When Quinn woke up Tuesday morning all she could see was, well, darkness. She fumbled around on the nightstand to find her phone and looked at it bleary eyed. Five thirty A.M was not a civilized time to be awake, only crazy people woke up this early. She didn't know what time she'd fallen asleep last night, but it had been before eight. All that crying she'd done with Rachel in the choir room yesterday had completely drained her.
She picked up her pillow and screamed into it when the memory of her embarrassingly, over the top confession to the Diva as to why she'd been so different recently came back flooding back to her.
Seriously, she could curse these stupid baby hormones for making her stupid brain, tell her stupid mouth, say those stupid things. Okay, so they were true but that didn't mean she didn't want to just bury her head in a bucket of sand right now and wait for her own humiliation to be over with. It was lucky that Rachel Berry practically thrives off drama; if she'd said it to anyone else she'd probably have to move to the North Pole so she'd never had to face anyone ever again, except for the occasional explorer and maybe Santa.
When she thought she'd smothered herself sufficiently she went upstairs to get herself an orange and then went into the living room to put on the TV. Not that there was a great deal of watchable shows on, but it took away the boredom for a while, even if that meant channel surfing for an hour.
At six thirty she sent a text to Rachel because she knew the other girl would be up. Her phone rang ten seconds later and when she answered, all she could hear was a whirring noise and what sounded like panting; she pulled the phone away from her ear and frowned at the screen, making sure it really was Rachel calling.
"Rachel?"
"Yeah."
"What are you doing?"
"My morning work out routine."
"You know it's customary to say 'Hello' and not just breathe heavily down the phone. It makes you sound like a creepy stalker."
"Sorry, I hadn't realized that you'd answered. Are you, Brittany and Santana playing again today?"
Quinn tried to focus on the other girls' words, and not on the breathy way they were being said. "We are. You want to watch again?"
"I do."
"Will you dress up as a cheerleader?"
"No."
"Aww, why not? I want you to spell out my name with your arms and wave Pom Poms in the air like you just don't care." She smiled when the Diva laughed.
"I'm not a cheerleader and because of this I don't actually own a cheerleading uniform. That would be the main reason for not dressing up as one."
"So you'd do it if you had one?" That sounded way too eager.
"I don't think I could fully commit myself to a definite answer."
"That's a 'maybe' then."
"I'll neither confirm nor deny."
"Spoilsport." Quinn said as she got up to fetch herself another orange.
"That's me. I'm also a Killjoy and a Party Pooper."
The blonde chuckled as she threw the piece of fruit in the air, bounced it off her upper arm and caught it in her hand. She shouldn't be as impressed with that ability as she was. "You sure are."
The whirring stopped then she heard a rustle. "Okay, work out done. I'm all sweaty now and I need a shower. Shall I meet you in the gym?"
"Yeah. Eight o'clock?"
"Eight it is. See you later."
She hung up and pinched the bridge of her nose. Apparently, Charlie was playing squash with the words 'Sweaty' and 'Shower' against the wall of her imagination. She had to go and take a shower of her own, which was slightly colder than usual.
When she got to school she found Rachel sitting in the gym, the singer had a large pink piece of card leaning against the seats next to her.
"Whatcha got there?"
The Diva grinned. "You'll see."
"I reject that answer."
"I veto your rejection."
"Damn."
"You'll just have to wait until Brittany and Santana arrive."
When the two girls turned up a minute later; the Latina cocked her eyebrow and smirked at Quinn when she saw the other brunette standing on the sidelines, both Cheerio's put their bags down pulling out their Sbuck equipment and the three players huddled up ready to start the game.
"Hey Tubbers. Looks like you've got yourself a fan." Santana nodded in the direction of the singer who was waving a sign around that said 'Team Quinn'. It had so much glitter; it looked like a fairy with the flu sneezed on it.
"Shut it Lopez. You're just jealous that you haven't got anyone to cheer for you. She clearly put some effort into that."
"Yeah she did. And we all know what that means. You've got a friend for life now; you'll never get rid of her even if you tried. You are so screwed." Santana stuck her tongue out and smiled.
"Bite me." Yes it was kind of weird but it was overshadowed by it being very sweet. She turned to Brittany who'd been waiting patiently. "Ready B?" The other blonde smiled and blew the whistle in her mouth.
Even though she was almost seven months pregnant, she was still agile enough to totally whoop both of their asses, and the singer being so enthusiastic about cheering her on helped too. She only looked over to Rachel once because she does wear particularly short skirts, and she was jumping around a lot.
When the game was over the Brittany shook her hand and congratulated her on a game well played. Santana's recognition of her triumph was a curt nod, which surprised Quinn; the Latina wasn't usually such a gracious loser. The cheerleaders left them alone and they went to sit on the bleachers, she was handed a giant bag of food and she played lucky dip to see what she'd be eating for her second breakfast.
"Yup, can't beat Oreo's at eight thirty in the morning."
The other girl rolled her eyes and nudged her. "That probably isn't the best option."
"But I picked it out now, I can't put it back it would break all the rules." Quinn put on her best sad panda face.
"Your crazy logic makes no sense to me." The singer said with a sweet smile.
"I know." She agreed, and twisted the cookie to break it in half then putting both halves in her mouth. She liked the filling to be on the top.
She looked at Rachel's hand next to her and took hold of it, linking their fingers together, she wasn't normally very affectionate but this girl sort of drew it out of her. She watched her thumb brush over the small hand she was holding thinking how soft it was.
"Quinn? Are you okay?"
She looked up into the brown eyes and smiled. "Yeah. You know what I was thinking about while I was waiting to text you this morning?"
"You were waiting to text me?" The Diva asked playfully.
"No." The blonde answered slowly. "Maybe." She grinned. "Anyway. What I was thinking about was that it has only been a week since the slushy incident. It seems like it was forever ago, so much has changed and yet nothing has changed, I know I told you this yesterday, but I'm not the same person I was seven days ago, you changed that, and I still find it a little hard to comprehend."
Rachel turned to face Quinn and put the hand that wasn't being held on her cheek. "It must be very confusing to be you." She said smiling softly, tucking a strand of blonde hair behind an ear.
The blonde laughed. "It can be, yes. Things haven't been great these last few months, I've been kicked out of two homes," Rachel tried to pull her hand away, but Quinn kept it in place. "I don't blame you Rach, I know you're sorry for what happened, but I have only myself to blame for all of this." The Diva was looking down and Quinn bent her head to catch the other girls' eye. "Since living at Puck's, I've been finding it harder and harder to keep myself out of the misery that I was drowning in." Rachel tried to pull away again, and the blonde was having none of it. She needed to say this. "Until last week. Until you. You pulled me out, I don't know why and I don't know how but you did, and I need to thank you for that." She pulled out a pack of tissues from her bag and handed them to the singer. "I'm sorry, I'm not normally like this, and I really don't want to be the reason you're crying."
Rachel finally looked at her with a smile and took the tissues. "It's happy crying."
"Well that's okay then." She leaned in and gave the smaller girl a kiss on the cheek, then wrapped her arm around the small waist and brought her into a hug. They stayed like this until just before first bell.
They walked towards the lockers before class and they were met by Santana and Brittany. The blonde Cheerio grabbed hold of Rachel and embraced her tightly, making the tiny brunette lose her balance and fall against the locker bank.
"Don't try and fight it Berry, it'll just make her squeeze tighter." The Latina said when the singer gave her a confused look.
"Why is B hugging Rachel?" Quinn whispered.
Santana raised her shoulders. "She's affectionate."
"Don't you be using the shrug of denial on me Lopez. I know, you know."
"Why would I know? I don't know what goes on in that head of hers."
Puck, Mike and Artie came up to them and looked on curiously. "Looks like we've got ourselves some les-glee-ans boys."
"As impressed as I am with your word play Noah, it is however inaccurate." Rachel said without looking at him because Brittany was still holding on to her and she couldn't move out of the vice grip.
"A guy can dream can't he?"
"Of course, I'm not one to crush someone's dreams, but I'd rather they didn't involve me."
"Too late." Puck went around the blonde cheerleader to give the singer a smile before the three boys walked towards their classes.
"Britt?" Santana said putting a hand on her friends back. "I think you should let her go now."
"Okay." The taller blonde pulled away and linked arms with the other Cheerio. "Later guys." She waved as they walked off.
Rachel looked perplexed. "What was that about?"
"I have no idea." Quinn said frowning.
Quinn spent the first of her morning classes trying to pay attention to the teacher but not really succeeding, instead she went through her notebook and ripped out all the unflattering doodles of Rachel she had drawn. She counted them when she was done and there were twenty nine pages. It usually took her around fifteen minutes to do each sketch and she worked out that she'd spent about seven hours drawing pictures of the Diva, and that was when she didn't even like her. That seemed a lot.
The lesson before lunch was biology, which she hated. Miss O'Neil the teacher would often get her to stand in front of the class and put a diagram of the human reproductive system over her baby bump. It was humiliating, and even though the students were all only a couple of years away from being legal adults, they still laughed at the words 'Penis' and 'Vagina'
She decided to feign sickness for this lesson and go to the library instead. Science was boring, stories were fun. She picked up 'George's Marvelous Medicine', she must've read it fifty times and it never got old. She and her sister created all the recipes one weekend while their parents were away, and even after Judy and Russell came home and grounded them both for making the house look like a liquid bomb had exploded, it never stopped being the best weekend of her life.
She pulled out a bag of cookies that Rachel had baked, and put them on the table. While she was reading, a hand came into view and took one of the cookies away.
"Mmm, tasty."
Quinn looked at Santana with a quirked eyebrow. "Yes I know, and they're mine."
"Did Man-Hands make these?"
"Don't call her that. Yes, Rachel made them."
"She knows how to bake, I'll give her that."
"You should try her truffles." The blonde said taking a cookie for herself.
"Is that a euphemism?"
"For what?"
"Her Truffles."
"Jesus Santana, has Joey Tribbiani taken over your body or something?"
"What can I say? I channel him when I need to imply sexual innuendos."
"You're an idiot."
The Latina nodded. "Are we doing lunch today? Or do you have other plans?"
"I'm meeting Rachel."
"You know, if I'd told you a week ago that you'd be practically attached to the hip with Berry you'd have laughed in my face."
"Things change. So are you going to tell me what the thing with B was this morning?"
"I told you, I don't know what makes her do the things she does."
"I don't believe you."
"I don't care." Santana took another cookie, skillfully avoiding the blonde's hand trying to slap her away. "Later Fabray." She said walking off towards the door.
She and Rachel had only been in the auditorium for five minutes before Jesse came storming through the door, and he didn't look very happy. He took the Diva aside and it looked like there was some tension between them. What kind she didn't know, but tension was tension ten feet away. It frustrated her that Rachel seemed so blind to the fact that Jesse St. James was a) A spy and b) Possibly gay. But the son of a bitch was charming, good looking and a senior. What girl wouldn't swoon at that? God she wanted to stab him in the face with a Spork.
The brunette came back after he stormed out and gave her a forced smile as she put her lunch back in her bag. "He's a little annoyed that I forgot to meet him again. I haven't practiced enough recently and we were supposed to meet in the choir room everyday this week to make up for it."
"Do you really need practice that much? Your voice is amazing." Quinn asked standing up from her position against the back of the piano.
"It isn't perfect though, and if we're going to win at regionals then I need to be my best."
"But you're perfect now, I think that boyfriend of yours is putting too much pressure on you." She hesitated when Rachel gave her an odd look. "What? Too much pressure can lead to a breakdown; call me selfish for not wanting you to turn into a nut-job and end up in an asylum."
She was rewarded with a genuine smile this time. "Well thank you Quinn, I appreciate your concern for my mental health."
"You are totally welcome."
"I have to go to the choir room now though." The brunette said apologetically.
"I'll come watch if you'd like."
"You don't have to; it probably won't be very interesting for you."
"It's okay, I like hearing you sing, and so does she." She held Rachel's hand and put it over her stomach. She'd never told anyone that the first time she felt her baby kick was during one of the Diva's solo's and it completely freaked her out when it happened, but then it became comforting, it meant that she was alright.
Rachel bit her bottom lip and smiled. "Really?"
"Yup. She clearly has taste."
The brunette put her other hand on the bump and rubbed it gently. "Thanks."
Quinn laughed when the other girl pulled away quickly looking terrified. "Rachel, it's okay, she was just kicking."
The singer relaxed and then beamed, putting her hands back. "Wow. I've never felt a baby kick before, the idea of it always unsettled me, but that was really amazing."
There was quiet for a whole minute as Rachel stared at her stomach, smiling happily to herself, then she shook her head and looked up at the blonde. "We should get to the choir room."
"Yeah, come on then." Quinn said picking up her bag.
The boy didn't seem to like that Quinn had come into the room with his girlfriend, throughout the practice he would glare at her, but she could out-glare his pansy ass with her eyes closed. Did he really think he could intimidate her? She used to be the HBIC for crying out loud. She also spotted Santana through the window of the door pulling faces at her and then she disappeared, when her phone buzzed (Rachel had made her put it on vibrate) she opened up the message and rolled her eyes.
I can't believe you'd rather watch Barbara Streisand and Elton John sing Do-Ra-Mi than hang out with me and B.
The Latina came back in view wiping the window with her sleeve then put her mouth on the glass, and blew, when the two singers turned around at the noise she made a run for it. Yeah, Santana Lopez was about as subtle as a drag queen at a ladies tea party. Jesse glared at her again, because she apparently controlled everything the Latina did, but Rachel laughed so she gave him a smug smile.
She actually liked two of her afternoon subjects, American History and English were always classes she paid attention in. But English was her favourite. Ever since she got kicked off the squad she had more time on her hands, and a lot of that time was used up by reading. She had at least three books on the go usually, which would sometimes confuse her if she forgot which story she'd picked up. She'd have to check the cover when during what she thought was Little Dorrit, the embodiment of Death and his horse Binky popped up. Then she'd have to reset her brain for Terry Pratchett.
She ran out of last class and went excitedly to Glee.
Because Mr. Schuester wasn't able to make it the next day, they had their Glee meeting today. She sat at the back like she usually did and spent quite a bit of time watching Rachel being bombarded with inane questions and ridiculous statements from the two boys that were sitting either side of her. Santana laughed at her for doing this but she still continued to watch, she wanted to be ready for when the singer looked back in her direction so could smile at her and give her the 'Aren't boys silly' look. She also recognized that waiting for someone to acknowledge you was very much in the realm of desperation, but screw it, so what if she wanted to be the centre of Rachel's attention?
She didn't even have to ask Brittany to call out to Rachel today when practice ended; the other blonde just did it. The Diva flapped her arms a bit when she was hugged again, but clearly just gave up. There really was no point trying to escape a Brittany embrace.
Quinn looked at the Latina and raised her brow. "What is going on?"
"You're like a broken record, stop asking me."
"Not until I find out what the hell this is about." The blonde huffed.
"Maybe B is just trying to kill her with love." Quinn blanked and stared at her. "I can see you didn't find that funny."
"No."
"Britt, let's go." Santana said as she dragged the other girl away leaving them alone.
Rachel looked at the closed door, then to the pregnant girl. "I am feeling befuddled."
Quinn chuckled. "I don't blame you." They went to sit on the piano bench before she carried on. "I like the word befuddled." She said playing a note. "I also like the word nominal."
"Both words are very good words." The brunette agreed. "Tell me something else about yourself that I don't know."
Quinn clicked her tongue as she thought about this. "Uh, I've had the intro to 'Take On Me' stuck in my head since I was five."
"I was thinking something more profound than that, but I suppose I wasn't very specific so I can't complain."
"No you can't." The blonde chuckled. "I told you something, now you have to tell me."
"Okay." She bit her lip for a second. "I used to think Eskimos were mythological beings."
"Seriously?"
"Well have you ever seen one?"
"Not in person, no."
"Exactly! Anyway, I said used to, it was when I was a kid."
"Aww, little Rachel was adorably oblivious."
"Whereas now, I'm just adorable." The Diva grinned.
Quinn tapped the other girls arm. "And so modest too."
They stayed in there for another half an hour before Rachel said she had to leave to get ready for her date with Jesse.
Driving back to the Puckerman's she felt inexplicably sad, so just avoided the family and went straight to her basement, putting on some music and picked up one of her books. Rachel kept popping into her head though and she'd try and make the thoughts go away, the book wasn't distracting so she tried thinking about other things. Like Sbuck, and how she wanted to bring up with Brittany and Santana in their next meeting, a motion to change the name of it. Because it sounded retarded.
When her phone beeped, she smiled at seeing Rachel's ID.
Date isn't going well. Jesse just said that 'Wicked' was a sub-par musical. Can you believe it?
Quinn couldn't believe it. She'd never seen the show and had no opinion on it what so ever. But she knew a couple of the songs, and Rachel's rendition of 'Defying Gravity' made the baby go crazy, so she was fully prepared to be as outraged as the Diva was on Jesse's view.
I can't! He wouldn't know a good musical if it came up and bit him on his ass.
No he would not. I'm not having fun, I'd rather be hanging out with you.
The blonde wished that Jesse St James was standing in front of her right now so she could laugh in his face.
That is because I'm awesome. She left out 'Significantly more awesome than your boyfriend, because he's a toe-rag'
Very true. And you probably won't tell me that Barbara Streisand's best work was in 'South Park'
It was a good job they were texting, she didn't think Rachel would appreciate the laugh she just let out.
Rach that's terrible. You should think about jacking him in for someone with better taste.
I think I might have to. Got to go now, we're about to go into the movie theatre.
She put her phone down and ran upstairs into Puck's room, holding her breath as she retrieved the laptop from his bed, then ran back downstairs. She flipped it open and exited all the porn and stuff about World of Warcraft, then went in search of Barbara Streisand's best work. She watched another four episodes of the show, and as she was about to watch a fifth, when Puck came charging down the stairs.
"You took my laptop." He waved a hand angrily at his computer.
"You took my virginity." She answered pointing at her bump.
"That cost me almost a thousand dollars."
Quinn got up quickly and grabbed the laptop. "Leave now, or I'm smashing this over your head."
"Okay." He may not have been the most insightful person, but he recognized that tone, and he wasn't about to see if she would go through the threat. She laughed as he ran out of the room and sat back down pressing play on the computer.
At half ten she received another message from Rachel saying goodnight, and she replied the same. Then she brought up the Diva's MySpace videos and put the speaker next to her stomach, falling asleep as her little girl moved to the song.