Yeah, so, FEELINGS. I owe you copious amounts of make outs, S. I started with good intentions, I promise, but this kind of happened.
the age of your intention
maybe we could look back at this and say we were only young once.
glee | puck/rachel | spoilers for pot of gold | 2,722 words, PG
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Puck is sitting on her bed when she comes home. Her daddy gives no warning; there is an odd jerk of his head and then a quick, quick kiss on her forehead that makes Rachel tense with curiosity until she opens the door to her room.
"Oh." She blinks, holding the door. "Noah," she greets. "What are you doing here?"
He shrugs. "Had some time," he says.
Her mouth opens and closes. He doesn't look at her; he shoves his hands into his pockets, leaning back against her bed. His elbows dig into her sheets.
It's been awhile since they've talked; this year is already a whirlwind and she's more than aware that he's preoccupied with her mother and Quinn and Beth. It's best that she leaves that alone. Part of her feels guilty, but it's her way of dealing with things, on top of everything else. It's a little terrifying, given that everything else is unraveling with it. But Rachel is trying to do the best that she can.
"The last time," she says slowly, "you looked at me like that - we were ten and you broke your mom's vase and you wanted me to help you tell her." Her mouth twitches. "After you dumped fruit juice over my dress too."
"I was a punk," he snorts.
"You were you."
Rachel moves to the bed to sit with him. The blankets sink against the back of her legs. He sits close and she curls her legs underneath her too, pulling them to the side as her hands smooth against her skirt.
"What's going?" she asks, and she looks over at him. Her hair brushes over her eyes. "Is your mom okay?" she asks too.
"Yeah." He rubs his eyes. "She's fine. Hannah's fine. They're okay - she keeps asking about you though. Hannah," he says. "She said something about you teaching her dance class next week or whatever."
She nods. "I'm helping out again."
He nods. He pulls out his phone, thumbing the buttons. It's awkward; Puck never gets awkward, even uncomfortable. It's strange sort of tension and she can't really figure out where this is coming from.
"What's wrong?" she presses again. Her voice is soft. "I know that -"
Something in her makes her stop. He's not like Finn; Puck is either open or unreadable, never anything else in between. She bites her lip, wondering how she should press forward. She doesn't want to go too hard, she thinks.
A picture of Beth flashes onto the screen. Then he says it, his voice calm.
"I kissed Shelby."
Rachel leaves the house. She does not look back.
Her jacket is wrapped around her tightly. Her phone is somewhere at home; she left on the kitchen counter. She knows her dad called her name out, her daddy not far behind him and she's sure she mumbled some sort of please leave me be because it was the only thing she could say.
Puck's confession makes her ears ring. Her throat is dry. She keeps pressing her fingers against her neck, her nails dragging against her skin as she just walks. She goes in between houses, weaving the straight path through the Jeffersons' and the Larsons', ignoring the dog barking from the backyard.
The park is lit; her feet walk her to the swing set, her hands dipping into her jacket pockets just as she sits in one of the swings. She cannot touch Puck's words again. She won't call Finn either.
"I shouldn't be surprised," she says out loud, and between the now, sudden split of the group and the resentment that shouldn't surprise her. Her mind wanders to the suitcase in her closet, the ticket sitting on top of her clothes. Her hands twitch in her pockets, her nails raking at the fabric.
But it take a few more minutes for Puck to reappear; she isn't surprised that he followed her.
"I didn't -" he sighs loudly. "I had to tell someone," he says.
Her eyes burn. "I don't know what you want me to say, Noah."
"Nothing, I guess."
He moves to her. She stares at the ground, rocking back and forth on her heels. He stops just in front of her.
"B," he says. "I just - I need someone to understand."
"So it has to be me?" Her hands curl into her fists. "Whatever is between Shelby and you is between Shelby and you - don't bring me into this. I don't - I can't handle that. And I don't want to be angry with you. Why would you tell me this? Why would you -"
"B," he says again, and it's his voice, too soft, almost sullen even. When she looks up, her eyes are starting to water. She rubs her throat. "Shit," he mutters. "I don't know how to not tell you stuff. It's not like I planned to -"
"Don't say it," she snaps.
Part of her waits for the excuse: you have Finn. She almost wants him to say it. Selfishly, it would be easier to take that and then be angrier at him. But he won't. Puck has never been like that.
The weight of her mother is something entirely different though. Of course, she has her dads. She's tried so hard to remove herself from the situation, despite Shelby's strange habit of coming in and out of her life; it may be just as bad as everything else, between Kurt being mad at her and the whole Mercedes situation that everyone else quietly blames her for. She should be used to this.
"Why would you tell me this?" she repeats. Her voice shudders and she tries to swallow. "I don't know what to say."
"I didn't mean to," he says softly. But it's not an excuse. It seems heavier than that; he talks to her and himself, almost as if it would the better reassurance.
She laughs. It waivers and catches. Her head drops back and she squeezes her eyes shut. The tears slide underneath her lashes.
"She's different."
She shakes her head hard. Her hair falls into her eyes.
"She is." His voice steadies. "I know you, like, don't want to hear it. But shit, she's struggling and it's just so easy to get caught up in all of this. Beth's my kid, Quinn's fucked up, and I'm right in the middle of it, trying to do the best that I can. I never wanted to lose touch with my daughter. Shit, it's pretty fucked that hear I am, finally trying to take some kind of responsibility - like I wanted to in the beginning - and then all of the sudden I fuck it up."
Rachel doesn't know what to say back. This is the conversation; it doesn't matter who leaves the park first.
The swings follow her to school the next day. Her hand wraps itself tightly in Finn's in the morning. She keeps quiet, half-listening to him and Kurt talk about Burt's run for Congress and Coach Sylvester being Coach Sylvester.
It isn't until they get to her locker, after Kurt heads to his first class, that Finn turns to her with concern. His gaze softens and he sweeps his fingers against her jaw.
"What's going on?" he asks quietly.
She doesn't answer. Her gaze is still over his shoulder; she catches Mercedes and Santana watching at her. Mercedes laughs, Santana narrows her eyes, but Rachel is too tired to do anything. Her fingers still feel cold.
"Rach," Finn presses. "Seriously."
Her hand slides into her hair, pulling through to the ends. Her nails claw at her neck and she can't quite bring herself to look at him.
"I want to bolt."
The words taste funny. Her gaze moves to the lockers.
"I just want to go," she says."Everything -" she shakes her head. "I'm just really tired," she says too. "Of getting to this space, no matter how hard I try. Mercedes and Santana hate me. I work just hard as everybody else, if not more and people still -" she lets out a shaky sigh, "I - I'm not trying to look for some kind of reassurance, but I'm tired, Finn. I'm really, really tired."
His hand catches her jaw and he turns her face to look at her, his fingers pushing at her chin. She refuses to cry, but leans in and presses his mouth against her forehead. She doesn't know how to tell him that Puck's a catalyst; it's always been easier to keep the relationships separate. It's what's been best at any rate.
But it picks at her. It picks and picks at her. This is that line again. Puck isn't Jesse. Puck will never be Jesse. He isn't Mercedes or Santana either. Puck is a constant. Puck has been a constant since they were kids, despite different friends and attitudes and whatever. It makes his confession hurt more.
"What happened?" Finn asks and her hand curls around his wrist, pulling it away from her face. The first bell rings and she laces their fingers together. Shelby passes them too, without looking and picking up her pace, and Rachel feels like laughing. Finn squeezes her hand.
"Nothing," she says.
Her physics class changes to the biology room; they have an exam and the lab is being used for some sort of freshman seminar. Mercedes is in her class. She sits in the front. The seat next to her is empty. Her partner took the option for their study hall in the library while Rachel chose to stay behind, working on her French for the next class.
Her skin crawls.
Shelby has already been in and out of the room. Her office is cut into the classroom in the back, close to Rachel's table.
"How's the musical?"
She jumps and her mother is standing over the table, eyeing her shyly. Rachel's fingers still over her pen and her notes. She stares at her textbook.
"Fine," she says carefully.
Shelby's voice keeps to a low murmur. "Good, good." There's a pause. "What class is this for you?"
"Physics."
"Do you like it?" the older woman asks, and if everything else wasn't everything else, Rachel might find herself laughing, putting the situation back into perspective. But she's caught and the shyness in Shelby's voice forces her to be suspicious.
"Sure," Rachel says. "It's fine."
"Your teacher says you're doing well."
Rachel's eyes close briefly, her fingers pressing against the bridge of her nose. She hesitates before shrugging. "I work hard," she says.
"But you enjoy French -"
"What do you want?" she presses, her voice hitches and she looks up at her mother, her hands sliding to the end of her desk. She catches Mercedes looking back, watching the two of them.
"I just wanted to see how you are," Shelby says. "That's all."
You make me want to not trust people, she almost says. But there is safety in keeping this conversation as basic as she can. She meets Mercedes' gaze too, watching her tiredly. She almost shakes her head.
"I think we're well beyond that," Rachel tells Shelby. "Don't you think?"
"Rachel," Shelby murmurs, and Mercedes breaks her gaze. In the front of the classroom, her physics teacher smiles at her. Rachel manages a nod. But Shelby sighs through her persistence. "I, uh -" she hears her swallow, "why French?"
Puck asked her once. She remembers; it was the summer that he tried to get her to manage the pool business, her first summer with Finn and the three of them were kind of lazy and okay with footing. Like all things too, it's different now. She always reminds herself that it's just wiser to keep Puck separate; she's protective of her relationships as it is. But now that foundation is different and things are sort of shaky and all she wants to do is leave. They can have everything else, she thinks.
Her voice is wistful and it slips. "It's a beautiful language to sing."
"You're avoiding me."
Puck is leaning against her car in the parking lot. Glee is over; Finn's gone home with Kurt, neither entirely happy about more discussions of Burt's campaign. She promises Finn to call later, but her heart isn't really in it.
She stops in front of the car, her fingers culling around the strap of her bag. She sighs and shakes her head, studying him.
"I can always talk to you," she says quietly. "I don't really know how to not talk to you, Noah. And now - I can't even look at you."
Her hand digs into her jacket for her keys. She spots his truck off to the side, a few spots over. There's Mr. Schuester's car too, tucked away.
"You can't -" His boots shuffle against the pavement. "Shit," he mutters. "Look, it's just been so easy to get caught up in all of this. I'm trying to make everybody happy and it's like, I don't know, Beth is Beth."
"That's fine," she tells him.
"Is it?"
He pushes himself off the car, reaching for her. His fingers tug at her bag, at the strap, and he tosses it to the ground. It lands hard and one of her books skip, sliding to the top of the opening. His hand moves to her jacket then and his fingers catch at the collar of her dress.
"B." She looks up. Her mouth presses tightly. "I'm not making excuses," he says firmly. "I just want to see my kid."
"I'm faulting you for anything," she murmurs.
"People do stupid shit all the time."
Her mouth twists.
He runs a hand through his hair. "Then why are you angry at me?"
She's quiet. His other hand still threads itself at her collar. His fingers drag against her neck and then rise to press against her jaw. He leans forward, over her and when she looks at him, he offers a slight, tired smile.
"I don't know," she confesses. She licks her lips. "I think - I just expected more for you. You've always been different for me, you know? And - I don't know how to handle my mother, Noah. I'm happy that you're getting to spend time with Beth, that you're figuring it out. But you just dropped that on me."
His fingers tuck her hair behind her ear. Her eyes start to water.
He's serious too. "I couldn't not tell you," he says. "Secrets are bullshit; they never did me any favors. And you, B, have that ridiculous way of finding it out."
She says nothing. She's tired of talking; she means to pull away then too, but his hand opens against her cheek. His palm is warm and he lowers himself over her, his mouth touching her forehead. He exhales and her hands press into his chest. She keeps them as steady as she can, her fingers flexing lightly.
His mouth is hot. He murmurs her name into her skin. He may or may not linger too long. For a brief, split second she thinks of kissing him too. It would petty and hard and completely and utterly stupid. It should be like this; that may mean something entirely different though.
Instead she draws back. His eyes are dark and she shakes her head.
Her lips feel too dry. They are not okay, she thinks.
The club is in the audience at the end of their rehearsal. Behind them, Mercedes, Britt and Santana sit too, Shelby along with them. Blaine murmurs something about nerves and Rachel gives him a slight smile, moving to take her place in the middle of the stage. Her music is somewhere by her bag and yet again, she is standing there and feels too much like she has something to prove.
Her gaze meets Puck's briefly and then she looks away, opening her mouth to sing. Even this is different now; the words taste larger, the sound is louder, and her voice feels like it's growing into something completely different. She stands in front of everyone, pouring herself out onto the stage, staring right back at them and for a moment, she gives it as good as it can get.
But when she sings as Maria, she remembers how easy it's becoming to leave. She can give them that too.