"So, Rachel tells us you're on the cheerleading team?" Not for the first time, Quinn shifted her peas around on her plate, staring at the food blankly. She couldn't think straight, she could hardly focus long enough to know when she was being addressed. Much like in this moment. "What's that like? I imagine they have you training like crazy if you've been sleeping so much."
Hazel eyes flickered for a moment before finally gazing up, realizing she was the one being spoken to. It was a rare occurrence in her own family even before everything that has happened lately. So it truly wasn't any surprise to her when she looked around the table before speaking. "Oh, um…it's okay. It used to be fun but now I'm more in it for the school politics."
"That hardly seems like any reason to join something that you'll lose sleep over."
"It's not the practice that has me tired," Quinn blurted, placing her fork down and giving the room her full attention. Her eyes met Rachel's inquisitive ones, and for a moment she almost smiled. Just for a moment. But then she remembered their kiss, the goodbye. That's what it was, that's all it could be. "I have nightmares. So I don't sleep much."
"Why didn't you tell me? I offered to help."
"It's no big deal." Quinn shrugged looking back down to the table as she reached for her glass and took a small sip of the water. The meal was delicious, veggie burgers with a side of peas and pumpkin pie for desert if Quinn decided to stay.
Should she?
Was that a wise choice? All the blonde wanted was to turn back time and live in that moment again. She wanted to go back to that room, to live and feel and breathe. She wanted to be alive. But she couldn't be, she couldn't get that back. It was wrong. It was so wrong to take Rachel away from Finn for her own selfish reasons. Security shouldn't be why someone breaks up a perfectly good relationship. Should it?
Quinn didn't know anymore. She didn't know what was okay and what wasn't. She didn't know why the two were fooling themselves. They couldn't be anything. All they ever were, all they ever would be, was some odd silent friendship. They'd look out for each other from a distance. That's how it always had been. One kiss wasn't going to change that.
And yet looking across the table, seeing those comforting brown eyes, maybe one kiss could change that. Maybe one kiss could change everything. Maybe Quinn did matter. And maybe Rachel mattered too. Maybe together they could change anything they wanted to. Maybe hope could still exist. "You don't like peas?" Rachel questioned, eyes locked to Quinn's, and Quinn's just as hooked.
There was a fire between the two. It was no longer a charge, or a small jolt. It was a blaze that could be seen for miles. Anyone who knew what love was knew that fate had finally laid its hand and was currently creating something legendary. Fate was creating something beautiful.
"They're not my favorite."
"I thought you weren't picky."
"I stand corrected." Quinn finished with a smile. A bright smile that finally began to reach her eyes again. It caught Rachel off guard. Brought one of her own to slowly creep up on her face until it was her true Rachel Berry smile. The glistening beam that interrupted Quinn's nightmares and fought off the images of whatever was around her. The smile of her savior. Even the Berry-men sat at their seats and watched their daughter steadily fall into the eyes that she would no doubt begin to dream of. After all it had happened to them, they knew the signs. They knew that right in that moment Rachel's heart felt light and that it pitter-pattered with a kind of excitement she'd only feel when looking at the blonde before her. They also knew the troubles she'd face with Finn, and then the troubles she'd face in life after high school. But they were one hundred percent sure of the fact that she was strong enough to handle the real world, and soon enough, so would Quinn.
"So, does this mean we can take out the pumpkin pie?" Hiram spoke with a smile, eyes flicking between the two girls who had yet to take their eyes off of the other. And then it happened. That moment that told Rachel everything she needed to know. Quinn was still there, behind those tears and that frown, she was still there. It finally happened, Quinn chuckled. A small chuckle with a large smile and those eyes finally came to life for the second time since she'd been acting this way. Tears threatened to fall the moment Rachel heard it. After having just cried upstairs over a kiss that held more emotion in it than any kiss she'd ever had before, than any kiss she could have ever imagined, she was watching Quinn chuckle and look to Hiram with a nod.
Quinn was alive in there. Somewhere she was still there, that girl that showed her head while pregnant. That Quinn still existed and only needed to feel safe and protected to return. Rachel finally understood. And as her father brought out the desert she wondered if it would be possible to keep Quinn here forever. If she just wanted to feel safe Rachel could give her that. She'd do whatever it took to give that to the blonde. And perhaps selfish reasons lay behind the need to do so, but Rachel was only human, and she was falling so quickly and hopelessly. How it began she couldn't remember, she only knew what was happening in this exact moment. And that was that Quinn Fabray was laughing and smiling. She was living. And Rachel had seen nothing better.