After a week of purposely avoiding being in Rachel's company came a week of unintentionally doing so.
First, Quinn accidentally fell asleep at Charlie's house and not just a nap. After the production meeting, they went back to his house and went up to his room to play video games like the bros they were. She closed her eyes for a second at around 9:00 and the next thing she knew it was 6:00AM.
She borrowed Charlie's car to go back to the house and get ready, but by the time she got there, pretty much everyone in the house was gone. A "cast bonding breakfast" was what the note on her door had said.
For three straight days Rachel had costume fittings in the hours between rehearsals, so even if Quinn wanted to be around her, she couldn't be.
On Tuesday an emergency production meeting was called after rehearsal. It lasted for 2 hours. Not only that, but Sugar took the minutes because Quinn let Charlie go on his date. She was really good at maintaining schedules and keeping organized, detailed breakdowns of things, but meeting minutes? Forget it. Her notes were pretty much useless. Quinn had to completely redo them.
Wednesday was the worst.
On top of it being a dance rehearsal day, Royston asked Quinn to meet with him after the dance rehearsal to set up a new schedule for week five. He wanted to have a complete understudy rehearsal. What? She thought it was the dumbest thing she'd ever heard, but she wasn't going to fight with him.
All the while, she was going absolutely crazy. Even with all the chaos, all she could think about was Rachel. When they were in the same room, Rachel didn't hide her feelings anymore. She openly flirted with Quinn, even though they couldn't even speak to each other most of the time. It was excruciating.
Despite thinking about Rachel all the time, she hadn't made any progress on her thoughts on their situation.
On her way back from the theater after her meeting with Royston, she decided to trust her shuffle function. Mistake. Clearly it knew something and decided to play songs she forgot she had and were disgustingly relevant to her life at the moment.
The worst was the last one that played before she got to the house. She didn't even know what it was when it started playing, but once she started listening to the lyrics she couldn't stop. She picked up her phone and glanced at it.
You Give Me Something
James Morrison
I was meant to tread the water
But now I've gotten in too deep.
For every piece of me that wants you,
Another piece backs away.
Shut. The fuck. Up.
'Cause you give me something
That makes me scared alright
This could be nothing
But I'm willing to give it a try
Please give me something
'Cause someday I might know my heart.
Seriously, shut the fuck up.
She kept thinking it, but she just couldn't stop it.
You only waited up for hours
Just to spend a little time alone with me.
Oh, well now this is getting rude.
I never thought that I'd love someone
That was someone else's dream.
Cut the shit man.
Why couldn't she stop the song?
'Cause someday I might call you from my heart,
But it might be a second too late.
And the words that I could never say
Are gonna come out anyway.
Fuck you, James Morrison. Fuck you and your lyrically perfect song. And your horrendously impeccable timing. Fuck you!
'Cause someday I might know my heart.
"Fuck you!" she screamed at her phone and finally tapped the pause bars. She looked up to the house that was completely dark save the porch light and let out a sigh of relief. She'd been sitting in the driveway for at least half of the song and hadn't noticed that all the lights were off until it was over.
Well, that was irrational.
~~{}~~
But now I've gotten in too deep
Quinn wanted to sleep so badly. The last four days had been so long and she'd already gotten in so much later than she'd wanted to. Sleep just wouldn't come.
For every piece of me that wants you,
Another piece backs away
Every inch of her brain was dripping with thoughts of Rachel. She wished she just knew what to do. She always knew what to do. Her instincts always guided her in the right direction, but something just kept telling her not to listen to them.
And you give me something
That makes me scared alright
As Rachel slept in her bed on the other side of the room, Quinn stared into the darkness at her silhouette. She just couldn't stop her brain. Sick of lying in bed and not sleeping, she threw off her blanket and quietly left the room, tip toeing down the stairs. She rounded the corner to go into the kitchen and crashed, head on into another body.
"Sorry!"
"Hey, Quinn! Why are you up?" the familiar voice of her tall blonde best friend asked.
"Can't sleep," Quinn shrugged and ducked past Brittany to the kitchen, "How about you?" she looked back from the sink.
"Santana's snoring and not the cute kind. You know, it's pretty weird when you can't sleep. You can always sleep. What's the matter?" Brittany the Ever Observant cornered Quinn in the inescapable kitchen.
"Nothing," Quinn shrugged, "I had a coffee during dance rehearsal."
What was that? Why were her reflexes set to "lie her face off?"
"You know you can tell me anything, right?" Brittany said with a slight pout.
"Babe, why are you down here... oh," Santana had ninja-ed her way into the kitchen from upstairs, "Hey, Q."
"You were snoring," Brittany turned and gave Santana a soft smile.
"I'm sorry. Come back to bed? I can't sleep without you," Santana yawned and nodded towards the stairs.
"But Quinn needs us," Brittany pouted and then looked back to Quinn.
This could be nothing...
She did. She definitely needed them.
"I'll be right back," Santana whispered and started for the stairs, "Set up those mosquito things on the porch."
"I know you don't want to talk about it, but it's keeping you up," Brittany wrapped her arm around Quinn's shoulder and guided her out the front door. She moved her all the way to the corner of the porch and signaled for her to sit down in the rocking chair. Then Brittany snatched up one of the bug lanterns and lit the candle inside with a lighter that was already on the porch.
Mere seconds after Brittany had sat down in the other rocking chair, Santana was out on the porch with them, wearing a little bit more than the tank top and underwear she was sporting before.
"Okay," Santana started in her still groggy voice, as she sat on the thick railing of the porch, "First thing's first: What happened Sunday?"
But I'm willing to give it a try.
"I kissed her."
Might as well give the whole truth.
"You kissed her?" Santana's jaw hung open even after she was done speaking.
"I finished what she started..." Quinn trailed off as a moving picture, complete with sensory elements, of everything that had happened at that picnic table flashed through her mind.
"Because you like her," Brittany smiled, leaning against the arm of the rocking chair towards Quinn.
"And she does like you," Santana only kind of said 'I told you so.'
"She wants to take things slow," Quinn needed to make this conversation go her way.
"What do you want?" Brittany asked, leaning back into the rocking chair.
"If I knew, we wouldn't be here right how," Quinn sighed, mostly at herself for being so pathetic.
"Okay, what's stopping you?" Santana tried, "Never mind! I know what they are." Her hand went to the pocket of her shorts and out came her phone, "I have a present for you."
"I don't like presents..." Quinn shook her head and hated every second of waiting for what Santana had for her.
"Mmm... Rachel..."
"What the fuck?" Quinn popped up from the rocking chair and tried to grab Santana's phone from her, "Charlie's dead!"
"Chill, Q!"
"Santana..." Brittany cooed through gritted teeth.
"I'm going to delete it! Get off!" Santana grunted as she tried to fend Quinn off of her back.
Suddenly, Quinn felt arms around her waist and her feet being lifted off of the floor. Brittany lifted her and put her back in front of the rocking chair in the corner.
"Why did he send you that?" Quinn felt like her head was going to boil off of her body, she was so angry, "Fuck! Why did he video that?"
"First of all, you woke him up with your moaning... awkward... second, he cares about you, like we do. And he thought you should know what's happening while you're asleep," Santana said as she rubbed her shoulders.
"I'm completely aware, thank you," Quinn expelled through clenched teeth.
"Kurt told me what you did for him," Santana said as she handed Brittany her phone.
"What did I do for Kurt?" Quinn had only slightly come down from her rage high.
"Blaine?" Santana 'duh-ed.'
"Oh, so what?" Quinn shook her head and sat back down. Clearly she wasn't getting out of that corner any time soon.
"And you let Charlie skip the meeting last night so he could go on his date, saying, and I quote, 'I wouldn't want you to miss out on any of your romantic summer,'" Santana crossed her arms and tilted her head to the side.
"I don't see where you're going with this," Quinn huffed.
"When I moved out, you always let me know how Santana was doing, even though you were miles and miles away," Brittany added, handing Santana her phone back and sitting down again.
"You're a sucker for romantic comedies," Santana jumped in.
"And remember when Santana and I started actually dating? You hung onto every word I said to you about all the romantic things Santana was doing to make up for lost time."
"And before that, when I told you how I really felt about Brittany, you were my biggest champion. You told me that I should trust how I felt because instincts don't steer us wrong," they were bombarding her.
'Cause someday I might know my heart.
"Why do you want love for everyone but yourself?" Santana asked with a sad expression rarely used for others besides herself.
What? That was the most absurd thing she'd ever heard, yet she had no rebuttal.
"She's scared," Brittany, Master of the Not-So-Obvious, said with a sad look not much different than Santana's.
I never thought that I'd love someone
Two little words swimming in the air easily whisked away all of the oxygen in Quinn's lungs.
"Quinn?"
Trying her best to regain some sort of composure and to re-inflate her lungs, Quinn looked up towards to Santana.
"What really happened with Becca?" Santana asked softly.
Quinn answered the same way she'd been answering for over a year, "She got a job in Amherst and moved after she graduated."
"Right," Santana rolled her eyes, "What happened before that?"
"She told me she got a job in Amherst and was moving there after she graduated," Quinn said thinking confidence, but her lungs and vocal cords betrayed her.
"And what did you say to her?"
That was someone else's dream.
"Nothing! What was supposed to say? 'No, stay! I love you!' It wouldn't have made a difference. She applied for that job knowing she'd have to move and knowing that I still had a year left in Boston!" Quinn let out what she'd been holding in for over a year.
"Where's Amherst?" Brittany asked.
"East Bum Fuck, Massachusetts," Santana muttered.
"West," Quinn sighed, "Anything east of Boston is Atlantic Ocean."
"You didn't even tell her you wanted to try long distance?" Brittany was suddenly quite stressed about what Quinn was telling them.
"She didn't want that. That was the next thing she said after she told me about the job. Ugh, she talked to me like I was this love sick child. It was the most degrading fifteen minutes of my life. Good fucking riddance," Quinn huffed, throwing herself into the back of the rocking chair.
Please give me something
"What a fucking cu-"
"Santana!"
"Twat."
"Rachel isn't going anywhere," Brittany smiled, "in fact, she's going to the same place you are when our summer in New Hampshire is over."
"How do you know...?"
'Cause someday I might call you from my heart
"How will you know if you never even give it a chance?" Santana jumped in, "You need to stop thinking about what could happen and start making things happen. What Becca did was absolute shit, but you can't measure the rest of your relationships with that. Learn from it, don't fuck yourself over because of it."
But it might be a second too late
"You're right."
"And stop with the other excuses- wait, what?" Santana's arms dropped from her chest to her side as she leaned forward in surprise.
"I know what I want," Quinn sighed feeling a slight weight off of her chest just from saying it.
And the words that I could never say
"Is there more kissing Rachel involved?" Brittany asked with her chin in her palms like a giddy school girl.
"If she'll still have me," Quinn shook her head, feeling the guilt of putting Rachel through what she had.
"Oh please! She's been throwing herself at you from across the room all week," Santana guffawed in her normal manner.
"You noticed?"
"Helen Keller would have noticed," Santana narrowed her eyes and tilted her head.
"You have to talk to her, Quinn," Brittany was still all giddy.
"I know-"
She was interrupted by the sound of the door sucking open. A flip flopped foot stepped down onto the porch followed by a familiar face... and voice, "I thought I heard voices out here."
Are gonna come out anyway.
"You have the most impeccable timing, Berry," Santana said as she pushed herself off of the railing, "Come on, babe. I promise I'll sleep on my side."
"It's okay, I'll just elbow you in the ribs next time," Brittany said as she got up, then turned to Quinn and laughed silently. Before she turned to go back in the house, she gave Quinn a quick thumbs up and a smile.
It was a little silly, but Quinn still appreciated every ounce of it.
"See you in the morning, Midget," Santana put her hand on Rachel's shoulder and gently pushed her away from the door and a step closer to Quinn.
"Night, guys," she looked a little lost as Santana and Brittany slipped back into the house.
"Couldn't sleep?" Rachel asked and nervously nibbled on her lip once the door was closed.
"No, which is a rare occurrence," Quinn admitted and hoped Rachel would figure out the why on her own.
"I know," Rachel chuckled and shifted her weight, "usually you're snoring away once your head hits the pillow."
"I have a deviated septum," Quinn mumbled in her own defense.
"I knew that, too," she looked down and tucked a loose piece of hair behind her ear, "I heard you singing in one of the rare moments you weren't sleeping in our room. You must have thought that no one was upstairs..."
"I didn't," Quinn replied flatly as her cheeks burned.
"You have a really pretty voice," Rachel stepped forward a little, "it's just so effortless. Oh and the way you speak... ugh some of the tones in your voice... I could listen to you talk all day."
Where did all of this come from? Quinn still couldn't fathom how either of them could have such strong feelings with such little interaction, despite how often they were in each others presence.
"How... do you just-"
"Pay attention to everything you do whenever I'm around you like a creep? Yeah, pretty much," Rachel smiled nervously, twisting her flip flop into the wood floor of the porch.
"That's a smidge more than I was going to say..."
"I don't know what it is. It's like... a spell!" Rachel's arms flew up in question, "I was convinced that you didn't like me and you'd just just been humoring me the entire time. I thought that was it, like that was what was causing all the thoughts... and the dreams..." she trailed off for a moment, shaking her head and the porch floor. She looked up again and sighed, "And to have this desire to know everything about you. Because for some reason I find myself infatuated with things I can't have. And then Sunday..." she bit down on her lip and laughed silently through her nose, "This isn't an infatuation. I'm really feeling these things and it's all I can think about."
"You talk so much," Quinn sighed with a half smile as she stared at Rachel's lips that had finally stopped moving.
"And you don't talk enough," Rachel sighed back and moved to sit on the banister across from Quinn.
"I talk," Quinn leaned back in the chair and crossed her arms.
"You think," Rachel shook her head, "I finally understand what Santana said to me."
"What did she say to you?" Quinn's eyes grew wide, worried about what on Earth her best friend could have said to Rachel and when.
"I told her that I didn't think you liked me at all and then she said, 'Q thinks too much,' as if that were a proper answer. Turns out it was," Rachel laughed a little.
"So you want to know what I'm thinking?" Quinn asked pulling up her leg to hide behind it just a little.
"Yes, please," Rachel smiled and moved over a little bit so she was directly across from Quinn.
"What do you mean by slow?" Quinn asked with a quirked eyebrow. She wanted to know what she was thinking, what she was thinking were questions.
"No pushing and we take things as they come," Rachel's beautiful, hopeful smile returned.
"Okay, and what if something happens and this doesn't work out and we still have to room together? What do we do then?" Quinn still thought this was a legitimate concern.
"Then we'll continue to room together and hope that we can handle it like mature adults," Rachel said with a hint of recognizable uncertainty.
"I'm not sure I like that answer..."
"Well I don't like the question."
"But we have to consider it!"
"Can't we just hope for the best?"
"That's not enough!"
Rachel let out a frustrated groan and pushed herself off of the banister. Before Quinn even knew what happening, her face was between Rachel's hands and her lips were interlocked with Rachel's.
Just like the last three times her body was overwhelmed and she could barely catch her breath when her lips were returned to her.
"Is that a better reason?" Rachel asked breathlessly as she leaned in with her hands still on Quinn's cheeks, "There's no way you can tell me you don't feel that."
"Sometime that's going to stop working as an argument," Quinn nibbled on her bottom lip as she looked down at Rachel's lips and sighed, "but probably not in the foreseeable future."
"The future, huh?" Rachel leaned back onto her heels and gave Quinn the pouty/smirky face.
Quinn smiled and leaned forward in the rocking chair closer to Rachel. She nodded and took Rachel's lips with hers, receiving an encore presentation of every sensation she'd ever experienced when their lips met.
"That's what I was thinking by the way," Quinn let her lip slide between her teeth as she looked back down to Rachel's lips.
"Well, I'm glad you're speaking your mind," Rachel laughed lightly.
"I'll try."
"That's better than not at all," Rachel stood up and held out her hand to help Quinn up... not that she needed help getting out of a chair, but she took it anyways just to be holding Rachel's hand, "So, you think Santana will get off your back about 'getting laid' now?"
Rachel didn't even bat an eyelash at what she'd just said.
Quinn did, however and suddenly she was swimming in a world where someone was definitely on her back... on a bed... or a wall... anywhere really...
She snapped out of her daze as soon as she heard Rachel's giggling.
"Remember when I said 'let's take it slow?'"
"Mhm..." Quinn knew she was blushing.
Rachel looked up with a smile, then leaned forward to place a soft kiss on Quinn's lips. "We should go upstairs," she whispered when she took her lips back.
This time, feeling her usual humor rise, Quinn quirked up a guttery eyebrow.
"To sleep," Rachel smirked and bumped into Quinn with her hip.
"I know," Quinn swung their hands between them as they walked towards the door, "But it's nice to know you're thinking about it, too."
"What?" Rachel turned with her hand on the doorknob. Quinn just smiled, "Mmm... clever, but you already knew that." She turned back around and walked into the house. They walked up the stairs without saying another word, until they were behind their closed door.
"Good night," Rachel smiled and walked towards her bed.
That's it?
Quinn reached out and grabbed Rachel's wrist, pulling her into her, "After all that, that's all I get?"
Rachel's lips twisted adorably as her arms draped over Quinn's shoulders, "I guess you can have a good night kiss."
"It's a little late to be playing hard to get," Quinn had finally found her flirty footing.
"Well then, in that case," Rachel popped up on her tip toes and interlocked their lips, "Maybe we could... sleep in your bed again? I mean, since we've already done it once before..."
The thought of it made Quinn's heart pound in her ears and despite thinking it was a little faster than slow, she answered in a nodded 'yes.' Silently they got into the same spots they woke up in the morning after the party, but this time, instead of having their backs towards each other, Quinn's front was pressed Rachel's back and her arm draped over her waist.
The few hours of sleep she got with Rachel in her arms were some of the best she'd ever had.
'Cause someday I might now my heart.
A/N: So, I personally hate waiting for fics to update which is why I stayed up way too late to finish Chapter 18. I'm posting this from my new iPad Mini that I worked my ass off to buy. Just thought I'd share that little tidbit. Welp, feel free to leave me your opinions. You know I love to hear from all of you.