Quinn Fabray's life hadn't gone according to plan. Lucy Caboosey led to an early trip under the knife and a new life in a new town which led to the complete mess that was high school. It wasn't until she applied to Yale on a whim and the acceptance letter came that she began to believe in herself again. With her grades and extracurricular activities, Ohio State was a lock but it wouldn't have felt like an accomplishment, just something expected of her like everything else in her life. On the other hand, the mere name of an Ivy League school opened doors for her that she wouldn't have been able to even knock on if she went to her state school.
Even with everything she had been through, she didn't feel sorry for herself for anything that happened to her or regret anything that she did. Instead of being a real estate agent back in Lima, she ended up living and working in the most powerful city in the free world. She had nothing to regret. Except for Beth of course, but even that had worked itself out in the end.
Most of the things in her life had fallen into place as well: She had a well-paying job she was good at in a career she enjoyed; she owned the condo, and the attached low-rate mortgage, she was living in; she had a nice set of friends, old and new; and a really nice boyfriend who really cared about her.
Everything a girl could want.
XXX
"Hey," Heather said as she poked her head into Quinn's office, "how's that report coming?"
Quinn didn't bother with looking over from her computer monitor as she said, "Should be done soon," which she hoped Heather would take as a hint to leave her to her work. She had no such luck as Heather slid into her office and took a seat.
"I can't believe how much work we have to do now," Heather said while grabbing a pen from Quinn's penholder.
After almost two years of peaceful bliss during work, Quinn had forgotten just how chatty Heather could be, but she could mostly ignore her and get through a conversation by using various forms of the word "yes." What she couldn't ignore was her pen flying through the air as Heather began to flick it up towards the ceiling. Part of her wondered how the woman sitting across from her, mindlessly tossing a pen up in the air, had been sorority president and valedictorian of her class, but Heather was one of the smartest people she had known.
"Don't you have work to do?"
"Not really, almost done with all of it."
Like she said, one of the smartest. And sometimes it frustrated her to know she wasn't the best at what she did.
After a few more minutes of futilely trying to work Quinn looked over and said, "Could you stop doing that?"
"Doing what?" Heather glanced over at Quinn, causing the pen to drop. "Oh, sorry."
While Heather ducked down to pick up the pen, Quinn sighed and rubbed her eyes. Heather was right. Now that the trio was reduced to two, their workload had almost doubled but sometimes it felt as though she was doing three or four times the work. Not to mention she lost the person who turned the few dull parts of the job into her favorite times of the day from her own stupidity.
When Quinn opened her eyes, she found Heather staring right at her and saying, "Have you talked to Mike recently?"
This was not what she wanted to talk about now.
"No, haven't had the chance."
"I wonder how he's doing."
"You could talk to him."
"Nah, we're work buddies. It'd feel strange if I talked to him out of the blue."
"I'm sure he'd be glad to hear from you."
Heather shrugged then returned the pen back to its proper place as she said, "You should probably talk to James about hiring someone new."
"Why? Mike will be back in a few months."
Heather gave her a look she couldn't read before saying, "Right. I'll let you get back to work."
XXX
"Here, let me get that for you," Chris said as he pulled Quinn's chair out at the restaurant they were at for dinner.
"Thank you," she said as she took her seat.
Chris was the nicest boyfriend Quinn had ever had and that was saying something since she stopped putting up with anyone who treated her poorly. Life was too short to keep assholes around. And Chris was the furthest from being an asshole as someone could be.
Flower bouquets would randomly show up at work. Texts that said he was thinking about her made her phone chime. When they were together, no door would go unopened and no seat would remain unpulled. No one had ever made her feel as pampered as Chris did, even if it felt like he wouldn't let her do either of those things for herself even if she asked to.
"How do you seem to know about every amazing restaurant in the city?" Chris asked as he looked through the menu.
The only menu Quinn need to look at was the wine list and she gave a waiter her bottle selection before she answered him.
"I have a…friend who enjoys food as much as I do, so we eat at a lot of places."
"Oh?" Chris glanced up from the menu. "Am I going to meet this friend?"
"No, he's up in New York now."
"That's too bad," Chris said as he closed his menu. "I think I'll get the chicken."
Always chicken, she thought. Not that there was anything wrong with chicken itself, but she couldn't help but think how unadventurous he was compared to the last person she ate here with.
She missed being able to try a bite or two or more of something she wouldn't want an entire plate of. She missed sharing her own food with someone who appreciated it. She missed the way his voice would rise in tone and speed up as he read out a combination of ingredients that grabbed him. She missed seeing the stupid grin on his face after the first bite of some incredible dish. She missed the way he had something clever or insightful or funny to say as they jumped from topic to topic. Thankfully, the wine arrived at their table before she could think of any more things she missed.
She drank much more than she should have that night, more than she had for a long time. Chris gladly escorted her home and left her on her doorstep with a kiss on the cheek which they were both fine with. He wanted to save himself until marriage and she hadn't felt like being intimate with anyone for a while.
Tossing and turning, she tried, and failed, to fall asleep even though alcohol had went from turning her into an angry drunk to just a sleepy one. A symptom of getting old along with nothing much to be angry about anymore, she supposed. She let out a groan and reached for her phone to check how long she had been not asleep which turned out to be a little over two hours, just long enough for a headache to begin. But not nearly enough to stop her from doing something reckless.
Her fingers slowly moved along the screen of her phone as she texted Mike, making sure she spelled her message correctly.
Hi
It didn't help her efforts at sleeping that she mindlessly stared at her phone waiting for him to respond which she didn't expect him to since it was close to one in the morning. That didn't stop her from continuing to write though.
I know you're probably asleep and we really haven't talked much, but I just wanted to say hi
Having a one-sided conversation with her phone while half-drunk and tired proved to be harder than she imagined. As she searched for something to write, the phone buzzed, startling her and causing it to drop right on her face.
It was a text from Mike that simply said, Hi
You're awake
I'm awake
She smiled for no reason and wrote, I'm a little drunk
I can see that
I wanted to say hi
You said that already
I hate you
His reply took a while to arrive and, as she wondered what was taking so long, her phone vibrated.
I know
She sat up and stared at his response, wishing that they were actually face to face so he could see she was joking. So she could see that he was in on the joke.
I don't actually hate you
This time his response came much faster.
I know
A wave of relief crashed over her as she fell back onto her bed which was followed by a wave of exhaustion.
I'm sleepy, she wrote as she rolled over on her side, barely able to keep her eyes open.
I am too, we should go to sleep
We should. Night
Mike sent back the same word in reply and Quinn felt happy, happier than she had felt in a long time. Before she drifted off to sleep, she texted him one more time saying, I miss you
I miss you too
She fell asleep with her phone on her pillow and a smile on her face.
XXX
Quinn stared at her useless computer as she drummed her fingers on her desk with one hand and twirled a pencil with the other. With every passing second, she could feel the work she had to finish by today piling up which meant another long workday in another long workweek in another long work-month.
Every piece of enterprise software promised an uptime of 99.X% with a varying number of nines in place of the X. In other words, no software could, or would, ever guarantee 100% uptime which meant there would be times when things went down. Patton Boggs had hit the jackpot. The company intranet, email, and document servers had all grounded to a halt as she came back from lunch, bringing all work to a stop.
The Internet could still be accessed for some mind-boggling reason.
Just as Quinn decided slip her heels back on and go out for a walk, Heather strolled into her office, sat down, and said, "Network's down."
"I noticed."
"Bad timing."
"Sure is."
"Staying late today?"
"Yea, probably," Quinn said with a sigh. "You?"
Heather returned the sigh before saying, "Yea. It's killing my social life."
They sat there commiserating over the increased workload. Or at least Heather did while Quinn scanned her Twitter then Facebook feed. She didn't use either very much, with Facebook for updates on people she cared about to varying degrees and Twitter being relegated to feeding her breaking news. Today, nothing interesting seemed to be happening in the world as her Twitter feed was filled with stories rehashing yesterday's news.
The second post on Facebook brought the pencil flying between her fingers to a standstill.
Mike had been tagged in a photo taken by Rachel Berry, which wasn't surprising since Rachel was the one person who would reconnect and hang out with someone she knew in high school just because they were in the same town. Quinn couldn't say the same thing about herself. If Mike hadn't taken the job here at Patton Boggs, she would have grabbed lunch with him one day to say hello and that would've been it. She wouldn't have made the best friend she had ever known.
Not that she didn't ruin the relationship anyway, but that wasn't new for her.
Part of her mind could feel the pencil in her hand bending as she gripped it and placed more and more pressure on the exposed part with her thumb. The rest of her mind was focused on the pretty face attached to the pair of lips attached to the cheek of Mike's smiling face. Rachel had helpfully taken and tagged many more photos of their night out on the town so Quinn could see just how beautiful this brunette was and how much fun they were having.
Annoyingly, Facebook wouldn't even tell her the name of the woman.
"What'cha looking at?"
That was another thing about Heather that annoyed Quinn; the woman was much too perceptive.
"Facebook."
"Anything interesting?"
The one good thing about Heather's questions was that it kept Quinn from snatching up her phone and demanding that Rachel tell her who the woman was. She wasn't supposed to care anymore. The feelings were supposed to go away. It wasn't her primary reason for pulling away from him, but it counted as point 1B at the very least.
"No, nothing interesting."
XXX
Quinn's preferred morning drink was tea which she brewed every morning after getting in. She found it to have the same deep and complex flavors that good coffee had, only more soothing and calming. What she loved most, though, was the actual brewing of the tea. She had done it so often, the motions were ingrained into her muscle memory like cheerleading once was. This allowed her the quiet time to mentally organize and prepare for what she needed to do for the day.
This was what she was doing as she walked back to her office with her teapot in one hand and an outline of a paper running through her head. She pulled up short of her office when she saw Heather standing with a woman with a Patton Boggs welcome packet under his arm outside of Mike's cubicle.
It was silly and something she worked on, but any disruption during this routine could throw Quinn off for the entire morning and the scene in front of her definitely counted as a disruption. It took a second before she found her legs again and walked up to the pair.
"—your cubicle. If you've got any questions, let me know."
If where they were standing and the welcome packet weren't enough of a hint then overhearing the end of Heather's welcome speech was all Quinn needed to know.
"What's going on?"
The question came out harsher than Quinn wanted and she could see the new woman opposite to her flinch.
Heather just grinned and said, "Quinn, this is Charlotte. She's one of the new interns. Charlotte, this is Quinn. She's someone you don't wanna mess with."
Quinn rolled her eyes. "That's Mike's cubicle."
"He's not here," Heather said with a smirk, "and there's nowhere else to put her."
"She's an intern. There's no way she's getting the largest cubicle in the section."
Heather shrugged and said, "Can't do anything about it."
"She's not taking the cubicle. I'll find a place for her."
XXX
The second time someone tried to take Mike's cubicle, it wasn't some summer intern but a paralegal with years of service time with the firm.
All Quinn had to say to him was, "Not happening."
The paralegal tried to put up a fight, but there was no way Mike was going to be shunted off to some closet of a cubicle on a lower floor while she was around. For one, they needed him to be around because it made their jobs easier if they were close together. For another, Quinn wanted him around because she just did and there was no point in denying it any longer.
XXX
Breaking up with Chris made her feel terrible. Not because she wanted to stay together, but because she knew she had used him. She knew what it felt like and no one deserved to be used. Not her, not Chris, and not Mike.
Yes, she had used Mike and lied to herself, and him, about it. His friendship meant so much to her that she wanted to keep it no matter what, even though she had started to think of him as more than a friend and it was obvious that he had as well. She thought if she ignored her feelings that they would go away and she would be able to move on while keeping their friendship intact. Mike would see that and move on as well.
Neither of those had happened for her, but Mike had literally moved on by moving away. After playing back their final encounters, she no longer believed his statement that she wasn't the reason for him taking the job. When he got back she would tell him the truth and hope for the best. If the steady stream of photos on Facebook and the short messages she got back when she tried to have a conversation with him were any indication, the best thing she could hope for was some form of friendship.
XXX
The third time she stopped someone from taking Mike's cubicle, James called her into his office to speak with her. She explained her position to him, minus the whole wanting Mike to be close because she wanted to be close to him thing. Somehow, she didn't think that would be a valid reason for the cubicle to remain empty. James said he understood but that the next person would be taking the cubicle and there wasn't anything she could do about it.
Fuming over this, she sat in front of her computer for the rest of the morning and hammered away at the keyboard. Apparently, anger was a great motivator and she finished almost all of the work she had planned to do for the day by lunch. It remained to be seen if the quality of the work was any good. It wasn't, so she spent the rest of the day fixing what she had written in the morning, frustrating her even more.
So she was none too amused when Heather walked into her office and said, "I hear you and James had a nice little chat this morning."
"It doesn't matter. I'll throw whoever's in there out when Mike gets back."
Heather took a seat then asked, "How do you know he's coming back?"
"Why wouldn't he come back?"
"Nothing for him to come back to," Heather said as she stared right at Quinn, almost causing the blonde to squirm under the gaze. Quinn was much more used to giving, and not receiving, those stares.
"He'll come back," Quinn said with a quickly fading confidence.
"No. He won't," Heather said slowly.
The firmness of Heather's reply shattered what little confidence Quinn had left. "Wha—What'd you mean?"
"They're gonna need someone to head up their new policy division and who better to do it than the guy who set it up?"
Quinn's hands froze on her keyboard as she processed the response. She hadn't thought of what would happen in New York after Mike was finished. All she was doing was counting down the days until Mike would be back. Not that she even knew the exact date he'd be back. She just assumed that he would be back when the job was done and the notion of him not coming back hadn't even entered her mind until that moment. But it was all she could think about now that it had.
XXX
Quinn looked down at herself and made sure everything was in its place. She hadn't been the type of person who had to have every fold of clothing just right and every strand of hair perfectly coifed before going out in public since being a high school cheerleader. That's not to say she didn't try to look nice when she left her house. It's just that she no longer felt the need to be seen as some sort of perfect being.
Today was different. Today, she wanted to look perfect and, with her favorite dress, shoes, and scarf on, she did. A final check in her mirror confirmed this.
The plan she came up with was the most impulsive thing she had done in decades. Ever since she graduated from high school she decided that she needed to weigh the pros and cons of every decision she made. Living through those events made her realize that her actions and decisions had consequences that affected her life and the lives of the people around her. She couldn't and wouldn't do anything without thinking it through.
Her hand came up in a loose fist and she noticed that her fingers were trembling from either excitement or terror. She couldn't decide which it was, but it was probably a bit of both. It didn't matter though. She was here and there was no turning back.
She rapped on the door in front of her with her knuckles and waited patiently, trying not to rock on her feet.
Nothing happened, so she knocked again, harder this time. After a few seconds, the door opened and she heard a familiar voice say, "You're here early."
Her excitement over seeing Mike again was quickly replaced by shock as she stared at his naked torso and those spectacular abs that Tina had gone on and on about back in high school. Apparently, dancing was more than enough for him to maintain them. She couldn't pull her eyes away from his abs and felt a warmth begin to spread out from the pit of her stomach.
"Quinn?"
She jerked her head up and could feel her cheeks flushing as Mike looked at her in confusion. After taking a few breaths to calm herself and trying to get some moisture in her mouth, she said, "Hi."
"What're you doing here?"
This was the problem with doing something impulsive. She hadn't had the time to think through all of the parts of her plan and this was one of the things that she couldn't come up with a solution for. All she could do was hope that Mike would listen to her and that required her to say something.
"I wanted to surprise you."
"Um," he said as his eyes danced around, looking at anything but her, "well, I'm definitely surprised to see you." Finally, his eyes settled on her. "I guess you should come in."
He stepped aside to let Quinn in and only then did she notice that his lower half was almost as undressed as his upper body. That warmth began creeping out from her stomach again, making her annoyed at her own body since now was not the time to get excited. It would help if Mike would put on some more clothes.
"I'm, uh, gonna put on some clothes," Mike said as he walked into what she assumed to be his bedroom.
Things would be so much easier if all her thoughts would become reality like they just did.
Quinn looked around his new apartment for the first time and grinned since it looked a lot like the one she had spent so much time in. It wasn't that everything was in the same place because it couldn't be; there just wasn't enough room. Even though the apartment was smaller, it had that same lived-in feeling that his messiness seemed to bring. She wondered how this apartment could feel so warm even though he'd only been living in it for a few months while hers felt nothing like it after being lived in for years.
The more she looked around though, the more things she saw that weren't the same: An expensive looking bicycle hung from a hook behind the door. The shelf where his television sat lacked the line of Blu-rays she knew he owned. A pyramid of Chinese takeout boxes was stacked on top of pizza boxes on top of the living room table. The kitchen, on the other hand, looked completely unused.
What she needed now was a glass of water, but that was another thing that had changed. She didn't know where anything was and she didn't want to be found rifling through his kitchen. Mike would believe her story, or at least she thought he would, but she still didn't want any thought of her being a crazy woman to be in his head. She sat down on the sofa instead and immediately stood up when Mike came back out.
"Hey," Mike said, dressed in an undershirt and nice pair of jeans, "so why are you here? Not that I mind or anything."
"I came up to visit a friend and decided to come by."
Mike closed his eyes for a second before saying, "How'd you even find my address?"
"Your address is listed with the company so—"
"That guy in HR?"
Quinn grinned. "Yea."
Mike groaned and shook his head. "So…aside from turning into a stalker—"
"Hey!"
"—what've you been up to?"
"Um, not much." She scuffed a shoe against the rug under his living room table a few times. "I see you got a bike."
"Yea, it's a nice way of getting to work and exercising at the same time."
"Good… Good." Her shoe scuffed the rug a few more times. "May I have a glass of water?"
Mike gave her a funny look before bringing her a glass of water which she took a long drink from before she said, "I broke up with Chris."
Blinking eyes were the only response she got for a few seconds before he said, "Sorry about that. He seemed like a great guy."
"It's okay. I'm okay." She took a breath and looked up at him. "I realized that I was lying to myself and wanted to be with someone else."
His mouth flopped open and barely moved when he said, "Oh."
He opened his mouth to say more but knocking on the door interrupted him. Turning too fast for her to see his reaction to the interruption, he went over to the door and opened it.
She wasn't surprised when a short brunette walked in, saw her, and screamed, "Quinn!" It also wasn't surprising when the brunette ran over and hugged her.
"Rachel, how are you?"
"Wonderful, now that you're here," Rachel said as she pulled away slightly. "We haven't seen each other in forever."
"I know, but that's what this trip is for."
Rachel pulled back even more and said, "Oh, I love this scarf."
"I'm, uh, going to finish getting ready," Mike said. "You two ladies can catch up."
The two ladies glanced over at Mike before Rachel continued, "Where'd you get it?"
"I bought a few while they were on sale at Nordstrom."
"They're amazing. I—," Rachel began to say, but when Mike walked out of earshot she pulled Quinn to the front of the apartment and switched to a furious whisper. "What are you doing here?"
"I know I wasn't—"
"The plan was to surprise him at dinner. Not pop up at his apartment like a stalker."
"I know. I know, but—"
"You're acting like I did back in high school."
Quinn rolled her eyes then said, "Nice acting back there."
Now it was Rachel's turn to roll her eyes. "Who do you think you're talking to?"
"Thanks for doing this," Quinn said after a moment with a smile.
Rachel returned the smile and said, "Couldn't wait to see him, huh?"
"No. I don't think I've ever been happier in my life than when he opened the door."
"Well," Rachel said as she tucked herself under Quinn's arm like the sister she had turned into during their time in college, "we'll see if we can make you happier this weekend. Our plan should still work even with this detour."
"Stop calling it a plan."
Mike came out a second later before Rachel could respond to Quinn, but she did say, "Mike! Quinn's coming to dinner with us!"
"She is?" Quinn couldn't tell if he was happy about it or not. "Are we gonna be able to fit her in the reservation?"
"Yea, I called the restaurant and they said it was fine."
"Oh, that's great then."
She still couldn't figure out if the idea of her coming along made him happy.
XXX
The plan, according to Rachel, was to have Quinn surprise Mike by showing up at dinner unannounced, make a declaration of love which Mike would return, and then they would live happily ever after. Preferably in New York.
Rachel had never lost her romantic streak which was one of the reasons Quinn loved her, but the chances of that plan happening were about as good as Quinn spontaneously turning into a duck. All she wanted to do was tell Mike the truth and hope for the best. She couldn't, and wouldn't, expect anything more which was why she talked mostly with Rachel as they made their way to the restaurant. There was an entire weekend available to her and the streets of New York were not the place to have the conversation.
As the restaurant came into view, Quinn saw the one major problem with this plan standing next to Finn. This dinner was originally supposed to be a way for Rachel to introduce Mike to one of her theatre friends. That idea had been tossed out the window when Quinn called and explained what she wanted to do. Thankfully, Rachel was being sneaky about it and, combined with a few last second invites, neither of the two knew what the dinner was supposed to be for.
That solved one thing. The larger problem was the fact that Rachel thought her friend would be a good match for Mike. Quinn had no reason to think Rachel was wrong. All she could think about was them hitting it off and Mike completely forgetting about her, even though Rachel promised she would make sure her friend would end up far away from Mike. Plus, Rachel had been downplaying her friend every day, but that turned out to be a bunch of lies.
"You didn't tell me she was a fucking supermodel," Quinn said after she dragged Rachel away from the group.
"She's not a supermodel. She's an actor on Broadway and she's just…tall and beautiful and…" Rachel grinned before continuing, "Dresses like a model."
"You're not helping."
"Stop worrying. You do what you need to do and I'll make sure they don't interact much."
Rachel did just that, but Quinn didn't talk with Mike as much as she would've liked since he wouldn't keep a conversation going with her, not matter how hard she tried. Most of her time was spent glancing at him and being reminded of the little things, like the way he dropped his nose close to his food and took a deep breath as he always did. Or how he closed his eyes to savor the first bite of his dish. Or the way he laughed at the dumbest comments.
Before she knew it, they had split off into smaller groups after dinner. Half the group, including the supermodel, decided they were still young and went bar hopping. The other half, comprised of the people she knew, felt way too old to be doing that and made their way to a subway station. She didn't know if Rachel and Finn actually felt that way or if Rachel heard Mike decide to head home. In either case, Quinn was thankful that someone would be there if Mike still wouldn't talk to her.
"So, dinner was nice," Quinn said, as Rachel and Finn sped off arm in arm ahead of them. That she knew was on purpose.
"Yea, it was."
Again with the short responses.
"I really liked the sweetbreads."
Mike chuckled. "I still can't believe that's the only offal you like."
"I know," she said, smiling that she made him laugh. "It's crazy."
"Did you see the look on Rachel's face when you explained what they are?"
"I did," she said, now with a full-blown grin. "It looked like she was going to throw up. Or cry."
"Probably both," he said drawing laughter from both of them.
They took half a dozen steps before he said, "They looked good."
"I would've given you a bite," she said, glancing over at him.
He glanced back and smiled. "I know."
If it wouldn't have been entirely creepy, Quinn would've taken her phone out and snapped a picture of that smile to keep forever. Instead, all she did was smile back and then look away. Every so often she would glance over at him and catch him looking at her. It made her want to skip down the street and scream with joy.
"So, how do you like New York?"
"It's fine," Mike said with a shrug. "Just different."
"The restaurants are great here right?"
"Yea, but…"
She waited a beat before saying, "But?"
"I don't really know anyone who loves food here and—" He stopped talking as he looked straight ahead "Hold on a second."
Mike ran off ahead, dodging past Rachel and Finn, as Quinn watched, completely confused. The pair ahead of her looked back and she just shrugged while walking faster to catch up. They watched as Mike dodged past a few more people until he reached a subway station half a block ahead of them. There a woman stood at the top of the stairs with the handle of a stroller in one hand and holding onto the hand of a child in the other.
The warmth in her stomach came back again. This time because of the ticking biological time bomb called her ovaries as she watched Mike making faces at the baby in the stroller as he helped carry it down the stairs. It was ridiculous how something like that could be turning her on. Biology and evolution were stupid.
"He's really great isn't he?" Rachel said as they stopped at the top of the stairs and watched.
"He is."
Even with Mike's help, it was a struggle to get the stroller and child down the stairs. Understandably, the mother didn't want to jostle the baby in the stroller or let go of the child who was making his own unsteady way down the stairs. Quinn excused herself and quickly caught up to them.
"Excuse me." Mike and the mother looked up at her. "Can I help?"
"Oh my god," the mother said. "Thank you so much."
Mike made another face at the baby, drawing a few giggles, before saying, "Hey, I got this."
"No offense," Quinn said with a smile. "But it looked like the big strapping young man was having some trouble."
This brought a smile to his face and, with Quinn's help on the stroller, they quickly made their way down the stairs to the fare gates. Beyond them there was another set of stairs to reach the platform and Mike just shrugged when she looked at him. He pushed the stroller through the gate and passed his fare card back to Quinn so she could use it. They carried the stroller down the second set of stairs and accepted the mother's many thanks.
"Do you two have kids?" the mother asked as they stood on the platform and a train pulled up.
"We aren't—" Mike and Quinn began to say at the same time.
"Think about it. You two would make great parents," the mother said, making her way onto the train. She thanked them again before the doors closed. That left Mike and Quinn standing there watching it pull away, ignoring the comment hanging in the air.
"The subway always makes me miss the Metro. Escalators. Elevators." He sniffed the air a few times. "And no funny smells."
Quinn laughed as they began making their way back up the stairs. "C'mon, let's get back."
She stopped when she felt a hand on her forearm and spun around, seeing Mike at eye-level since he was step or two below her. There was a funny look on his face as he held up his phone.
"Rachel and Finn were exhausted and went home first."
Struggling to keep a blank face, she silently thanked Rachel and said, "Oh."
"I guess I'll take you back to your hotel. Where are you staying?"
"The Algonquin, by Times Square."
Mike looked up at the sign above them for a few seconds then said, "We can take a train from this station."
The train ride back to her hotel was a quiet affair as they were both tired, Mike from a day of work and Quinn crashing from an adrenaline high. It took all she had not to drop her head against his chest as they stood pressed together in the crowded train, swaying along with the rest of the people. Two transfers in the subway and a short walk later and they were standing in front of her hotel looking at each other.
It didn't take too long for the moment to turn awkward with Mike looking around and Quinn gripping one of her elbows. Just for something to do, she said, "Thanks for walking me back."
"Don't worry about it."
"Reminds you of old times, doesn't it?"
"Yea, it does."
They fell silent and the awkwardness grew back with each passing second. Too bad it wasn't a physical object so she could glare at it until it went away. She settled by saying, "Do you want to grab a drink at the bar?"
"I think I'm gonna go. I'm—"
"Just one drink. I need to tell you something."
She stared at him with those piercing eyes of hers. They had always been helpful with getting things from other people and she hoped they wouldn't let her down now.
"Fine," he said as held up a finger. "One drink."
XXX
"So, what'd you want to talk about?"
Quinn took a sip of her wine, set the glass down, and said, "I wanted to say I'm sorry."
"What for?"
She took another sip. "I really, really liked— like you Mike, but I didn't do anything about it out of some perverse belief that I was protecting you."
"And how exactly were you doing that?"
"I stink at relationships." She looked down at her hands. "I've ruined every single one I've been in starting with my best friend back in middle school who I stabbed in the back to impress the popular kids all the way to Chris who I used to try and get over you."
"Quinn—"
"I'm an awful person and—"
Mike interrupted her with laughter. Laughter. He was actually laughing at her and it was all she could do to not slap him across the face while saying, "I bare my soul to you and you laugh in my face?"
"No. I'm not— It's just that—" He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. "This is your plan?"
Her eyes blinked a few times as her anger was pushed out of the way by confusion. "You heard us talking?"
"Thin walls," he said with a smile. "And I thought Rachel said something about a love confession. Not…that."
She rolled her eyes. "That was Rachel being a romantic and making up a story of how this would go in her mind."
"You'd say 'I love you' then I'd say it back then we'd live happily ever after?"
Quinn laughed and Mike joined her after she said, "In New York of course."
Out of everything she missed about Mike, laughter was the biggest, and it felt good to laugh with him again. The happiness from seeing him was one thing, but what she got from interacting with him was so much better.
After their laughs died down Mike stared at her and said, "Rachel was right. Minus the whole New York thing."
She stared back blankly, not quite able to process what he had said.
"But, that means— I don't want to hurt you."
"I know you don't and that's the important thing."
"But—"
"Listen," he said as he grabbed her hand. "The fact that you don't want to hurt the people you care about makes you not an awful person."
The warmth from his hands felt really nice and she looked down while stroking the back of one of them with her thumb. "But I always end up hurting them."
"It happens."
She covered his hands with her other and squeezed. "I don't want to hurt you."
"Too late for that." She looked up and he had a wry smile on his face. "But things like that happen when you make progress."
It took a moment to catch his reference but when she did, she smirked and said, "You and your Stanford wisdom."
They sat there, hands intertwined, just looking at each other. She felt giddy which was why her yawn caught her by surprise which caused Mike to yawn which caused both of them to laugh.
"I think we're done with our drinks."
"Yea," she said, dropping her head back against the booth and closing her eyes. Only to open them when she felt him pull his hands away.
"I think I'm gonna go."
She watched him as he pulled out his wallet and dropped enough money to cover their tab. Her mind was made up before he extended his hand to help her out of her seat.
"Mike," she said, pulling him to a stop. "Come upstairs."
When his answer didn't come immediately, she had the ridiculous feeling that he would reject her, even though they just had that entire conversation. Not that they had come to an actual decision with all that talking.
"Don't you think we should wait? Or talk some more?"
"No," she said as she pulled him into the lobby of the hotel. "We've done enough of both."