Rachel woke up suddenly, struggling against her sheets. Somehow, during the night, she must have wrapped herself up in them. She could barely move.
She opened her mouth to ask one of the other girls to help her get out of bed, then found that her mouth was already open. In fact, her mouth was stuck open, with some sort of gag winding its way around her head. Now that she was thinking about it, Rachel could feel the pressure of it on the back of her head.
Rachel opened her eyes, and was surprised to see a tree. Maybe she was looking out of Quinn's window?
No, that was definitely the bottom of the tree. The roots were everywhere, one even reaching the road. The road. The road that was in her line of sight. The road that she could see easily from where she was. Lying on the ground.
Mustering up muscle gained from her gymnastics, she did a sit up, flopping over so that she was leaned against a different tree.
Rachel thought that she knew what had happened. Either she had been kidnapped, changed into her Cheerio uniform, and dumped on the side of the road, (From what she knew of kidnapping, that was highly unlikely) or it was something much worse. Hazing.
She struggled against her bonds-which had turned out to be ropes- and found herself resigning to the fact that she would just have to stay here until some hopefully kind soul passed by in their car and helped her. Or murdered her, depending on who it was.
Rachel couldn't believe that they would just leave her like this. Tied up in a reveling skirt, unable to run or make any noise. She had thought that they were becoming friends. Maybe she had just thought wrong.
After what seemed like days, but was probably just a couple of hours, it was beginning to get brighter outside. She hopped to her feet, using the tree as a balance. Her arms were tied to her sides, so she couldn't wave to a car. Rachel decided that her best option was to bounce to the sidewalk and wait for somebody to stop.
During her short, treacherous journey, a truck rounded the corner, and started slowly down her road. Her eyes widened, and she started making terribly muffeled pleas for help. That failing, she pled with her eyes. It worked, and the truck stopped. She was too short to see who was driving, so she tried to hop to the driver's door.
Before she reached it, the door opened, and somebody she was equal parts grateful and confused to see driving around so early on a Saturday morning.
Noah Puckerman had just stepped out of the cab of the truck.
She was conflicted. On one hand, he had been fairly certain she had gone bat-shit crazy and stolen a Cheerios uniform. On the other she was tied up and gagged, wearing her cheerleading uniform. She decided to be happy.
Rachel jumped furiously towards him. He stepped back slightly, which actually hurt her feelings a bit. She stopped where she was and stood, eyes wide, watching him.
His eyes were wide too. "Rachel?" Puck questioned, obviously just as confused as she was.
She couldn't answer, so she settled for rolling her eyes and nodding.
Puck stared at her for another few seconds. "Hold on. I have to commit this to memory." He didn't blink, gaping at her.
Rachel was suddenly grateful that she was tied up, because if she hadn't been, she would have thrown a tantrum, foot stomping and all.
"Mmmm." She tried very hard to enunciate, but having proper pronunciation was extremely difficult with a gag in your mouth. Rachel tried again. "Mmm, mmmMMM!" This wasn't working.
Puck shook his head. "What?" Just after he spoke, he seemed to realize that she couldn't answer. "Oh, sorry!"
He meandered around her, pulling her hair to one side so that he could untie the cloth that stretched around her head. He succeeded, and she pucked it out with her tongue, moistening her teeth and lips quickly. She took in a deep breath from her mouth, accidently tugging on her other ropes.
"Thank you." She said, and Puck stood behind her, working on the other knots.
"Why are you tied up?" He didn't waste any time asking. "If I had known you were into this sort of thing, we would have dated for much longer."
"Noah!" She scolded, not letting her mind travel where he had hinted. "I'm not into…that! I fell asleep at Quinn's last night, and I woke up here! I assume that they're hazing me, although I thought that was only for sororities and fraternities."
Rachel heard him snicker, then the ropes around her fell loose. She sighed, and stretched her arms. He walked around her, and, without asking, she used him as a balance for her standing splits. She really needed to stretch.
"Damn, you got hazed?" He laughed, so she slapped his stomach lightly. "That's awesome."
"I hardly think so!" She had little conviction in her voice. Rachel thought it was actually funny. "Anyway, what are you doing out here so early?"
He grinned, and pulled out his phone. "Santana texted me and told me that there was a little present for me out here. I had hoped that she, Quinn, and Brittany had finally decided to take me up on my offer of a fourway, but this is good too."
