The Only Exception (Quinn/Rachel)
Name: The Only Exception
Rating: PG
Length: 1000
Spoilers: Britney/Brittany
Summary: Quinn reflects on the concept of being a better person.
Author's Note: I pretty much just knocked this out right after the episode thanks to how sad Quinn looked during the song and that tiny little scene (you know what I'm talking about). It's probably a little more of a reflection on Quinn's character than on a Faberry relationship, but it definitely comes into play.
Being a better person was hard, Quinn had realized. She had realized this in the midst of a terrible time in her life when walking had become waddling and she and the bathroom had been almost constant companions. It sucked being a better person. She didn’t like it, and so when she gave up her baby to Shelby Corcoran and cried in her room for a week, she walked out of the room with a new purpose: be a terrible person.
Needless to say, she had spent much of the summer socializing with Mercedes and Kurt and volunteering with the new church she and her mom were going to. Being a better person sucked, because she broke three fingers helping a tipsy Kurt into her car and accidentally slammed the door on her own hand and then proceeded to drive her own damn self to the hospital. It sucked because she rebroke two of those fingers once more at Habitat for Humanity when a little boy’s kite got stuck in a tree and she climbed up to retrieve it and then proceeded to fall from said tree.
Now her fingers were misshapen and her back hurt like a mother (the irony did not escape her) all the time. So when she got back to school, she decided she would really be a terrible person.
It sort of worked - she got Santana demoted and regained her throne as the head cheerleader and had everyone falling at her feet. But it was a false sense of satisfaction, and that was the worst part. She loved the power associated with it, and that it earned her loyal subjects. But in the end, she gained more satisfaction from falling out of a tree and breaking two of her fingers, clutching a Bob the Builder Kite and only being met with a small child concerned about the state of his kite than she gained from falling off a cheerleading pyramid and immediately being surrounded by nervous girls all offering to call an ambulance.
Within a week of her demotion, Santana was right back where she had been before Quinn’s unfortunate fall from grace - right at her side. After a small out-and-out fight that had ended with Quinn and Santana both tumbling headfirst into a lake and Brittany hauling them out, Quinn had admitted with no small hatred of herself that she didn’t like treating Santana the way she had.
Santana had looked at her, wrapped up in a blanket and tucked up under one of Brittany’s arms, and frowned, her forehead crinkling up, and asked when Quinn Fabray developed all these, “feelings and shit.”
She hadn’t answered, just cracked her aching knuckles. After she had broken them, getting them wet had always ended with terrible shots of pain that made her wish she wasn’t such a good person, that she would break other people’s knuckles and make them feel this way just because she could. But that went right to Santana’s point - the thought of inflicting pain on someone who didn’t deserve it, or doing it in the first place brought no glee to Quinn anymore. She didn’t know why it had in the first place. She didn’t know what had possessed her to think that anything that she had done was acceptable or reasonable or logical or forgivable.
Maybe she deserved the pain.
But the feelings, she knew where they had come from. She missed her little girl, the little human being she had grown inside her for what seemed like so long, who she had protected and fought for and lost so much for. It was just a void in her, physically, mentally, emotionally. Little Beth was somewhere out there in the world, but not with Quinn, not even with her father.
It just sucked. She would give anything to be like Puck, so unaffected by everything going on around him, always the same. She would love to be like Santana or Brittany, who lived in their own world and didn’t give a shit about anyone else at the end of the day besides each other. She wished she could just not care, she wished she could look down at her weird slanty fingers and not smile because she helped a kid get his damn kite or Kurt get home safe.
Being a better person was hard. And it was especially hard now.
Watching Rachel Berry sing a sweet little song about love and exceptions being made - it sucked. She was a better person. She wanted to stab the girl in the face, she wanted to set Finn on fire, she wanted to shove Puck off a cliff, with his dopey smile looking up at her. She wanted to breathe fire and make people be afraid.
Because her exception, her one exception - before any other, before Mercedes or kites in trees or broken fingers - was making one for someone else. And it hurt more than she could say.
Somewhere in her head, she had thought that maybe Rachel would get it, that she would understand that Quinn had helped her for some reason, would question it, and maybe Quinn could have the courage to say what’s been building in her for too long, since the moment she saw Rachel Berry open her mouth and sing Keep Holding On and mean it for her, for the girl who had tore her apart since they were kids. She thought maybe Rachel would see her as Quinn Fabray, head bitch in charge, and ask in her little adorable voice, “Why are you helping me?”
And maybe, just maybe, the new, better person Quinn Fabray might say, “Because I think I might love you.”
But Rachel had so much faith in Quinn, so much faith that so little people had, and didn’t question her. She only smiled that little smile that Quinn had grown to love so much in this journey that she had embarked on over the past several months and she had whispered, “Thank you.”
For once in a long time, she hadn’t done something out of the goodness of her own heart. But this time, it wasn’t broken fingers that hurt Quinn Fabray.
Being a better person was hard, she thought, as she watched a single tear slide down Rachel’s cheek, as Rachel stared lovingly up at Finn.
You are the only exception…
the end.
Rating: PG
Length: 1000
Spoilers: Britney/Brittany
Summary: Quinn reflects on the concept of being a better person.
Author's Note: I pretty much just knocked this out right after the episode thanks to how sad Quinn looked during the song and that tiny little scene (you know what I'm talking about). It's probably a little more of a reflection on Quinn's character than on a Faberry relationship, but it definitely comes into play.
Being a better person was hard, Quinn had realized. She had realized this in the midst of a terrible time in her life when walking had become waddling and she and the bathroom had been almost constant companions. It sucked being a better person. She didn’t like it, and so when she gave up her baby to Shelby Corcoran and cried in her room for a week, she walked out of the room with a new purpose: be a terrible person.
Needless to say, she had spent much of the summer socializing with Mercedes and Kurt and volunteering with the new church she and her mom were going to. Being a better person sucked, because she broke three fingers helping a tipsy Kurt into her car and accidentally slammed the door on her own hand and then proceeded to drive her own damn self to the hospital. It sucked because she rebroke two of those fingers once more at Habitat for Humanity when a little boy’s kite got stuck in a tree and she climbed up to retrieve it and then proceeded to fall from said tree.
Now her fingers were misshapen and her back hurt like a mother (the irony did not escape her) all the time. So when she got back to school, she decided she would really be a terrible person.
It sort of worked - she got Santana demoted and regained her throne as the head cheerleader and had everyone falling at her feet. But it was a false sense of satisfaction, and that was the worst part. She loved the power associated with it, and that it earned her loyal subjects. But in the end, she gained more satisfaction from falling out of a tree and breaking two of her fingers, clutching a Bob the Builder Kite and only being met with a small child concerned about the state of his kite than she gained from falling off a cheerleading pyramid and immediately being surrounded by nervous girls all offering to call an ambulance.
Within a week of her demotion, Santana was right back where she had been before Quinn’s unfortunate fall from grace - right at her side. After a small out-and-out fight that had ended with Quinn and Santana both tumbling headfirst into a lake and Brittany hauling them out, Quinn had admitted with no small hatred of herself that she didn’t like treating Santana the way she had.
Santana had looked at her, wrapped up in a blanket and tucked up under one of Brittany’s arms, and frowned, her forehead crinkling up, and asked when Quinn Fabray developed all these, “feelings and shit.”
She hadn’t answered, just cracked her aching knuckles. After she had broken them, getting them wet had always ended with terrible shots of pain that made her wish she wasn’t such a good person, that she would break other people’s knuckles and make them feel this way just because she could. But that went right to Santana’s point - the thought of inflicting pain on someone who didn’t deserve it, or doing it in the first place brought no glee to Quinn anymore. She didn’t know why it had in the first place. She didn’t know what had possessed her to think that anything that she had done was acceptable or reasonable or logical or forgivable.
Maybe she deserved the pain.
But the feelings, she knew where they had come from. She missed her little girl, the little human being she had grown inside her for what seemed like so long, who she had protected and fought for and lost so much for. It was just a void in her, physically, mentally, emotionally. Little Beth was somewhere out there in the world, but not with Quinn, not even with her father.
It just sucked. She would give anything to be like Puck, so unaffected by everything going on around him, always the same. She would love to be like Santana or Brittany, who lived in their own world and didn’t give a shit about anyone else at the end of the day besides each other. She wished she could just not care, she wished she could look down at her weird slanty fingers and not smile because she helped a kid get his damn kite or Kurt get home safe.
Being a better person was hard. And it was especially hard now.
Watching Rachel Berry sing a sweet little song about love and exceptions being made - it sucked. She was a better person. She wanted to stab the girl in the face, she wanted to set Finn on fire, she wanted to shove Puck off a cliff, with his dopey smile looking up at her. She wanted to breathe fire and make people be afraid.
Because her exception, her one exception - before any other, before Mercedes or kites in trees or broken fingers - was making one for someone else. And it hurt more than she could say.
Somewhere in her head, she had thought that maybe Rachel would get it, that she would understand that Quinn had helped her for some reason, would question it, and maybe Quinn could have the courage to say what’s been building in her for too long, since the moment she saw Rachel Berry open her mouth and sing Keep Holding On and mean it for her, for the girl who had tore her apart since they were kids. She thought maybe Rachel would see her as Quinn Fabray, head bitch in charge, and ask in her little adorable voice, “Why are you helping me?”
And maybe, just maybe, the new, better person Quinn Fabray might say, “Because I think I might love you.”
But Rachel had so much faith in Quinn, so much faith that so little people had, and didn’t question her. She only smiled that little smile that Quinn had grown to love so much in this journey that she had embarked on over the past several months and she had whispered, “Thank you.”
For once in a long time, she hadn’t done something out of the goodness of her own heart. But this time, it wasn’t broken fingers that hurt Quinn Fabray.
Being a better person was hard, she thought, as she watched a single tear slide down Rachel’s cheek, as Rachel stared lovingly up at Finn.
You are the only exception…
the end.