Forever Has to Start Somewhere
Chapter 23: Silly Love Songs
"I'm sorry I can't be there today," Jesse said.
"It's fine," Rachel answered. She was walking through the schools hallway with her phone pressed to her ear as she looked for a certain member of the student body. "I understand. If you're going to be here for regionals and prom, you need to pull ahead now.
"That doesn't make me feel any better about not being with you on our first Valentines."
"Valentines day is a manufactured holiday," she pointed out.
He gave a thoughtful hum. "That may be true, but at it's heart it's a holiday to show someone how much you love them."
"You shouldn't need a holiday to show someone that you love them."
"I'd like to think I'm good at showing you that I love you."
"You are quite good at that."
"So why can't I use Valentines as an excuse to do that in an even bigger way?"
She frowned at his words. "Jesse, please tell me you didn't plan anything too extravagant."
"You know, most girls are begging for expensive Valentines presents."
"Most girls didn't just receive several thousand dollars worth of jewelry from their boyfriends at Christmas."
"To be fair, not all of that was from me."
Her tone went firm, "Jesse."
He let out a full laugh. Amusement clung to his voice as he said, "I promise I didn't get you anything too extravagant, Rachel."
"You're fingers aren't crossed right now?"
"My fingers are not crossed right now," he repeated. "Neither are my toes or any other body part of mine."
Through the crowded hallway, she could see the back of Puck's mohawk.
"I have something else I have to deal with right now," Rachel declared, "but if I find out you're lying to me-"
"I'm not lying to you," Jesse assured.
"You'd better not be."
They exchanged a quick goodbye before Rachel hung up.
She had just placed her phone into a pocket on her dress when she reached Puck's locker.
"Noah, I need your help with something."
He glanced down at her before saying, "I'm not singing with you this week, Rach. Your boyfriend may be cool with us singing love songs usually, but even he's gonna have a problem with it when Valentines is right around the corner. And Lauren told me I had to serenade her if I wanted her to go on a date with me so I was planning on singing Fat Bottomed Girls to her."
"You think it's romantic to point her weight out to her?" When Puck opened his mouth, Rachel cut him off, "Don't answer that. I'm just going to tell you right now that it's highly offensive and she's not going to enjoy it. So you should go with my idea instead."
He stared at her for a moment. Then he asked, "What's your idea exactly?"
"I want you to sing Big and Rich's Lovin Lately with David," Rachel informed. "You can use it to serenade Lauren while introducing him to the club at the same time. I considered asking one of the others since, as you pointed out, it would tacky to sing a love song with someone other than Jesse during Valentines but ultimately decided David would be the most comfortable with you."
"Karofsky and I might be on the football team together, but we aren't exactly friends."
"No, but he expressed to me last week that he appreciated working with people who weren't too afraid of him to tell him when he was messing up." She waved a hand at him, "Like you."
"Well I'm definitely not afraid of the fucker," Puck said with a huff. He bit the corner of his lip before asking, "You really don't think she'll like Fat Bottomed Girls?"
"I'm fairly positive, yes."
A moment passed before he nodded. He slammed his locker shut. "I'll listen to the song. If it doesn't suck, I'll talk to him."
"Kurt." The glee club turned their attention to Shelby as she spoke up from the piano. She was sitting on the bench, leaning her elbow against the tray while she smiled softly. "Why don't you wrap us up with your number?"
"I think that's an excellent idea!" Kurt agreed.
He took several steps towards the center of the room before turning to face them.
His hands fiddled with something behind his back as he said, "I got a call recently from someone who I care about a great deal. He spent nearly half an hour whining about the fact that he couldn't be here to spend his first Valentines with his girlfriend."
"Oh!" Rachel squeaked. She brought her hands up to her mouth in surprise.
"So, to make him shut up I agreed to two things. The first was to make sure his girlfriend received this cheesy but absolutely gorgeous bracelet."
Kurt took his hands out from behind his back and presented Rachel with an open velvet box. She took it from his hands, examining the bracelet inside as she did so.
It was a simple silver chain with an infinity sign on it. She could see her name engraved onto the bottom of one loop while Jesse's was engraved in the top of the other.
"The second," Kurt declared, drawing her attention back to him, "was to make sure she knew how much she was loved even though he couldn't be here."
At the sound of shuffling behind her, Rachel turned her head.
She watched as Karofsky, Puck, Mike, and Matt all made their way down towards Kurt.
They flanked him, two on each side.
Matt stood the closest to the piano bench.
He grinned widely as he said, "Rach, you're a super great friend. I haven't really worked up the courage to do another number in front of the group yet, but without you giving me the confidence I wouldn't even be considering it."
Mike stood between Matt and Kurt. He said, "I know we haven't hung out much since I started dating Tina, but I really do appreciate you Rachel. It means a lot to me that you ask me for tips even though you're such a great dancer."
"You make kick ass cupcakes," Puck declared from his spot between Kurt and Karofsky. "And you're a pretty kickass yourself. You go after what you want and you've always encouraged me to do the same, no matter how many people call me a Lima Loser. Plus, I asked Lauren on our date and she confirmed that you totally saved my ass earlier this week by suggesting that duet for Karofsky and I."
Karofsky scratched the back of his neck. "We've really only been friends for a week, but you've already helped me a lot. You convinced me to join glee club and gave me a space to be something other than the asshole football player you see in the hallways. And I appreciate that." He flashed a nervous smile as he added, "And, Hummel said now that we were friends you probably weren't going to let me go so I should just show you how much I appreciate you now."
His words started a laugh out of Rachel.
She was so caught up in the affection welling in her chest, both for Jesse for arranging this and the boys in front of her for doing this, that she couldn't even hear Santana and Quinn's scoffs or Finn's confused whimpers.
"Rachel Berry, you are total diva. You shout a lot and still cry at musicals you've seen a million times and you storm out so often that it's really starting to lose it's effect," Kurt said. His smile softened into something more affectionate as he watched her. "But you're my diva and the two of us are going to take New York by storm in two years."
There was a beat before the band started playing the music.
The boys started the song together, singing, "When everything is wrong, I'll come talk to you. You make things alright when I'm feeling blue. You are such a blessing and I don't be messing with the one that that brings light to all of my darkness."
Kurt took the next line by himself, forming a heart and pointing it at her as she sung, "You are my best friend and I love you and I love you. Yes I do."
The boys came together again, "There is no other one that can take your place. I feel happy inside when I see your face. I hope you believe me because I speak sincerely and I mean it when I tell you I need you."
Puck winked at her and Karofsky gave her another one of his smiles as they sung together, "You are my best friend and I love you and I love you. Yes I do."
"I'm here right beside you. I will never leave you and I feel the pain when you start crying," the five chorused.
Matt and Mike had their arms slung around each other. They were both grinning widely, pointing at her as they sung, "You are my best friend and I love you, and I love you. Yes I do."
They closed the song together, all of their voices joining, "You are my best friend and I love you, and I love you. Yes I do. Yes I do... Yes I do."
They had barely finished singing before she was on her feet, gathering them all to her in a tight hug.
"So the thing is my friend Blaine and I started this week on opposite sides of the Valentines scale," Kurt said. He was standing on the stage in front of Breadsticks, speaking into a microphone. The Warblers were lined up to his side. "I didn't really believe in Valentines while Blaine really did. Blaine's opinion was recently changed by rejection-"
"Oi!" Blaine hollered from his spot with the Warblers. There was a good-natured smile on his face. "I thought we were doing this to make me feel better!"
Kurt waved a hand dismissively at him, causing laughter to ripple through the crowd in front of them. "However, my opinion was recently changed as well. I got to see dozens of girl's smiling into roses and a dozen boys with wide relieved eyes when they didn't get rejected. I got to see the laziest guy in my school try his hardest to woe over the girl he wanted. I got to see my best friend light up as she realized what her boyfriend had planned for her. And I decided that Valentines might be a holiday designed to sell chocolates, but that doesn't mean it's stupid. So without any more delay, I give you a Warblers Valentines concert, featuring special guest Kurt Hummel!"
"I can't explain, the feelings plain to me, so can't you see?"
"How was your Valentines dinner?" Jesse questioned. He propped his chin on of his hands, watching his girlfriend through the computer screen.
Rachel was sitting in her desk chair, her chin resting on her drawn up knees, in her pajamas. He could see the bracelet he'd bought her resting on her wrist.
"Good. The Warblers are fantastic performers," she answered. Her lips turned up in a warm smile, "The rest of my Valentines wasn't too bad either."
"No? You enjoyed your presents then?"
"Very much," Rachel agreed. "I must admit, though, that as much as I loved the boys' performance, I am a little disappointed I didn't get an actual love song."
"Oh?" He drawled out teasingly. "Was there someone in particular you were hoping to get one from?"
Her lips twitched in amusement.
She tilted her head down. One finger settled on her bottom lip and she looked up at him through her eyelashes as she murmured, "Well, I was hoping my boyfriend would sing to me. He's rather good at it."
"I think I can arrange that," he said.
He licked his lip before starting, "Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm glad this week is over, I need to get away. Go home and throw my clothes on, come get you right away. Can't wait to see you looking lovely, I hope you're thinking of me. Cause all I want is time with you and I don't need nothing more."
En: I'm a little bit in love with this chapter. Hopefully no one minds too much that it's pretty much all Rachel & McKinley. There's been a lot of that recently and I'm hoping you guys are enjoying it at least a little bit?
So usually i try and keep the songs for a chapter to ones that were actually out when the episode would have aired, but my love for Noah Puckerman singing country music ruined that in the very first section of this chapter.
I'm starting to think I need to make a playlist for this fic so that I can remember which songs got used.
Songs in this chapter: there's mention of Puck and Dave doing "Lovin Lately" by Big and Rich, "My Best Friend" by Weezer, and "So In Love" by Jill Scott and Anthony Hamilton. There's also beginning of the Warblers canon performance of "Silly Love Songs".
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