NIGHTMARES: OR PERHAPS NOT, WHO CAN SAY?
Author's Note: The following is essentially an adaptation of some stream of consciousness writing I did more than a year ago to a friend and a few lines of dialogue I wrote not long after that. These writings ultimately represented a plan for a multi-chapter Glee fic that I now know I will never have the time or dedication to write. I have rewritten this open letter to more closely resemble prose, and I do hope you enjoy it.
May 15, 2012
Chicago O'Hare International Airport
They tried everything to get the lady working the check-in counter to let them carry-on their 1st place trophy.
"Neither of us will take carry-ons," Sam offered, gesturing to Mike at his side. Mike nodded rather convincingly, but apparently not convincingly enough.
"I'm sorry, but it's too big—"
"My father, the inventor of Toaster Strudel, will have something to say about you not letting us on with—"
"Sugar," Mercedes interjected with an exasperated sigh, "your father didn't invent those delicious, stuffed breakfast pastries."
"I—"
The airport employee was interrupted again, this time by an irritated and delusionally savvy Santana. "Look, here's the deal: I slip you this Benjamin, you look the other way, we slip right on through security with this bad boy, and no one has to be any the wiser that you were the one who approved it." Before the woman could even open her mouth again to protest, Santana held up a hand. "All right, all right; instead of the green, I'll just let you watch me and my sexy ass girlfriend here make-out for 60 seconds."
Just as the uniformed woman was tilting her head, seemingly to consider Santana's dubious offer, Mr. Schuester pushed his way through his congregated students. Santana blustered irately from over his shoulder as he silenced her with one hand.
"I think maybe we could come to some kind of agreeable arrangement here…" Mr. Schue began.
Near the escalators that lead up towards the checkpoint for their gate, several members of the William McKinley High group began to congregate.
There were Troubletones—or Cheerios, depending on their outfits for the day—musicians from Artie's long-time jazz band connection, and the other members of New Directions.
Just next to the escalator, relatively obscured due to the shadow cast by the mid-afternoon sun through the tall atrium windows, stood a brunette. And, next to her, a blonde.
"I can't believe Carmen Tibideaux came."
"You can't?"
"I've never heard of someone getting this kind of second chance. For her to have come, to hear me sing again… It was really the shining opportunity of my career thus far."
"Every time you sing, Rachel…"
"…Yes?"
"It's just that, every time you sing—every single time—it feels like the world should stop and take notice."
"Quinn, I don't know what to say."
"You don't have to say anything."
Rachel smiled. Quinn smiled back. Their hands met somewhere between them, fingers touching gently. They shared no further words – just a look that seemed to last a lifetime.
"All right, team! Let's head to security!"
Whatever the strings Mr. Schue had somehow pulled, the trophy was coming with them on the plane.
One Hour Later
Rachel sat backwards on her knees in her aisle seat so that she could observe all of the familiar faces of her friends – her family – as they took their seats. They would be pushing back from the gate soon, but Rachel had something to say first.
"I'm so proud of you all," she said, making sure to catch the eyes of every glee club member or Cheerio or jazz musician filling the back third of the plane. "We've come so far, made some of the unlikeliest of friends, and now we have a national championship to prove that we're the best!"
Santana mumbled a snarky comment about having been part of numerous other national championship teams, but everyone ignored her.
"I won't say anything more. Just that… I'm really happy to be part of something so special."
Finn and Puck burst into cheers and started clapping loudly, and soon everyone else was joining in.
Mercedes and Tina. Kurt and Artie. Sam and Blaine. Brittany and Santana. Sugar and Mike. And all the rest.
Rachel smiled brightly before turning back around and sitting down fully in her seat.
Next to her, Quinn sat, a fond smile playing across her lips.
"Rousing speech," she teased.
Rachel huffed playfully. "I meant it."
"Unlikeliest of friends?"
"We are, aren't we?"
A flicker of doubt or something similar passed over Quinn's face. "Kind of," she muttered.
Rachel looked at her confusedly.
In moments, she was distracted by the plane pushing back and the flight attendants walking through the necessary safety precautions in case of the worst. Rachel normally didn't pay much attention to these instructions, believing them to be pointless in the unlikely case of an actual crash. But her mind was racing – for a lot of reasons, but mostly because she was considering the look Quinn had just had on her face, a look she had seen before (several times over the years, in fact) but was only just starting to recognize for what it was. Or, at least, for what it might be.
And the truth was somehow terrifying.
Two tense hours later, they were nearing their final airport destination. Rachel hadn't spoken much, and she knew Quinn had been sneaking furtive glances her way in the wake of her silence. But Rachel didn't know what to say, for once, and she had thought it best to keep her mouth shut. Her courage, however, was surfacing.
She turned to look towards Quinn, and hazel eyes quickly connected with hers.
The seatbelt lights overhead turned on with a ding. But Rachel ignored them, still tightly fastened in.
She could feel her heart pounding inside her chest. She wasn't supposed to be feeling this, not while staring at this girl beside her, and not when the supposed love of her life was two rows back and to the left. But she had to know. She had to ask.
"For how long?" she questioned, simultaneously hoping that Quinn would confusedly ask for clarification or that she would proclaim for always.
Tears welled up in Quinn's eyes. Rachel watched the girl swallow and then open her mouth to speak.
The plane shuddered. Rachel's ears popped. It felt like they had dropped five hundred feet all at once. She glanced around worriedly and noticed that others were looking a bit disconcerted by the sudden turbulence as well. Rachel turned back to Quinn.
"Rachel, I—"
Again, the plane shook violently. Before Rachel knew what was happening, both of her hands were wrapped around one of Quinn's own. There was more shaking, some yelling that seemed to come from all directions at once.
"Quinn!" Rachel gasped. It was suddenly difficult to breathe.
"Rachel—"
But Quinn was again cut off. Shouts had turned to screams. Lightning flashed outside, lighting up the night sky. Rain streaked across the windows. Rachel hadn't even noticed before that they were flying through a storm. The plane was caught in a seemingly endless seizure, and then there was an odd moment of stillness—
The oxygen masks dropped from above them as the plane began to lose altitude. Rachel had never liked rollercoasters, and this was like a hellish carnival ride gone terribly, terribly wrong. She suddenly couldn't breathe. Tears were already streaming from her eyes, making it difficult to see Quinn.
But Quinn was there – god, Quinn was there, and Rachel could still see her face in the now flashing cabin lights. The intermittent darkness and the pressure on her ears made it nearly impossible to see or hear what the other girl seemed to be screaming at Rachel's face, but she was mouthing words – the same words, over and over and over…
Rachel tried to gasp out, "I can't hear you, Quinn, I can't hear you," but she nearly choked on the lack of oxygen and the fear bubbling upward from somewhere deep, deep inside of her. The words Quinn was mouthing looked an awful lot like a confession, but Rachel just couldn't get her brain to process them.
Quinn must have somehow been minimally more level-headed though, because she clearly understood what Rachel was trying to shout. She leaned forward, and she pressed her free hand against the back of Rachel's neck. Her forehead pressed firmly into Rachel's, and they closed their eyes together. Beyond the shaking, spiraling, dizzying plane, crashing down around them, all they felt in that moment was each other.
Consciousness was slipping kindly away. And Rachel smiled at the sudden sensation of warmth, and of quiet.
And then there was nothing.
September 9, 2009
The Berry Residence
Rachel woke, gasping for air, and sat straight up in bed. Her alarm clock started blaring Break My Stride.
"Last night I had the strangest dream."
She blinked rapidly in the dim light of the early morning sunrise peeking through her curtains. Her eyes began to adjust. She pressed her palm to her chest in an attempt to calm her racing heart. There was a pressure on her eardrums, sort of like all the blood had rushed from her head at once. And the song playing from her bedside was overpowering the resonating screams that were filling her head…
At the end of her bed, there were clothes. Her outfit for the day. Crawling out from under her covers, Rachel moved closer to look, confusion clouding her senses.
A black cardigan. A yellow and black checkered skirt with matching belt. Purple shirt.
This was an outfit she remembered. And she didn't remember it because she had picked it out the night before – she remembered it because she had picked it out nearly two and a half years ago. This was the outfit she had been wearing the day she'd turned Mr. Ryerson in for touching Hank.
"What on earth…" she mumbled, falling backwards on the bed.
In a daze, she reached out and shut the alarm clock off.
"Ain't nothin' gonna break my—"
It couldn't be. Rachel remembered everything. Turning Hank in, Mr. Schue taking over glee club, and the following years of humiliation and ridicule – and joy and triumph. They had won Nationals, for goodness' sake! And then—
"The plane," Rachel gasped, "the plane crashed."
Rachel was a smart girl. And her subsequent thought process went something like this:
I am either dreaming, dead, or destined for a second shot at this. Maybe, somehow, it's all three at once. But I'm all about Taking Chances, so what comes next?
It was quite the rational conclusion, honestly, given the situation.
Rachel believed deep down in her heart that glee club had always been special. They were all special, every single one of them. And being part of that, well, it made her special, too. But Rachel also knew that they never would have gotten to nationals if it hadn't been for her; hell, they never would have stayed a glee club after sophomore year if she hadn't… If she hadn't…
She sat straight up in bed again. That was it. That was the answer.
Rachel didn't need to put a stopper on her talent. But the answer was nearly as simple as that: she just never had to work to reinstate the glee club in the first place.
Yes. That would work, she thought. It would keep them all from dying in a fiery plane crash, at least.
"That's it," she said, resolutely determined to avoid incineration. "I've got a second chance at high school, that's what this is. I'll succeed, I'll get the NYADA audition, and I'll keep my friends from getting killed while I'm at it." Then, she gasped. "But… What about my friends?"
Because they weren't her friends, here, were they? No. There would be no glee club to bring them together, no thread connecting them.
But…if she could change everything else, maybe she could change that, too.
Rachel hopped out of bed and ran to her desk. She pulled out a notebook and one of her pink pens and began to furiously jot down her plan.
By the time the sun had fully risen, Rachel had plotted out the remainder of her high school career on the pages before her.
She would befriend Tina and Kurt by getting them to join drama club with her. Artie, Mike, and Brittany would be her next targets, and she'd snatch up their nerdy little cat-loving hearts by joining the quiz bowl team. She could still sing with Mercedes – in jazz band! Sam, Blaine, and Sugar – well, she would deal with when the time came. The real trick had been figuring out how to befriend the football players and the Cheerios from the bottom of the school's social hierarchy – but somewhere around minute forty-three in her planning, Rachel hit the jackpot of ideas. It would allow her to open the lines of social communication between Noah, Finn, and the other football players, and it would also keep Brittany, Santana, and Quinn from turning on her with complete derision: she would join the Cheerios!
At some point after she slammed the cover shut on her notebook, Rachel realized that nowhere in her plan did the seduction of Finn Hudson come into play. But she realized that she had taken careful consideration in the actual befriending of one Quinn Fabray.
"It doesn't mean anything," Rachel said to herself as she showered and got ready for school. "It's just that becoming her friend was one of my greatest high school accomplishments. It would be silly of me not to try and get that relationship back."
But even as Rachel reassured herself, she closed her eyes and pictured Quinn's face as the plane had been crashing – the shapes her lips had made as she had tried to scream the unknown into Rachel's mind, as she had tried to force some understanding on Rachel in those last, desperate moments.
Rachel shook her head. It didn't matter. Not anymore.
When she got to school that morning, she went to the choir room. She arrived just in time to see Mr. Ryerson caressing Hank's stomach as he sang.
She said nothing. The series of events that would have followed otherwise culminated in an ending she could not bear to think about.
That afternoon, Rachel wrote two notes and dropped them into two lockers. The first was to Hank, letting him know that he did not have to put up with Mr. Ryerson's questionable teaching methods.
The second was to Quinn. All it said was: You are beautiful. Make sure he wears a condom.
The following months were difficult, if not downright disheartening. But things slowly started to come together.
Drama club – and friendship with Tina and Kurt – was about the easiest thing Rachel accomplished that fall semester, and it was challenging, to say the least. But she cracked Tina by telling her that she had a lot of talent and didn't need to hide behind a false stutter, if she ever wanted to drop it entirely. And she managed to get Kurt on her side by mentioning that he reminded her a lot of her dad, Hiram. She also helped him practice his lines for the school's fall play auditions, and that certainly didn't hurt.
Rachel, to her disdain, did not make the quiz bowl team until spring semester. But it wasn't long after that when she started hanging out every Saturday afternoon with the team at Artie's house – typically playing video games with Mike and Artie while Brittany recited cat facts to them and ate gummy worms.
And Rachel's budding friendship with Artie helped her get an in with the jazz band a few weeks later. All it took was the suggestion that they would be much stronger as an ensemble if they added a few vocal charts to their set list to get Mercedes onboard.
As fall turned to winter and winter to spring, Rachel began to implement Operation: Cheerio. It worked out in her favor that open auditions were going to be held near the end of the school year; otherwise, Rachel may never have found an in with the tight-knit, Sue Sylvester-run organization.
Quinn, Santana, and Coach Sylvester sat behind a table in the gymnasium. Rachel performed the required cheers, used her excellent lung capacity to stun them with her projection technique, and capped off the audition with an impressive gymnastics pass – she had been throwing fulls without a spring floor since she was thirteen.
Throughout the entire audition – and especially after the full – Rachel was entirely too cognizant of those hazel eyes keyed in on her.
When the list was posted the next day, Rachel was officially a Cheerio.
That summer was one of Rachel's busiest of her life. She was still taking ballet lessons, gymnastics classes, and singing lessons. But she was also balancing a very full social life – between the summer drama program, the jazz band's summer trip to Ohio State University, and the continued weekly video game and cat education sessions at Artie's, Rachel barely had time to reminisce about the glee club that never was, or the life she thought she had lost.
And on top of all that, there was a two-week cheerleading camp that was required mid-July. It was Rachel's first opportunity to get closer to Brittany and Santana. And, of course, to Quinn. She always seemed to be thinking about Quinn. The girl's life was so much different, since she hadn't gotten pregnant, and Rachel often wondered if her note had done more harm than good. But there was a light in Quinn's eyes that was painfully familiar to Rachel, and she made it her goal that summer to become more familiar with it.
While cheer camp was definitely an unusual (and slightly unnerving) experience for Rachel, she really did come out of it feeling like a true member of the Cheerios squad. She had managed not to drop the spirit stick – yes, there really is always a spirit stick at cheer camp – and she'd become friends with many of the Cheerios. And not just the ones who had been a part of New Directions or the Troubletones in another life.
Towards the end of summer, Titan Buddies – football players and Cheerios who were teamed up and who visited Lima elementary school classrooms every Friday while decked out in their gear – were chosen by random draw. To Rachel's astonishment, she was paired with Noah Puckerman and the new kid at school, Sam Evans. All throughout football season, Noah invited Rachel to parties pretty much every Friday night after games. It wasn't long before she was friends with Finn and Mike again as well.
During football season, something else started happening. It was astonishing, really. Quinn started going out of her way to be near Rachel. It was not subtle, not even from the very beginning. And Rachel felt drawn to the other girl, and she thought it must have been a mutual feeling, because Quinn seemed to seek her out at every opportunity. There were a few Cheerios sleepovers, and Quinn and Rachel always seemed to be up even after everyone else had fallen asleep, talking long into the morning hours.
And then Rachel started asking Quinn over, for sleepovers just between the two of them. They would still talk long into the night – but they would also delicately hold each other's hands while doing so.
Over winter break, all of the Cheerios went to see a movie together. Rachel and Quinn were sitting in the row behind most of the other girls, and Brittany and Santana were to Quinn's right. Halfway through the movie, Quinn boldly reached over and entwined her fingers with Rachel's. Rachel nervously glanced toward Santana, but the other girl's eyes only briefly flashed in their direction before she decidedly grabbed Brittany's hand in hers as well. Rachel smiled.
That night, Quinn drove Rachel home. And she kissed her, there, in the driveway. And Rachel nearly forgot her own name.
They didn't come out as a couple quickly. They handled it quietly, at first, so as not to let it get back to Quinn's family. But eventually, it did get out. Quinn's mom left her dad when he tried to disown Quinn. Things were rough for a while, but Rachel was and always had been a solid anchor. She did her best to support the other girl; as it turned out, her best was more than enough.
The summer between junior and senior years was as full as the previous had been, but Rachel's heart was even fuller. She had Quinn. Every time she felt like pinching herself at how effortless it all seemed, she would mentally shake herself – and make sure she remembered the lives lost and the future she had narrowly managed to avoid.
When fall came again, it brought two new students. Sugar turned out to have a very loud voice, but was terrible at singing – she was a perfect fit for the Cheerios. And Blaine was one of the most effortlessly dramatic people Rachel had ever met – which was saying something, indeed. He fit right in with the drama club.
Senior year couldn't have been more perfect. Sometimes, Rachel had nightmares where she would wake up short of breath with a racing heart and pounding eardrums. But those nights were rare. She ignored them, when she could. Other times, she cherished the reminder that second chances were real.
As the month of May approached, Rachel's college applications and ever-busy schedule kept her too preoccupied to notice the confluence of events that was approaching.
The national glee competition had been in Chicago their senior year. As it turned out, this was still the case – but there was no McKinley High glee club to represent them at the competition. Rachel hardly cared – she had been accepted to Juilliard, and Quinn was to attend NYU in the fall. They would be in the same city for the next four years, at least. Rachel hardly needed a 1st place national trophy to feel satisfied with her life.
But other things also happened in Chicago, apparently. Because that was where their national cheerleading competition was to be held that second weekend in May. And the jazz band's biggest divisional contest was also held there – that same weekend. Several of Rachel's closest football friends – including Finn, Puck, Mike, and Sam – were flying out with some other members of the team to catch an NBA playoff game. The drama club was taking a trip to Chicago's theater district to see a performance of Wicked, and it happened to coincide with all of the other events. The quiz bowl team had been knocked out of regional competition back in March, but apparently that didn't matter – because Brittany was there with the Cheerios, Mike was there for the basketball game, and Artie was there with the band.
It wasn't until Rachel was at the airport, after the Cheerios had won their competition, that she realized something strange was happening.
She was standing near the escalators that led towards the security checkpoint. Quinn was next to her. They were standing together, hands held, talking about the awesome things they had seen and experienced that weekend. Quinn was telling her a story, intermittently interrupting the telling with kisses to Rachel's lips. It wasn't until Mr. Schuester – the temporary drama club director – called out, "All right, team! Let's head to security!" that Rachel received the sickest shock of déjà vu she had ever experienced in her life.
And it wasn't until she reached her seat on the plane, next to Quinn, that she realized the full extent of the problem.
She stood in the aisle, and she looked at the faces – the beautiful, kind, loving faces she had grown fond of (again) – that were looking back at her.
Finn and Puck. Mercedes and Tina. Kurt and Artie. Sam and Blaine. Brittany and Santana. Sugar and Mike. And all the rest – Cheerios (or Troubletones, once upon a time) and jazz band members, too.
Rachel nearly got sick then and there. Her eyes frantically searched for Quinn's, and when their eyes connected, she came to the ultimate realization:
This… This was where she was meant to be.
She sat next to her girlfriend. Held her hand. Kissed her lips – kissed them like the world was ending, because Rachel was pretty sure that it was, for them. Rachel kissed Quinn like the taste of their lips together could save them; but it couldn't.
When the plane began to shudder and shake, Rachel pressed her mouth to Quinn's ear and whispered the words she now believed Quinn had tried to scream at her, once, in something that now resembled a dream, or a nightmare:
"I love you, Quinn."
"I love you, Rachel," Quinn replied.
And they clutched at each other, as the plane began its spiraling descent from the heavens.
September 9, 2009 (Again)
The Berry Residence
When Rachel woke up next, she couldn't understand why her heart was racing, or why her eyes were wet. Her yellow and black checked skirt and purple shirt and black cardigan were lying across the foot of her bed, waiting for her to slip them on for the day. Break My Stride began playing as she blinked her eyes in the dim light of her room.
Rachel's heart felt heavy with unknowable regret, for something… Something that she couldn't remember.
Later that morning, when Rachel got to school, she walked toward the choir room because she normally spent some time practicing for her latest myspace video before class. But just before Rachel reached the door, she heard footsteps pounding behind her in the otherwise empty hallway.
She turned around, not knowing what to expect. And what she saw was Quinn Fabray – Cheerios Captain, Quinn Fabray. The girl was running full speed at her, and Rachel felt a rush of confusion and terror, until she realized that there was no slushie in the girl's hands.
Rachel almost expected Quinn to run past her. After all, why would she have stopped?
But Quinn did stop – she stopped right in front of Rachel; slammed on her brakes and let her breath – soft and warm – brush against Rachel's face. Rachel could only look on with wonder, concerned and confused about what on earth was happening.
And without wasting another second, Quinn grabbed Rachel's face in her hands, and she kissed her, hard, on the lips.
The memories of two and a half years – or five years, depending on how you want to look at it – did not come rushing back to Rachel. What did come rushing to her, however, was a feeling, deep inside her chest, somewhere – an ache, a longing, a sharp-edged and inconceivable hunger, ready to burst them both into flame.
Rachel kissed Quinn back, not knowing why – only knowing that she must.