Why Does Your Mother Think We're Still Dating?
Written for the Puckleberry Drabble Meme (Part One)
Prompt: "Noah, why does your mother seem to think we're still dating"
Characters: Rachel Berry & Noah (Puck) Puckerman
Word Count/Rating: 612words/K
She hasn’t talked to him in two weeks; not since she stormed out of his house after a day of relaxing on his couch watching movies while his mother and sister had been out escalated into another fight for them.
She had left muttering something about vulgarities and obscenities, promising him that he would never hear from her again.
I would only be so lucky was the last thing she heard from his before the wooden front door slammed behind her.
Sure, they had passed each other in the hallways at school and glee practices were inevitable but they’d walk past each other without a single glance and sit at opposite ends of the choir room. None of their friends were game enough to get into the middle of a Puck and Rachel fight by asking what was wrong.
That was why, two weeks after she’d stormed out of the house, when she was at synagogue with her dad and daddy she was more than surprised when Mrs. Puckerman sat down next to her, all smiles.
“Rachel, we’ve missed you around the house lately.”
The tiny brunette glances sideways at the older woman, making a mental note to kill her jerk of an ex the next time she saw him.
“I…I’ve just been super busy lately Mrs. Puckerman.” Rachel forces a smile, Puck could be damned if he thought she was going to be the one to tell his mother that they weren’t together anymore.
“You’ll have to come over for dinner really soon, I know Sarah’s been dying to see you again.”
“I’ll try.” She couldn’t break the woman’s heart.
~*~*~*~
After service ended, when her fathers’ were busy talking with another couple she slipped around the corner to the tall oak tree she would play under as a little girl.
His number is still in her address book, and as she presses the small piece of technology to her ear, listening to the irritating sound of the ringing; she wonders if he’s even going to bother picking up when he sees her name.
“What?” It’s the greeting she gets when he does answer, after the second attempt. “I’m kind of busy at the moment.”
“I’m at the synagogue.”
“So?”
“Noah, why does your mother seem to think we’re still dating?”
“And break her heart when I tell her those Jewish grandchildren she’s already planning for aren’t going to happen? No thanks.”
“Noah.” Rachel hissed again, even now that they were arguing she still couldn’t bring herself to call him Puck. Even after all this time it just sounded wrong. “She wants me to come over for dinner this week. You need to tell her.”
“It’s unnecessary Berry.”
She waited a couple of beats before answering, “How do you figure?”
“Well, every time we fight and you storm out I have to tell her you’re not going to become her dream daughter-in-law and she yells at me. Then you get over whatever fit you’re in and I tell her that everything’s fine and I get yelled at because you’re too good for me. I figured it was easier to just not tell her.”
“Everything’s fine?” She repeated. “You don’t want to leave me?”
She hears him pull away from his phone to laugh. “You’re ridiculous Rachel.” He answers. “We were being stupid. You know I don’t mean half the stuff I say.”
She looks down at the white gold watch she got last Christmas, and decided that they couldn’t make up properly over the phone. “I’m coming over Noah.” She looked up at the car park, spotting the woman she’d been talking to earlier. “I’m catching a ride with your mother.”