When Rachel wakes up in the morning, she stretches and feels the comforting heaviness of his arm around her waist. When she turns around, she finds Noah smiling down at her with warm eyes.
He brushes a soft kiss across her lips and tightens his hold.
"Hey you." He whispers.
She's about to reply, when she realizes his breath smells like their toothpaste and hers probably, well. . .doesn't. Rachel wiggles out of his grasp and shoots into their tiny bathroom. She brushes her teeth as fast as possible and walks back out. Noah is still lying in bed on his back, his arms crossed behind his head. She can't help but marvel at his sculpted upper body and the look of pure content on his face, complete with a happy smirk. Rachel slowly walks back to the bed and shuffles in next to him, reaching up to pull his neck down and kiss him fully. This time his kiss is not as scorching as last night, they still make her toes curl, but it is the pure adoration and happiness she feels as he tenderly brushes his lips across hers again and again.
"Hey . . ." she finally says, her smile a mile wide.
That is pretty much how they spend their morning, simply enjoying being together, occasionally kissing and whispering sweet nothings to each other. It is simple, easy, being with him she finds. So much simpler than when she was hung up on Finn. Looking back she marvels at how a few months have changed her.
In the beginning of last school year, she was convinced she was fated to have one of those tragic love stories with the sweet quarterback, consisting of stolen kisses and forever kept apart by society, damned to hidden glances and moments away from prying eyes. Then she met Puck, and he was everything she knew he would be. Mean, egoistic, foul-mouthed, uncouth and just plain rude. Their first relationship, if you could call it that, was doomed to fail before it even started. And it did. But even though Rachel broke it off, she always felt like there was something she was missing.
Then of course, the baby-drama happened. She is still sorry for the pain she caused, not because she told Finn the truth, it was the right thing to do. But she hurt Finn, nonetheless, and she hurt Noah, not Puck, but Noah. In the aftermath, Rachel likes to think they all grew up and learned something about themselves and each other. She learned that yes, Quinn had made a mistake, but she was just a frightened girl, thrust into a situation in which making the wrong choice was too tempting for a 16 year old girl. She realized that Finn, despite all his sweetness and adorable character, was nothing but a high-school student. He still led her on, he still used her, and when the only thing that was keeping them from being with each other was peer pressure, a pressure his behavior as Quarterback could easily direct towards another target, and he still did not make a move out of fear, he might just be not worth all the heartache she had endured.
And she found what she had been missing in her relationship with Puck. Noah. While all others rallied around Finn, the hero who had been betrayed, and Quinn, the perfect girl who had been led astray and seduced by the villain, she couldn't help but look at the supposed bad guy. Yes, he had made a mistake, but he had tried to make up for it. He did his best to take responsibility, he tried his hardest to do the right thing, but in the end, everyone expected him to fail, so he did. Rachel had stuck by him, stuck up for him at times. She had heard him cry in empty class rooms, seen him in anguish when he thought no one was looking. This was the Noah she had come to like, and, dare she say, even love.
And Rachel also realized something else. High school was just that . . . High school. It hit her with a startling clarity one afternoon, while she tried her hardest not to cry about the mean comments Mercedes and Kurt had said about her, unaware of her proximity. This was just one part of the journey, a part which would end in less than a year. She would leave Lima behind for college, she would meet new people and she would probably finally make friends. Rachel knew that the Glee Clubbers were the only people who liked her, well, not all of them. Santana, Quinn, Mercedes and Kurt still made her life living hell. But Artie and Tina seemed to like her, Artie and her had bonded over Rachel's Bass-playing skills and she had always liked Tina's . . . unique . . . style. Matt and Mike had warmed up to her, especially after she told Finn the truth. They both thought what Puck had done was screwed up, but Quinn had done just as much. And telling Finn the truth had to be done.
Brittany was nice enough, away from Quinn and Santana. They drove home together from time to time, as it turns out they lived in the same street. The blonde was quirky and not the brightest bulb around, but her unwavering optimism had always brightened Rachel's at best murky days.
And of course, now she had Noah, who pretty much turned on the halogen-spotlights in her life.
A rustle of fabric behind her broke her from her musings and the object of her affections nuzzled her neck softly.
"I can hear you think, Rach…"his voice was gravelly from sleep and rumbled deeply through his chest. It was quite possibly the sexiest thing she had ever heard. She pressed a kiss to the highest part he could reach, which happened to be the underside of his chin. A look at her phone on the nightstand made her wiggle out of his grip and stretch.
"Noah! It's almost 2 in the afternoon!" She panicked, and was already grabbing all her stuff, stumbling towards the bathroom.
Noah for his part had been just about to kiss his way down her neck when she had moved away, leaving him to make out with the matrace.
"Rachel??? The fuck???" She stops in the doorway, her arms full with her clothes and a towel.
"Noah! Come on, we need to . . ." That's when it hits her. There is literally nothing stopping her from spending the entire day in bed with him. Except . . . yeah, except that they still haven't quite figured out what they are. Yes, she wants him (oh so much!). And she is fairly confident that he wants her (reaaally confident). But from what little experience she has had with boys, Rachel is hesitant to jump into something head on without having all the facts.
Noah just chuckles and scrubs a hand down his face. He knows the moment when she realizes that there is nothing stopping them, and he also sees the struggle in her face. He knows if he asks, she'll be with him in a second. But he promised himself last night to be less Puck and more Noah.
So he regretfully pushes himself up.
"Feel like Pancakes?" He asks and she gives him a grateful smile, before nodding and slipping into the bathroom to get changed.
An hour later they sit outside on the roof and are having brunch in silence. Noah is kinda freaking out at this point, because Rachel is hardly ever silent. As scary as she is when she shouts, or screams or just talks reaaally fast, its when she's silent that you better run. So he digs into his pancakes and washes them down with a huge gulp of orange juice, nearly killing himself in the process. When he is done, he puts his plate down and looks at her. She has barely touched her food.
"So, I guess we gotta talk. . ." She looks about as uncomfortable as him, which he figures makes the next part a bit easier. Noah grabs her hand.
"Look, Rach. I gotta tell you some stuff, and if you wanna ditch me afterwards, that's fine, too. But ... well, just lemme get this through before you kick my ass to the curb, alright?" He doesn't look up, but the light squeeze of his hand tells him she'll stick around, at least for this. He takes a deep breath.
"I figure I owe you at least a reason why I dragged you to New York with me." He feels she's about to interrupt and gives her a small smile to let her know he doesn't mean it like that.
"Quinn's kid . . .it ain't mine. . ." He hears her draw a sharp breath and the pressure on his hand increases. He feels the numbness creeping back into his soul, and focuses everything on her tiny hand in his.
"I mean . . .shit, I fought for her…like, I didn't give a shit about Quinn, but that little girl was mine, you know. I loved her. . .but how can you fucking love something . . .I mean, I should be feeling relieved and shit. . . but. . .how can you love something so much when it's not even yours? When it don't even exist" he's looking off into the city.
Rachel just shifts closer to him, knowing he doesn't want her to answer him just yet. Noah winds an arm around her and drags her between his legs, her back to his front.
"And man, I get now what Finn felt like. . . I mean. . . shit, it felt like she was dead or something. . .I loved that little girl. . ." Rachel can feel the moisture of his tears splashing on her head and his sobs wrack her body. She turns around and simply pulls him close to her, letting him rest his head on her shoulder and allows him to simply let go.
And Noah feels the numbness receding with every tear he sheds for his little girl, who was never his but who he loved nonetheless. All his anguish comes flowing out of him and he starts to feel lighter. Before he can even try to stop himself, everything comes pouring forth.
He tells her about his Dad, about his fucked up childhood, how Glee was pretty much the only thing keeping him going, how he doesn't know if he can come back from that. That afternoon he cries more than in his entire misspent youth and tells her more about himself than he has ever told anyone before, more than he knew about himself.
Rachel just holds him, keeping her mouth shut the entire time. Only after he has stopped crying and his breathing is evening out does she say anything.
"Suspenders." Noah for his part, feels like a polarbear in a washing salon.
"Huh?" Rachel looks up at him and smiles impishly.
"Suspenders. That's why I accompanied you." She clarifies, sorta.
"Berry. . .you know that whole making sense thing? You totally blew it." He looks down at her worriedly. Suspenders don't seem like a very good reason to go to a strange city with a guy like him, much less one to stick around.
She sees his worried look and leans up to press a short but poignant kiss to his mouth, before resuming her cuddling position half on top of him.
"I was watching Larry King, when I fell asleep and saw myself in the future, being interviewed by him. He asked me about my greatest adventure. . .and I was unable to answer him. So, I realized, I had never truly been out of Lima. And my entire life has always revolved around becoming a Star and working towards a goal. . . that I forgot to actually have a life." He knows it might sound ridiculous, but he can hear the deep sadness and loneliness underneath it.
"I mean, I have hardly any friends, except maybe you, Artie and Tina, nobody outside of Glee. I used to get slushied every day, people make fun of me, not even behind my back but actually in front of me. I humiliated myself by crushing first on the school's quarterback who is as intelligent as deep-frozen pizza and a teacher, and not exactly being subtle about it." Noah feels the need to interrupt her.
"I'm sorry, by the way. For the slushies and shit. That stuff was fucked up. . ." he trails off, unsure if it was a good decision to remind her of his role in her social status.
"It's alright. It's not forgotten, but forgiven nonetheless." She kisses his jaw and he tightens his grip.
"But you know what I have come to realize, following the last few months? All of that is of very little significance. In one more year we will depart for College, we will leave Lima, and I will attend a College in New York and you will be wherever you want to be, New York or San Francisco or Washington or Dallas! And it does not matter whether or not some pea-brained imbeciles felt the need to belittle me constantly for four years, or whether they held preconceived notions of you as a non-achiever, because why should it matter to us what these fools think? Half of them have neither the drive nor the talent to achieve something outside of Lima! Who are they to judge?!?!" She has talked herself into a rage, and while Noah is not entirely sure what preconceived means, he got that gist of it is fairly easy to understand – fuck them!
Then he realizes, Rachel actually believed he could attend an out – of - state College, and the thought that someone as driven, as talented and as bound to succeed as Rachel is convinced that he can make something of himself, makes him happier than he ever thought he could be.
Before she can continue to rant, he pulls her up until her face is level with his and raises his head to give her a sweet, loving kiss. Usually he would swoop in and have the girl creaming her pants within a few seconds, begging him for more. But with Rach, it's different. He knows that, he's always known that. She's changed him, and fuck him, he's actually grown up.
He wraps his arms around her and pulls them both into a sitting position. With a bit of shuffling, she is sitting between his legs again, the position in which this entire thing began. He feels oddly light, as though he could leap off the building and start flying. The weight that has been pressing on his chest ever since he found out the truth about his daughter and since he saw his Dad sitting in his living room, has lifted.
Together they watch how the sun slowly sets around them and dips New York into a plethora of different colors. He drops kisses on her head every now and then, and she draws random patterns on his forearms.
When the last of the light is gone, she turns her head towards his and pulls him into a deep kiss. Afterwards he locks his piercing green eyes with hers and sees the happiness and adoration he feels reflected in their dark depths. Rachel smiles and he sees mischief sparkling.
"So, does that mean you want to go steady with me, Noah?"
He chuckles and mumbles a reply in a deep husky voice, before fusing their mouths together once more.
"Baby, I'm the handyman to your housewife!"