"Welcome back." Quinn forced a smile, pulling the cold cloth from Rachel's forehead.
"I-" Rachel looked around. "How long was I out?"
"Only an hour or so." the blonde said, standing up. "I think it's time you go back to your apartment."
Rachel's face sank down to her hands and she shoved her head into one of the pillows. "I can't." Quinn could hear her say, muffled slightly.
"That's right." Quinn mocked. "You don't know who you are."
"It's not a joke, Lucy!" Rachel sat up, protesting the other girls reaction.
"Stop calling me that… I go by Quinn, now."
"Oh." Rachel took a breath and relaxed a little more. "It's… This is not a joke to me, Quinn. And I can't go home because I don't know where that is."
Looking down at her former best friend, Quinn sighed. "I'll help you find it."
After an hour of walking, Quinn looked down at Rachel's license and then over to an apartment building. "Does this look familiar?"
"Yeah, this is where I live now."
"Okay." Quinn smiled. "So, nice seeing you."
Rachel stared up silently with a sad look in her eyes as Quinn started to walk away.
"Lucy!" she called after the blonde. "I-I mean… Do you want to, um, come upstairs and hang out?"
Shoving her hands into her pockets, Quinn thought for a moment before walking back toward Rachel and into the building.
"You never came to visit me?" Rachel asked as she turned the knob and gestured for Quinn to come in.
"Like I said, our lives went separate ways. We went to different colleges, we had different careers."
"Not even for the holidays?"
"Rachel…" Quinn rubbed her forehead. "I think I saw you get out of a taxi once about 9 years ago."
"9 years?" Rachel mumbled to herself. She didn't know how it was possible her and her best friend had grown so far apart. "What happened to us, Quinn?"
"I already told you-"
"No." Rachel interrupted, insisting Quinn explain their lives in more detail.
After a little over ten minutes of searching, Quinn was able to find Rachel's copy of their senior year book and handed it to Rachel. Quinn didn't intend on repeating every disastrous detail of their past and she thought the book would be enough.
Rachel grabbed the book and began flipping through it. Stopping at one of the pages, she blurted out. "I was in the musical cast!"
"Yeah, you pretty much had the lead in everything since Sophomore year. You were the star." Quinn said, still looking around the apartment.
As Rachel continued to flip through the pages, she stopped at the prom ones and sighed. "I-I was the Prom Queen…"
Quinn nodded and spoke to herself. "Yeah, you were."
"And I took Jesse St. James! I wonder what happened to him."
"I don't care." the blonde mumbled again.
"I got everything I ever wanted." Rachel gushed. "I can't believe-Quinn!" she yelled, swinging around in her chair with the book still in her hands. "You didn't tell me you were a Cheerio!"
"That's because it was the worst time of my life." Quinn replied softly and avoided eye contact.
Rachel looked sadly over to her former best friend and thought of something to say. "Hey, I-I… There's this cast party thing tomorrow night and we're allowed to bring people… You can come if you want?"
"I'm busy tomorrow."
"Oh, okay." Rachel muttered.
"I'm gonna get going." Quinn finally said as she walked toward the door. Rachel followed her and before she left, she spoke. "What if… What if this isn't a dream? What if this is all real?"
"Then you got everything you wanted." Quinn forced a smile as she walked out the door. Looking back one last time, she gave a more sincere smile. "Goodbye, Rachel."
x
"Come on, woman!" Kurt yelled down the hallway.
Rachel strutted out of her bedroom in a fierce dress, looking beautiful as ever. Kurt stared at her and all he could muster was "damn".
Arriving at the cast party, they walked up to the bar and Kurt ordered a drink. Rachel's eyes grew wide for a second before she remembered they were old enough to drink. "I'll have a strawberry daiquiri. If you need to see my ID, I totally have it."
The bartender shook his head and made their drinks. Wrapping her tongue around the straw, Rachel spun and looked over the room. She knew that not all these people were in her musical, and the only one she recognized was Kurt and...
"Hello, Cassandra." Kurt nodded as Rachel tried to smile. She really didn't like the older woman, mostly because she was really mean to her during her first rehearsal.
"I'd like to have a word with you, Berry." Cassandra eyed the younger woman. "I understand that you were a big thing in your twenties, but you're old now. Before, you had to be perfect, and now, you have to be more than that."
"Maybe we should-" Rachel tried to say that they should talk privately, but Cassandra kept going.
"I've seen better performances from the kids in High School Musical than what you did at rehearsal." She sneered. "If you don't get your act together, your last role on Broadway will be just that… Your last."
"I understand."
"I don't think you do."
The look Cassandra gave Rachel just then made her feel more uncomfortable than she had ever been in her life. Thankfully, Kurt stepped in. "I think she gets it."
"She better." the older woman muttered as she walked away, pounding her cane on the floor with each step.
As soon as Cassandra was out of sight, Rachel slammed her drink on the bar and ran off toward her dressing room. Out of the corner of her eye, she spotted Quinn just getting to the party. Without warning, she grabbed the blonde by the arm and tugged her to her dressing room.
Shutting the door behind them, Quinn gave Rachel a puzzling look. "What's going on?"
"She hates me!" Rachel cried.
"Who does?"
"Cassandra July."
"I-I don't know who she-"
"How could she be so mean to me, I mean, I've never even performed like this before!" Rachel continued to rant. "She said if I don't get better, she'll fire me!"
Quinn's eyebrows lifted. "Can she do that?"
"I don't know." Rachel shrugged. "I guess I'll find out soon enough."
Taking a step forward, Quinn touched Rachel's arm lightly. "It'll be alright."
"How?" the brunette sobbed.
"I-I…" Quinn paused and took a breath. "I-I'll help you?"
"You will?" Rachel's eyes brightened as she looked up at her former best friend.
"Sure." she shrugged. "What were you having trouble with?"
Rachel laughed. "Can you believe it… The singing."
"I-I don't know if I can help with that." Quinn shook her head.
"But you said-"
"I know, it's just…" she couldn't finish her sentence with the way Rachel was staring at her. "Nevermind." Quinn rubbed her eyes gently and sat down on one of the chairs. "Let's hear it."
"Well, you see…" Rachel worried her lip. "It's a duet."
"Oh."
"It's Kurt's part, but he hasn't been taking me seriously so he can't help me and my assistant is also my understudy so if she sees that I can't do it she may use it to her advantage. You know, Broadway is very cut throat."
"Rachel." Quinn mumbled into her hands. "I'm not a singer."
"Are you kidding me?" Rachel laughed. "Just last week we were singing and dancing in my bedroom!"
Quinn arched her eyebrow at the other girl. "Pretty sure I wasn't anywhere near your bedroom last-"
"Here." Rachel said, handing Quinn the lyrics. "It's supposed to be a really emotional scene, I mean, I die you know. Which, now that I think about it, that could be a horrible foreshadowing of my Broadway career…"
"Rachel."
"Sorry." she frowned.
"I guess you're Marcus?"
"No, you are Marius. I'm Eponine." Rachel corrected, but she quickly knew that Quinn was joking. She tended to do that when she was nervous, and it made Rachel smile. Finally, she saw something familiar to her best friend.
Quinn got down on the floor and fixed her skirt over her legs. Rachel looked down at her. "What are you doing?"
"You're dying, Rachel, do you really think you have enough energy to stand? Now get down here."
Obeying, she rested her head on the other girls stomach and looked up at her. Quinn smiled down at Rachel before clearing her throat.
Rachel began to sing softly and dramatically, a little too dramatic. "Stop." Quinn interrupted.
"What's wrong?" Rachel asked, sitting up.
"Too much." Quinn insisted. "Tone it down a little, okay?"
Nodding, Rachel started again. She softly touched her face as she sang, sometimes running her hand down her neck and to her chest, where her wound was supposed to be. Quinn couldn't help but follow the other girls hand as it moved.
"Quinn?"
"Yeah, sorry." the blonde said, shaking her thoughts away as she sang her parts to the best of her abilities.
Rachel looked up at her with wider eyes. Quinn looked so elegant and her voice was better than she had remembered.
"If I could heal your wounds with words of love" she sang and squeezed her arms around Rachel lightly, but to Rachel, it felt like a hug.
"Hold me now, and let it be"Rachel returned, grazing Quinn's forearm slightly. If she didn't know any better, she could have sworn that Quinn shivered at the touch.
"The rain can't hurt me now…" Rachel continued to move softly in Quinn's arms as she sang. "The skies begin to clear and I'm at rest."
Looking down, watching Rachel, Quinn's heart began to pound. She didn't let Rachel know it, but she knew this scene. In fact, she knew the whole musical… By heart by now.
They sang in unison for the first time in 17 years. Rachel almost sang out of beat, solely because of Quinn. Just as Rachel was to die, Quinn brought her hand up to the other girls face.
"I'll stay with you till you are sleeping" she sang as Rachel's voice faded out and she pretended to die. "And rain will make the flowers grow…"
Quinn took a deep breath and closed her eyes for the last note. Slowly opening them, she glanced down at Rachel and smiled, but Rachel wasn't moving.
That's right Quinn thought to herself. The scene isn't over.
Leaning down to Rachel, Quinn puckered her lips-
*knock knock*
As soon as she heard that loud noise, Rachel threw her body upright, connecting her head with Quinn's.
"Ow!" they said in unison. Quinn grabbed her jaw and Rachel held her head as she got up and ran to the door.
Peeking her head through the crack, she saw Kurt on the other side. "I know she can be a bitch sometimes, but she just-" he paused as Rachel opened the door wider. "I didn't know you had company."
"It's just Quinn..."
"Wait…" Kurt said, squinting. Suddenly, he began to grin. "Caboosey? Wow…" he nodded, seemingly impressed.
Quinn forced a smile that barely showed on her face. "I was just leaving."
"Kurt!" Rachel scolded and then turned to the blonde. "You don't have to go."
"Yeah, I do." Quinn insisted as she brushed past the other two.
x