Disclaimer: Though I wish at 11:11 every day, I still don't own glee =(

Chapter Eleven

This was it, this was the moment that they had worked towards all year long. They stood there holding hands smiling at one another because they knew they had given it their all. No matter what, they were a family, that's what Mr. Schuester had said as they walked onto the stage and they agreed they would always be a family, but they wanted to be a family of winners. The head judge handed the votes to the official and sat back down. The official made his way centre stage and made a long speech about talent and performance that no one cared about. All they wanted to know was who the hell would be going to nationals. Top three, that's all they needed. It would be nice to be first but they just needed to be in the top three. "If we don't place, Imma cut a bitch" "hahaha calm down Kurt, we gonna place."

And they did. Second felt just as good as first if you asked the members of New Directions. It had taken a while for them to realize what was being said. Second, that's in the top three. That means nationals in July. That means they have three months to prepare. It means they placed. Its three hours later and when it finally hits them. They're in the hotel pool swimming and laughing when Matt does a back flip off the diving board, "Nationals here we come!" And then they all go crazy, someone finds the stereo system and its one huge party. A few of them think that this may be the best day of their lives, others think that will be their all time favourite memory and the rest know that this is just the beginning for them, they had two more years to create moments like this.

Rachel gets up to go get snack and Finn offers to help (bad choice?), no one really pays attention because this is a good moment and there's no time to think about drama. It isn't until Quinn realizes that its taking longer than it should that she decides to go see what's going on. She tells Puck that she's only going because they probably got more than they could carry (no need to worry him) and that she expects him to play water polo with her when she gets back. Matt distracts him before he has a chance to argue.

She had expected to see them arguing, really she had. Finn had made it no secret to her how much Puck and Rachel being together bothered him. She was he best friend, he told her everything (even things she didn't want to hear), and she even expected him to get in her face when she didn't listen because that's what he does when he feels like someone isn't taking him seriously. What she didn't expect was for him to kiss her.S he never ever thought that this would happen. She never thought that he would do something like this. She was head cherrio, she had gotten pregnant by her boyfriend's best friend and managed to claw her way back to the top of the social hierarchy. She was Quinn Fabray, and it was about time her boyfriend realized just what that meant.

Rachel knew that Finn helping her with the food was a bad idea. She also knew that he would try to talk to her about Noah and that would only piss her off. What she didn't know is that he would kiss her, because if she had then she would never have left the swimming pool. She doesn't know how long she is left immobile from shock and she doesn't know how much force was behind her slap but she hopes it hurts. She's ready to lay into him about boundaries and kissing their friendship goodbye and the consequences of his actions when she sees Quinn standing not five feet away.

"Noah's looking for you. I'll carry the food in, you should go"

"Quinn i..i…"

"It's okay sweetie, Noah's waiting for you"

Rachel walks right up to Quinn and hugs her. She tells her that she loves her and never meant for this to happen. She would have gone on but Quinn stopped her. Told her that she knew all of this, and that she was the very best sister Quinn could hope to have. She asked that Rachel not say anything to Noah about this, as pissed as she was she didn't want Finn's murder on her hands. She told Rachel that she would handle this her way and not to worry about it. Whether Rachel thought this was a good idea or not really didn't matter. Quinn was her sister in every way but one and Finn was her boyfriend so she would let her do this however she wanted.

She turned to her boyfriend then, and remembered all the times he had sworn he was over whatever crush he had on Rachel. Looked her in the eye and told her that he only wanted to protect his friend from big bad Noah. She didn't believe him, hadn't for a while but she loved him and after everything she had done figured that he deserved her trust. Quinn had changed a lot in the past few months. She had become a better person but that was no reason to think she was above getting her hands dirty. So she smiled and acted like she hadn't seen anything.

If Finn was a smarter person he would have seen the look in her eyes, the one that only meant trouble, but he isn't. So he takes her hand and smiles, he places a kiss on her forehead and acts like he wasn't kissing her best friend (against her will) just five minutes ago.

She asked him if he needed help carrying anything, and asked very politely if he would stop upsetting Rachel. The way she saw it, there was no need to spook the chicken before you cut its head off.

Next: By the time that he knew there was a lesson to be learned the class was over. And there was no one left to give him the notes.