The Beginning [2/3]
Title: The Beginning
Pairings: Santana/Brittany, Rachel/Quinn, Puck/Anna (OC) Minor/Mentions: Quinn/Finn, Santana/Finn, Rachel/Finn, Rachel/Jesse, Quinn/Puck, Brittany/OC
Minor Characters: Allison Fabray, Rachel’s dads, Rachel’s “Pop” Berry
Rating: PG-13
Length: ~4,700 for this part. ~14,700 total.
Summary: Before their lives were perfect there were a few bumps in the road.
Warning: Minor character death
Author’s Note: See Part 1
Part 1
--March 2012 - July 2012--
Santana and Brittany
Santana got her acceptance letter to Northwestern the same day Quinn got hers to NYU. Brittany’s parents had some friends in the city that knew a man who ran a dance studio and they were able to get her a full time job teaching there. The pair left for Chicago a week after graduation because Santana was determined to get the hell out of Lima as quickly as possible. It was a tearful goodbye but Santana swore for years after that she had a piece of dust in her eye.
The Latina had already put a deposit down on an apartment that she’d found online and was really impressed with the rental rate but when they got there and saw the space Santana learned the hard way that words could be twisted and that when an ad says the place has a 225 square foot bedroom she should check to make sure that the bedroom is not also the kitchen and living room and doesn’t include the bathroom. Unfortunately that’s all she and Brittany could afford that was close to anywhere they needed to be.
It was livable even if Brittany’s parents did have to take back most of the furniture they had brought in the small U-Haul trailer. They had room for their bed, a small table with two chairs, and a TV on their dresser. There was a stove, refrigerator, and sink in the kitchenette. It looked more like a hotel room than an apartment. Santana did some research on the building and found out that it was actually a hotel at one point. She thought about finding and killing the landlord but decided against it because her goal in life was to become the first Lopez to go to college, not the sixth to go to prison.
--July 2012 - July 2013--
Rachel and Quinn
In late July, Rachel and Quinn packed theirs and Allie’s bags, boxes, and two beds into a small U-haul trailer attached to Rachel’s dads’ SUV. They said goodbye to Puck and the remainder of those still in Lima, got in Quinn’s car, and left.
Rachel’s cousins’ basement was fairly spacious, there were two bedrooms and a bathroom and a small living area that was already furnished with a couch and a TV. After they moved everything in they took tours of their respective campuses and worked out a babysitting schedule. Rachel’s cousin, Tia, was the self proclaimed “Queen of Charting” and made an Excel spreadsheet of the girls’ classes, Allie’s schedule, babysitting, free time, and family time. Quinn, and Tia’s husband, Dave, were both in the same boat of needing an engineer to decipher the schedule. Actually they needed something better because Dave was in fact an engineer and was still confused.
It took Allie a while to get adjusted to the city. They weren’t in an extremely busy part but it was definitely still louder than Lima. The toddler found her way in to Quinn and Rachel’s bed almost every night and snuggled between the two of them. It was fine for about a week until one night, when the pair thought Allie might actually stay in her room all night, Quinn was getting ready to round third base and the two year old came sprinting into the bedroom and landed almost on top of the pair. The first thing Rachel did the next day was buy a speaker and make a special playlist on her iPod for Allie to sleep to and had Dave put a lock on their bedroom door.
Both Rachel and Quinn got jobs on their campuses. Lucky for them the majority of their educations were covered by scholarships and Puck sent money every month for Allie from his job he got working at the Pick-n-Save while he figured out what he wanted to do for the rest of his life. Most of that went to paying for babysitters. With their incomes both girls wanted to help out Rachel’s cousins with groceries and bills and also start saving for when they moved out on their own. Living in New York City was expensive and they would need every penny they could get. Unfortunately, it meant deciding which holiday break to miss in Lima for since they didn’t expect a spike in gas prices.
“We have to go for winter break,” Rachel said, looking at the pro and con lists they’d made up that were scattered on their living room floor. “And at least a few weeks in the summer.”
“What about Thanksgiving and spring break, though?” Quinn sighed. She looked down at how much they’d allowed for travel expenses.
Rachel shrugged. “We have to pick one, we can’t do both.”
“Thanksgiving is closer.”
“Spring break weather is nicer.”
Quinn nodded. “And there’s not that long between Thanksgiving and winter.”
“Noah can take Allie more during spring so we can study for our finals.”
“Spring break it is,” Quinn said, scribbling down notes on the calendar.
“You should call Noah and tell him. He’s not going to be incredibly enthusiastic about this.”
“He’ll have to get over it, Rach.”
Rachel sighed. “Maybe…maybe we should see how she does with him?”
Quinn looked up at Rachel and snapped the pencil in her hand in half. “If you’re suggesting…”
“Quinn, I love Allie, you know I love her like she is my own daughter but maybe what Noah said was right. We’re both going to school, we both have jobs, I have rehearsals, and we barely get to see each other. It’s only been two months and you’re exhausted. It wouldn’t be a permanent thing it would just-“
“Rachel,” Quinn said calmly, clenching her jaw shut and her knuckles turning white from gripping the now broken pencil so hard. “I’m going to ask you to leave the room now. And I would like to sleep alone tonight.”
“But Quinn I-”
“I really, really need you to leave.”
Rachel nodded and silently stood and headed upstairs. Quinn stared down at the calendar in complete disbelief. She picked up her phone and dialed Santana, the one person she absolutely knew would agree with her.
“What’s up New York?” Santana answered. “You get mugged yet?”
“Hey S,” Quinn said quietly.
“Oh shit, something’s wrong. Let me go get B…”
“No, I need to talk to you. I know you’ll agree with me.”
“You’re fighting with Berry? Duh, I’ll agree with you. Spill it.”
“She wants me to give Allie to Puck while we’re in school.”
There was a silence.
“Santana?”
“Okay, Q, let me just ask you something. How much sleep have you gotten this week?”
Quinn sighed. “I don’t know.”
“Look, I know school is hard. I’m fucking going crazy here with that on top of my job. You have all that plus a kid. You’re definitely getting less sleep than I am and I’m not getting shit.”
“Santana Lopez if you’re telling me that you agree with Rachel I will drive to Chicago and smack you into next week.”
“I’m not saying I agree with her, Q. I’m just saying, you’re exhausted. And there’s a way to fix it.”
“Puck wouldn’t be able to handle her.”
“How do you know that?”
“He went crazy when she wouldn’t stop crying!”
“She was a freakin’ infant, Q! Now she can at least tell him what she wants and he still lives with his mom, right?”
“I can’t believe I’m listening to you. I’m hanging up.”
“Just think about it is all I’m sayi-”
Quinn slammed her cell phone down on the floor and settled her forehead on her knees. Before she could even begin to process Santana’s betrayal she heard a muffled cry come from Allie’s room. Quinn groaned and dragged her feet to the toddler’s bedroom. Allie refused to stop crying when Quinn tried to soothe her. The older blonde begged her daughter to tell her what was wrong but all the two-year-old did was cry more and cling to her mother. Quinn lay in the small bed with her for what seemed like hours rubbing her back and singing to her.
When it seemed like Allie had finally settled down, Quinn moved to get up which prompted a fresh round of tears and the older blonde was close to tears of her own. She’d had six hours of sleep combined in the last two days, Rachel was being horrible, her classes were getting harder the closer she got to mid-terms, and Santana abandoned her. For the first time since moving to the city Quinn briefly thought maybe she’d made a horrible mistake and that Rachel and Santana were right.
Quinn heard footsteps and knew who they belonged to when Allie was being pulled away from her and Rachel’s soft voice was filling the room.
“I’ve got sunshine,” the brunette sang softly, “on a cloudy day. When it’s cold outside, I’ve got the month of May.”
Quinn curled up into a ball and hugged a pillow tight to her chest. The tears started flowing.
“I guess you say, what could make me feel this way?” There was a pause and Quinn looked up just as Rachel looked down at her. “My girls.”
Allie calmed down and stuck her thumb in her mouth and Rachel continued singing and swaying until the toddler was fast asleep. Quinn rolled out of the bed and helped tuck her daughter in. Without a word Rachel wrapped an arm around the blonde’s waist and took her to their bedroom, Quinn collapsed in bed and that was all she remembered until she woke up.
It was cold, was the first thing Quinn noticed. Nothing was pressed up against her. Quinn rolled over to see Rachel curled up on the far corner of the bed and she sighed. She rolled back over to look at her clock and panicked. She was two hours later for her shift in the library. Quinn sprang out of bed and didn’t bother trying to be quiet as she flung open the closet door and started digging through her clothes.
“Come back to bed,” Rachel groaned.
“I’m late for work! Did you shut off my alarm?!” Quinn grabbed a dress and a sweater.
“I called in sick for both of us today. Come back to bed.”
“Rachel! You can’t just do that! We need the money!”
“I can and I did. You need sleep. And no we don’t. Bills are paid for the month.”
Quinn hesitated a moment before dropping her dress and crawling back into bed. She looked over at Rachel who had closed her eyes again and was breathing softly.
“I’m still mad at you,” Quinn sighed, pulling the covers up to her chin.
“Mkay.”
“What you said was completely out of line.”
“I know,” Rachel sighed. “And I’m sorry. I never should have said anything. I’m not her mother, you are. And it’s up to you and I will support you no matter what. Get some sleep.”
Quinn reached out and grabbed onto the hem of Rachel’s shirt and pulled her over to the center of the bed. The brunette curled into her girlfriend and Quinn drifted back to sleep. She woke up alone, the clock indicated she’d slept until almost two and she felt as though she could sleep for another day and a half but the sound of music and giggles coming from the other side of the door coaxed her out of bed. Quinn smiled as she peeked into Allie’s bedroom to see Rachel dancing and Allie attempting to mimic her moves. Quinn swallowed hard and tiptoed back to her bedroom, pulled out her phone and pressed 4, then call.
“Hey Baby Mama, how’s it going?”
“It’s fine, Puck. Listen…we can’t be home for Thanksgiving. It’s too expensive, we don’t have the money for it but I promise I’ll make it up to you on winter break. You can take Allie for an entire week if you want.”
“I told you you’d do this to me! You’re trying to keep her away!”
“No, Puck, please…I swear to you that’s not it. We don’t have the money and both Rachel and I would honestly like to have the week to just do nothing and not have to worry about going anywhere.”
“Fine. But I’m holding you to that week. I’m serious, the whole week. I can handle her.”
“I’m sure you can,” Quinn whispered. “I…Puck if you…” Quinn trailed off.
“What? If I what?”
“Nothing.”
Quinn continued getting very little sleep and by the time winter break rolled around she was sure she was about one step away from pure exhaustion after her finals. She and Rachel took shifts driving back to Lima and they took Allie to Puck’s and then went to the Berry house for what they intended to be a nap but both woke up twelve hours later, ate whatever they could find in the kitchen, then went back to bed and slept for another five hours.
They were both startled awake by Quinn’s cell phone, it was Santana informing her that they were in town and Brittany was dying to get to see them. The pair hauled themselves out of bed and to the restaurant Brittany had selected. Quinn saw Santana’s jaw drop as soon as the pair dropped into their side of the booth.
“You guys look like shit,” the Latina said.
“Thanks for that,” Rachel mumbled.
The waitress came by and both Rachel and Quinn ordered coffee and their breakfasts. Santana and Brittany were staring at them the entire time.
“What?” Quinn finally snapped. “We’re tired, okay?”
Santana shook her head. “No you’re not, you’re exhausted. You look like Sylvester made you run suicides for three days. God, did Rachel hit you or are your dark circles really that bad?”
“Shut up, Santana,” Quinn mumbled.
“I do not approve of domestic violence,” Rachel said. “To insinuate such a thing is-“
“Got it, Berry. You didn’t hit Q. You guys just look like death warmed over.”
“Can we please talk about something else?” Quinn sighed and smiled at the waitress who had returned with their coffee. She and Rachel both immediately started sucking it down.
“How’s Allie?” Brittany asked excitedly. “Those pictures you sent were so cute!”
“She’d with Puck for the week.”
“The week?” Santana furrowed her eyebrows.
Quinn nodded. “Since we didn’t get to come for Thanksgiving I promised Puck he could take her for a week if he wanted to.”
Santana nodded. Quinn knew the Latina could read what she was thinking.
Puck called Quinn every day for that week and Quinn couldn’t help but notice how happy he sounded. She let him keep Allie for an eighth day. Then a ninth. Rachel was the one that demanded Allie wake up at her dads’ house on Christmas morning like she always had so Christmas Eve afternoon Puck dropped her off. Allie seemed rather unimpressed and cried with Puck left; it took Quinn and Rachel two hours to get her calmed down. Once the toddler was napping on the couch Quinn excused herself to her and Rachel’s bedroom and paced the floor.
“Quinn? Quinn what’s wrong?” Rachel crossed the floor and put a hand on the blonde’s shoulder. “You’ve been up here for half an hour.”
“Nothing,” Quinn said. “Nothing’s wrong.” She looked up at Rachel and fake-smiled through her lie. Everything was wrong.
Rachel furrowed her eyebrows. “You’re lying to me. Tell me what’s wrong.”
“I…I’m a horrible mother.”
“Wh-what?”
“When Puck had Allie…God, Rachel…I slept through the night and I felt awake in the morning like I could actually function and I had time to do my reading for next semester without worrying about when I was supposed to work and finding Allie a babysitter and you and I had really good not-tired sex!”
Rachel blushed. “I don’t understand how that makes you a horrible mother.”
“I’m horrible because I want my life to be like that all the time!”
Rachel looked at the ground. “Oh. I…I should help out more.”
“Rachel this isn’t-”
“No,” Rachel cut her off. “I signed up for this, I should be a better parent. I should step up and take more responsibility. I'll find time to do it, I just have to look at the chart and find out where I can take time.”
“That’s…not the solution I’m thinking about.”
Rachel sighed and gently brushed Quinn’s hair back from her face. “You’re thinking about leaving her with Noah, aren’t you?”
“Don’t say it like that,” Quinn shrugged away from Rachel and dropped to the bed. “I’m thinking about letting her spend more time with her father.”
Rachel sat down next to the blonde and softly took her hand. “It’s your decision, Quinn.”
Quinn felt her head move up and down in a nod and she dug into her pocket for her phone and stared at it.
“I should talk to him about it.”
“Quinn you don’t have to do this. I’ll try to find more time to help you…I know you don’t really want this. I was completely out of line to ever suggest it.”
“I’m not just thinking about me, Rachel. Puck can spend more time with her and that’s what she needs. I’m busy working and doing homework and going to school. I can’t give up any of those things. If I could then believe me, I would. I would in a heartbeat. You saw how she was when he dropped her off…he’s probably spent more time with her in the last nine days than I have the entire semester.”
Before Quinn could flip open her phone Rachel’s Dad knocked on the door with a huge smile on his face. “Rachel, Grandpa Berry is here.”
Rachel’s eyes lit up and she grabbed onto Quinn’s hand and tugged her to the door.
“You can call him later, I want you to meet Pop!”
Quinn shrugged and followed along down the stairs and saw Rachel’s Daddy sitting on the couch next to a much older version of himself who was holding a very smiley and happy Allie.
“Pop!” Rachel squealed and darted toward the couch. She practically landed on top of the old man and hugged him. “Why didn’t you tell me he was going to be here, Daddy!?”
“We wanted to surprise you.”
Rachel darted back to Quinn who was still standing at the bottom of the staircase and she pulled her to the couch.
“Pop, this is Quinn. Allies mother and,” Rachel looked over at the tall blonde with a smile, “the love of my life.”
Quinn extended her hand and the old man chuckled and shook it.
“The infamous Quinn Fabray. The way Rachel talked about you I thought you would have levitated down the stairs and turned glasses of water into wine for us.”
Quinn blushed. “Pleased to meet you.” She put off calling Puck for the rest of the day.
Christmas morning was spent with presents for Allie, more presents for Allie, putting together Allie’s presents and then watching her play in the box that her dollhouse came in and completely ignoring the present itself. At one point the toddler curled up inside the box clutching onto a stuffed duck from Brittany and Santana and fell asleep, Rachel and Quinn relaxed against the wall. Rachel’s Pop smiled at the pair and handed Rachel one final, thin flat box to open.
“It’s for the three of you,” he said with a smile.
Rachel opened the box and Quinn furrowed her eyebrows at the singular piece of paper that was inside. The brunette picked it up and unfolded the tri-folded document. Both girls shrieked.
“Pop!”
“Mr. Berry!”
“Oh my God! Pop! What…where…how?!”
The old man chuckled. “Oh, my little Rachel-bear. There are many things you don’t know. Like the day you were born your grandmother started a savings account for you. Every year she put in a little something and after your fathers told me how hard the both of you were working I thought maybe now would be the time to turn it over to you.”
“A little something?!” Rachel gasped. “Pop! This account has over ten thousand dollars in it! That’s not little!”
“I can do the math, Rachel. I know you’re one of several grandchildren on your dad’s side but you’re our only grandchild. Your grandmother, God rest her soul, wanted to make sure you were taken care of if you ever needed anything and thanks to some smart investments, we always had the money to put away. You need this. It’s your money.”
Rachel looked from her grandfather to her girlfriend and to the box that Allie was napping in and then back to her girlfriend.
“You’re quitting your job,” Rachel said.
Quinn could tell by her tone that it wasn’t a polite suggestion. It was a demand.
“What?”
“You said if you could quit your job that you would. You’re quitting and Allie’s coming home with us.”
Before Quinn could answer Rachel had leapt up off the floor and wrapped her arms around her Pop’s neck and was thanking him profusely. Quinn picked up the piece of paper on the ground and stared down at it.
“Rachel, I can’t…this is your money.”
Rachel knelt down next to the blonde and kissed her forehead. “Yes, you can. And no it’s not. It’s ours.”
“No…”
“Okay, fine, it’s my money. And I choose to spend it in a way that allows you to quit your job so you can focus on more important things.”
Quinn looked down at her phone and thought about the fact that Puck was number four on speed-dial and she thought about Rachel’s demand and how much free time she would have. She pushed the phone away and pulled Rachel into her and held on tight.
“I want our baby with us,” she whispered. “I…I can’t leave her here.”
Rachel nodded. “I don’t think I could have either.”
“It was your suggestion.”
“Suggesting something and actually having the capacity to do it are two separate things. I couldn’t have done it. We would’ve figured out a way to make it work.”
So, at Rachel’s insistence, Quinn quit her job when they got back to New York. Rachel still worked at her job in the Julliard library so the account could remain mostly untouched until they absolutely needed it. Quinn was happier because she was able to sleep and spend more time with her daughter and in turn Rachel was happier because Quinn was happier. That and the sex was back to normal.
-*-*-*-*-*-
Rachel had always thought of herself as a good performer. Actually, she thought of herself as a fantastic performer. She’d always excelled at her vocal, dance, and acting classes and was told that if she tried hard enough she would make it. She had the same plan she did when she was five except now on her life storyboard there was a picture of Quinn and Allie glued over the picture of Prince Eric from The Little Mermaid.
Rachel’s aspiration was always to go to Julliard and upon completion, start auditions to transition into Broadway. It was on the storyboard timeline. The fall musical went smashingly even though she only had a minor role. Still, she had a solo and received a standing ovation from the crowd. She really wasn’t nervous about auditions for the spring musical until she stepped out on stage and saw not only the director and his assistants but a man sitting in the audience with a clipboard. She was even more nervous when, after she finished, the man got up and peered over the director’s shoulder and the pair whispered for a while before Rachel was dismissed.
On her way out of the building a few hours later Rachel was stopped by the man she saw in the theater. He was smiling.
“Rachel Berry?”
Rachel nodded. “Yes.”
“Levi Travers. Do you have some time to kill?”
Rachel found herself sitting across from this man at a Starbucks only a few minutes later. He bought her a coffee and a Danish and pushed a business card across the small table at her.
“My colleagues and I are starting the final stages of work on a new production,” Levi started. “Our female lead dropped out and I saw you in the fall musical and showed the tape to the director and he wants you.”
Rachel quirked an eyebrow. “How can I be assured you’re not a fraud?”
Levi chuckled and sipped his coffee. “Would your director have let me in if I were a fraud? He helped with the rest of the casting.”
Convinced, Rachel relaxed a little. She’d heard the director talk about it vaguely with other colleagues, he sounded rather excited and had said the show was already generating a lot of buzz.
“What kind of production? What genre, I mean?” Rachel straightened up her shoulders and sipped her coffee.
“It’s a musical, an original. I suppose you could classify it as a romantic drama. Think of it as a modern day Romeo & Juliet without the tragic ending.” Levi pulled a thick folder out of his bag and slid it across the table. “There’s the script and the music. Everyone we’ve cast so far have been amateurs and unknowns, that’s how we wanted to do it. We’re slated for an Off-Broadway premiere in August if everything goes right. Rehearsals start in June, there’s a contract in that folder as well for you to look over but don’t sign it, it’s just a copy for you to look at, nothing official.”
Rachel looked down at the folder and picked it up cautiously. “Can I think about it? I’d have to talk to…You see, I have a girlfriend.”
“Okay.” Levi took another sip of his coffee.
“And she has a daughter.”
“What’s your point?”
“Assuming all goes well, I would have to drop out of school, wouldn’t I?”
Levi chuckled. “Rachel, you don’t need Julliard. Even your director said it, you could go out and start auditions right now. Give me a call with your decision.” He hopped off his stool and left the coffee shop.
Rachel pulled the thick script out of the folder and started reading.
“Rachel!” Quinn shrieked when the brunette got home. “Where have you been? You were supposed to be home two hours ago, I tried calling and you never answered!”
Rachel was still rather stunned. She hadn’t let go of the business card in her hand and the thick folder was tucked into her backpack. She glanced up at Quinn and swallowed hard.
“I…I got asked to do a show.”
“What?”
Rachel led Quinn downstairs and they sat on the couch as the brunette spilled out the story of her afternoon and dug the script out of her bag and let Quinn thumb through it. Rachel sat in silence and stared at the floor.
“What do you want to do, Rach?” Quinn asked, putting the script down on the coffee table. “It’s your decision.”
“The salary is a significant increase compared to what I’m making right now. However, the rehearsals will be grueling, I won’t have much time for you or Allie for a little while…but once it starts I would only be working nights. I could keep Allie during the days. I fear that if the production doesn’t last, though, that I’ll be stuck without a source of income.”
“We still have most of the money your grandfather gave us. If you did get stuck then we would be fine for a while until we figured out what else to do. Rachel, if you want this then you know I will support you.”
Rachel nodded. “I do…I want this.” She looked up at Quinn and smiled. “This is a once in a lifetime opportunity, Quinn. I may never get another chance.”
“Then do it, Rachel. Sweetie, you’ve done amazing things for Allie and me and you’ve never asked for anything in return. This is what you want to do and I want you to do it. It’s about you now.”
Rachel nodded. “I’m going to do it.”
Rachel stayed with an on-campus job until the rehearsals started and then, with shaking hands, she dropped off her forms to drop out of Julliard and quit her job and she signed the offered contract that Levi passed to her across a conference table. Rachel Berry was officially working on a potential Broadway show.
Part 3
Pairings: Santana/Brittany, Rachel/Quinn, Puck/Anna (OC) Minor/Mentions: Quinn/Finn, Santana/Finn, Rachel/Finn, Rachel/Jesse, Quinn/Puck, Brittany/OC
Minor Characters: Allison Fabray, Rachel’s dads, Rachel’s “Pop” Berry
Rating: PG-13
Length: ~4,700 for this part. ~14,700 total.
Summary: Before their lives were perfect there were a few bumps in the road.
Warning: Minor character death
Author’s Note: See Part 1
Part 1
--March 2012 - July 2012--
Santana and Brittany
Santana got her acceptance letter to Northwestern the same day Quinn got hers to NYU. Brittany’s parents had some friends in the city that knew a man who ran a dance studio and they were able to get her a full time job teaching there. The pair left for Chicago a week after graduation because Santana was determined to get the hell out of Lima as quickly as possible. It was a tearful goodbye but Santana swore for years after that she had a piece of dust in her eye.
The Latina had already put a deposit down on an apartment that she’d found online and was really impressed with the rental rate but when they got there and saw the space Santana learned the hard way that words could be twisted and that when an ad says the place has a 225 square foot bedroom she should check to make sure that the bedroom is not also the kitchen and living room and doesn’t include the bathroom. Unfortunately that’s all she and Brittany could afford that was close to anywhere they needed to be.
It was livable even if Brittany’s parents did have to take back most of the furniture they had brought in the small U-Haul trailer. They had room for their bed, a small table with two chairs, and a TV on their dresser. There was a stove, refrigerator, and sink in the kitchenette. It looked more like a hotel room than an apartment. Santana did some research on the building and found out that it was actually a hotel at one point. She thought about finding and killing the landlord but decided against it because her goal in life was to become the first Lopez to go to college, not the sixth to go to prison.
--July 2012 - July 2013--
Rachel and Quinn
In late July, Rachel and Quinn packed theirs and Allie’s bags, boxes, and two beds into a small U-haul trailer attached to Rachel’s dads’ SUV. They said goodbye to Puck and the remainder of those still in Lima, got in Quinn’s car, and left.
Rachel’s cousins’ basement was fairly spacious, there were two bedrooms and a bathroom and a small living area that was already furnished with a couch and a TV. After they moved everything in they took tours of their respective campuses and worked out a babysitting schedule. Rachel’s cousin, Tia, was the self proclaimed “Queen of Charting” and made an Excel spreadsheet of the girls’ classes, Allie’s schedule, babysitting, free time, and family time. Quinn, and Tia’s husband, Dave, were both in the same boat of needing an engineer to decipher the schedule. Actually they needed something better because Dave was in fact an engineer and was still confused.
It took Allie a while to get adjusted to the city. They weren’t in an extremely busy part but it was definitely still louder than Lima. The toddler found her way in to Quinn and Rachel’s bed almost every night and snuggled between the two of them. It was fine for about a week until one night, when the pair thought Allie might actually stay in her room all night, Quinn was getting ready to round third base and the two year old came sprinting into the bedroom and landed almost on top of the pair. The first thing Rachel did the next day was buy a speaker and make a special playlist on her iPod for Allie to sleep to and had Dave put a lock on their bedroom door.
Both Rachel and Quinn got jobs on their campuses. Lucky for them the majority of their educations were covered by scholarships and Puck sent money every month for Allie from his job he got working at the Pick-n-Save while he figured out what he wanted to do for the rest of his life. Most of that went to paying for babysitters. With their incomes both girls wanted to help out Rachel’s cousins with groceries and bills and also start saving for when they moved out on their own. Living in New York City was expensive and they would need every penny they could get. Unfortunately, it meant deciding which holiday break to miss in Lima for since they didn’t expect a spike in gas prices.
“We have to go for winter break,” Rachel said, looking at the pro and con lists they’d made up that were scattered on their living room floor. “And at least a few weeks in the summer.”
“What about Thanksgiving and spring break, though?” Quinn sighed. She looked down at how much they’d allowed for travel expenses.
Rachel shrugged. “We have to pick one, we can’t do both.”
“Thanksgiving is closer.”
“Spring break weather is nicer.”
Quinn nodded. “And there’s not that long between Thanksgiving and winter.”
“Noah can take Allie more during spring so we can study for our finals.”
“Spring break it is,” Quinn said, scribbling down notes on the calendar.
“You should call Noah and tell him. He’s not going to be incredibly enthusiastic about this.”
“He’ll have to get over it, Rach.”
Rachel sighed. “Maybe…maybe we should see how she does with him?”
Quinn looked up at Rachel and snapped the pencil in her hand in half. “If you’re suggesting…”
“Quinn, I love Allie, you know I love her like she is my own daughter but maybe what Noah said was right. We’re both going to school, we both have jobs, I have rehearsals, and we barely get to see each other. It’s only been two months and you’re exhausted. It wouldn’t be a permanent thing it would just-“
“Rachel,” Quinn said calmly, clenching her jaw shut and her knuckles turning white from gripping the now broken pencil so hard. “I’m going to ask you to leave the room now. And I would like to sleep alone tonight.”
“But Quinn I-”
“I really, really need you to leave.”
Rachel nodded and silently stood and headed upstairs. Quinn stared down at the calendar in complete disbelief. She picked up her phone and dialed Santana, the one person she absolutely knew would agree with her.
“What’s up New York?” Santana answered. “You get mugged yet?”
“Hey S,” Quinn said quietly.
“Oh shit, something’s wrong. Let me go get B…”
“No, I need to talk to you. I know you’ll agree with me.”
“You’re fighting with Berry? Duh, I’ll agree with you. Spill it.”
“She wants me to give Allie to Puck while we’re in school.”
There was a silence.
“Santana?”
“Okay, Q, let me just ask you something. How much sleep have you gotten this week?”
Quinn sighed. “I don’t know.”
“Look, I know school is hard. I’m fucking going crazy here with that on top of my job. You have all that plus a kid. You’re definitely getting less sleep than I am and I’m not getting shit.”
“Santana Lopez if you’re telling me that you agree with Rachel I will drive to Chicago and smack you into next week.”
“I’m not saying I agree with her, Q. I’m just saying, you’re exhausted. And there’s a way to fix it.”
“Puck wouldn’t be able to handle her.”
“How do you know that?”
“He went crazy when she wouldn’t stop crying!”
“She was a freakin’ infant, Q! Now she can at least tell him what she wants and he still lives with his mom, right?”
“I can’t believe I’m listening to you. I’m hanging up.”
“Just think about it is all I’m sayi-”
Quinn slammed her cell phone down on the floor and settled her forehead on her knees. Before she could even begin to process Santana’s betrayal she heard a muffled cry come from Allie’s room. Quinn groaned and dragged her feet to the toddler’s bedroom. Allie refused to stop crying when Quinn tried to soothe her. The older blonde begged her daughter to tell her what was wrong but all the two-year-old did was cry more and cling to her mother. Quinn lay in the small bed with her for what seemed like hours rubbing her back and singing to her.
When it seemed like Allie had finally settled down, Quinn moved to get up which prompted a fresh round of tears and the older blonde was close to tears of her own. She’d had six hours of sleep combined in the last two days, Rachel was being horrible, her classes were getting harder the closer she got to mid-terms, and Santana abandoned her. For the first time since moving to the city Quinn briefly thought maybe she’d made a horrible mistake and that Rachel and Santana were right.
Quinn heard footsteps and knew who they belonged to when Allie was being pulled away from her and Rachel’s soft voice was filling the room.
“I’ve got sunshine,” the brunette sang softly, “on a cloudy day. When it’s cold outside, I’ve got the month of May.”
Quinn curled up into a ball and hugged a pillow tight to her chest. The tears started flowing.
“I guess you say, what could make me feel this way?” There was a pause and Quinn looked up just as Rachel looked down at her. “My girls.”
Allie calmed down and stuck her thumb in her mouth and Rachel continued singing and swaying until the toddler was fast asleep. Quinn rolled out of the bed and helped tuck her daughter in. Without a word Rachel wrapped an arm around the blonde’s waist and took her to their bedroom, Quinn collapsed in bed and that was all she remembered until she woke up.
It was cold, was the first thing Quinn noticed. Nothing was pressed up against her. Quinn rolled over to see Rachel curled up on the far corner of the bed and she sighed. She rolled back over to look at her clock and panicked. She was two hours later for her shift in the library. Quinn sprang out of bed and didn’t bother trying to be quiet as she flung open the closet door and started digging through her clothes.
“Come back to bed,” Rachel groaned.
“I’m late for work! Did you shut off my alarm?!” Quinn grabbed a dress and a sweater.
“I called in sick for both of us today. Come back to bed.”
“Rachel! You can’t just do that! We need the money!”
“I can and I did. You need sleep. And no we don’t. Bills are paid for the month.”
Quinn hesitated a moment before dropping her dress and crawling back into bed. She looked over at Rachel who had closed her eyes again and was breathing softly.
“I’m still mad at you,” Quinn sighed, pulling the covers up to her chin.
“Mkay.”
“What you said was completely out of line.”
“I know,” Rachel sighed. “And I’m sorry. I never should have said anything. I’m not her mother, you are. And it’s up to you and I will support you no matter what. Get some sleep.”
Quinn reached out and grabbed onto the hem of Rachel’s shirt and pulled her over to the center of the bed. The brunette curled into her girlfriend and Quinn drifted back to sleep. She woke up alone, the clock indicated she’d slept until almost two and she felt as though she could sleep for another day and a half but the sound of music and giggles coming from the other side of the door coaxed her out of bed. Quinn smiled as she peeked into Allie’s bedroom to see Rachel dancing and Allie attempting to mimic her moves. Quinn swallowed hard and tiptoed back to her bedroom, pulled out her phone and pressed 4, then call.
“Hey Baby Mama, how’s it going?”
“It’s fine, Puck. Listen…we can’t be home for Thanksgiving. It’s too expensive, we don’t have the money for it but I promise I’ll make it up to you on winter break. You can take Allie for an entire week if you want.”
“I told you you’d do this to me! You’re trying to keep her away!”
“No, Puck, please…I swear to you that’s not it. We don’t have the money and both Rachel and I would honestly like to have the week to just do nothing and not have to worry about going anywhere.”
“Fine. But I’m holding you to that week. I’m serious, the whole week. I can handle her.”
“I’m sure you can,” Quinn whispered. “I…Puck if you…” Quinn trailed off.
“What? If I what?”
“Nothing.”
Quinn continued getting very little sleep and by the time winter break rolled around she was sure she was about one step away from pure exhaustion after her finals. She and Rachel took shifts driving back to Lima and they took Allie to Puck’s and then went to the Berry house for what they intended to be a nap but both woke up twelve hours later, ate whatever they could find in the kitchen, then went back to bed and slept for another five hours.
They were both startled awake by Quinn’s cell phone, it was Santana informing her that they were in town and Brittany was dying to get to see them. The pair hauled themselves out of bed and to the restaurant Brittany had selected. Quinn saw Santana’s jaw drop as soon as the pair dropped into their side of the booth.
“You guys look like shit,” the Latina said.
“Thanks for that,” Rachel mumbled.
The waitress came by and both Rachel and Quinn ordered coffee and their breakfasts. Santana and Brittany were staring at them the entire time.
“What?” Quinn finally snapped. “We’re tired, okay?”
Santana shook her head. “No you’re not, you’re exhausted. You look like Sylvester made you run suicides for three days. God, did Rachel hit you or are your dark circles really that bad?”
“Shut up, Santana,” Quinn mumbled.
“I do not approve of domestic violence,” Rachel said. “To insinuate such a thing is-“
“Got it, Berry. You didn’t hit Q. You guys just look like death warmed over.”
“Can we please talk about something else?” Quinn sighed and smiled at the waitress who had returned with their coffee. She and Rachel both immediately started sucking it down.
“How’s Allie?” Brittany asked excitedly. “Those pictures you sent were so cute!”
“She’d with Puck for the week.”
“The week?” Santana furrowed her eyebrows.
Quinn nodded. “Since we didn’t get to come for Thanksgiving I promised Puck he could take her for a week if he wanted to.”
Santana nodded. Quinn knew the Latina could read what she was thinking.
Puck called Quinn every day for that week and Quinn couldn’t help but notice how happy he sounded. She let him keep Allie for an eighth day. Then a ninth. Rachel was the one that demanded Allie wake up at her dads’ house on Christmas morning like she always had so Christmas Eve afternoon Puck dropped her off. Allie seemed rather unimpressed and cried with Puck left; it took Quinn and Rachel two hours to get her calmed down. Once the toddler was napping on the couch Quinn excused herself to her and Rachel’s bedroom and paced the floor.
“Quinn? Quinn what’s wrong?” Rachel crossed the floor and put a hand on the blonde’s shoulder. “You’ve been up here for half an hour.”
“Nothing,” Quinn said. “Nothing’s wrong.” She looked up at Rachel and fake-smiled through her lie. Everything was wrong.
Rachel furrowed her eyebrows. “You’re lying to me. Tell me what’s wrong.”
“I…I’m a horrible mother.”
“Wh-what?”
“When Puck had Allie…God, Rachel…I slept through the night and I felt awake in the morning like I could actually function and I had time to do my reading for next semester without worrying about when I was supposed to work and finding Allie a babysitter and you and I had really good not-tired sex!”
Rachel blushed. “I don’t understand how that makes you a horrible mother.”
“I’m horrible because I want my life to be like that all the time!”
Rachel looked at the ground. “Oh. I…I should help out more.”
“Rachel this isn’t-”
“No,” Rachel cut her off. “I signed up for this, I should be a better parent. I should step up and take more responsibility. I'll find time to do it, I just have to look at the chart and find out where I can take time.”
“That’s…not the solution I’m thinking about.”
Rachel sighed and gently brushed Quinn’s hair back from her face. “You’re thinking about leaving her with Noah, aren’t you?”
“Don’t say it like that,” Quinn shrugged away from Rachel and dropped to the bed. “I’m thinking about letting her spend more time with her father.”
Rachel sat down next to the blonde and softly took her hand. “It’s your decision, Quinn.”
Quinn felt her head move up and down in a nod and she dug into her pocket for her phone and stared at it.
“I should talk to him about it.”
“Quinn you don’t have to do this. I’ll try to find more time to help you…I know you don’t really want this. I was completely out of line to ever suggest it.”
“I’m not just thinking about me, Rachel. Puck can spend more time with her and that’s what she needs. I’m busy working and doing homework and going to school. I can’t give up any of those things. If I could then believe me, I would. I would in a heartbeat. You saw how she was when he dropped her off…he’s probably spent more time with her in the last nine days than I have the entire semester.”
Before Quinn could flip open her phone Rachel’s Dad knocked on the door with a huge smile on his face. “Rachel, Grandpa Berry is here.”
Rachel’s eyes lit up and she grabbed onto Quinn’s hand and tugged her to the door.
“You can call him later, I want you to meet Pop!”
Quinn shrugged and followed along down the stairs and saw Rachel’s Daddy sitting on the couch next to a much older version of himself who was holding a very smiley and happy Allie.
“Pop!” Rachel squealed and darted toward the couch. She practically landed on top of the old man and hugged him. “Why didn’t you tell me he was going to be here, Daddy!?”
“We wanted to surprise you.”
Rachel darted back to Quinn who was still standing at the bottom of the staircase and she pulled her to the couch.
“Pop, this is Quinn. Allies mother and,” Rachel looked over at the tall blonde with a smile, “the love of my life.”
Quinn extended her hand and the old man chuckled and shook it.
“The infamous Quinn Fabray. The way Rachel talked about you I thought you would have levitated down the stairs and turned glasses of water into wine for us.”
Quinn blushed. “Pleased to meet you.” She put off calling Puck for the rest of the day.
Christmas morning was spent with presents for Allie, more presents for Allie, putting together Allie’s presents and then watching her play in the box that her dollhouse came in and completely ignoring the present itself. At one point the toddler curled up inside the box clutching onto a stuffed duck from Brittany and Santana and fell asleep, Rachel and Quinn relaxed against the wall. Rachel’s Pop smiled at the pair and handed Rachel one final, thin flat box to open.
“It’s for the three of you,” he said with a smile.
Rachel opened the box and Quinn furrowed her eyebrows at the singular piece of paper that was inside. The brunette picked it up and unfolded the tri-folded document. Both girls shrieked.
“Pop!”
“Mr. Berry!”
“Oh my God! Pop! What…where…how?!”
The old man chuckled. “Oh, my little Rachel-bear. There are many things you don’t know. Like the day you were born your grandmother started a savings account for you. Every year she put in a little something and after your fathers told me how hard the both of you were working I thought maybe now would be the time to turn it over to you.”
“A little something?!” Rachel gasped. “Pop! This account has over ten thousand dollars in it! That’s not little!”
“I can do the math, Rachel. I know you’re one of several grandchildren on your dad’s side but you’re our only grandchild. Your grandmother, God rest her soul, wanted to make sure you were taken care of if you ever needed anything and thanks to some smart investments, we always had the money to put away. You need this. It’s your money.”
Rachel looked from her grandfather to her girlfriend and to the box that Allie was napping in and then back to her girlfriend.
“You’re quitting your job,” Rachel said.
Quinn could tell by her tone that it wasn’t a polite suggestion. It was a demand.
“What?”
“You said if you could quit your job that you would. You’re quitting and Allie’s coming home with us.”
Before Quinn could answer Rachel had leapt up off the floor and wrapped her arms around her Pop’s neck and was thanking him profusely. Quinn picked up the piece of paper on the ground and stared down at it.
“Rachel, I can’t…this is your money.”
Rachel knelt down next to the blonde and kissed her forehead. “Yes, you can. And no it’s not. It’s ours.”
“No…”
“Okay, fine, it’s my money. And I choose to spend it in a way that allows you to quit your job so you can focus on more important things.”
Quinn looked down at her phone and thought about the fact that Puck was number four on speed-dial and she thought about Rachel’s demand and how much free time she would have. She pushed the phone away and pulled Rachel into her and held on tight.
“I want our baby with us,” she whispered. “I…I can’t leave her here.”
Rachel nodded. “I don’t think I could have either.”
“It was your suggestion.”
“Suggesting something and actually having the capacity to do it are two separate things. I couldn’t have done it. We would’ve figured out a way to make it work.”
So, at Rachel’s insistence, Quinn quit her job when they got back to New York. Rachel still worked at her job in the Julliard library so the account could remain mostly untouched until they absolutely needed it. Quinn was happier because she was able to sleep and spend more time with her daughter and in turn Rachel was happier because Quinn was happier. That and the sex was back to normal.
-*-*-*-*-*-
Rachel had always thought of herself as a good performer. Actually, she thought of herself as a fantastic performer. She’d always excelled at her vocal, dance, and acting classes and was told that if she tried hard enough she would make it. She had the same plan she did when she was five except now on her life storyboard there was a picture of Quinn and Allie glued over the picture of Prince Eric from The Little Mermaid.
Rachel’s aspiration was always to go to Julliard and upon completion, start auditions to transition into Broadway. It was on the storyboard timeline. The fall musical went smashingly even though she only had a minor role. Still, she had a solo and received a standing ovation from the crowd. She really wasn’t nervous about auditions for the spring musical until she stepped out on stage and saw not only the director and his assistants but a man sitting in the audience with a clipboard. She was even more nervous when, after she finished, the man got up and peered over the director’s shoulder and the pair whispered for a while before Rachel was dismissed.
On her way out of the building a few hours later Rachel was stopped by the man she saw in the theater. He was smiling.
“Rachel Berry?”
Rachel nodded. “Yes.”
“Levi Travers. Do you have some time to kill?”
Rachel found herself sitting across from this man at a Starbucks only a few minutes later. He bought her a coffee and a Danish and pushed a business card across the small table at her.
“My colleagues and I are starting the final stages of work on a new production,” Levi started. “Our female lead dropped out and I saw you in the fall musical and showed the tape to the director and he wants you.”
Rachel quirked an eyebrow. “How can I be assured you’re not a fraud?”
Levi chuckled and sipped his coffee. “Would your director have let me in if I were a fraud? He helped with the rest of the casting.”
Convinced, Rachel relaxed a little. She’d heard the director talk about it vaguely with other colleagues, he sounded rather excited and had said the show was already generating a lot of buzz.
“What kind of production? What genre, I mean?” Rachel straightened up her shoulders and sipped her coffee.
“It’s a musical, an original. I suppose you could classify it as a romantic drama. Think of it as a modern day Romeo & Juliet without the tragic ending.” Levi pulled a thick folder out of his bag and slid it across the table. “There’s the script and the music. Everyone we’ve cast so far have been amateurs and unknowns, that’s how we wanted to do it. We’re slated for an Off-Broadway premiere in August if everything goes right. Rehearsals start in June, there’s a contract in that folder as well for you to look over but don’t sign it, it’s just a copy for you to look at, nothing official.”
Rachel looked down at the folder and picked it up cautiously. “Can I think about it? I’d have to talk to…You see, I have a girlfriend.”
“Okay.” Levi took another sip of his coffee.
“And she has a daughter.”
“What’s your point?”
“Assuming all goes well, I would have to drop out of school, wouldn’t I?”
Levi chuckled. “Rachel, you don’t need Julliard. Even your director said it, you could go out and start auditions right now. Give me a call with your decision.” He hopped off his stool and left the coffee shop.
Rachel pulled the thick script out of the folder and started reading.
“Rachel!” Quinn shrieked when the brunette got home. “Where have you been? You were supposed to be home two hours ago, I tried calling and you never answered!”
Rachel was still rather stunned. She hadn’t let go of the business card in her hand and the thick folder was tucked into her backpack. She glanced up at Quinn and swallowed hard.
“I…I got asked to do a show.”
“What?”
Rachel led Quinn downstairs and they sat on the couch as the brunette spilled out the story of her afternoon and dug the script out of her bag and let Quinn thumb through it. Rachel sat in silence and stared at the floor.
“What do you want to do, Rach?” Quinn asked, putting the script down on the coffee table. “It’s your decision.”
“The salary is a significant increase compared to what I’m making right now. However, the rehearsals will be grueling, I won’t have much time for you or Allie for a little while…but once it starts I would only be working nights. I could keep Allie during the days. I fear that if the production doesn’t last, though, that I’ll be stuck without a source of income.”
“We still have most of the money your grandfather gave us. If you did get stuck then we would be fine for a while until we figured out what else to do. Rachel, if you want this then you know I will support you.”
Rachel nodded. “I do…I want this.” She looked up at Quinn and smiled. “This is a once in a lifetime opportunity, Quinn. I may never get another chance.”
“Then do it, Rachel. Sweetie, you’ve done amazing things for Allie and me and you’ve never asked for anything in return. This is what you want to do and I want you to do it. It’s about you now.”
Rachel nodded. “I’m going to do it.”
Rachel stayed with an on-campus job until the rehearsals started and then, with shaking hands, she dropped off her forms to drop out of Julliard and quit her job and she signed the offered contract that Levi passed to her across a conference table. Rachel Berry was officially working on a potential Broadway show.
Part 3