All This Time [2/5]
Title: All This Time
Pairings/Characters: Quinn/Puck, Rachel/Quinn, Rachel/Quinn/Puck friendship, implied Puck/Original Character
Mentions past: Rachel/Finn, Rachel/Puck, Quinn/Others, Puck/Others
Other Minor Characters: Russell & Judy Fabray, Rebekah Fabray Puckerman, New Directions, Rachel's dads - Stan & Alex Berry, other charactersRating: R
Length: ~6,900/ ~30,000 (subject to change)
Summary: AU Quinn Fabray comes to Lima, Ohio and enrolls at McKinley as a seventeen year old senior. She quickly befriends and falls in love with Rachel Berry but Quinn's deepest secret, shared with none other than Noah "Puck" Puckerman, has made her life almost impossible to live and she knows that she and Rachel can never be. However, when Rachel accidentally stumbles upon said secret it turns Quinn's life on its head and she finds herself breaking her own rules of survival to be by Rachel's side.
Part I
-Part II-
The next Monday, Quinn found herself being dragged through the hallway by Puck after she and Rachel went their separate ways from the brunette’s locker. She had been in the process of leaving a nicely visible bruise on Rachel’s neck when Puck interrupted them.
“Dude, what the hell are you doing?” Puck growled after he slammed the classroom door shut.
“I’m dating Rachel, what’s it look like?”
“I saw the way you looked at her, Quinn! You used to look at me that way.”
“Puck…”
“Q, seriously, you know this is dangerous shit. You’re leading her on. Berry is like…when she wants something she doesn’t let up. You can tell her it’s over and she’ll keep coming back to you. I know, trust me.”
Quinn clenched her jaw and growled. “You?”
“I’m a stud. Everyone wants me. We didn’t go all the way or anything, she wouldn’t even let me touch her boobs.”
Quinn smirked and smiled at the memories of the weekend that were still floating around in her brain. “I guess I’m one up on you then.”
Puck shrugged. “I still got your v-card.”
“That is a disgusting term.”
“Listen…just be careful with her. She’ll fall for you and she’ll fall really hard.”
“Puck, I can’t just go on without being with people. Believe it or not, girls have needs, too. And don’t ask, you don’t have a chance.”
Puck smirked. “That’s what you said last time.”
“Yeah, well, last time I was tripping on LSD and had no idea what I was doing.”
“Woodstock was pretty fun, though. You gotta admit.”
-*-*-*-*-*-
August 1969
White Lake, New York
The sixties changed everything, Quinn noticed. She found herself in New York looking at a poster for a huge free concert and she shrugged and figured she might as well. It was something that was sure to at least hit the radar of the history books. She’d fallen into the culture of the late sixties, braiding her hair and wearing headbands, loose shirts and flowing skirts. She decided to let herself go for once and not be so straight laced. And besides, The Who were going to be there and she really did like their sound.
Quinn found a ride to the festival in a van full of hippies and they passed around joints. Quinn took the offered hits and her new found friends laughed at her when she choked the first few times. She just shook her head and tried again and by the time they got to the festival site she had finally gotten the hang of it and one of them was teaching her how to roll up her own joints.
When Quinn stepped out of the van onto the festival grounds it was like nothing she’d ever seen. There were thousands of people in this field and she could hear the music from the sound stage in the front of the crowd. The people she’d traveled with offered her a place to stay and she graciously accepted. They danced and smoked into the evening until someone came around offering what looked to be sugar cubes. Quinn furrowed her eyebrows at the familiar looking young man and gasped as soon as his brown eyes locked on her hazel.
“Quinn…”
“Puck…”
“You’re…at Woodstock. That’s pretty badass.”
Quinn nodded. “How are you?”
“Good babe, how about you?”
“Right now I’m pretty stoned.”
“Sweet.” He smiled a mischievous smile and held out a small cube. “You want to try one?”
“What is it?”
“LSD, babe. It’s pretty awesome. Trip of a lifetime.”
Quinn shrugged. It was about having fun and letting herself go for a little while at least. She figured she might as well throw herself into the experience because she may never get another chance. Puck put a thumb on her chin and opened her mouth and dropped the cube on her tongue. She kept her gaze locked on his as she waited for the trip.
Puck tugged her to the ground and she leaned over against him as she started in on her trip. Her vision began to haze and she placed her hands on the ground on either side of her, eyes widening as it began moving, almost breathing. She felt herself falling backward, and she could see the night sky above her, the stars descending to dance inches above her. The music enveloped her and she smiled as Puck held a hand out. She took it, stepping up onto the rainbow that appeared in the midst of the campground. He led her down the path it made and she giggled at the little men with flowers in their hair holding out marijuana cigarettes. She took one, and tucked it between her lips, twirling and dancing on green and yellow raindrops as she fell into his arms.
“Take me somewhere, Puck…please.”
“You sure, babe?” his voice echoed. Quinn smiled.
“I want you.”
-*-*-*-*-*-
Quinn smiled a little and shook her head. Puck’s face said he’d been lost in the same memory.
“I’ll see you later, Puck.”
“Just…when you leave her then let her down easy, okay?”
Quinn gave an assuring nod. “It’ll all be fine,” she lied.
-*-*-*-*-*-
Quinn kept tutoring Rachel in Spanish but the girl just couldn’t get it. They tried yoga, meditation, anything to get Rachel to relax and roll her “r’s”. The brunette was just incapable, Quinn decided.
“I give up,” Rachel mumbled. “I’ll just fail the oral final and get an A on the written, it’ll average out to a B since the spoken part is only worth twenty-five percent of the entire test.”
Rachel slipped her books into her backpack and sighed. Quinn hated the look of disappointment on the girl’s face so she reached forward and swept Rachel’s hair out of her eyes. She leaned in and pressed the gentlest of kisses onto the brunette’s pouting lips.
“Try again,” Quinn whispered.
Rachel tried, she was a little closer. Quinn kissed her again. Rachel tried once more and she was so close that Quinn could taste it. The blonde kissed her one last time, a little harder than the rest and Rachel’s breath hitched in her throat and with her eyes still closed…she did it.
The brunette’s eyes flew open and Quinn grinned.
“I told you we’d find something to relax you.”
Rachel giggled and pulled Quinn back in for another kiss.
“I suppose you’ll just have to kiss me right before my final.”
“I was planning on doing that anyways.”
As things got deeper with Rachel, Quinn couldn’t help but fall harder. Their first time was when Quinn spent the last night of Hanukkah with the Berrys.
Quinn didn’t think of herself as a slut, really. Like she’d told Puck, she had needs. The number would startle most people but then again, that would be one of the least startling things they could find out about her. However, out of all of the partners she had, something about Rachel was different. It was different like it had been only one other time. It was out of passion and love, not out of primal urge.
When Rachel had fallen asleep Quinn quietly sat up and took one of the blankets with her as she made her way to Rachel’s bedroom window. She kept the blanket held close to her chest as the cold air ran down over her exposed back. She stared out the window at the barely visible by the moon layer of snow that had blanketed Lima. Her thoughts drifted, surprisingly not to a time and place far away from where she was then. Her thoughts, for the first time in a very long time, were focused on the future until her trance was broken by soft lips on her back.
“I thought you were asleep,” Quinn whispered. She leaned back into Rachel’s small body and smiled.
“I got cold, someone took the blanket away.” Rachel tugged at the blanket clutched to Quinn’s chest and pulled it around where it was covering both of them. “Tell me about these,” the brunette whispered as she kissed over another scar.
“Maybe someday,” Quinn sighed. “You wouldn’t believe me if I told you now.”
-*-*-*-*-*-
October 8, 1871
Chicago, Illinois
Quinn grumbled as she picked up her things that she’d dropped when someone had knocked into her. She knew the O’Learys would be angry that she was late with their things that Catherine had asked her to pick up from the market but there was really nothing else she could do. She picked up the breads and yards of fabric before carefully making her way down DeKoven street toward the Irish family’s barn. She’d been working for them for about three weeks in exchange for a room in their home and taking care of their young son and daughter.
Late that night after having been lectured by Mrs. O’Leary on being responsible and how the woman had taken her into her home and expected her to do as she was asked Quinn quietly retreated to her room after putting the children to bed. She read a few chapters in her copy of the brand new Through the Looking Glass, and What Alice Found There. She giggled at the images of what a “bread-and-butterfly” might look like when she smelled it. She smelled smoke. It wasn’t the same as what the stove in the kitchen would smell of. She closed her book and went to her window to look out back and gasped at what she saw.
There were orange and yellow flames engulfing the O’Leary’s barn and men shouting about retrieving the fire brigade. Quinn could practically feel the heat off of them and she grabbed her bag from underneath her bed and quickly started shoving her belongings in it. She slung it over her shoulder and went to the children’s room where she met Catherine. Quinn hoisted James on her hip and Catherine picked up Anna and they quickly ran through the streets. Quinn turned back to see the rear of the O’Leary’s house beginning to catch fire. She gasped at the thought of what she left behind and dropped her bag and handed James off to Mrs. O’Leary. The woman screamed after her but Quinn took off running.
The blonde made it into the house, the air was thick with smoke. She got to her small bedroom and started rummaging around in her chest of drawers. There was the sound of glass breaking and Quinn screamed at the stabbing pains in her back as the shards hit her but she carried on looking. She finally found it, that little gold ball, rolling around in one of her bottom drawers. She grasped the ball in her hand and hurried out of the house. The upper part of the sleeve of her dress caught fire on the way and she quickly put it out, the burns were merely pink flesh by the time she reached Catherine and the children again. The Irish woman pulled two shards of glass out of Quinn’s back when they got out of the city. Lucky for Quinn, Catherine was too stunned by the fire to notice how quickly the wounds healed.
Quinn camped with the O’Learys outside of the city. She watched as the massive flames engulfed the buildings and the majority of Chicago was left in absolute ruin. She tended to the wounded, just as she had done during the war and she saw more death and more infection. When the excitement had died down, Quinn said her goodbyes to the O’Learys and tried to figure out where to go next.
-*-*-*-*-*-
“I love you, Quinn,” Rachel whispered as she pressed another kiss to the scars. “Whenever you’re ready.”
“I love you, too.”
Unlike the countless number of times she’d said it to others who she knew she could leave when she had to…she meant it when she said it to Rachel. And that meant trouble. But Quinn had enough of being cautious. She had enough of lying. She had enough. And she knew she could trust Rachel but the problem was trying to figure out how to tell her.
-*-*-*-*-*-
Quinn made her way through the school library in search of Rachel. Winter break had only been over for a few days, Quinn had spent plenty more time at the Berry house for the duration of it. Rachel’s dads again offered their home to her but Quinn again denied.
The blonde found her girlfriend at one of the computers scrolling through what looked to be like extremely old pictures on some website. Quinn dropped to the seat next to her and pecked her on the cheek.
“How’s the paper going, sweetie?”
“Not bad,” Rachel said with a grin. She turned her head and put her fingertips underneath Quinn’s chin and pulled her in for a proper kiss. “I’ll be glad to have it over with. I can’t believe we’re only a few short months away from graduation, it’s so exciting!”
Quinn smiled a little. “Yeah, exciting.”
Rachel turned her attention back to the computer screen and Quinn pulled out her periodic table of elements to study the elements that had been added since the last time she was in school. She jotted down the numbers and symbols on index cards to use later and listened to Rachel type on the computer and scroll up and down. She only looked away from her work when she heard Rachel gasp a little.
“What’s the matter, Rach?”
Rachel swallowed hard and Quinn watched the color drain from the girl’s face as she stared at the computer screen. Quinn tore her eyes away from her girlfriend and to the screen. Her stomach dropped. On the screen was a very, very old photograph, and she was looking at herself, Puck in uniform, and another nurse. Her eyes darted to the caption.
“Two Union nurses and a Union soldier during the American Civil War. Photograph circa 1864.”
Quinn only looked away from the computer screen when she heard Rachel hit the floor. The blonde got the attention of the librarian and exited out of Rachel’s internet window while the woman went back to the desk to call the nurse.
“I’m so sorry, Rachel,” Quinn whispered as she pressed a kiss to the girl’s forehead.
Quinn quickly packed up her bags and snuck out of the library to search the hallways for Puck who was nowhere to be found. She ran out of the school to the football field where she spotted him chatting with Finn near one of the benches.
“Hey Quinn,” they greeted her in unison.
Quinn smiled and grasped onto Puck’s forearm. “We need to talk. Now.”
Puck shrugged and Quinn pulled him toward the bleachers.
“What’s up?”
“Rachel knows.”
“What?”
“Rachel, she knows.”
“You mean…how the hell?!”
By the time Quinn finished explaining what had happened in the library Puck looked almost as pale as Rachel had. He rubbed his forehead and took a few deep breaths.
“So…what are you gonna do?”
“I don’t know! We’ve never…I mean, this has never happened! I was planning on telling her sometime but not yet!”
“Do you trust her?”
“Yes,” Quinn whispered. “I do.”
“Then maybe you should just go ahead and tell her. Tell her everything. I don’t have a problem with it, she’s a good person even if she is a little irritating.”
Quinn swallowed hard and nodded. This was it. Puck wrapped his arms around her for a quick hug and kissed the top of her head.
“Let me know how it goes.”
The blonde sighed as she pulled away and gripped the strap of her backpack and headed back to the school building. She made her way to the nurse’s office and stepped inside. Before she could get the words out of her mouth the nurse pointed over to the bed in the corner where Rachel’s small body was. Quinn pulled a chair over and dropped her bag. She took a deep breath before she sat down and took the girl’s hand in hers. Rachel stirred a little at the contact and Quinn’s heart started racing.
“Quinn?”
“I’m right here.”
Rachel locked eyes with Quinn and Quinn could see the wheels in the girl’s head turning.
“We’re not going to talk about it right now,” Quinn said before Rachel had a chance to open her mouth. “We’ll talk about it tonight. I need some time to figure out what to say.”
Rachel nodded and Quinn waited with her until Alex picked them up. Rachel was silent the entire car ride home and Quinn stared at her lap and tried to figure out how to explain everything. Out of all the things she’d done in her life, this was probably in her top five of the hardest.
They arrived at the Berry house much too quickly and Quinn followed Rachel upstairs to her bedroom. Alex kissed the top of Rachel’s head and thanked Quinn for staying with her before he headed back to work. Rachel crawled up on her bed and sat at the headboard, Quinn took her place in front of the brunette. She reached out to take Rachel’s hands and the brunette recoiled a little and pulled her knees up to her chest to hug them. Quinn sighed.
“What do you want to know?”
Rachel trembled a little. “I…I don’t know.”
“Okay…let’s start with the basics. I’m not really seventeen. I’m a hundred and sixty-eight.”
Rachel shook her head. “That’s impossible. Obviously…that picture was…was photoshopped.”
“It wasn’t. And you know it wasn’t. You wouldn’t have actually fainted if you really believed that.”
“So…let’s assume I believe you. How did this happen?”
Quinn took yet another deep breath and spoke the words out loud that she never thought she’d ever tell anyone. “It started the spring before I turned sixteen…”
-*-*-*-*-*-
April 1859
Savannah, Georgia
Quinn sprinted through the fields and hit the forest edge and stared into the darkness. Even on the verge of turning sixteen she still never dared venture into the forest. She shouldn’t have been running through the fields at that age anyway but there was still that little bit of her that was ten years old that loved to run and have sugar cookies when she returned home.
She stared into the forest, just as she had always done. As always, she wondered what could be looming inside and she never found out. She would always turn back to the house. On this day, though, something rustled. She jumped a little and peered harder.
“Hello?” she called.
“Yeah?” a voice called back.
“Who’s there? This is my father’s property, you know! You could be arrested!”
The voice chuckled. A young man with dark hair and dark eyes emerged from the forest slowly. There was a bag slung over his shoulder and he had a smile on his face.
“So you’re a Fabray?” he asked.
Quinn nodded. “Quinn.”
“Noah Puckerman. Everyone calls me Puck.” He extended his hand and Quinn took it. The tenderness of his grasp shocked the blonde a little.
“That’s an unusual last name, Puck. I’ve never heard it.”
“I’m from up north.”
Quinn gasped. “A Yankee?”
“I don’t care either way,” he said. “I’m just looking for work.”
“Perhaps my father could give you work. If you’ll come with me I could ask him.”
Puck smiled and followed Quinn through the fields. She talked about life on the plantation. He talked about his father leaving his family and how he was to send money to his mother and sister. When he pleaded his case to Quinn’s father and the importance of family to him the older man showed sympathy and hired Puck as a house boy.
It wasn’t long before the summer affair started. Quinn’s father was adamant in his disapproval of Quinn courting a boy that was not only just a houseboy but a “damn Yankee” as well. The pair took to meeting in the shadows near the forest and in closets while Puck was working. Quinn was in love, she was so in love that she would have given up anything to spend forever with the young man.
-*-*-*-*-*-
October 1859
Savannah, Georgia
Quinn paced back and forth in the parlor nervously wringing her hands. Puck sat on one of the chairs with his head buried in his hands.
“You’re sure?” he asked for the third time. “Really sure?”
“Yes! I told you!”
“I should ask your father for your hand. If we get married right now…”
“He’ll say no. He doesn’t think you’re good enough for me.”
“That’s…”
“You’re a house boy, Puck. I have to marry a plantation owner or his son or someone of equal wealth, don’t you understand? And for goodness sake, there is no way he’ll let me marry a Yankee! I’m certain he could look beyond the wealth but a Yankee? He’d rather I die a lonely old spinster.”
“Damn Yankees!” Russell Fabray’s voice boomed through the house. “I knew it! I told Johnson last week they were trying to start trouble, I said it!”
Puck stood and grabbed his jacket from the back of the couch and hurried out of the parlor.
“What’s the matter, Daddy?” Quinn asked sweetly, putting on her best smile.
“Nothing, Quinnie. Nothing a young lady needs to worry her head about.”
“Daddy, I know I’m a young lady but I like to know what’s going on.”
“This Yankee, John Brown, he’s a radical and trying to destroy how we do things around here. He’s tried to raid Harper’s Ferry to steal our ammunition to give to some slaves to lead a revolt. Colonel Lee put a stop to it before things got out of control but,” Russell sighed and rubbed his forehead, “I have a feeling this isn’t the last time we’ll hear about these things.”
“Daddy, I’m sure there’s nothing to worry about,” Quinn tried to assure her father. “It’s just some troublemakers.”
Russell chuckled. “You wouldn’t understand, Quinnie. Where’s that house boy? I need a drink.”
“I think Pu--Noah went to the kitchen. Why don’t you approve of him courting me, Daddy?”
“I’ve told you, he’s not good enough. And he’s a Yankee.”
“He says he doesn’t care either way.”
“He was born a Yankee. Blood says everything. Why don’t you go on upstairs and take a nap?”
Quinn sighed and nodded. “Of course, Daddy.”
When she was awoken from her nap by her mother, Quinn stood patiently as the woman laced up her dress and sighed disapprovingly.
“I’m going to ask Mary to stop giving you so many sweets,” Judy Fabray said. “You’ve gained two inches on your waist.”
Quinn nodded. “Noah would be a good father,” she whispered.
Her mother didn’t say anything.
-*-*-*-*-*-
The way her father found out was by complete accident.
“You can’t hide it forever,” Puck hissed. “That’s my child, our child! You’re carrying our child and I want to marry you!”
There was a deafening silence as Quinn looked over Puck’s shoulder to her father who was standing in the doorway. He calmly walked to the cabinet in the corner of the parlor and produced a Smith & Wesson pistol.
“Daddy,” Quinn’s voice quivered.
Puck spun around just as Russell raised the firearm. The younger of the two took off in a sprint out of the parlor and front door, Quinn chased after him but was held back by her father who shut the door loudly.
“What do you have to say for yourself?”
“I…” Quinn looked up into the stern eyes of her father and she winced at the grip he had on her arm. “I’m so sorry…He’ll marry me, he’s said he’ll do it…”
Russell shook his head. “Go pack your things.”
“Daddy…why? Where?”
“Go pack them.” He let go of her arm and returned the pistol to its cabinet. “And leave.”
Quinn did as she always did and she obeyed her father’s orders. She packed a few simple dresses in a bag along with what little money she had when she descended the staircase she looked into the parlor to see her father standing with his hands on the mantelpiece staring up at their family portrait.
“Daddy, please…”
“Go,” he said. “You’ve embarrassed me.” He shook his head. “Damn Yankees,” she heard him mutter as she shut the front door.
Quinn found herself walking toward Savannah with her small bag and she found her way to the train depot and sat on one of the benches, unsure of where to go or what to do. She watched people board the train that was apparently destined for Charleston. She listened to the station master call out times and she waited. For what, she was unsure of.
“Quinn!” she heard the familiar voice from a distance.
Puck was suddenly in front of her and he pulled her into his arms.
“Come on,” he said. “We’re getting on that train.”
“I don’t have a ticket.”
“We don’t need one, come on.”
Puck led her to the freight car attached to the passenger train and hoisted her up into the box. Quinn looked around at the various crates and barrels that were tightly packed. She carefully took a seat on one of the crates and Puck shut the large sliding door. There was a little light coming in through the gaps in the boards but otherwise it was mostly dark.
“Will we stay in Charleston?” Quinn whispered. She sniffled and wiped away the tears she felt escaping her eyes.
“No,” Puck answered. “We’ll keep going until we get to Virginia, around Manassas, where my mother and sister live. We’ll get married and I’ll take care of you, okay? I promise I’ll do whatever I have to.”
Quinn nodded.
-*-*-*-*-*-
July 21, 1861
Just outside of Centreville, Virginia
“Puck, they’re getting closer!” Quinn whimpered when she heard the rifle fire.
Quinn was standing on the small front porch of the small one-room house that Puck had built by hand on a few acres of land he’d purchased from the man he was working for. Immediately after they got to Manassas they were married and lived with Puck’s mother and sister until Puck found work. They’d lived in an even smaller worker’s house while Puck built their own in his spare time. After he was finished in the fields of his employer’s land he would come home and tend their own small fields. His mother taught Quinn how to cook with what little they could afford and when their daughter came she was the midwife who brought the girl into the world and showed Quinn everything she needed to know about being a mother.
Rebekah, with her small doll Quinn had made from extra quilting material, cautiously walked out onto the small porch and clung onto Quinn’s leg. The blonde picked up her small daughter and kissed her head. Puck was right behind her a few seconds later and he wrapped an arm around Quinn’s waist.
“It’ll be fine,” he assured her.
Quinn let out an uneasy sigh and went back into the house to read her Bible to Rebekah. As the hours progressed the shots were getting louder and Quinn didn’t miss the nervous look on Puck’s face as he got up and looked out the door several times. He took his rifle down from above the door and began cleaning it. There was a pause in the firing for a while, Quinn got up that time and looked out the door, she could see nothing.
“See?” Puck said. “Nothing to worry about.”
He lifted Rebekah on his hip and stepped out onto the front porch with a smile. He walked out off the porch and into the grass. Quinn smiled a little as her husband let the tiny blonde down to run around and he chased after her.
Quinn squinted when she saw something, several somethings in gray, coming toward her and she yelled for Puck and ran toward Rebekah but several shots ringing out stopped her dead in her tracks. It wasn’t the sound that stopped her, though. It was the sight. Her heart throbbed in her ears as she watched Puck drop to his knees next to their daughter.
“No,” he whispered. “NO!” The second was a shout. Quinn couldn’t move.
-*-*-*-*-*-
“I think we should leave,” Puck said as he stared out the window.
It had been three weeks. Three silent weeks in their small house. Quinn mostly stared at the empty small bed that was next to her own. She went through the actions of an obedient housewife, cleaning, cooking, sewing, but inside she was completely numb.
“I can’t leave her,” Quinn mumbled.
“It’s just a grave. There’s nothing to leave.”
“It’s more than a grave…”
“Things are getting worse,” Puck said. “More dangerous. We need to leave.”
-*-*-*-*-*-
October 1861
Titusville, Pennsylvania
Quinn sighed as she stirred the pot hovering over the fireplace in the small worker’s house. She shivered and wrapped her shawl around her shoulders even tighter. The sun was setting and Puck would be in soon from his job at the oil well and as a good wife she needed to have his supper ready. She pulled the kettle of hot water off of the fire and poured it into the wash basin on the countertop put out the soap and a towel. She refilled the kettle from the shared pump outside the house, making small talk with the other wives, and put it back on the stove to use for dishwater later. Right on time, Puck came in and started scrubbing his arms and face, trying to remove as much of the oil as he could.
“How was your day?” Quinn asked quietly as she took two bowls from the cabinet.
“Interesting,” Puck said. “I have something to show you.”
Quinn ladled the soup into the bowls and set each one at the table. While Puck finished washing she sliced a few pieces of bread and set them out with glasses of milk.
“After supper,” she said. “You need to eat, they’re working you to the bone. You look exhausted.”
Quinn sat across from her husband and they silently ate their meal by the glow of the fireplace. When Puck was finished Quinn took his bowl to their larger wash basin and poured hot water in it and scrubbed the dishes while he threw out his water from the wash basin he’d used earlier. Quinn smiled appreciatively when he returned and he kissed the top of her head before settling into his rocking chair. After the dishes were washed and dried, Quinn joined him in her own chair and went to work on repairing a hole in one of Puck’s shirts.
“I want to show you something,” Puck stated again.
Quinn looked up at her husband and watched him dig around in his pocket and he produced a small gold ball.
“I stepped on this on my way home,” he said.
Quinn furrowed her eyebrows. The ball was peculiar, it was simply a ball but there was almost a glow about it. And it was gold. Very shiny gold.
“What is it?”
“I don’t know but when I picked it up…I don’t know. It was strange.”
Quinn held out her hand cautiously. “May I?”
Puck dropped the ball into Quinn’s hand and she immediately knew why it was strange. The ball wasn’t heavy as she expected it to be but very light, almost too light. She felt a warmth come over her and she got slightly dizzy. She felt very tired yet not and she felt her eyelids become a little heavy.
“It is…very strange,” she said. The warmth soon dissipated but the tiredness stayed. “What do you suppose it’s made of?”
“Gold, the outside at least,” Puck said. “I don’t know about the rest.”
Quinn handed the ball back to her husband. “Perhaps you should take it into a jeweler.”
“I will next time I go to the city,” Puck said. He got up and went to their bed and pulled out the small wooden chest from underneath it and dropped the ball in.
The first time Quinn noticed something odd was the next afternoon when she was slicing herself a piece of bread to have with her soup at lunch. The knife hit her finger as it did every so often. The initial pain was normal and Quinn immediately reached for a rag. The problem was, when she looked down at her finger the wound was there but there was only a little blood oozing out. She furrowed her eyebrows and dabbed at it, the blood came off on the towel. It had felt like a deep cut and at first sight it looked a little deep but there was very little blood. Right before her eyes the wound got less deep and only a couple of minutes ticked by before it was completely healed. Quinn dropped into her chair and stared at the small scar.
“Impossible,” she whispered to herself.
Puck burst into the cabin and Quinn jumped, her thoughts breaking away from the small scar on her finger. He stood in the doorway and looked at her.
“I should be dead,” was all he said.
Quinn swallowed hard. “What?”
“I fell from the back of one of the wagons. I landed on my neck, Quinn. Everyone heard the snap, I felt the snap…but I got up and walked it off. I should be dead, I’ve seen men land like I did and they broke their necks and died on the spot.”
Quinn’s eyes darted back to the scar on her finger. “Something happened to me, too.”
When she finished explaining her story, Puck’s eyes darted to the kitchen knife sitting by the loaf of bread and he quickly cross the floor and held it in his hand. He trembled as he pressed the tip of the blade into his other arm. Quinn watched, wide eyed, as blood barely oozed out. She dabbed away the blood and just as hers had done earlier, Puck’s healed leaving only a scar.
“What the hell is going on?” he said under his breath.
Quinn glanced over at their bed and hurried across the floor and dropped to her knees on Puck’s side. She pulled out the small box and opened it. The small glowing ball was still glowing. Quinn carefully picked it up and held it in her hands.
“You think so?” Puck asked.
“What else could it be?”
“So what do we do?”
“I don’t know.”
“We could sell it…”
“No!” Quinn shrieked. “Puck…we don’t know what it can do…”
“Obviously it makes us not die.”
“The consequences of this… the consequences could be disastrous if anyone were to find out.”
“They can’t kill us.”
“We mustn’t tell anyone.” Quinn dropped the ball back in the box. “Perhaps it will wear off. In a week or so, maybe.” She grabbed her Bible and sat in her chair in front of the fireplace. “You should go back to work, they’ll dock your pay.”
“That’s it? We just found out that we can’t die and you want me to go back to work?”
“If you’d like something other than flour and water for your suppers then yes, you should go back to work.”
Puck did go back to work. One week passed then two and three and then a month. They spoke of it a few times, wondering what would happen in the future. Would they age? What would the future hold? They tried everything to destroy the little ball in hopes that it would somehow lift whatever had been cast upon them. It floated. It didn’t burn. They buried it and it was sticking out of the surface of the ground only hours later. Puck tried hitting it with hammer and it didn’t even scratch. They kept reading news of the war and every time Puck would pick up the knife and poke himself and heal instantly Quinn knew more and more of what he was thinking.
“I’m joining,” he said two months after their discovery. “I’m joining the Union and I’m getting revenge.”
“Puck…”
“I can’t die! Why shouldn’t I?!”
“Keep your voice down!” Quinn hissed.
“I should do this, Quinn.”
“Puck…I…I love you, I don’t want you to leave.”
“Come with me! I read all the time that they need nurses and cooks. You know how to do that.”
“I don’t know anything of being a nurse!”
“You could learn. The doctors will teach you. I’m going whether you do or not.”
“Fine,” Quinn sighed. “We’ll go.”
-*-*-*-*-*-
Rachel’s eyes were wide and Quinn tried her best to keep her own locked with Rachel’s even though she wanted desperately to look anywhere else.
“So,” Rachel breathed, “to recap your story, you and Noah had a daughter, conceived out of wedlock, who was killed during the First Battle of Bull Run in the Civil War. And afterwards you found a glowing ball that somehow made you immortal and you’re trapped as a seventeen year old for the rest of eternity?”
“Actually I was eighteen but I say seventeen for school. Other than that, yes, that about sums it up.”
“Okay. I see a few possibilities here. You’re certifiably insane and I should have you committed to a psychiatric hospital or you’re lying or I’m certifiably insane and should be committed to a hospital…or you’re telling the truth.”
“I can prove it.”
Quinn watched Rachel watch her as she got off the bed and go through her backpack. She pulled out her small pocket knife and flipped open the blade.
“Quinn…”
“I’ll be fine.”
Quinn took a deep breath and touched the metal to the palm of her hand and made sure Rachel watched as she pressed deep and dragged it along her skin. Quinn twitched a little at the initial pain, it was always the same. She folded the knife back up and dropped it to her backpack and Rachel stared at the palm of her hand as a few drops of blood oozed out. Quinn swallowed hard and blinked a few times and when she looked down at her hand there was nothing but a faint scar. Rachel squeaked and her jaw dropped.
“So either you’re crazy or I’m telling the truth,” Quinn said. She clutched her lower lip nervously between her teeth awaiting Rachel’s reaction.
Rachel nodded slowly which turned into shaking her head. “It’s impossible.”
“Yeah, it is.”
Quinn held her hand out and Rachel carefully took it and traced her fingers over the faint scar. She pressed a kiss to Quinn’s palm and swallowed hard.
“I believe you,” Rachel whispered.
Rachel pulled Quinn down to the bed, the blonde settled on top of her girlfriend and kissed her forehead.
“I love you, Rachel.” Quinn pulled away and sat back on her knees. Rachel followed her and Quinn kept her forehead pressed against her lover’s. “I love you…but more importantly, I trust you. I trust you with this. You can’t tell anyone. You can talk to Puck about it but you cannot tell anyone. Not your dads…not anyone. Promise me, Rachel.”
Rachel nodded. “I promise.”
Quinn dropped her head and pressed her lips against Rachel’s, the brunette understood it was to seal the promise. The rest of the afternoon was just for fun.
Basking in the afterglow, Rachel pressed a kiss to the scar on Quinn’s ribcage. Quinn told her the story of Pearl Harbor.
“It was utter chaos,” she whispered. “No one knew what to do because it just…it happened and it was the first time it had ever happened. We had drills to train us but nothing prepared us for it. We were scrambling around having to pick who to save and who to let go. That was the last time I ever enlisted. I almost wanted to for Vietnam…but I couldn’t. Not after I saw what was going on over there.”
“How did you manage to enlist, Quinn? Surely your birth records…”
“Fabricated. Just like everything else. It’s getting more difficult to do since almost everything is done on computers. This might be the last time I ever go to school, I really don’t know. I just do what I need to do at the time.”
Before Rachel could open her mouth they heard the slam of the front door and Rachel pressed a soft kiss over the tattoo on Quinn’s chest before the pair got out of bed to search for their discarded clothes. Rachel’s dads offered once again for Quinn to move in with them and this time, the blonde nodded.
The next day at glee club, Quinn watched as Rachel cautiously approached Puck. He glanced at Quinn then back at Rachel. A few soft words were exchanged and Rachel hugged him before rejoining Quinn. Puck didn’t talk much for the remainder of rehearsal, Quinn found him after school out on the football field staring off into space. She sat with him for a few minutes and rested her head on his shoulder.
“It doesn’t get easier,” he finally mumbled.
“No,” Quinn sighed. “It doesn’t.”
“So Berry knows everything?”
Quinn nodded. “The beginning, anyway.”
“You’re really in love with her?”
Quinn nodded again. “Yeah.”
“You were really in love with me, too.”
“I know I was, Puck.”
“What if she wants to…”
“I don’t know.”
Part III
Pairings/Characters: Quinn/Puck, Rachel/Quinn, Rachel/Quinn/Puck friendship, implied Puck/Original Character
Mentions past: Rachel/Finn, Rachel/Puck, Quinn/Others, Puck/Others
Other Minor Characters: Russell & Judy Fabray, Rebekah Fabray Puckerman, New Directions, Rachel's dads - Stan & Alex Berry, other charactersRating: R
Length: ~6,900/ ~30,000 (subject to change)
Summary: AU Quinn Fabray comes to Lima, Ohio and enrolls at McKinley as a seventeen year old senior. She quickly befriends and falls in love with Rachel Berry but Quinn's deepest secret, shared with none other than Noah "Puck" Puckerman, has made her life almost impossible to live and she knows that she and Rachel can never be. However, when Rachel accidentally stumbles upon said secret it turns Quinn's life on its head and she finds herself breaking her own rules of survival to be by Rachel's side.
Part I
-Part II-
The next Monday, Quinn found herself being dragged through the hallway by Puck after she and Rachel went their separate ways from the brunette’s locker. She had been in the process of leaving a nicely visible bruise on Rachel’s neck when Puck interrupted them.
“Dude, what the hell are you doing?” Puck growled after he slammed the classroom door shut.
“I’m dating Rachel, what’s it look like?”
“I saw the way you looked at her, Quinn! You used to look at me that way.”
“Puck…”
“Q, seriously, you know this is dangerous shit. You’re leading her on. Berry is like…when she wants something she doesn’t let up. You can tell her it’s over and she’ll keep coming back to you. I know, trust me.”
Quinn clenched her jaw and growled. “You?”
“I’m a stud. Everyone wants me. We didn’t go all the way or anything, she wouldn’t even let me touch her boobs.”
Quinn smirked and smiled at the memories of the weekend that were still floating around in her brain. “I guess I’m one up on you then.”
Puck shrugged. “I still got your v-card.”
“That is a disgusting term.”
“Listen…just be careful with her. She’ll fall for you and she’ll fall really hard.”
“Puck, I can’t just go on without being with people. Believe it or not, girls have needs, too. And don’t ask, you don’t have a chance.”
Puck smirked. “That’s what you said last time.”
“Yeah, well, last time I was tripping on LSD and had no idea what I was doing.”
“Woodstock was pretty fun, though. You gotta admit.”
-*-*-*-*-*-
August 1969
White Lake, New York
The sixties changed everything, Quinn noticed. She found herself in New York looking at a poster for a huge free concert and she shrugged and figured she might as well. It was something that was sure to at least hit the radar of the history books. She’d fallen into the culture of the late sixties, braiding her hair and wearing headbands, loose shirts and flowing skirts. She decided to let herself go for once and not be so straight laced. And besides, The Who were going to be there and she really did like their sound.
Quinn found a ride to the festival in a van full of hippies and they passed around joints. Quinn took the offered hits and her new found friends laughed at her when she choked the first few times. She just shook her head and tried again and by the time they got to the festival site she had finally gotten the hang of it and one of them was teaching her how to roll up her own joints.
When Quinn stepped out of the van onto the festival grounds it was like nothing she’d ever seen. There were thousands of people in this field and she could hear the music from the sound stage in the front of the crowd. The people she’d traveled with offered her a place to stay and she graciously accepted. They danced and smoked into the evening until someone came around offering what looked to be sugar cubes. Quinn furrowed her eyebrows at the familiar looking young man and gasped as soon as his brown eyes locked on her hazel.
“Quinn…”
“Puck…”
“You’re…at Woodstock. That’s pretty badass.”
Quinn nodded. “How are you?”
“Good babe, how about you?”
“Right now I’m pretty stoned.”
“Sweet.” He smiled a mischievous smile and held out a small cube. “You want to try one?”
“What is it?”
“LSD, babe. It’s pretty awesome. Trip of a lifetime.”
Quinn shrugged. It was about having fun and letting herself go for a little while at least. She figured she might as well throw herself into the experience because she may never get another chance. Puck put a thumb on her chin and opened her mouth and dropped the cube on her tongue. She kept her gaze locked on his as she waited for the trip.
Puck tugged her to the ground and she leaned over against him as she started in on her trip. Her vision began to haze and she placed her hands on the ground on either side of her, eyes widening as it began moving, almost breathing. She felt herself falling backward, and she could see the night sky above her, the stars descending to dance inches above her. The music enveloped her and she smiled as Puck held a hand out. She took it, stepping up onto the rainbow that appeared in the midst of the campground. He led her down the path it made and she giggled at the little men with flowers in their hair holding out marijuana cigarettes. She took one, and tucked it between her lips, twirling and dancing on green and yellow raindrops as she fell into his arms.
“Take me somewhere, Puck…please.”
“You sure, babe?” his voice echoed. Quinn smiled.
“I want you.”
-*-*-*-*-*-
Quinn smiled a little and shook her head. Puck’s face said he’d been lost in the same memory.
“I’ll see you later, Puck.”
“Just…when you leave her then let her down easy, okay?”
Quinn gave an assuring nod. “It’ll all be fine,” she lied.
-*-*-*-*-*-
Quinn kept tutoring Rachel in Spanish but the girl just couldn’t get it. They tried yoga, meditation, anything to get Rachel to relax and roll her “r’s”. The brunette was just incapable, Quinn decided.
“I give up,” Rachel mumbled. “I’ll just fail the oral final and get an A on the written, it’ll average out to a B since the spoken part is only worth twenty-five percent of the entire test.”
Rachel slipped her books into her backpack and sighed. Quinn hated the look of disappointment on the girl’s face so she reached forward and swept Rachel’s hair out of her eyes. She leaned in and pressed the gentlest of kisses onto the brunette’s pouting lips.
“Try again,” Quinn whispered.
Rachel tried, she was a little closer. Quinn kissed her again. Rachel tried once more and she was so close that Quinn could taste it. The blonde kissed her one last time, a little harder than the rest and Rachel’s breath hitched in her throat and with her eyes still closed…she did it.
The brunette’s eyes flew open and Quinn grinned.
“I told you we’d find something to relax you.”
Rachel giggled and pulled Quinn back in for another kiss.
“I suppose you’ll just have to kiss me right before my final.”
“I was planning on doing that anyways.”
As things got deeper with Rachel, Quinn couldn’t help but fall harder. Their first time was when Quinn spent the last night of Hanukkah with the Berrys.
Quinn didn’t think of herself as a slut, really. Like she’d told Puck, she had needs. The number would startle most people but then again, that would be one of the least startling things they could find out about her. However, out of all of the partners she had, something about Rachel was different. It was different like it had been only one other time. It was out of passion and love, not out of primal urge.
When Rachel had fallen asleep Quinn quietly sat up and took one of the blankets with her as she made her way to Rachel’s bedroom window. She kept the blanket held close to her chest as the cold air ran down over her exposed back. She stared out the window at the barely visible by the moon layer of snow that had blanketed Lima. Her thoughts drifted, surprisingly not to a time and place far away from where she was then. Her thoughts, for the first time in a very long time, were focused on the future until her trance was broken by soft lips on her back.
“I thought you were asleep,” Quinn whispered. She leaned back into Rachel’s small body and smiled.
“I got cold, someone took the blanket away.” Rachel tugged at the blanket clutched to Quinn’s chest and pulled it around where it was covering both of them. “Tell me about these,” the brunette whispered as she kissed over another scar.
“Maybe someday,” Quinn sighed. “You wouldn’t believe me if I told you now.”
-*-*-*-*-*-
October 8, 1871
Chicago, Illinois
Quinn grumbled as she picked up her things that she’d dropped when someone had knocked into her. She knew the O’Learys would be angry that she was late with their things that Catherine had asked her to pick up from the market but there was really nothing else she could do. She picked up the breads and yards of fabric before carefully making her way down DeKoven street toward the Irish family’s barn. She’d been working for them for about three weeks in exchange for a room in their home and taking care of their young son and daughter.
Late that night after having been lectured by Mrs. O’Leary on being responsible and how the woman had taken her into her home and expected her to do as she was asked Quinn quietly retreated to her room after putting the children to bed. She read a few chapters in her copy of the brand new Through the Looking Glass, and What Alice Found There. She giggled at the images of what a “bread-and-butterfly” might look like when she smelled it. She smelled smoke. It wasn’t the same as what the stove in the kitchen would smell of. She closed her book and went to her window to look out back and gasped at what she saw.
There were orange and yellow flames engulfing the O’Leary’s barn and men shouting about retrieving the fire brigade. Quinn could practically feel the heat off of them and she grabbed her bag from underneath her bed and quickly started shoving her belongings in it. She slung it over her shoulder and went to the children’s room where she met Catherine. Quinn hoisted James on her hip and Catherine picked up Anna and they quickly ran through the streets. Quinn turned back to see the rear of the O’Leary’s house beginning to catch fire. She gasped at the thought of what she left behind and dropped her bag and handed James off to Mrs. O’Leary. The woman screamed after her but Quinn took off running.
The blonde made it into the house, the air was thick with smoke. She got to her small bedroom and started rummaging around in her chest of drawers. There was the sound of glass breaking and Quinn screamed at the stabbing pains in her back as the shards hit her but she carried on looking. She finally found it, that little gold ball, rolling around in one of her bottom drawers. She grasped the ball in her hand and hurried out of the house. The upper part of the sleeve of her dress caught fire on the way and she quickly put it out, the burns were merely pink flesh by the time she reached Catherine and the children again. The Irish woman pulled two shards of glass out of Quinn’s back when they got out of the city. Lucky for Quinn, Catherine was too stunned by the fire to notice how quickly the wounds healed.
Quinn camped with the O’Learys outside of the city. She watched as the massive flames engulfed the buildings and the majority of Chicago was left in absolute ruin. She tended to the wounded, just as she had done during the war and she saw more death and more infection. When the excitement had died down, Quinn said her goodbyes to the O’Learys and tried to figure out where to go next.
-*-*-*-*-*-
“I love you, Quinn,” Rachel whispered as she pressed another kiss to the scars. “Whenever you’re ready.”
“I love you, too.”
Unlike the countless number of times she’d said it to others who she knew she could leave when she had to…she meant it when she said it to Rachel. And that meant trouble. But Quinn had enough of being cautious. She had enough of lying. She had enough. And she knew she could trust Rachel but the problem was trying to figure out how to tell her.
-*-*-*-*-*-
Quinn made her way through the school library in search of Rachel. Winter break had only been over for a few days, Quinn had spent plenty more time at the Berry house for the duration of it. Rachel’s dads again offered their home to her but Quinn again denied.
The blonde found her girlfriend at one of the computers scrolling through what looked to be like extremely old pictures on some website. Quinn dropped to the seat next to her and pecked her on the cheek.
“How’s the paper going, sweetie?”
“Not bad,” Rachel said with a grin. She turned her head and put her fingertips underneath Quinn’s chin and pulled her in for a proper kiss. “I’ll be glad to have it over with. I can’t believe we’re only a few short months away from graduation, it’s so exciting!”
Quinn smiled a little. “Yeah, exciting.”
Rachel turned her attention back to the computer screen and Quinn pulled out her periodic table of elements to study the elements that had been added since the last time she was in school. She jotted down the numbers and symbols on index cards to use later and listened to Rachel type on the computer and scroll up and down. She only looked away from her work when she heard Rachel gasp a little.
“What’s the matter, Rach?”
Rachel swallowed hard and Quinn watched the color drain from the girl’s face as she stared at the computer screen. Quinn tore her eyes away from her girlfriend and to the screen. Her stomach dropped. On the screen was a very, very old photograph, and she was looking at herself, Puck in uniform, and another nurse. Her eyes darted to the caption.
“Two Union nurses and a Union soldier during the American Civil War. Photograph circa 1864.”
Quinn only looked away from the computer screen when she heard Rachel hit the floor. The blonde got the attention of the librarian and exited out of Rachel’s internet window while the woman went back to the desk to call the nurse.
“I’m so sorry, Rachel,” Quinn whispered as she pressed a kiss to the girl’s forehead.
Quinn quickly packed up her bags and snuck out of the library to search the hallways for Puck who was nowhere to be found. She ran out of the school to the football field where she spotted him chatting with Finn near one of the benches.
“Hey Quinn,” they greeted her in unison.
Quinn smiled and grasped onto Puck’s forearm. “We need to talk. Now.”
Puck shrugged and Quinn pulled him toward the bleachers.
“What’s up?”
“Rachel knows.”
“What?”
“Rachel, she knows.”
“You mean…how the hell?!”
By the time Quinn finished explaining what had happened in the library Puck looked almost as pale as Rachel had. He rubbed his forehead and took a few deep breaths.
“So…what are you gonna do?”
“I don’t know! We’ve never…I mean, this has never happened! I was planning on telling her sometime but not yet!”
“Do you trust her?”
“Yes,” Quinn whispered. “I do.”
“Then maybe you should just go ahead and tell her. Tell her everything. I don’t have a problem with it, she’s a good person even if she is a little irritating.”
Quinn swallowed hard and nodded. This was it. Puck wrapped his arms around her for a quick hug and kissed the top of her head.
“Let me know how it goes.”
The blonde sighed as she pulled away and gripped the strap of her backpack and headed back to the school building. She made her way to the nurse’s office and stepped inside. Before she could get the words out of her mouth the nurse pointed over to the bed in the corner where Rachel’s small body was. Quinn pulled a chair over and dropped her bag. She took a deep breath before she sat down and took the girl’s hand in hers. Rachel stirred a little at the contact and Quinn’s heart started racing.
“Quinn?”
“I’m right here.”
Rachel locked eyes with Quinn and Quinn could see the wheels in the girl’s head turning.
“We’re not going to talk about it right now,” Quinn said before Rachel had a chance to open her mouth. “We’ll talk about it tonight. I need some time to figure out what to say.”
Rachel nodded and Quinn waited with her until Alex picked them up. Rachel was silent the entire car ride home and Quinn stared at her lap and tried to figure out how to explain everything. Out of all the things she’d done in her life, this was probably in her top five of the hardest.
They arrived at the Berry house much too quickly and Quinn followed Rachel upstairs to her bedroom. Alex kissed the top of Rachel’s head and thanked Quinn for staying with her before he headed back to work. Rachel crawled up on her bed and sat at the headboard, Quinn took her place in front of the brunette. She reached out to take Rachel’s hands and the brunette recoiled a little and pulled her knees up to her chest to hug them. Quinn sighed.
“What do you want to know?”
Rachel trembled a little. “I…I don’t know.”
“Okay…let’s start with the basics. I’m not really seventeen. I’m a hundred and sixty-eight.”
Rachel shook her head. “That’s impossible. Obviously…that picture was…was photoshopped.”
“It wasn’t. And you know it wasn’t. You wouldn’t have actually fainted if you really believed that.”
“So…let’s assume I believe you. How did this happen?”
Quinn took yet another deep breath and spoke the words out loud that she never thought she’d ever tell anyone. “It started the spring before I turned sixteen…”
-*-*-*-*-*-
April 1859
Savannah, Georgia
Quinn sprinted through the fields and hit the forest edge and stared into the darkness. Even on the verge of turning sixteen she still never dared venture into the forest. She shouldn’t have been running through the fields at that age anyway but there was still that little bit of her that was ten years old that loved to run and have sugar cookies when she returned home.
She stared into the forest, just as she had always done. As always, she wondered what could be looming inside and she never found out. She would always turn back to the house. On this day, though, something rustled. She jumped a little and peered harder.
“Hello?” she called.
“Yeah?” a voice called back.
“Who’s there? This is my father’s property, you know! You could be arrested!”
The voice chuckled. A young man with dark hair and dark eyes emerged from the forest slowly. There was a bag slung over his shoulder and he had a smile on his face.
“So you’re a Fabray?” he asked.
Quinn nodded. “Quinn.”
“Noah Puckerman. Everyone calls me Puck.” He extended his hand and Quinn took it. The tenderness of his grasp shocked the blonde a little.
“That’s an unusual last name, Puck. I’ve never heard it.”
“I’m from up north.”
Quinn gasped. “A Yankee?”
“I don’t care either way,” he said. “I’m just looking for work.”
“Perhaps my father could give you work. If you’ll come with me I could ask him.”
Puck smiled and followed Quinn through the fields. She talked about life on the plantation. He talked about his father leaving his family and how he was to send money to his mother and sister. When he pleaded his case to Quinn’s father and the importance of family to him the older man showed sympathy and hired Puck as a house boy.
It wasn’t long before the summer affair started. Quinn’s father was adamant in his disapproval of Quinn courting a boy that was not only just a houseboy but a “damn Yankee” as well. The pair took to meeting in the shadows near the forest and in closets while Puck was working. Quinn was in love, she was so in love that she would have given up anything to spend forever with the young man.
-*-*-*-*-*-
October 1859
Savannah, Georgia
Quinn paced back and forth in the parlor nervously wringing her hands. Puck sat on one of the chairs with his head buried in his hands.
“You’re sure?” he asked for the third time. “Really sure?”
“Yes! I told you!”
“I should ask your father for your hand. If we get married right now…”
“He’ll say no. He doesn’t think you’re good enough for me.”
“That’s…”
“You’re a house boy, Puck. I have to marry a plantation owner or his son or someone of equal wealth, don’t you understand? And for goodness sake, there is no way he’ll let me marry a Yankee! I’m certain he could look beyond the wealth but a Yankee? He’d rather I die a lonely old spinster.”
“Damn Yankees!” Russell Fabray’s voice boomed through the house. “I knew it! I told Johnson last week they were trying to start trouble, I said it!”
Puck stood and grabbed his jacket from the back of the couch and hurried out of the parlor.
“What’s the matter, Daddy?” Quinn asked sweetly, putting on her best smile.
“Nothing, Quinnie. Nothing a young lady needs to worry her head about.”
“Daddy, I know I’m a young lady but I like to know what’s going on.”
“This Yankee, John Brown, he’s a radical and trying to destroy how we do things around here. He’s tried to raid Harper’s Ferry to steal our ammunition to give to some slaves to lead a revolt. Colonel Lee put a stop to it before things got out of control but,” Russell sighed and rubbed his forehead, “I have a feeling this isn’t the last time we’ll hear about these things.”
“Daddy, I’m sure there’s nothing to worry about,” Quinn tried to assure her father. “It’s just some troublemakers.”
Russell chuckled. “You wouldn’t understand, Quinnie. Where’s that house boy? I need a drink.”
“I think Pu--Noah went to the kitchen. Why don’t you approve of him courting me, Daddy?”
“I’ve told you, he’s not good enough. And he’s a Yankee.”
“He says he doesn’t care either way.”
“He was born a Yankee. Blood says everything. Why don’t you go on upstairs and take a nap?”
Quinn sighed and nodded. “Of course, Daddy.”
When she was awoken from her nap by her mother, Quinn stood patiently as the woman laced up her dress and sighed disapprovingly.
“I’m going to ask Mary to stop giving you so many sweets,” Judy Fabray said. “You’ve gained two inches on your waist.”
Quinn nodded. “Noah would be a good father,” she whispered.
Her mother didn’t say anything.
-*-*-*-*-*-
The way her father found out was by complete accident.
“You can’t hide it forever,” Puck hissed. “That’s my child, our child! You’re carrying our child and I want to marry you!”
There was a deafening silence as Quinn looked over Puck’s shoulder to her father who was standing in the doorway. He calmly walked to the cabinet in the corner of the parlor and produced a Smith & Wesson pistol.
“Daddy,” Quinn’s voice quivered.
Puck spun around just as Russell raised the firearm. The younger of the two took off in a sprint out of the parlor and front door, Quinn chased after him but was held back by her father who shut the door loudly.
“What do you have to say for yourself?”
“I…” Quinn looked up into the stern eyes of her father and she winced at the grip he had on her arm. “I’m so sorry…He’ll marry me, he’s said he’ll do it…”
Russell shook his head. “Go pack your things.”
“Daddy…why? Where?”
“Go pack them.” He let go of her arm and returned the pistol to its cabinet. “And leave.”
Quinn did as she always did and she obeyed her father’s orders. She packed a few simple dresses in a bag along with what little money she had when she descended the staircase she looked into the parlor to see her father standing with his hands on the mantelpiece staring up at their family portrait.
“Daddy, please…”
“Go,” he said. “You’ve embarrassed me.” He shook his head. “Damn Yankees,” she heard him mutter as she shut the front door.
Quinn found herself walking toward Savannah with her small bag and she found her way to the train depot and sat on one of the benches, unsure of where to go or what to do. She watched people board the train that was apparently destined for Charleston. She listened to the station master call out times and she waited. For what, she was unsure of.
“Quinn!” she heard the familiar voice from a distance.
Puck was suddenly in front of her and he pulled her into his arms.
“Come on,” he said. “We’re getting on that train.”
“I don’t have a ticket.”
“We don’t need one, come on.”
Puck led her to the freight car attached to the passenger train and hoisted her up into the box. Quinn looked around at the various crates and barrels that were tightly packed. She carefully took a seat on one of the crates and Puck shut the large sliding door. There was a little light coming in through the gaps in the boards but otherwise it was mostly dark.
“Will we stay in Charleston?” Quinn whispered. She sniffled and wiped away the tears she felt escaping her eyes.
“No,” Puck answered. “We’ll keep going until we get to Virginia, around Manassas, where my mother and sister live. We’ll get married and I’ll take care of you, okay? I promise I’ll do whatever I have to.”
Quinn nodded.
-*-*-*-*-*-
July 21, 1861
Just outside of Centreville, Virginia
“Puck, they’re getting closer!” Quinn whimpered when she heard the rifle fire.
Quinn was standing on the small front porch of the small one-room house that Puck had built by hand on a few acres of land he’d purchased from the man he was working for. Immediately after they got to Manassas they were married and lived with Puck’s mother and sister until Puck found work. They’d lived in an even smaller worker’s house while Puck built their own in his spare time. After he was finished in the fields of his employer’s land he would come home and tend their own small fields. His mother taught Quinn how to cook with what little they could afford and when their daughter came she was the midwife who brought the girl into the world and showed Quinn everything she needed to know about being a mother.
Rebekah, with her small doll Quinn had made from extra quilting material, cautiously walked out onto the small porch and clung onto Quinn’s leg. The blonde picked up her small daughter and kissed her head. Puck was right behind her a few seconds later and he wrapped an arm around Quinn’s waist.
“It’ll be fine,” he assured her.
Quinn let out an uneasy sigh and went back into the house to read her Bible to Rebekah. As the hours progressed the shots were getting louder and Quinn didn’t miss the nervous look on Puck’s face as he got up and looked out the door several times. He took his rifle down from above the door and began cleaning it. There was a pause in the firing for a while, Quinn got up that time and looked out the door, she could see nothing.
“See?” Puck said. “Nothing to worry about.”
He lifted Rebekah on his hip and stepped out onto the front porch with a smile. He walked out off the porch and into the grass. Quinn smiled a little as her husband let the tiny blonde down to run around and he chased after her.
Quinn squinted when she saw something, several somethings in gray, coming toward her and she yelled for Puck and ran toward Rebekah but several shots ringing out stopped her dead in her tracks. It wasn’t the sound that stopped her, though. It was the sight. Her heart throbbed in her ears as she watched Puck drop to his knees next to their daughter.
“No,” he whispered. “NO!” The second was a shout. Quinn couldn’t move.
-*-*-*-*-*-
“I think we should leave,” Puck said as he stared out the window.
It had been three weeks. Three silent weeks in their small house. Quinn mostly stared at the empty small bed that was next to her own. She went through the actions of an obedient housewife, cleaning, cooking, sewing, but inside she was completely numb.
“I can’t leave her,” Quinn mumbled.
“It’s just a grave. There’s nothing to leave.”
“It’s more than a grave…”
“Things are getting worse,” Puck said. “More dangerous. We need to leave.”
-*-*-*-*-*-
October 1861
Titusville, Pennsylvania
Quinn sighed as she stirred the pot hovering over the fireplace in the small worker’s house. She shivered and wrapped her shawl around her shoulders even tighter. The sun was setting and Puck would be in soon from his job at the oil well and as a good wife she needed to have his supper ready. She pulled the kettle of hot water off of the fire and poured it into the wash basin on the countertop put out the soap and a towel. She refilled the kettle from the shared pump outside the house, making small talk with the other wives, and put it back on the stove to use for dishwater later. Right on time, Puck came in and started scrubbing his arms and face, trying to remove as much of the oil as he could.
“How was your day?” Quinn asked quietly as she took two bowls from the cabinet.
“Interesting,” Puck said. “I have something to show you.”
Quinn ladled the soup into the bowls and set each one at the table. While Puck finished washing she sliced a few pieces of bread and set them out with glasses of milk.
“After supper,” she said. “You need to eat, they’re working you to the bone. You look exhausted.”
Quinn sat across from her husband and they silently ate their meal by the glow of the fireplace. When Puck was finished Quinn took his bowl to their larger wash basin and poured hot water in it and scrubbed the dishes while he threw out his water from the wash basin he’d used earlier. Quinn smiled appreciatively when he returned and he kissed the top of her head before settling into his rocking chair. After the dishes were washed and dried, Quinn joined him in her own chair and went to work on repairing a hole in one of Puck’s shirts.
“I want to show you something,” Puck stated again.
Quinn looked up at her husband and watched him dig around in his pocket and he produced a small gold ball.
“I stepped on this on my way home,” he said.
Quinn furrowed her eyebrows. The ball was peculiar, it was simply a ball but there was almost a glow about it. And it was gold. Very shiny gold.
“What is it?”
“I don’t know but when I picked it up…I don’t know. It was strange.”
Quinn held out her hand cautiously. “May I?”
Puck dropped the ball into Quinn’s hand and she immediately knew why it was strange. The ball wasn’t heavy as she expected it to be but very light, almost too light. She felt a warmth come over her and she got slightly dizzy. She felt very tired yet not and she felt her eyelids become a little heavy.
“It is…very strange,” she said. The warmth soon dissipated but the tiredness stayed. “What do you suppose it’s made of?”
“Gold, the outside at least,” Puck said. “I don’t know about the rest.”
Quinn handed the ball back to her husband. “Perhaps you should take it into a jeweler.”
“I will next time I go to the city,” Puck said. He got up and went to their bed and pulled out the small wooden chest from underneath it and dropped the ball in.
The first time Quinn noticed something odd was the next afternoon when she was slicing herself a piece of bread to have with her soup at lunch. The knife hit her finger as it did every so often. The initial pain was normal and Quinn immediately reached for a rag. The problem was, when she looked down at her finger the wound was there but there was only a little blood oozing out. She furrowed her eyebrows and dabbed at it, the blood came off on the towel. It had felt like a deep cut and at first sight it looked a little deep but there was very little blood. Right before her eyes the wound got less deep and only a couple of minutes ticked by before it was completely healed. Quinn dropped into her chair and stared at the small scar.
“Impossible,” she whispered to herself.
Puck burst into the cabin and Quinn jumped, her thoughts breaking away from the small scar on her finger. He stood in the doorway and looked at her.
“I should be dead,” was all he said.
Quinn swallowed hard. “What?”
“I fell from the back of one of the wagons. I landed on my neck, Quinn. Everyone heard the snap, I felt the snap…but I got up and walked it off. I should be dead, I’ve seen men land like I did and they broke their necks and died on the spot.”
Quinn’s eyes darted back to the scar on her finger. “Something happened to me, too.”
When she finished explaining her story, Puck’s eyes darted to the kitchen knife sitting by the loaf of bread and he quickly cross the floor and held it in his hand. He trembled as he pressed the tip of the blade into his other arm. Quinn watched, wide eyed, as blood barely oozed out. She dabbed away the blood and just as hers had done earlier, Puck’s healed leaving only a scar.
“What the hell is going on?” he said under his breath.
Quinn glanced over at their bed and hurried across the floor and dropped to her knees on Puck’s side. She pulled out the small box and opened it. The small glowing ball was still glowing. Quinn carefully picked it up and held it in her hands.
“You think so?” Puck asked.
“What else could it be?”
“So what do we do?”
“I don’t know.”
“We could sell it…”
“No!” Quinn shrieked. “Puck…we don’t know what it can do…”
“Obviously it makes us not die.”
“The consequences of this… the consequences could be disastrous if anyone were to find out.”
“They can’t kill us.”
“We mustn’t tell anyone.” Quinn dropped the ball back in the box. “Perhaps it will wear off. In a week or so, maybe.” She grabbed her Bible and sat in her chair in front of the fireplace. “You should go back to work, they’ll dock your pay.”
“That’s it? We just found out that we can’t die and you want me to go back to work?”
“If you’d like something other than flour and water for your suppers then yes, you should go back to work.”
Puck did go back to work. One week passed then two and three and then a month. They spoke of it a few times, wondering what would happen in the future. Would they age? What would the future hold? They tried everything to destroy the little ball in hopes that it would somehow lift whatever had been cast upon them. It floated. It didn’t burn. They buried it and it was sticking out of the surface of the ground only hours later. Puck tried hitting it with hammer and it didn’t even scratch. They kept reading news of the war and every time Puck would pick up the knife and poke himself and heal instantly Quinn knew more and more of what he was thinking.
“I’m joining,” he said two months after their discovery. “I’m joining the Union and I’m getting revenge.”
“Puck…”
“I can’t die! Why shouldn’t I?!”
“Keep your voice down!” Quinn hissed.
“I should do this, Quinn.”
“Puck…I…I love you, I don’t want you to leave.”
“Come with me! I read all the time that they need nurses and cooks. You know how to do that.”
“I don’t know anything of being a nurse!”
“You could learn. The doctors will teach you. I’m going whether you do or not.”
“Fine,” Quinn sighed. “We’ll go.”
-*-*-*-*-*-
Rachel’s eyes were wide and Quinn tried her best to keep her own locked with Rachel’s even though she wanted desperately to look anywhere else.
“So,” Rachel breathed, “to recap your story, you and Noah had a daughter, conceived out of wedlock, who was killed during the First Battle of Bull Run in the Civil War. And afterwards you found a glowing ball that somehow made you immortal and you’re trapped as a seventeen year old for the rest of eternity?”
“Actually I was eighteen but I say seventeen for school. Other than that, yes, that about sums it up.”
“Okay. I see a few possibilities here. You’re certifiably insane and I should have you committed to a psychiatric hospital or you’re lying or I’m certifiably insane and should be committed to a hospital…or you’re telling the truth.”
“I can prove it.”
Quinn watched Rachel watch her as she got off the bed and go through her backpack. She pulled out her small pocket knife and flipped open the blade.
“Quinn…”
“I’ll be fine.”
Quinn took a deep breath and touched the metal to the palm of her hand and made sure Rachel watched as she pressed deep and dragged it along her skin. Quinn twitched a little at the initial pain, it was always the same. She folded the knife back up and dropped it to her backpack and Rachel stared at the palm of her hand as a few drops of blood oozed out. Quinn swallowed hard and blinked a few times and when she looked down at her hand there was nothing but a faint scar. Rachel squeaked and her jaw dropped.
“So either you’re crazy or I’m telling the truth,” Quinn said. She clutched her lower lip nervously between her teeth awaiting Rachel’s reaction.
Rachel nodded slowly which turned into shaking her head. “It’s impossible.”
“Yeah, it is.”
Quinn held her hand out and Rachel carefully took it and traced her fingers over the faint scar. She pressed a kiss to Quinn’s palm and swallowed hard.
“I believe you,” Rachel whispered.
Rachel pulled Quinn down to the bed, the blonde settled on top of her girlfriend and kissed her forehead.
“I love you, Rachel.” Quinn pulled away and sat back on her knees. Rachel followed her and Quinn kept her forehead pressed against her lover’s. “I love you…but more importantly, I trust you. I trust you with this. You can’t tell anyone. You can talk to Puck about it but you cannot tell anyone. Not your dads…not anyone. Promise me, Rachel.”
Rachel nodded. “I promise.”
Quinn dropped her head and pressed her lips against Rachel’s, the brunette understood it was to seal the promise. The rest of the afternoon was just for fun.
Basking in the afterglow, Rachel pressed a kiss to the scar on Quinn’s ribcage. Quinn told her the story of Pearl Harbor.
“It was utter chaos,” she whispered. “No one knew what to do because it just…it happened and it was the first time it had ever happened. We had drills to train us but nothing prepared us for it. We were scrambling around having to pick who to save and who to let go. That was the last time I ever enlisted. I almost wanted to for Vietnam…but I couldn’t. Not after I saw what was going on over there.”
“How did you manage to enlist, Quinn? Surely your birth records…”
“Fabricated. Just like everything else. It’s getting more difficult to do since almost everything is done on computers. This might be the last time I ever go to school, I really don’t know. I just do what I need to do at the time.”
Before Rachel could open her mouth they heard the slam of the front door and Rachel pressed a soft kiss over the tattoo on Quinn’s chest before the pair got out of bed to search for their discarded clothes. Rachel’s dads offered once again for Quinn to move in with them and this time, the blonde nodded.
The next day at glee club, Quinn watched as Rachel cautiously approached Puck. He glanced at Quinn then back at Rachel. A few soft words were exchanged and Rachel hugged him before rejoining Quinn. Puck didn’t talk much for the remainder of rehearsal, Quinn found him after school out on the football field staring off into space. She sat with him for a few minutes and rested her head on his shoulder.
“It doesn’t get easier,” he finally mumbled.
“No,” Quinn sighed. “It doesn’t.”
“So Berry knows everything?”
Quinn nodded. “The beginning, anyway.”
“You’re really in love with her?”
Quinn nodded again. “Yeah.”
“You were really in love with me, too.”
“I know I was, Puck.”
“What if she wants to…”
“I don’t know.”
Part III