Chapter Five
Between third and fourth period at McKinley High the next day, the power randomly went out. Students all around the school were bewildered, including a very flustered Finn Hudson. "What the fuck?" he mumbled as he looked around, not able to see much in the dark. Some belligerent hockey players thought it would be a beneficial use of their time to trip those who couldn't see anything in the senior-dominant wings.
Rachel Berry found herself as one of the victims of this immature behavior, her books sprawled on the ground in a crowd of students. If not for the lack of lighting, she would have been mortified. Finn felt someone trip over his foot and leaned down to assist the unknown pedestrian with her books. As Rachel felt herself being helped, she looked up into a familiar pair of almond-shaped eyes. Unable to put her finger on where she had seen them before, the young Barbara Streisand shrugged it off and thanked the kind stranger for his efforts.
"No problem," he replied, following up with: "I wonder what happened to the power."
Standing up as she listened to him, Rachel also realized something familiar about his voice. Again thinking it was just her imagination, she let it slide. "I'm sure the power will be back soon."
"It'll be hard finding classes in the dark, too," Finn added as yet another hooligan bumped into Rachel, resulting in her falling into Finn's arms.
That's when it hit her: the touch, the eyes, the voice. "Tom?" she asked, simply not believing her realization.
At this, Finn froze. "I.. uh.. Mysterious Girl? Is that you?" He prayed he could escape before the lights turned on. "Wow, uh. We have to stop meeting in the dark like this."
Rachel was confused. Why was Tom in her school? "Why are you here?" she boldly asked, curious to hear his answer.
"I uh, I go to school here."
Rachel shook her head. "No, Tom, that's not possible. The quarterback's name here isn't Tom, it's..." Her eyes widened, a state of shock taking over her entire body. "Finn?!" she concluded in disbelief.
Shit, he thought to himself. Damn her intelligence; my cover is totally blown.
"Yeah, uh, it's me. I mean it's Finn," he replied as he awkwardly rubbed the back of his neck, looking everywhere except her tiny presence.
Rachel gulped, feeling herself get uncomfortable. "I-I have to go." She said, turning and carefully walking in the other direction, doing her best not to step on anything anyone could have dropped or lost in the midst of the power outage.
"N-No, come back." Finn began to follow in her direction as the lights slowly flickered on, one by one. The students then crowded the hallways immediately, Finn losing his mystery girl as it occurred.
He sighed loudly before getting ready to go to his next class, hoping he'd see her sometime soon, somehow, someway. Rachel, however, was praying for the exact opposite.
SHORT UGH.