Chapter Eleven
Quinn looked over her shoulder and waited for her friend to finish driving away before turning back to Rachel.
"Are you sure you don't want me to come with you?" Quinn asked.
"Yes, this is just something that I need to do by myself," Rachel said.
"Whatever happens," Quinn said taking Rachel's hand. "Whatever happens, just know that I'm here for you when you're done okay?"
Rachel nodded. "Yeah, I know."
"Good luck in there," Quinn pulled her into a hug, "And I love you."
"I love you too, Quinn." Rachel said. Of course Quinn would choose a time like this to say I love you for the first time, but Rachel wished that she had waited. She didn't want the memory of their first time declaring their love to each other to be intertwined with the memory of the meeting with Shelby that Rachel was about to have.
"Alright," Quinn said after they had pulled away. "Meet me in the coffee shop, hopefully I will have finished some of our math homework by then."
"'kay," Rachel smiled and waved at her girlfriend.
Her smile faded as she turned to face the building in front of her, Carmel High. She took a deep breath and walked at a slow even pace towards the back entrance of the auditorium.
When she entered, she heard the soft, disjointed plunking of piano keys. She didn't announce herself, she wanted a little more time to prepare herself. As she walked down the aisle leading to the stage, and the women sitting at the piano with her back to her, memories washed over her, and suddenly she felt as if she were in another place.
As if she were standing silently in front of a room full of children, a women she never learned the name of holding her hand. It was distantly noisy, and rows of beds were lined in front of her. The women let go of her hand, then gave her a small push. After that, Rachel didn't move anymore, instead she stood frozen, until the lights above her were turned off, and she was slapped for not being in bed and shoved into one of the remaining empty ones. When she woke she was wet, and the next thing she felt was stinging as she was slapped again for messing the bed.
Her first foster home had been packed with children. Before her first day of kindergarten, the girl Rachel had to share a bed with had messed the bed, covering Rachel in it too. When she had told her foster mother, she had been punished for waking her in the middle of the night. She had gone to her first day of kindergarten smelling like urine, and hadn't made any friends. But she had learned to keep her head down.
Now she would have to find some way to meet her mother's eyes. As she neared the piano, an overwhelming feeling of warmth washed over her. She was also filled with dread, as if she were walking to her execution. It was a strange combination.
"I never learned how to play piano," Shelby said. She played four keys together then stopped. "It was one of my biggest regrets."
Shelby looked up and met Rachel's eyes. Rachel felt paralyzed by the intense stare. Tears rose up in her eyelids.
"But it wasn't my biggest one." Shelby stood and approached Rachel.
Shelby paused for a moment, looking into Rachel's large, frightened eyes. Maternal warmth rushed through her, and then she couldn't resist the urge. She wrapped her arms around Rachel and hugged her.
Rachel tensed but otherwise didn't move. She stood there with her arms at her sides, holding her breath. Shelby's arms were strong and gentle. Wave after wave of warmth washed over Rachel. After a moment, Rachel felt her knotted insides loosen by a fraction.
"Let me guess," Rachel said, a little surprised when her voice came out normally. "Your biggest one was that Vocal Adrenaline lost all of its coolers after Sectionals."
Shelby pulled away. "You heard about that?" She said in amusement masking tears.
"One of my best friends is dating your lead singer. News travels fast." Rachel felt suddenly cold without Shelby's arms around her.
"Well, Jesse's not supposed to be dating Tina anymore. But I guess there's no point in even trying to break them up. Some people just can't stay apart."
"While others very easily can."
Shelby didn't miss the bitter note in Rachel's voice.
"Do you want to, go get some coffee or something? Then we can talk more properly."
"No." Rachel said firmly. "I don't think that would really be appropriate considering that you're a teacher, and I'm a minor."
"Alright, lets just sit down then," Shelby said.
Shelby held onto Rachel's arm lightly, as they moved towards the cushioned auditorium chairs, as if Rachel needed the guidance. Rachel didn't like the feeling of being controlled, and she felt uncomfortable with Shelby in her personal space. But she also felt relieved to be receiving her mother's touch. After nine years she had thought she never would again.
Shelby sat down expecting Rachel to take the chair beside her. At the last moment, Rachel moved to sit in a row in front of Shelby. She wanted a break from the closeness, and she also knew that she would never be able to ask the questions she needed to if she was meeting Shelby's eyes. If she cried, she wanted to be able to hide that too.
Rachel felt Shelby's eyes on the back of her neck.
"I never found out why you left." Rachel said, the smallest of flutters in her voice, so small that only a mother could pick it out. And Shelby noticed.
"Before I go into that, I want you to know that I always loved you."
Rachel rolled her eyes. The word 'love' seemed to mean very little coming from Shelby.
"It-it wasn't easy what I had to do." Shelby's voice caught in her throat.
Rachel snorted. "It had to be easier than spending nine years in foster care."
"Rachel, I hoped that you would have been adopted."
"Well maybe you should have made sure." Rachel turned her head angrily and met Shelby's eyes, then quickly looked away. "No one wants to adopt annoying little kids. Most people prefer babies." Rachel said more softly, looking down into her lap.
"Rachel, I hoped that you would have been young enough I-" Shelby looked down at the floor. "Rachel I didn't just give you up for no reason-"
"I know, it was money."
"No, it wasn't about money!" Shelby raised her voice a little, then said in a more normal tone: "Rachel, I had cancer."
"W-what?"
Shelby nodded, a few tears had slipped from her eyes. She sniffed and brushed them away. "After you left, or, went over to Quinn's house, Mrs. Fabray, her mom, came over to check on me," Shelby was speaking through a slow flow of tears now, but quickly wiping them away as she spoke. "She knew something was up, her mom, had recently died of cancer, and so she took me to the doctor, and when I got my diagnoses, I thought I was going to die Rachel. And Mrs. Fabray made me see, that it wouldn't be good for a child to be around that so-"
"So it was her fault!" Rachel said, anger and hope rising in her chest.
Shelby blinked empathetically as she watched the desperation cover Rachel 's facial features. Needing to be close to her, Shelby moved over the row of chairs and dropped into the chair beside Rachel. She put a hand on her shoulder.
Rachel stared down into her lap.
"Rachel look at me."
Rachel's eyes flicked up and a tear slid down her face. It stung her to meet Shelby's eyes.
"I was the one who chose to give you up." Shelby brushed away Rachel's tear. "No one could have ever made that decision for me. I promise. I never would have given you away because of someone else's opinion of me."
Rachel took a moment to cry a little, but she brushed her own tears away quickly before Shelby could. Shelby rubbed her back, wishing Rachel would let her help her.
"You remember that day when I was sick and you were taking care of me? I couldn't stand to have you see me that way...it was just so wrong."
Rachel looked up again. "What about relatives? What about your parents, why couldn't they have taken me?"
Shelby leaned back in her chair. "I've been estranged from my parents since I was eighteen. I'm sorry you never got to meet them but...giving you to them would have been even worse than foster care. And you still would have had to watch me die." Shelby didn't know if her parents would have even taken Rachel, but she figured she didn't need to tell Rachel that detail.
"But you didn't die."
"I was a lab rat Rachel, they wanted to experiment for a new treatment, so I figured why not. It would probably make my death more painful but..."
"But you didn't die."
"Don't look so angry Rachel. It was a miracle. From what I did when I was a teenager? I thought it was just my past catching up to me. Finally hurting me right when everything was perfect, right when I had you. I thought there was no way I would make it. I did some pretty nasty stuff, never get started on smoking Rachel, its only a gateway drug but still."
Rachel snorted.
Shelby looked up at the ceiling for a moment. "You know it was Chris who got me into rehab."
"My father." Rachel said fondly, with a small smile.
"Chris wasn't your father," Shelby looked down and met her gaze. Rachel deserved to know the truth. From how upset she looked now, Shelby knew that she might never get to see her again. "I know you must have assumed that because he was the only guy I ever talked about but-"
"Who was my father?"
Shelby swallowed. "I don't know. I met him at a bar. We were drunk, it was...a one night stand. You know I never even got his name, and if I did I don't remember," Shelby shrugged. "Chris didn't leave me because he didn't want to support you. He left me because I cheated on him. The one thing he couldn't forgive me for, though he forgave me for so many other things. Too many times. But he would have been a good father to you."
"You know I never even cared who my father was. When I was younger, it was just all about you. And then when I was in foster care, sometimes when I was outside, I would look for you, as if you would be there. Like I was just expecting you to be on the street, or at the grocery store. Especially Seven-Elevens. I remember crying so hard one time when you weren't there."
"Rachel, I'm so sorry-"
"Why did you never come back? After you got better, couldn't you have come and found me?"
Shelby studied the ceiling again and shrugged. "I didn't know where to find you. When I gave you up, I didn't fill out any paperwork, told them that I had noticed you on the street a couple times, that you were homeless. They must have known I was lying, the resemblance was striking, even then. I just knew that if I didn't cut off all ties, if I didn't make it impossible for me to find you that I would come back. Upset your whole new life. I knew there was the possibility that you could tell them your name, but not much else, I didn't even know if you knew your last name."
Rachel had known her last name. But she hadn't told anyone anything. She hadn't spoken a word. It had been impossible for her to talk. The first time she had talked had been to tell her first foster mother that the girl had wet their bed. And that hadn't gone so well.
"Foster care sucked."
"Rachel you don't have to be in foster care anymore," Shelby said leaning forward. "You can come live with me, I have a nice place, its not much but its big enough for the two of us. I can adopt you, we can be a family again, I can be your mom."
"I'm already adopted."
"You, you are?" Shelby swallowed. "Um, that's um," she couldn't quite force herself to say 'good'. "Well how long has that been...?"
"His name is LeRoy," Rachel said avoiding the question intentionally. "My, my Dad." She said firmly but with great effort. She didn't consider LeRoy to be her parent, more of a... living supervisor. It was extremely hard saying this word in front of Shelby, because the pain in Shelby's eyes did bother Rachel. But she needed Shelby to believe that she considered LeRoy her father, and right now it seemed to be working, maybe only because Shelby was too hurt to see through it.
Rachel and Shelby sat without speaking. Rachel listened to Shelby's breathing. Shelby stared around at the ceiling, as if examining stars in the sky.
"Its getting pretty late," Shelby said starting to stand.
Rachel didn't feel like standing up, but she followed Shelby anyway. The faster Rachel got away from her the better.
In the aisle Shelby turned to Rachel and put her hands on her shoulders. "I know you probably never want to see me again...can I get one last hug?"
Rachel wrapped her arms around Shelby this time. As she was enveloped in that warmth again, her mother's embrace, she couldn't prevent herself from tightening her grip, from clinging on to her. She wanted to stay in her mother's arms forever. "I might see you again," Rachel said, caught up in the moment yet unsure that it was true. "Quinn has your email, so maybe we could go to dinner sometime?"
Shelby pulled away and nodded, brushing a stray tear off of her own cheek and forcing a smile.
"I love you," Shelby said as Rachel started walking away.
Rachel turned her head slightly. "Right." She said softly and gently.
Shelby didn't follow Rachel to the door, instead she turned toward the stage. Rachel felt a wave of annoyance. Did Shelby think fixing her piano skills would change the past?
Rachel tried to slam the auditorium door, but it was too heavy. She only succeeded in making her arm sore.
Outside, Rachel leaned against the auditorium wall. She didn't care that she was on a school campus, or that her mom was a door and a stage away, sobbing over piano keys. She pulled out one of her emergency cigarettes and took a long drag. Maybe she would even get caught.
It would be better than thinking about Shelby or explaining the talk to Quinn.
Okay so this chapter took a lot longer to get posted than I wanted it too, but I've been suddenly pretty busy with driver's ed and other summer programs. I will try to get some more chapters up as soon as I can, but it might be a few weeks before they're up. I thought this chapter would be a good stopping point for a little while. Its been really fun writing this story so far and I'm glad that what entertains me to write also seems to entertain others to read. Thanks so much for the continued support of this story! :)