Glee: Heart and Soul [1/?] (Rachel, Puck)
Title: Heart and Soul [Prologue]
Author: diamondinsanity
Pairing,Character(s): Rachel, Puck
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 1,656
Spoilers: None. Completely and utterly AU.
Summary: Seventeen year old Rachel Berry was on her way to becoming a Broadway star when she died at the exact same time Noah Puckerman was born. And so instead of moving on, she's stuck haunting the boy she died trying to help.
Notes: The idea for this is loosely based off the movie Heart and Souls, which is also where the title comes from. If you haven’t seen Heart and Souls, I completely recommend watching it. Robert Downey Jr. is AMAZING in it.
Disclaimers: I do not own Glee, and I do not own Rent, and I sure as hell do not own Heart and Souls. I just love them all and decided to bend them all to my will. And sadly I don’t own Anthony Rapp or Mark Salling either.
Prologue
1993
New York City. Center of the Universe. Times are shitty, but I’m pretty sure they can’t get worse. A smile lingered on Rachel Berry’s face as the lyrics from rehearsal earlier still spun about her mind. Suddenly dropping out of high school and forcing her way onto Broadway wasn’t looking like the worst idea she ever had. Here she was, proving her fathers wrong and, working with a genius. Jonathan Larson was a great man, and this rock opera of his was going to redefine Broadway; she just knew it. Being cast as Maureen was the biggest break she’d ever gotten, and alright, so they were still just in workshops and they were nowhere near close enough to making it off-Broadway yet, let alone onto Broadway, but it was a start, and Rachel loved it. Finally her life was turning out they way she wanted it to; everything was going according to plan.
Still humming "Santa Fe" under her breath, she changed out of her sweaty rehearsal clothes and into her street clothes. She grabbed her bag, and waved a cheery goodbye to Anthony before heading out onto the street. Her plan was to call her fathers from the payphone on the corner to check in with them, and then head home to her shitty apartment. Sure, it wasn’t much right now, but once Rent got picked up, she knew she was going to be a star and was going to be able to live somewhere amazing, but for now she’d suffer through having her shower and her kitchen in the same room. For now.
She was half-way to the payphone when a pregnant woman waddled into her. Before Rachel could even complain, the woman grabbed her by the shoulders, her fingers digging into flesh as she moaned out in pain. “I’m sorry. So sorry.” The woman quickly apologized, looking sheepish at randomly grabbing a stranger.
Rachel stared at her in complete and utter horror as she realized the severity of the situation. “Are you… Are you in labor?” She asked, glancing down at the woman’s legs, like she was looking for her bloody show or her water breaking or all that other stuff she enjoyed learning about in school until she dropped out because of her big break. Nervously she looked back at the woman. “It is completely inappropriate for you to be wandering about like this in your current condition. You should already be in the hospital and-”
The woman’s moaning as another contraction hit her cut off Rachel’s speech. She grabbed tightly onto her again as she rode through the pain. “Cab.” She suddenly panted out. “I can’t get a cab to stop for me.”
Nodding, Rachel dragged the woman over towards the curb, put two fingers between her lips, and whistled. Loudly. Immediately a cab stopped. Quickly Rachel hauled the woman into the cab. As she opened the door, another contraction hit.
“I’m not going to make it.” She moaned.
“Yes you are!” Rachel encouraged as she put the woman in the cab. “Take her to the closest hospital.” She instructed, making to close the cab door.
“No! You have to come with me!” The woman begged before her face contorted in pain. “Please!”
Rachel glanced towards her path to the payphone before looking back to the woman, realizing she couldn’t leave her. If she was in labor, she was fairly certain that the last thing she would want was to be alone. “Sure.” She relented. “I’ll just get in on the other side just in case you go into labor. I watched a documentary on live childbirth. I’m sure I can figure out how to deliver your child if needed.”
A look of horror passed over the cabbie’s face. “Oh, no, no, no, lady! Not in my cab.”
Rachel ignored him, and instead closed the door and ran around to the other side of the cab. She didn’t hear the honking until the headlights were bearing down on her and it was too late.
There was a sickening crunch.
A rush of cold air.
The sound of a baby crying.
Rachel’s world went black.
*
When she woke up she was in the hospital. The strange thing was that she wasn’t hooked up to any machines. And even stranger, she was stranding in the maternity ward, right next to the glass window that looked into the nursery. Weird. Suddenly she was very aware that something wasn’t right here. She was slightly psychic, you know. That’s why she had no qualms about dropping out of high school in order to achieve fame. She knew she was going to be somebody, and soon.
A nurse moved down the hallway and Rachel approached her.
“Excuse me, ma’am?”
The nurse ignored her.
Anger flared through Rachel and she was about to stalk after the woman and demand that she speak to her, but she saw another nurse pushing a baby towards the nursery. Maybe she’d have more luck with her.
“Excuse me?”
This nurse ignored her, too. Except… Except this nurse walked RIGHT through her! As though she wasn’t even standing there. As though she was a…
No! It wasn’t possible. She couldn’t be… She wasn’t… No… She wasn’t a…
“NO! NO! NO! NO! NO!” She screamed out, running frantically through the ward, wanting someone, anyone to notice her, to calm her down, to tell her that she wasn’t dead.
No one even reacted.
Still freaking out, she ran through the hallways of the hospital, determined to prove she wasn’t dead. She couldn’t be dead. She was only seventeen years old! She never finished school! She had no friends. No boyfriends. She was still a virgin! She couldn’t die a virgin! How tacky was that? And the show! What about Rent? It was her chance to be a star! She was never going to be a star now. And her dads! She never got to call them and tell them she was making a name for herself. They didn’t know she’d been happy.
No. No. No!
She couldn’t be dead.
But she kept remembering those damn headlights. And that sound. God. Had that been her? Was that crunching sound her body being crushed?
Oh my God.
She was dead. She was dead. She was DEAD!
Frantically, she threw herself at the front doors of the hospital, determined to make it to her fathers and tell them she’d been happy. They needed to know!
God, she couldn’t be dead. Her life had only just begun!
But as soon as she walked out the front doors, she found herself standing right back in the maternity ward, standing in front of the nursery again.
“Of course.” She whined, glaring up at the ceiling. “This is because I’m Jewish, isn’t it?! I know my life already! I don’t feel like I need to know what I did and what I should have done better!”
Her rant was cut off when she overheard one of the nurses ask the other nurse, “Did you hear about the accident victims that were brought in last night?”
That caught Rachel’s attention and she walked right though the glass window and into the nursery.
Weird.
She wasn’t going to be getting used to that anytime soon…
“A woman gave birth right next to a hit and run.”
The other nurse gasped. “No way!”
The first nurse nodded excitedly. “And apparently the girl was some up and coming Broadway starlet. The show had just gotten picked up for the off-Broadway circuit.”
“That’s some shitty luck.”
Rachel stared at them. It had gotten picked up? They’d gotten picked up?
No! No! No! No!
This wasn’t fair! She was so close. Why now? Why?
“Which baby was born on scene?” The second nurse asked, glancing over at the babies.
The first nurse glanced down at her clipboard. “The Puckerman boy.”
Curiously, Rachel moved around until she found the right baby. She wrinkled her nose at the sight of the wrinkly little baby with the huge tuft of brown hair, and his hand in his mouth. “I died trying to help you?” She asked incredulously. “I died because of you? You can’t even speak yet and you’re already kind of a jerk.” She ran her fingers over his hair, trying to flatten his Mohawk looking tuft, but her fingers ghosted right through. “It isn’t fair that you get to live while I don’t.”
Suddenly the baby’s eyes flew open, and Rachel could have sworn he was looking right at her. Her theory was only confirmed when he burst into tears.
“Oh my God.”
Could he hear her? Was he the only person who could hear her?!
The nurses looked worriedly over at the baby. “Poor thing. Imagine growing up knowing you were born at the exact same time the person trying to help deliver you died…”
“He’s going to grow up to be neurotic.”
Rachel stared at Baby Puckerman. “This must be why I’m still here.” She realized. “We must have a psychic connection. I died trying to help you, and now I’m bound to protect you.” She sighed dejectedly. “Why couldn’t you have waited to be born until after I won at least one of my many Tonys?”
The baby started crying harder and one of the nurses moved to soothe him.
“Or maybe this is all just a coincidence…” She mused.
The baby’s eyes looked like they were focused on her as he cried. She sighed again. “Or maybe I’m Rachel Berry: Supernatural babysitter.”
He cried even harder at that.
So, Rachel did the only thing she knew how to do: she started singing.
Immediately the baby stopped crying.
All she could do was stare at him. This was turning out to be the worst day ever. First she died, and now the only person who could see her was a baby?
The song was wrong. The times were shitty and they could only get worse.
Author: diamondinsanity
Pairing,Character(s): Rachel, Puck
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 1,656
Spoilers: None. Completely and utterly AU.
Summary: Seventeen year old Rachel Berry was on her way to becoming a Broadway star when she died at the exact same time Noah Puckerman was born. And so instead of moving on, she's stuck haunting the boy she died trying to help.
Notes: The idea for this is loosely based off the movie Heart and Souls, which is also where the title comes from. If you haven’t seen Heart and Souls, I completely recommend watching it. Robert Downey Jr. is AMAZING in it.
Disclaimers: I do not own Glee, and I do not own Rent, and I sure as hell do not own Heart and Souls. I just love them all and decided to bend them all to my will. And sadly I don’t own Anthony Rapp or Mark Salling either.
Prologue
1993
New York City. Center of the Universe. Times are shitty, but I’m pretty sure they can’t get worse. A smile lingered on Rachel Berry’s face as the lyrics from rehearsal earlier still spun about her mind. Suddenly dropping out of high school and forcing her way onto Broadway wasn’t looking like the worst idea she ever had. Here she was, proving her fathers wrong and, working with a genius. Jonathan Larson was a great man, and this rock opera of his was going to redefine Broadway; she just knew it. Being cast as Maureen was the biggest break she’d ever gotten, and alright, so they were still just in workshops and they were nowhere near close enough to making it off-Broadway yet, let alone onto Broadway, but it was a start, and Rachel loved it. Finally her life was turning out they way she wanted it to; everything was going according to plan.
Still humming "Santa Fe" under her breath, she changed out of her sweaty rehearsal clothes and into her street clothes. She grabbed her bag, and waved a cheery goodbye to Anthony before heading out onto the street. Her plan was to call her fathers from the payphone on the corner to check in with them, and then head home to her shitty apartment. Sure, it wasn’t much right now, but once Rent got picked up, she knew she was going to be a star and was going to be able to live somewhere amazing, but for now she’d suffer through having her shower and her kitchen in the same room. For now.
She was half-way to the payphone when a pregnant woman waddled into her. Before Rachel could even complain, the woman grabbed her by the shoulders, her fingers digging into flesh as she moaned out in pain. “I’m sorry. So sorry.” The woman quickly apologized, looking sheepish at randomly grabbing a stranger.
Rachel stared at her in complete and utter horror as she realized the severity of the situation. “Are you… Are you in labor?” She asked, glancing down at the woman’s legs, like she was looking for her bloody show or her water breaking or all that other stuff she enjoyed learning about in school until she dropped out because of her big break. Nervously she looked back at the woman. “It is completely inappropriate for you to be wandering about like this in your current condition. You should already be in the hospital and-”
The woman’s moaning as another contraction hit her cut off Rachel’s speech. She grabbed tightly onto her again as she rode through the pain. “Cab.” She suddenly panted out. “I can’t get a cab to stop for me.”
Nodding, Rachel dragged the woman over towards the curb, put two fingers between her lips, and whistled. Loudly. Immediately a cab stopped. Quickly Rachel hauled the woman into the cab. As she opened the door, another contraction hit.
“I’m not going to make it.” She moaned.
“Yes you are!” Rachel encouraged as she put the woman in the cab. “Take her to the closest hospital.” She instructed, making to close the cab door.
“No! You have to come with me!” The woman begged before her face contorted in pain. “Please!”
Rachel glanced towards her path to the payphone before looking back to the woman, realizing she couldn’t leave her. If she was in labor, she was fairly certain that the last thing she would want was to be alone. “Sure.” She relented. “I’ll just get in on the other side just in case you go into labor. I watched a documentary on live childbirth. I’m sure I can figure out how to deliver your child if needed.”
A look of horror passed over the cabbie’s face. “Oh, no, no, no, lady! Not in my cab.”
Rachel ignored him, and instead closed the door and ran around to the other side of the cab. She didn’t hear the honking until the headlights were bearing down on her and it was too late.
There was a sickening crunch.
A rush of cold air.
The sound of a baby crying.
Rachel’s world went black.
*
When she woke up she was in the hospital. The strange thing was that she wasn’t hooked up to any machines. And even stranger, she was stranding in the maternity ward, right next to the glass window that looked into the nursery. Weird. Suddenly she was very aware that something wasn’t right here. She was slightly psychic, you know. That’s why she had no qualms about dropping out of high school in order to achieve fame. She knew she was going to be somebody, and soon.
A nurse moved down the hallway and Rachel approached her.
“Excuse me, ma’am?”
The nurse ignored her.
Anger flared through Rachel and she was about to stalk after the woman and demand that she speak to her, but she saw another nurse pushing a baby towards the nursery. Maybe she’d have more luck with her.
“Excuse me?”
This nurse ignored her, too. Except… Except this nurse walked RIGHT through her! As though she wasn’t even standing there. As though she was a…
No! It wasn’t possible. She couldn’t be… She wasn’t… No… She wasn’t a…
“NO! NO! NO! NO! NO!” She screamed out, running frantically through the ward, wanting someone, anyone to notice her, to calm her down, to tell her that she wasn’t dead.
No one even reacted.
Still freaking out, she ran through the hallways of the hospital, determined to prove she wasn’t dead. She couldn’t be dead. She was only seventeen years old! She never finished school! She had no friends. No boyfriends. She was still a virgin! She couldn’t die a virgin! How tacky was that? And the show! What about Rent? It was her chance to be a star! She was never going to be a star now. And her dads! She never got to call them and tell them she was making a name for herself. They didn’t know she’d been happy.
No. No. No!
She couldn’t be dead.
But she kept remembering those damn headlights. And that sound. God. Had that been her? Was that crunching sound her body being crushed?
Oh my God.
She was dead. She was dead. She was DEAD!
Frantically, she threw herself at the front doors of the hospital, determined to make it to her fathers and tell them she’d been happy. They needed to know!
God, she couldn’t be dead. Her life had only just begun!
But as soon as she walked out the front doors, she found herself standing right back in the maternity ward, standing in front of the nursery again.
“Of course.” She whined, glaring up at the ceiling. “This is because I’m Jewish, isn’t it?! I know my life already! I don’t feel like I need to know what I did and what I should have done better!”
Her rant was cut off when she overheard one of the nurses ask the other nurse, “Did you hear about the accident victims that were brought in last night?”
That caught Rachel’s attention and she walked right though the glass window and into the nursery.
Weird.
She wasn’t going to be getting used to that anytime soon…
“A woman gave birth right next to a hit and run.”
The other nurse gasped. “No way!”
The first nurse nodded excitedly. “And apparently the girl was some up and coming Broadway starlet. The show had just gotten picked up for the off-Broadway circuit.”
“That’s some shitty luck.”
Rachel stared at them. It had gotten picked up? They’d gotten picked up?
No! No! No! No!
This wasn’t fair! She was so close. Why now? Why?
“Which baby was born on scene?” The second nurse asked, glancing over at the babies.
The first nurse glanced down at her clipboard. “The Puckerman boy.”
Curiously, Rachel moved around until she found the right baby. She wrinkled her nose at the sight of the wrinkly little baby with the huge tuft of brown hair, and his hand in his mouth. “I died trying to help you?” She asked incredulously. “I died because of you? You can’t even speak yet and you’re already kind of a jerk.” She ran her fingers over his hair, trying to flatten his Mohawk looking tuft, but her fingers ghosted right through. “It isn’t fair that you get to live while I don’t.”
Suddenly the baby’s eyes flew open, and Rachel could have sworn he was looking right at her. Her theory was only confirmed when he burst into tears.
“Oh my God.”
Could he hear her? Was he the only person who could hear her?!
The nurses looked worriedly over at the baby. “Poor thing. Imagine growing up knowing you were born at the exact same time the person trying to help deliver you died…”
“He’s going to grow up to be neurotic.”
Rachel stared at Baby Puckerman. “This must be why I’m still here.” She realized. “We must have a psychic connection. I died trying to help you, and now I’m bound to protect you.” She sighed dejectedly. “Why couldn’t you have waited to be born until after I won at least one of my many Tonys?”
The baby started crying harder and one of the nurses moved to soothe him.
“Or maybe this is all just a coincidence…” She mused.
The baby’s eyes looked like they were focused on her as he cried. She sighed again. “Or maybe I’m Rachel Berry: Supernatural babysitter.”
He cried even harder at that.
So, Rachel did the only thing she knew how to do: she started singing.
Immediately the baby stopped crying.
All she could do was stare at him. This was turning out to be the worst day ever. First she died, and now the only person who could see her was a baby?
The song was wrong. The times were shitty and they could only get worse.