"And what makes you so self-assured, Jesse? It's not like I've ever said that I loved you."
She regrets the words as soon as she says them, her instinct to hurt him much weaker in hindsight. He physically recoils from her, as if she has slapped him, and it's a direct reversal of their movements when she kissed him just moments earlier.
She wants to go back to that, even if she had been the one to stop them at the time. Her mouth is no longer occupied, but she feels as though she can't breathe.
He's walking away from her. Literally. He steps back a couple of steps, still facing her, but not really seeing her. She can tell. He drops his head to stare at the ground at the same time he starts rummaging through his pockets. He comes up with two keys on a ring, and an NYU ID card.
"These will get you back into the building and into the room," he states, holding out the items to her. She doesn't move to take them, and he steps forward, placing them in her left coat pocket.
"Allie should be in her office by around 8:30."
Then he turns around and walks away.
She realizes then that he won't be coming back. In the months since their breakup, she has wondered and fantasized about how they would meet again in the future, when they were both successful and high school became something to be joked about. She realizes now that this was it. This had been their moment, their chance. Whenever, wherever he sees her after this, no matter how much time has passed, he will refuse to meet her eyes, or say her name. He will forever turn and walk in the other direction.
But he stops and turns back around, and she feels hope she doesn't deserve blossom in her chest.
He speaks very softly, but even surrounded by shouts and the sound of snowballs meeting snow and bodies, she hears every word.
"He doesn't understand you, Rachel, and he never will. You can try to make it work, to write your high school romance exactly the way you want it, for as long as you want to try. He has hurt you so many times, and yet you still forgive him, you always take him back. I don't know why or what he does to deserve it. But one day you will come to realize, for him, it will never be you."
He pauses, sighs. "Don't you get it, Rachel? He is your fucking Hubbell."
And with that, he's gone.
She's crying, sucking in ragged breaths all the way back to his dorm. She doesn't know how she let it get that far. She had never said the words to him before, true, but she had never doubted the basis of her attraction to him, either. When, in those months following Regionals, she had doubted the veracity of his feelings for her, she had never, not once, doubted the sincerity of hers for him.
She hates to think of what she said to him just now, and the way she said it. She will never forgive herself for ending their relationship like this, in a way that is so blatantly a lie. It hurts her too much to think that even when he ended it the first time, he had still affirmed his love for her in the process.
Walking into his room without him feels like physical pain. She sidesteps the air mattress and collapses unto his bed, cries giving way to sobs. This day has been way too long, too overwhelming, and she just wants him there with her, holding him like he used to. She wants to apologize, to explain to him why she keeps sabotaging their relationship when she could have given them the one thing that they both obviously want. Explaining would be easier, however, if she had any idea why she did this, and why she keeps doing it.
He enters the room at 8:25am. He has the door only part way open and the first thing he notices is that the air mattress has been tidied away so there is space to walk easily. He then notices that the extra sheets and the sweats that he had given her to wear are folded neatly in a pile on his desk, his ID card and keys next to them.
She's sitting on his bed, wearing her pajamas, back against the wall, knees pulled up against her chest. Her hair is a mess and her eyes are red from crying, tear tracks stain her cheeks. It's clear she hasn't slept at all. She's obviously waiting for him.
He didn't expect to find her here.
He's not sure he can do this again. Earlier, he had wanted a definitive answer from her, and he had gotten one.
He turns his head, weighs stepping back into the hallway, when she speaks.
"Please don't go." She pushes off of the wall with her hands and gets to her feet, walking towards him.
"I can't do this anymore, Rachel," he says, twisting the doorknob in his hand, still indecisive as to whether he is in or out.
"Please," she pleads, finally reaching him and drawing his hand away from the knob, pulling him into the room.
He lets out a breath. "Look Rachel, I know I messed up when I egged you, but I won't keep paying for that mistake over and over. Honestly, I came here to escape it. So let's stop doing this. You want Finn, so have him. I'm not in the picture. I never was."
He removes his arm from her grasp. "Just go."
She grabs unto the edge of his coat, starts shaking her head slowly.
"I didn't mean it," she takes a huge gulp of air, "Not like that."
"I know."
Later, she will remember how immense her love for him is in that moment.
She meets his eyes for the first time since he came back to his room, his response giving her the confidence she needs to go on.
She speaks quickly but quietly, sentences punctuated by the sobs that are still escaping her.
"I've thought about this so much tonight. I wanted Finn because Finn is easier to forgive, because I can control him … I can sort of control him. I can control how much I give of myself to him, to our relationship, and, even when he disappoints me, it's easy to start from scratch and rebuild it … making it more like how I want it to go."
Her left hand comes up to wipe at her eyes and her nose. Her right hand still holds steadfastly to his coat.
"But Jesse, you… you and I … we're equals. But that means that you have so much more power over me. I'm not used to that … I don't know how to deal with it … It's everything I've tried to avoid. But for some reason, it works. Until we tip the balance and one of us tries to gain the upper hand and it hurts. It hurts so much … and its so easy to try to avoid that, to run from it … But it hurts so much more to be without you."
She starts crying once more. "I miss you and I can't survive you leaving me again. Tonight… I just… Please … please don't go."
He takes off his hat and gloves. He starts unzipping his coat, removes her hand from the hem, slips it off and tosses it onto his desk chair.
"So," he asks slowly, "what do you want, Rach?"
"I want you. I love you," she answers without hesitation. She sucks in a breath.
"I've never said that to anyone else before," she stresses, biting her lip and tucking her hair behind her ears.
"Neither have I."
He puts a hand on each side of her face, thumbs circling her cheeks.
"Are you sure this is what you want? No regrets?"
She shakes her head. "No regrets." She pauses, adds, "I'll regret not doing this, I already regret all of this."
"And what about Finn?"
"I'll deal with Finn … with everyone else when I get back. I just want to have this weekend with you."
He initiates their second kiss, and there is no pulling back on her part. It's desperate and passionate and this time she gives in wholly and completely. She forgot that she sees colors when she kisses him, and she can't explain it better than that. It's all sensation and bare consciousness, lack of sight and faith. When they pull back to breathe, her lips are already sore.
"What are my ground rules?" he asks quietly in her ear, forehead pressed against hers, eager to get closer to her.
"Ground rules?" She's tired and not thinking straight, and perplexed by his question. She wants to kiss him again, not talk. They've done enough talking.
He slides his right hand under her shirt, just at her waist and curves it around her body. He begins to slide it upwards so, so slowly.
"Obviously, you have veto power," he says, looking directly into her eyes, "But I just want to know what I can and can't do."
His hand is just under her breast now. After changing out of his sweats and into her pajamas she had neglected to put a bra back on. He's obviously noticed. He pauses, waits for her to tell him to stop.
She kisses the side of his mouth, his cheek, the underside of his jaw, fingers digging into his hips. "None that I can think of right now."
"You're sure?"
"Sure."
His hand moves upwards to caress her breast, fingers playing gently across her nipple as he kisses her. She moans against his mouth, her body instinctively leaning towards him as his left hand comes up to join his right.
"Love you," he whispers as he pulls her shirt over her head.
Happy chapter next!
With Finn, I can control him. Even when he doesn't act like I want him to, I can still work it in as
We're equals and I don't know what to do with that. I can't control