A twisted up frown disguised as a smile
Title: A twisted up frown disguised as a smile
Pairing: Rachel/Quinn
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 5774
Summary: Based off the Successful!Quinn/Failure!Rachel prompt on the rq_meme.
http://community.livejournal.com/rq_meme/2275.html?thread=79843#t79843
Author's Note: Hopefully this is to the OP's satisfaction.
A twisted up frown disguised as a smile
When Quinn sets off for New York, it's not for some pipe dream like Rachel. She's going to study law at NYU and she's going to own all those geeks, like she's done before and after Beth, minus the slushies. Stepping off that plane, she feels invincible, more than she ever did wearing a cheerleading uniform.
It only takes a few weeks for that feeling to dwindle into nothing. No experience should be as trying as sophomore year, but between classes, studying, and working at a nearby Starbucks, for the free coffee more than anything else, Quinn's never been so run down. Rising to the top, she finds, is a lot harder without Santana's muscle and Brittany's charm.
.........
Days begin to blur together into a whirlwind of failure. Like trying and failing to get to class on time. Mixing up orders at work, despite all the free coffee. Attempting to stay awake at the library to study, but falling asleep anyway. It feels too much like sophomore year, only it’s worse, because there's no doomed, but supportive, Glee Club to keep her on track. No friends to have her back.
But, even as her eyes slip shut behind the counter, Quinn notices him. A patron whose order she could barely handle with the way his words flew, it's the only time she'd actively thanked her experience in understanding Rachel speak. He's been staring at her for the better part of an hour; drink mostly untouched. The unsettling feeling she gets from him is almost enough to keep her awake, almost anyways.
A sharp jab on the shoulder sends her nearly toppling off her stool and wiping instinctively at her mouth, before meeting a set of sharp blue eyes, the same eyes that had been trained on her before her impromptu nap. It's only years of not backing down from Santana that keep Quinn from taking a defensive step back. He tugs once on the lapels of his blazer, like it's supposed to make him more presentable, before offering her a nearly blinding smile.
"Have you ever considered a career in modeling?"
Her eyes slip down over her wrinkled shirt, the coffee-stained apron, and as she thinks about how tired she must look, any smile she might have had plastered onto her face for the sake of customer protocol, slips off like melted butter. Even if he did manage to get that out without sounding sleazy, and she's really not sure how he pulled that off, Quinn crosses her arms, eyes narrowing.
"Look," she growls when his smile doesn't falter under the force of her glare. "I am not interested in whatever scam you're trying to pull."
His eyes roll, like her assumption is completely ridiculous, which it isn't, before he straightens, crossing his arms. "First of all, it's not a scam," he says frankly. "Second of all," and at this next part, his lips turn up into a sneer. "I don't think you can afford to turn down five hundred bucks for a few pictures."
"Yeah, I don't care how much money you're offering. I'm not doing some sleazy photo shoot," Quinn growls, slamming a hand down on the counter, even if she's well aware of how intimidating she isn't anymore.
With a groan, he draws a hand over his eyes, looking up at the ceiling like he's pleading to God for patience. "Alright, you can think what you want, but it's not by any means sleazy. Here is my card," he says with an impressive flick of his wrist revealing a business card. When she doesn't take it, he drops it on the counter. "You've got until Saturday. Give me a call if you change your mind." Without another word, he turns on his heel, his ignored coffee and the seemingly benign business card on the counter.
After a moment's hesitation, she pockets the card.
............
Against her better judgment, Quinn calls him, this Steve Leiber guy, according to his business card, if that's his real name. She can almost imagine the satisfaction on his face, because it's so obviously clear even through the phone. Through the entire conversation, she consoles herself with the fact that if this is legit, it's more than she makes in a week at Starbucks for a lot less time. If it's legit, she can actually spring for something that's not at the dining hall or fast food.
Of course, all that quiet reassurance only lasts until Saturday when she's staring at a large building, hugging her jacket closer to her body, and ready to run and hide under her bed. She re-laces her sneakers, before walking in, fully prepared to get the hell out of there at the first mention of 'showing some skin.'
When they don't ask for money of any kind or ask her to put on clothes that would essentially qualify for underwear, she grows increasingly freaked out. Even more so, when a grinning, if smug, Steve hands her a check for five hundred, as promised.
It's a choice between a career her father would approve of, even if it would put her into years of debt, courtesy of student loans, or something that would earn her money now, something she's clearly better at than school.
.............
Steve keeps calling and soon enough not only does Quinn not need or have the time to work at Starbucks, but she's wondering if the same can be said about school. The turning point comes when Quinn starts missing classes for shoots and Steve offers her a contract.
Quinn never finishes her first year at NYU, but she does make it into a commercial for the first time since sophomore year, before the year is through.
........
Quinn feels like some low fat, expensive version of McDonald's. As pompous as it makes her sound, she can't actually drive a few blocks without seeing her name or her face, so, really, it's no wonder people like to throw around the word reclusive with her name. Of course, reclusive is much preferred over perfection, because she is so far from perfect. Someone perfect wouldn't feel this alone; wouldn't have ceased contact with all the real friends she had to trade them up for some scene fakes she occasionally shares space with.
She even prefers frigid bitch over perfection, but usually that's only thrown around behind her back by her so called friends and whatever guy her publicist insists she should be seen with. It's exactly how she winds up where she is right now, on the arm of one of Calvin Klein's newest boys, Raphael she thinks, at another exclusive VIP party in the back room of Carpe Noctem.
Quinn can't be sure what he's blathering on about to the group of girls surrounding the two of them, but it's probably something useless, like how to make his eyes look intense during a shoot if the way he's widening them and the girls' eyes are glazing are any indication. With a sigh, Quinn releases her hold on his muscular bicep, and slips away just as he uses his newly freed hand to tousle his hair. The new ones are pompous, high on their newly found success, but just as easily as she goes through them, they move on just as quickly.
A pleasant smile graces her face as Quinn nods; quietly greeting various acquaintances, even as she reaches for another glass of wine, her third or her fifth. It's always hard to keep track. Eventually, Quinn stumbles into the bathroom in the hopes of sobering up, before she walks out of here alone. Her publicist will already be on her ass about ditching Raphael, and Quinn would rather not have to be raged on for leaving a stumbling drunk as well.
Sinking gratefully onto the couch in the bathroom, one of the amenities, and, really, the only plus side to the sort of parties she attends, she tosses an arm over her eyes, idly swishing the half empty wine glass in her free hand.
It’s times like this, when she remembers she's got no one to go home to or to take care of her when she's about ready to pass out, that she thinks about Beth. The arm tossed over her eyes, lifts to skim a hand across her flat stomach. She remembers feeling like a whale, but not necessarily an unhappy whale, not with a tiny, innocent life kicking away from within her belly. When she closes her eyes, and especially when she's had too much to drink, she can still feel ghostlike kicks beneath her fingertips.
Beth would be nine by now, and Quinn wonders if it would've worked, if she could've handled law school and Beth or even her current career and Beth. She definitely has the means to care for a child now, but all that she has now, the spacious studio apartment, more clothes than she knows what to do with, may not have ever come to be if she had kept Beth. A baby would've kept her in Lima for the rest of her life, but maybe she'd be happier than she is now.
What feels like seconds later, someone bursts into the bathroom, sending the swinging door crashing into the wall amidst a string of grumbled profanities. Some of her wine sloshes to the floor as she sits up, suddenly alert, her eyes swivel to a girl, a waitress by her attire, dabbing at the red splotch on the front of her white blouse. Quinn contemplates leaving, before someone sees her camped out on a bathroom couch, but just the thought sends her head spinning.
Then the girl looks up at herself in the mirror and Quinn begins to eye the wine glass in her hand dubiously. It must be her fifth drink, because there's no way that's who she thinks it is. Quinn drains the rest of her wine and blinks furiously, but the image doesn't change.
"Rachel," she whispers bewildered and still trying to blink back the haze of the alcohol in her system.
The other girl stiffens and turns around. Quinn’s suddenly glad she's sitting, because it feels like she's just had a rug pulled out from under her. "Quinn," Rachel says weakly, looking like she'd rather be anywhere but here.
"Rachel," Quinn repeats, standing abruptly and striding as quickly as her jelly legs will allow towards an increasingly alarmed looking Rachel. She stumbles drunkenly into the other girl, catching herself on Rachel's shoulders, and grinning foolishly, because, God she's real.
"Quinn, while I realize it's been several years, since we've last seen each other," Rachel says delicately, trying to gently extricate herself from Quinn's hold. "We have never been the sort of friends that merit this kind of familiar greeting."
She's right; they're not, but Rachel's just so real, Quinn can only manage to wrap her arms tighter around Rachel's neck, getting right up into Rachel's personal space. Rachel's hands meet her hips, pushing at them until she flops back onto the couch with Rachel bent over her. With several grunts, she manages to pull Quinn's arms from her neck.
"You are clearly intoxicated," Rachel declares, looking distastefully at the wine glass forgotten on the floor. "Do you have a ride home?"
Her head feels fuzzy as she shakes it in the negative.
Rachel clicks her tongue like it's what she expected. "Alright, I'm going to call you a cab." Just as she pulls open the door, Rachel looks back at her with narrowed eyes. "Stay here," she mutters through gritted teeth, looking furious and disgusted.
Quinn does. All the while wondering why the hell Rachel isn't on Broadway, making her look like the lonely peon she is. It doesn't make sense. Out of all of them, Rachel's the one that should've made it, even if back then she had a penchant for going after taken guys, Rachel's the most talented and determined and deserving. Rachel didn't have a baby by her then boyfriend's best friend and then give that baby up, because she couldn't handle it.
There are a lot of things Quinn doesn't understand. Things like being where she is right now, but Rachel Berry, waitress to the stars makes even less sense.
Doubt that Rachel was ever really there, or that she's ever coming back seeps in as the alcohol finally blankets over her mind.
............
Quinn wakes up cotton-mouthed and groggy in her bed, and thankfully very much alone. She's deep into her morning coffee, when the memory of last night, of seeing Rachel again for the first time in seven years, assaults her mind with all the finesse of that hangover headache that assaulted her head the second she was vaguely conscious.
Even with the clarity of the morning and caffeine, Quinn still can't assimilate the idea of Rachel working as a waitress, can't really assimilate the idea of Rachel Berry as anything other than a Broadway superstar, regardless of her ideas of insane pipeline dreams. All she knows is that their positions should be reversed.
She convinces herself throughout the day, through every touch up of her makeup, through every snap of the camera, that it’s all some drunken manifestation of her loneliness. Quinn almost believes it, but every glance at her wallet, at money that hadn't been taken for a cab ride she barely remembers, makes her think about how Rachel, even at her lowest would've helped out someone in need.
Quinn makes it as far as a few steps into her too large studio apartment, listening as she always does to the echo of her own footsteps, dying at the lack of answering footsteps, before she heads back out.
Taking a cab out to Carpe Noctem, she looks ridiculous wearing sunglasses at night, but feels more ridiculous for going. It reminds her of that fiasco of an attempt at regaining her popularity. Of course, now it's necessary, but it never makes her feel any less moronic.
A quick lift of the eyes behind the sunglasses and the maître d’ leads her out to a table tucked into the corner of the restaurant, small and mostly hidden. "Does Rachel Berry work here?"
His brows draw together, but he nods as he drops a menu in front of her. "Would you like her to handle you? She's in tonight," he offers, looking all too eager to please.
She doesn't look at him as she nods, not wanting to see that eager expression on his face, or the curiosity. It takes a surprising amount of time to get Rachel to her table, but when she does, it looks like some backwards version of her infamous storm out.
"What are you doing here," Rachel hisses furiously.
"I'm hungry," Quinn defends with a shrug.
Rachel crosses her arms, unimpressed by her answer.
"Okay, I wanted to see you," she admits.
"You know what? I don't care if I get fired. I refuse to be the butt of whatever joke you're trying to pull. Where are Santana and Brittany? Hiding out until the minute I serve you, so they can record it and send it to everyone back in Lima."
Quinn sinks into her seat as Rachel slams her hands onto the wooden surface of the tiny booth, making the table tremble beneath her palms.
"Rachel, I haven't spoken to Santana or Brittany or anyone from Lima in years."
Rachel's eyes narrow and Quinn feels, not for the first time, that Rachel sees right through her. Finally, Rachel sighs, straightening and tugging a notepad from her apron.
"Alright, you seem to be honest and I’ve been forced to serve you,” she says in this way that reminds Quinn of all the times she hasn’t been honest. “What do you want, because you can't stay here and not eat, well; no, you could probably get away with it,” Rachel grumbles viciously.
She not sure, whether the venom in Rachel’s voice or her question, considering Quinn hasn’t so much as opened the menu, much less figured out what to order, since she sat down, makes her pause longer. “Um, what would you recommend?”
Rachel snorts, rolling her eyes at the question, and Quinn feels it’s not the first time that Rachel’s made her feel an inch tall. “Vegan, remember? I find most of the menu inedible and the rest,” she trails off, pursing her lips.
In a last ditch effort to smooth over her latest faux pas; Quinn flicks open the menu, looking desperately for the dessert part of the menu, before pointing at whatever looked like it carried chocolate.
A raised eyebrow is her answer. “Won’t your handlers have a cow, and a goat, and a sheep, and several other barn animals?”
Yes, Quinn thinks, they will. For the potential havoc it could wreak on her body and skin. She shrugs defiantly anyway.
“And to drink, and think hard, Quinn? If it’s anything alcoholic, I will not drag your drunken ass home a second time.”
“Water,” Quinn says weakly, feeling a flush creep up her neck in shame like it hasn’t in years.
When Rachel turns on her heel, her skirt flies up like it has every other time, but this time, with her eyes just about level with Rachel’s skirt, Quinn can’t help but see what the boys in school did. She sucks in a deep breath to shake the image, but has about as much success as she’s had most of the day. Clearly, waitress or not, Rachel’s body hasn’t necessarily been negatively affected by time.
After dropping off her cake and water, Rachel doesn’t bother to drop by Quinn’s table other than to check up on her progress, which has more to do with the job requirement than anything else. Slowly customer’s trickle out, but Quinn stays until she wears Rachel down enough to have the girl storm over to her table, arms crossed agitatedly.
“Do you plan on spending the night or something? You didn’t even eat your cake,” Rachel gripes.
Quinn looks down at the mutilated slice on her plate.
"Do you want to hang out?"
"What? No," Rachel exclaims, looking at Quinn like she's lost her marbles, and yeah, maybe she has.
"Why not?"
Rachel's chest heaves as she searches for words and a certain degree of smugness seeps into Quinn at being able to render Rachel Berry speechless.
"More reasons than I could ever possibly name in one sitting," Rachel says finally, dropping Quinn's check on the table.
With a sigh and eyes trained on Rachel's receding back, Quinn drops a few bills on the table and makes her exit.
She doesn't immediately hail a cab, instead making her way down the empty street plagued by memories of the last time she saw Rachel, a going away party seven years ago. Remembers that too tight, too familiar hug; from a girl with stars in her eyes and an unendingly optimistic smile.
It occurs to her that walking around late at night is not her brightest idea, when she hears hurried footsteps hot on her heels. Quinn's still fumbling around in her purse for her Taser, when Rachel's dainty, but impossibly strong hand grips her shoulder, and turns her around.
"What is this," Rachel hisses, thrusting a handful of bills in her face.
"Money," Quinn replies cautiously.
"No, this is a ridiculous tip for horrible service. Just what are you trying to pull?" Foot tapping and furious, Rachel looks much too intimidating for someone so tiny.
"I'm trying to pay you back for hauling my drunk ass home and so what if I'm a good tipper, Rachel? It's not a crime," she defends.
Rachel deflates visibly. Her mouth opens and closes several times, before she starts walking back.
It should be a sign that Rachel doesn't want to see her, socially or otherwise, but Quinn remains rooted to the spot until Rachel's waving off some of her co-workers and walking back.
She makes it a few steps past Quinn, before stopping. "Are you going to stand there all night waiting to get mugged?"
"Actually, I was going to was going to walk you home."
"And, if I refused your offer?"
"I was going to follow you anyway," Quinn admits sheepishly.
With a sigh, Rachel keeps walking and Quinn figures it's about all the consent she's going to get. She walks just close enough to Rachel, that their elbows brush as they walk, but no closer, even if every molecule in her body is screaming against all reason to get closer.
"Why won't you leave me alone?" Rachel turns her head slightly, and it's the only indication Quinn has that it isn't just some idle question to break the silence.
"Why don't you want to talk to me?"
Her only answer is an entirely unfamiliar sneer forming on Rachel's lips. The sneer, the silence, Rachel's reluctance to be in the same space as her all point to jealousy; but it's a different jealousy than she usually deals with on a day-to-day basis. Maybe, it's their history, but Rachel's anger seems justified.
They don't talk again, not in the subway, not during the walk through Rachel's less than savory neighborhood, and Quinn fully expects when Rachel slams a door in her face without another word.
.............
Even if the very sight of her; makes Rachel look like she's going to shatter a glass, Quinn keeps showing up. Keeps walking Rachel home, even if the other girl spends most of that time glowering.
Keeps glowering until it's too much and she just stops in her tracks a few steps from her door. "This needs to stop," Rachel declares, turning to face her with cold, dark eyes. "You cannot out keep following me around looking like some kicked puppy, alright? Go home. Go back to your perfect life. Go back to your perfect job."
Before Rachel can keep throwing around the word perfect, even if she's far from perfect, Quinn seals her mouth against Rachel's, swallowing her anger in a kiss that's as vicious as Rachel's words.
But, the thing that takes the cake is that Rachel's the one that pulls her inside, tries to swallow her whole, sucking dark bruises from her neck that Quinn knows her makeup team will give her hell for. The sense of reckless abandon, Rachel possesses as her lips and hands map Quinn's body, make the night’s Quinn's agonized over the whole situation worth it.
"You don't deserve this," Rachel growls all the while, each word, each truth, almost drowned out by Quinn's sighs.
Quinn hears every word, though, proving Rachel right on her knees and with whispered agreements.
When they're done, Rachel turns her back on Quinn, and Quinn doesn't expect any less than that.
…………….
One night, Rachel doesn't turn her back on Quinn immediately after they've exhausted each other. Instead, she leans close, tracing her fingers along the angles and planes of Quinn's face, stopping at her mouth.
"Why are you always so sad," Rachel questions, not angrily, just soft and inquisitive.
"Why are you always so sad," Quinn returns.
"My dreams never came true," she replies easily. "Your turn."
Turning her head slightly, Quinn presses a kiss to Rachel's palm, before tugging the other girl closer. "Sometimes, I wonder if I did the right thing," she says finally.
"Quitting school, or," Rachel trails off with a loud swallow.
"That, and giving up Beth," Quinn finishes.
Rachel's palm leaves Quinn's mouth to skim soothingly down her back. Suddenly Rachel chuckles, bitter and dark, as her hands stops. "You've got all the success I've ever dreamed of and you don't even appreciate it." The hand at her back fists in her hair and as Rachel mouth crashes into hers, all thoughts of sleep flee from her mind, as they usually do where Rachel's involved.
...........
Sometimes, but not often, things are easy with Rachel. Usually when they're both thoroughly sated and Quinn feels something like bliss all the way down to the bottom of her toes.
Those are her favorite times.
The times when she doesn't crave harsh bruises distributed by Rachel's lips and even harsher words by Rachel's poisonous tongue, and Rachel's touch is gentle enough to be confused for affectionate. It's the only time their words don't sting.
"Do you talk to Shelby at all?"
"Not really," Rachel gasps, breathing still a little uneven.
Quinn's heart sinks. She doesn't talk about Beth to anyone, but spends about as much time wondering how she's doing as she does wondering what she's doing with Rachel.
Rachel's arms tighten around her.
"Beth's doing alright, you know."
She stiffens in Rachel's arms, until the brunette palms her cheek, locking eyes with her even in the dark room.
"I don't talk to Shelby much, but sometimes she visits when I'm home. She's beautiful Quinn," Rachel admits, voice a little choked.
When she cups Rachel's cheeks, Quinn's not sure if the moisture gathered there is from her own tears or Rachel's, but she finds that as their lips meet, that she has one answer to her question.
............
"It must be because you're Jewish," Quinn says one night.
"What," Rachel exclaims, pushing herself up onto an elbow.
"Or your gay dads," Quinn continues, squinting vaguely at Rachel's form in the dark.
"That's about the stupidest thing I've ever heard," Rachel says frankly, flopping back down.
"Well, you being a waitress is about the craziest thing I've ever heard."
"That's like punishing me for imagining gay sex with you," Rachel retorts. "Or, punishing me for the sex I would have with you that wouldn't have occurred if I had made it to Broadway."
Quinn is silent for a moment, trying to figure if any of what Rachel just said has any merit. "That makes no sense," Quinn says finally.
"Neither does your theory."
"You've imagined," Quinn trails off, wondering if Rachel means now or back in high school or whether it even matters.
"I said it, didn't I?"
"When," Quinn questions, wishing she could put a stop to the sudden word vomit. It's getting them nowhere, when they should both be sleeping. Plus, even if she can't see Rachel, she can feel the other girl tilt her head closer, can imagine her eyebrows raised and the teasing smile on her lips at her curiosity.
"Mostly back in high school and mostly for the novelty of it. Debauching the President of the Celibacy Club would've made anyone go down in history. Besides, you were as pretty then as you are now. You would've been hard pressed to find someone who wouldn't have jumped at the chance for a single night with you," Rachel admits quietly. Quinn doesn't miss the bitterness in Rachel's voice. "Sometimes, not with all that much frequency, but enough to drive me nuts, I'd dream of you. It started around the time you first blew up."
There's something in Rachel's voice that makes Quinn think about how Rachel never lets her turn on the lights when they're intimate, how Rachel's always up and dressed by the time sunlight streams into the room, that speaks volumes about her current level of self-esteem.
"I'm not the only one people wanted to debauch in high school. As criminally as you dressed, there was something about you that had some of the most popular guys in school after you," Quinn reminds, not bothering to mention her own fixation with Rachel.
"You act like any of that ended well," Rachel grumbles, turning away from Quinn.
"It doesn't matter that it didn't end well. What matters is that you're as appealing as you've always been."
"No, I'm not."
"You are," Quinn insists, wrapping herself around Rachel's back. "It got me into your bed, and you did it with a lot more ease and frequency than anyone else before you." Her mouth meets Rachel's neck; biting and nipping at the place that makes Rachel forget her own name.
Rachel's mood turns as quickly as Quinn can turn her on, which, all things considered, isn't very long at all. Later on, when Rachel's sated and sleeping with her back to Quinn, she thinks about their earlier conversation.
"You're beautiful," Quinn whispers, wishing Rachel would believe it.
.............
It's a testament to how much she needs this thing with Rachel that she skips out on dinner with her agent, Ryan. Especially, since he's nowhere near as nosy as her publicist, Rebecca, unless she bails on something.
He stares at her now, looking remarkably as he always does, like a blonde version of Kurt.
"So," he begins, when she doesn't immediately confess. "I suppose those rumors about you haunting Carpe Noctem are more truth than rumor, hmm?"
Silence is apparently enough of an answer for him, because he nods knowingly as he sips at his coffee.
"It's going to come out eventually. Rebecca's already dealing with grainy photos of the two of you," he continues nonchalantly.
"I can-won't stop seeing her," Quinn says, lifting her chin defiantly.
Ryan merely raises an eyebrow coolly, before shrugging. "I never said you had to. Sure I could do without Rebecca riding my ass about what the hell my client's getting up to, or rather who she's getting into, but that's really not my problem. Although, you might want to tell your little midget to ease up on the biting, or you'll be out a makeup team."
Quinn blinks. She'd expected more resistance. "That's it."
His lips quirk smugly while he nods. "You're better than ever, what would I have to complain about? Other than Rebecca, of course." He sneers a little at this, and Quinn's surprised she hadn't seen that he'd be behind her sooner, considering he's usually behind anything that will drive Rebecca nuts. "Just try not to stand me up next time, darling," he says dryly.
.............
It feels like love, mostly because Quinn can't imagine needing someone as much as she needs Rachel. Needing someone as much for the hate as for the love. As twisted as it seems, she loves Rachel's bitterness and anger almost as much as she loves the rare tenderness Rachel shows, remnants of the person Quinn knew first.
Beth becomes a less frequent image through her mind, because Rachel's reassuring words linger, a fact that never fails to keep Rachel on the forefront of her thoughts.
Not even, Ryan with his consistently infuriating knowing looks and teasing can keep her from counting down the minutes.
But, everything, their every moment is as precarious as it feels, and it all comes to a head when the first definitive pictures are released. Rebecca's as frustrated as she expects, but it's not her publicist she can't handle. What she can't handle is Rachel, and not just Rachel so much as Rachel refusing to see her.
The day the story breaks, the brunette quits her job at Carpe Noctem and won't answer her door. Of course, both locations are swarmed with paparazzi, but if she could just see Rachel, it'd be worth it.
It must be love, Quinn decides. Nothing less would hurt this much, and the pain's on par with saying goodbye to Beth. It's only then that her work suffers, which is strange considering it's the first time in a while she's had the opportunity for a full night's sleep.
..............
For the most part, the situation feels hopeless. Rachel had always given her dark looks at the mere mention of exchanging numbers, which should've clued her into her place in Rachel's life.
Then she walks into the lobby of her building and sees Rachel gripping her building manager's collar. There's a sudden lifting in her chest as she barrels towards the other girl, who stiffens under her embrace, but doesn't pull away.
"Perhaps, we should take this upstairs," Rachel, murmurs delicately, nodding towards her ruffled and wide-eyed building manager.
Quinn nods, but doesn't let go of Rachel this time, even if Rachel looks distinctly uncomfortable and aggravated about being out in public this close.
"I got a part," Rachel says stiffly as soon as the door shuts behind them. "It's just some off-Broadway show, but I got one."
"That's great," Quinn says, although it comes off like a question. She hasn't been aware of Rachel's efforts to make it on stage and knows even less about why Rachel looks so incised about it.
"No, it's not great. It's charity," Rachel corrects venomously. "This is all your fault."
Quinn looks down at the finger pressed just below her sternum. While she's very much aware of her many faults, Quinn has no idea what Rachel's talking about.
"The director recognized me by so-called torrid love affair with world renowned model, Quinn Fabray. I barely had to do a thing, before I had the part."
A wince follows every word, which has more to do with the other girl's tone of voice than her poking.
"And, that's a bad thing," Quinn questions.
"Yes, that's a bad thing. It's unfair," Rachel continues, looking scandalized. "I don't deserve that part."
"Who says you don't?"
"They gave me the part, because of you."
"Rachel," she says cautiously, recognizing the flair of Rachel's temper. "I wish you could see in you what I do."
"And what do you see that I don't?"
"I see a star. I see someone who's not afraid to push barriers and can belt an amazing song on the fly. You've always had a spark, Rachel. This is just your chance to show them. You think you don't deserve it, then show them that you do," she finishes, feeling all the fight leave her and hoping it's enough.
Rachel's lips purse as she considers and all it does is remind Quinn of how long it's been since their last kiss, how much she has to lose. "Do you honestly believe that?" It's one of the few moments the old Rachel slips through, the vulnerable self-conscious one.
"I do. As someone who's had talented people shoved down her throat for more than half a decade, I can honestly say I do."
She takes a step closer to Rachel, cupping a trembling jaw, before she brushes her lips against Rachel.
It's nothing like every other kiss they've shared. There's no anger or sadness, just an absence of everything that's ever brought them together. Something akin to happiness builds within her chest as they kiss, and she thinks that maybe, this is her favorite Rachel, because it's all of her.
There's a moment, where Rachel almost backtracks and Quinn's never been as terrified as when Rachel first steps into Quinn's room, bright and open, where there's nowhere to hide.
"You're beautiful," Quinn breathes, hands on Rachel's shirt. "Trust me." Just this once, she finishes silently, and just this once, Rachel lets her.
..........
Their relationship is far from perfect.
Even with Rachel's recent success and Quinn's sudden heat from the public, there's still a lot of lingering bitterness. Love is still as entwined with hate as it's always been, but they need each other. Somehow, some way, they make each other better.
It's not perfect, but it's all they've ever needed.