A/N: Thanks so much for your input everybody! I do have a plan; no more winging it to see what spews out. Oh, and I got a little carried away with the raccoon thing because it happened to me.

I Can See For Miles

Chapter 7

"Quinn, they're manatees, not man-eaters. Get in the damn water."

"Yeah girl, who gave you the impression that manatees are so violent?"

"Really Quinn, there were sharks in the water when we went snorkeling last week but you're scared of the sea cows."

Quinn scoffed. "Oh yeah, Kurt, you can talk. You stepped on something slimy earlier and screamed like you were dying."

"In my defense, I thought I was dying. My life flashed before my eyes."

Quinn just rolled her eyes and scooted closer to Rachel. They were on the beach of some crowded little cove a few miles from Kurt's Grandma's house, and nobody had been successful in convincing Quinn to swim with the manatees.

"I want to stay with Rachel." Quinn pouted, wrapping her arm around the girl's shoulders. Who could really argue with that, except, of course, Rachel.

"Awww, baby, that's sweet, but if you don't get your butt in that water in the next five minutes, I will drag you in."

Quinn raised her eyebrow. "You'll drag me in?"

"Mmhm."

Quinn still didn't move, smiling amusedly.

"Okay. Sit here. Avoid your 'hordes of violent manatees.' Just know, you're not getting any kisses for the rest of the day."

Quinn whipped her head to the side; she looked stricken. "What?"

Rachel just smirked.

Quinn sighed heavily and shifted to stand up. "Fine. I'll swim with the damn manatees."

"Good girl!" Rachel grinned brightly. "I'll get you something from the ice cream truck for when you get back."

"Are you sure?"

Rachel tapped her cane confidently. "I can beat the crowds away and use my powers of coercion to obtain free ice cream. It'll be great!"

"Give me a kiss first." Quinn leaned down with her face in front of Rachel's.

Santana groaned from a few feet away. "Yep, definitely just vomited in my mouth a little."

Rachel kissed Quinn sweetly on the lips, then ruffled the choppy blonde hair and shooed her away with the others. Artie would keep her company while the rest floated around with the manatees for a while.

Quinn was pleasantly surprised when she wasn't mobbed and assailed by massive, aggressive manatees the moment they saw her. She stayed close to Puck, figuring he would have the best chance of fighting them off if their gentle personalities took a turn for the worse. Then Puck left Quinn, so that he could dive down and retrieve Brittany's dropped goggles from the bottom of the sea.

She did have a heart attack when Tina accidentally grazed her leg, and inhaled about seven gallons of water, but soon allowed herself to drift closer to the peaceful manatees. They really were cute, if you ignored some of the scars and weird bulges and whatever that was growing on their backs. She swam back to the beach after about half an hour, towing Finn behind her because the boy was complaining of leg cramps and 'temporary paralysis.' Quinn deposited him on the sand where he could sort himself out and ran right over to Rachel.

She stood over the smaller girl, who was unaware of her presence, and smiled at Artie, putting a finger to her lips. Quinn stuck her arms out, dripping water on Rachel's bare stomach and giggling to herself. Artie rolled his eyes. Rachel ignored it and Quinn frowned, then grinned a moment later and wrung her hair out onto Rachel's stomach. Rachel gasped and shot up into a sitting position.

"Artie!"

"What! No, don't even try to drag me into this. That was your girlfriend, not me."

"Quinn?"

"Yes, baby?" Quinn draped her body over Rachel from behind.

"Stop doing that! Ugghh…Such a child…" Rachel muttered, reaching for a towel and squirming out of Quinn's dripping grasp.

"Where's my ice cream?"

"Hmmm, if you stop acting like you're four I might tell you."

Quinn stayed quiet, smiling innocently at Rachel.

"So, you didn't get eaten by any manatees…" Rachel said a minute later.

Quinn's smile widened. "I didn't. They're very nice…Did you get ice cream?"

Rachel shook her head smilingly at her girlfriend and reached for the cooler.

"Oh yeah, Rach here definitely got ice cream." Artie stated, laughing. "First, she yelled at this guy who cut in front of a little kid in line; then she tripped the same guy with her cane when he tried to cut her in line, thinking she wouldn't notice or something."

Quinn looked concerned and watched Rachel closely as the girl dug around the cooler. "Seriously?"

Artie nodded enthusiastically. "Yeah, then the ice cream man refused to sell this asshole guy any ice cream and he gave Rachel tons of free popsicles for her 'public service."

Rachel smiled shyly when Quinn wrapped her arms around her. "That's my girl." Quinn whispered, and then snorted when she caught sight of Rachel's yellow star-shaped popsicle.

"Perfect. That is perfect."

-oooooooooo-

Quinn didn't know how she ended up with these people. These crazy lunatics that she could somehow call her friends danced whimsically around Mrs. Hummel's living room to old Spice Girls hits as a storm raged outside. Mike and Puck shamelessly sang along to every word while the rest were trying to choreograph some sort of dance routine that could only end in tears and injury. Quinn knew she belonged here though, because she was one of the people screaming, "No! Step forward, then shake your hips! Shake them harder Finn!"

Eventually Brittany did poke Mercedes in the eye and the dance routine fell apart, so Quinn started to swing Rachel around the room instead; the girl's loud, full laughter was contagious. Tomorrow would be their last full day in Key Largo, and everybody wanted to make the most of it.

A particularly loud clap of thunder shook the house and its occupants.

"Jesus! Are we being bombed?"

"Uh, I'm pretty sure my heart just stopped beating."

Lord Tubbington came streaking out of the bedroom and bolted straight towards Mercedes, who tripped over the coffee table in her haste to escape his wrath.

She groaned. "Okay, there is way too much crap in here. Puck, why did you bring seven bags and why are they all on the floor by the couch?"

"Um, there's actually nine and they're all Brittany's." Artie interjected.

"Oh, you're one to talk Mercedes. You are a certified hoarder. I looked in your closet once, you have seventy-seven pairs of shoes."

"Seek help, girl."

"Uh, Brittany!" Finn called from the kitchen. "Your cat just sprung out the window."

Everybody paused their dancing and watched as Brittany and Santana sprinted through the kitchen door.

"Guys," Puck hissed, drawing their attention away, "there's something coming down the chimney."

"Puck, we're in Florida. That's a fake chimney, it doesn't go anywhere-Ohmygod holy shit!" Kurt frantically scrabbled onto the couch as a loud crash came from the fake chimney.

"Oh yeah, it can climb up a freaking chimney but won't be able to reach you on the sofa." Mercedes stated, but looked a little shaken herself.

"Finn, get a broom. And a bucket."

"Why me?"

"You're the biggest."

"…Yeah, and the least coordinated. And what do you expect me to do with a bucket?"

"Just…do it like a spider."

"Oh, just do it like a spider, there's some advice you just can't go wrong with."

"Yeah, Mercedes we don't even know what's in there."

Quinn sighed when nobody seemed to be doing anything. Bunch of pansies. She handed Rachel off to Mike with a kiss on her cheek and strode over to the fireplace.

"I'll see what it is." She stated confidently, kneeling down.

"Whoa, wait! Don't stick your head up there!"

"It'll be fine."

"Really! You can't think of anything that could go wrong?" Tina pressed.

Quinn rolled her eyes and stuck her head into the fireplace, tilting it up to look around the small space, seeing as there wasn't actually a chimney.

If she thought she had a heart attack when she kissed Rachel, she was wrong. If she thought she had one when that freaking fan started on the airboat, she was wrong. If she thought she had one when Tina brushed by her in the manatee cove, she was wrong. But now, face two inches away and staring into the beady black eyes of some animal, she was having a heart attack.

Quinn flailed backwards, all her muscles seizing in panic and adrenaline, and whacked her head on the mantel. She scrabbled away, the other glee clubbers shrieking at her reaction and stumbling around like headless chickens. They shrieked even louder as a raccoon emerged from the fireplace and skittered around the couch.

"Holy shit!"

"Quinn! Are you okay!"

"Get it! Get it!"

"Catch it! Open the door! Someone get a bucket!"

"Finn, get a bat!"

"What, no! Don't hit it!"

"Rachel, it traumatized your girlfriend!"

"Don't hit it!"

"It's flying!"

"Get me a gun!"

"Dude it's not a bat."

"Good Lord, why's everybody screa- Ahhhhhh!" Brittany emerged from the kitchen soaking wet and clutching a very angry cat in her arms. She dropped him as the raccoon shot out from behind the couch and both animals headed through the doorway, startling a very scratched up Santana as she rounded the corner. Puck took a swing at them with a broom from his perch on the coffee table, but only succeeded in breaking a vase.

"Get him Fatso cat!"

"Mercedes! What if he hurts him?"

"Oh girl, you know nothing can hurt that damn cat. He's freaking indestructible."

Mike led Rachel over to Quinn, who looked like she'd been scarred for life, as everybody else tried to restart their hearts now that the raccoon wasn't in the same room as them.

"Let's make a trap!"

"What? Dude, we're not Bear Grylls here. I don't know about you, but I can't even cut straight lines in printer paper."

"Just open the door."

"Yeah, let's open the door and let a whole fleet of them in."

Just then, Lord Tubbington came strolling back into the kitchen as if nothing had happened. Everybody eyed him warily, as if the raccoon now possessed his body.

"Someone check the kitchen."

Puck grabbed his broom and tip-toed into the kitchen. A minute later he reemerged. "It went out the window." He stated.

The room breathed a sigh of relief. Rachel continued to rub her hands comfortingly up and down Quinn's arms; the girl was gradually becoming more responsive and trying to cling on to whatever dignity she had left.

"You are very brave Quinn."

Quinn smiled. "Whatever Rachel. You can laugh at me, I know you want to."

"Never baby. Just…that scream, I have never heard anything like it before." Rachel couldn't contain her laughter and the rest of the room joined in, still high on killer-raccoon-attacking-from-the-fireplace-induced adrenaline rushes. Quinn got up and shoved them all, reminding them of their own mindless, shameless shrieking, and turned the Spice Girls back on, as the stereo had been turned off to better strategize raccoon removal techniques, not that that helped at all.

Ten minutes later, although most of the club was still too scared to go into the kitchen or within a five foot radius of the fireplace, they danced like spastics around the living room to Wannabe, singing at the top of their lungs and pretending to look for Lord Tubbington, who had yet to return.

-oooooooooo-

Quinn woke up on the morning of their last day in Key Largo the same way she had every other morning; Rachel was wrapped tightly in her arms and one of her limbs was stuck through the slats of that freaking tiny bed. The club spent the morning bandaging Mercedes up because apparently Lord Tubbington had shown up with a vengeance in the middle of the night, and hauling the jet skis to the water behind the house. Now, everybody was lying on the beach watching Puck on one jet ski race Kurt and Mercedes on another.

Kurt seemed to be treating his like he was taking a driving test, while Puck skimmed around not caring that he was nearly violently thrown into the whitewater with every turn.

"Oh no."

Quinn turned around to face the house when she heard Tina's lament. Finn was lugging out a large hotdog-shaped, five-seater raft, obviously to be towed behind a jet ski. Mike came into view with a smaller, two-seater raft just as Puck and Kurt ran the jet skis up onto the beach.

"Dibs on the this one!" Mike called.

"Uh, I really don't wanna ride that one." Puck said, gesturing at the giant hot dog.

"Why not?"

Puck hesitated and Kurt stepped in for him. "It's gay." He stated bluntly.

"It does look really…sexual." Artie observed.

"It'll be fun!" Finn encouraged. "Come on!" He hauled it out to the water and left it to float where everybody could climb on. Kurt and Mercedes went to tow Mike and Tina around on the smaller raft, while Finn, Rachel, Quinn, Brittany, and Santana resigned themselves to being towed by Puck. Artie had his video camera out; this was bound to be YouTube gold.

Rachel sat on the front and Quinn wrapped her arms around her from behind; she didn't want anybody molesting her girlfriend on a giant hot dog.

"Can I get pregnant from this?" Santana asked, climbing on behind Finn. She seemed a little too excited about what they were about to do.

Puck towed them slowly out of shallow water, and then let loose once they were out past the breakers. He sped them around, over the waves, through the waves, turning sharply and inflicting whiplash on every single one of his passengers.

"This is wrong on so many levels…" Quinn muttered in Rachel's ear when their heads knocked together for the fourth time. Rachel pulled Quinn's arms tighter around her stomach. It was fun though; when they got over the sexual/creepy aspect of the raft, they started directing Puck and racing Kurt, laughing when Mike and Tina were catapulted as their light raft flew ten feet into the air.

It was all fun and games until the hot dog started sinking. This is when Artie pressed record on his video camera. Rachel, God knows how, that girl's freaking one with the world, was the first to notice they were sinking.

"Um, Quinn, is the raft deflating?" She asked in one of Puck's lulls, caused by Santana screaming that he had broken her neck.

Quinn looked down and realized that yes, in fact, it was. "Puck! We're sinking!" She called out to him.

"Whoa, we are!" Finn looked around and realized it as well.

"Okay. Who popped the hot dog? Which one of you bitches has the spiky ass?"

"Wow. That's charming Santana."

"Aren't you the one who carries razor blades in your hair? Judging by the state of it…I'd say you could fit several thousand in there right now. One probably fell out."

"Puck, shut up." Quinn said. "Take us to shore."

The water now reached their butts and the front of the hot dog was half submerged. Puck tried to go, but the raft was too far underwater, the drag was too intense. It was like a few days ago when they'd tried knee-boarding, and Kurt had been dragged face first through the water for a hundred yards, leaving a wake like Shamu. That certainly cleared his nasal passages right up.

Finn slid off the side of the hot dog and Santana and Brittany sighed and followed him. Quinn loosened her hold on Rachel and leaned in to talk to her.

"I'm gonna get in, okay Rach?" Quinn did as she said when Rachel nodded, and doggy-paddled against the girl's calf.

"Come on, get on my back."

"Are you sure Quinn? I don't want you to strain yourself."

"Yeah, come on. Puck, don't run us over!"

Rachel still looked hesitant.

"Rachel, you'll be in the water anyway in like six seconds. Just ride me to shore."

Now Rachel looked amused. Quinn rolled her eyes and impatiently tugged the girl's arm.

Rachel slid off the raft and situated herself piggy-back on Quinn, who swam them to shore, avoiding the waves, followed by Puck and the deflated hot dog.

"Well, that was fun while it lasted." Santana stated, watching Puck valiantly try to reinflate the raft using his mouth. "Oh, and that's not gay at all."

They spent a few more hours playing in the water and the sand, building sand castles and injuring themselves on skim boards.

"Dude, do you have a shovel?" Mike asked. Thirty minutes later he had buried himself in a five foot hole that it took four other people to dig him out of. Artie won the sand castle competition when he 'accidentally' rolled over Quinn's masterpiece and Kurt turned into the bright red Teletubby again, while Santana's hair had reached its maximum potential, apparently, and ceased to grow, at only eleven times its normal size.

They had a dinner of hamburgers and veggie-burgers with flaming buns and French fries with sugar on them, as opposed to salt.

"They look exactly the same!" Brittany argued.

Everybody went to bed happy and exhausted, preparing themselves for the long drive tomorrow. They needed sleep to survive thirteen hours with Finn Hudson at the wheel.