Chapter 9
Sorry, this chapter took a little longer than I had anticipated. I had all but one scene written before Christmas but with all the craziness of the holidays and writers block and a lack of inspiration on my part, it took me a bit longer.
But here it is! Thank you all for reading and reviewing. I hope you enjoy it.
Rachel's memorized the disposable plastic lid of her Lima Bean coffee cup. Her fingers run over the lettering countless times. She can't look at Jesse's face. They've sat in almost complete silence for the last ten minutes and he looks thoroughly confused, while feels like she's about to throw up and is trying desperately to ignore the feeling in her stomach and gather her thoughts.
Jesse breaks the silence first.
"So… are you going to tell me what's going on? Why you ignored my texts and flipped out when I went to see you at McKinley and why that scary cheerleader girl assaulted me and yelled at me in Spanish?"
Surprisingly, the mention of Santana calms Rachel a little. It feels comfortable. Familiar.
"Sorry. I just… freaked out a little because of um… the last time we saw each other?" She finally looks up and meets Jesse's eyes, willing him to remember without her explaining further because she's not sure she could take that.
"Oh. Yeah, that. God, we were so drunk." Jesse looks a little bit sheepish and the knot in Rachel's stomach loosens a little. He's just a person. They can talk about this. He was drunk too. It was okay.
"Yeah, we were…" She trails off.
"It was pretty great though, huh?"
"Um… yeah." Rachel answers automatically. What the hell was she supposed to say? No, Jesse. I didn't want to do it at all and now I have nightmares about you and I couldn't think about your face for weeks without wanting to throw up and even now every time someone touches me without warning me first I freak out. Yes. Totally great. Maybe she doesn't know how to do this. Why did she think she could do this?
He's talking now about how they should start hanging out again and how he's missed her but all Rachel can hear is his voice. It's the same tone of voice as that night. She's trying to connect the two people. This Jesse and that Jesse… It's not scary. She can sit here with him and she can talk about it and it should be so completely fine but why is it not? Why does she still feel sick? This isn't enough to cancel it out. It's still there. That memory trumps every memory she's ever had of Jesse which is so messed up because it's the haziest, too. It's clouded in alcohol and the fog of sleep deprivation but it still overrides everything else.
She's checked out of the conversation and is still staring deeply into her coffee cup as if it holds the answer to all her struggles, and she doesn't notice Jesse reaching across the table. He places his hand over hers, trapping her… or at least, that's what it feels like. This is so much worse than being touched without warning by anyone else because it's him. Now she can connect the two. And now she's scared.
But she can't just pull her hand away. That's… worse. She's not sure why but she knows she can't do it. She can feel her entire body anchored by that one touch. Just by his hand on hers. She can't move because then she'll feel it. She's almost afraid that he won't let her go and she can't handle that. It's better to keep her hand there and imagine that it's friendly, that he isn't trying to control her. She hates that her mind is so powerful because to anyone else this would look like two friends having coffee. And it is. Before this, they were friends. Friends. It's a friendly touch. It's not bad. Nothing to be scared of.
The first pull is a test. When her hand slides the first bit easily, she begins to slowly draw her hand out from under his. She uses it to grab her coffee cup. It's an easy enough excuse. She needs both hands, clearly. She's so distracted that she takes a huge gulp of her searing hot coffee, burning her throat in the process.
"Shit, Rachel, are you okay?" Jesse notices her obvious sputtering and fanning of her tongue.
"Yeah. Fine. Sorry. I'm just… really distracted." She searches her brain for an excuse. She can't handle this much longer. They should have done this over Skype, or something. Shit. "I have this glee assignment to work on tonight."
"Do you need help with it? I could come over."
"No!" She blurts, much too quickly. "I mean, no. It'll be fine. I have it figured out but I just need to practice; it'll be boring."
"Okay, well… text me later?" Jesse makes a move to pull her chair out and help her up but she stands up quickly on her own.
"Yes. Of course. I'll talk to you later. Bye Jesse." She walks quickly toward the door before he can follow her and try to do something chivalrous again.
Rachel is in such a hurry to leave and Jesse is so focused on her hasty exit that both fail to notice the person in the shadows behind the display station, watching.
x x x
The next morning at school, Rachel moves entirely on autopilot. Her mind is on Jesse. She hasn't been able to think about much else since meeting up with him last night. She's still not sure it was a good idea. It needed to be done, but it did nothing to quell her anxiety. She's still on edge. She's not any more comfortable around him. And she's pretty sure she put up a decent enough façade that he thinks nothing is wrong and will probably try to contact her even more often now. So maybe it was a completely bad idea. But then again, maybe it will get easier.
She thinks back to her sophomore year Psych class with Mrs. Simmons, the angry old lady who smelled like cats. What was it she called it? Systematic desensitization. That's what she needs. Gradual exposure to Jesse until she doesn't feel like bolting when he's near or crying when he touches her. She's not about to initiate on her own again, but maybe if he texts her back and asks her to hang out again… maybe she'll say yes.
She's so deep in thought she doesn't notice that she's been joined at her locker by someone else.
"Hey, Hobbit."
Where Rachel used to find Santana's nicknames offensive, she's realized that it's just the other girl's somewhat unorthodox way of showing affection and she now finds them sort of endearing. Although, to be perfectly honest, it probably has something to do with the fact that they are no longer hurled at her along with slushies and verbal attacks against her personality.
"Hello Santana. What are you-" Rachel barely stashes her books inside her locker and presses the door closed before Santana's long fingers wrap around her wrist and she yanks her into the bathroom.
"Santana! What on earth- you can't just pull people in to bathrooms, my goodness!"
Santana chooses to ignore Rachel's indignation and points at the girls doing their makeup in the long bathroom mirror. "You. Out."
The girls all look at each other then back at Santana, grabbing their purses before scurrying out the door. Santana smirks for a moment, relishing the power that being a member of the cheerios (and a complete bitch) brings her before locking the bathroom door and rounding on Rachel.
"You want to tell me what you were doing at the Lima Bean last night with St. Assface?"
Rachel breathes sharply in surprise and before she can say a word Santana cuts her off.
"And don't even try to deny it, Berry, I saw you two drinking your lattes in the corner and sitting disturbingly close to each other." Santana stalks her way toward Rachel across the bathroom and Rachel meets every step with a backwards one of her own. Santana backs her all the way into the corner by the sinks and Rachel opens her mouth to speak but Santana stops her with a finger.
"Not finished. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I seem to remember not a month ago jamming my foot where the sun don't shine and scaring that creeper away from McKinley. Sooo… you want to tell me why you're throwing away all my hard work and talking to St. Jerkoff again?"
"I- He-" Rachel stutters. Santana caught her completely off guard. How could she have missed her? Granted, her back was to the rest of the store but Jesse had to have seen her… Crap. She's not prepared for a confrontation with Santana, at all.
"Spit it out, dwarf." Santana backs off a bit, but leans next to Rachel against the sinks, blocking her pathway to the door in case she decides to try to escape.
"I just… I needed to talk to him. To see him. I'm-" She pauses, trying to figure out how much of this she really wants to tell Santana. "I'm so tired of being afraid. It's like I've built him up in my mind and sometimes everything scares me but I just need… I have to remember that he's just a person."
She pauses, trying to collect her thoughts and figure out how to explain why. "Look, I understand it's not going to change what happened with him, but-"
"You mean what he did to you." Santana interjects.
Rachel can't take it anymore. Nobody understands. Everyone assumes that they know but nobody gets it. She feels a frustrated shriek building in her chest but pushes it back down. "It wasn't just him! It was me! I was there. I made a mistake that I can't take back and I can't… I'm dealing, okay? Just leave him alone and stop pointing fingers because it's not just him."
"What the hell, Rachel? This isn't your fault." Santana's words are becoming more forceful, trying to shock sense into Rachel.
Rachel feels her blood racing through her veins. Nobody understands. Nobody was there. Nobody knows. Every emotion she's been pushing back and trying to control comes bubbling to the surface and thrown at Santana. "I HATE MYSELF!"
Santana freezes. She wasn't expecting an outburst like that from Rachel.
Rachel looks about as shocked at her temper surge as Santana feels. Her eyebrows are pressed together and two straight white teeth are pressing indentations into her lower lip. Her voice is calmer than before but just as forceful. "You don't understand how much I hate myself for letting this happen." She pauses, staring down at the counter as a look of realization crosses her face. "God, I let this happen. I LET it happen."
"Stop, don't say tha-"
"No, you don't understand. I need to fix this. Please, just… just let me fix this."
"Rachel, I do understand."
Rachel looks up, the unfamiliar sound of her first name on Santana's lips halting her thoughts and bringing her focus to Santana's face. Something about the way she said it… Rachel can tell that she means it. She's not just pacifying her. How can she understand?
"What do you mean?"
"I don't… It's not important how I know, I just… do. And I promise you, no matter what the little details are that make you think that your situation is different, that this was your fault, it wasn't. It took me a long time and a lot of agonizing over it to figure that out, but I promise, Rachel. No matter what you think your involvement was, it's not your fault." Santana feels herself teetering on the precipice. She's inches away from succumbing to her emotions. The hot tears gathering in the corners of her eyes are threatening to spill down her cheeks. She can't let them.
She swallows hard, trying not to choke on the lump in her throat. Her heart is breaking once again for Rachel. If she could only convince her… God, she remembers exactly what that felt like. When she felt just as confused and lost and at fault as Rachel does right now. She takes a deep, shaky breath, determined to hold herself together for Rachel's sake… but she knows she needs to end this encounter because she's inches from a breakdown. Shit. She never should have brought this up. She's not going to get through to Rachel but now she's going to know. She never allows herself to think about… that… because she's overcome with regret and fear and despair every single fucking time. She hates thinking about it. Fuck.
Brittany. She needs to get out of here and she needs to find Brittany.
x x x
It takes Rachel a few seconds to realize that the bell has rung, ending her second period class. The rustling of book bags and scraping of metal chair legs across the cheap flooring alert her that class is over. She slowly gathers her notebook and papers, shoving them haphazardly into her school bag.
Her mind is still on her conversation with Santana. Rachel wants to believe that she knows best when it comes to her own life. She's always made her own decisions and for the most part it has always worked out for her. She doesn't have any close friends whose opinions she takes into account. It's always been just her. But there's a nagging feeling she can't shake that maybe Santana is right… maybe she does know. She's never seen the girl show any kind of emotion except the occasional soft smile that comes when Brittany melts her hard exterior, but Santana legitimately looked on the edge of a breakdown. Between Santana's initial reaction and complete change of demeanor towards Rachel regarding what happened with Jesse, and their conversation in the bathroom, Rachel is beginning to think that Santana knows exactly how she feels. Maybe confiding in her was the right thing to do after all. And maybe listening to her now would be smart.
She's stopped suddenly in the hallway by a hand on her arm. Why do people have to try to get her attention so dramatically? The first thing she notices is the red uniform and she immediately thinks it's Santana again, but the soft voice that greets her belongs to an entirely different cheerio.
"Rachel, can we talk?"
Rachel's stomach drops. She hasn't talked to Quinn since spring break. She doesn't know what to think anymore. It seemed like they were almost friends over break. At least… they were getting along. Quinn helped calm her down when Brittany spilled her secret. Things were okay. But then she had her slushied and now Rachel doesn't know what to expect. Is Quinn back to her old self? She knows she should never have trusted her given their history, but Quinn was just so nice over break. It figures, though. Rachel spent so much time waiting for the other shoe to drop, and just as she started to hope that maybe this time would be different, everything came crashing down.
She realizes she hasn't answered Quinn yet. The blonde is worrying her bottom lip between two perfect sets of straight, white teeth and Rachel has the fleeting thought that Quinn has such pretty lips and shouldn't bite them like that.
She nods her head in answer to Quinn's question and before she can blink Quinn has ushered her into the dark, empty art room. Neither of the two make a move toward the light switch and Rachel can't help but think how fitting this is. If she's about to be gruesomely murdered in an empty classroom, at least the lighting will be dark and dramatic.
Quinn's tongue darts out to wet her lips. She looks conflicted.
"Rachel, I…" Her voice catches and she clears her throat. A deep breath passes into her lungs and as she releases it her facial expression morphs into a neutral one. She steels herself.
Rachel can't figure out what's going on but she can certainly see the wall Quinn just put up. She feels miles away.
"I'm sorry."
Well, that's unexpected.
Quinn continues, her words tumbling out. "I'm so so sorry I had you slushied. And I'm sorry I ran out on you at Santana's house."
"It's fine, Quinn." Rachel didn't expect an apology and she's having a hard time figuring out if Quinn is being sincere or not. She decided weeks ago to never let her guard down in front of the cheerio again, so it probably doesn't even matter. She knew it was going to happen. It's Quinn Fabray, after all. "We both know our places at this school. You were right to remind me of that."
"It doesn't have to be like that, R- Berry." Quinn catches herself. She needs to be super careful of the familiarity with which she refers to Rachel. Maybe they can be friends, but they can't be close. She's going to take her cues from Santana. "Look, if Santana can be nice to you, so can I. I just had a momentary lapse when we came back from break."
Rachel gives her another guarded look. So many emotions have flitted across the smaller girl's face since Quinn pulled her into the classroom, Quinn doesn't know what to think. She's caught fear, trepidation, wariness, and defeat with little flickers of trust interspersed before the trust is covered up by something negative again. Quinn watches intently as Rachel bites her soft pink bottom lip and pushes her hair behind her ear with tiny hands. She catches the flutter of her eyelids and the shine in her eyes as she looks back up at Quinn's face. Her stomach flutters.
"Okay…" Rachel doesn't know what to do besides agree. She isn't about to argue with Quinn. But if the girl wants to be friends she just needs to make sure she doesn't ever let her guard down again. She's tired of thinking so hard about the intentions behind everyone's actions. There's always been a reason she hides herself.
"So, are we good?" Quinn tries again in vain to read Rachel's face. How did this happen? So much has happened to Rachel and from what she can gather, it's been a while since everything happened with Jesse. How did nobody notice? How can Rachel come to school every day and act like everything is okay? Looking at her face now, if Quinn didn't know what she did she would think that everything was fine. She's mildly impressed with Rachel's acting skills but also incredibly worried about her well-being. How can she ever know if Rachel needs help?
It doesn't matter. You're her friend and nothing more. You're not going to get close again.
Rachel nods, silent in her agreement. She's not going to give anything more. Mostly she just wants to get out of this room and go to class before she's late again. Can't she get through a school day without having to deal with personal crap? Why do these girls insist on following her and accosting her between all of her classes?
"I have to get to class. Thank you for the apology, Quinn." The corners of Rachel's mouth curve up in the hint of her practiced show smile, words leaving her lips in the politest of tones. She steps around Quinn and leaves the room without looking back.
Quinn is surprised for a moment at the abrupt end to their conversation. What did she expect? At least Rachel doesn't seem to suspect anything. That tiny hint of Rachel's lovely, albeit fake, smile warms her face and gives her a slight flicker of hope.
Still facing the space Rachel just vacated, Quinn turns and leaves the room a few steps behind the other girl. She enters the hallway slowly, looking both ways to see if anyone's noticed. Then she catches a pair of calculating eyes from a locker at the end of the hallway. Finn. She can't tell if he saw Rachel leave first but he looks like he's trying to piece something together. Then again, it's Finn… he's always been out of the loop, bordering on completely oblivious. She shoots him a quick glare, daring him to say something before she turns the corner, leaving him behind.
x x x
Santana can't breathe. She tried so hard after her talk with Rachel to calm down. She sat in the dark, creepy janitor's closet for almost an hour trying to pull herself together but she can't. She supposes that this is what she gets for pushing her emotions back every time she starts to feel something negative. Once they get out of hand they take over and there's nothing she can do. She can't stay at school any longer. She rounds the corner, heart pounding. Her steps quicken as she nears Brittany's locker.
"B, I need to go home."
"What? It's only second period. San, what's wrong?"
"I don't want to talk about it here. I just… just take me home, please?" She needs to release her emotions somehow because she just feels so full and she can't handle being at school any longer. She feels the walls of the hallway narrowing, threatening to trap her inside. Her breath starts to catch in her chest.
Brittany, recognizing the rare signs of an impending Santana breakdown, grabs her bag from her locker and pulls her girlfriend through the hallway toward the parking lot.
They make it back to Santana's house in record time. Her parents are out and the house is silent. Brittany guides her upstairs to her bedroom. Santana breaks away and trudges to her walk-in closet, presumably to change. Brittany sits on the bed and scans the room. It's comfortably cluttered; clothes and shoes are strewn across the floor and makeup covers the surface of the vanity. It's so very Santana. Brittany smiles at her own drawings of Lord Tubbington and stick figures of her and Santana holding hands she sees tacked up along the wall.
The closet door opens and Santana steps out in leggings and a sweatshirt Brittany recognizes as her own, probably left here the last time she spent the night. Santana crosses the room without a word, dropping heavily next to Brittany on the edge of the bed. Brittany slides her hand to Santana's back and tips her head down to look at her face. Before she can ask again what's wrong, Santana takes a deep shaky breath and a tear clings to her eyelashes for a moment before dropping to her lap.
"Oh, honey…" Brittany rubs her back, encouraging her silently to talk.
"I was talking to Rachel about Jesse and I was trying really hard not to but I just kept thinking about freshman year and…" She trails off and takes another deep breath, trying to press her emotions back down.
"Shhh, San… it's okay…" Brittany can feel her chin trembling. She hates seeing Santana like this. It's only happened a few times because Santana is so strong and so practiced at pushing her feelings away, but every single time it tears at Brittany's heart. Sometimes she thinks Santana is an extension of herself because it hurts her so much to see her hurt, too.
"I can't… do this right now. Just hold me, Britt?" Santana scoots back on the bed and lays down, her back to the blonde.
Brittany acquiesces, fitting her body along Santana's and wrapping her arms around her girlfriend from behind. She feels soft sobs racking Santana's body and she buries her face into dark hair, kissing the nape of her neck. She feels her own silent tears tracking down her face and she tightens her arms.
Despite it being so early in the day, Santana is asleep within minutes and as her irregular breathing begins to even out, Brittany can feel herself starting to drift off as well.
x x x
Quinn is pretty sure today was the longest in her existence. She made the mistake of talking to Rachel early in the morning, so their conversation hung over her head all day. But she had to apologize. She's been feeling so awful for having Rachel slushied, for ignoring her, for leaving her alone at Santana's... Quinn tried to do it without alerting Rachel's suspicion (Quinn Fabray was never one to apologize) but she shouldn't have worried. The defeated look on Rachel's face haunted her through all her classes, through lunch, through glee. By the time she made it home she was so emotionally exhausted she collapsed on a chair in the kitchen and has been sitting in the same spot for hours, staring at the granite her mother hand-picked and special ordered from Brazil. If she stares hard enough, the patterns in the stone start to morph and shift and she finds herself seeing shapes like one does in clouds.
Rachel.
She's been the only thing on Quinn's mind since she dumped Finn. How did she ever think Finn was a good idea? She just ended up making him suspicious. Her whole plan backfired. Her intent was to remind everyone at school that she was on top and in charge and remind herself that she liked boys. None of it worked. She ended up hurting Rachel, making Finn suspicious, and realizing that she was very seriously attracted to a completely straight girl. She still can't get over that. How can she feel so much more for Rachel than she has for any guy she's ever dated? They haven't even kissed. They've barely touched. And she's a girl. It's wrong. So wrong.
Quinn feels her nails digging into the palms of her hands. How did this happen? She grew up thinking – knowing – that being gay was wrong. It's the work of the devil. That's all she's ever heard. Her first knowledge of homosexuality came from her father walking in one night, spewing nasty words about the abomination that was "those Berry men". She remembers sitting through sermon after sermon, the stern eyes of her pastor daring anyone to disagree with him. Homosexuality is a sin. She feels a sob bubbling up in her throat. How did this happen to her? Is it God's punishment for the way she's treated others her whole life? She wishes she could take it back. She would take it all back.
Her parents would kick her out if they ever knew. There's no question. Her dad doesn't like her all that much anyway and her mother always goes along with what he thinks. Where would she go? Everyone hates her. Nobody would take her in. She's spent her life in high school making sure everyone feared her but where does that leave her now? Alone. She worries so much about what people think of her and how they see her and it's left her without any real friends. God, what would they all think? Their perfect, straight-laced celibacy club cheerio. A lesbian.
She shudders. She hates that word. It makes her feel physically sick. Maybe she's not. She can no longer deny her obvious attraction to Rachel, but maybe Rachel is an exception. Maybe, if she can make it through this, she'll start to like guys again. Nobody will have to know. Not people at school, not her parents, not the people at church. Certainly not Rachel. Never Rachel. All she can do is pray that this is a fluke. She can't take hurting Rachel anymore, but she can't get too close again. She'll be nice. Civil. That's it. Rachel can never know. If she can keep this buried until it goes away or until she graduates and goes to college, then nobody will ever know. She'll be safe. Everything will be okay.
Thank you guys all so much for the reviews, favorites, and alerts. Please keep the reviews coming! I can't tell you how much it means to me that people are reading and enjoying this little thing I started writing just to get out some of my own issues. Even a couple of words to let me know you enjoyed it is encouraging!
Also, if you haven't already (though I know many of you have!) come find me on Tumblr! The link is in my profile, and my URL is Three3LittleBirds.
Thanks so much again! I love you all.
And happy 2012!
