Thanks again for all of your feedback! I really appreciate it and can't wait for more. I know a lot of you weren't happy with Rachel last chapter, and hopefully this chapter will help. As I tried to explain here, it's harder for her than it is for Puck to accept this because she chased Finn for TWO YEARS! That's a really long time, so she's just being a little more stubborn about the inevitability that is Puckleberry. I hope you all like her a little more after this chapter, and we might just get to here her tell Finn off soon! Enjoy!
Rachel's head was spinning as she watched Puck walk out of her bedroom. She sat down on her bed and tried to use her yoga breathing exercises to calm herself down so she could think logically about the matter at hand. All throughout Glee she had dreaded talking to Finn because she knew she had to make a huge decision.
She had been Finn's for years, and when Quinn had reminded her that Finn would move on if she let him, at first the thought had terrified her. Could she really let him go after everything they had been through? After a few minutes of sitting in the choir room watching him though, she had realized that she definitely could. She felt possessive over Finn because she had worked so long to make him hers, but she didn't really feel anything other than that anymore. She would always care about him, but the thought of his with another girl no longer made her ill. She wanted him to be happy, and she wanted him to be happy without her.
"Why didn't I tell Noah that part?" She muttered angrily to herself. She had gotten defensive when he compared her to Quinn, because it was an unjust comparison, but she knew the majority of what he was saying made sense. When she had been repeatedly cast aside for Quinn, it had hurt.
She came to the decision that it wasn't fair to do that to Noah. She needed to make a decision, and being the organized person she was, she needed to give herself a deadline to do it.
She was just sitting down to compose one of her signature Pro/Con lists for the situation when her fathers got home and called up to ask if she'd finished her homework. She realized that she had not, and decided that her personal life would have to wait until her academics had been taken care of.
The next day, every time she attempted to talk to Puck, he found ways to avoid her, even going so far as to actually stay late after class to talk to a teacher. Since he was normally the last one in and the first one out, if he showed up at all, Rachel knew he was taking drastic measures to avoid her. The only contact she got all day was a text after school saying:
Bought Schindler's List yesterday…Mom said that's super Jewish…Make flyers or something.
She had smiled just seeing his name come up on her phone, and she was hoping maybe this meant he was ready to talk. She quickly typed back.
That is a classic. Thank you very much. I will make flyers and the rabbi said there's a projector in the rec-room we can use Saturday after temple. I'll get lots of yummy snacks.
She was feeling better about her day, and even started humming, until she got a text back.
K. See you there.
See you there? Did that imply he didn't intend to speak to her until Saturday? Her heart broke at the thought. She didn't realized how quickly she had messed things up. She searched through her music library but nothing quite said, "I'm still unsure about how I feel, but I'm trying to make a decision, so please forgive me and be my friend until I do because I miss you." She sighed melodramatically and pulled out the list she had been working on.
By Friday, after going a painfully slow week without speaking to Puck, the only con Rachel had come up with on her list for exploring her feelings with him was "It will hurt Finn." Staring at the piece of paper, she realized in that moment just how unfair she was being. She liked Puck. The amount she had missed him this week had proved that. And even though she wasn't sure how deep her feelings were or how long they would last, she still owed it to him and herself to explore them. Finn shouldn't take priority. She was finally free of Finn's influence and it had only taken a week of being freezed out by the boy she currently adored to realize that. She couldn't wait until the movie event to tell Puck that she had made a decision.
Puck's week hadn't been much better than Rachel's. He hated avoiding Rachel. He hated how he missed her rambling and her beautiful laugh and her take charge attitude. He hated how the one text she had sent him about the movie event had been so her that he had wanted to hug his phone. Unfortunately, he knew it would hurt more to talk to her. His feelings had become second to Finn's again, and that was not something he could handle.
He understood it had only been a couple of days since Finn and Rachel broke up, but the second he had realized he had feelings for Rachel, he had been willing to dump Lauren and show the world where his heart was. He didn't do anything halfway, and he didn't think anyone else should either.
He also hated how he kept hoping that Rachel would pick him. Everyday where she didn't sing him some sappy love song in Glee or text him and tell him that she needed to talk to him…it killed him. He woke up everyday trying to squash his hopes down, and went to bed every night with them having sprung up to be crushed anyway.
By Friday, when he realized he was sitting in his room hoping to hear from her rather than partying like he would have any other weekend, he felt pathetic and decided he was done being a pansy-ass. He was a stud, and he could have any girl he wanted. He wasn't going to let Rachel Berry make him feel bad about himself anymore.
He wasn't going back on his word. He wasn't going to pretend anymore. He wasn't going to tell a girl he had had feelings for her, but he could still bang all of his frustrations into one with very angry sex. It's not like he had a girlfriend or anything to make that wrong. With his newfound goal of getting laid, he felt more like his old self again. He couldn't wait until the movie event to try to score some hot Jewish tail.
Obviously, the next day, as soon as Puck stepped into temple and saw Rachel, he wanted to forget his whole "getting some tail" plan and just tell her how smoking she looked in her little black dress. Unfortunately, it took about two seconds of watching her talk to her dads to remember everything that had and hadn't happened the previous week. Puck was just so sick of being upset about it everytime he saw her. Was any chick really worth this? He kind of already knew the answer, but wouldn't let himself think it. He was Puckasuaras Rex and he was on a hunt for prey today.
Just like last week, Rachel had advertised the event (and the amount of free food at it) well (and just like last week, you had to go to temple that day to be able to attend the event after it), so luckily for him, temple was filled with a lot of teenagers. The only one Puck wasn't happy to see was in attendance was Jacob, who apparently hadn't been deterred from temple events last week when Puck had sent him to the same crackhouse Rachel had sent Sunshine to instead of his house for the party. Puck shook his head in disdain at the little runt's persistence, and kept his eyes peeled for a really hot girl he could slide in next to.
Unfortunately, he kept automatically comparing them to the brunette talking to her fathers, and now his mother, that still hadn't noticed he was there, so none of them seemed good enough. As soon as he noticed he was doing this, he wanted to punch something. Cut it the fuck out, Puckerman. He told himself, picking a semi-attractive girl at random and strutting over to her like he knew she wanted him, and by the smirk she gave him when he sat down next to her (even though her parents were on her other side), he could tell she did. Was part of him slightly hoping this might make Rachel jealous? Probably, but part of him just wanted a girl to want him again because A. He was horny as fuck and B. He just wanted to feel like he was the man again.
Rachel spotted Puck just as he was sauntering over to his new female friend. She was a little confused. She didn't know Puck even knew Lily Robbins. Rachel had always dismissed Lily as one of those girls who would love nothing more than to go to college, meet a husband, and settle down in Lima. Not that there was anything wrong with that, it just made her and Rachel's values so different that they had never really been friends. Well, that and the fact that Rachel was still basically a loser to most of McKinley.
She didn't really know what to think of this new development. She had planned to tell Puck she had picked him, but suddenly she wasn't so sure he was even an option. Had he really already moved on? Had she really been about to cause a lot of drama for a guy whose feelings weren't true?
Maybe she was overreacting, she thought to herself as the service wore on while she was sandwiched between her fathers. Maybe Puck and Lily were just friends, and it was no big deal that he had chosen to sit with her over his mother today. Unfortunately, that glimmer of hope was destroyed as soon as the service ended. As soon as Lily said goodbye to her fathers to stay for the movie event, Rachel watched a very excited Lily getting escorted towards the deserted corridor by the bathrooms by a smug looking Noah Puckerman. When they came out five minutes later as Rachel was setting up the movie snacks with Lily's hair a mess and her lipstick smeared, Rachel wanted to vomit. Her reaction to their hookup made her wonder how she had ever doubted she had feelings for Puck. At the moment, she was torn between crying and punching him in the face.
"Noah Puckerman!" She called, storming over to him, finding a third option. "As co-chair, don't you think it is also your responsibility to help me put out the snacks?" She was surprised when his reaction was to glare down at her.
"That's the first thing you say to me after not seeing me all week?" He retorted, anger settling into his beautiful eyes. "That's cold, Berry." Rachel flinched at her last name and the fact his tone showed how hurt he was at Rachel's greeting.
"I'm sorry." She admitted sincerely. "But I wasn't exactly the one ignoring you all week. I kept trying to talk to you."
"Unless it was to tell me I no longer have to play second best to Finnigan, it would have just sucked." Rachel wanted to hit something. It wasn't fair that he could always be 100% open about his feelings, and Rachel still didn't understand him. If he still cared about that, why was he hooking up with Lily McFloozy over there? It had been so much easier when the guy she was after was only one layer deep, instead of the thousands of layers that seemed to be buried in her Noah.
"Actually, I was going to tell you that today." She told him, relishing in the way his eyes got bigger when she said it. "But after your little rendezvous with Ms. Robbins over there, I'm not sure that is the wisest option anymore." She turned back to adjusting her snacks, but still felt Puck behind her. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw the anger deflate out of his body and he slumped a bit.
"Shit, I messed up, didn't I?" He whispered, a little bit of pain in his voice.
"Noah, we are in a temple! Shoot would have been an acceptable way to begin that sentence." Rachel knew she was being ridiculous to correct his language at this particular time, but she honestly wasn't sure what else to say. On one hand, she wanted to say, yes, it was hurtful what you did and it made me question everything, but was that really fair? She knew she had hurt him on Sunday and Monday of this past week with her decision-making, and she hadn't told him if he waited celibately by, she would eventually make up her mind for him. "Why did you do it?" She needed to know.
"I was sick of feeling rejected." He answered simply, and Rachel was once again astounded about how simply he could voice his emotions. Six words could change her entire opinion about the matter. She was amazed by it, but also realized it was one of the things she was quickly coming to love about him. As someone who needed many words to get her message across, she was quite impressed by his ability to do so in so few.
"Well, I suppose I can understand that." Rachel conceded. After the feelings she had watching him come out before with Lily, was tired of playing games. "We'll talk after the event, but can you please go set up the projector and get the movie ready to go? The children will only be satisfied sitting around eating sugar with no entertainment for so long."
"Oh um yes, of course." Rachel could tell that Puck was trying to hold back a grin, and it made Rachel feel really good about herself and how much he cared about her. She liked that he could make her feel that way. "Talk to ya later, Rach." With a smirk and a wink in true Puck fashion, he was gone, and Rachel couldn't wait for their "later".
Puck was a feeling a mix of shame at using Lily and excitement at the fact that if he had read their last conversation correctly, Rachel was actually picking him. Eventually, after avoiding Lily's attempts to get him to sit next to her during the film, and slowly making his way to the back where Rachel was sitting, he let excitement win out as she smiled at him plopping down next to her.
He was contemplating whether they were at a place yet where he could casually sling his arm around her when he heard Jacob McCreep sit down on Rachel's other side and start whispering disgusting nasally things to her.
Puck clenched his fists and was about to say something when Rachel put her hand on top of one of his fists to calm him. She kindly told Jacob to be quiet so that they all could enjoy the film, and he did, but her hand did not leave its spot on top of Puck's.
Puck guessed that answered his question and opened up his fist so he could hold her hand in his. It was only a small thing really, and nowhere near the action he was used to getting from a chick during a movie, but it made his heart leap like a stupid girl, and he was really content to just get this little piece of her at the moment.
He was actually getting into the movie, it was nice and gory, when he heard the girl whose hand he was still holding shriek next to him. He looked over just as she was slapping Jacob's hand off of her chest, and Puck could swear he saw red. How dare Jacob touch Rachel!
"What the fuck dude!" Puck yelled and most of the faces that were watching the screen turned around to watch the three of them.
"She was sitting right there and they just looked so nice." Jacob tittered, and Puck scrambled to his feet, despite Rachel's attempts to hold him down. He grabbed Jacob's collar and pulled him.
"That chest, and everything else on her, is off limits!" He roared in Jacob's face. He threw him back on the ground and waited until Jacob scrambled to his feet to do more damage.
"According to all of my sources, Rachel Berry is newly single, so none of her is off limits." Puck couldn't believe this little fucker. Did he want to die? Puck was about to punch him repeatedly in the face when Rachel stepped between them.
"Actually Jacob, even though if I were single, I would still be off limits to you since the boundaries of personal space would still exist, I am, in fact, taken." Puck was a little caught up in how hot her take-charge attitude with Jacob was and how much he stil wanted to get through her to strangle the asshole and almost missed the last word she said.
"What?" He and Jacob both screeched at the same time. Rachel ignored Jacob and turned around to look at him.
"Well, aren't I?" She smiled coyly up at him. He knew they still had a lot to talk about, but to hell with it for this very second.
"Fuck yeah you're taken, babe." He forgot all about Jacob, who was still standing there whining, and caught Rachel's lips in his.
As happy as he was, he knew they were in for a shit storm in Glee Monday, and he wasn't looking forward to seeing how his former best friend took the news.