She'd never really planned on taking it this far. In fact, she'd never really had a plan at all; that was the problem. That was how the whole thing had just snowballed out of control until suddenly she'd found herself trying on dresses at Lima's Discount Bridal and looking up recipes for vegan wedding cakes.
All she'd known, originally, was that somewhere along the way, Finn Hudson had started to shine more brightly than any trophy she'd ever coveted.
It wasn't even so much his looks that had sent her salivating. Sure, he had a certain dough-faced, Midwestern charm about him, but, in retrospect, he was no Noah Puckerman or Jesse St. James, either. Instead, what had really made her mouth water was the fact that no matter how badly he screwed up in the classroom or out on the football field, he could still walk through the halls of William McKinley High School like he owned the place. Teachers and students alike would smile at him and pat him on the back when he passed.
He was golden in Lima in a way she knew she wouldn't be until later, until New York.
She hated how much it piqued her jealousy. It made her feel so petty and small that she even cared what the cretins at McKinley thought about her. But when she was really honest with herself, she knew it wasn't so much that Finn had the approval of everyone, it was the approval of one person in particular that had her so worked up: his girlfriend, Quinn Fabray.
Cheerleader Quinn Fabray.
The first time Rachel had seen Quinn sauntering down the hall in her Cheerios uniform, pressed into Finn's side, she'd had to rush to the ladies' room to splash cold water on her flushed face. And that afternoon, she'd gone home and thrown out the box of magazine clippings she'd been keeping under her bed since middle school.
Her dads had never known about the box, thank goodness. It would have broken their hearts to know that even after the epic after-school talk they'd given her in sixth grade about her looks,—otherwise known as "the talk that launched a thousand Funny Girl viewings"—she'd still never quite been able to believe it. She knew they'd devoted all of their energies to making sure she felt wanted and special and beautiful, and she couldn't bear to think of how it would hurt them to discover she'd still always felt not quite right, incomplete in some way, misshapen.
For one thing, it was apparent to her, as early on as age ten, that her fathers' frames of reference when it came to female beauty weren't exactly mainstream. Most girls her age didn't even know who Barbra Streisand was, and she doubted they'd spent the summer shopping for school clothes inspired by their favorite outfits from The Judy Garland Show.
She wanted to stand out, to be a star, yes. But being a star in Lima, Ohio, required a different skill set than the one needed to be a star on a 1960s variety show, and that was a distinction her dads didn't really seem capable of making. The truth, though she hated to admit it, was that she wanted, maybe even needed, a mother to help her navigate the nuances of that difference.
But that was just one more thing she could add to the list of things she'd never have.
So instead, she had the box, and over the years she'd amassed a vast collection of articles and attributes that made up her self-education on what it was to be a modern woman. And the box had been enough, or close to enough anyway, until that morning Quinn Fabray had swished past.
And then it all just seemed like an exercise in futility.
It didn't take long for her to realize she'd never be able to be what Quinn was: blonde, delicate, graceful, classically beautiful with a laugh like tinkling crystal. At best, the words people used to describe Rachel's looks were things like "quirky," "unique," and "ethnic." And whereas Quinn seemed so contained and composed, Rachel knew she was all over the place, her emotions rabidly foaming and frothing out of her at any given moment.
As far as Rachel was concerned, Quinn Fabray was a living, breathing model of the kind of femininity to which she aspired. She was Grace Kelly, real leading lady material.
Rachel didn't need a box full of glossy paper cut-outs to show her how to be the perfect hometown girl now that she could see the real deal smiling widely from the top of a pyramid at every school assembly. And, what's more, as long as Quinn Fabray existed, was there even a point in trying?
No, there wasn't; so she'd thrown out the box.
From then on, she knew she'd never be able to be what Quinn Fabray was. But maybe, just maybe, if she could get Finn Hudson, she could feel like the girl she was was just as good.
