To be Wise and Love

Hi did I seriously just write shakespeare!faberry? YES I DID. I'm a fuckin nerd, I'm well aware. The amount of lines I had pulled from different plays really is the peak of my bullfuckery lol. Title is from Troilus & Cressida – Act 4, Scene 2

A note: it might be better to read this on ao3 or tumblr if you wanna see where i got the quotes from, since ffn didn't let me do footnotes.

x.X.x

"You know, it'd probably be a good idea to actually look at your book when you're studying," Rachel remarks wryly, and from where she's sitting semi-beside Quinn, she watches her girlfriend flushes at the words.

Taking no small amount of pleasure in it, she allows a coquettish smirk to dawn on her lips. They're having their weekly study session – though how well they accomplish that is up to debate – and throughout their reading of Henry V, Rachel's been feeling hazel eyes on her the entire time.

At the corner of her eye, she sees that Quinn doesn't look away at all, hand propping up her chin, and Rachel pretends that her cheeks don't turn rosy as her heart speeds, simply continuing to look at (and not read) her book.

The smile on Quinn's face can only be described as smitten, and it only takes a few seconds for Rachel's façade to break, a sweet smile of her own coming out. She turns in her seat with a giggle, getting a better look at her girlfriend, and she can't deny that the sight makes her breath hitch – a Quinn Fabray in causal clothing never ceases to cause her heart to skip a beat.

"Quinn, go study!" she berates, tone playful, and Quinn's eyes shine with mirth in response.

"But why, I am, my lady," the blonde drawls, voice dipping with false extravagance, "for from women's eyes this doctrine I derive: they sparkle still the right Promethean fire; they are the books, the arts, the academes; that show, contain, and nourish all the world1. With that in mind, I am no fool to be gleaming eternal knowledge from your eyes, am I not?"

Quinn looks pleased with herself as she finishes her monologue, and Rachel's heart flutters up a storm – both from how cute her girlfriend looks and from the poetry that said girlfriend had just sprouted.

Biting down on her lower lip slightly to keep her bashful grin at bay, she arches an unimpressed brow instead. "Quoting Shakespeare at me, Fabray? Good thing that love looks not with the eyes, but with the mind2, huh?"

As Rachel gives herself a mental pat on the back for her quick thinking, Quinn shrugs, an impassioned expression on her face. "Then hear my soul speak – of the very instant that I saw you, did my heart fly at your service3," she quotes, and Rachel's never been so approving of how Russell and Judy had Quinn read Shakespeare early on.

Unlike the numerous other extracurriculars her parents had enforced on her, Quinn actually liked reading and reciting literature works, and well…if it so happened that Rachel absolutely adored having the blonde aim masterful words at her, then all the better.

Trying to ignore how the light blush on her face is all-telling, Rachel tries her best to keep a nonchalant mask on. "Then why aren't you studying, if you're that eager to please me?" she retorts.

"Well, my beautiful songbird, the answer's quite simple, really." A grin that's almost (definitely) shit-eating in its quality appears on Quinn's alluring lips. "She's beautiful, and therefore to be wooed; she is a woman, therefore to be won4."

Before Quinn can even take a breather though, Rachel's narrowing her eyes in indignation and yelping, "Quinn Fabray you did not just give me a misogynistic quote!"

"I have no idea what you're talking about," Quinn deadpans, eyes gleaming with false innocence, and Rachel huffs, opening her mouth to go on a tirade.

Any words she might have sprouted are instantly quelled though, because the next thing she knows, Quinn's surging forward from her chair to draw her into a kiss, a hand reaching up to cup Rachel's jaw.

Fully appreciative of the romanticism of it all, Rachel tilts her head to deepen the kiss immediately, heart racing with butterflies like every time she feels Quinn's lips against her own, and she pulls on the hem of Quinn's shirt, tugging her down gently.

Quinn moves to straddle her lap without any more prompting, and Rachel sighs in satisfaction at how well the blonde's weight settles across her. Trying her damn hardest to keep her hands from delving under Quinn's hoodie and feeling up smooth alabaster skin, she stifles a moan when teeth nip at her lower lip, fanning the arousal steadily building up in her lower stomach.

"Quinn…We're supposed to- to be studying," she breathes out in between fervent kisses, and her girlfriend smirks against her lips, drawing away only to start nipping a trail up Rachel's jaw with a few quick pecks.

Her willpower unable to last any much longer at this rate, Rachel's hands move further south to palm a full, round ass – Quinn Fabray is way too fucking sexy for her own good – and it's then that Quinn chooses to pull away, leaving Rachel a hot and panting mess beneath her.

The lavish smirk that's on her girlfriend's face is way too smug for Rachel's tastes, and under her breath, she mutters sullenly, "Tease."

"Oh, but I thought we were to be studying?" Quinn gasps in faux-theatrics (it's only cute when Rachel does it, okay? …And no, that slight upturn of her lips was the result of a muscle spasm and nothing more), though the rough quality to the blonde's voice gives her away, allowing Rachel some semblance of satisfaction.

"I hate you," she sulks quietly, crossing her arms over her chest while pouting, and Quinn laughs.

The blonde leans forward to plant a light, lingering kiss on Rachel's lips, and she feels Quinn smile against her. "I humbly do beseech of your pardon, for too much loving you5," Quinn murmurs, low and soft, and well-

Rachel swoons. There's no way around it.

The delivery of the line in Quinn's downright too-sensual-for-this-world husk has Rachel's heart fluttering up a storm, and casting a quick glance to her Henry V book, she racks her brain to remember a few lines she recalls reading earlier.

"You have witchcraft in your lips, Quinn Fabray," she breathes out, voice airy, and pausing a bit to remember the exact wording, she continues, "alas, I know no ways to mince it in love, but directly to say 'I love you'6."

When Quinn's eyes light up with delight, Rachel feels proud of herself immediately, loving how she's put that show-stopping beam on her girlfriend's face, and after a brief moment of deliberating, she darts forward to steal another kiss.

"I love you." Another. "I love you." Another. "I love you." And yet another.

Quinn kisses back tenderly, passionately, lovingly, and Rachel feels as if she falls in love all over again.

"Well, good thing I have enough words for the both of us then, huh?" Quinn softly says as she pulls away, and really – the smile on her face is everything.

It's the smile that tells Rachel that she's not the only one hopelessly in love, that all of her feelings are returned and more, and she basks in it, relishes in it, lives in it.

"O heaven, O earth, bear witness to this sound, and crown what I profess with kind event if I speak true," Quinn starts, a soft look on her face. "If hollowly, invert what best is boded me to mischief…I, beyond all limit of what else in the world, do love, prize, honor you7."

There's a moment as everything keeps to stop in place for a beat, and right then, Rachel feels her entire being swell up with so much unadulterated love that it's almost astounding, the fact that she can feel so strongly for someone; the fact that someone can make her feel like this.

…But it's not, because it's Quinn, and that makes it so much better.

"…Yeah?" she breathes out, feeling a bashful grin stretch onto her face. Quinn flashes a brilliant smile at her in return, and her heart beats up a storm in her chest.

"Doubt thou the stars are fire, doubt that the sun doth move, doubt truth to be a liar," a pause here, as Quinn takes in a breath. "…But never doubt I love8," the blonde vows, and at that, Rachel can't help but press her lips against Quinn's, unable to do anything else.

Both of her hands move to cup her girlfriend's face, and it's a bruising kiss that Rachel pours all she has into, because she doesn't know how else to say it.

"I love you," she murmurs when she finally pulls back, and Quinn nestles into her lap with a content sigh, brushing her lips across Rachel's cheek.

"I love you too."

Biting her lip, the edge of her voice with her next words is undeniably hopeful. "Always?"

"And forever," Quinn solemnly promises.

Rachel's heartrate goes into overdrive at the proclamation. "You're my forever," she admits, whispered with an almost-reverence, and Quinn just smiles sweetly, leaning forward to kiss her again.

"…I'll love you even more if you actually study though."

"Rachel!"