When Rachel awoke the next morning it was still dark. She groggily wiped the sleep from her eyes and turned her alarm clock off. It was 4am and Sam would be at her house to pick her up in a half an hour. Sam usually hit the school gym at 5:30 before school, but Rachel was concerned about using the weight room with the rest of the off season athletes so he agreed to go especially early with her.
Rachel quickly brushed her teeth, pulled her long hair into a knot at the top of her head, and for the first time in her life changed into a pair of black, mesh shorts, a purple t-shirt from drama camp last summer, and a pair of sneakers to head off to school.
When she heard the rumble of Sam's old Chevy pick up pull into her driveway she grabbed her backpack a granola bar and a duffle bag filled with school clothes and her newly purchased shin guards and soccer cleats. Leave it to Rachel Berry to actually find cleats with golden stars emblazoned on the sides. She skipped out of the house and climbed up into the cab of Sam's truck.
"You ready for this Berry? Im not going to take it easy on you."
"I wouldn't expect you to Sam. If this whole soccer thing is going to work I will have to be amazing at it, and if that means you running me into the ground, than so be it."
Sam chuckled at her response and within a few minutes they we pulling into the McKinley High parking lot. They walked towards the gymnasium passing the school janitor, the only other person at the school that early, and Sam passed Rachel a copy of their work out. The first thing on the list was speed and agility training. Sam set up a variety of cones, ladders and suicide sprints that they would be rotating through. Rachel carefully listened to how each drill was to be completed and when Sam yelled "GO!" they both started shuffling through the cones spread across the gym. Sam looked back to see how Rachel was doing and didn't see her, as he turned his head forwards to finish the exercise he realized that he hadn't seen Rachel behind him because she was in fact right next to him, matching him stride for stride.
"Jesus Rach you are really fast!"
"Am I? I've never really raced I just ran as hard as I could and tried to keep up with you."
The rest of the drills pretty much went the same way, Sam sprinting as hard as he could and Rachel finishing right behind him. After they cleaned up the the gym Sam lead Rachel into the schools weight room. Running was one thing but lifting weights was a foreign concept to Rachel, she had never seen a dumbbell before let alone lifted one.
Sam demonstrated the proper way to do bicep curls with a set of 35 lbs weights and then handed Rachel a set of 8 lbs weights to start off with. As good as Rachel had been during the agility and sprint workout was how terrible she was at the weight lifting routine.
Sam saw her struggling as he arms flopped around lifting the weights up and down with quite honestly the worst form he had ever seen. He smiled and shook his head as he came up behind her and grabbed her elbows steadying them against her sides. As soon as Sam touched her Rachel's heart skipped a beat. I mean he was really sweet to her but other than a high five or an occasional fist bump Sam had never actually made contact with her.
"Ok Rach, you need to keep your elbow into your body and lift the weight up and down very controlled. Its important that you learn this stuff correctly so you don't get hurt and so that you can build muscle. A lot of those girls are going to be bigger than you and you can't just let them throw you around the field. The stronger you get the more you will be able to hold your own." He tried to cover the nervousness in his voice.
Sam would be lying if he said he didn't feel anything when he touched Rachel's arm. His fingers tingled as they came in contact with her soft skin, and is stomach felt a little funny. Once he corrected her he quickly pulled away and continued demonstrating other exercises for her to do. As attracted as he was to her he knew both of them had recent break ups and there was no way of determining if Rachel felt the same way. For now he would just keep his distance and be a good friend.
Towards the end of the work out, around 6am coach Beiste walked into the weight room and was shocked to see Rachel in there. Rachel looked just as shocked to see coach Beiste concluding that if she was there it would only be a matter of minutes before the rest of the football players would be in there. Rachel quickly explained to Coach Beiste about the soccer team and why she was using the gym, asked her to please not say anything about it to her team, or any of the other glee kids. She then quickly gathered up her stuff and sprinted off to the girls locker room before anyone else could see her.
Rachel got out of the shower and changed into a blue and white plaid skirt and a teal sweater, completing the look with her trade mark knee sox and penny loafers. As she stood in the mirror brushing out her hair she couldn't help but think of Sam. She wondered if she should take the lead and ask him out, but then again she was humiliated by Finn and whose to say Sam even liked her back. She was very vulnerable now and she new it. Being reject again could literally break her.
Her train of thought was broken as she heard Coach Sylvester and some of the cheerios enter at the other end of the locker room. Apparently she was quickly trying to reconfigure her squad with the departure of Quinn, Santana, and Brittany. Rachel quickly tied her hair into a ponytail, not very characteristic of her but she didn't have the time to blow dry and curl it. She laid low and once she heard the talking enter Coach Sylvester's office and the door shut she scampered out and headed to her first period class.
The day went by just as well as any other, with shoves into lockers, and name calling, but lucky for Rachel the schools slushie machine was broken that day so it was one less thing she had to worry about. When lunch came Rachel sat at the typical glee table with the rest of the gleeks and Sam, who had moved over there once Quinn and Finn got back together, he just couldn't sit with them anymore it was too painful. As soon as She sat down she could see the latest gossip was being passed around the table. Kurt, Mercedes, Tina and Artie were all hunched over the table, there heads close together so they could whisper without other tables hearing them.
"Hey guys whats up?" Rachel asked as she sat between Sam and Tina.
"Apparently this new girl joined the soccer team and she is supposed to be phenomenal!" exclaimed Tina.
"Yeah I hear that there is all this talk about making the state tournament," added Artie
"I hear she is a transfer student from Brazil and she 6 feet tall and gorgeous." Kurt chimed in.
Rachel stiffened at the remarks, they were talking about her, except the whole 6 foot tall Brazilian thing, the way news spread around this school worried her. Her mind raced, how did anyone know there was a new girl on the team, Miss Holliday and the rest of the girls promised that they wouldn't say anything until their first game and Sam and Coach Beiste the only others who knew wouldn't tell. At least no one knew it was her yet, but it would only be a matter of time
Sam noticed Rachel's body go rigid and put his hand on her shoulder to try to relieve some of her nerves. Its as if he could read her mind as he leaned over to whisper,
"Ill give you three guesses who started this gossip and the first two don't count."
Rachel followed Sam gaze across the crowded cafeteria until she spotted exactly who he was staring at. Standing just to the right of the lunch line was a head of unruly curled hair holding a flip cam and smirking in her direction. It was none other than Jacob Ben Israel.
Rachel immediately rose up from her seat and headed for the cafeteria exit she just couldn't deal with this right now.
"Rachel where are you going you didn't even eat anything" Mercedes called after her.
"Im not hungry Ill see you all at glee." she replied and hustled out of the room and as far away from Jacob as she could.
Sam just glared at Jacob. How could he do something like that to Rachel. Jacob tells her that he is in love with her all the time but he constantly making her life as miserable as he possibly can. I would never do that to someone I cared about especially Rachel. With that Sam got up and purposefully headed in Jacobs direction never taking his eyes off of the little Jerk.