Author's Notes: So after the worst case of writer's block ever (like I seriously thought my muse had hitched a ride to Mexico or something), I bring you the next chapter. I hope those of you who don't want Puck to just forgive Rachel too easily are happy as well as those who want them to just make up already. I'm to keep a delicate balance here so I hope you all can appreciate that. Thanks for reading!
Chapter Eleven
Quinn flopped as gracefully as she could on the bed that she shared with her husband seeing as how she was going on six months pregnant. Finn looked up from one of the papers he was grading before bed.
"Something wrong?" he asked as he graded an incorrectly answered question on depression.
"I have baby brain," Quinn complained irritated. She had not been able to get Cole's assistance in pushing Rachel and Puck together once and for all and with Aviva in Ohio, it was tough to get anything out of the woman other than advice.
Finn put down the papers, knowing that the frustration that flowed off his wife in waves needed to have his full attention or he would be paying for it later. And his back would scream in the morning due to him sleeping on the couch.
"Okay, what is baby brain?" he questioned, seriously not remembering that topic being featured in the baby books. And he read them out of fear for his life. He knew all about nesting and the different phases of labor. He was good to go. But baby brain was seriously escaping him.
"I used to be so good at getting what I want accomplished. Now, I can't even get my two stubborn friends back together without difficulty. This baby is ruining lives."
Finn smirked at his wife's ranting. If he had a dollar for every time that Quinn's focus was on Rachel and Puck, their future child would already have enough money to buy freshman year college textbooks. In truth, he wanted them happy and together as well but if he made it his life's mission to get those two back together, he was sure that a few parents would call the school board upset they were paying tuition for a poorly taught health education class.
"Babe, maybe it's for the best. I mean, you are pregnant. Shouldn't you be focused on your happiness and the baby instead?"
Quinn narrowed her eyes at her husband. "Are you implying that I'm a bad mother?" she questioned.
"Hell no. I just wouldn't want you stressed out because things are not going the way that you would like." There, that should appease her. There certainly was a way to answer a pregnant woman and it had taken a few tries but Finn had quickly caught on.
The blonde smiled and got up to get ready for bed. "I'll figure a way to make things better for the two of them. I just know it."
Rachel stared at the phone like it was the greatest enemy. Part of her told her that it was only going to end in her own heartache but the lonely part of her, the larger part of her, wanted company. Wanted his company.
Noah had gotten his own place a few days after the doctor's appointment had told him that he would not be returning to active duty quite so soon. So with the money saved from years in the service, he had leased an apartment in Tribeca for the time being. He had told Rachel he couldn't keep taking advantage of her generosity and it had been difficult to watch him pack up what little he had and leave, especially when she wanted nothing more than him to stay.
Cole was still hanging out in the city but had plans to return to Texas a few days from now and it was certainly going to be sad to see him go. He had been a good friend and had served a term or two as relationship advisor. Although he would be a phone call away, Rachel understood that having Cole go back home would be like Puck losing his last link to the military in a fashion.
So now, it was three weeks after he had left her apartment and she was fighting loneliness. Sure she had her friends from the cast that she had been rehearsing and she had Quinn and Finn, but she desperately craved the one person who still didn't want her.
And she would not throw herself at him. She couldn't. It was too desperate and it would push him even farther away. But it wouldn't hurt for her to invite him to dinner would it? From what she could remember, his cooking repertoire was complete with the empty calories of fast food and Easy Mac. And wasn't the quickest way to a man's heart through his stomach?
It was settled. She would invite Noah over for dinner and maybe, hopefully, they would have a long overdue talk without interruption.
Puck stared at the phone after he hung up with Rachel. Cole watched him curiously as the emotions played out over his face.
Hope. Confusion. Trepidation. Yup, Cole was pretty sure that Rachel had finally taken the first step to working on things between the two of them all by her lonesome. Quinn had been bugging him for weeks, trying to gain his assistance with pushing the two of them together but he had politely told her that it was his belief that the two of them would figure shit out eventually. The chick was pregnant and he did not need her screaming at him in the middle of the restaurant that he had met her in. Quinn had been less than pleased with that response because she wanted the two of them to be godparents to the baby and she didn't want to ask without the two of them being together.
"Pardon me, Quinn, but using the baby as a bargaining chip to get my help on this weird project is not gonna work. The two of them will be good godparents whether or not they are together," Cole had told her and with the huff of a toddler, she had dropped the subject.
And he truly believed that the two of them would get their act together. Recently, Puck would bring up Rachel inadvertently and it didn't seem to even phase him. But now that Rachel was putting dinner on the table, his friend looked shaken to the core. And this guy had survived time overseas where getting injured or dying was a real possibility.
"What'd Rachel want?" he asked casually popping a Combo into his mouth. The two of them had been playing Halo for the last few hours in Puck's brand new bachelor pad and Rachel's call had been the first human contact in hours.
"She wants to have me over for dinner. I said yes."
"That's awesome man. What time? Do we have time for another round?" he asked setting up another game on the home screen. When he didn't get an answer about the game, he looked back over to see Puck in deep thought. "Okay, you overanalyzing the invitation and your answer to said invitation is really unnecessary. She wants to have dinner, not assault you."
Puck nodded his understanding of that but it was the next demand that would set the stage for the rest of the evening. "You have to come with me."
Everything was ready for dinner with Noah. There was mood lighting but nothing too suggestive that would send the wrong message, so that meant candles but nowhere near the dinner table. She had a few burning on her coffee table and they were scented so there was always that excuse if he called her on it.
She was wearing an adorable black dress that showed off her legs and toned arms but that wasn't too fancy. Dinner was still in the oven but there was wine to be poured prior to. (Don't sue her that she wanted him to open the bottle just so that she could see his muscles flex.)
When the knock came on her door, she took a deep breath and opened up ready to greet him. What she was not ready for was for him to actually be them.
"Noah, Cole…" she said surprised, "Come in, come in."
They entered and it was apparent that Cole felt just as awkward as Rachel felt it was him being there.
"What's for dinner? Smells fucking good," Puck said peering around the apartment.
"Lasagna actually," Rachel said, leaving out the part that it was vegan. If the boys were hungry enough, they would not even notice the change in cheese. Rachel went to go open the wine and surprised when Puck nudged her out of the way and took on the task.
"Go sit," he instructed, "You did enough."
Rachel smiled at him appreciatively before going over to sit next to Cole. While Puck was busy finding a corkscrew and opening the merlot, she needed to get Cole on the fast track out of here.
"What are you doing here?" she hissed and then immediately curbed her tone. "Sorry, I'm not trying to be mean but I distinctly remember inviting Noah alone. And you being here? Not a part of that plan."
"I'm sorry, I figured as much but he was freaking out at his place about coming here alone." Rachel's shoulders slumped hearing that he was nervous coming here. "If it makes you feel any better, I think he only thinks that he needs me here. I don't think he really does."
"Well if that's case, can you make a smooth exit at some point?" she asked hopefully. Rachel wanted to talk to him and with Cole present and accounted for, it was most definitely as him as a third wheel that she was not interested in having. There was no way she could talk with Noah on the level she wanted.
"Let me give him a pep talk and you've got yourself a deal. Go to the bathroom or something."
Rachel took the orders and left the room. Cole went to his friend and assessed the wine opening situation.
"Need assistance brother?" he asked, noting that the cork was almost out.
"Naw, I'm good. Where'd Rachel go?" he asked as he poured the wine into three glasses that the brunette had set out.
"Had to freshen up. How are you feeling?"
"Okay. Not as nervous."
Cole nodded. "If that's the case bro, I think that you should try to fly this one solo. Because if you don't, you and Rachel are going to keep doing this dance. Now, I know you're still upset about everything that happened between the two of you but maybe this is the first step to correcting all that shit."
Puck resigned to that fact. He and Rachel were doing a dance. He couldn't say he didn't think about her. He couldn't say that he didn't think she was the one for him. The only thing that he could say was that after everything he had experienced and what had happened between the two of them, maybe it was worth being just the two of them to just talk. No friends, no mother, no sister. It was her and him and it had been a long time since that had happened.
"All right, get out of here before I change my mind."
Cole clapped him on the back and hightailed out of the apartment. He knew Rachel was scrappy and he did not need to get his still injured ass kicked by a girl. The soldier did send Quinn a text to let her know that the two were alone and would be for a while.
You're going to owe me a play-by-play ally.
Cole just shook his head Quinn's infectious need for things to go her way. He couldn't lie and say he wasn't happy to see the two of them start heading in the right direction.
Rachel emerged from the bathroom and seriously expected to see Cole still in her apartment. But to find the younger soldier gone was a happy surprise. Puck handed a glass of wine to her and they clinked them gently in toast.
"What are we celebrating?" Puck asked referring to their toast
"You," Rachel said simply. "I know things are tough not doing exactly what you want right now but you're doing so well by getting a place on your own and whatnot. I'm proud."
"I'll accept that."
Rachel removed the lasagna from the oven and worked on serving him some. It was tough to do when she could feel his eyes on her.
"You doing a new show?" he questioned as she placed the plate in front of him.
Rachel nodded and got her own, explaining that previews for Phantom started in two weeks and opening night soon after that. She told him that she liked the cast, that she had already become friends with her understudy and had agreed to let the girl do a few evening shows because the vocals were going to be tough on her voice. Sipping from her glass, she giggled at the memory of him in her childhood bedroom trying on the Phantom mask right before the Run Joey Run fiasco.
"What?" he asked with a smirk, clearly wanting to be let in on the joke
"Do you remember trying on the Phantom mask in my room when we were sophomores? You were trying to make it so badass."
"It was badass, babe, because I was doing it."
Rachel tried to hide the excitement at his use of a pet name for her. He dug into his food and was clearly still a fan of her cooking from the noises he made as he ate the lasagna, devoured the garlic bread that had been peeking out of the wicker basket on the table and washed it down with the wine that she had chosen to accompany the meal.
"You seem to enjoying dinner," Rachel said lightheartedly, "I had a feeling you've been eating like crap the past couple of weeks."
"You know me too well," he replied with a mischievous grin.
'I used to,' Rachel thought to herself sadly. The man before her was clearly changed and she didn't know if it was simply because he was guarded because of their broken relationship or if there was other reasons behind the tenseness.
"Noah, what happened to you over there? I know the basics but…"
Puck shook his head fervently. Having been there, having seen it first hand. The daily life of a soldier wasn't pretty and the ambush that he had experienced played out in his mind every goddamn day. As the leader of that group, he felt responsible for the lives lost even if there was no way that he could have predicted the attack. But he could have responded differently, prepared differently…fuck he didn't know anymore. He just knew that there were two families without fathers and a girl had a fiancé that was never coming home. "You don't want to know that stuff Rach."
"Why? Why are you trying to make decisions for me? I asked because I want to know."
She reached across the small kitchen table and placed her hand over his. He looked down at their joined hands. The simple touch let him know that she truly did want to know that part of him but he wasn't ready. But he could tell her why that was.
"You not knowing…you being separate from all of that…fuck, you're all that kept me from sliding into this dark place where I was no longer me."
Tears pooled in her eyes at his admission that she was what kept him sane. She wanted to kiss him, to hold him and tell him that he was safe now even if he complained that he didn't need it.
"Noah, I can see what you're thinking and you are still you. Would I be working as hard as I am to get into your good graces if you weren't?" He shrugged. "What?" she questioned
"Nothin'," he said but Rachel wouldn't let him off that easily.
"No, you shrugged which means you don't agree with my statement."
"A big part of me wants to believe that you want to be with me, that we can just go back. But the other part still knows that you dropped me pretty fast for Owen."
Rachel hung her head in shame because he was right. Owen had happened. She couldn't change that in their history and there was no hope in Noah forgetting it either, it seemed.
Puck didn't like seeing her defeated. "Listen, don't get all broken up about that because it's not the end of the world. I'm just saying that it's going to take some time."
He left it at that. He wouldn't make promises because he didn't know if he could keep them. But Puck certainly enjoyed the hopeful look that crossed her face.
"Can you tell me more? About being over there?" Rachel asked scooting her chair closer to him, which he didn't miss. Puck could faintly smell her perfume and it pulled him back to times where he held her close. It was intoxicating.
"Only if you tell me more about the new show," he countered.
Progress. That's all Rachel had hoped for and she believed wholeheartedly that they were achieving that.
Puck dragged Cole to the school where Finn taught to meet up for lunch before the young teacher finished out the afternoon with more classes. They found an empty deli where they ordered food and grabbed a table.
Cole was still attempting to get details out of his friend regarding the dinner with Rachel. Finn catalogued information for Quinn, sure that any information he could give her about this topic that she had been obsessing over would play in his favor. If she was happy enough maybe she would have mercy on him and they could have sex. It had been awhile for the married couple and Finn was pretty sure it was because she was so focused on reuniting their friends.
"Jesus, after the way Rachel was acting right before you two ended things, I didn't think that you two would ever get back on the right path."
Puck stopped chewing at the comment that Finn made.
"What are you talking about?" Puck questioned, knowing that Rachel most likely had sought advice from Quinn and her fathers but Finn? That was weird.
"Um…yeah," Finn started, getting the feeling that he probably should have not brought the topic up. "Rachel came by the school after New Year's like really upset. We talked."
"Hudson…what did you say? Exact words would be fucking nice." Puck was desperately trying to keep his composure but hearing that Rachel was upset and she and Finn "talked" was not comforting. In fact, it was terrifying. Finn had been his best friend since they were little and despite some bumps in the road in high school, they had always been basically like brothers.
But Finn was not the type of person that Puck went to advice for. Especially not on serious stuff. If he wanted to get a new car or if he was questioning if Heidi Klum still looked good after popping out four kids, sure he would get his friend's opinion. But on matters of relationships and whatnot? There were more suitable options.
Finn recounted his words of explaining that he knew that Puck loved Rachel but he wasn't sure that he was the marrying kind. Cole nearly choked on his sandwich at the words that were tumbling from the teacher's mouth. The murderous look in Puck's eyes was intimidating.
"Un-fucking-believable. You tell me this how many goddamn months later? You would think you might tell me when I came home and bought a fucking ring that you were the one to plant more seeds of doubt."
Puck threw money on the table and stood up.
"Whoa, don't blame me for your shortcomings."
Puck rolled his eyes. "Rachel asked me if I was going to marry her and I said I didn't know. I never said no. You made her think that." He left the deli without another word. Cole watched his friend go and wasn't really sure what to say to Finn.
Somehow Finn felt like he would be sleeping on the couch that night.