Disclaimer: I don't own Glee or any of its characters (I do, however, own the wonderful Maria Arioso as well as Ms. Powers).

A/N: Sorry everyone, I've been a bit busy the past few weeks. I've gotten sick quite a bit and had weeks jam packed with Jazz performances. But never fear, I have oneshots on the way, and now I'm posting this: a Faberry interactions chapter just for your enjoyment. A little less angst than the past few chapters… sort of a short refresh for you all before the next chapter of action and because I love you all… by the way, ch3lsk0, this one's for you :). Your request has been fulfilled. Now shout outs to all you wonderful, amazing people:

Thanks to J0EBLACK, gleefulness, thetamarine, bluhawk, Saurus, snakeyninja, d80p, Achelette, aquarius127, Stevie92, RUlov3r, w1cked, Buffy-Obssessed, HighwayMagickUnicorn, G6-flying, Music and Reading Lover, erw-fan, RandomOtakuFromTumblr: Hello again :) Yes, English is my first language. I speak semi-fluent Spanish and a little bit of French (I started classes this year). Ideas from Just A Kiss came from a mixture of an actual event and the Lucy storyline, along with a healthy dose of my imagination (the divorce between Leroy and Hiram, the separation, etc.). That's sort of my writing style. Blending reality and fiction together, sarasunnyshine, kiarcheo, ch3lsk0, redashford, BleachedBlondeDork, smartblonde317, Princesakarlita411, Sannie: I'm definitely not sick of it. I'm a bit uncertain about my writing, because I NEVER let anyone in 'real life' read it. Thank you for your comments :), clenche, EagleRay, Novak Fan, Iza.G, makurutenoh: I'm sorry about the whole eyes swelling thing :( I hope this chapter is happy enough for you., MsChloeMa, jacketweather, DAgron01: Thank you! :), becauseyouscareme, and wsupAnonnymous for their lovely comments.

Please review if you have the time :) I'd love to hear what you all think of the chapter. Any questions? Ask them here or on my tumblr (link's on my profile page). And if you haven't read the prequel to this story go ahead and check out Ordinary Day to get yourself a lowdown :)

Chapter 9: A Little Too Concerned

"Sweetheart, are you alright?"

Rachel's fascination with her silverware ended as brown eyes snapped up to meet worried gray. A twinge of a smile crossed full lips as she let her fork fall to her plate with a clatter. "I'm fine, Dad."

"Are you sure?" Leroy's gaze fell to his daughter's plate. He frowned. "You've barely touched your breakfast."

"I'm sure," Rachel reiterated with that same little grimace of a smile across her lips, reddish brown dull with melancholy. "I guess it must've been all the amazing food you cooked over the weekend."

Though she hadn't eaten much of that supposedly amazing food either.

The trip about Lima drudged up plenty of Rachel's old memories. The death of her favorite sheet music store confirmed the singer's assertions. For all its unchanging simplicity, Lima, Ohio changed after Rachel Berry left it and snuffed out some of her sweetest memories with it.

After locking up the studio, Ms. Powers walked about town with Rachel at her side, talking here and there about students from the guitarist's dance class. Joseph from Jazz dance was attending some performing arts camp. Amy in Hip Hop passed away a few years past while her sister Kayley worked on some odd end project in some school far from Ohio.

And whilst they walked through the empty streets, more and more things came into perspective.

Rachel's favorite ice cream shop was gone. The little Italian restaurant Papa brought her to after Ballet and singing lessons was now home to some weird pawn shop with a bored looking teenager manning the counter.

They were such little things. But these little things were memories that she cherished and held near and dear to her heart when she looked back upon her time in Ohio.

And now it was all gone. Erased.

She was a stranger in a warped alternate reality of this world that she once knew and viewed through rose colored lenses.

'Or…,' Rachel closed her eyes, shoulders slumping a bit under the heaviness of her thoughts. 'I used to before…'

"At least eat a little something for lunch, Sweetheart?"

Rachel nearly jumped as a wad of money was placed into her trembling hand. Gentle, large fingers pressed the crisp bills into her palm as the other, large hand squeezed her lithe palm comfortingly.

Brown eyes softened. "Of course, Dad."

The edges of Leroy's thin lips curved as he patted his daughter's leg and pressed a kiss to her forehead. "That's my girl. Now we'd better finish getting cleaned up. We don't want you to be late to school, now do we?"

"And someone needs to be a little more punctual about getting to the firm on time," Rachel smirked, yelping as she dodged the dish towel her father threw at her on her way out the kitchen door.

The playful smile drained from Rachel's face as she bounded up the stairs to retrieve her signature leather jacket, black scarf, and bag.

He still couldn't understand.

The singer threw her coat on, wrapped the black material of the scarf about her neck, and slung the messenger over her torso. She stepped over the plethora of clothes on the ground (she'd shucked off her stuff as soon as she got home Friday, unwilling to deal with the laundry at that moment) to snatch her iPhone up off of her white iHome.

The little device let out a rebellious beep as she pulled it off the stand, lighting up and informing Rachel of several text messages.

The singer typed her password in, grinning as she read through the list of texts from her friends in San Diego. They all told her the same clichéd 'we miss you so much' message in rather lewd manners. What friends she had.

Rachel froze over the menu as she took in a text from an unknown number. She stared at the number long and hard, trying to see if she knew who it might be. Unable to think of anyone matching the digits, the guitarist pressed open the conversation only to be struck dumb.

'Hey stranger! Did you survive the weekend? Was I right? Did a strange white male assailant with a fetish for kidnapping petite brunettes attack you? ;)'

Quinn Fabray. Quinn Fabray was texting her. Why was Quinn Fabray texting her?

'How'd you get my number?'

'Is that REALLY how you say good morning or answer a question, Berry?'

Rachel frowned. Quinn wanted to play that game, hmm? Fine then.

'No, of course not. I always greet unknown numbers with a hearty GOOD MORNING when they text me.'

'Ooo, sarcasm.'

'Yes. And don't dodge the question, where the hell did you get my number?'

'You're such a charmer in the morning. …And Tina gave me the number. I wanted to check up on you.'

'Checking on me is unnecessary, Quinn. I'm perfectly fine.'

'Can you blame me after you went running off in some random direction a couple days ago? You were all kinds of crazy to try to walk home from school.'

'As I said before, Quinn. I'm capable of taking care of myself.'

'We'll see. I'm coming over to get you this morning.'

Rachel's eyes widened. 'What do you mean you're coming over?'

'I need to really make sure you're in one piece, now don't I?'

The guitarist opened her blinds, checking up and down the streets for the blonde's car. Seeing the coast clear, she quickly typed out a message to Quinn, biting her lip.

'That's a bit unnecessary, don't you think? I mean, if I was harmed, I wouldn't be texting you right now, would I?'

The reply was almost immediate. 'You're a bit late in the reply, Berry. I'm already halfway there. And I think that it's a bit easy to lie, hmm? Especially when I can't see you.'

Rachel cursed under her breath, grabbing her thick, black leather watch from her bedside table and fastening it onto her arm. She jumped down the stairs hastily, running into the kitchen to grab an empty thermos.

Leroy looked up his place at the table, placing his paper down on the kitchen table as Rachel rushed about the kitchen preparing her coveted coffee milk. "What's going on Rachel, you're a bit… jumpy."

"Quinn's coming to get me," Rachel muttered, throwing some caramel creamer into the thermos for good measure, sealing the lid tightly.

"Really?" The large man's eyebrows rose in surprise. "Why didn't you tell me that she was coming? I might've fixed a little something for her."

"Because I didn't know," Rachel replied flatly, leaning against the counter near the bubbling coffee maker, crossing her arms stubbornly.

Leroy's eyes widened for a brief moment. Just as quickly, a wicked twinkle took residence in the man's grayish orbs as a smirk curled about the corners of his stern mouth.

Rachel stiffened at the sight of her Father's mischievous smile before scowling at him. "No, Dad. It's not that way. No matter how much you'd like to think it is, it isn't."

"I don't know what you're talking about, sweetheart," the same shit-eating smirk was still splayed across the man's smug features.

"Quinn's a new friend," Rachel shook a finger at her father. "And I don't need you messing up anything between us with your supposed crush sensing. Quinn is a Catholic, proper popular girl with no homosexual tendencies whatsoever."

"Sweetheart," Leroy put his paper down on the table once more, a mock wounded expression wrought across his face as he held a hand to his heart. "I'm insulted. I thought you thought so much better of me."

"Not when you have that devious look plastered across your face," Rachel countered. "I haven't known Quinn for that long so there's no way-."

"You'd be surprised how quickly these things happen, Sweetheart," her Father interrupted. "A crush can surface out of nowhere. Don't you think Quinn's been a bit… accommodating with you?"

"English?" Rachel muttered, tapping her foot.

"Goodness, isn't this what your girlfriends are for, sweetheart?"

"Dad."

"I mean, this isn't exactly a conversation you're supposed to have with dear old Dad."

"Dad. The point."

"…Right…" Leroy cleared his throat. "She gets up at five to see you, drives you to the coffee shop—did she pay for drinks?"

"Yes, but what does-."

"She pays for your drinks, then she checks on you on a Monday morning… it seems as though that's a lot for a friend that you've just 'recently' made, isn't it, sweetie?" Leroy folded his hands on the table, waiting for his daughter's response.

"…Maybe she's just…" Rachel dug through her mind, "practicing her Catholic values. It's perfectly acceptable to do all of the aforementioned items if it's all out of good religious charity."

"Oh Rachel," Leroy shook his head. "I thought I raised you to avoid denial."

"I am not-."

"You are, sweetheart, if you can't see something so blatantly obvious," Leroy sighed. "I feel like I've failed as a father."

"Quinn Fabray is not gay," Rachel jumped as the doorbell rang. Screwing the lid onto her thermos, she pointed threateningly at her father. "And you better not say anything, troublemaker. In fact, don't even get up."

Her father lifted his hands in defeat. "Alright, alright. Have it your way, sweetheart… Have a good day."

"Oh," he paused thoughtfully as his daughter walked out of the kitchen. "PLEASE don't turn down the ride today, Rachel! I need to work late at the office."

The man straightened his paper up once more, shaking his head and sighing in exasperation. "If a gay man cannot impart his gaydar unto his offspring, what has he to pass down?"

Rachel's palms sweated profusely as she stood before the front door, numb in the brain.

Quinn Fabray was outside that door. Quinn Fabray was here. Why was Quinn Fabray here?

Leroy's words, despite Rachel's utter refusal of their validity, seeped their way into the singer's brain. For once in her life, Rachel was lost in a haze of uncertainty all because of a single infuriatingly confusing cheerleader.

Rachel prided herself on her ability to know people. It got her through the day and kept her from feeling too vulnerable. If she could read others and how they reacted to certain stimuli, certainly she could learn to keep better control of herself.

People were boringly easy to read. A little curl of the lip could mean contempt. A stutter in speech meant a lie. Detecting emotions was easy enough if you had the formula and Rachel knew every code in the book.

Know every code and you can learn to write your own. Write a lock over your emotions and no one can ever guess what's going on in your mind.

But Quinn was a fucking enigma. Her steady, amber gaze unsettled Rachel with its nostalgic swirls of emerald. The blonde could be hard and unyielding, yet turn gentle at the slightest trigger.

Rachel hated it.

She couldn't see the blonde's motivations. Why befriend someone so low on the social rungs? Why have coffee with her? Why even associate with a loser when she was so much higher up on the social pyramid?

Why stare at Rachel?

So many questions bombarded the poor brunette's mind as she fought valiantly to control the flow of emotions pulsing through her veins.

A knock broke Rachel from her musings, a tan hand flinching on the doorknob. The door, right. Now was no time for these inane thoughts. She had someone waiting on the other side.

The girl pulled on the brass handle, fixing a smile to her features.

Quinn stood just outside the door, hands shoved into her jean pockets as she shivered against the cold. Her shoulders, covered by the red, fitted polo shirt the girl wore, trembled in the cool of the morning.

Still, despite her obvious discomfort, Quinn's lips curled back to reveal perfectly white teeth as she flashed a smile at Rachel. "Hey, good to see you're alive, Rachel."

"Nice to see you're freezing, Quinn," the guitarist responded cheekily, stepping out into the chilly air and closing the door behind her.

"Are you always so warm and fuzzy in the morning?" the blonde questioned, throwing a playful glare at the irritatingly chipper brunette.

"Yes, I'm very much a morning person," Rachel flashed a smug smile at her friend. "I just love my chilly, bright-ass mornings."

"Says the girl in the warm, leather jacket," Quinn muttered, glaring at her. Gentle emerald eyes studied the small girl's form, making Rachel shiver. "So it looks like you made it home in one piece, hmm?"

"Just like I said I would," Rachel replied, taking the first step toward the car resting on the curb. "I told you that you didn't need to worry about me."

"You can't blame me for worrying, Berry," Quinn opened the front door, taking a seat behind the wheel as Rachel followed. "You did cause a bit of a splash the first day. Langley decked you a good one and you ended up with a split lip."

"Because I wasn't trying," Rachel scoffed, crossing her arms like a petulant child. She froze at the action, eyes widening a bit.

She hadn't… done something like that for a while. It was an action that she thought she'd long outgrown since she was twelve.

But there… there it was.

Twelve year old Rachel Berry, seeping out from cracks in the well-made barriers her older self had left her to for five years.

Quinn sensing the change in Rachel's demeanor, spared a concerned glance in the girl's direction as she turned a corner. "Something wrong?"

"No," Rachel's hands slowly slid down her arms. "No, nothing's wrong at all… Just a bit thoughtful today."

"Well snap out of it," the blonde smiled at the guitarist. "Don't you think that we do enough thinking at school already?"

"Maybe I like thinking," the brunette huffed in response.

"It's awfully rude to be thinking," brief pause at a turn, "when there's someone who wants to have a conversation with you."

"And what would you like to talk about, Quinn?" Rachel folded her hands in her lap and sat up primly in the car seat in a parody of propriety. "Shall we discuss boys, as is customary? Or perhaps the latest issue of Vogue? Or maybe you'd like to talk about how cute every which article of clothing is, that's typical too, hmm?"

"You look like you'd be terrible at discussing all of those things," Quinn mused, a mischievous smile on her lips. "I mean, look at that scarf… not matching with that jacket. And would you even buy an issue of Vogue, Berry? You don't really look like a fashion magazine kind of girl."

"You'd be guessing right," Rachel replied. "But what about boys? You don't think we could have a rousing round of discussion about boys? Even I've done that one before, even though I don't look like the 'type.'"

Quinn's jaw visibly tightened and dark emeralds turned a shade of sharp amber. Hands tightened slightly about the wheel, frightening Rachel. "…I'd… rather not."

"Bad experiences?" Rachel questioned gently, brown eyes softening.

The blonde snorted, shaking her head. "You have no idea."

"Well, when you have certain expectations that you expect your significant other to meet, that's when things get messy," the guitarist shook her head. Oh how true that was. She'd learned it all too well after several years of faulty relationships.

"You sound like you've had a bit of firsthand experience, Berry," the cheerleader said stiffly as she took off down the road once more. "Why don't you spill a little bit? Tell me about the glamorous love life of Rachel Berry before she got trapped in Hicksville, Ohio."

Though the statement was meant to seem as though it were a joke, the kidding note in the girl's voice was long absent. Her posture had taken on a rigid, almost robotic sort of preciseness. Her turns became razor sharp as hands tightened against the steering wheel. Rachel disregarded it.

Maybe she'd had a rough morning?

"I seem to have a propensity," the singer drew her legs up to her chest, "to go for boys who just aren't… enough."

"Enough?" the blonde questioned.

"They're…" Rachel paused, searching for the right word. "They're good guys. Most of the girls in the choir would kill for the chance to date them. But there's just something… something that I can't put my finger on… something's missing."

"Attractiveness?" the blonde tried, "intellectual chemistry…?"

"Most of them were pretty good looking guys," Rachel sighed. "They were smart and they could sing circles around the other kids in school. But no matter how much I wanted to, I just didn't feel… like it worked."

The brunette's head dropped down onto her knees as she continued to speak. "And then… Sometimes I think that I'm a bit too damaged to ever love anyone."

Rachel paused before laughing, shaking her head. "I'm sorry, we just became friends the other day and I'm acting a little too open with everything. You're supposed to be a friend, not a therapist."

"It's alright," Quinn looked over at her friend, a smile quirking on her lips. "If it makes you feel any better, I've felt a strange sort of connection since the first time you spoke to me. I've told you so many things that took me ages to tell Britt and Santana. You're… sort of special, Rachel."

"And as for being 'unable to love,'" the blonde laid a tentative hand atop Rachel's right, which rested against her thigh, bunching the fabric. Amber turned once more to gentle green as fingers entwined. "Everybody can love. It just comes down to waiting for the right person to come along."

The cheerleader gave the guitarist's hand a gentle squeeze, meant to offer some form of comfort. Rachel appreciated the sentiment, yet the gesture made her give a gentle hiss of pain as she pulled the damaged limb from Quinn's grasp.

The taller girl froze, eyes snapping to the musician and watching as the girl applied pressure to her hand, teeth gritted. "Rachel, what's wrong?"

"Nothing," Rachel forced out from between clenched teeth. "Napkins… do you have napkins in here?"

"Why do you need napkins, Berry?" the blonde's voice took on an authoritative edge as she reached into the side of her door, searching around for a wad of the needed items.

"Unless you want me to bleed all over your nice, leather seats," the brunette said darkly, "I suggest that you get them."

Quinn's jaw firmly set, fisting about the napkins in her hand. She shoved the car violently to the right, sending Rachel sprawling against the interior as the cheerleader pulled it against the curb. Several cars behind them honked violently as they passed.

"Jesus, Quinn," Rachel yelped, pulling herself up. "Are you trying to get us killed?"

"Let me see your hand, Berry!" Quinn's eyes were fierce, shoulders squared as she thrust a stiff hand out for the singer's own.

"I can take-."

"Bullshit, Berry. Give me your fucking hand."

The curses chilled Rachel down her spine. She'd never seen Quinn Fabray look so angry. Not even when she confronted those boys in the hallway. There, she seemed calm and confident, so in her element.

But this Quinn looked angry and wild, her eyes warring between green and fierce gold as she looked hard at the injured hand. The concern and frustration radiated off her in droves, her lean figure stiff and unrelenting.

Why was Quinn so concerned about her? Why would anyone other than Maria ever be concerned about her unless they got something out of it?

Scared, the singer hesitantly put the wounded appendage into Quinn's hand. She was surprised as the cheerleader gently pulled her fingers over, accessing the jagged cut across her palm.

Soft fingers dabbed the blood off the opening, pressing napkins to the affected area while the girl reached around to the backseat and pulled out a bright red first-aid kit and hauled it to the front.

"So you didn't come back in one piece on Friday, hmm?" Quinn said harshly as she opened the kit, reaching for gauze pads and an ace wrap. "You got yourself hurt after all. I knew something like this would happen."

"How do you know I didn't get it-."

"Shut up, Berry."

Rachel let out a pained groan as hydrogen peroxide wipes were pressed thoroughly against the cut and came away saturated in crimson liquid.

"Good, I hope it hurts," Quinn spat stonily. "That's what you get for being stupid. How the hell did you get this?"

"Broken glass," Rachel replied in a mere whisper.

"On the way home Friday?" she questioned, then held up a finger as the brunette opened her mouth to reply. "And you better tell the fucking truth."

"…Yes," Rachel's gaze fell to the carpet as she felt the girl press gaze against the mouth of the wound and begin to wrap it firmly about her hand.

"You walked around with an open gash on your hand all weekend," Rachel let out a hiss of pain as the blonde accented the last of her words with a sharp tug on the bandage, "and you tell me that you think you can take care of yourself, Berry? Jesus Christ, you really do need someone to watch your back."

"And I have Tina and Artie to do so," the guitarist snapped back, then yelped as Quinn tightened the bandage once more. "Fuck Fabray, quit doing that!"

"I'll say it again, you deserve it,' Quinn replied harshly as she slapped two metal pins in place to affix the bandage. She pushed Rachel's hand away from her, putting the car into drive and swerving back into the road. "You're going to show up at my car afterschool and you're going to let me give you a fucking ride to wherever you're gonna go. No protests, Berry, got it?"

"I'm seventeen years old, Quinn," Rachel's eyes narrowed, a hint of steely red coming to once gentle brown. "And furthermore, you haven't known me long enough to boss me around. Hell, you don't have the right to-."

"Why can't I care about you?" the blonde's voice cut through the brunette's argument. "Rachel, I've had so many false smiles and whatever in my life, and you're one of the most real people I've ever met. I'm not just doing this to trip you up or for some chuckles. I care about you. So whether or not I've been in your life for a year or just for a goddamned week or so, I'm still going to care."

Quinn's shoulders slumped as golden hair formed a curtain about her face, guarding the girl's emotions from the guitarist. "So please, just take the ride to humor me."

The car filled with silence as Rachel looked down upon the seemingly resigned cheerleader.

She looked just as tired as Rachel felt. Just as old and just as defeated. The guitarist's apprehensions about Quinn's motives faded away the longer she looked at her, replaced by a sense of melancholy and guilt.

There was nothing to be scared of, it seemed. Nothing to be suspicious about. Quinn had helped her, not because she'd had some sort of ulterior motive, but because she genuinely cared about Rachel and wanted to help her.

All because of some weird connection she felt to Rachel. Because of the weird, nausea inducing looks she sent across the room. The ones that disarmed the guitarist and made her want to shout for Quinn to look the other way.

Rachel's eyes softened. She needed friends here in Lima, Ohio. Friends other than Artie and Tina, because as much as Rachel loved to be around them, she knew she'd never be able to tell Tina and Artie about everything. She didn't feel as comfortable around them as she did with Quinn Fabray.

Which was somewhat ironic, considering how uncomfortable she felt whenever strong hazel eyes fixed upon her almost every waking moment of the day.

But Quinn Fabray was magnetic. She attracted every which thing to her and held it captive and unaware with those shy smiles and charming remarks. She was every bit the type of person that Rachel swore she'd never trust.

But she was everything that Rachel needed and wanted. And so Rachel allowed herself to be swept in by Quinn's magnetism. Allowed those pained likenesses to attract.

Swallowing heavily, Rachel kept her gaze steadily upon the ground and parted chapped lips.

"…Alright."

And Quinn looked up at her with those vibrant, curious eyes as a soft smile came to her lips. A delicate hand once more came to rest upon Rachel's, this time squeezing only minutely.

"Thank you."

The bandages annoyed Rachel to no end. Quinn had tightened them enough for her to barely bend her fingers enough to grasp a pencil, which made her study notes and work pages sloppy to read.

And though Rachel Berry had gotten rid of most of the traits from her twelve year old, anal-retentive self, she could not help the fact that she was obsessive compulsive in the manner she arranged her school work.

It was a shame that she saw Quinn during passing period, nor that the cheerleader sat next to her at lunch, during which she attempted to loosen the bandage, only to have Quinn slap her hands and carefully retighten the loosened strand.

Then when Glee Club rolled around and Rachel reached for the cherry wood electric guitar she used to cover their latest number (Sweet Child O' Mine with Finn—again, Rachel huffed angrily—on lead vocals) her friend insisted that she let Noah take her part for a good week to allow for the cut to close adequately.

To round off her shitty day, Mercedes and Kurt put up a stink about Rachel taking lead on another song for which there had been fair try outs. They might have been grateful for Rachel's interference on dance rehearsals the other day, but she still wasn't worthy of 'their' solos in their minds.

Rachel was grateful for her new friend's attention, but she hated being treated like a child. She'd already ceded her right to walk home for the day, and now she was suddenly too 'wounded' to play guitar, her favorite pastime. She'd had cuts worse than this before in her fighting classes, and managed just alright.

But Quinn wouldn't let her do a single fricking thing, not even open her door at the end of the day, for fear of setting off another round of fresh bleeding.

The day conclusively ended with a rant to Rachel's 'therapist.'

"She won't even let me play guitar! Freaking guitar!" Rachel muttered, pacing back and forth in front of the iPhone sitting propped up by a pillow on her bed.

"Just tell your girlfriend she's being a little too heavy on the control," Maria shrugged, pulling the ring from her lip and licking over the resulting piercing, placing it down on a cluttered desk.

Brown eyes glared at icy blue as a smirk made its way onto full, red lips. "Quinn Fabray is not my girlfriend."

"Sure seems like it," Maria hummed, starting to remove the jewelry from her ears. "I mean, it seems like she's dictating everything you do, smurf."

"Catholic. Cheerleader. Not gay," Rachel said. "Do those words not mean a thing to you?"

"Denial, does that mean anything to you?" Maria chirruped in response. "And you didn't think I was so straight when I gave you a couple little kisses on the lips at Brody's winter formal after party."

"You had too much fucking Smirnoff that night," Rachel countered.

"It's funny that the one person that helped me realize that I was a fucking bisexual," Maria smirked, "by allowing me to cry all over her during my holy denial during a killer hangover now thinks that Catholic gays don't exist."

"It's not just that," Rachel said exasperatedly, slumping onto her computer chair. "She's been pregnant, I have it on good authority she's only dated guys, and we've only been friends for… a week. Maybe less."

"I became friends with you in a day."

"Well you also told me to 'Shut the fuck up and stop being such a goddamned crybaby,'" Rachel replied wryly, "then didn't stop annoying the hell out of me till I did become your friend."

"I was such a fucking genius," Maria smiled fondly. "What sort of twelve year old is that brilliant? Or likeable. Me. That's who."

"What sort of twelve year old knows that sort of language?" Rachel muttered under her breath.

"The brilliant, unsheltered, amazing kind," Maria replied smugly. She clapped her hands excitedly. "Now come on, Rach. I didn't call you so you could talk about your women problems. I need to hear how New… New… New Infections is doing."

"New Directions," Rachel corrected.

"I can say it however I want. It was close enough," Maria snapped back.

"No you ca-."

"Just tell me how your fucking Glee Club is going!"

"Honestly?" the guitarist asked.

Maria frowned. "That badly, hmm?"

Rachel sighed, shaking her head. "The lead singer can't dance at all or sing incredibly well. The most promising male lead is a womanizer, and the Glee teacher has a strange obsession with Journey songs and reliving the glory days."

"Oh," the redhead blinked. "…Well, that's shit."

"I'm just trying to find a way to turn it all around," Rachel responded, looking up at the ceiling and wincing when she observed the Pepto Bismol like shade. "But no one really trusts me. Some of the members don't like me though. I've been… taking up some of the solos and they think I'm not that great."

"Well fuck," Maria scowled. "Are they deaf? You were our strongest singer. The bargaining chip between band and choir. The kid all those old, moldy people at Carnegie Hall said were brilliant. The singing, dancing munchkin prodigy."

"Watch it," Rachel glared.

"If they can't appreciate you," Maria crossed her arms. "Kick their asses. Make them appreciate you."

"I don't have you to terrify people into submission anymore, M," Rachel shook her head. "And I sang a fucking solo for them on the first day, and all they did was 'you sing well, kid' and let me join. They thought it was some sort of fluke."

"Well what'd you sing?" Maria asked, curious.

"The Entertainer," Rachel replied.

"Oh! Well no wonder," Maria laughed.

Rachel's eyes turned steely. "What do you mean 'no wonder.' That song's a classic, Maria, a classic."

"For those who listen to oldies but goodies," the girl smirked as her friend's visage reddened considerably. "If you want to get their fucking attention, you need to sing something with a little bit more of an edge. I say you take another solo, and this time, do a song that's a challenge. One that will make their fucking jaw drop so much, the birds will nest in their open mouths."

"And what sort of song would that be?" Rachel replied. That dangerous looking smirk made Rachel's heart drop into her stomach as it curled on Maria's red-stained lips.

"Well…" that smile sent chills down the guitarist's back. "Do you remember that little Barbra number you did for Carnegie last year…?"