Sorry this is so late! Hopefully the length makes up for it!

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Chapter 7: Master Baiters

Rachel still wasn't talking, which was getting freakier by the second, so Puck loudly told Mr. Schue where to turn. He thought she'd say something about how awesome it was that he'd remembered where she lived, but she didn't. And then he put his arm around her shoulders and maybe sort of copped a feel, and she didn't even try to move his hand off the top of her boob. So he moved it on his own because if she was too sad to even freak out about it and call him a pig, then that just made him a skeeze, and she didn't even say anything about him moving it on his own.

He didn't have any other stops to pull to get her to stop being so quiet (and could anyone ever have predicted he'd ever think of Rachel Berry being quiet as a bad thing? And not only a bad thing, but like something to be legitimately worried about?), and he was definitely not going to make a play for some under-the-skirt action just to get a reaction in the back of his teacher's car. Maybe if it was a chick who was willing, like Santana, but Rachel clearly wasn't feeling it.

He sort of felt like a jackass for touching her boob at all, so he wondered if he should kiss her hair to, like, make it up to her or something. He thought it would be a nice gesture, but he didn't do it.

No, that would be weird. He didn't want her to get the wrong idea.

"Okay, here it is. The one with the fence," Puck said, pointing to Rachel's house. Mr. Schue pulled into the driveway and it was pretty clear that no one was home from the lack of cars in the driveway or lights in the windows. Which, actually, was sort of a relief, because that meant that Puck's inner nightmare about three Berrys ranting was drastically reduced to just the one, and he knew how to shut her up.

"Are you sure the two of you are allowed to be…" Schue started, but Puck just smirked at him. Which was a pretty definitive 'probably not, but what are you gonna do about it?'

"My dads work late," Rachel said quietly, all wounded and sad and baby deerish. Which was probably the right route to go considering Schue's obvious crush on Miss P., who looked like a cartoon bunny ninety percent of the time. "They have given me permission to keep Noah in the house with me tonight, given my assault this morning."

See, she knew what assault meant: creepy and sexual or whatever. At least, he was pretty sure that was what that meant. He'd Google it later.

"Okay, if you're sure," Mr. Schue said, still sounding doubtful. Rachel got out of the car and dragged Puck along with her.

"Thank you for the ride," she said quietly. Puck just waved over his shoulder. He still wasn't over the annoying 'Rachel's too good for you' vibe that Schue was giving off. And, sure, it was pretty cool that he got to avoid walking home in awkward silence, but that didn't mean he had to like Schue's 'tude.

"See you kids in school tomorrow," Mr. Schue said, sending a seriously vibetastic look in Puck's direction. Only, Puck wasn't sure what he was trying to say, because it sort of looked like a weird, weak ass version of a stink eye, only Schue was smiling, so it was sort of (really) creepy. To the point where Puck was pretty sure he'd be having a nightmare about Schue that night.

He stood there watching the car back out of the driveway for a while, but then he turned and saw that Rachel was waiting for him in the doorway.

"Are you coming in?" she asked shyly, and that, right there, was The Sign. The universal sign for 'Puck, come violate me on my parents' bed' that made his skin crawl with anticipation.

But, wait, that was weird, right? She still looked sad, which Puck had started to realize was generally not a good way to go if you wanted sex. The bump growing under Quinn's babydoll shirts was pretty much the worst reminder ever of that.

"Sure," he said, suddenly feeling really uncomfortable. He'd never felt the pressure of having to be any sort of moral judge, but this was different. He knew better, even though he hated it. So if she threw herself at him and wanted to have sex, he had to say no. No matter what she did or said…shit. It was going to be hard. Impulse control was not one of his strong suits.

But he was a guy, and he had needs, so he figured he could at least get it get a little far. Just not to the point of actual penetration with his actual dick.

He walked into the front foyer and tried not to look at her as she shut and locked the door behind him.

"My dads will be gone for another few hours," she said lightly. Puck thought maybe her dads were going to be gone longer than that, but he didn't want to say that because he didn't want her to think he was like, trying to score an overnight invite or whatever.

"Hey, is it cool if I use your phone? I gotta call my mom and tell her about the tires so she can figure out what to do about that. And she should probably pick me up 'cus I don't really remember how to get to my house from here, anyway, and I'm pretty sure it's too far for me to want to walk to."

"Okay," Rachel said, still quiet. Puck decided to head into the kitchen and call. He'd deal with the freakiness of the situation once he was done.


Once Noah moved into the kitchen, Rachel sat down in her father's favorite arm chair, dedicating herself entirely to the task at hand. The hateful slur scrawled across the side of Noah's truck, particularly the casual manner in which it was executed, as if the perpetrators had no idea that they were writing about a person who had feelings, had startled her deeply. It wasn't that she was a stranger to such words, or even such sentiments. They lived in a small town with a miniscule LGBT population, after all. There were many people who objected to the lifestyle of the Berrys on a religious basis (which of course was entirely ridiculous) but Rachel wasn't concerned with them at that moment. She knew that the attack on Noah's car was executed chiefly by a revenge-driven group of Neanderthals rather than hateful hypocrites like Quinn's parents who preached tolerance while practicing the opposite approach to nearly everything.

It was not hard to plan revenge on people who relied on social and athletic status for self-worth. She didn't have much experience in that field, but she had a feeling that although she was finding teen television dramas to be less helpful than she would have expected when it came to romance, her knowledge of the subject of revenge that she had gained from such shows would probably prove useful. And she had just the right idea. She hurried into the kitchen where Noah had just hung up with his mother.

"I know what to do."

"About what? How pissed my mom is? That would be cool. You might have to find a new casual boyfriend because, shit, I'm probably going to die tonight."

"Regrettably, no. Although from what you have told me of her in the past, I assume that informing her of the rekindling of our relationship might please her. I would, of course, leave out the fact that we are engaging in this relationship on a purely casual basis for the comfort of physicality and friendship alone."

"Right. Yeah. Sure." Noah sighed and sat down at the kitchen table before lamenting, "Man, my truck. I can't believe they did that to my truck."

"Your truck will be fine. What we should be concerned with is retaliation."

Noah arched an eyebrow at her.

"If retaliation means what I'm pretty sure it means, then I'm with you. But seriously, you gotta stop freaking me out with the fake emotional shit around Schue. You were, like, in a coma of sadness and it really freaked me out. That's not cool."

"I wasn't faking it! Noah, I was deeply offended by what those boys wrote on your truck. It took me a while to compose myself. I resent your implication that I was in any way acting out that indignation, although I can perhaps understand your confusion given our riveting performance in principal Figgins' office this morning. If it will assuage your concerns, I promise you that if I am going to be faking any sort of emotion in the near future, you will be well aware of it before the fact."

"Okay, uh, cool. Are we gonna make this a regular thing, cus I gotta tell you, the whole casual thing usually means, like, friends with benefits, and friends with benefits don't usually have to comfort each other and shit."

"Do friends not engage in comforting activities?" Rachel asked incredulously.

"Well, I don't know, girls maybe."

"I don't think that's a fair generalization to make. I often see Artie being very comforting towards Tina."

"That's because he likes her."

Rachel bit her lip and looked down at the ground, feeling very exposed.

"Well, of course. Tina is wonderful. Anyone can see that he likes her. But…" She trailed off, unsure of how to continue even though she knew exactly the words she wanted to use.

"But what?"

At Noah's somewhat irritated prompt, Rachel reluctantly continued. She and Noah were completely honest with one another, after all. She didn't want to break from that tradition just because he was in an unfortunately gruff mood.

"Well, I assumed that if you'd agreed to reengage in whatever this is, I assumed that meant you liked me, at least a little. Is that not true? Is this just a purely physical endeavor for you? No friendship attached? Because if that is the case I will readjust my conceptions of what this is meant to entail."

Noah's face softened, like it had when he'd looked at her right after the slushy had hit his face when they walked together in the hallway during their brief initial romantic entanglement. He had looked shocked, hurt, and then he had seen her face (her horrified, admittedly slightly fearful face). His eyes had drooped, his mouth had curled downwards, and he had allowed her to lead him into the nearest bathroom in order to get cleaned off. She'd known at that moment that he was sorry for ever doing the same to her, although it would take him several more minutes to admit it aloud.

And he was looking at her like that again, only this time they weren't in a boy's bathroom, which made it all the better. Rachel could not ignore the way that her body was engulfed with a sense of tingling warmth.

"Rachel," he said quietly, standing up and towering over her. "You know I like you. You're cool, sometimes, and you're a lot less hard to understand when it's just the two of us. But Rach…this isn't like Artie and Tina. You like Finn and I…I like Quinn, right? This isn't going to be like…anything else, right?"

He was looking at her strangely, so she nodded. Quick, brief, and dirty. Like ripping off a Band-Aid. No, of course they couldn't ever truly like one another. What they had was a relationship doomed to fall to the wayside. They were Veronica Mars and Troy Vandergraff, they were Blair Waldorf and Lord Marcus, they were Angela Chase and Brian Krakow. Each of those boys represented a one act relationship fabricated to force the characters towards the true happy ending that was awaiting each of those heroines. Veronica's Logan, Blair's Chuck, and Angela's dreamy-eyed Jordan. Rachel's Finn.

Noah was just another love interest designed to confuse and befuddle viewers. That was all. In the movie of her life, he would be played by a dreamy unknown, and Finn would be played by a rock star.

The fact that each of those soul mate counterparts was a reformed ne'er do well escaped her notice entirely. There was a light at the end of her tunnel vision, and that light was Finn. That light did not have a landing strip on his head or a penchant for bullying behavior. Her light didn't need reforming. Her light was perfect.

Noah was not. And if he got her body feeling tingly in a way that Finn did not, then she was sure that she had hormones to blame. Nothing more.

"Of course," she whispered, and she noticed that Noah seemed to find it as difficult to meet her gaze as she did to meet his.


He didn't want to admit it. Hell, he'd have rather died than admit it out loud. But, in his head, deep down, he was sort of willing to admit that he was a little (not hurt, not at all) bothered by the way Rachel had been so quick to totally reinforce the whole casual part of their relationship. Like Puck didn't know. Like Puck wasn't the king of casual or whatever. And maybe he sort of liked the way that it felt to comfort her, and maybe he sort of didn't feel so nervous anymore and was starting to realize that the whole boyfriend thing wasn't nearly as difficult as he had hyped it up to be, but he still knew that they were just each others' jumping-off points to a better tomorrow. Her dream boy and his dream baby.

His mom was on her way to pick him up, so they didn't have a whole lot of time to go over what Rachel had in mind in terms of revenge for the following day. Plus she was talking like, way too fast for human ears to even hear, and she was using a lot of weird hand gestures and she was so excited that her boobs were sort of bouncing around all over the place and it was totally awesome, but also really distracting. At the end of her little rant when she looked at him all expectantly like he'd had any chance of catching a single word she'd said, he just sort of smiled and hoped that would fool her into thinking that he had listened at all.

But she looked at him sort of like she knew he wasn't paying attention, and like she sort of knew he'd been staring at her boobs.

"As flattering as it is, Noah…" she started, but Puck was not going to listen to a lecture about decency after like an hour of dating. No fucking way. He stood up and smirked down at her with the typical Puckerman smirk, full of cockiness and just the right amount of lust. Rachel shut up. He grinned wider.

"Come on, my mom's gonna be here in like five minutes. What do you say we consolidate this relationship?"

Rachel laughed abruptly, covering her mouth.

"Consummate," she said quietly. But he didn't really mind when she corrected him, because she didn't say it all bitchy like most people did. She said it like she wanted to help him expand his vocabulary or something (and, God, he hated it, but she totally was, because he was actually starting to like, remember the shit she said to him).

"Whatever."

"I don't think we can quite get to that point in five minutes, Noah, but I appreciate the offer. Still, I think it would be appropriate if…"

She broke off abruptly and kissed him. Which, first of all, was really weird because usually he was the one who had to shut her up by smothering her with his lips, and second of all it was weird because he totally was not expecting it. Rachel was all talk, most of the time. She said she wasn't a prude or whatever, but she totally was. When he'd tried to get under her shirt last time, she told him to back off and spent the next fifteen minutes rearranging her clothes so it didn't look like he'd tried it. It was so lame. But this time, her shirt was even riding up a little in the back and when he put his hand on that strip of skin, she shivered at the contact but didn't pull back.

"Your hands are cold," she murmured against his lips, and she started pushing him back towards the couch on tip-toe. And the thing was, she was like super graceful. It was weird, because to hear Quinn and those girls talk about her, she was a total klutz who couldn't do anything right. But she was, like, balancing on the absolute tips of her toes, like those ballet dancers, and when they got to the couch she spun him, and pushed him down on the cushion, and it was like watching the Nutcracker or some shit (which he only went to because when he was nine his mom bought tickets for her anniversary but his dad was gone before they got the chance to go, and Puck figured that she shouldn't waste them). He leaned back on his elbows as she flitted to the curtains and pulled them closed, then turned back to face him in those knee socks, that skirt, that plaid sweater vest.

He smiled at her, trying to look encouraging or whatever, because he knew she was self-conscious about her looks, thanks in part to him and thanks in part to Quinn and the girls who called her RuPaul and Man Hands (neither of those things made sense, he was beginning to realize, especially since a commercial for RuPaul's Drag Race had made him aware of who RuPaul was). She smiled back and glided over to the couch. Then, to his surprise, she sort of dove right into it, straddling his waist and putting her arms down on either side of his head on the arm of the couch. Then she bent down and kissed him.

And, damn, but those sparks were flying. She was so take-charge and badass at that moment. Looking at her smirk was like looking in the mirror, and he felt a swell of something else besides lust…was it pride? He thought it might have been. He was proud of her for not pussying out. Which was weird, but made sense, he thought.

He brought one hand up and put it on the back of her neck. That was his favorite part of a girl's body, even though he'd never tell anyone that because it was such a super lame place to like when there were boobs and vaginas and inner thighs. But really, he liked it when he got the chance to put his hand there, because girls would turn to putty. Just a few fingertips pressing in the right places, and he could have them moaning and groaning and…yeah, well, Rachel wasn't quite ready for that, he thought. He moved his hand a little higher to tangle in her hair, and he brought her mouth closer to his, as if that was even possible.

Her hands were sort of flying all over the place, over his stomach, his chest, his shoulders, his face. It was weird, but totally awesome, because it was like she had twelve pairs of hands or something. And that was really cool to imagine because that would be the hottest thing ever, like having an orgy but with only one person.

He decided to try a little experiment, so his hands shifted a little lower. He brought them slowly down her back, trying really hard to ignore the way she arched into him when he did that, and the way she made that happy little purring noise in the back of her throat. His fingertips found that area of exposed skin again, and he carefully started to drag his hands up her sides, bringing the shirt and that awful sweater vest with him.

She didn't stop kissing him.

This is it, Puckerman, he told himself. You're going to get to touch Rachel Berry's boobs. You might even get to round the corner to third if you're really lucky. Now just keep moving your lips, just like that, don't get distracted by how smooth her skin is, like it's constantly lotioned or whatever. Don't pay attention to that. Stop paying attention to your fingers, Puckerman! Distract her with your mouth!

He forced himself to focus. This was a big deal.

His fingertips had just grazed the underwire of her bra when he heard the car honking outside. He growled under his breath and pushed himself into a sitting position. She sort of slid down to his lap area, still straddling him, and he was fucking relieved that he didn't have Finn's little 'problem', because it would certainly have been coming into play at that moment.

"Your mom?" Rachel asked breathlessly. One hand was splayed across his chest while the other was bent around his neck, and it was totally hot. He had a feeling that he'd be dreaming about this later. Or at least reliving it mentally once he was sure everyone else in the house was sleeping.

"Yeah," he said. "You still wanna come over tomorrow?"

"Of course. I'd love to meet her."

She finally removed herself from the couch, smoothing out her clothes and her hair. Puck tried not to gaze longingly at her chest area, but he couldn't help it. He'd been so close, and it had been torn away from him.

"All right, and we're gonna have to work in some make out time, too, because, you know, practice makes perfect."

He saw the way that her face fell instantly, and he wondered what she was so upset about. Was she the one starting to question the casualness of their relationship? Had she fooled herself into thinking that it had evolved into something else? Because Puck could pretty much understand; it was easy to forget sometimes. Or maybe she was upset because he was leaving and she wanted to make out some more. That would be cool, too.

She looked like she was trying to think of what to say, so finally she murmured, "Of course, all right. Sure."

Which was weird, because she didn't sound like things were okay or all right. She sounded upset. Not really upset, but a little. Upset enough to make him feel like maybe he did something wrong.

"Uh…okay. I'll see you tomorrow then?"

Because, fuck, but one of the perks of being in a casual relationship was avoiding the whole trying-to-figure-out-what-she-was-feeling thing. And if she had a problem with him, she could say it.

He bent down and kissed her on the lips, quickly, and she smiled up at him in this weird, adorable sort of way like she was trying to think of some way to tell him that he was awesome.

"Thank you for being so wonderful, Noah," she said finally, and it was like watching one of those fruity kids shows that his sister used to love, where the characters would just walk around senselessly complimenting each other all day, which was so annoying. But Rachel wasn't a fruity television character. She was a hot chick who actually liked him despite the fact that he was an ass. So he guessed he could probably make an exception for her and not think she was the lamest person ever.

"Well, you're pretty awesome, too," he admitted. His mom honked the horn again, and he was pretty sure that this one was an angry honk, which meant that he really had to go. Rachel seemed to recognize it for what it was, too, and she hurried him towards the foyer.

"I'll see you tomorrow," she said brightly, strangely not walking him all the way out but ducking back into the kitchen as soon as he opened the door. He frowned, because every other time he had been to her house, she'd been all super polite and had insisted on walking him to the door every time. But this was different. He closed the door behind him, wondering if it still had to do with her being sad about whatever it was that he'd said to upset her. Then, he jogged across the front lawn and got into his mother's car. She frowned at him thoughtfully.

"What are you doing here, anyway?" she asked. "What happened to your truck?"

"Let's talk about it at home," Puck said quietly. She nodded and glanced back at the house, and suddenly her face lit up.

Puck turned back to see what she was smiling at, and he just barely refrained from losing his shit when he saw that there was a great big sparkling Menorah in the picture window of the Berrys' living room. That definitely had not been there when Rachel was closing the curtains. She'd probably dug it out of some cabinet and put it there just to make his mother happy.

He was going to have to remember to thank her, because that actually was frighteningly sweet.

"She's Jewish!" his mother exclaimed, putting the car into drive.

"Yeah, mom."

"Well, isn't that nice!"


Once Noah's mother's car had gone, Rachel took the Menorah down and put it back into the closet. Then, she ran up the stairs. Something that Noah had said had bothered her. It could have been nothing, of course, but it also could have been meant as a hint.

She knew that Noah was one of the most experienced boys their age in the entire town, possibly the state, possibly the world. It was safe to say that he had slept with every girl that he had ever wanted to sleep with in the school (with the exception of Quinn and the possible exception of Rachel herself, because although she suffered from severe self-esteem issues, she could at least admit that his advancements towards her were definitely rooted in what seemed to be lust). Therefore, when he told her that 'practice makes perfect', her brain had gone into overdrive trying to think of what he possibly could have meant by that.

Of course, he could have simply meant that he wanted to practice with her often (based on her body's favorable reaction to their brief moments together in the living room, she'd have to say that she was in accord with him on that), but he also could have been alluding to her woeful inexperience in the kissing area. He was known for picking up on peoples' insecurities and using well-placed and concise barbs of verbal assault to break down an individual's self-esteem. Rachel had often suspected that he was at least slightly smarter than he pretended to be, and she had a feeling that she was correct in that suspicion. He was observant, at the very least. The fact that he knew that grape was her favorite flavor because of the way she licked her lips after he threw a grape slushy on her face was testament enough to that. The last time they had dated, he had used that information to sway her into a sense of security before asking her out. It wasn't a genius move or even a particularly brilliant one, but it was well thought out and it worked. Could the kissing comment be the same? Could it be designed to sway her into a frenzy of insecurity so that she would work on her kissing technique in her spare time?

Well, if that was the case then she would certainly not be giving him the satisfaction of knowing that he had bothered her. Although she was constantly on the look-out for ways in which to better herself, she did not desire to feel the need to better herself because of a boy. She had tried that once with Finn, and he had proved to her that Mr. Schue's words had been true: there would be a boy who liked her just as she was. Ideally one whose perfect girlfriend wasn't pregnant with what was undoubtedly a genetically superior human being.

She faltered at her computer. She'd had every intention of running straight to her room and Googling proper kissing techniques with a few extra tricks thrown in, but her thoughts of Finn made her stop and consider. Wasn't she doing this social experiment with Noah in order to prepare herself for a relationship with Finn or, failing that, with some other talented young performer who she had yet to meet? Wasn't the purpose of engaging in a casual relationship to learn how to do the things that a girl should know how to do in the modern world? Admittedly, Noah was a lovely young man when he wanted to be and she did feel a desire to impress him in some sense, but he was her stepping stone, just as she was his. They were brief entertainment for one another on the way to their true goals. That was all.

She sat down on her bed and stared morosely at her computer screen. No, she should not adjust herself to fit whatever Noah might think that she should be. If he had a problem with her kissing technique, he could bring it up directly. Odds were that she was making a big deal out of nothing, anyway. She tended to do that often, according to the people in her life who she sometimes felt comfortable enough to call friends. Kurt especially seemed determine to remind her on a near-daily basis that she was far too dramatic and no boy would ever like her if she didn't stop, including but not limited to Finn Hudson.

She rose to her feet slowly. Her romantic problems could wait until the following day. She had a revenge to plan, and she would not let her dramatic nature hinder that in any way. Karofsky deserved to be punished for what he had done, and she was going to take it upon herself to make sure that he did.


When they finally got back home and his mom put his sister to bed, Puck sat at the kitchen table ready to be yelled at. As far as he could tell, his mother hadn't had anything to drink. Which was usually worse because at least when she was drinking he could pretend to himself that it was the alcohol talking and not just the fact that he was a shitty son.

She came back into the room and sat down across from him, giving him that Scary Mom look that he always pretended was stupid but actually made him feel really bad about himself.

"Noah, I want you to tell me everything."

He didn't look her in the eye, because that was when he'd start feeling guilty and shit.

Instead, he looked at his hands and said, "What do you mean?"

"Noah, I saw your truck. I saw what was written there. Why did that happen? Is there something you want to tell me?"

Puck looked up, totally by accident, and caught the look in her eye. Which made him feel guilty, just like he knew it would.

"What, are you asking if I'm gay?" he asked.

"Well, I don't know! Why else would they write that word on your truck?"

"Because it's like the most common insult of all time," Puck muttered, looking back down.

"Oh, really, Noah! Do kids really use that word to insult each other? What kinds of kids are you hanging out with?"

"That's the problem, mom. I'm not hanging out with those kids. Not anymore. And I mean, like, any of the sports kids, so they're the ones who get all pissed at me."

"I don't understand. Why aren't you hanging out with them anymore? You're still playing football, aren't you?"

"Yeah, but…I don't know, look, it's just a lot to explain."

"So tell me all of it. I have time."

"I have to do homework."

"Nice try. Spill."

Puck sighed. There was no way he was getting out of it. He was going to have to tell his mother everything. She knew when he was full of shit. The good thing was that she wasn't around all that much because she worked a lot, but when she was around, she knew right away when he was making stuff up or hiding stuff from her. He was like, thanking the universe that she hadn't found out about his kid yet.

"All right, look, I started dating this chick because of what you said about me not liking Jewish girls…"

"Oh, Noah!"

She was disappointed in that explanation, okay. She sort of should have been, it was a pretty dick thing for him to do. But he knew how just how to placate her.

Fuck. Placate.

"No, listen. I mean, I only asked her out because of what you said, because she's really annoying and loud and she's super talented at singing and stuff, so she's really full of herself and it's just…she's just annoying. I used to be really mean to her because…I don't know, because the Cheerios had it in for her and that meant that the football players did too. But then I joined glee and I sort of got to know her a little better, and I sort of got used to her being annoying all the time…"

"You joined what?"

"Glee, mom. It's a club. With singing and stuff."

"How come I've never heard any of this?"

"I don't know! Do you want to hear about the truck or not?"

"Fine, fine."

"Okay, so I eventually asked her out and I kind of liked her, I guess, even though I really liked this other super Christian girl who hates me and who I never have a shot with anyway because she's, uh, she's pregnant with Finn's kid. So, I don't know, so I guess Rachel was like, the next best thing. And Rachel's in love with Finn anyway, so I'm her next best thing. I don't know if it makes sense, but…I don't know, it works for us. So, anyway, Coach Tanaka was a total douchebag…"

"Noah!"

"…and he gave us this, uh, that word where you have to choose one thing or the other."

"Ultimatum."

"Yeah, ultimatum. He gave us one of those and said either we had to choose football or glee, we couldn't choose both. So I chose glee, because I like glee, and I guess because of Rachel, too, because I really did like her a little, and she was nice to me and helped me clean off the slushy that I got dumped on my by some tool Karofsky."

"David Karofsky? Peggy's son?"

"Yeah, exactly. That whole family is full of assholes."

"Well, I won't argue."

"Anyway, so I chose glee, but then Rachel dumped me even though Finn chose football, because she was still in love with him or whatever. And she wanted to be friends, but I said no, because I was pissed, but then today I felt bad and bought her a slushy because, I don't know, because it's sort of like a peace thing I guess. Like a truce. And I said we could be friends, and she was cool with that, but then like the entire hockey team threw slushies in her face and she didn't even get to drink mine."

"Oh, that's horrible! Why would anyone do that?"

Puck felt sick as he swallowed the guilt that was brewing in his stomach, but he didn't tell her the truth. How could he? How could he tell her just how awesome Rachel was for forgiving him? How could he tell her that he'd only thrown that first slushy in her face because she was in his math class and he hated the way she said the answer like she was smarter than everyone else (even though she was)? How could he possibly tell her that her son, the screw up, was just as big a failure as she assumed he was?

No way.

"Yeah, I don't know. It was really awful. So, anyway, me and Rachel got back together and I sort of punched Karofsky in the face after school for doing that to her, so they spray painted my car and slashed my tires to get back at me."

"I don't understand. They did this because you stuck up for your girlfriend? Noah, I'm so proud of you!"

"Yeah, but…I punched the kid in the face."

"And I'd rather you didn't, but this is the first time I've ever heard of you doing something so sweet. I hear things, you know, about what you do during those pool cleaning outings."

"Yeah, mom, I know. You bring it up every day."

"It's just…it's so nice to hear that you've found a girl your own age who you're willing to stand up for."

"Well, too bad Karofsky and his tool friends can't feel the same way."

"Their insult didn't make sense, anyway. You shouldn't feel bad about what they think of you."

He wanted to ask her if he should feel bad about what she thought of him, but he didn't. He didn't want to fight.

"Uh, it kind of did. They weren't insulting me, they were insulting Rachel. Rachel doesn't have a car so, you know, they couldn't spraypaint hers. She has two dads."

"Really?"

Puck thought that her grin was going to explode off her face and decorate the wallpaper with happiness or something.

"Yeah. Why?"

"Nothing, it's just, I never expected you to turn out to be so tolerant."

"Yeah, well, I've never met them or anything, but Rachel's pretty cool, so it sort of pissed me off, too, but not as bad as it made her mad. She was going on about revenge earlier before you came and picked me up. I'm not really sure what she was saying because she's basically a dictionary with legs, but it's probably going to be pretty intense."

"I don't want you getting into trouble over this, Noah," his mother said warningly. And even though it was super cheesy and gay (or, stupid, or whatever. And he was only trying to remember not to use gay as an insult because he didn't want to get a lecture or anything, not because he was starting to realize that it really didn't make any sense at all) he knew exactly what he should reply to that.

And, dammit, he was actually going to say it.

"Yeah, well, I've been in trouble for stupid stuff all my life, mom. This isn't stupid. This is a good thing. They shouldn't do shit like that to her or her dads. So even if I get in trouble, it'll be worth it."

His mother prompted him with, "She's worth it?" Just like he figured she would.

He sighed and shrugged, but his mom totally seemed to know that he was full of shit because yes, Rachel was worth it. Her crazy was worth it, her legs were worth it, her lips and her hair and that way she laughed at her own stupid jokes was worth it. And most worth it of all was the way she made him feel, when he was completely honest with himself and he wasn't afraid to admit that he felt anything at all.

Plus, she was hot. There was that, too, and maybe it was better to stick with that if he didn't want his testosterone to flee his body weeping like a little bitch.