I was told the prior chapter was too short. This one? Isn't.

After our talk, Rachel had asked if I would mind waiting while she met with fans. "I owe my career to them, you know?" I nodded, and watched from the door while she talked to them, signing playbills and posing for pictures. After a little while, I let the door close and wandered around. I soaked up everything: the props tables, the hair and makeup stations, the costumes and wigs. Then I wandered out onto the stage. The houselights were up, and the house was empty, but the experience was magical nonetheless.

I wanted to sing. No, not "wanted to." Had to. I had to sing. My brain raced a million miles an hour to find the perfect song to show what I felt right then about my parents and my bio-parents. Then I thought, screw that! I decided to sing about how it felt to be standing on a Broadway stage instead.

"Let me entertain you. Let me make you smile," I sang, tentative at first, just like Gypsy Rose Lee. What if I got caught? What is someone got mad or—worse—laughed at me? Again, I reminded myself, Screw it! How many people get to do this? I might never get to again! So I went for it. "Let me do a few tricks, some old and then some new tricks, I'm very versatile!" I used the whole stage, vamping it up for my imaginary audience, seducing them with shimmies and dips: "And if you're real good, I'll make you feel good! I want your spirits to climb! So let me entertain you! And we'll have a real good time, yes sir! We'll have…a real good time!"

Instead of silence, I was greeted with applause, and whipped around to see Rachel Berry in the wings. "That was wonderful!" she exclaimed with a mirthful giggle. I see your mom took my advice about the lessons. I knew you were a star in the making; I just knew it! And that song choice? You are certainly Noah's daughter. I mean, it's obvious in the eyes and the lips, but when you turn on the seduction?" She waggled her eyebrows and dissolved into laughter, but the good kind, not the mean kind. "Come on, we have reservations! Noah wanted to meet at La Paloma, but that is ridiculous. Yes, their burritos are economical and astonishingly good, but it is not the place for intimate discussion!"

"Thanks, Ms. Berry."

"Rachel! Please, call me Rachel. Won't your parents worry when you're not back?"

"I decided you were right, so I called and told them what I was doing…kind of."

"Kind of?"

"Well…I told them I was getting autographs, told you my name, and you recognized me...at which point I remembered you from the video."

"Not quite the truth, but it's a start," she said with a nod.

"Anyway, I told Mom I was curious and wanted to ask you questions about my bio-parents, but only if it was okay with her and dad. She said, 'Of course, sweetie, if you're sure you're not bothering Ms. Berry.'"

"You're not at all!" Rachel assured me.

"I know, but could you maybe…call my mom?"

Rachel gulped, but nodded. "What, exactly, am I calling about?"

"Maybe you could ask her if it's okay if I meet my dad? That way my parents feel like they have some control in the matter?"

"What if they say no?"

"I'll meet him anyway. It's just…if they say 'yes,' it doesn't have to be a secret."

She sighed, but agreed. I dialed my mom again. "Mom, Rachel Berry wants to talk to you. Yes, 'seriously.' Why would I kid about that? No, I'm sorry, Mommy. I'm not trying to give you attitude." I rolled my eyes. "Here she is." I handed the phone to Rachel.

"Hello, Sharon? It's Rachel Berry. I apologize for springing this on you. I know you and Noah and Quinn had some kind of arrangement. When I saw Drizzle, though, and heard her name, even my years of experience as an actress were no match for my astonishment. When she saw my reaction, your clever daughter put the pieces together. Listen, Drizzle doesn't know this…" She winked at me. "…but I'm still in touch with Noah, and I know he would love to meet her. In fact, I was going to invite him to have dinner with us tonight. However, I don't want to make that offer if you and Joshua don't approve." There was a long pause. "Yes. I know they felt that way then, but I also know that he regretted that decision. If this happens, Noah will be back in her life for good, though in a manner that respects your role as Drizzle's parents. Mm-hmm. Of course. I understand completely." My heart sunk. What was mom saying? "Sure! I'll go get Drizzle and put her on."

Rachel put her hand over the receiver and grinned at me while she waited long enough to pretend that I hadn't been standing there listening the whole time.

"Mommy?"

"Drizzle, Ms. Berry is in contact with your biological father, Noah. She says she can arrange for you to meet him if you would like. Is that something you want?" I jumped up and down and tried to hide the extreme excitement from my voice.

"Yes, Mom, I want to meet him."

"Okay. You know your dad and I always supported having Noah and Quinn in your life. Honey, she says you can meet him tonight for dinner. Are you ready for that?"

"Yes!" I said, unable to hide my excitement.

Mom laughed. "We should come with you."

"Mom…" I wasn't sure how to say this. "Mom, can I meet him this first time by myself? I love you and I love Daddy, but meeting Noah with you watching…I…it would be…I don't want to say anything or do anything that…"

"Okay," Mom said, sounding a little hurt. "I understand. You want this to be a private moment, just for you, when you can feel whatever you need to feel without worrying about your dad and me."

Ouch. Mom is so right it hurts. "Mom, I…"

"Honey, it's okay. Just call us if you need anything, and come straight back to the hotel after."

"Okay. I love you more than anything, Mom—you and Daddy. I'll see you later. Bye."

Mom said goodbye and hung up the phone. Without even thinking about it, I pulled my blonde hair into a high ponytail using the band around my wrist. Suddenly Rachel's jaw dropped.

"Quinn!"

I raised an eyebrow at her.

"Sorry," she said. "With the ponytail…you just reminded me that I forgot to tell Quinn."

"With the ponytail?" I asked, but she was already pacing and dialing her own cell phone.

"Noah! No, she hasn't changed her mind. In fact, we even checked with Sharon and Joshua, and they approved the meeting. No, I'm not going to say 'I told you so!' Because what's done is done and I'm not petty! Well, you can't change that, so please focus on what's happening right now. You need to call Quinn and bring her up to speed! Okay. See you soon."

"Why would you say, 'I told you so?'"

"When you were a baby, Noah and Quinn visited you occasionally. When the visits ended, you would cry and they would cry. They got pictures and updates from Sharon and Joshua, and Noah would be tense for days after. Quinn would be depressed. They decided to break contact for a while. Eventually, Noah decided he wanted to see you again, but he was afraid that Joshua and Sharon wouldn't approve, or that it would be hard on you. I told Noah your parents agreed to let him in your life from day one, so if it were clear to them that his presence would be consistent, they would welcome him with open arms."

Then she glanced down at her cell phone, saw the time and gasped. "We'll have to hurry if we want to get to Carmine's on time." We rushed back to her dressing room. She finished changing into a gorgeous red pencil skirt, black tanktop, a cardigan in red and black argyle, and black kitten heels—very sexy librarian. She brushed her shiny hair and finished primping for dinner. I looked at myself in the mirror: my favorite jeans, purple Chucks and soft black Ramones shirt (they're a punk band from way back in the 1980s). Then she quickly ran a brush through my ponytail, advised me to touch up my lipgloss and declared, "Hello, Gorgeous!"

Then we quickly exited the theater and snaked through the rush of pedestrians to Carmine's. The smell of Italian food hit me when we walked in the door, and my mouth began to water. The maitre d' rushed over: "Ms. Berry! It's an honor. Right this way!" He guided us to somewhat-secluded table. Rachel squeezed my hand.

My birth-father stood as we approached. He was kind of tall and quite muscular: the most handsome person I'd ever met. He wore jeans, an untucked green button-front shirt and a black leather jacket. I crossed over to him. I was about to hold out a hand to shake, but at the last second, I hugged him instead. He embraced me gently for a second before crushing me to his chest. We were kind of rocking back and forth. Eventually, he let me go. I was crying a little. Rachel was crying a lot. Even Noah had to clear his throat and swipe away a tear.

"You look good," he finally said. Rachel warned me he was a man of few words.

"Thanks," I replied. "So do you."

"I like your shirt. The Ramones were badass."

"Totally!" I replied, and we sat. Waiters brought food to the table in large dishes for us to pass and serve ourselves from. For a while we were occupied by dishing up salad, clams, lasagna and penne alla vodka. Rachel was happy to fill the silence between bites, chattering about that evening's performance and how happy she'd been to meet me.

"So," I finally piped up, "Can I ask you two some questions?"

"Yeah," Noah said, sounding nervous. He tugged at the cuffs of his jacket, then ran his hand over the center of his hair. It reminded me of the video: he'd had a Mohawk, and he'd run his hand over it, nervously. Rachel reached over and took his hand. Noah's thumb caressed her hand in wide half-circles spanning from the back of Rachel's hand to her inner wrist. She leaned closer to him.

"Are you two a couple?"

"No," Rachel said. "We're just friends. Best friends."

I raised an eyebrow, because my best friend and I? We do not hold hands like that. "Okay," I said, deciding not to push it…yet. "What do you do?"

"I'm a session musician. When artists need someone to help out on a recording or performance, they hire me. I mostly play guitar and piano, and I sing."

"He's also is a rather popular local band," Rachel said proudly.

"Yeah, well, I'll never be a famous rock star, but I get to do what I love and still pay the bills," he said, shrugging.

"And he's agreed to sing a duet with me on my new album!" Rachel exclaimed.

"Good," I said. "You two sound amazing together. It gives me chills."

Noah looked puzzled, so Rachel reminded him of the video my dad made of the birth. "What song was it, Noah? I know Quinn and I sang 'Over the Rainbow,' and you pretended not to know the words."

"'Blackbird,' Rach. We sang 'Blackbird.'"

From Rachel's smile, I suspected she'd known the answer all along. She just wanted to hear him say it.

"So, what brought you to New York?"

"Berry. First, she made me take piano lessons. Then she made me apply to college to get better at music. I ended up at OSU. I got a pretty big scholarship to do both vocal and instrumental, but double-majoring? They busted my ass for years. They even made me learn to sing opera!"

"The horror!" Rachel teased.

"Meanwhile, she was running around Manhattan having a good old time. Eventually, she landed a role on Broadway and dropped out of college. But was I allowed to drop out of college? No."

"Noah, I was not 'running around Manhattan having a good old time.' I was swamped with acting lessons, dance lessons and voice lessons. Julliard doesn't leave a lot of time for running around! And I only quit because my advisor encouraged me to do so. It was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity!"

Rachel later explained to me that they had been workshopping a revival of 'Funny Girl.' Barbra Streisand's take on Fanny Brice was so iconic that no one else had wanted to attempt it. While Rachel was in college, though, the 50th anniversary of the show had been approaching and R.A. Gindi, known as 'The King of Off-Broadway,' decided to gamble for his chance at the big-time. Rachel had made it through a slew of auditions, just to win the right to workshop the role of Fanny Brice. Since audiences had become so enamored with the film version of 'Funny Girl,' the show-runners were attempting to reconcile the differences between the versions. Rachel had been sure they would replace her at the last second with a big-name star. The problem was, most established stars were either wrong for the part or afraid of Babs. Besides, by that point Rachel knew the part inside and out, so they finally offered her the role, not just in the out-of-towns or an off-Broadway run, but the honest-to-God lead on the Broadway stage.

Noah just laughed. "Anyway," he said, "I eventually graduated and she convinced me to move out here to be a musician, and I convinced her to loosen up a little. Okay, what else you got?"

I took a deep breath. "Was it my fault you and Quinn broke up?"

"No! No. Um…technically, Quinn and I weren't really a couple. Are you sure you want to know about this stuff?"

I nodded, eagerly.

"Noah, are you sure that's appropriate?"

"Berry, she's in high school. She knows how it works, and I'm not going to lie to my kid! Drizzle—do people seriously call you that, or did you just use it to get through to Berry?"

"No one calls me Dreama unless I'm in trouble, or it's a teacher on the first day of class or whatever."

"Freakin' Hudson. Okay, I had a thing for your mom, but she was dating my best friend, Finn. But one night she was sad and we were drunk. We had sex, she got pregnant, and she decided to have you. I wanted to keep you, but she convinced me that you'd have a better life if we gave you up. When we found Sharon and Josh, they seemed cool and like they'd take really good care of you. They did, right?" He looked really nervous when he said the last three words and stared at me intensely.

"Yeah. Mom and Dad are awesome," I said, honestly. Like any parents, they can be annoying or embarrassing, but they always do their best to make sure I'm happy and healthy.

He sighed in relief. "And I don't want you to think Quinn was a slut or something. I was, but she wasn't. It was some kind of fluke. As far as I know, the night we made you was the only time she slept with anyone except the guy she ended up marrying. Not that there's anything wrong with being a slut."

"Noah!" Rachel exclaimed.

"What? The kid's got my genes! I'm not saying she should be sleeping around. I'm just saying if she is, then…no judgment. Although I have this weird desire to punch every boy in this place who checks her out."

"There are boys checking me out? Where?" I asked, trying to look around subtly.

He groaned, and Rachel and I giggled.

This was going better than I could have dreamed, so I decided to go for broke: "Is Quinn in New York, too?"

"No. She's in L.A. I…haven't reached her yet," Noah said, although his tone and facial expression darkened.

She doesn't want to hear from me, I realized. "Oh," I said, trying not to feel crushed.

"It takes Quinn a while to process things, Drizzle," Rachel said. "It took her months to let Noah be a part of your life. She'll call." My bio-dad raised an eyebrow at her, as if to say don't make promises you can't keep. "She'll come around," Rachel repeated, nodding resolutely, and I suspected if it didn't happen on its own, Rachel Berry would make it happen.

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