Hey readers! I literally do not know how to fix the spacing. In word, it looks fine but then I upload it...

Anyway, thanks for reading. I promise, we're getting to the romance. I'm a sucker for the build up. :P

Chapter 9

Sometimes in life you go to the wrong place, but the right way always comes and finds you. It might make you trip over it or it might come to you when a day is stripped apart by night. It'll ask you to take its hand and leave this wrong place.

There are moments when you can only stare, watching the world forget you as you try to remove yourself from it. Life will come, calling your name; begging. But you're gone. You hear nothing, see nothing. You've gone, and it's a place where nothing can touch you. Nothing can save you.

Then you're back on earth, placed where the world doesn't recognize you. Your name is the same as it always was; you look and sound the same.

Yet. You are not the same.

The world will call out to you again. This time. This time it connects. It speaks to you rather than at you. Sometimes you feel it calling out for you.

She had spent the entire weekend with me. After the initial shock of the situation, we talked. Just not about what happened.

"So you dumped him?"

She shrugged " Finn and I had a discussion about our relationship. After everything that had happened between us, we realized that we were just forcing something that was inevitably going to end. We had a mutual break up."

"When?"

Chuckling, her hand moves to scratch the back of her neck revealing a tattoo that had gone unnoticed, " actually the night we saw each other at Santana's house".

I was staring. "What? Is there something on my face?"

I closed the distance; pulled her hair back, and my finger outlined the small tattoo hidden behind her ear. "What is this?"

"Oh… uhm, it's a tattoo".

I rolled my eyes at her, "I know it's a tattoo Rachel".

She laughed nervously, "right. I got it last year. It's Hebrew for forgiveness. I- uh I just needed a reminder".

Sometimes I can't stop the eyebrow raise. It just happens. " But you can't see it."

"I don't need to see it. When you permanently mark yourself you tend to never forget".

Questions lunged at me. There was a sadness that flickered in her eyes. Did she want me to change the subject?

In the end it was Rachel's voice that drove the silence away.

"I…" She hesitated. I waited.

She sighed, "Sophomore and Junior year, I suffered from self harm. I- uh, I have scars so that's what I mean. The scars burn more than the actual act. I don't have the ability to forget… I mean I see them everyday when I look in the mirror. But I can forgive". She glanced at me then quickly looked away.

I stared at her. I watched her. The sadness settled into her eyes. It made my heart ache.

A minute passed, and another. It was like nails on a chalkboard silence. I couldn't stop all chaos in my head.

Finally, I moved.

"Rach-" my voice caught.

She leaned into me. It was my turn to hold her.

I couldn't stop the memory from coming back into my mind.

Freshman year. Rachel walked through the hallway of McKinley High.

They called her name incessantly or rather callous names. They labeled her without a second look.

"Hey man hands", "yo dwarf", "get lost boy hips".

Each time Rachel kept walking.

It made me envy her, as she kept her smile on her face.

Rachel was at her locker, stopping her momentum.

They pointed. Laughed. Told her she was useless.

As she moved to put her books in her locker, a large red slushy made contact with her head.

She stopped.

She just froze.

In no rush at all, she continued to put her books into her locker. Then she picked up the cup and held it in her hand. She studied it.

She turned to the group, where it came from. They became quiet. She carefully handed the cup back to them. Then she started walking again. She stopped. Turned. She stared at them for a few seconds, and then continued walking.

As I watched this all happening, I couldn't help notice that Rachel's stare wasn't angry in any way. If anything, it was amused. She could have done anything she wanted, said anything. She could have slapped them or thrown the cup at them.

But that was something they could have done just as easily.

There was no way they could have walked away if it were them.

That was how she beat them.

That was how she won.

She did the one thing they were incapable of doing.

She walked away.

I couldn't help but wonder what happened to that girl, to that Rachel. But I knew exactly what happened and it killed me a little inside.