Disclaimer: I own nothing of Glee and everything related to it. Just borrowing Quinn and Rachel for a bit.
Spoilers: Flashback scenes from '2.04 - Duets' forward.
"Quinn?" Rachel breathed out.
Rachel couldn't believe what she was seeing. There she was: Quinn, in all her beautiful glory. Rachel just stood there in disbelief, watching the blonde as she marked her book and removed her glasses and put them on the coffee table in front of her. She leant back into the chair and nodded her head back, silently beckoning Rachel to come over to her.
After what felt like a lifetime, Rachel finally remembered how to move her legs and walked over to where Quinn was seated, sitting on the other arm chair that made up the quaint corner of the café that the blonde was currently occupying.
"Hi." Rachel nervously began.
"Hello to you too Rach," Quinn smiled. "How are you?"
"I'm doing well thank you. Just a little shocked and highly surprised more than anything, all in a good way of course, in seeing you here. You were the last person I thought I'd see. How are you?"
"I can see that." Quinn chuckled. "I'm pretty good thanks. Quite content as it's Sunday and it's my day to be me, so I'm pretty happy with that." The blonde continued.
"I'm glad you're enjoying your day, Quinn. May I ask what you're doing here on such a beautiful day?" Rachel inquired, reaching up and tucking a loose strand back into her waves.
"I am currently reading Dan Brown's Inferno is what I'm doing and I'm here at the Black Sparrow because I saw two women do one of those slow motion movie love embraces with each other from each side of my street whilst I was watching the world going by out of my window. Plus, I'm a coffee addict so, you know, gotta get that fix." Quinn excitedly blurted out.
"That sounds like it was rather beautiful to witness?" Rachel asked.
"It was. I have never seen love like that before and it sparked my brain into thinking overdrive and when you sent me that message just before, I just knew it."
Those last four words intrigued Rachel to no end. She just knew what, Rachel wondered.
"I hope you don't mind me inquiring, but, you just knew what?" Rachel asked, hoping the blonde wouldn't turn her down after having waited for so long.
Quinn knew Rachel was going to ask that and after what the blonde had had the pleasure of experiencing this morning, she knew that she had to answer the singer's question. So she focused her all her attention on to the brunette and began.
It was time.
"Okay Rach. I am going to give you the answers you seek, but I need you to not interrupt, okay?" Quinn asked, with Rachel nodding in agreement, understanding that Quinn needed this and that she had to hear it.
"Okay, well, as you're more than well aware of what I asked of you do for me and I thank you whole-heartedly for that, because otherwise we wouldn't be sitting here." Quinned chuckled, but continued on. "The fact that you are sitting here with me is testament to all the fateful things that have happened in the last 3 months or so."
Quinn paused, taking a deep breath, as she knew what she was about to say was going be both difficult for her to say and difficult for Rachel to hear.
"When I landed in Italy, and after clearing customs and taking a much-needed bathroom break, I saw the paparazzi going nuts over someone, and with their speaking in Italian, I could still hear that they were saying your name and I couldn't believe it. I spent years trying to get over you. I tried to do that with alcohol, women and burying myself in my work, but to no avail, I did not succeed. I didn't develop a drinking addiction, couldn't afford to because of my work, but every two to three weeks or so I would just sink my own ship, downing a bottle or so over the course of an afternoon and well into the night until I would pass out. I drank just to forget you for a while, just to give my mind a break because you were always on it. Some of these nights I'd be relatively sober enough to go out and I head straight to a bar just to pick up. It's probably not what you think I'd bring myself to do, but I did it. I needed to let out some of the frustration that I had with both myself and you and it was always girls who looked like you that I would choose to take back to a room or go to back to theirs with. Never once would I bring one home with me. I couldn't ever share something like that in my bed with someone who wasn't you. I couldn't bring myself to do it." Quinn stopped, taking a swig from her lukewarm coffee, setting it back down and continuing on.
"As much as I wanted to not be that person, I was and I am still so ashamed of that. I spent all this time, trying so hard to forget the one person, the only person, my heart has ever loved and it just wouldn't let up. I couldn't ever forget the love that heart possessed for you and after all these years, it still burns with as much raging fury as it did when I first told you I lov-."
"Rachel!"
Rachel's head furiously whipped around at the sound of her name, with anger burning in her eyes for the person that interrupted Quinn.
Kurt sauntered over, taking a seat on the arm of Rachel's chair.
"Look who we have here - Quinn Fabray. My, oh my, it's been a long time Quinn." Kurt said, knowing the blonde was good friends with Brittany and Santana but almost never running into her. He threw an arm around Rachel's shoulders, giving her a quick squeeze in greeting.
"Hello to you too, Kurt. It has been a while, hasn't it?" Quinn replied, the soft smile adorning her delicate features disappearing as soon as she noticed the fury that was spread across Rachel's face and disappearing into her show smile as Rachel began to speak.
"Kurt, would you be able to give us a minute? Quinn was in the middle of telling me something that I would very much love to finish hearing her tell."
"It's okay Rachel, you and Kurt had plans and I wouldn't want to keep you from them any longer than I already have." Quinn trailed off.
"No, Quinn, it's fine, really." Rachel replied, turning her attention to Kurt, "Kurt, would you please go find us a table and I'll join you in a moment? After all, you did ask me to meet you here, so you must be chomping at the bit to have a look at their menu." Rachel added with sweetness in her voice, knowing how to work Kurt when she needed to… now being one of those times.
"Well, I heard the lady, I best be going to find us a table. Quinn, it was lovely to see you again." Kurt replied to both women, standing up from his spot on the arm of Rachel's chair and walking away to a free table on the other side of the café.
"I'm so sorry about that Quinn. Kurt does have a tendency to interrupt at the best of times."
"It's okay Rachel. I probably shouldn't have started saying what I did when I knew you wouldn't be here if you didn't have plans. And having said that, I do want to finish what I started telling you, if that's okay with you?" Quinn gently asked.
"It is more than okay Quinn and what you have said, it doesn't hurt as much as I may have lead you to believe. I wasn't a part of your life for a long time, so I have no control over what you may or may not have done and also, I don't have an opinion really as it is your life, not mine and that's okay." She finished with a smile.
Rachel leant across the coffee table, softly taking Quinn's delicate hand in her own.
"I have to ask though; did you mean what you said in your message earlier? About me somehow knowing that you were going to call me up to ask about taking me out, like it was fate almost."
"I meant every word, Rachel." Quinn softly replied.
A brilliant smile lit up Rachel's face with Quinn's reply and the blonde couldn't contain her happiness, with her face lighting up like the fourth of July.
"Okay then, well how about I beat you to it then. I'm going to the park later on this afternoon to feed the ducks with Brittany and despite what they think, I would love it if you would join us? Just to ease things and break some of the nervousness I've been feeling and then maybe we can a walk and see where things go from there?"
"I was already going to the park to feed the ducks with Brittany. That sneaky girl!" Quinn laughed.
"You know what though? Despite common popular opinion in high school, that girl is incredibly smart." The brunette added.
"That she is. Well, I guess you better get over to Kurt. He looks like he wants to throw his coffee on me because I'm keeping you from him." Quinn added, glancing over at him as she spoke.
"Okay then. It was so, so lovely seeing you this morning Quinn. I hope you we can talk more when I do see you next as I have a few things I need to say to you too and I'd really like it if we could at least talk about those?" Rachel added, hoping she hadn't scared the blonde off.
"That, we can do Rach. I'm so glad I looked out my window this morning otherwise I probably wouldn't be here with you." Quinn finished, her hand slipping from the singer's as the brunette stood up.
Rachel scribbled down something on a Post-It from her bag and bent over, sticking it to Quinn's book.
"I look forward to seeing you this afternoon, along with the sneaky duo."
"As do I Rachel. Have a lovely brunch and I shall see you a bit later." Quinn finished, picking up her book and seeing Rachel's note with a quote on it;
Happiness is only real when shared. – Jon Krakauer; Into the Wild
"Enjoy your book and I'll be seeing you, Quinn." Rachel smiled, turning around and making her away over to Kurt, with Quinn watching her walk away.
While the two women had been talking, Kurt had been furiously talking into his phone,
"Thanks for telling me that Quinn frequents this place a lot every Sunday, Britt. I had no idea it was even here and I can see why she spends most of Sundays here; it screams Quinn."
"I was so over seeing those two mope around all the time, so it was time." Brittany replied from the other end of the line.
"Well, Brittany, you are a genius! When Rachel sent me that message while she was in Italy, I knew I had to do something and getting you and Santana involved was the best idea I have had. With Rachel the way she is and Quinn being set in her own ways and from what both Santana and yourself have told me about Quinn's longing for Rachel, I knew she wasn't gonna make a move without some encouragement."
"I realise I am a genius now Kurt – "
"That you are babe." Santana chimed in the background.
"Thanks baby. As I was saying Kurt, it was only a matter of time before either one of us finally did something about it. With the three of us being friends with the two of them, how did we never make them cross paths sooner?"
"Yeah no shit, baby!" Santana yelled out in the background.
"Yes that would have saved us a lot of grief Britt, but, like I said, it was just a case of waiting for the opportune moment more than anything and that message from Rachel was it." Kurt stopped abruptly as he noticed Rachel beginning to leave Quinn's table. "Shit Brittany, I have to go. Rachel's leaving Quinn's table. Tell Santana I said bye and I'll see you this afternoon. Bye." Kurt hurried out, not even waiting for Brittany to say goodbye before hanging up and shoving his phone back into messenger bag.
"Who was that?" Rachel inquired, taking a seat in the chair opposite Kurt.
"That was Blaine. He sends his love." Kurt replied, smiling with his little white lie and picking up his menu.
"Give him mine when you see him next." Rachel added, hearing her phone chime in her bag.
She dug it out and unlocked it, finding a text message from Quinn.
I forgot to tell you how beautiful you look today – Q x
Rachel's face lit up in a shy smile and she glanced over to Quinn, who was playing the stoic act; her hand propping her book open, fresh coffee in the other and with her head aimed at her book, her eyes were watching Rachel over the top of her black-framed glasses. Quinn shone a smile at the brunette, gently shaking her head and turned her attention back to her book, taking a sip of her coffee as she did so.
Rachel thought about tapping out a reply, but the way she was watching Quinn was enough of a reply for her. She couldn't keep her eyes off of the blonde when she jolted back from a hand finger snapping in her line of vision.
"Rachel!" Kurt spat, sitting back down in his chair. "Welcome back from Planet Quinn."
"I am so sorry Kurt. The message she sent me before just made me get lost in her. She still has that effect on me all this time later." She sighed out.
"Woo! I'm glad she makes you all moon-eyed again Rach, but can we focus on what's important?! This array of dinners and gifts you offered if I could help you out."
"Ah yes, I almost forgot about that. Dinner for you and I, dinner for you and Blaine, dinner for the four of us, being Quinn and I and Blaine and yourself provided things work out the way I hope them to and a Marc Jacobs patent leather military jacket. How could I forget?" Rachel played.
"That's right Missy and after what I just saw and how cosy you two looked, I believe a thanks will more than be in order when the time comes to give the speeches at your wedding." Kurt replied, going along with the playful banter.
"Kurt! I don't believe that will be happening any time soon at all, although I have always wanted to marry her for a very long time." Rachel trailed off, revealing exactly how she felt about the lawyer.
"Wow Rach! I knew you were still in love with her, but I didn't realise it was that deep."
"Yeah, well, when you make the mistake of giving up the best thing that has ever happened to you, it makes you think about all the things you could have had with that person and the more I thought about Quinn and how amazing she is and she has become, it just makes me want that forever and I know she is my forever. Like Steve Maraboli once said, 'I knew you were the one when I realised your smile was my heaven, your laugh my favourite song, and your arms my home'," Rachel lifted a hand, adding an air quote to emphasise her reference. "Quinn is everything to me and even if this isn't what she wants, she will still be my person in my life on way or another, y'know?!" the singer revealed, her eyes welling up at the possibility of this only chance with Quinn not panning out the way she wants it too.
"Oh Rach, I know you want to be with her. If there is anything you regret in this life, it was letting her go after we graduated. I saw how much it broke you to do that. You didn't really become you again until you moved to New York and began your classes at NYADA. Singing brought you back and I'm glad that Quinn is back in your life, even if it's a little tentative right now." The designer smiled, reaching across and taking the singer's hand in his own.
"It is a little tentative as to how much she will be in my life from an outside perspective, yes, but it doesn't change the fact that I hope she stays in my life the way that I want her to be." She replied, dabbing at her eyes with her napkin.
"Fingers crossed all goes well then." Kurt smiled, drawing his hand back in favour of his menu as a waitress approached their table.
A/N: And so the journey begins, to what I hope is a beautiful relationship :) - K