"This time I think I'm to blame. It's harder to get through the days. You get older and blame turns

[dontrainonmyparade]

Who: Rachel Berry and Kurt Hummel
What: Unexpected facing of music
Where: Kurt, Quinn and Mercedes apartment
When: A few days after THIS and resulting from THIS

Rachel couldn't deny that she was nervous. In fact, she was so nervous, she felt like she was just going to throw up all the time in anticipation of this conversation. Blaine was back in Miami, and although he was staying with Kurt for the couple of days they were here, she needed to seize this window of opportunity she had to try and make amends with one of her closest friends before she lost him. In fact, it was why she didn't text him in advance to warn him she was coming, in case he didn't want to talk to her. She had been a mess lately, she didn't think she could add that one more rejection on the top of everything. She just had to take Robin Williams sound advice, and seize the day. Carpe diem! She had even watched Dead Poets Society three times last night after seeing Blaine's Facebook post to try and pluck up more courage for this.

This apartment block didn't have buzzers. Each place had their own knocker or bell, so that did help. She rang the doorbell and stood back, fiddling anxiously with the leather strap of her handbag over her shoulder. She didn't know what she was going to do if Blaine told her to piss off. It really could be the end of everything.

Comments

[dontrainonmyparade]

"I-I--" Rachel stammered, completely shocked and taken aback by his confronting question. But ultimately, words just failed her and she had to snap her mouth shut again when she could answer it. She had no answer and it wasn't even a question she had ever asked herself for. There was maybe a tiny part of her that was annoyed at him for asking it and just throwing it out there to roadblock her, but when she glanced up at his face again, there was nothing confronting or aggressive there at all. It was just an honest question that he seemed bewildered about. All he wanted to know was why she had created such a battle in his own school life and why he had always had to fight her on anything. Enough time had passed for him to have the balls to ask now, and with them trying to call some sort of truce here, she realised he had every right to ask her.

She toyed with the pendant on her necklace, a nervous gesture she always harboured. She wanted to get up and leave, but that was the coward's way, and she didn't want to be a coward anymore. All this happening with Blaine, Kurt, and Puck, she wanted to try and claim her life back and find some way to just... like herself again. Right now, she just didn't, and she was pretty sure she hadn't in a very long time. Maybe Kurt was right. Maybe it was the pregnancy and adoption that had done that and she never realised just exactly how much it had stolen from her. "T-There's nothing really. It's just that I never really found my feet again after that. I always felt like it was a screw up I could never change. It was this blight that would always be in my past that I was ashamed of. Because I was. I wanted my first time to be special and I... I thought once push came to shove that Puck might... he might just... I-I mean, he wanted me, and at a time I was really not sure about myself, that made me feel good. But it's our past, and it was one time. There was no way I was ever his type. We're just... we're better as friends. I don't have many friends. That's why Puck and Blaine mean the world to me. I feel like wanting anything more than that is asking too much because no one ever really wants to put up with me. I mess everything up. But I wish someone would one day look at me the way Blaine looks at you," she finally admitted, her voice lowering to almost a whisper and she couldn't even make eye contact with him. "Anyone I think might be a hope of that, when I look... they're in another direction. Story of my life really. The only way I could get anyone to notice me was if I just put myself everywhere. I-I guess that's why I was so annoying to be around. And now I have nothing because the two people who meant anything to me don't have room for me in their lives anymore."

[justbeingaqueen]

"And you blame me for that on some level. Taking Blaine's time away from him. Rachel, I..." Kurt paused and had to sigh, only because he did feel for her but it was more than obvious there was so much between the lines here she wasn't actually saying. It could be because she was deluded to it herself and didn't realise there was more playing deeper below the surface than she realised, or it could be because she wanted to keep things extremely concealed for some reason or another. "I need Blaine right now. It's really hard for me to admit to that, but it's time for me to start being honest. I know he and I haven't been together all that long in the grander scheme of things, but he's been like a saviour to me and right now, he's helping me more than I thought anyone really could. And so, so selflessly. That blows my mind. I don't think I have ever met anyone who is so unbelievably kind, caring and selfless as he is. Which is exactly why I have to tell you that you are so goddamn fucked in the head if you honestly believe that he would just shoved his friends out of his life because he's starting a relationship. You're talking crazy if you honestly believe he has no room left for you. He just didn't want to be around you when you were doing things like insulting me... who, like it or not, is who he wants to be with. And trust me, that still blows my mind most days."

He shook his head a little. "I can't tell you what to do or how to feel, Rachel. I actually hardly know you. This you, anyway. I didn't even much know the you I disliked back in school." There was a hesitant pause before he continued, though he hadn't missed a single thing she said and that was when something vital dawned on him quite starkly. "Are you saying that you don't regret that your first time was with Puck, but that you just wished he had wanted it to be special like you did...?"

He had always just thought Puck had lulled Rachel into a false sense of security with a few drinks and took her virginity when she was having a weak moment. He had no clue in the slightest that maybe the reason Rachel might have done it was because she had feelings for Puck and thought it would be the start of something. Which potentially meant she never had deeper feelings for Finn beyond a confused affection. It was a revelation that came as a shock, and he wasn't sure if that was what Rachel was implying at all but if it was... was there a chance she still had feelings for Puck even now, and that the reason why she was so upset and confused about just about everything was because that was never resolved for her? Was that why the guy who took her virginity in a less than personal encounter, knocked her up at 16, ruined her chances of a normal high school experience... ended up her best friend? If no relationship, maybe she thought that was the next best thing and then Blaine was in the mix because he was a package deal with Puck.

[dontrainonmyparade]

Rachel looked up at Kurt with a frown when he started to bitch her out, but then she realised exactly what he was saying. He wasn't bitching her out, not really, he was going to bat for Blaine and that actually made her feel warm and fuzzy inside. At least, before there was a slight hint of jealousy that came with it that she never really had anyone stick up for her like that. This whole thing was hard for her because the loneliness was eating her up inside. She didn't want to be jealous of Blaine, but she desperately wished she could find a relationship like he had. It had to be nice to have someone care about you that much that they would stick up for you no matter what. "I just... felt like I would be getting in the way of what you guys had when he was mad at me and you didn't really like me. None of my reasoning is sound, okay? I'm jealous of you. There. I said it. I would give anything to have a connection with someone like you do. I've never had that before. I don't want to get in the way of the relationship you have with Blaine by being an annoying pain in the ass. Because seriously, that seems to be about the only talent on my CV lately."

As soon as he was asking her that question, it felt like someone was trickling cold water down her back. She looked at him, wondering how the hell he could know, or even be that close on the right track. "Who wouldn't want their first time to be special? I bet yours was. I knew hardly anything about sex at the time... I... still don't. But I knew it was one of the most intimate things I would ever do, and I-I hoped it would be with someone who cared about me. I hated at the time how it made me feel because I felt like I screwed something up I would only get one chance at in my life, but yes... I guess you can say I did hope at the time he might have changed for me behind closed doors. He didn't. I didn't feel special or important, I felt like another notch on the bedpost he just moved on from when he was done. I don't even know why I hoped that with Puck. He wasn't really capable of making anything but his own dick feel important. I was so young and stupid. I should have waited. Then when I found out I was pregnant, it was like my whole world came crashing down around me, and not even in a romantic drama type of way. I couldn't tell my fathers because I was so terrified. I didn't tell anyone until I was so far along, I had no choice but to tell them. It was too late to do anything then. It's why adoption was the only answer."

She fell quietly, looking down at her hands. "You would think I would be used to this feeling of loneliness by now, right? I never really had anyone. Not until later when things got a little better and I came to Miami with Puck and Blaine. We got close, and they were like brothers to me, I guess. Just... brothers. That's it... Maybe faghag to Blaine, but Puck only ever saw me as some substitute little sister he once fucked. Even that was weird, considering we're basically the same age. I'm glad things didn't stay bad between us after I had to give the baby up, but I just need to let go of my past and move on because no matter how hard I have tried, I still have nothing. I have no one. See my best friends hook up and have less and less time for me, it's just... I think it's time for me to move on."

[justbeingaqueen]

"You're never going to find that connection with anyone, Rachel, if you keep sabotaging yourself. Trust me, I know. I also know it's a really hard lesson to know how to open yourself up to someone and let them in, but until you do, all you're going to project is a negative vibe about yourself. So, sure, you have done some some nasty and awful things in the past. You've hurt people. It just sounds to me like your comfort zone is being alone because you're afraid of what will happen if you try to get what you want and it doesn't work." With his fingers entwined together, Kurt put his hands on his chest for emphasis. "And I know that concept better than anyone right now. I know what it's like to constantly live in fear of yourself. You don't want to get like I am, Rachel. You just don't. You can be happy if you want it, but you can't be scared of it. And that takes a lot to learn, and sometimes? Sometimes you need to let someone else help teach you how to get it. That's Blaine for me. He came into my life at a time I least expected it and he was opening my eyes up to a whole new world and what I started to see within myself terrified me because I had never experienced those feelings before. I think you have experienced those feelings, and I think that it didn't turn out the way you hoped, so it spooked you and now you have never figured out how to lay your heart on the line again. You're scared if you do, it will get shattered all over again..."

He shook his head slowly. "No one ever gets used to loneliness. We accept it, but we never get used to it. Hell, I've had people around me for many years now, but I was still lonely within myself. The loneliness you're talking about isn't physical distance from people, it's emotional distance. But only you can fix that. Running away won't help. It's just going to create even more distance. You can't keep letting your emotions cause you to lash out at people, or you will be left with no one. Rachel... you need to talk to Puck, and I think you know why. Really talk to him, and make him talk to you."