As Rachel buried herself in Jesse's embrace, she watched Finn walk out of the auditorium from the corner of her eye. She had noticed him watching awhile ago, but chose not to acknowledge him. The words she sang were the things she didn't have the guts to say to him in person. Of course, she had a few more things to say, but she wasn't ready. Not now. She did have to admit, though, every time she looked at Finn, she missed him even more. She could tell the obvious sadness on his face, the way he had to force a smile just to tell the rest of the world that he was okay. She always admired that about him. Despite his frequent breakdowns, he always appeared to get back up and shake it off. He didn't show his despair most of the time, because he knew that people always counted on him to be the one who listened to problems and never talked.

Rachel thought about the times when she would constantly ramble on about things in her life, and he would always listen, no matter how boring he thought the topic was. He had that warm personality and always looked on the positive side of things. She remembered the way he would compliment her randomly right in the middle of the conversation, and she would always smile. Rachel couldn't help but wonder if she would ever get that back. Even though he didn't defend her much when she got verbally assaulted, she had to admit that for the most part, Finn was a good boyfriend. And he tried. I wish I could say the same for me as a girlfriend, Rachel thought. Over the past few days, she had realized all of the mistakes that she had made, and if maybe, she had lessened on those, he would have forgiven her a little more easily. He needs time. So do I.

"Are you ready to go?" Jesse asked, interrupting her little mental analysis of the situation. Jesse was due back in a week, and as a good friend, he spent most of the day with Rachel, driving her around, listening to her talk about her day, and helping her practice for Regionals.

"I'm going to get a solo for Regionals, and colleges are going to come flocking to me, begging me to consider their theatre programs," Rachel had said the other day. Of course, Jesse had been down that road before, so he offered his expertise. He beamed at the fact that Rachel was no longer considering quitting the glee club. It turns out, all she needed was some constant support from a few friends. She talked it over with Kurt as well, and both him and Jesse agreed that it would be the stupidest thing Rachel could ever do. She decided that she might as well start her road to Broadway now. Jesse had asked her to consider UCLA and although she laughed, she thought about it for awhile. After all, it would be nice to have at least one person around looking out for you.

"Yeah, I'm ready," Rachel said, forcing a small smile as she grabbed her bag from on top of the piano.

"Good, cause I told one of my Carmel friends we were meeting up with him today. Well, mainly for your purposes," Jesse explained, trying to casually run it by her.

"Jesse!" she scolded him. In no way was she ready for this. "I look like crap at the end of every school day. You should've at least given me some sort of a heads up."

"Rachel," he interrupted, before she started rambling on again. He was reminded the past couple of days that it was an uncanny habit of hers. "You look beautiful. I'm glad I get to say that without anyone punching me in the face." Rachel smiled and gave in.


Rachel and Jesse arrived at Breadstix after 15 minutes, Rachel's heart pounding out of nervousness. Hopefully, he's extremely attractive, like Jesse… or Finn, she thought, then scolded herself for the use of the F word. She was trying extremely hard not to think about him anymore. She knew it was impossible. Every time their eyes met in the hallway, she imagined him walking up to her and apologizing for everything. Unfortunately, so far, that hasn't happened and her hope was decreasing greatly.

The waitress led them to the table where Jesse's friend was sitting, and Rachel saw Jesse's friend sitting on one side of the booth. She smiled at him and he returned the favor, showing off his dimples and his perfect teeth. He had green eyes and light brown hair, and his skin had somewhat of an olive complexion.

"Rachel, meet Austin," Jesse said, gesturing to the other boy, who stood up to shake Rachel's hand.

"It's nice to meet you," Austin smiled. "Jesse talks a lot about you, but there's no way he could've prepared me for how pretty you actually looked." He dressed nicely, Rachel had to admit, and she wondered if it was an everyday thing or if it was just for that particular event. He wore khaki pants, Sperry boat shoes, and a dark blue button-up shirt. He was about 6 foot, which towered over Jesse, but he wasn't quite as tall as Finn. She realized she should probably stop comparing guys to her two exes.

"Well, thank you," Rachel smiled. "Jesse kind of dropped the bomb on me a few minutes ago, but I'm glad he did."

The three of them sat down and ordered pasta dishes, while conversing.

"Well, it's been nice, guys, but I gotta head out," Jesse said, standing up and winking at Rachel. A look of panic showed up on Rachel's face. She didn't want to go through it alone, and she was already starting to feel a little bit comfortable with Jesse breaking the ice.

"J-Jesse, how am I supposed to get home?" she said, looking for an excuse for Jesse to stay.

"I can drive you home," Austin offered. Jesse smiled, and with that, he grabbed his coat and walked out of the restaurant, and there was an awkward silence for a little bit.

"So are you into anything like Jesse is?" Rachel asked, starting out the conversation again. This time, it went on much longer.

Unfortunately, she found out that Austin wasn't musically involved in any aspect in Carmel. She wondered how Austin and Jesse became friends, considering there wasn't much in common between them. Later, she found at that their parents had been friends for a long time, and they practically grew up together. Rachel had come to also find out that Austin was rich. Really rich. Austin's dad owned a successful car dealership, and his mom was an anesthesiologist. Obviously, they were a success-driven family, which meant that it had somewhat of an effect on Austin. While he made straight A's at Carmel's rigorous curriculum, he was a ruthless striker and team captain on the Carmel Sharks hockey team.

"I can't believe you're on the hockey team, you're the exact opposite of the hockey guys at McKinley," Rachel commented. "I mean, there's this absolute asshole named Dave Karofsky, and I can't stand him at all."

"Karofsky, the defenseman?" Austin asked, and Rachel nodded. A smile formed on his lips. "I dominated that guy all season last year, he couldn't touch me and when he did, it was always a penalty. Kind of figured that he was a dirty player in real life too."

"Yup. He actually drove one of my best friends away to an all-boys school cause he loved to shove him around and comment on his sexual orientation," Rachel explained, showing that she wasn't the only one in school who couldn't stand Karofsky at all.

"We play McKinley on Thursday, actually," Austin said, and Rachel's eyes lit up, hoping for an invitation to come watch him. "My younger sister owns a shirt that could fit you and I want you on the front row. Maybe watch me get by Karofsky without even breaking a sweat."

"I would probably get murdered at school for wearing the enemy's shirt," Rachel laughed, politely declining the t-shirt offer. After all, she was hoping for a few more friends, not for the whole school to hate her.

"Tell them you're supporting your new boyfriend," Austin said coyly, and Rachel's smile got bigger.

"I may be an extremely talented actor, but I'm not a liar," Rachel reasoned out, in the way that she was hoping for him to give a few more positive signals like he was already doing.

"You're not lying, you're just talking in future tense," Austin replied confidently, which practically made Rachel's heart skip a beat. She smiled and nodded. She couldn't believe that this was happening to her.


It was Thursday morning, and Finn walked into the halls of McKinley High School. He still wasn't over the whole Rachel thing, but he was getting a little better. It helped that, like Rachel said, he had his popularity to fall back into. Their football team actually had a winning record, and Finn was the starting quarterback of that very team. Football season ended with their loss in the second round of the playoffs, and basketball and hockey season had commenced. Finn was kind of glad that it meant he didn't have to deal with Karofsky and Azimio anymore, considering they were on another team now. Puck played hockey too, so Finn had to somewhat support his best friend's team. He had committed to watching their game, considering he and Puck were on good terms now. For some reason, their friendship was like titanium. They always managed to forgive each other at the end of the week. Finn wished he could say the same about his and Rachel's relationship.

He looked for her down the hallway again, and he couldn't believe what he was seeing. Rachel was wearing jeans, something that she never did, and a royal blue t-shirt. He automatically recognized it as Carmel High blue, considering there was a shark on the back of the shirt. Unfortunately, Karofsky had noticed it too.

"What the hell are you wearing?" Karofsky yelled, getting up in Rachel's personal space. "In case you didn't notice, dwarf, you go to McKinley, not the fairy school Carmel." He didn't engage in any physical contact with her after that, and he walked away. Automatically, Finn walked over to her, checking to see if she was traumatized by the confrontation or anything.

"Rachel, are you okay? And, honestly, what are you actually doing wearing that shirt to school? I know it's Jesse's school, but you never wear t-shirts, nor does Jesse play hockey," he said.

Rachel looked up with surprisingly, a smile. "I'm fine, Finn, thank you for asking," she said. "Actually, it doesn't bother me one bit. I know Dave's going to be humiliated tonight, considering Carmel actually has a good hockey team. I'm going to watch the game."

Finn was still slightly confused, trying to put the pieces together. But obviously, something was missing. "Since when were you interested in sports? I mean, football and basketball, I understood, because I was playing them, but hockey? You could show Puck a little support by wearing a McKinley shirt, you know?"

"I already explained it to Noah. As a matter of fact, my b-, I mean, good friend, plays on the Carmel hockey team, and Dave is no match for him," Rachel explained to a still-confused Finn.

He didn't get it. Who was this guy who Rachel knew? As far as he remembered, Rachel didn't have any friends at Carmel besides Jesse, considering the whole VA team egged her. He chose, however, not to ask anymore questions. Well, except that last one. "Oh, cool. Well, I was going to go to the hockey game too, for Puck. Maybe we could meet there and sit beside each other, you know," Finn offered, knowing fully that Rachel would probably say no.

To his delightful surprise, that didn't happen. "That would be nice," she said, and Finn smiled his lopsided smile. This was a start. Sure, it wasn't the best opportunity in the world, but it was nonetheless an opportunity to sit down and talk with Rachel, just being friends.