Chapter 2 The Check-In

Quinn had driven them to a tiny café that she had never heard of before, but that Jason had highly recommended. Quinn's head was spinning. Not only had Jason re-entered her life completely out of the blue, but she had discovered an entire area of the town she'd lived in all her life that she had never seen before. Jason was chatting merrily as they went into the café and sat at a table near the back.

"Everyone really liked you!" he said with a grin as the waitress brought them menus. Quinn shook her head.

"I still have no idea what a stage manager does."

Jason continued to grin. "Well, that's me, I'm the stage manager, and I'm basically responsible for everything that goes on backstage. During rehearsal I take notes on how the scene is being directed, I figure out what kind of props we need, try to figure out if there's going to be a costume issue."

"What kind of a costume issue?" If Quinn was going to be honest, she would have to say this job sounded awful.

"Well," Jason sipped his water and continued to peruse the menu, "If someone has to run, then they can't be wearing something so restricting that they can't run, you know. Stuff like that. The designers won't normally be in rehearsal so my job is to be there so that I can tell them about that stuff."

The waitress came and took their food order, and Quinn could feel Jason watching her intently. She resisted strongly the urge to roll her eyes. She could tell he was waiting for her to jump up, throw her arms around him and answer with a resounding 'yes!' She wasn't ready to give him a definitive answer yet, so to stall she said, "What are you doing up in Cincinnati?"

He only looked slightly disappointed. She had presented him with an opportunity to talk about himself, after all.

"I'm in the musical theatre program at the College-Conservatory of Music," she could tell by his pause that she was supposed to be impressed by this, but since she had never heard of the place before, her face remained neutral. He pressed on, anyway. "I audition whenever I can, you know. I work, too. I'm supporting myself."

Quinn was surprised by this. She knew Jason's family had money. "Your parents aren't helping you?"

There was a pause as the waitress set their food on the table and they both got settled into the meal. Finally, Jason looked up, and Quinn saw him look sad and a little bitter for the first time since she'd run into him.

"No, they aren't."

"Oh." Quinn was torn between wanting to ask, but also not really caring. Whatever spoiled-boy-forced-into-growing-up issues he was having were things she didn't want to hear about.

"Quinn, do you know why Annie and I broke up?"

Quinn shrugged and pretended to be very interested in her sandwich. She was going to regret agreeing to come to this lunch if Jason was going to whine about problems that didn't even matter. She scowled at her plate.

"I'm gay." Her eyes shot up to meet his and her mouth fell open.

"What?"

Jason chuckled. "Yeah. I told Annie, I asked her to forgive me for hurting her feelings. I asked her not to break up with me, to help me hide it. I told her maybe she could help me be cured. But I think she was more hurt than she cared to let on. She told my parents and they kicked me out."

Quinn stared at him. It was a lot to process; the eerie similarity between her story and his, her sister's treachery. Finally she managed, "How did I not know about this?"

Jason laughed again. "My parents were mortified, and I moved in with my brother and I didn't tell anyone. I had it easier than you did, people couldn't tell I was gay just by looking. Not then, anyway." He grinned.

Quinn blinked at him, "Is this why everyone at the theatre kept laughing whenever you told them about Annie?" He nodded, still chuckling. Quinn had to smirk a little at that. Quinn agreed that had discretion been an option for her, she would have minimized the scandal by keeping her secret, too. Although, she wasn't sure how "easy" he had had it. She knew they had both had similar upbringings and had both gone to the same church. As they paid for their meal and prepared to leave, she couldn't help but appreciate that Jason seemed to know a little of what she had gone through in the past year.

"I have to say," he said, taking a sip of his drink, "I kind of expected you to start preaching at me."

Quinn smirked and looked toward the front of the restaurant, out the windows. "I know what that's like, after…well, after this year. Besides, I lived with someone whose best friend is the only gay person in our school. I was around him a lot."

"You mean the only out gay person at school. Some people could be gay and not even realize it, or they're hiding it."

Quinn just shrugged at him. She wasn't sure what to say to that.

"Listen, about the assistant thing," Jason held up his hand when she opened her mouth to protest, "just sleep on it and give me a call tomorrow. We don't start rehearsals until Monday, anyway."

Quinn hesitated. It was Saturday, and the possibility of being thrown into something that seemed so involved in two days' time was daunting. She found herself nodding yes, anyway. "I'll think about it," she answered. Jason grinned again.

Quinn drove off feeling intrigued by Jason's offer, but also emotionally drained from revisiting so many pent up emotions by hearing his story. When she arrived home, she found her mother passed out on the couch, the television still on and tuned to Court TV. Quinn sighed and turned the tv off, draping a blanket over her mother without much care. The woman's self-pity was starting to rub Quinn raw. Judy Fabray was where Quinn would be if she stopped trying, and Quinn couldn't help but feel that her mother didn't quite have the right to check out. Sure, she had been cheated on and thrown Russell out. Quinn had unknowingly had unprotected sex, gotten pregnant, been kicked out of her house and then gave the baby up. If anyone had the right to check out it's me,the younger Fabray decided, climbing the stairs, and that, she thought, looking over at her mother, will never be me. As she climbed into bed, she grabbed her phone to text Jason:

I'll do it.