Hey all! So, I am back. I know it didn't take long but I missed writing + I am on summer break right now so here we are. This is a little something that has been sitting in my head for some time now. It is season three based and basically just a little take on how season three could have gone if it wasn't such a mess in real life. Hope you enjoy!
Chapter 1:
Quinn Fabray slams her locker door shut, determined to ignore the stares that she can feel being shot at her from every direction.
The former Cheerio and William McKinley Queen Bee had all but disappeared off the face of the planet this summer. She told as few people as she could get away with that she would be spending the summer holiday with her sister and her husband on the east coast while her mother was on a mixer cruise for divorcees in the Caribbean.
Part of the reason for her secrecy was that she did not want to lament on the idea that her mother was dumping her on her sister for the summer so she could get laid by middle-aged divorcees in the middle of the ocean. A stronger part was because she just didn't care anymore.
Quinn spent her summer shucking oysters for a restaurant on the bay alongside rich boys in pastel shorts whose parents actually wanted them to understand the value of a dollar. When that restaurant had closed up shop for the winter, Quinn returned to Ohio where she showed up to her first day of her senior year with her blonde hair chopped off and dyed pink and the tattoo of an obscure celebrity on the small of her back.
Quinn understands that her postpartum freak out is delayed, but in that first year after she had given her daughter up for adoption, she refused to give herself the opportunity to consider the implications of her actions. She spent her junior year trying to pretend that it never happened, trying to pretend that Beth didn't exist.
Pretending. That was all she was ever doing.
It had taken Quinn a full year to realize that she was no longer the pretty, popular cheerleader she had been before her pregnancy. It had taken her even longer to face the fact that maybe she had never been that girl at all.
Inevitably, the protective bubble that she had placed around herself burst. The fall had been hard and painful. In hindsight, she knows that she should have expected all of these feelings to catch up to her, but anticipation has never been her strong suite.
Quinn cannot tolerate the staring of her classmates even though she had been expecting it thanks to her new look. This is why she decides to skip her very first class of senior year to head out the rear entrance where she smokes a cigarette within the vicinity of a girl wearing a heavy black hoodie and cargo pants despite the fact that the temperature has been hovering in the upper seventies all week.
Smoking is a habit that she had forced herself to pick up. She does not particularly enjoy it. She had started in the beginning of the summer and still, the smoke hangs in her chest like a brick and makes her cough every time she lights up.
But Quinn was looking for a way to rebel and this seemed like the perfect start. Besides, one of the fisherman for the restaurant that she had worked for over the summer had the hots for her and even though he was in his forties and Quinn would never entertain the idea of actually getting with him, she had left him dangling because he would always bum her a smoke whenever she asked.
Quinn sucks her cigarette down to its filter in silence. She says nothing, only observes from a distance as a few late-comers shuffle inside of the school in their back-to-school outfits looking so happy, so cheerful, so blissfully unaware…
The whole scene makes Quinn sick to her stomach.
In fact, she is just starting to think that there is nobody in this stupid town who actually understands her when the girl in all black approaches just as Quinn is stamping out her cigarette with the toe of her boot. She asks Quinn if she is willing to skip a few more periods so she can hang out with a group of friends whom she calls Skanks.
Quinn is not naïve. She knows who The Skanks are and what their reputation is. The thing is, she doesn't care. In her eyes, skipping not only first period, but all her morning classes to pass around a stale forty ounce that one of the girls had stolen from her foster father's fridge is much more interesting than AP Biology…
Quinn does not so much as re-enter her school until right before lunch.
The first person that she sees who she recognizes is Rachel Berry which seems like a bad way to start her year.
Rachel is at her locker. She is wearing an outfit that Quinn can't tell would suit an infant or an elderly person better and she is meticulously taping pictures of her and Finn that they had taken over the summer on the inside of her locker.
Rachel hasn't even spoken to Quinn yet and she is already starting to irritate the blonde.
When the young singer finally does spot the ex-cheerleader, her brows furrow in the center in a way that is all too familiar to Quinn, who knows enough to understand that she is about to get an earful.
"You missed glee rehearsal yesterday."
"How did you have glee rehearsal yesterday?" Quinn scoffs. "Today is the first day of school."
"We had auditions yesterday, Quinn!" Rachel huffs, placing her hands against her hips. "And in case you were wondering, they didn't go very well. We really could have used you."
"Relax, will you? I was in Rhode Island at my sister's all summer. I just got back last night."
This is a lie. Quinn has been back in Lima for over a week. Still, lying seems like a better option than the alternative: having to listen to Rachel Berry preach to her about team loyalty and dedication or whatever.
Quinn needs another cigarette already.
"You weren't in AP Biology this morning either," Rachel pushes. "I know you're registered for that class. The teacher called your name for attendance three times and you never showed up."
Quinn rolls her eyes. "Thanks for the concern mom, but I'm dropping AP Bio. I'm dropping all of my AP's."
"What about Yale?" Rachel asks, folding her arms over her chest.
Quinn snorts at her. She doesn't need Rachel Berry to lecture her. She doesn't need anybody to lecture her.
"What about it?"
Now it is Rachel's turn to roll her eyes. "You know Quinn, this really isn't a good look for you."
Quinn cocks her head and transforms her face into a sarcastic expression of hurt as she wraps a finger around a short lock of pink hair and twists.
"You don't like it?" she asks the brunette. "I dyed it myself."
"I'm not talking about your hair, I'm talking about your delinquency," Rachel clarifies sharply. "We have glee this afternoon after school. I am enforcing a strict attendance policy this year. It is our last chance to win Nationals and we will win Nationals. You better be there."
The small girl slams her locker shut and shoulders past Quinn. Unfortunately, the blonde has to travel in the same direction as Rachel in order to get to the smoke pit outside.
She waits until Rachel is a safe distance ahead of her, just in case the brunette decides that she is not finished with her lecture, and then steps into the crowd.
She is craving a cigarette, wondering if the Skanks are still underneath the bleachers waiting for her. In fact, Quinn is so busy inside of her own head that she doesn't even notice Rachel skidding to a halt until she crashes straight into her back.
"What the hell, Berry?" Quinn snaps at the girl, giving her a little shove for added measure.
But the brunette does not appear to notice. She says nothing to Quinn which is unusual because Quinn usually couldn't pay Rachel to shut up.
"Hello, Earth to Berry." Quinn walks around Rachel and snaps her fingers in front of her face, but Rachel doesn't so much as blink. Instead, she stares straight ahead with a bewildered, almost frightened look on her face.
"Did you do drugs before you came to school today?" Quinn asks, feeling irrationally irritated by Rachel's bizarre behavior. "What are you looking at, Berry? Answer me!"
Rachel still does not say anything but this time, she at least acknowledges Quinn.
She grabs the blonde by her shoulders and spins her around so that she is looking in the same direction as Rachel.
Quinn's eyes adjust to the distance. It takes her a moment to scan through the crowd in order to spot what has stunned Rachel so senseless, but then Quinn does see it and she realizes that she is going to need something much stronger than a cigarette.
The woman in front of them is short like Rachel but the implication of her presence is enough to make up for that fact.
She is wearing a sleek-fitting, purple dress and tall heels that echo like gun fire. She doesn't notice Quinn and Rachel staring at her but that is only because she looks determined, like she is on a mission and is resolved to complete it.
There is no mistaking Shelby Corcoran, though. Quinn couldn't forget that woman if she tried.
And she has tried.
Before Shelby can notice the two girls, she makes a sharp cut down the opposite hallway away from Rachel and Quinn.
She disappears from their sight, but it is not far enough. In Quinn's humble opinion, Shelby could live on the moon and it still wouldn't be far enough away from her.
Slowly, Quinn turns towards Rachel with her mouth agape. The brunette is wearing an expression identical to how Quinn feels.
The blonde knows that she is trying to convey a new reputation for being a brute and a badass, but for a moment even she forgets herself as she swallows dumbly at Rachel like a fish out of water, not even bothering to hide her shock.
"What the hell is she doing here?"
Rachel still attends all of her afternoon classes, of course she does, but now that she has seen Shelby wandering the hallways, she can hardly concentrate, afraid that the next turn she makes will be straight into her estranged mother.
Rachel has not so much as considered the woman in some time.
It had taken her months to get to a place where she could turn off her memories of the last time she had met Shelby Corcoran. That didn't mean that she would ever forget how the woman had entered her life only to nearly ruin it.
While Shelby had been on Rachel's mind quite often after that fateful trip to Regionals her sophomore year, months of therapy had turned her into an afterthought.
She has no idea where Shelby had disappeared to for the last year and a half, or why she decided to pick now of all times to return. All she knows is that she doesn't like it.
Rachel spends the majority of her afternoon thinking about Shelby and what she might be up to by being here, but her time not thinking about Shelby is spent thinking about Quinn.
Rachel hasn't seen Quinn since the two of them learned of Shelby's return in the most unceremonious way possible.
She isn't really expecting to. Rumor is already circulating throughout the school that Quinn had spent her morning with a notorious gang of girls who dub themselves Skanks of all things.
It is hardly a good look for a girl with so much to lose, but Rachel knows that it is hardly any business of hers. Out of all the people Quinn could turn to, Rachel knows that she is likely last on the blonde's list.
Rachel is surprised when she walks into the choir room after school and actually sees Quinn waiting in her usual seat.
She knows that she had warned Quinn to come, but something seems different with the blonde and nothing anybody says seems to hold any merit with her anymore.
"You came," Rachel states simply. It is still early enough that they are the only two in the room. Despite the ample space, Rachel chooses to sit in the vacant seat directly next to Quinn, who looks upset by this arrangement.
"Don't get too excited," Quinn warns dryly. "I figured that if Shelby is back it probably has something to do with this stupid club. I'm only here to figure out her intentions."
"Her intentions are probably to have a job."
"Stop pretending like you're so naïve," Quinn rolls her eyes. "You know as well as I do that she wouldn't take a job at this school without it having something to do with us."
Rachel sucks her bottom lip inward and bites down hard.
She has been trying not to think like that. She has been trying desperately to give Shelby the benefit of the doubt ever since she first saw her this morning, but she realizes now that she hadn't spent her entire afternoon thinking about Shelby because she truly believed that the woman's intentions were honorable…
Quinn watches Rachel's face sink with a satisfied look on her face.
It is nice to see Rachel show her actual feelings for a change and portray something other than that carefree, happy-go-lucky kid she always only pretends to be.
"She's here to flaunt Beth in both of our faces, Rachel," Quinn continues, hammering the nail in the coffin of Rachel's optimism. "And I for one am not going to be caught off guard by it."
Rachel's need to respond is cut short as the choir room door flies opens and Finn stumbles through with a sense of urgency.
Rachel shrinks away from her boyfriend before she can tell herself not to.
She hasn't had the opportunity to tell Finn that she had seen Shelby yet. She is taking all AP classes this year in order to boost her NYADA application and Finn could hardly keep up with that. Rachel knows that the two will rarely cross paths during the school day this year unless it is during lunch or glee.
"I just had your mom as a substitute in my Spanish class," he tells Rachel breathlessly, sliding into the one empty chair besides her.
"Don't call her that," Rachel sighs, weaving her fingers through her thick hair.
"Did you know that she was coming back?" Finn pushes. He seems oblivious to the tone in Rachel's voice, one which seems to indicate just how little she wants to talk about this.
Quinn almost feels sorry for the girl. Away for the entire summer, she had almost forgotten what it was like having to put up with Finn.
Almost.
"Don't you think that I would have told you if I did?" Rachel snaps and Finn reels backwards if only to avoid having his head chewed off any further.
Quinn feels her eyes widen, almost uncomfortable as she watches the normally composed girl lose her nerve. It is now clear that this situation is upsetting Rachel much more than she had been initially letting on.
Rachel huffs away from her slack-jawed boyfriend. She doesn't need any more reasons to be angry today. Today was supposed to be the first day of the best year of her life. She isn't about to let Shelby take that away from her too.
Quinn feels her forehead slant with concern towards the brunette's fading composure. The worst part is that she knows that Rachel sees the way that she is looking at her before she can clear it off her face entirely.
The brunette catches the entire thing.
The choir room fills gradually.
Everybody can tell that there is something wrong because Rachel is sitting front and center, yet the room is completely silent.
They have so much to anticipate for their upcoming senior year that everybody had been expecting her to speak for hours. Usually, they were begging for her to stop. Today, they find themselves actually uncomfortable in her silence.
When Mr. Schuester walks into the classroom, he is staring at Rachel, Quinn, and Puck with a look that allows the girls to realize that he is aware of Shelby's return too.
For the first time, the two of them wonder if Puck knows.
Of course, Puck had attended less class today than even Quinn and his face looks relaxed and carefree leading both Rachel and Quinn to silently conclude that he has no idea.
"Listen up you guys," Mr. Schuester silences the class with a sigh that projects a worry that transcends across the room. "I know that our open auditions yesterday didn't exactly go as planned."
"One person showed up," somebody snaps from the back. Judging by the tone the voice is easily pinpointed back to Santana. "And she was terrible."
"Well, she wasn't particularly happy about being rejected by you guys yesterday," Mr. Schuester explains, shaking his head gently. "And as it turns out, her father has a lot of money; a lot of money that he has dedicated to funding a second glee club at this school with his daughter at the helm."
A series of giggles erupts around the announcement. The only people who are not laughing are Rachel and Quinn, who glance at each other uncertainly, neither particularly liking where this is heading.
"I wouldn't be too concerned about a one-person glee club headed by Sugar Motta, Mr. Schue."
"The thing is Kurt; this isn't just any glee club. Mr. Motta also fronted the funding for an outside choir director." He pauses. The way he glances at Puck and then Quinn and then Rachel tells the two girls what he is going to say even before he says it. "And I think that we all know not to underestimate Shelby Corcoran."
A collective gasp goes up inside of the classroom. Rachel and Quinn feel themselves flush. Both girls are remarkably aware of just how many eyes have turned to them.
"Wait, Ms. Corcoran is back?" Puck swallows from somewhere in the back.
Quinn closes her eyes. She realizes too late that the first thing she should have done after seeing Shelby was to find Puck. She had been selfish, absorbed in her own way. She knew exactly what it felt like to have to find out about Shelby's return without warning and she had still let it happen to Puck.
If this is only her first day of school, she doesn't want to know what the rest of the year has in store for her.
"She is," Mr. Schuester confirms with a nod. The room tenses and quiets as the last shred of hope is broken, leaving everybody equally upset and equally confused.
"But that doesn't make any sense," Finn insists, his tone low and drawling. Usually, he always sounds this confused, but this particular instance is unique in that the rest of the glee club is confused right alongside him. "Ms. Corcoran is back just to build her own glee club to compete against us? Why would she do that?"
Finn's question makes something inside of Rachel burst. The chord has been tensing dangerously all day and now, she finally feels it snap.
It is the realization that Quinn has been trying to force her to confront all day.
Shelby isn't here because she needed a job. She isn't here to introduce Puck and Quinn to their daughter or even to apologize to Rachel for the abysmal way she had treated her. Instead, she is only here because some rich stranger was paying her to be.
Rachel tells herself that she hadn't been expecting any of this to be about her, but that terrible, self-destructive force that continues to hold onto hope whenever it comes to Shelby can't help but feel disappointed anyway.
It feels like she is being stabbed in a still-healing wound. She is standing on the stage, spilling her guts and Shelby is the one holding the knife.
Her chair is scraping against the linoleum floor before she even realizes that she is getting up. The silence that falls throughout the choir room is as deafening as it has ever been as Rachel storms out of the choir room and into the hallway.
She isn't exactly sure where to find Shelby, but she has an idea.
She may not know her mother very well, but she does know Shelby Corcoran and if that woman is in charge of a glee club, chances are they are rehearsing.
There is only one other room with a piano in the entire school and that is in the auditorium. Rachel enters it without warning.
Sure enough, there is Shelby.
The older woman is sitting behind the piano with that awful girl Sugar – who Rachel is certain not even Shelby could turn into a star – standing beside her doing vocal warmups with the grace of a feral cat.
The notion of Shelby's impending failure feels somehow satisfying to Rachel.
"You could have at least given me some warning!"
Livid, Rachel makes her presence known early, screaming at Shelby as she storms down the aisle towards the stage.
She has prepared roughly a thousand speeches for Shelby throughout the course of her day, yet somehow this is what comes out and Rachel realizes that as prepared as she thought she had been to face her mother, there are just no words to describe just how badly Shelby had hurt her.
Staring at Shelby now, Rachel cannot believe that there had ever been a time that she had wanted this woman more involved in her life. Now, as far as Rachel is concerned Shelby can drop off the face of the Earth and it wouldn't make any difference to her.
Rachel's surprise entrance clearly startles Shelby. The older woman's hand slips against the keyboard creating a painfully sharp tone.
Ironically, it is the only note that Sugar Motta actually manages to hit.
Shelby's head turns. She sees her estranged daughter for the first time in over a year and her face falls. Rachel reads her expression. It is not one that might signify an apology for everything that she has put Rachel through. Instead, she only looks sorry that she had gotten caught.
"Rachel…" Shelby starts, but Rachel doesn't even acknowledge it.
"Why do you always have to keep popping up just when things are finally starting to go well in my life?"
"Wow, looks like somebody had a bad first day."
Rachel hears the drawn-out, nasally voice of Sugar Motta and she almost feels angry enough to hit the girl.
"You need to leave," Rachel glares at Sugar. "Now!"
Rachel is certain that nobody has ever spoken to Sugar Motta like this before. She is certain that the girl has never so much as heard the word no.
But despite being ready and willing to deliver an unsuspecting insult and blame it on a questionable diagnosis of Asperger's, Sugar does not seem prepared to take what she often dishes out. The girl scurries off the stage without so much as a retort.
As Sugar leaves, Rachel climbs the steps onto the stage and faces Shelby who is sitting stiff and pale on the piano bench.
Neither of them says a word until they finally hear the auditorium doors slam shut behind Sugar.
"Why are you here, Shelby?" Rachel finally breathes through the silence. "I have a boyfriend who I love, we are going to win Nationals this year, and I have already started my application to NYADA. Do you have like a radar or something inside of your brain that goes off whenever I start feeling a semblance of stability? Is that what this is? Because you were so messed up at my age, you can't let me live my life?"
Rachel hadn't intended to project so many of her feelings to Shelby. She never wanted the woman to see just how badly she had hurt her. She is experienced enough however, to understand that when it comes to Shelby, intentions and reality hardly go hand-in-hand.
When Shelby stands up from the piano bench, her arms crossed over her chest and a look on her face like she hadn't even heard Rachel, the younger girl feels her stomach drop and clench.
"Can I explain myself?" Shelby asks with a tone that makes Rachel want to throttle her. "Or did you just come here to yell at me?"
Rachel narrows her eyes at her mother's accusation, but she remains silent, allowing Shelby to continue.
"I was offered a job with good pay and I accepted it," Shelby states pointedly. "That's it, Rachel. I do not have any ulterior motives against you or Quinn or Puck. I just have a child to feed."
Rachel crosses her own arms over her chest and glowers, trying not to consider just how much she resembles the woman standing in front of her by doing so.
She wonders if Shelby even thinks about the words that come out of her mouth before she says them. More importantly, she wonders if she thinks about just how much those words hurt a girl who is half a piece of her own body.
Is Rachel really supposed to just accept that Shelby took this job like she would any other without even considering the implications? Then again, judging by Shelby's track record of not considering her at all, Rachel realizes that this is likely.
"I'm sorry that I didn't have the opportunity to reach out and find you before you found me first," Shelby continues when Rachel says nothing. "That was not my intention."
"It has been a full school day and still I am the one who had to find you!" Rachel shouts, ignoring the tears that she can feel welling up inside of her eyes. She is exhausted from all of Shelby's excuses. Rachel has been fighting to justify them ever since the woman left Lima. Now, she is finding that she is out of reasons and out of energy to keep doing so. "My boyfriend had you as a substitute in his class today, Shelby! Do you have any idea how humiliating that is? A phone call might have been nice. Hell, I would have even taken a text. You have no idea what it felt like having to find out that you are back by seeing you in the hallway by chance! The worst part is that you don't even seem to care."
"Rachel-"
"No!" Rachel cuts her off sharply. She has spent the entire day convincing herself that she would not cry in front of Shelby. Now, the tears are flowing freely down her cheeks and she hardly even cares. "I don't want to hear it anymore. You have no right to just pop into and out of my life at your convenience. You don't get to uproot my life again. I won't let you. So, I'll make you a deal. I'll stay as far away from you as I can and all I ask in return is that you return the favor. As for your little glee club, don't expect it to last long. The New Directions are winning Nationals this year with or without your interference."
Before Shelby can even think up a response, Rachel performs a sharp about-face and storms behind the stage towards the back exit.
Her vision is so clouded with anger that she doesn't even realize that somebody has been hiding behind the thick, maroon curtain this entire time until she runs right into her.
Rachel sees a mass of blonde hair and then feels a terrible pain in her backside that matches the pain in her pride.
She hits the floor with a grunt. Her cheeks are flaming with embarrassment as she glances tentatively up at Quinn Fabray, expecting to get hell from the blonde.
Much to Rachel's surprise however, the Quinn only offers Rachel a hand to help lift her back to her feet.
"What are you doing here?" Rachel asks as she wipes the grime from the filthy auditorium floor off her skirt.
"Do you really think that I was going to miss that?" Quinn asks, and when she smiles at Rachel it almost looks genuine. "That was the closest I have ever come to actually liking you, Berry."
Rachel knows that coming from Quinn Fabray, she should take this as a compliment. Instead, she only feels more embarrassed.
"I've never yelled at anybody like that before," Rachel admits. "When I saw you this morning, I thought you were crazy because you were hanging out with the Skanks and you dyed your hair pink and got that stupid tattoo… Now I think I understand why you did it."
Quinn nods solemnly at the brunette. She doesn't say anything but the tone in her gesture says everything that Rachel wishes her own mother would have the guts or at least the decency to say to her.
Quinn goes so long without speaking that Rachel thinks she isn't going to say anything at all. The brunette isn't in the mood to play games or wallow in the awkwardness of this situation, so she moves to push past Quinn.
She has no idea where she is going to go.
She can hardly go back to glee after her abrupt exit. She could go home, but her dads would be able to sense that something was wrong and she was a horrible liar when it came to her parents. She would inevitably have to tell them that Shelby was back, and she isn't sure that she is ready to do that quite yet.
"Hey Rachel," Quinn calls back to the brunette before she can disappear into the hallway. "You don't have to always pretend like you're okay, you know."
Rachel purses her lips, but nods.
"For the record Quinn, neither do you," Rachel offers, looking up to meet Quinn's inquisitive, hazel eyes.
Quinn stares at Rachel for a long time, truly considering the brunette for what feels like the first time.
She had taken Rachel Berry's presence in the hallway earlier as a bad omen. She started her school year thinking that the only people in this town who could understand her pain were The Skanks. Now, she realizes that those girls didn't know her at all. Much to her surprise, Quinn is starting to realize that that designation belongs to the tiny brunette standing in front of her.
Before Quinn could do something totally embarrassing like tell Rachel this, the brunette pushes through the heavy stage door and into the hallway without so much as a goodbye.
She leaves Quinn alone in the darkened stage vestibule to wonder how many more surprises Rachel Berry has in store for her this year, and whether or not her self-declared mortal enemy might just turn out to be the ally that she has been looking for this entire time.