Part Six: What Should Have Been . . .
"Rachel. I'm serious. Let. It. Go," Quinn demanded firmly, trying to keep her frustration in check
Quinn had one side of the leather-bound check holder in a death-grip, while Rachel was being stubborn and clinging onto the other with a face that was red partly from embarrassment and partly from her hot temper. There were a lot of battles that Quinn had lost to Rachel in the past, but this was not going to be another one. But God, the diva was strong for being such a small girl. Who would have known that taking an unknowing Rachel Berry on a very sneaky date would be so damn difficult?
Once they had left the park, Quinn had asked Rachel if she wanted to get lunch, and surprised her by knowing of a vegan-friendly restaurant not too far from where they were. It felt good to spend time together, just the two of them; they hadn't really had any quality time since the summer before they went off to college and now it was April. Quinn had missed the way that she had found she and Rachel could talk easily about anything and everything or nothing at all, how Rachel would pause and blush and offer an apology when she realized that she had been dominating the conversation, the way Rachel always spoke with theatric hand gestures and tried to imitate the voices of their friends, or touched her in some way to show comfort or support or pride in her. Throughout their entire conversation, Quinn had begun to realize just how far back she had had these feelings for the animated brunette.
"Rachel, please," Quinn found herself begging when several moments went by and Rachel had yet to release her hold on the bill fold. "Come on. I asked you to lunch, I want to pay, so just let it go."
"Why do you want to pay so badly anyway?" Rachel huffed.
"Because," Quinn began. Rachel didn't expect her to say anything beyond that but again Quinn surprised her. "Because when you ask someone else out on a lunch date, it's simple etiquette that the asker pays the bill."
Rachel saw the look in Quinn's hazel eyes and heard the serious tone in her voice. She reluctantly released the leather booklet and sat back in her seat. "Fine. I will surrender for the time being, but the next time we go out, I will pay," she stated firmly, leaving no room for arguments.
Quinn stopped midway through putting the tip on the receipt and sliding her card in the fold. "Next time?" Quinn questioned, trying to hide a smile.
"Lunch date?" Rachel parried, lifting an eyebrow in perfect imitation of Quinn.
Immediately, Quinn ducked her head and went on with what she had been doing, if only to hide the scarlet blush on her cheeks.
It felt nice to walk with Rachel in New York, to feel the brunette's hand brush against hers, and to know that Rachel was at least somewhat enjoying herself. There was only one problem though. The silence was back, and it was stifling Quinn. She needed to hear Rachel's voice like she needed air to breathe.
Courage finally plucked up, Quinn reached for the hand that swung beside her own. It felt natural to hold Rachel's hand, because, despite Santana's sarcastic jibes at Rachel's small stature, Quinn only had two – maybe three – inches on Rachel, versus the six or seven inches that guys usually had on her, and their hands hung at roughly the same level. After dredging up the courage, it was easy to reach for Rachel's hand. Except maybe for the fact that it did its intended job of drawing the diva's attention to her, and her questions.
"Are you going to tell me?" the brunette asked softly, a hint of dejectedness in Rachel's voice despite her obvious efforts to conceal it from Quinn.
Quinn mulled it over for a moment, and then an idea stopped her in her tracks. Because their hands were still attached, this caused Rachel to stop too, and she looked questioningly at Quinn, who smiled reassuringly. "I have an idea," the blonde told her. "Did you ever play Truth in junior high?"
Rachel's questioning look didn't fade as she shook her head 'no'.
"Okay, well, it's a game that Santana and I used to play at cheer camp, only back then we were always trying to one-up each other. We would ask each other questions that the other probably really didn't want to answer, and we had to answer them honestly or else we had to forfeit," Quinn explained. "Basically, it's like Truth or Dare, but without the Dare."
"O. . . kay," Rachel began with uncertainty. "How is this relevant to my question?"
Quinn smiled. "Because you asked me a question, so if I answer your question, then ask you one and you have to answer," the blonde explained. "We take turns."
"And try to one-up each other?" Rachel teased. A sparkle of competitiveness ignited in her big brown eyes and she smiled challengingly.
The blonde couldn't help but laugh and pull Rachel closer to her side. "How about we just try to understand each other for now?" she suggested, though she knew what Rachel was thinking.
"Deal," Rachel agreed with much less enthusiasm.
"You can go first. Ask me anything."
Rachel seemed to think hard about it, and a few times her hand gripped Quinn's tighter, as if by sheer reflex to keep Quinn from running. "Something's been bothering you all day. I can see it in your eyes. What's bothering you?" Rachel finally asked.
"I . . ." Quinn began. Damn, leave it to Rachel to ask the hardest question first. She sighed and watched Rachel's face for her reactions as they walked. "It's like. . .. It's like I want to be happy, but . . . I promised myself that I wouldn't allow my happiness to depend on another person again, and now it kind of does." She looked to the brunette, "Does that satisfy your question? Because I know it's kind of vague."
Rachel nodded. "That's okay. I know more now than I did before. I know you'll tell me the extended version when you're ready." She seemed to laugh at her own words and continued, "Go ahead. It's your turn."
Quinn's replied was almost automatic. "What's your favorite color? I've been trying to figure it out for years. It's driving me crazy."
Rachel burst out laughing. "Well, Quinn, if I had known you cared so much . . ." the smaller girl giggled. "It's gold."
All expression faded from Quinn's face and she stared at Rachel blankly for a few moments before bursting out loudly, "Are you SERIOUS?!", and scaring a few stray pigeons from the sidewalk as well as a street vendor. Rachel was laughing in earnest now, clutching Quinn's arm as she double-over with laughter. "All these years, it's always been right there in front of me the whole time?"
Wow, how ironic this that, Fabgay? she found herself thinking.
"Can I go now?" Rachel asked upon regaining some composure.
"Certainly. Please take the attention off of me and my cluelessness."
Because Rachel still had a tight grip on her arm, Quinn could tell when the brunette began squirming.
"Just ask me, Rach," Quinn coaxed her. "It's okay. Nothing's off-limits. You're not going to upset me."
"W- Why did you do . . .. I mean, why . . ." Rachel took a deep breath and tried again. "What was it about me . . . that made you hate me so much . . . in the beginning?"
Quinn stopped. They were meandering through New York City, but Quinn could have sworn they were standing beside Rachel's locker in the hallway of McKinley High School. It took Rachel a few strides to realize that Quinn had paused back a ways, and she scurried back to the blonde.
"You don't have to answer that, Quinn," Rachel conceded. "We can keep playing. I can ask you a different–"
"Rachel, stop," Quinn told her calmly. Her hazel eyes looked into Rachel's and she saw the brunette's apology in them; she hoped to God that Rachel could see the overwhelming guilt in Quinn's. She sighed and took a few steps forward to grasp both of Rachel's hands in hers. "I knew you would ask me sooner or later." She paused, considering her words. "It wasn't that you asked the question, Rachel. It's how you phrased it.
"I never hated you. God, I wanted to sometimes. You . . . ooh!" Quinn stopped to laugh softly, an ironic smile spreading across her face. "You were always. . . so perfect, and it always grated on my nerves. You were . . . you, and you were never scared of that. I was so angry for so long . . . that you could just. . . be yourself . . . so easily, and I wanted to make it hard for you, the way that it was hard for me.
"Rachel, all I wanted was to be happy, and I thought that I had everything that was supposed to make me happy, but I wasn't and somehow you were. So I was so jealous and angry and I wanted to make you feel the way I felt . . . miserable. . . and I liked you, Rachel, I did. More than that, I wanted to be like you. Myself. Happy. Really, honest-to-God confident.
"You've always been . . . so beautiful . . . without ever even trying. You wore . . . animal-print and argyle sweaters and knee-high socks and mary janes and no makeup, and you still looked absolutely beautiful. And I . . . exercised like hell and starved myself to lose weight, I got plastic surgery on my nose and contacts to replace my glasses, I spent hours doing my makeup to perfection every morning, I walked around in a Cheerios uniform . . . and people told me I was beautiful, but I didn't feel beautiful. So. . . I tried to make you feel unbeautiful too. I called you terrible names, lies.
"And it was . . . so wrong, Rachel; I was so wrong. I know that now, but at that time . . ." Quinn trailed off, finally stopping for the first time in what felt like forever. She looked up and Rachel saw the tears that she was trying to combat. "You were amazing Rachel, and I didn't think I could ever be like you. ' Never even crossed my mind that I could learn how to be amazing from you."
Rachel had remained still and silent throughout Quinn's entire explanation, but the tears and the tension were too much, so she stepped forward and started wiping tears from Quinn's cheeks. Their eyes met, and Rachel could distantly hear herself asking, "Was that the only reason?"
Quinn took a step back from her and laughed nervously, swiping at the last few errant tears. "Uh-uh. Not a chance, Rach. It's my turn to ask a question," she teased in order to push away the awkwardness that had sprung up.
Rolling her eyes, Rachel nodded but made a mental note to continue badgering Quinn until she got the answer to her follow-up question. "Okay. Go ahead," she sighed.
The blonde began walking backwards as she carefully pondered what question to ask. "How do you feel about living with Kurt and Santana?" she questioned, because it was the best she could come up with without getting into the heavy questions that she was building up to.
Shrugging her shoulders, Rachel continued climbing the stairs to her apartment. "It's actually kind of nice," she admitted. "Kurt coddles me a lot, until he can't possibly take my melodrama anymore. Santana has a shorter fuse, but I'm finding out that she also has a soft and supportive side too. If I need someone to be brutally honest with me, I usually go to Santana. If I need someone to indulge me for a second, I go to Kurt. Santana intervenes in my life if she thinks something is off, even if I tell her not to. Kurt waits for me to come to him. Santana gives me a kick in the pants, Kurt gently nudges. It's kind of the best of both worlds. I don't know what I would do without either of them. They're my family."
As they came into the apartment and took a seat on the sofa, Quinn commented in a slightly wistful tone, "It sounds nice. Always having people who love you around. I mean, even if they're being so annoying that you want to strangle them, I bet it's still comforting."
"It is." Rachel reached down and grabbed both of Quinn's legs, bringing them to rest across her lap. She didn't miss it when the blonde winced, and it made her hesitate for a moment before Quinn smiled reassuringly at her.
"Your legs are still bothering you," Rachel commented, her fingers subconsciously beginning to work at the knot that had existed just above Quinn's knees for a long time now. "I'm–"
"If you're about to say you're sorry– don't." Quinn carefully leaned back against arm of the couch, closing her eyes and letting the mid-April sun soak into her skin through the wide loft window. "We've gone over this a million times before, Rach. You in no way caused my accident, and it's in the past now."
They were quiet for a few minutes while Rachel's nimble hands expertly massaged their way down Quinn's legs, pausing in one spot every so often to work out a particularly tight muscle. Rachel wasn't quite sure how to describe the way that taking care of Quinn made her feel, but she knew that she loved it. She watched the way that the blonde's face relaxed in a way she had never seen before, and seeing Quinn so serene tugged at something inside of Rachel, some basic instinct to protect and love and comfort.
"I worry about you," she voiced suddenly, causing Quinn to start. Rachel reached up and ran her fingers through Quinn's impossibly soft hair to calm her. "I worry about you so much sometimes, Quinn. I'm so sorry I didn't reply to your e-mails when we first got to school. Everything just seemed to fall to hell when I got here, but I should have let you to know that I was here for you if you needed me, that I was just a train-ride away. I get worried now because you don't talk about your life at Yale, or your friends there. You come to The City every weekend and I feel like I'm stealing you away from your life in New Haven, but I want you here and I'm selfish." She glanced up to see tears sliding down Quinn's cheeks from her closed eyes as the blonde sat motionless. "Quinn? Honey, what's been going on?"
Quinn sucked in a breath and took her legs from Rachel's lap to replace them with her head. "Rachel," she cried, her voice breaking on a sob. "You have to promise me that if I tell you, you won't care about me any less." More tears streamed down her pale cheeks.
"Ssh, Quinn, I'm right here. I'm not going anywhere, and there's nothing you could say or do to make me love you any less," Rachel reassured her. If Quinn noticed her slip-up, she didn't say anything at that moment. "It's okay. Just tell me. I promise, I'm here."
"You just got so angry when you found out about Santana and I," Quinn mumbled self-deprecatingly.
Rachel looked down into Quinn's wide eyes that shone gold today. "I was hurt because neither of you were honest with me, but you're trying to be honest with me right now, Quinn," she spoke ever so softly, "so I promise you, I won't get angry."
Quinn took a deep breath and closed her eyes with the most crumpled and pained look on her face. "First semester . . . I was sleeping with my married psychology professor," she admitted in a barely audible voice. Rachel's involuntary sharp intake of breath caused Quinn to quickly continue on, "Rachel, I was so lonely, so far from home and everything that I'd ever known, from glee club, from my friends, from you. He was the only person who seemed to give a damn." Quinn's eyes opened and she saw the shock in Rachel's eyes and sighed. "You can start yelling now. . . or running." She broke down in sobs again.
"No," Rachel said simply, wiping tears from her own eyes before holding Quinn and doing the same for her. "I'm not going to yell, and I am definitely not going to run away. You're stuck with me, Quinn Fabray. Haven't you figured that out by now?" Quinn's hand reached up and brushed Rachel's cheek and the blonde smiled half-heartedly at her. "That being said," Rachel continued, "I am asking a follow-up question this time, no putting me off, Miss Fabray."
With another weak smile, Quinn nodded. "Okay," she croaked out. "I think we should actually finish this conversation before we get on with the game."
"Good," Rachel said, bringing Quinn's hand to her mouth. Quinn bit back a sigh at the gesture. "Quinn, I need to know . . . are you still sleeping with this professor?"
"No," the blonde choked out. "That was kind of a part of why I slept with Santana the night of the wedding."
Rachel nodded distantly. "Why Santana?" she asked suddenly, unsure where that even came from. "There were dozens of people at that reception, so why Santana?"
Quinn sat up and faced Rachel, scrubbing at the splotches on her face so she could look serious when she asked, "Why does it bother you so much that it was Santana?"
"It doesn't," Rachel answered too quickly. "It's just . . . Never mind. Forget I asked." She stood up to leave, but Quinn grabbed her hand and stood up as well.
"No. Remember a second ago when you told me you weren't letting me put you off this time? Well, guess what. I'm not letting you put me off this time either, Rach," Quinn told her very seriously. "So I'll ask you again: why does it bother you so much that it was Santana? And don't say it doesn't, because we both know that's a lie. Talk to me, Rachel, you can tell me anything."
Rachel gaze hardened. "What was the real reason you came after me, specifically, in high school?" she asked.
"Why does it bother you so much that it was Santana?" Quinn repeated again calmly.
"What did you mean when you asked if I was singing to 'only Finn' at Regionals last year?" Rachel countered loudly.
"Why does it bother you that it was with Santana, Rachel?" the blonde persisted, knowing what the brunette was trying to do.
"How do you really feel about me?" Rachel asked in an even louder tone.
"Why does it bother you so much that I had sex with Santana on Valentine's Day?" Quinn asked one last time.
"BECAUSE IT SHOULD HAVE BEEN ME!" Rachel erupted finally.