. "I do believe you are two hours early Santana. If I had known I would have been better prepared for you, though I appreciate that you are not late for our meeting." The visitors took note of Rachel's fitted yellow t-shirt and loose gray sweat pants.
"Yeah, well Brittany's dealing with the girl half of Asian Fusion and Q and I had nothing to do, so we thought I should just get this over with. She's here to make sure I don't snap from hearing your mind numbing voice for too long and beat you to death with one of your singing trophies." Quinn tried not to laugh at Santana's explanation.
"I assure you that I do not need Quinn to protect me from you Santana," said Rachel. At first she was intimidated by having the two girls in her home before the appointed time. She had never been worried about anyone from school popping up unannounced because they rarely willing wanted to be in her presence, much less her home. Though, this was her house damn it. This was her house and she had her own back up if needed.
"You're kind of hot when you get all tough, Berry," Santana grinned and nudged at a quiet Quinn.
Rachel went to open her mouth but was cut off by the slew of giggles coming down the stairs. The woman with the motorcycle from the night before followed by a tall young heavyset black woman and a slender blonde made their way down the steps. "Hello there," said the black girl, showing off a full set of teeth with a slight gap in the front.
"Hey ladies," said the blonde, flipping the hair that flowed down to her bottom.
As they approached the girls, Farah slung her arm over Rachel's shoulders. "You must be the girl scouts," she gave a lazy smile. "Put me down for some thin mints."
"You're such a dork," the black girl joked. "Leave Ray's little school friends alone. You girls hungry? We're gonna have brunch in just a bit."
"No thanks," Quinn said, feeling out of her element in ways she never felt before. "Don't want to be any trouble."
"Girl, if it was trouble, she wouldn't have asked in the first place," said the blonde, her brown eyes showing her slight annoyance. "What the hell am I saying? She still would have asked."
"Dakota's in there finishing some things up, but Dylan and I have been hooking it up in there." The black woman motioned toward the skinny blonde. "We have to represent non-vegans, you know?"
"We love Ray but I love my meat," Dylan laughed out loud, holding on to her black friend's hand.
"I swear Dakota and I are the only civilized people out of all of us," Rachel chimed in.
"I'm plenty civilized," said Farah with false anger. "At least we don't eat pork around your ass."
"Thankfully," the small brunette rolled her eyes.
"Oh, I'm sorry, I'm so rude," the black woman began to speak again, using her free hand to brush a few loose burgundy and black braids out from in front of her face. "I'm Rachel's cousin, Lorna," At seeing some of the confusion on the visiting girls' faces she clarified, "Through my uncle Leroy….You know the tall black man in the family portrait?" She giggled and pointed to the picture on the mantle of her Uncle's Hiram and Leroy with a five year-old Rachel. The girls seemed to gain some understanding. "And this is Dylan," she motioned to her blonde buddy. "And that crazy thing is Farah."
"Sorry," Rachel began. "Everything started happening all at once. This is Santana," she pointed at the cheerleading co-captain, "and this is Quinn." She now motioned at the girl with the pink hair.
"I'm digging the pink," said Farah.
"Thanks," Quinn replied. She wasn't entirely impressed by the woman with her arm draped around Rachel's shoulders.
"I did the blue thing during my junior year; thought the chicks would be into it." Farah returned.
"You wanted to piss off your daddy," Rachel corrected. The easy chatter wasn't lost on the former Cheerio. She was almost aggravated listening to Rachel easily speak in a way that she never got the chance to hear from her at school.
"And I wanted to piss Jim off," the biker amended. "Totally worked," she sing songed. "On both counts."
"Dakota stuck her head out from the kitchen and declared, "Get your pretty asses in here so we can eat. Ray, get you friends in gear."
"Uh oh, Blue's getting grumpy. We better get in there. Come on wifey," Lorna began to tug at Dylan's hand, dragging her to the kitchen.
"Yeah, I'm gonna get in there. My baby isn't at her happiest when she's hungry." She followed the other two into the kitchen.
This perturbed the two girls on the couch. Weren't Rachel and that Farah girl, in Santana's words,' getting it on'? Yet Dakota seemed to be with Farah. It was a confusing dynamic at the very least.
"Uh, so you are welcome to join us," stated Rachel. "We have until two and we all planned this brunch accordingly. I assure you we have plenty to go around."
"Hells yeah little Berry, I'm starving," Santana chuckled, going to join the others.
"I guess," said Quinn. "Since you have more than that vegan crap."
"The girls even have turkey bacon." Quinn arched a skeptical brow. "I'm half Jewiah alright? Not even my daddy Leroy eats pork anymore."
"And does daddy Leroy know about the little sorority life going on here," Quinn snarked.
"Both my fathers are aware of what goes on in this house in their absence. Well, maybe not everything but they've known the girls for years and they trust all of us. That isn't to say that they think that we're angelic, however they trust us not to do anything arrest worthy."
"I didn't ask for the whole book, Rachel. Goodness I just asked a simple yes or no question." Quinn had to fight from bringing up having seen the other girl the night before. The beer was most definitely arrest worthy in her eyes. And if Rachel's parents knew that she was doing whatever it was she was doing with these girls, she imagined that they wouldn't exactly approve.
"Well in my house. I have every right to talk the way I want," Rachel huffed. "If you don't like it, you know where the door is."
Quinn had to admire that the other girl wasn't taking her shit. "Fine, I could go for some of that turkey bacon."
The final two girls made it into the kitchen to see the others sitting around the table, filling their plates and making simple conversation. Quinn was shocked to see Santana eating home fries and scrambled eggs. She'd been on another one of Sue's crazy diets lately and only Brittany was able to get her to eat normally and even then it was almost restricted to fruit and breadsticks. Rachel passed off a plate to the girl with the pink do and grabbed them both a fork before they found themselves seats. Quinn sat next to Santana and Dakota with Rachel between her and Lorna, who was next to Dylan. Farah finished off the seating arrangement, sitting next to Santana.
"Lor, can you pass me the vegan pancakes and the fruit please," asked the brunette glee singer. Without verbal confirmation, the dark woman did as she was asked. "Thanks," said Rachel.
"I'll take the regular. Thank you," Farah said cockily before taking a huge bite of her syrupy pancake." She quickly chewed the contents in her mouth. "Mmm, good job, D."
"Thanks, hoe," the blonde joked.
"Well ain't that the slut calling the prostitute a whore," Lorna cracked at her blonde friend.
"And I'm very good at what I do, just ask my man," her friend laughed back, along with the rest of the table, well except for the Latina and her punk friend.
"Don't mind us," Lorna spoke over the group. "That's just how we are. Terms of endearment and all that."
Santana scrunched her face and looked at the women that were probably no more than a few years older than herself. "Yeah, so I'm just gonna go on and ask. What's up with you and blondie locks?" She motioned toward the black woman. "She has a man but you call her wifey and you're all like touchy feely."
"We're soul mates," the blonde said simply as if it were obvious.
"Best friends. Go to gals," added Lorna.
"Oh."
"Don't worry. You aren't the first to make that mistake and you won't be the last," replied the girl with the braids.
"And you don't care what people have to say about that? People must think you're total mo's," Santana's curiosity was getting the best of her.
"Hey," Dakota spoke up.
Quinn was about to make an excuse for her friend's words but it was Lorna that spoke up first. "Well this house is full of lady lovers with a couple of crosses in between. If you got a problem…"
"You can get your little ass gone," the blonde bit out.
"Relax Malibu Barbie, I was just asking a question," Santana shot back.
"Show some damn respect because I'll cut a minor."
"I'll go all Lima Heights on you bitch," Santana stood up.
"Please, little girl, I grew up in Lima Heights and it ain't no ghetto."
"You sure talk like it is," the Cheerio pointed out. That was a thing everyone seemed to notice about Lorna and Dylan. Lorna's speech defied stereotypes. She was well versed on the importance of speaking properly, while her blonde friend tended to talk like she was straight out of a southern ghetto.
"Calm yourselves," Rachel yelled above the commotion. "This is just Santana being Santana and Dylan being Dylan."
"See,D? I told you someone was gonna give you a run for your money," Farah laughed.
"Let it go, Fare," Lorna warned.
The two brooding females sat back in their chairs, letting their anger dissipate. "So," Dakota began, attempting to turn things around. "Ray, you planning on singing anything this year at sectionals?"
"No, I'm not too worried about it. Blaine and Kurt are doing a duet, and Mercedes is doing the Solo." She said non-committedly.
"She's the one that always gets the end notes, right?"
"Not this time," replied the glee club captain.
"From what I've heard, the girl has a pretty decent set of pipes," Dakota added.
"She does. Actually at last year's sectionals, Quinn and her ex sang a duet. Santana had a solo as well," said Rachel.
"Oh, yeah we saw that. You all did great," said the black woman. The other occupants of the table followed suit.
"Thanks," the two guests mumbled.
"We would have gone to Nationals to see you guys but we all had school and work," Dakota chimed in.
"We lost anyway," Santana said sourly. "Finn and Rachel couldn't keep their lips off each other."
A resounding "BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!" was heard around the table.
"I thought we booted gorilla boy once and for all," spat Farah.
"Stop that," stated Rachel, trying to stifle a giggle.
"I know you like charity work girl, but that one should get you a free pass for life," Dylan threw in.
"That's mean," the small brunette chided.
"Since when did I claim to be nice?" Was shot back.
"Really Ray, you could do so much better, or at least smarter. God knows I can't stand that prick Jesse but even his dumb ass could outsmart Finny boy." This was Farah again.
"Finn is not stupid," Rachel defended.
"The dude who thought he knocked up his girlfriend by jizzing in a hot tub, right," Farah joked.
Quinn had been fairly quiet, content to observe her surroundings, but at that mention, she found herself stiffening in her seat, while both Santana and Rachel looked to her with concern.
"What? What did I say?" the biker looked perplexed.
Quinn sat up in her chair and attempted to muster up some false confidence. "I'm the girl that got knocked up."
"Well congratulations on dodging that bullet, lucky for you he wasn't the daddy," Dakota tried to add humor to the tense moment.
"Twice, was it?" Farah couldn't help but run her mouth.
"Shut up, Farah," Rachel hissed quietly.
"Hey it took Ray a few times to get the creature out of her system, so don't feel bad," Lorna tried to smooth over. "Besides, Farah here has never been one to learn her lesson on the first try."
Farah flipped her off. "Hard headed bitches shouldn't throw stones missy."
"Hey I know my sex life is screwed up, I don't deny it," Lorna defended.
"That's what I thought."
"Quit picking on my hubby," Dylan spoke up. "I don't know about the two of them," she pointed at Quinn and Santana, "but the rest of us have all had messed up love lives at one point or another."
"I never said anything about love," Lorna stressed.
"Sure baby girl," the blonde condescended. "Whatever helps you sleep at night."
"Anyway," Rachel cut in again. "Let's finish this up. Santana and I do have work to do at some point. And the rest of you all had plans, am I right?"
"Dakota and I are going on a bike ride and catching a couple movies," Farah smiled almost childlike.
"And you two?" Rachel looked over at the blonde and Lorna.
"Antonio gave me some plastic, so I want to give it a little work out," Dylan chuckled. "There's a trip to the mall in our near future."
"It's a good thing you got yourself a guy with cash to keep up with your high maintenance ass," Farah snorted.
"That's right, girl," Dylan agreed, rather than getting offended. "Rach, I'll pick up that sexy little number you were eyeing last week."
"I don't need your boyfriend buying my outfits," huffed Rachel.
"Technically I'm buying it; he's just paying for it."
"I don't need him to pay for it either."
"She's going to get it anyway so just smile and nod," interjected Lorna.
"Great," Santana jumped in. "A new school outfit. She could really use a few."
"Oh hell no, she better not," Dylan raised her voice. "If she comes home covered in whatever that crap is she's always trying to hide on her 'normal' school clothes and she's wearing an outfit I got her, I'll go to jail for fucking up some little high school kid's face."
The table fell into silence. That was something they never actually talked about. Rachel didn't want to broach the topic and none of the other's wanted to push her. Dylan just couldn't help the outburst this time. Santana just brought the comment out of her.
"Like being bitch-slapped by an iceberg," said Quinn, for the first time attempting a joke. When Rachel began to laugh, so did everyone else.
Quinn had been pretending to read a book while listening to a surprisingly agreeable collaboration of the small brunette and the raven-haired Cheerio. Rachel had agreed to preform "Missunaztood" by Pink. It was far from a Rachel Berry glee club performance piece, but then Quinn remembered Rachel's performance from a couple of days prior and decided that this was fairly tame in comparison.
It was an hour and a half after the other girls had left the house that Tina dropped Brittany off. That was when the girl with the pink hair stopped her charade of indifference and began to chat with the blonde dancer. There were no mentions of Friday night, though Brittany had almost spilled about their attendance more than once.
They had actually ironed out all the details and gone over the song a few good times before the Lorna and Dylan showed up with arms full of shopping bags. They introduced themselves to Brittany before heading up the stairs to unleash their loot. It was after seven by then, so they all decided to call it a night. Rachel and Santana agreed to meet during their coinciding free periods to finish rehearsing.
They performed on Wednesday citing that the song spoke for itself. Mr. Schuster was less than impressed at what he felt was Rachel's lack of attention to the week's assignment. There were whispers throughout the room as Brittany clapped and whooped, and Rachel gracefully took a seat without as much as a hint of outward annoyance. Santana displayed enough for the two of them and then some.
On Friday afternoon, Quinn had just finished a smoke when she heard the two climbing up the bleachers. Once they'd sat down there was silent for a few minutes until finally, "You said that you wanted to talk so I suggest we do that before our free period is over. "
"Yeah, um…well Mr. Schu wanted me to make sure everything was good with you," Finn mumbled.
"And why, pray tell, would he ask that of you," Rachel asked a little snarkily, though it went right over the tall boy's head.
"Well…you've kinda been acting weird. You don't like…care the way you used to."
"I assure you that I care just as much as I ever had," the girl defended. "I just figured it would be a nice change of pace to let go of some of the control and relax."
"But you're Rachel. You like, live for this stuff. I mean, it's not fair to stick Mr. Schuster with all the work. You're co-captain."
"I am hardly abandoning my role as co-captain, however if you, Mr. Schuster, or anyone else feels as if I am failing to fulfill my duties, then by all means ask me to forfeit my title. I'm completely open to giving someone else a chance, though originally nobody else was up to that particular task," said the brunette girl. "You weren't even up for it in the beginning."
"But you said you were, so you need to do that crazy thing you do to fix everything."
"First of all, you can step up too you know? You are the other captain. Besides, I won't be here next year. Mr. Shuster is going to have to take charge at that time anyway so he may as well start now." Quinn tried not to snort at the other girl's words. She'd thought the same in the past.
"Rach, I said we could get back together if that's what this, whatever this is, is about."
"I'll have you know that you and I have nothing to do with my newly adopted 'go with the flow' attitude toward glee," she responded. "It isn't like my former behavior was enjoyed by our fellow glee clubbers, nor was it appreciated by Mr. Schu. I believe I was told to be a team player in one instance and in another told that my attitude sucks."
"Dude, it's our last year. We can be a glee super couple and go out with a bang. Forget all that other stuff."
Rachel sighed at the thought of having this conversation, yet again. "Like I told you at the beginning of the summer; you and I are not good to or for each other. We will never be together again, so we should try to make due as friends."
"But I don't get it. The only time you didn't like…. chase after me is when you were dating Jesse."
"I'm not."
"Then why?"
"Finn our relationship has proven to be more negative than positive. It's brought out the worst in both of us and we hurt each other over and over again."
"That's not true, Rach," the boy said gruffly. "We were good together."
"When you were dumping me to go out on dates with Santana and Brittany, or when you were lying to me about being a virgin," she half yelled. Quinn couldn't help but be a little proud of the diva for saying what nobody else would.
"You only cared because it was Santana."
"I cared because you lied," she was obviously angry now. "And yes it hurt that you slept with one of the girls you dumped me for even if I was with someone else at the time."
"So you turn around and made out with Puck knowing how it would hurt me!" This time he yelled.
"Yes and I was wrong. It was another way I disappointed you. So you see, we just can't make each other happy for long," she lowered her voice in hopes that Finn would do the same.
His voice sounded sympathetic when he said, "We can get over all of that."
"No," she said quietly yet sternly. "I can't get over the fact that I begged you to take me back and got constantly rejected until Jesse was back in the picture. I can't get over the fact that you broke up with me for something you turned around and encouraged Quinn to do. I can't just get over the fact that even though you were dating her, I had to be the one to tell you what kind of corsage to get her because you were too busy whining about her to figure it out for yourself."
Really, Quinn thought bitterly from her spot under the bleachers. That was the only thing he did right that night and it was her idea?
"And I sure as hell can't forget that you ruined prom for both of us because you couldn't decide who you wanted to be with. God Finn, you broke up with the girl at a funeral!"
"Why do you even care? It's not like you two are close or anything."
"That doesn't matter. She's still a girl with feelings," the girl stressed. Quinn winced. She'd rarely considered the brunette's feelings, though that was mainly because she'd spent most of high school pretending her own were neutral.
"Okay I get it. I'm sorry. If you want I can like tell her sorry or whatever, but the club is always at its best when we're together," the quarterback tried to reason.
"I encourage you to seek forgiveness from Quinn, though I won't date you again. Glee was good with or without us as a couple and even if what you said was true, I wasn't at my best when we were together, or when I was chasing after you. I deserve a chance to be me again."
"This isn't you. Not the Rachel any of us know. Only you're still selfish. You still want everything to be about you, but this is about the team."
"Me dating someone isabout me. It would have nothing to do with the team," Rachel scoffed. Quinn silently did the same from beneath her. This was classic Finn Hudson. He wanted what he wanted and it didn't matter how it affected anyone else as long as he could portray the good natured boy who's good intentions simply went awry. But Rachel was now more than ever aware of what the saying 'the road to Hell is paved with good intentions' meant. And though she tried to always give him the benefit of the doubt; sometimes she wasn't even completely sure that Finn always had good intentions anyway.
"Forget it, I'm outa here," he huffed before standing up and marching down the bleachers.
Rachel remained sitting as she watched him stomp over to the gym doors and disappearing behind them.
"If it's any consolation, you were right about everything, and yes it physically hurts to say those words out loud," Quinn spoke through the silence.
Rachel jumped in her seat with a quick deep breath before looking down and catching a glimpse of pink. "Goodness Quinn, you scared me half to death."
"There's my drama queen," she said dubiously in return. "I wasn't eavesdropping…..Okay I was but it's not like you don't know this is kind of my place."
"And where are the skanks spending their time these days?"
"They're on a lunch money run in the bathroom right about now," Quinn said without a hint of a smile.
"Of course," the shorter girl said from her spot on the bleachers, now looking back to the field.
"I know you think I was just being a bitch when I told you that you didn't belong here, Rachel," Quinn said with as little emotion as she could, but damn if it wasn't hard to keep her voice in check. "Part of me was trying to get you to let go of Finn for me, but you do deserve better than he can give you." She tugged at her bomber jacket sleeve as a way to keep her eyes from trailing to Rachel's form above her. "Better than Lima can give you. You've got the goods to do something more with yourself than most of us."
"So I've been told," the other girl said plainly. "I'm starting to really believe that…at least about the Finn stuff. I've always believed the rest. Maybe you should realize the same for yourself."
"I'm working on it."
"Good, but don't think you have to have a nose ring and pink hair to do it. Not that I don't find the look rather thrilling, it's just that's not what's going to get you out of here. You can do that regardless of what you look like. You have the drive; you just have to tap into it." Rachel said it with conviction.
The tone of her voice almost made Quinn come up and join her because nobody but Rachel had ever said they believed in her in a way that she actually believed it. But as much as the old version of Quinn hid her feelings, this version of herself was working with Fort Knox. She'd already promised herself that she wouldn't, not with her, not again. She'd been weak with her in the past, accidently allowing her enemy to see inside of her during little moment in private, but she was determined not to repeat those actions with anyone, especially Rachel. Finn had asked her if she felt anything anymore, and as much as she wanted not to, she had. She had felt the pain, just like she always had and she'd cracked. She had cracked right in front of him and it was all Rachel's fault.
"Yeah well, we'll see." She left without as much as a goodbye.
Yes, I borrowed the iceberg line. I believe it was originally said by Lea Michele, though I couldn't bet on it.
Thanks for reading. I hope you're enjoying or at least still interested. Please leave me a review if you have the time. I'm open to answering questions about the chapter providing they don't involve spoiling the rest of the story.