The Pool of Tears: Part II

"Rachel?"

Dianna paused to acclimatize her eyes to the inexplicably low light in the restroom. She moved towards the girl standing forlornly in a corner.

"Rachel?"

Dianna placed both hands on her shoulders and gently turned her around. Her face was swollen and her eyes were red.

Dianna felt her heart go out to the girl.

"Sweetheart…"

Rachel stiffened.

"Rachel" she started again.

"What are you doing, Quinn?"

Dianna sighed.

"Well, right now, I'm just trying to get you to stop crying and come out of this dark cave.

"I turned the lights off" Rachel said matter-of-factly.

"What is it? What are you so upset about?"

Rachel looked up at Dianna, her lips quivering.

"You don't understand…" she said.

Dianna touched the sink with her fingers to check if it was wet, then hopped onto it.

"So tell me" she said impassively.

The words came out in a rush like a flood "You don't understand what it's like to be me. I know what people think of me, okay? I've read all the comments that you and your friends post on my MySpace videos. I know that I talk too much. I know that people find me annoying."

She paused for a breath. Dianna opened her mouth to interrupt her, but thought better of it and closed it again.

"I'm not pretty like you. I don't have your sense of style. I don't have guys falling over themselves to be with me. Finn was the first boy who really took an interest in me. And even he…" she trailed off.

"Do you think Finn is really interested in you?" the words came out before she could stop them.

Rachel looked like Dianna had slapped her and her eyes started to fill up again.

Dianna started apologizing almost immediately.

"Sorry, that came out wrong; that's not what I meant. I'm simply saying that Finn – although he was able to see the good in you – takes you for granted and, like everyone else, is unable or unwilling to see past your surface flaws – because that's all they really are, Rachel.

She sighed. She didn't want to be talking about Finn; there was just no way to win going down that path. She started over.

"Do you know what I see when I look at you?"

"What?" Rachel asked hesitantly

"I see someone … special – a gifted … artist who hasn't let her talent dull her drive."

Rachel interrupted "I know that, Quinn. It hasn't helped…"

Dianna put up a hand, "Let me finish."

Rachel quieted down, her eyes still firmly affixed on Dianna's face.

"I see an extremely attractive girl, not just beautiful, but more, someone who can light up a room with her presence, with her energy and enthusiasm."

Rachel blushed slightly, but didn't otherwise move. Her piercing brown eyes widened, but stayed focused on Dianna, following every motion of her face, in particular, her lips. Dianna had to fight off a sudden urge to kiss the girl. She looked away, focusing on a random piece of art on a stall door. She wondered idly if it was one of Quinn's.

She continued "But even more, I see a warm human being who is affectionate and caring – even towards people who have done nothing to deserve that affection. I see an ability to look past the surface and see the best in people and a capacity for forgiveness that I will never have."

Here, she paused and looked down at her hands. They both stood in silence for a while.

"I don't understand" Rachel said finally.

"I hear the words you're saying to me now, but I can't reconcile them with all of your actions up to this point. Everything you've done in the past has been directed at tearing – or at least keeping me down. What's changed now?"

"So many things" Dianna wanted to say, but didn't. She could feel Quinn's life flash before her eyes: The pregnancy. Getting kicked off the Cheerios. Falling down the social pyramid. Being abandoned by her parents. Losing Finn. Having to live in the Puckermans' basement…

Dianna had spent many hours trying to put herself in the young girls shoes as the walls of her precariously balanced life came crashing down around her. Sometimes, the emotions were so strong; she had to remind herself that these things hadn't actually happened to her. It was hard for her to understand how the people around her, these friends couldn't even see Quinn's pain.

"Do you know why I sang the song with you?" she asked, her voice taking on an unintentionally harsh undertone.

Rachel looked confused.

Dianna pressed on, more forcefully.

"Rachel, you're not the only one who feels unloved and unappreciated."

She turned to look straight at Rachel, making the girl squirm a little under the force of the gaze.

"I mean, you have two wonderful fathers who love you very much and think the world of you. They love you for who you are. You don't have to live your whole life thinking that you have to fit some ridiculous model of perfection because your parents will stop loving you if you don't."

An image of Judy flashed before Dianna's eyes. She looked down to hide the moisture suddenly welling up in her own eyes.

"You don't have to worry about being disowned by your parents and thrown out of your home because you made a mistake…"

Dianna felt a small hand clutching at hers.

"Quinn…"

Dianna shrugged her off and turned away.

"Quinn…"

There was a plea in Rachel's voice.

"You're not the only one who feels unpretty, Rachel."

Dianna could feel the anger, so dangerously close to the surface all the time, showing in her own voice.

A large tear drop splashed onto her lap, finally drawing her out of Quinn's past.

"I'm a horrible person." Rachel whispered. "Not just a bad friend, but a horrible person."

"I took Finn away from you at the hardest time in your life and made it even harder."

She sniffed audibly causing Dianna to forget about Quinn and look at her with concern.

"I was so shocked to find that you were living in the Puckermans' basement. I had come over to pick up some Roda… some pumpkin pastries that Mrs. Puckerman had baked for us for the Jewish New Year. I heard her shouting at Noah about something – it took me a few minutes to realize that she was talking about you and that you were in the basement. Like Cinderella."

Dianna supressed a natural temptation to correct her – as well as a sudden craving for Lea's mom's rodanchas and mansanada which she made for Rosh Hashanah in the Sephardic tradition.

"At that moment, I wanted to run down and tell you to move in with my family instead and stay in our guest room, but I didn't have the courage, as usual."

Rachel was sobbing now. Dianna put her hands around her tentatively and tightened her grip when Rachel didn't pull back.

"I went back home and cried for hours – and then called Mercedes to beg her to take you in."

Dianna was surprised by this piece of information, but didn't comment, just saying "It's okay" over and over again and rubbing little circles on the girl's back instead.

"She wasn't willing at first, but changed her mind after you sang It's a Man's Man's World – I think that's when she kind of understood what you were going through."

"I always saw it – but I thought that you were okay now that you had the baby and had moved back home and were back to being a Cheerio..."

"Yeah, well you should know, the feeling of being unloved and unwanted doesn't go away." Dianna said shortly. Not a smart thing to say; that just made Rachel cry harder. She shook her head at herself and lifted the girl's face with a hand and gazed deeply into her eyes. Rachel quieted down almost immediately and stared back at her.

If Finn hadn't picked that very time to burst in, she was pretty sure she would have kissed the girl.

"Finn!" they both shouted automatically, Dianna perhaps with a greater measure of annoyance. "You can't be in here!"

"Rachel? Quinn? Uh… I can't see you. Why is it so dark in here?"

Dianna cursed under her breath as Rachel slipped away and darted towards the door. She was past Finn and through the door in a flash, leaving Dianna to deal with her boyfriend.