A/N: Thanks for all the love! I'm really glad everyone's enjoying this story as much as I enjoy telling it! I've been trying to respond to everyone's reviews, and if I haven't yet I will and for those who I can't respond to personally thank you!

I had one review wondering about the pairing because Rachel and Puck weren't together yet, but I assure you, I wouldn't have marked this as Puck/Rachel if it wasn't, but like any story, there needs to be a story arc, conflicts, and a climax, otherwise it's not a story! And this story didn't start with them together, so there needs to be a buildup, right? Well, I think there does ...

But anyway, on to the story, enjoy!

It was the most beautiful day out. The sun was shining, the humidity didn't make you feel like you were going to melt away, and it felt more like spring out than summer. Rachel decided it was the perfect weather for a run. She has been lacking in her normal exercise routine and hasn't ran in a while. At home they have a small gym in their house and when she's up to it, she'll go for a run in Central Park. But there wasn't much to her disposal here in Shelbyville, so she mostly just did yoga every morning and got Aunt Sarah into it, but it was definitely not as intense as what she was used to. It was usually too hot out to go out running but with this perfect day she had to. It's a good way to get out all of her stress and to not think for awhile.

She gets back and stops by the porch to stretch and cool down. Her legs feel like they're on fire and she smiles because it's a good burn. She takes a big gulp of her water and when it spills down her neck she sighs because it feels so refreshing. She brings her shirt up to wipe the water and sweat off her neck and face revealing her toned stomach and the bottom of her pale pink sports bra.

When she brings her shirt back down she looks out and sees Puck standing a ways back staring at her. She can't really make out the expression on his face but she swears she can feel his eyes on her. Rachel bites her lip as she swipes her hand across her hand across her collarbone and can see Puck lick his lips as he just stands there still watching her. All of a sudden Rachel feels ten times hotter and like her skin is going to catch on fire.

Joe calls out to Puck and it breaks whatever spell they were under. Puck just runs a hand through his short, cropped hair and then sends Rachel a wave before he goes and sees what Joe wants. Rachel just takes a deep breath as she watches him retreat and then turns to walk into the house.

She goes straight to the shower, running the water cold. When the water hits her she lets out a small scream at the shock of it but quickly she just feels relief from the heat. She closes her eyes as the water runs down her head then down her body. She tries to push thoughts of Puck from her mind. But she would be lying if she said she didn't see his eyes the second her's closed and didn't image his tongue licking something other than his own lips.

Rachel is making a batch of iced tea in the kitchen later that afternoon and is reaching for the sugar in the cabinet above the sink. She's pushing it so it comes closer but she does that thing where she accidentally gets pushed further back. But she's still determined to get it.

All of a sudden she hears a laugh, his laugh. She turns to see Puck standing there with a smirk on his face. He comes up right behind her and reaches up and grabs the sugar for her. He backs away and she turns around fully facing him. He hands her the sugar and their hands linger for a second longer than they should.

Rachel walks back over to the stove and measures out sugar to put into the pot, "How was your day, Noah?" Rachel asks.

Puck shrugs, "It was fine, the usual".

Rachel nods as she stirs the contents of the pot.

"Are you doing anything Thursday?" he asks her.

"Do I ever have anything to do?", Rachel says laughing. It's true that she has done pretty much nothing this summer.

"Well, Quinn usually babysits my sister on Thursdays but she's going out of town this week to visit her cousin in Nashville and I was wondering if you wouldn't mind watching her for the day?"

"I would love to!" Rachel says with excitement, which Puck laughs at in response.

Shaking his head, he says, "Okay, cool. Just so you know, she's a brat, so be prepared."

Rachel just rolls her eyes at him and says, "I'm sure she's not."

So that's how Rachel finds herself in front of The Puckerman's household bright and early Thursday morning. It's a white, one story house with a dark green roof and shutters. There's a front porch with a small white iron table with four matching chairs around it. She walks up the porch and rings the doorbell and she's not sure why, but she's really nervous to meet Puck's sister.

Puck answers the door, tells her to call if she needs anything and all the emergency numbers are on the 'fridge, but he has to go or he'll be late. As he walks out the door, he yells over his shoulder, "Annie be good!"

Rachel smiles and walks into the house. As soon as you walk in, you're in the living room and there's a small girl with dark hair sitting in front of the television with a bowl of cereal in her hands. She looks at Rachel and smiles.

"Hi, I'm Annie!"

"I'm Rachel, it's very nice to meet you."

"You too. You can sit and watch some TV if you want." Annie says as she scoots over making room for Rachel on the couch.

"Okay" Rachel says as she walks over and sits down next to her.

Rachel adores Annie Puckerman. She learns that she is ten years old, gets straight A's in school, and tells the best stories. She tells her that she has a boyfriend named Tommy who lives down the street. Rachel smiles remembering when she was ten and she married Josh Lieberman at summer camp, they were married for the whole summer and she was the only girl he didn't throw worms on.

Annie looks at Rachel and very seriously says, "Don't tell Noah okay? He won't like it."

"Why won't he like it?" Rachel asks with her brows raised.

"He says I can't have a boyfriend til I'm 30 and a month ago he saw Peter Matthews kiss me on the cheek and he just comes over and he's so angry, it looked like his head was going to explode and he didn't even say anything! He just looked and Peter with the meanest look and Peter just peed his pants."

Rachel yells, "No he didn't!"

"He did!" Annie says throwing her hands in the air.

"Oh no, poor Peter!" Rachel laughs.

"I know! So you can't tell Noah, okay?"

Rachel takes her fingers and "zips" her lips shut, "My lips are sealed."

Rachel tells her she played Annie a couple times when she was younger and Annie thinks that is the coolest thing she's ever heard. She also makes Rachel sing "Tomorrow" for her. Which leads to Rachel having to sing every song ever done by a Disney Princess. Rachel would be lying if she said she wasn't having fun.

Later Rachel is sitting on the floor with Annie wearing a pink feather boa, a crown, and very pink lip stick. Across from her Annie is wearing the same lipstick, a pink tutu, and about 20 plastic bracelets. They are having a tea party with Annie's stuffed bear, Mr. Snuggles. And she can say they are having a lovely time.

Rachel hears the door open and sees Puck walk in and she can feel her face get instantly red.

"I like the new look", he says with a smirk.

Rachel rolls her eyes and says, "Leave us alone, we are having fun, right Annie?"

Annie smiles and says, "Yupp! Noah, would you like to have some tea?"

Puck just laughs and says, "No way."

Annie rolls her eyes and looks at Rachel, "He plays with me when no one else is here, he even wears the feather boa."

Rachel laughs and looks at Puck seeing his face completely red.

"I've never seen you blush before," Rachel says still laughing, "Would you like your boa back?"

"Whatever", Puck says as he stalks off down the hall to what she presumes is his room. Her and Annie continue their tea party, still giggling.

Shortly after their tea party is done, Rachel and Annie are sitting on the couch watching some show when Puck comes out. Annie had just told her the most fascinating story about Puck and she is dying to say something about it. When he was 14, Annie had a babysitter, Kristy Worthington, who Puck apparently had the biggest crush on. He even wrote a song about her that Annie said he would sing all the time.

So Rachel sits on the couch and tries not to giggle the second she sees him. He looks at her like he has no idea whats going on, but when he sees his sisters stupid evil grin, he knows it's not good.

"What did that little brat tell you?" he asks, arms crossed across his chest.

Rachel tries to act coy, "Oh nothing, we were just talking about this girl, Kristy."

Puck yells, "Annie!", which just makes her laugh harder.

"Do you still write songs?" Rachel asks him.

Before Puck can respond, his sister jumps in and says, "Yes he does, he has a notebook in his room that he thinks is hidden, but it's not."

"What are you doing sneaking around in my room?"

"I'm a little sister, it's my job." She says matter-of-factly.

"Yea well then it's my job to kill you."

Annie gets up and Puck runs right after her and picks her up tickling her until she can't breath and yelling at him to stop. Rachel smiles and gets up and grabs for Annie, taking her away and trying to protect her from Puck's "attacks".

Rachel ends up staying for dinner after Puck tells her that his mom called and said she would be home soon and wanted her to stay. She is coming back from the bathroom when she sees a door open and when she peaks in, can tell it's Puck's room. She stops to peak in further. His floor is scattered with some clothes and his bed is unmade, but other than that it is relatively neat. She sees a guitar leaning against the wall by his bed.

"Snoop", she hears from behind her and she jumps a little and turns to see Puck standing behind her.

"I'm not snooping, just curious."

He walks past her and into his room, "You can come in if you want, the room doesn't bite."

Rachel laughs and steps in after him, "I see you have a guitar."

"How'd I know that'd be the first thing you noticed?"

Rachel just smiles. She walks over and picks up the guitar, hands it to Puck, and says, "play something."

Puck laughs but he sits down and places the guitar in his lap.

"Any requests?"

"Play something you wrote" Rachel tells him.

Puck clears his throat and shakes his head, "Fine".

Rachel lets out a squeal of excitement and leans against the rail of his window across from him with a huge smile on her face.

He starts to playing and as soon as Rachel hears the actual words she can't help but let out a little laugh.

Oh Kristy, Kristy,

Please just be with me.

Oh Kristy, Kristy,

You and me, we're meant to be.

Rachel continues to laugh and Puck asks, "What'd you think? Deep right?"

"Yes. You're very talented at rhyming, Noah."

"I try." He says laughing, but then he starts playing a song that they both know and Puck smiles when he hears Rachel starting to sing along.

Rachel is having such a lovely time at the Puckerman's. Puck's mother, Ava, is really sweet and made the best apple pie she's ever had. Ava asks her all about New York, high school, and Julliard. Then Annie tells her about the great day they had and makes Rachel blush when Annie gushes about what a good singer she is. Puck has been pretty quiet, but keeps sending Rachel smiles. She thinks is one of the best days she's had this summer.

But then Ava asks Puck if Quinn is enjoying her time in Nashville and all of a sudden Rachel is brought right back to reality.

The next day Rachel gets a call from Puck which surprises her. Yes, they're friends. And yes they have many conversations and hung out a lot. But she actually thinks this is going to be the first time she's ever talked to him on the phone.

"Hey, so to what do I owe this honor of receiving a phone call from you?"

"I know you want to be a star on Broadway, but did you ever consider being a comedian?"

"I'll just leave that to you."

Puck just laughs and the groans into the phone.

"What's the matter?"

"I'm bored. You wanna hangout?"

"I would but I have plans tonight with Finn."

"Oh yea, what are you doing?" Puck says, but the way he says it is drastically different than the light heart-ness way he was talking to her before.

Rachel tells him, "I'm not completely sure, he just said something about a lake. But we can hang out tomorrow if you want."

Puck doesn't respond right away and Rachel can hear him clear his throat and then he suddenly says, "Yea sure. Well I gotta go."

"Oh, okay. Bye." Rachel says a bit shocked.

Puck hardly says, "Bye" and then hangs up.

Rachel closes her phone a bit confused.

Rachel realizes right away that Finn's date night at the lake is his way of trying to be romantic. And also his way of trying to get some. She thinks it's funny that he went through all the trouble to get her to have sex with him. She also thinks it's a bit sweet in a way. But she's not going to sleep with him, not when she is still trying to get over whatever she feels for Puck.

Besides she hasn't known him that long and she's not going to have sex with him in the bed of his truck. She's also starting to fear that Finn might be feeling more for her than she feels for him. She feels badly and thinks that maybe she is still holding out for Puck for some reason and maybe that's why her feelings won't develop for Finn. But she's not sure if they would even be anything more even if Puck wasn't in the picture. All she knows is that she would never cry over Finn Hudson in anyway. That might sound like a good thing, but it really just means you didn't care enough to begin with.

Rachel doesn't hear from Puck for the rest of the weekend and she's not sure what to think of that. Maybe he got busy or found other people to hang out with. She's certainly not his only friend. She doesn't see him again until the end of Monday when she walks into the barn and sees him putting one of the horses away.

"What happened? I thought we were going to hangout this weekend because you were so bored," Rachel says with a hint of mockery.

Instead of laughing or telling her something came up, he just looks at her, his jaw set, and for some reason looks angry.

Rachel doesn't know what to make of this, "What's your problem?"

"Did you have fun on Friday?" Puck asks staring her straight in the eyes in and in a tone she's never heard from him before.

"Yes, it wa-"

"Did you fuck him?" Puck asks cutting her off.

Rachel is completely shocked at the way Puck is talking to her.

"Excuse me?" Rachel spits out.

"I've known Finn my whole life, and I know why he takes girls to the lake." he says in an excusatory tone.

Rachel just looks at Puck, stunned speechless and the hurt she is feeling is quickly replaced with anger.

"Well, did you?" he asks.

"No", she yells, "but I don't see how it's any of your business!"

"God, I don't know, I just thought-"

Rachel throws her hand in the hair, "You thought what?"

Puck opens and closes his mouth, not sure what to say so Rachel just says, "You have a girlfriend, Puck."

Puck takes a moment and says, "I know that."

"Yea, well, she's not me so stop acting like it." Rachel responds. (Rachel can't believe she actually just said that.)

Puck looks at her in a way she's never seen from him before. She's not sure what he's doing when he stalks towards her, she's not sure if he knows either. But the next thing she knows, he is crashing his lips to hers and his hands are tangled in her hair. She lets out a gasp and he uses that to slide his tongue into her mouth as she wraps her arms around his waist.

She never been kissed like this before. With such force and such passion. She has never felt this when someone kissed her, like she never wanted it to end. She could literally live the rest of her life with her lips fused to his. He pushes her backward until her back hits the wall and when he lifts her up she wraps her legs around his waist.

She runs her hands across his broad shoulders, then up his neck, and racks her nails through his short hair. He lets out a moan and it vibrates through her whole body and she lets out a noise she's never heard herself make before. But Puck seems to like it because he just kisses her harder and a shiver goes down her spine.

They finally pull apart because as much as she would love to never stop, they both need air to live. But she keeps her eyes closed because she doesn't know what this means. She knows that was what she's been waiting for since the first moment she first saw him and it was so much better than she could have ever imaged. But she also knows that this isn't a fantasy and as soon as she opens her eyes she will be met with reality. So she just keeps her eyes closed for as long as she can.

Rachel can hear Puck's heavy breathing and he's still holding her up and has his hands placed on her hips, securing her against the wall. She just hears him say, "Rachel", and then she is forced to open her eyes and look into his.

Next: Cliffhanger, what? You'll just have to see what the aftermath of that well anticipated kiss is going to be ...

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