You all can thank Nemo for this update. Since the snow has me stuck in the house I decided to be slightly productive and finish this chapter. Hope you guys enjoy it. And go listen to Lea Michele's version of On My Own. I hadn't heard it in a while and it is truly lovely.
Rachel stood in the crisp September air and looked up at McKinley High School. She watched other students milling around and talking in groups. Occasionally someone would bump into her, probably not even realizing she was there. She let her eyes flit through the faces of people. Part of her hoped maybe Lucy would be here. Her fathers and she had just moved back to Lima a week ago and Rachel had been too scared to ride by the Fabray's house. They could have moved but even if they didn't maybe Lucy didn't even go to McKinley. She could go to Carmel or some other school Rachel wasn't aware of. The other part of Rachel let out a sigh of relief that she wouldn't have to see her childhood friend again. At first they had sent each other letters, shying away from computers and texting because both girls were fans of the classics. But soon Rachel's letters went unanswered. Desperately she tried texting but she received no response there either and every Myspace or Google search for Lucy Fabray bore no results. Unsure of what to do next Rachel gave up and went back to devoting all her time to her music but Lucy never left her mind.
Washington hadn't been better for making friends for the brunette. People still seemed annoyed and turned-off by her loud, opinionated attitude and her drive. Rachel was oddly at peace with this. She had known true friendship once and that would suffice her until her peers were more understanding of her ambition. She thought maybe this would happen in college considering she would go to NYADA or Julliard, places where there were people just as dedicated to the arts as she was and if not she could wait until she was a famous Broadway star and then people would realize how wonderful she was. High school was just a test she decided, to weed out the strong from the weak, to see who could survive with their insides still intact. Rachel Berry was strong and she would be damned if she let them get the best of her. With one final look around, she headed into Mckinley High for her first day. School had started a week ago so she hoped she hadn't missed too much.
The day passed quickly. Barely anyone even noticed her until lunchtime. She grabbed her lunch tray and looked around. There were a few girls from her English class sitting at one table. Rachel started to approach it but on of the girls stopped laughing long enough to glare at Rachel and let her know she wasn't welcome there so she swerved around it and found an empty table in the middle of the cafeteria. She sat down in her chair and sighed and then smiled to herself. The day was going better than expected so far nobody knocked her books out of her hands or called her names or wrote mean things about her on the bathroom stalls like at her old school. Rachel should have known by now that this was too good to be true.
She was delicately eating her salad when a pack of girls approached her table. Rachel looked up at their arrival and realized they weren't just girls, they were cheerleaders. A slight feeling of terror passed through the brunette but she wasn't going to let them know she was afraid. She was after all an actress and a good one too.
Rachel noticed which one was the leader of the pack right away. She stood slightly in front of the others. She had long, shiny jet-black hair, dark eyes, and tan skin. Peaking over her shoulder was an innocent looking blonde girl with the bluest eyes she'd ever seen.
"May I help you?" Rachel asked as polite as could be.
"May you help us?" The dark-haired girl asked putting her hands on her hips. "What you can do is get away from our property."
"I'm sorry?" Rachel asked confused.
"Our table. This is where we sit at lunch." She clarified. "Don't you know the rules around here?"
"San, I think she's new." The blonde said.
"Fresh meat huh." She said with a wicked glint in her eyes. "Let me help you out. This is the cheerleaders' table and that is your table." She pointed to one that had four boys with glasses and suspenders playing some kind of trading card game. "Or maybe that one." She pointed to another where nobody was sitting. Rachel stood up and grabbed her tray. As she walked past the group the dark-haired girl called out to her. "And hobbit, if I ever catch you at this table again…" She trailed off thinking whatever Rachel's imagination could fill in would be worse than anything she could think of on the spot. Rachel nodded not making eye contact and made her way to the empty table.
At dinner that night Rachel's fathers asked her how her first day was.
"It was okay. The cheerleaders are mean bullies but that's to be expected; however, I did sign up for glee club. I'm excited to showcase my talent and perform in competitions albeit they are low rank ones experience is still experience and I'll take what I can get it this small town."
"Well that sounds lovely, darling." Leroy said with a smile.
"What about…?" Hiram asked trailing off. "Was she there?"
"No, I don't think so. Every time I was in class and someone would walk in my head would shoot up expecting it to be her. I spent lunch scanning every table for her face. I made sure to look at everyone I passed in the hallway and let me tell you most of them didn't enjoy my 'staring'." At this word she used air quotes slightly exasperated.
"You could check the class roster." Hiram suggested hopefully. He had really liked the other girl despite her despicable family and he had never seen his daughter as happy as she was with Lucy neither before they met nor after.
"Maybe, I'm not sure I want to know definitively yet. I think I want to remain hopeful for just a couple more days."
"So I guess that means no driving by the Fabrays' house either?" Hiram asked. Leroy rolled his eyes at his husband's suggestion. If he wasn't careful, he was going to have two stalkers on his hands.
"No. Not yet anyway."
Meanwhile at the Fabray household
"Qunnie, you have guests." Mrs. Fabray called up the stairs to her daughter.
"Send them up." Quinn already knew who it was, Santana and Brittany. Every day since she'd been sick they had brought her her homework after Cheerios' practice. Santana threw the textbooks on the desk and plopped down on the bed next to Quinn while Brittany sat Indian style on the foot of the bed.
"God Quinn you have to come back soon. Coach Sylvester is running us ragged ever since you've been out." The Latina threw her arm over her eyes blocking out the light. "When are you coming back anyway? Tomorrow?" She asked hopefully.
"No. I have a doctor's appointment tomorrow. He has to give me the okay before I can come back. Maybe the day after."
"Ughh." Santana sighed dramatically.
"Anything else happening since I've been out?" Part of Quinn was worried that someone else could sweep in and steal her queen of McKinley status during her absence. Even though it had only been a week, time worked differently in high school. All the vultures were just looking for an opportunity, a moment of weakness on Quinn's part to steal her popularity. There was Janice. She had been gunning for the spot of captain of the Cheerios since she made the squad. Everyone knew she disliked Quinn although she played nice and pleasant and followed her orders. Even Janice understood how the hierarchy worked but, she was always trying to get on Coach Sylvester's good side (if the woman had one) but luckily for Quinn, Coach just always seemed annoyed by the girl. Quinn knew one girl who could pose a serious threat but she was sitting on her bed at the moment. Santana was sneaky and manipulative and downright mean but she and Quinn were friends. That's probably why they were friends, birds of a feather. Santana, Brittany, and her, they were the Unholy Trinity so she wasn't too worried about the dark-haired girl.
"Yeah some new girl tried to steal our lunch table. What was her name Britt?" Santana lifted her arm up to look at the blonde who was now making a bracelet out of gimp.
"Hobbit." She answered looking at Santana. Santana's eyebrows lifted quizzically at this. "That's what you called her so I assumed it was her name." Brittany said matter of factly and returned to her work.
"Right so I guess we don't know her name. But don't worry cause I totally put her in her place. I threatened her and every thing. It was pretty awesome." She smiled smugly. Quinn didn't like this new girl. Janice and Santana, Quinn knew them, knew how to keep them in check. This girl was a wildcard. She couldn't assess the threat level and didn't know what to expect. Quinn was the most popular girl in school and she wasn't sure this new girl even knew she existed and that had to change.
"Good job Santana really." Santana smiled proudly. Quinn knew how important praise was. After the girls left Quinn pulled out her phone and made a call. On the third ring he finally picked up.
"Puck, hey…yeah I miss you too, stud. Listen do you think you could do me a favor?"
Rachel's second day at McKinley passed basically the same as the first except now when cheerleaders or jocks saw her they glared menacingly. She guessed her little lunchtime "table stealing" incident had been circulated. Rachel barely paid them any attention though. Today was the day she would audition for glee club. This filled her with a sense of determination. Her old school hadn't even had one.
She had spent all last night picking which song would be perfect and had settled on "On My Own" from Les Miserables. If she just replaced all the he, him, and his with she, her, and hers in her head she thought it fit with her feelings quite nicely. She was even slightly giddy at the prospect of possibly making some friends in glee. She rationalized that they must all love to perform as she did and some maybe even shared her dreams of starring on Broadway or making music in some other way. While she realized they could and should be considered competition, they could still be cordial to each other. Everyone's heard of "friendly" competition right? Rachel didn't know anyone in glee club and hadn't heard anyone talking about it. Oh well, she thought, she would just have to be surprised.
After the last period bell rang, Rachel scurried to the auditorium to warm up her vocals. Alone in there she imagined a sold out crowd before her all coming to see her perform. She imagined the heat of the spotlight on her skin and she bathed in it. She also imagined Lucy sitting front and center watching her with such adoration and at that she shook the fantasy away, checked the time, and ran to her locker to get her sheet music. She didn't want to be late for her audition and in the Berry household if you weren't early, you were late. There was still quite a bit of students in the halls considering it was after school but, they were all waiting for rides or for clubs to begin or just hanging out with nothing better to do.
As she was running down the hallway, a voice called out to her. Even with all those people around, she knew it was for her.
"Hey." It was a boy's voice and it was a command to get her attention. Rachel didn't know whether to keep going or stop and see what he wanted. She didn't like ignoring people and didn't want to seem rude so she turned to him. He was very tall and had a Mohawk, Rachel noticed, but most importantly he was wearing a letterman jacket. Later Rachel would realize that wasn't the most important thing.
"May I help you?" She asked.
"Yeah. I'm Puck." He offered her a charming smile and she thought maybe he wasn't so bad. "And I have been given a very special mission. One that you're an essential part of." Quinn had told the boy exactly what to say.
"Me?" Rachel questioned confused.
"Mhmm." He answered and before she knew it he was lifting up the slushie he had in his hand (which by the way was the most important thing she was supposed to have noticed before) and threw it in her face. It was ice cold and ran down her front staining her outfit red. Luckily she had closed her eyes in time. Puck leaned in close to her ear and said, "From Quinn," and then he walked away. She remembered his breath smelled a bit like cherries, as if he had been drinking the slushie prior to dumping it on her, and she hoped to god he hadn't backwashed.
Rachel stood there until he rounded a corner and she could no longer see him. The students around her gawked and openly laughed at her humiliation. She didn't look at any of them. She wiped slushie out of her eyes, went to her locker to grab her sheet music and gym clothes and then to the bathroom to clean herself up. Rachel was a performer and she knew the show must go on no matter what. She looked in the mirror and decided she was presentable despite the gym clothes, which she couldn't help at this point. She checked her watch again and sighed. Now she was late by both Berry standards and normal ones but she walked into that glee room with her head held high and confidence in her walk. She handed her music to the piano player and looked around at the students gathered.
There was an extravagantly dressed boy sitting between two girls who had been gossiping until she walked in. Another boy in a wheelchair looked at her with sympathetic eyes. He wiped at an imaginary spot on his jaw and Rachel took the hint. She swiped her thumb over the same spot on her face and found she missed a spot of slushie. She silently thanked him with a smile. She also saw the two cheerleaders from yesterday in the cafeteria, the Latina and the blonde one. Behind them sat four jocks, one of whom was the infamous Puck who slushied her. She averted her eyes quickly.
"Okay everyone, now that Rachel's here we can begin. I believe she has picked out a song to audition with. You can begin now Rachel." Mr. Shuester flashed her a smile. She recognized him as her Spanish teacher. She hadn't known he ran the glee club but smiled back because he had seemed nice enough.
"Hi everyone. I'm Rachel Berry and I will be auditioning with the song "On My Own" from Les Miserables.
Her performance was flawless if she may say so. Her audience was captivated and rendered speechless. Mr. Shue gave her a standing ovation himself and congratulated her letting her know she made the club. She knew she would but praise was always accepted and welcomed. She thanked him and sat down among the other students. She didn't miss the looks the flamboyant boy and the girls on either side of him (their names were Kurt, Tina, and Mercedes) and Santana gave her. They were not pleased with how well she performed, not at all, and Rachel smiled to herself. They were jealous of her. If they weren't going to be her friends at least they recognized her talent. Glee club passed quickly Mr. Shue talked about preparing for Sectionals especially now that they had enough members to compete. Then he dismissed them.
As she was walking out she heard one of the jocks talking to Santana.
"Santana, when's Quinn coming back?" It was practically a whine. He had brown hair and looked fairly innocent and boyish.
"I don't know. Maybe tomorrow Tubby. Ask her yourself." Santana answered. The boy pouted making him look even more like a child. Rachel hurried out before any of them could notice her. Who was this Quinn? And why did she hate Rachel already?