For once, her morning goes off without a hitch.

Or substance.

She gives Sam back his sweater, grabs her books, and...goes to class.

No slushies, no "Hey, Caboosey!"s, no legs catching her shin and sending her and her books tumbling face first to the floor.

It's...nice. In a way.

But in another way, it just makes her skittish. Her body is tensed, shoulders slightly raised, ready to duck under a slushie shower or hop over conversed feet.

She's one hallway away from her class, and she pivots around the corner—

Her book lands on the floor, the cover bent awkwardly, pages most likely creased in half. One of her assignments is poking out of her notebook. She can see her name scribbled in the right corner.

'Sup, Caboosey? Hahahahaha... She could hear Karofsky's voice already.

Her "awesome", is laced with sarcasm, and when she opens her eyes, instead of a Letterman jacket and broad shoulders, she's met with an owl sweater and a plaid skirt—

"Please forgive me, I wasn't aware someone else would be turning the corner at the same time that I was, and—" oh.

Oh. "Hi."

Rachel looks up from kneeling on the floor, her books tucked under her arm and Lucy's notebook grasped in her right hand.

Rachel stands up, and when Lucy's hand touches spiraled metal, she grips and pulls the book to her chest. Rachel straightens her bangs with a small hand before looking up.

"I—oh. Hello."

"I'm...sorry." She says. "For—I ran into you."

Rachel shakes her head. "If we're being fair, I ran into you."

"I—" Lucy takes a deep breath. "We ran into each other."

Rachel smiles slightly. "Okay."

Lucy nods and looks down, Rachel's skirt immediately catching her eye again, and...

She's actually almost positive that skirts have to be mid-thigh—or, that's what it says in the dress code, anyway (but then again, it also says no bullying in the rulebook, so...) —so she really has no idea how Rachel is getting away with that, because that skirt is very obviously much less than mid-thigh—

Why does she care?

She cares because she wishes she had thighs like that.

But she doesn't, she has floppy pieces of skin that she has to shove into denim every morning and—well, Rachel could probably fit in a size 3 without even trying, but—

"I like your skirt." Well, it's better than the argyle.

"I—" Brown eyes look at plaid and then through lenses at hazel. "Thank you, Lucy."

"You look nice today."

"Same to you." Rachel says, and Lucy decides that Rachel is the nicest person she's ever met because there is nothing nice about a hoodie and jeans that aren't your size.

"Slushie-free." She adds, sympathetic, pitying-if-you-squint smile on her lips.

Lucy's shoulders raise in a shrug, eyes moving from Rachel's legs to her face. "For now."

Shiny hair bobs when Rachel nods, and Lucy resists the urge to jump and pull away when Rachel places a hand on her bicep.

"I apologize for cutting this short, but—"

"C-class. Yeah, I've gotta...um. Me, too." She feels bad for interrupting, but she still feels the warmth of a palm through the cotton of her top and self-consciousness starts to bubble inside her chest. She moves to the right, and Rachel's hand goes back to steady her books. "But I'll—" She almost says 'see you later', but something that feels a lot like insecurity makes the words bunch up in the back of her throat.

She must scare Sam a little bit when she throws her plastic spoon down and asks, "Can we go sit with Rachel?", because he stops chewing and just stares at her.

"I—um. Why?" He looks over at her table.

Lucy looks over at her table, too, and watches Rachel take out a square container of grapes and pop the lid off of it, taking one into her mouth and looking around the lunch room while running a hand through her hair.

"She looks lonely."

"She's—this is going to sound really mean but...well—she's Rachel Berry. Of course she looks lonely. She is lonely."

She frowns. "Sam..."

"I'm not trying to be a dick. Really." Sam explains, taking a drink of his milk. "But if McKinley was a forest, she'd be like, the plant life. Bottom of the food chain."

Lucy snorts. "Then what does that make us?"

"I'd say...rabbits." Sam says. He points to the footballers. "They're the top, obviously. Lions." Lucy follows his finger and she watches Noah Puckerman fling ranch at Finn Hudson.

"I'm offended on their behalf. Lions are intelligent."

Sam laughs and shrugs. "Yeah, well." He takes another bite of pizza, and when Lucy ducks her head back down, but not before glancing over at Rachel one last time, Sam sighs and heaves himself up, large hands gripping the edge of his tray.

"I—" she stares up at him and he stares back expectantly. "What are you doing?"

"We're going to sit with Rachel." He says, and she stands up, fisting her lunch bag. "So you can stop staring at her from across the lunch room because – uh, it's kind of creeping me out."

The room seems like it gets quieter when they start walking over to the last table, and Lucy plucks at the front of her shirt to make it hang a bit looser in the front. She keeps her head down, avoiding any glances her way, and she ignores the "Toot-toot! Comin' through!" from someone a few tables back.

"Hope you don't mind." Sam says when he sits down next to Rachel. "She figured you could use some company." He nods to Lucy and she smiles slightly, slipping in across from them.

"I'm—thank you." Lucy can tell she's confused, but pleased, from the confused-but-pleased half-smile that pops up onto her lips when the grape freezes inches from her mouth. "That's—thank you."

"Yeah." Lucy says, and ducks her head. "It's...no problem?" Her shoulders rise in a slight shrug.

"What is that?" Sam says then, looking at Rachel's lunch with a mix of curiosity and fear.

"It's a tofurkey sandwich." Rachel says, and when she catches sight of Sam's face, she laughs. "It's, um. Like tofu."

Lucy remembers walking into the kitchen and watching her mom cook white, jiggly squares in a frying pan. She remembers the face her mom made when she had taste tested it at the dinner table, and she remembers never eating it again.

"That's like that, squishy, white, Jell-o type stuff that they have in like, the vegetarian aisle, right?" Rachel nods and Sam fake gags. "Sorry dude, but I don't get how you can eat that. It doesn't smell like anything. Food is supposed to smell like food, you know?"

Rachel glances at him, amused, and Lucy chuckles.

"Would you like to try it?"

"No offense, but like. Hell, no."

She throws her bag over her shoulder and nods when Ms. Terri smiles at her on her way out, tugging her sweatshirt down and out, and turning out the door to make her way quietly and quickly down the hall.

People in Letterman jackets and Cheerio uniforms shoulder check her and sneer as she makes her way passed them, and she manages to ignore them, despite the fact that she just feels like sitting down and curling herself up into a ball on the (probably disgustingly filthy) hallway floor.

She manages not to, because the last class of the day just ended and for once she actually can't wait to get home.

Not because she wants to be home, really, but because at home there's only two people that make her feel like shit, as opposed to the hundreds that are milling about around her at the moment.

One weird thing she's actually crazily, exceptionally good at is opening her locker. And, yeah, no one really gives a flying fuck about whether she can do her combination with eyes closed or not, so she figures it's really a pretty damn useless skill, but fuck it if she doesn't feel at least a little bit of self-satisfaction when she does it anyway.

"I wanted to thank you for lunch."

She jumps at the unexpected voice and looks around the door of her locker to glance at Rachel. She gives her a half smile and dumps her Math book into her bag. "You already did."

"I figured I should do it again."

"Why?" Lucy shrugs and pushes the metal closed. "It's not a big deal. Really."

"It is to me. People aren't – no one really ever cares that I eat by myself most of the time."

"Those people are assholes, then." Lucy looks at her before before adding, "And I care. I know how that feels and it...sucks."

Lips disappear between teeth and Lucy nods down the rapidly emptying halls.

'I'll walk you out?' sounds plain creepy, even inside her own head, she just settles for a couple steps toward the door and a "You coming?"

"Oh. Of course."

They fall into step, Rachel's flats making noisy claps on the floor while Lucy's sneakers tap almost silently.

She pushes the door open, the cool air feeling fantastic after being trapped in a non air-conditioned building all day, and stops at the top of the steps, hands in her pockets. She hears Rachel murmur, "Oh, there's Dad," and is about to look up and stutter some type of goodbye when Rachel calls her name.

"I – yeah?"

Rachel looks like she's regretting even trying to start this conversation, and Lucy just stands there, shifting from side to side, making her bag bump against her hip, while Rachel tries to figure out whatever she needs to say.

She finally spits, "Are we friends?", and Lucy can see her physically restraining herself from clapping a hand over her mouth. She smiles despite not meaning to.

She settles with, "Do you want to be?" and mentally adds the because holy shit, I could use all the friends I can get, and when Rachel nods, she returns it.

"Cool." She says, and then a horn rings out, along with a shout of, "Oh, Rachel!", making the shorter girl's cheeks tint pink and Lucy's smile stretch into something of a grin.

"I'm – I'm sorry, that is so...embarrassing – "

"It's fine." She says. "I get it. Parents." Except she kind of doesn't get it, because her parents just save all the embarrassing comments and discussions for the (dis)comfort of her own home.

Rachel nods, and she looks like she's going to make a move to step forward, prompting Lucy to raise an eyebrow and tilt backward just the slightest bit.

"I have to go. Um, can I – should I hug you?"

"I'd prefer if you didn't. I have, um, personal space issues."

"Oh." Rachel says. "Of course."

"But we can...high-five, or something?"

"Okay."

So she raises her hand and Rachel taps it with her own, smiling and uttering a 'bye' as she hops down the steps.

Lucy can't help but laugh a little when she hears a, "See you tomorrow!" and then a door shut and a car starting.

A/N: I don't know why Rachel still gets picked up by her dads, either.

Shrugs.