slidingmoments | "Big girls don't cry."

"Big girls don't cry."

Who: Rachel Berry and Noah Puckerman
What: Facing the music
Where: News Cafe, Miami
When: Follows THIS, almost four weeks after Kurt's admission to the clinic

Rachel had selected a small table for two by the window of the cafe and proceeded to sit there playing with the little cannister of sugar sachets while she waited for Puck to arrived. She arranged them all neatly, then took them back out to make sure they were all facing the right way up. It had nothing to do with wanting the sugar to be neat. In fact, she really had no fucks to give about what the cafe's sugar looked like. She was just nervous and uncertain about this whole thing. She had spent the last eight weeks alone, the latter four of which had been in Lima with her fathers. She'd had to do a lot of soul searching and even now, she wasn't sure she had a soul after the horrible things she had said. She never meant to hurt anyone.

What had her life become? Seriously? How had it all gone so terribly wrong? How did she keep managing to fuck it all up, no matter what she did? She couldn't keep going on like this. She really didn't like herself anymore but she had no idea how to fix anything. She had reached out to Puck when she had been too ashamed to try with Blaine again. Blaine wasn't answering any of her texts or emails anymore. She had lost one of the best friends she ever had.

She was so lost in her own thoughts that she startled and jumped when Puck sat down at the table with her. The sugar packets were quickly shoved (messily) back into the cannister and she wrung her fingers in front of her as he looked at him. "I don't know how to stop screwing everything good that happens to me up. I..." There was a pause and she swallowed heavily, eyes dropping down to her tightly coiled fingers. "I attacked Kurt because I was scared he would take Blaine away from me," she finally confessed in a choked voice.

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The fact of the matter was, Puck had been on edge for weeks. Between spending every spare moment in Jacksonville with Blaine, Kurt, and sometimes Quinn, and all the stress of his job, combined with the fact that his feelings for Quinn were a lot deeper than one-time comfort sex kinds of feelings... Well, it wasn't hard to realize that his brain was a jumbled mess of exhaustion and emotions he couldn't fully understand. And not having Rachel around had been tough on him. The two of them had never made the best of couples, but they made one hell of a pair of friends when things were good. And ordinarily, these were the kinds of things Puck would've felt comfortable talking to Rachel about, but now? She'd managed to fuck everything up with Blaine, and Puck's loyalty to Blaine, combined with the fact that Rachel really was well and truly the one in the wrong had made it hard for him to come to her.

Still, she'd asked him to have coffee with her, and the fact was that no matter what, she had a part of him that no one else ever would. She'd carried and given birth to his child all those years ago, and they'd gone through the painful process of giving said child up for adoption together. It was a pain that Puck had gotten over, with a lot of help along the way from good friends, and he was more or less happy with the way his life had turned out, as opposed to being stuck in Lima in an unhappy marriage (or divorce) with Rachel, raising a child who would turn out unhappy, too. They'd made the best decision for themselves and the baby, and Puck wouldn't have changed it. But despite the fact that they were well past that, there would always be that bond between them that meant that Puck could never entirely write Rachel off.

As he sat down in front of her, he was fully expecting another Rachel Berry moment, but the one that came wasn't exactly what he was thinking. It was a full on outburst of heartbroken feelings, and Puck just stared at her for a moment as his brain caught up to his ears. "R... Rachel, Blaine... You know Blaine better than that. He'd still be talking to you on the regular if you hadn't said that to Kurt." He paused, shaking his head as he tried to understand Berry logic for what seemed like the millionth time. "He loves you to death, you know. You're his hag. Or were. I just don't understand why you'd do this."

"Kurt hated me in school, Puck. Hated me. He was my biggest threat and you know I was different back then. I wanted to do anything I could to win, and that meant trying to block everyone who threatened to take my dreams away from me. I know I was awful back then, and I was so damn jealous of him because he was one of the only people in the school who challenged my talent. He was biggest threat. Maybe in another universe, we could have been friends but we never got close. It was him, and it was me. Then he joined the Cheerios and he became untouchable to even try to reason with. It never helped when you got me pregnant and we cheated on Finn. Finn, who ended up being his brother. He has no reason to ever like me," Rachel implored pleadingly, already feeling that tickle behind her eyes of threatened tears.

She paused, trying to maintain her composure, but it was taking distinct effort. "When I heard that it was Kurt that Blaine had fallen for, I just panicked. I did try to keep it together, but then suddenly Kurt was there in that store with me. And he was just... being Kurt. Veiled, stoic, bitchy around the edges. Seeing him in person, I really freaking panicked that this guy would steal Blaine's heart and convince him that I was an awful person he shouldn't be friends with anymore. I didn't really know anything about how Kurt was and is now, after school. I had no idea he was sick or anything. He always seemed to have it so together, how would I know? So, I just tried to protect myself. I tried to protect myself from him taking Blaine from me, turning him against me. I bitched back at him and I was awful. It was like some sort of weird pissing contest going on in my head with myself. That I deserved to be Blaine's friend and who was Kurt Hummel to take him away from me? This was all before I even knew what Kurt's intentions were. I never said any of this was rational, because it wasn't. I panicked and I screwed up. Story of my life. I'm always screwing up. I always do stupid things when I'm threatened because I don't know how to handle things out of my control, and Kurt was this sudden unknown entity Blaine was all heart-eyes at. Blaine's never had a boyfriend or had feelings for anyone. I didn't know how to handle it... especially hearing it was Kurt, of all people."

"You hated him, too," Puck replied, trying to get her to see the logic in the situation. Although, as Puck well knew, logic and Rachel Berry were two things that very rarely went together. "I know you guys hated each other. And you were both bitches to each other with a capital B. But fuck, Rachel, that was years ago. This isn't high school. If it was, I'd still be having unprotected sex like some kind of idiot dickhead and knocking up other dude's girlfriends. We all made a royal metric fuckton of mistakes, Rach. We all did. Every single one of us. But we all grew up and learned from them, and that's what you have to do now. For Blaine, but also for you. This is real life, babe. It's not a joke. Our best friend's hurting right now, and it's our job to be there for him and make it easier. Not to make things harder on him or Kurt. I know you know that, Rachel. I know you do."

Puck's eyes, that had glared with anger at his phone when she'd texted him earlier, now showed only care and compassion for this person who'd remained a part of his life through thick and thin, no matter how bad things had gotten after the pregnancy of epic doom. "I know. Because I know you, and everything in life is crazy drama as far as you can see. But the fact is, Kurt loves Blaine and Blaine loves Kurt. It doesn't matter to them what happened back in high school nearly so much as it matters that they surround themselves with good people and loyal supportive friends now. I know you can be that for our boy, but you have to be willing to try. Blaine loves you, Rachel. He was so fucking hurt, not because you hurt his boyfriend nearly so much as because you betrayed him in something that was very important and special to him. I know that you know that, babe. And I know that you can step up and fix it. Fuck, you have to. You have to if you ever want Blaine to be willing to give you a second chance. Rachel... Don't ever underestimate the power of Blaine's friendship. That kid will love you to the moon and back, but you have to be fair to him. And to the other people he loves. I know you. God knows I do. And I know that your heart's in the right place, and you love Blainers. Just... Search your heart to find the best way to deal with things so you can be there for him? Because things are really bad, Rach."

Rachel sighed and held up her hand. "I don't see how that makes any difference to any of the current situation. He had reason to hate me, because I was trying to sabotage him just like I have been trying to lately. But what no one ever knew was that I never really hate him. I was jealous of him, but I wanted to be his friend. He just would never let me close. I thought we could have been good friends, bonded over the love of the same things but he just despised my very presence. He once told me he wanted to lock me in a basement and shove socks in my mouth to shut me up. I hated him because he wouldn't give me a chance. I'm not making excuses here. That's not why I'm here, I'm just making a point because you brought it up. All I ever wanted was to be his friend, I just never knew back then how to go about getting any friends without being obnoxious and pushy, two very traits Kurt despised in anyone because he was so independent and in control. He didn't want to be controlled by anyone else. And... and knowing now what was really going on back then, and how he was under all that cool bitch exterior? I... I feel like a huge part of it was my fault. What if I was one of the biggest reasons he turned out like this?" she asked, her voice dropping to a choked whisper when the tears of guilt finally spilled over. Her stomach had been coiled with it ever since the truth about Kurt had been exposed.

She grabbed for some napkins to wipe her eyes, feeling stupid for crying in a public place. "I know it's bad, okay? I've been trying to keep up from afar, but I went back home to Lima so I wasn't in anyone's faces and making everything worse. That's why I'm here. I want to know how Blaine is, how Kurt is. I... want to try and fix all this somehow. I just don't know how when Kurt isn't going to want anything to do with me. You don't need to tell me what I have to do, I'm well aware of it. But everyone was saying how volatile the situation was and easing my own guilt seemed like a selfish thing to do when Kurt was so sick and things were a giant mess. That's why I just went away."

Puck was seriously at a loss here. He'd never claimed to fully understand the mishmash that went on in Rachel Berry's brain. It was a scary place sometimes. But the fact remained that, if anyone could help Blaine and Rachel work their shit out, it was probably going to end up being Puck. "Listen to me," he said, looking at her across the table and speaking firmly. "Rachel, I know how you and Kurt were in high school. Fuck, while you and I were dating, I was constantly getting earfulls of just what exactly you thought of Kurt Hummel, and he wasn't going to steal your spotlight, and the whole nine. I know that you and Kurt never got along back then, but... Fuck, Rachel, that was years ago. I know you know that. And trust me, babe, I feel you on the whole blaming myself in part for what's going on with Kurt. For Christ's sake, I used to throw him in dumpsters. Like garbage. Like he was nothing but gum stuck to my shoe... And now to find out that's what he really believes about himself? I know what that feels like. I do. And I fucking hate myself for it. But listen to me. Kurt had a lot of terrible shit he had to deal with along the way, and you can't take all the responsibility for it, either. Trust me on this, Rachel. We probably both added to it. But it's not mostly your fault, okay?"

He watched her break down in front of him, and slid his chair around to the other side of the table to put his arm around her. "Shhh..." he soothed, gently stroking her hair. "It's gonna be okay. Blaine loves you, and I know deep down he misses you, even if he is really angry with you. But being upset with you is the least of his worries right now. He's running himself ragged trying to be there for Kurt, and Kurt's... He's not okay. Last time I was there, he did look a little better. I guess what I'm saying is... This could take a bad turn at any time... We don't know how it's gonna go. And I can't tell you what to do, but if it takes that bad turn, I wouldn't want this to be still hanging in the balance."

Rachel frowned a little at this. It had been a long time since the dumpster thing was brought up and she became abruptly aware of the enormity of it all of a sudden. Puck actually did used to throw Blaine's current boyfriend into dumpsters. She couldn't explain it, but that hurt deep inside on Kurt's behalf. She had the rationality now to pause and see how awful that must have made Kurt feel at the time. This was the person Blaine had come to have feelings for, and the history was just terrible. It was no wonder that Kurt had inevitably come to have such low self-esteem and self-worth that a sickness fuelling it was plaguing his very existence. "It... it all seems to insignificant and stupid now. Back then, it was like everything was revolving around it. But now it's just... how could we have been so awful to each other? Kurt in that store that day where I said those horrible things to him, I had no idea anything was wrong with him. He looked like he had everything together, and I was actually jealous of him for that."

She wrung the napkin between her fingers and sighed. "You have to admit, though, there was always a possibility that Blaine might have chosen Kurt over me. If push came to shove and Kurt did ask him to choose, how can you be so sure Blaine wouldn't have just gone along with that for Kurt's sake? I always knew that when Blaine fell in love, he would fall so damn hard and passionately. I just never expected it to be Kurt who was the one. I never expected to find out that the one person I thought always had it together has been falling apart from the inside out for along time. How is Blaine going to cope with any of that? I just... I don't know how anything between them is. It's not like anyone has kept me informed and I was too scared to ask. The last thing I heard was that you were going out to dinner with them and Quinn. It sort of hurt I didn't get an invite too, but for obvious reasons, I wasn't welcome. Blaine hasn't told me anything about things with Kurt."

There was a huge part of Puck that was struggling with guilt and blaming himself. Quinn had more or less told him there would be, and she couldn't have been more right. It made Puck almost physically ill to think of how fucked up his role in this whole thing was, treating Kurt like something worthless and mistreating him. To have the person that he'd spent a huge amount of his high school career torturing, suddenly be the person that his best friend was falling hard and fast in love with, and to see him hurting like this? Puck was pretty damn sure it was the most heartbreaking and sickening feeling in the world. "We were so goddamn full of ourselves back then. Most everybody was in some way or another. And we all went around fucking with each other's feelings. Whether we were cheating on people or throwing kids in dumpsters, we were all a bunch of fucking dicks. But no, babe... He doesn't have it all together. He doesn't have it together at all. It's a fucking mess how hard he's having to fight just to fucking eat right now."

"Okay, I guess that's fair to question," Puck replied, mulling that over for a moment. "But I think they decided in the beginning that they weren't going to be that couple. They have taken each other for better or worse without even getting married, Rachel. Things are tough, but they're holding onto each other. The dinner thing that night was a disaster... But even if we'd all been in good shape friendship wise, I think the point of that dinner was to try to set me up with Quinn. That... Is a whole different story. But Kurt and Blaine broke up that night when Blaine caught Kurt trying to purge. It was a fucking mess. The fact is... They don't want drama or bad shit happening between any of us. They just want their friends and each other to help them through."

Rachel lowered her eyes in shame. He was right. Beyond right. They really all had been awful people to each other a lot of the time. "But we were just trying to keep our heads above board and find a place to belong. I'm justifying how we were, but if we just put all that aside and be friends, maybe none of this awful stuff would have gotten as bad as it did. I wouldn't have lost Finn as a friend, Kurt might have actually even wanted to be my friend, Quinn would have been looking at me like I was something she stepped in, people might have given you more chances than just assuming you were nothing but an irresponsible slut. How did we screw ourselves over so bad? I feel like I have nothing to show for any of that horrible stuff. None of it was worth anything... and now Kurt's sick because of it. I wish I knew how to make it better."

She nodded as she listened, but she was toying anxiously with the pendant around her neck. She couldn't help but wonder what things would have been like if Kurt and Blaine met each other back in school. She knew the early days of their relationship here, where it was all still new and shiny, they had pretty much fallen for each other from the moment they met. She knew that much. Probably not love right off the bat, because love at first sight was a fallacy. No one could truly love someone just on looks. But it was like there was a natural connect there to see how Blaine had responded to it. He had been on Cloud 9. Now it had all gone horribly wrong, but not from anything Blaine did, and it wasn't Kurt to blame either because he was ill. "I... I don't even know how I would begin to talk to Kurt. I'll talk to Blaine, but Kurt is a whole other factor. And the way you talk, it sounds like he's really sick and maybe I should just keep my distance anyway. Is there anything, really, that I could do to help? I don't know anything about eating disorders. I tried one in sophomore year, but I failed at even that. I can't imagine even a little what it would be like to keep doing that for years on end. How is he even still functioning? If I even had the slightest clue about any of it, I would never have said those horrible things to him. And I... I... the day it happened, Kurt ended up in the ER. Was that my fault? Did I push him to make himself sicker?"

"We were," he agreed. "But we went about it all the wrong way... Do you know how many scenes I've had to go to where kids had fucking offed themselves because of people like the person I used to be? Kids who got made fun of so much, they decided it wasn't worth being alive anymore? Not just gay kids, but fat kids, skinny kids, just... this... this way that kids have of hurting each other to make themselves look better. We were just like that, Rach. We didn't just hurt the people we hated, or the ones we were threatened by... We hurt our own friends... The people we loved. Those kids could just as easily have been Kurt, or even Finn, after what we did to them back then. I know we can't go back and undo the past, Rachel, but fuck... We've gotta make the future better, for Kurt and Blaine's sake."

Puck could all but see the wheels turning in Rachel's mind, and he knew her well enough to recognize the "what ifs" face. She got that look a lot these days, usually in relation to what if she'd made it on Broadway and hadn't ended up where she was now. But he knew without even asking that she was wondering a lot of what if's about Kurt, and that was hard to even imagine now that he knew the heartbreaking truth. "Maybe it's going to take a while... And you may be right. Maybe for now you just need to talk to Blaine, and assure him that, as soon as Kurt feels up to seeing you, you'd really like to apologize to him, too. In person. I don't think there's much you can do right now, babe... Just... Be there for Blaine. Let him know that... That you're here for him and for Kurt, too, if needed. There's only a lot of waiting. You can check in on Blainers from time to time. I don't know, Rach. I really don't. I don't think any of this is completely any one person's fault. I think it's a lot of years of the same hurtful bullshit going on, and in the end, it just became too much for him. It flares up... He has good days and bad days. But no, I don't think it's totally your fault. Besides... Laying blame doesn't help anybody. All we can do now is try to do the right things and help them out as we can, if we can. Sometimes we can't even do that. Just... wait to see what comes next. But either way... Do try to talk to B... And Kurt, too, when the time is right."

Rachel just went quiet at this, finding herself sitting there and indulging in a moment of her own hurt in this own thing, even if she knew she wasn't entitled to it. She was awful and it had consequences, but she was still human. That, after all, had always been her biggest flaw... she was just human. "I just... feel left out of everything with you guys lately. You're hooking up with Quinn, Blaine's hooked up with Kurt. You guys seem to do everything together, and I'm still painfully single. I live alone, I don't even have a cat. You're always too busy to do anything. Even with just this, it was like you were considering five hundred other things you might need to do before you could agree to meet me, and that hurt. It's not like I am ever going to get someone to date me, because I just seem to piss everyone off all the time. No one wants me, and even my best friends have no room for me anymore."

"I know I fucked up, but why am I always the one who has to pay for that more than anyone else? Everyone else seems to have more forgiveness for anyone but me, because, oh no, when Rachel fucks up, it must just mean she a giant evil bitch or cares about no one but herself and wants to hurt everyone for her own gain." Her voice broke at this and she started to cry again and just shook her head. "You know what? I'm just going to go. I said my piece. You guys can just get back to me when Kurt is better and you don't have a billion other things on your plate beyond making me jump through a billion hoops to prove myself worthy of just being your friend anymore. After all, I'm not allowed to get hurt or upset, am I? That just means I'm being a selfish bitch. That's all I'm ever capable of, isn't it?" She tried to grab her handbag to leave, but it got caught on the leg of her chair and she just dropped back into it with a miserable and lonely sob. "When am I going to be someone's something special?"

The fact was, as much as Puck wanted to tell Rachel to quit being selfish and focusing on herself, he couldn't help feeling for her. No matter what happened, Rachel would always be a part of his life, and like it or hate it, he would always care for her on some level. And it sucked when he thought about it. Rachel really was being left out of everything, even though a lot of that was her fault. It didn't mean that she didn't still hurt because of it. His dark eyes moved over her face, his head tilted a bit as he watched her. "Rachel... It's not like we wanted you out of everything. It was just... Well, it seemed like you didn't really want to be a part of it if Kurt was involved. And... Fuck, I know I didn't have the nicest response when you asked to meet up with me, but you have to understand that Blaine was seriously hurt by what happened. I don't usually go into things to take sides, but there was a pretty clear right and wrong this time." Still, he couldn't help the sympathetic look on his face. He knew she wasn't an evil person, and that she'd never wanted to hurt Blaine, and deep down, she didn't even really go into it to hurt Kurt so much as to get back what she thought was rightfully hers in Blaine.

And then she was angry and hurt, and tears were streaking her face as she asked for the explanation of something that Puck wasn't sure he could give her. It hit him hard and fast that she really was right. People held her to a higher standard for some reason that not even Puck was sure he could name, though it was something he was just as guilty of as anyone else. For a moment, Puck said nothing, watching as she tried to leave, only to slump back into her chair, sobbing with the heartache that seemed to have so much more to it than just the recent upset with Blaine and Kurt. And without even thinking about it, Puck moved to the other side of the table, taking his chair with him, to sit next to her and wrap her in a tight embrace. He brought his hand up to gently stroke her hair at the back of her head, and simply let her cry. "Shhhh..." he whispered comfortingly. "I'm sorry, Rachel. I'm really sorry. You're right, babe. You're right that people expect more of you, but it's because we know you're capable of so much more than you think you are." It was true. Somewhere along the way, Rachel had lost so much of the almost annoying level of self-confidence she'd once had, and with it, she'd lost so much of what made her Rachel. "I'm sorry, Rach," he repeated, holding her gently against his shoulder.

This was stupid. It was so goddamn stupid. She even knew it was ridiculously stupid as soon as she let herself lose it like this, but once the floodgates were open, it felt damn nearly impossible to quickly slam them shut again. She usually saved these sorts of break-downs and embarrassing self-pity for the privacy of her own home, but lately everything was just getting harder to hold inside. She had no one to talk to, no one to confide in, no one to comfort her and tell her life was going to be okay when it felt like it was never going to get better for her. Why couldn't she just move on from all of this and cut her losses? Why couldn't she be stronger and deal with her feelings from behind masks where it looked like nothing in the world even touched her? And for some reason, Puck's word when he did speak just hurt even more. "You never even asked if I wanted to be! I wasn't invited into anything! It was always you and Blaine. It's always you and Blaine! Now it's you and Blaine and Kurt. And Quinn. There's no room left for me. And there you go again! Finger pointing me for being horrible and blaming everything on me. Oh you're wrong Rachel. You're always wrong. It's always you the one to fuck up, just admit it and everything will be perfect again. Let me go, I'm leaving!"

She didn't want to make a scene, but she knew people had to be staring. Hell, if this was anyone else, she would be staring at her too. "Just... don't worry. I'll fix things with Blaine so no one needs to feel awkward anymore. But then, I'm just going to leave you guys to it. I can't fight anymore to try and be an important part of someone's life only to keep getting shoved aside and told I'm an awful person. I can't. I'm going somewhere where I don't even need to think about mattering. Blaine can have Kurt, and you can have Quinn, and you can keep being each other's best friends. I won't be in your way anymore," she said tearfully and finally stood up, her bag freeing from it's chair prison so she could run out of the cafe without looking back. She needed to get out of Miami. She couldn't handle being there and feeling like dog crap on the bottom of everyone's shoes anymore.

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"Big girls don't cry."

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