Fic: The Life and Times of Sarah Puckerman, Aged 9
Title: The Life and Times of Sarah Puckerman, Aged 9
Author: une_fille / unequivocally
Characters/Pairings: Baby Puckerman, Mama Puckerman, Puck/Rachel, various cast members
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 4622
Spoilers: Aired Episodes
Summary: Lima's resident bad boy moron as told through the eyes of his kid sister Mom's favorite
This entire fic came to fruition after this simple conversation:
une_fille : Fuck me, I think Junior Puckerman might be my favoritest character of all time. Because I know that there is a fucking psychopath/adorable little girl in there that will own our souls if we ever get to know her.
unequivocally : I'm pretty sure Sarah like, rules my life. Am seriously considering a Sarah centric fic. Like Puck and Rachel's relationship through her eyes.
What started out as a throw-away comment has EXPLODED into this. So please enjoy!
--------------------
Her brother is an asshole.
Most of the time.
But that's ok, ‘cause she still loves him.
Most of the time.
-----
Sarah crawls into his bed one night and lays next to him in silence.
After an hour, she asks, "Why do you think Dad left?"
"He's not your dad," Noah snarls, "and that's why he left." He has the decency to look guilty after she bursts into tears, and he pats her head awkwardly when he says, "Look, I'm sorry. I didn't mean it."
It's not enough to subdue her and he sort of flails around for a few minutes before sputtering, "I don't know why he left, Sarah. I don't know."
-----
Sometimes he lets her sit in his room when he practices his guitar. "I know that song," she says once.
"Oh yeah? Sing it for me."
She does, and he snorts. "You're a shit singer," he teases, but when she gets up to stomp off, he stops her. "Nah, just keep going."
-----
During her quarterly Parent/Teacher meeting, Mr. Gerald tells her mom that she has a real talent for the clarinet. Once they get home, her mom gushes and fawns over her, and promises that all her overtime will go to buying her very own instrument, so she can be a real musician.
Her mother comes home the following week waving her latest pay check in the air. “How about a trip to the music store tomorrow?” and they both jump up and down. But they get a phone call less than an hour later; Noah’s been arrested vandalizing Mr. Vargas' house. So the clarinet money goes to his bail.
On the drive home, she stews silently in the back seat, kicking the back of his seat as hard as she can. He just stares straight ahead, not even turning around to yell at her like he normally does.
"I hate you," she mutters when they walk into the house
"Yeah, well, I don’t care. You're not even really my sister," he spits out and for the first time since she can remember, her mom slaps him across the face.
He goes into his room and they don't see him for 3 days.
-----
She doesn't understand how a nice man like Finn Hudson gets along with her brother.
He's nice, and kind, and actually showers every day, unlike Noah, so she's not sure how they became best friends. But she doesn't mind, because when Finn comes over, he ruffles her hair and gives her a big grin and says something like, "Hey, kiddo," before following Noah up to his room to blast loud music for the rest of the night.
She thinks she's in love.
-----
Her brother starts bringing home some cheerleader.
Her name is Santana, and Sarah thinks she's really pretty, though sometimes she makes this face like she just stepped in something gross. That's not such a pretty face.
The first time she came over, Sarah walked into the living room to find Santana and Noah sitting close together on the couch. Her brother told her to go upstairs and leave them alone, but then Santana made that ugly face and looked at him saying, "Get over it, Puck, you're not touching my tits," before turning back to Sarah and saying, "You can stay, he's just mad that I know about Elizabeth."
She stood there for a second, feeling uncomfortable before the cheerleader finally looked up at her again, scoffed, and said, "You wanna come hang out, or not?"
Since then, Sarah's come to like Santana; she lets her hang out with them, and she calls Noah a moron a lot. Which he is.
And sometimes, she brings her friend Brittany who is like a real life Barbie doll and always has a snack in her backpack. She stays downstairs with her, even when Santana and her brother go to his room and Noah is complaining that he wants Brittany to come too.
After a while, Santana stops coming over, and she hears Noah swearing into his cell phone about a credit report. When he grumbles into the receiver that the girl is a snotty bitch, Sarah throws one of her dolls at his head and yells that he can't call her friend that name.
------
Sarah stumbles into the kitchen early one morning to find a stranger sitting at the table, bawling into a glass of orange juice.
"Where's Noah?" She asks, and the blond looks up with puffy eyes.
“Who are you?” the blonde throws back.
“I live here,” she says, crossing her arms. “I’m Noah’s sister.”
The girl looks back into her orange juice, mumbling “He told me he was an only child.”
He would.
“Well, you wouldn’t be the first to fall for it,” she replies and the other girl flinches. “What’s your name?”
“Quinn.”
“Do you think you can make me some breakfast?”
It turns out she can’t. She burns the toast, breaks the eggs and snaps when Sarah tries to give helpful directions. Twice she bursts into tears over the pop-tarts they end up having.
“Are you friends with my brother?”
“Yes. No. I don’t know.”
“Are you his girlfriend?” She misses Santana. Santana Lopez would never cry over burnt toast.
“No, definitely not,” Quinn answers. She gives a small smile and says “I’m dating Finn Hudson.”
Sarah drops her pop-tart.
“Get the hell out of my house.”
Sarah finds a bright red stain on the couch after Quinn leaves. She flips the pillow over and watches cartoons until Noah stumbles in from the backyard.
------
She walks in on him one night.
Dancing.
"What are you doing?" She says, mystified as she watches him bob awkwardly in front of his mirror.
Her voice startles him, and he turns on her, glowering and blushing. "Get the hell out of my room, twerp." He pushes her out into the hallway and is slamming the door before she can even reply.
"I'm gonna tell everyone I caught you dancing!" She yells, giving his door a swift kick.
The next night, he approaches her while she's watching cartoons and blurts out, "Ok seriously, last night. How bad did it look?"
She eyes him warily. "Your dancing?" He looks everywhere but her and nods, and she continues, "I think you're pretty much the worst dancer I've ever seen."
"Well fuck," he mutters under his breath, "Fine. Help me, then."
He lets her stand on his feet as they dance around the living room, and that's how Mom finds them when she gets home.
Her mom cuts in, because she's taller; Sarah watches from the couch and laughs when Noah dips her.
-----
Chores suck. They’ve both become pros at avoiding them.
Grocery shopping with Noah however is fun, and when their mom asks them to run to the store, they never complain.
Noah calls her his perfect partner-in-crime, because nobody ever suspects a little girl.
They’re about to get away with at least 20 chocolate bars stuffed in her jacket when some creepy lady stops them in the parking lot.
She has her hand on Noah’s chest and she keeps going on about her husband’s business trips. Noah looks annoyed and she doesn’t know why he doesn’t do anything about it.
“Hey, old lady,” she shouts. “Leave my brother alone.” The woman throws Sarah a nasty look and he lets out a bark of laughter.
When they get to his truck, she gets first dibs on the chocolate.
-----
After their yearly viewing of Schindler's List, she has nightmares. She goes to Noah's room in the middle of the night, but she can't bring herself to wake him. So instead she stands at the head of his bed, staring at him for a few minutes until he wakes with a start and swears under his breath when he sees her.
"God damn it, Sarah," he groans, rubbing a hand over his face.
"I had a bad dream."
"Whatever, kid. Get in." He pulls back the covers and scoots to the far end of the bed, and she wastes no time in clambering in after him.
He keeps throwing weird looks at the window, so she pats him on the shoulder and whispers “It’s okay, Noah, I don’t think Nazis can get in from there.”
He leans back down onto his pillow and mutters, “Yeah, I know,” before falling back asleep.
-----
Rachel Berry amazes her.
The first time she meets her, Rachel uses more words than she's ever heard in her life. She speaks so fast she's impressed she doesn't lose her breath, and she wears skirts that look like they came right off of Barbie.
But that's not what amazes her.
What amazes her is when Noah interrupts her and says, "Whatever, Berry, let's just get upstairs," she says, "I find that completely inappropriate and I would appreciate it if you didn't interrupt me when I'm talking."
Sarah half expects him to call her a name, but instead he just rolls his eyes and says, "Yeah, yeah, I'm sorry."
Rachel Berry amazes her.
-----
Their mom invites Rachel over for dinner. She spends the whole time talking about herself.
Noah spends most of the time rolling his eyes.
But he also actually uses his utensils and chews with his mouth closed, so that’s a welcome change.
-----
A week after Rachel showed up for dinner, Sarah finds Noah in his room, plucking at his guitar. He doesn't notice her at first, and it isn't until she says, "I know that song," that he looks up.
"Yeah," he says, and looks back down at his hands on the strings.
"Where's Rachel?"
"I'm not her type. Close the door on your way out."
-----
Finn Hudson comes over the following Saturday, and Sarah spends the afternoon hovering around the boys.
"Sarah, seriously, get out of my room," Noah snarls, throwing a pillow at her in the doorway.
"Nah man, she can stay, it's cool," Finn says, grabbing a pillow from Noah before he can throw that one at her too. "I always kinda wanted a little sister."
"Fuck, dude. You can have her."
Sarah hurries off to pack a bag, but when she comes back, dragging Mr. Hunnybunny with her, Finn's already gone home.
-----
She finds Noah in his room one day with two black eyes and a fat lip.
"What happened to you?" She breathes, and she's a little frightened because anyone who could beat up her brother must be a big, strong man. She wonders if he knows where they live.
"Your boyfriend," he grumbles, adjusting the bag of frozen peas over his face, "Just leave me alone."
She closes his door and heads downstairs. She finds his cell phone on the coffee table and she only hesitates for a second before grabbing it and going through his contacts.
Her first choice is obvious, she thinks.
“I don’t care if that douchetard is dying on the side of the road,” Santana tells her.
When she tries Brittany, all she gets is, “Sorry little girl, but Santana doesn’t care if Puck is dying on the side of the road. Tell him I say hi!”
Quinn answers the phone sobbing and doesn’t make much sense; once she starts blubbering about drizzle, Sarah decides to hang up on her.
There’s only one other person she can call, really.
But when Rachel shows up and manages to get Noah to eat something and let her clean his cuts, she admits to herself that maybe Rachel Berry should have been number one on her list.
-----
After Rachel leaves, she walks into the living room to find Mom and Noah sitting on the couch together.
Her mom is crying, and Noah is staring at the ground with his jaw clenched, and when Sarah steps towards them, her mom just shakes her head. "Not right now, Sarah. Go upstairs and play."
She hears the two of them screaming for the rest of the night and she can only catch bits and pieces, but she knows them well enough to know when it's serious.
Her mom screams that he's throwing his life away and he screams that she has no idea what she's talking about and then she hears the front door slam and Noah's truck rattle to life.
They don't see him again for two nights.
-----
She’s going to be an aunt.
When she announces this in class the next day, nobody believes her. Her teacher asks her if maybe she’s mistaken.
“No, it’s true,” she proclaims hotly. “I’m going to be Aunt Sarah.”
During recess, the rest of the teachers are already all talking about it.
Playing near the huddled group, Sarah tries to seem as though she doesn’t know they’re talking about her.
“Well, if it was going to be anyone,” one mutters, “it was going to be him.”
"I don't believe I know him," one of the newer teachers replies, "Is that the one that cleans Jo's pool?"
-----
She loves Finn Hudson. She does.
But Noah spends a lot of his time moping around the house now, his bruises still dark.
Prince Charming isn’t supposed to beat up your brother.
At least not in any of the fairytales she knows.
-----
She comes home from school one day to find Rachel and Noah sitting on the couch together. Rachel is doing homework, but when she sees her standing in the doorway, she smiles at her.
"Hi," she says, "did you have a good day at school?"
As she's about to reply, Noah pokes the older girl in her side. "Berry, go make me a sandwich."
She gives him a dirty look and makes one for herself and Sarah instead.
Sarah thinks Rachel could be better than Santana, maybe.
Then Noah says something about Rachel's "giant girl boner for Finn Hudson."
She doesn't know what a girl-boner is, but she knows she isn't about to share Finn, and she narrows her eyes at Rachel until the older girl hands her a peanut butter sandwich and asks if she wants milk, too.
-----
She hears shouting coming from Noah’s room. She hesitates about going to eavesdrop, but the decision is taken out of her hands when her brother raises his voice even louder and she can hear him clearly say, “Fuck, Berry! What’s it going to take to make you see what he’s doing?”
“He didn’t mean it that way-” Rachel cries but she is cut off by Noah coming out of his room and barrelling down the hallway past Sarah. He flies down the stairs and slams the front door on his way out.
She finds Rachel in the room, sitting on his bed, crying. Sarah sits down next to her, putting her hand on her back awkwardly.
"Noah yells at me sometimes, too," she says sagely, and Rachel laughs a bit.
"No, no, it's not Noah," she says, wiping at her tears and planning her words carefully. "He's mad because my friend hurt my feelings, is all."
"Finn Hudson?" She doesn't answer, and Sarah glowers, "Finn is like Prince Charming. He wouldn't hurt anybody. And if he did, he must have been under a spell."
Rachel chokes out a laugh, "A spell?"
"Every time Prince Charming does something wrong, it's ‘cause of bad magic. Real Prince Charming wouldn’t hurt you.”
“No, I guess he wouldn’t,” Rachel whispers.
-----
Rachel’s parents invite them over for Shabbat dinner, which means Sarah gets to wear a pretty new dress.
While the three of them get ready, her mom tells her that Rachel has two fathers.
“Well, that’s good then isn’t it?” she asks, letting her mother brush her hair. “We can ask her for one of them if she has a spare.”
Noah throws her a panicked look. “Don’t say anything fucking stupid tonight, Sarah,” he warns.
He goes back to fiddling with his tie so he doesn’t see her stick her tongue out at him.
-----
Rachel comes over to watch a movie, and they send her to her room because “it’s not kid-friendly.” So she watches from the stairs.
It’s one she’s seen before; it had a lot of blood and guts in it, and she had nightmares for a week. Noah didn't seem to care about it then, so she doesn't know why he's pretending to care now.
The show on the couch is a lot more interesting, in her opinion.
They jab each other with elbows, toss popcorn at each other and when Noah tugs on her hair, Rachel yells at him to knock it off, but doesn’t actually do anything to stop him.
And then he starts tickling her. It’s a move Sarah recognizes.
This is usually the part when he slips his hand up a girl’s shirt.
But he doesn’t. Just keeps on tickling her, as if he’s forgotten or something.
“This is the part where you put your hand up her shirt,” she blurts out. They both spring away from each other, Rachel beet-red and Noah with a scowl on his face.
He throws a pillow in her direction. “Get out of here, you little perv.”
They spend the rest of the movie sitting on opposite sides of the couch.
-----
She’s still the competition, but Sarah’s not stupid. She knows there is a lot she can learn from Rachel Berry.
“Is Finn a good kisser?” she asks her one day over coloring books and wax crayons.
Rachel stops her coloring abruptly and flushes a dark red. “He’s a perfectly fine kisser,” she says with a firm nod.
Noah, who had been drawing squiggly lines across Rachel’s paper to annoy her, cracks a crayon in his hand.
Sarah abandons her own paper and puts her chin in both hands. “I bet he’s the best kisser in the world,” she says dreamily.
Even though it’s not a question, Rachel still answers under her breath. “No, not the best,” she mumbles softly but they both hear her.
Noah gets up and helps Rachel to her feet. “Come on, Berry,” he says with a stupid smile on his face, “Time to go work on our homework. Upstairs.”
Rachel gets the same stupid look on her face and follows him, and Sarah thinks they’re both stupid to be doing homework on a Saturday, anyway.
------
Rachel likes projects.
They re-wallpaper Sarah’s bedroom. She makes a chore wheel to help out her mother.
The wall-paper gets ruined during a game of indoor football that goes a little too far and Noah just sets the chore wheel on fire after Rachel leaves, but it’s still fun to watch her come up with crazy new ideas that fail spectacularly.
When Rachel decides she is going to clean their garage, nobody complains. At the end of it, Sarah stands with Rachel, watching the last of the boxes get tossed into the back of the garbage truck.
“Um, that last one was Noah’s pool cleaning stuff,” she warns, her eyes following the truck turning around the corner.
Rachel smiles. “Oops.”
-----
Rachel comes over a lot, lately.
Sometimes she stays for dinner, and on the nights Mom works, she is still here long after Sarah goes to bed. She wakes up one of these nights to the sound of raised voices, some of which she doesn't recognize, and she leaves her room and peeks down the stairs into the living room.
Rachel is standing between Noah and Finn, separating them with her hands, and Quinn is crying on the couch. Sarah thinks that she seems to do that a lot.
Finn notices her first, and when he sees her standing at the top of the stairs he backs away from Noah and nods in her direction. Four sets of eyes turn to her, and Rachel is the first to speak.
"Hi, Sarah," she says in that matter-of-fact tone of hers, "I realize how scary this must look, but we need you to go back to sleep."
She just nods dumbly at them and heads back towards her room, and she can hear Finn say, "You know Sarah?" as she closes the door.
They stop yelling though, and she falls back asleep easily.
Finn starts coming over again. So that’s good.
-----
On Friday nights, Rachel convinces Noah to let Sarah stay up with them.
She can never make it past midnight, though, and she always ends up falling asleep on the loveseat and waking up to Noah carrying her upstairs. One night she wakes up to hushed voices instead. "C'mere," she hears Noah whisper, followed by the sound of people moving on the couch; she doesn't look at them, horribly afraid that she'll find them with his hand up her shirt.
There is a long silence and after what feels like forever, she risks a glance at the couch.
Noah is on his back with an arm thrown over his eyes, and Rachel is curled up next to him on the inside of the couch with an arm and leg thrown over his body. Their eyes are closed and they don't see her staring at them when Rachel mumbles, "Night," and he presses a kiss to her forehead.
She wakes up in the morning to the thump of the newspaper against the door.
They're both in the same position as last night so she throws a blanket over them and decides to go learn how to make breakfast for herself. Noah and Rachel wake up to the sound of the smoke detector.
-----
She wakes up in the middle of a Saturday night to a thump coming from Noah's room. The first thing to come to mind are Nazis, and she sneaks from her room and tiptoes down the hall, hoping to not disturb them.
Whispers and noises are coming from behind his door and just as she is almost there, she steps on a creaky floorboard. The noises stop, and she can hear Noah saying, "hang on, shhh."
A second later, his door flies open and he steps into the hallway shirtless, staring right at her. "What are you doing up," he says nervously, pulling his door closed behind him.
"I heard Nazis."
He snorts out a laugh and rubs his hand over his scalp. "It's not Nazis, kiddo. Go back to bed." Noah heads back into his room, and before his door clicks shut she hears him whisper, "just Sarah."
Rachel is there when she wakes up, and she cooks them breakfast.
She burns the toast and makes the eggs all wrong, but at least she doesn't cry about it.
-----
She is woken up in the middle of the night by her mom pulling her out of bed.
"C'mon, get up," she says breathlessly, "we gotta get to the hospital."
"Is someone hurt?" Sarah mumbles, rubbing the sleep out of her eyes as her mom helps her into her jacket hurriedly.
"Quinn's having the baby, grab your shoes."
She lays across two chairs in the waiting room at the hospital while her mom paces the other side of the room; Noah is with Finn in Quinn's room.
She is almost asleep when Rachel Berry rushes into the room still in her pyjamas.
"Rachel--" Mom starts, but she cuts her off.
"Noah called me."
She can't go into Quinn's room since she's not (one of) the fathers, so she sits next to Sarah and lets her sleep on her shoulder while her mom continues her pacing.
-----
She didn't know it was possible for a human to be so tiny.
Sarah is finally allowed in to see the baby a little past 3 AM, and the Puckerman family + Rachel + Finn all crowd around the bed, cooing and awwing at the tiny pink bundle in Quinn's arms.
"Her name is Barbara." Quinn whispers when Mom asks, and Noah has to nearly hold Rachel back from tackling the blond in giddiness.
"It has nothing to do with Streisand, Berry!" he says, but she does not deflate.
"Can I call her Barbie?" Sarah says excitedly, and Quinn nods at her as she smiles through tears.
She doesn't understand how someone can cry so much, but she lets her touch the baby even though Noah hovers over her the entire time.
-----
Everyone gets to hold Barbie but her. “Come oooooon, Noah, pleeeeeease?” she begs. She reaches her hands out for her niece but he holds her up out of her reach.
“No,” he says firmly. “You’ll drop her. You don’t know how to handle a baby.”
Oh really?
She gets up and points an angry finger in his face “You’re the one who lost her two days ago!”
Everyone in the room stops what they’re doing. Right, right, she wasn’t supposed to mention that.
“I - I fucking didn’t!” he swears. His eyes immediately go to Quinn and he passes Barbie off to his mom hastily before getting up and backing out of the kitchen. “I didn’t!”
She runs to Quinn and nods fervently. “He did, cross my heart,” she rambles, following the blonde as she advances on her brother. “He put her down to answer his phone and then when he came back he couldn’t find her and he spent at least a million hours looking and then Mommy found her.” She’s breathless and probably going to pay for this later in a big way but she can’t help but add, “In the sink."
Quinn chases Noah out of the house and Rachel follows to make sure she doesn’t do too much damage.
Nobody gives Sarah a chance to explain how Noah had almost passed out from relief and then spent the rest of the day with Barbara in his arms, not letting her go once. From the screeching and thumping coming from the front yard, she figures she’ll need to mention that part to Quinn.
But it can wait, because her mom beckons her over. She makes her sit on a chair and places Barbara on her lap, putting her hand behind the baby’s head.
“Hi Barbie,” she whispers. “It’s me, Aunt Sarah.”
-----
After school on a Friday afternoon, Sarah comes home to find a seemingly empty house. Her mother is at work, she knows, but she knows that Noah and Barbie should be here (and if they are here, Rachel most definitely is, too). So she wanders the house, calling her brother’s name, and finally when she's decided that the bottom level is all clear, she heads upstairs.
At the top of the stairs, she can hear voices coming from Noah's room, and the door is wide open so she assumes that his "Don't Knock when Rachel is over" rule doesn't count and heads towards the sound.
She finds Noah curled up on his bed opposite Rachel, with Barbie in between the two. They're talking in low tones, and she is about to turn and leave them alone when Noah looks up and sees her.
"Hey, brat," he calls out, and Rachel turns to follow his gaze. "Wanna hop in?"
She nods, but as she moves towards the bed, he says, "Just go make me a sandwich before you get comfortable."
-----
Her brother is an asshole.
Sometimes.
But that’s ok, ‘cause she still loves him.
Author: une_fille / unequivocally
Characters/Pairings: Baby Puckerman, Mama Puckerman, Puck/Rachel, various cast members
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 4622
Spoilers: Aired Episodes
Summary: Lima's resident bad boy moron as told through the eyes of his kid sister Mom's favorite
This entire fic came to fruition after this simple conversation:
une_fille : Fuck me, I think Junior Puckerman might be my favoritest character of all time. Because I know that there is a fucking psychopath/adorable little girl in there that will own our souls if we ever get to know her.
unequivocally : I'm pretty sure Sarah like, rules my life. Am seriously considering a Sarah centric fic. Like Puck and Rachel's relationship through her eyes.
What started out as a throw-away comment has EXPLODED into this. So please enjoy!
--------------------
Her brother is an asshole.
Most of the time.
But that's ok, ‘cause she still loves him.
Most of the time.
-----
Sarah crawls into his bed one night and lays next to him in silence.
After an hour, she asks, "Why do you think Dad left?"
"He's not your dad," Noah snarls, "and that's why he left." He has the decency to look guilty after she bursts into tears, and he pats her head awkwardly when he says, "Look, I'm sorry. I didn't mean it."
It's not enough to subdue her and he sort of flails around for a few minutes before sputtering, "I don't know why he left, Sarah. I don't know."
-----
Sometimes he lets her sit in his room when he practices his guitar. "I know that song," she says once.
"Oh yeah? Sing it for me."
She does, and he snorts. "You're a shit singer," he teases, but when she gets up to stomp off, he stops her. "Nah, just keep going."
-----
During her quarterly Parent/Teacher meeting, Mr. Gerald tells her mom that she has a real talent for the clarinet. Once they get home, her mom gushes and fawns over her, and promises that all her overtime will go to buying her very own instrument, so she can be a real musician.
Her mother comes home the following week waving her latest pay check in the air. “How about a trip to the music store tomorrow?” and they both jump up and down. But they get a phone call less than an hour later; Noah’s been arrested vandalizing Mr. Vargas' house. So the clarinet money goes to his bail.
On the drive home, she stews silently in the back seat, kicking the back of his seat as hard as she can. He just stares straight ahead, not even turning around to yell at her like he normally does.
"I hate you," she mutters when they walk into the house
"Yeah, well, I don’t care. You're not even really my sister," he spits out and for the first time since she can remember, her mom slaps him across the face.
He goes into his room and they don't see him for 3 days.
-----
She doesn't understand how a nice man like Finn Hudson gets along with her brother.
He's nice, and kind, and actually showers every day, unlike Noah, so she's not sure how they became best friends. But she doesn't mind, because when Finn comes over, he ruffles her hair and gives her a big grin and says something like, "Hey, kiddo," before following Noah up to his room to blast loud music for the rest of the night.
She thinks she's in love.
-----
Her brother starts bringing home some cheerleader.
Her name is Santana, and Sarah thinks she's really pretty, though sometimes she makes this face like she just stepped in something gross. That's not such a pretty face.
The first time she came over, Sarah walked into the living room to find Santana and Noah sitting close together on the couch. Her brother told her to go upstairs and leave them alone, but then Santana made that ugly face and looked at him saying, "Get over it, Puck, you're not touching my tits," before turning back to Sarah and saying, "You can stay, he's just mad that I know about Elizabeth."
She stood there for a second, feeling uncomfortable before the cheerleader finally looked up at her again, scoffed, and said, "You wanna come hang out, or not?"
Since then, Sarah's come to like Santana; she lets her hang out with them, and she calls Noah a moron a lot. Which he is.
And sometimes, she brings her friend Brittany who is like a real life Barbie doll and always has a snack in her backpack. She stays downstairs with her, even when Santana and her brother go to his room and Noah is complaining that he wants Brittany to come too.
After a while, Santana stops coming over, and she hears Noah swearing into his cell phone about a credit report. When he grumbles into the receiver that the girl is a snotty bitch, Sarah throws one of her dolls at his head and yells that he can't call her friend that name.
------
Sarah stumbles into the kitchen early one morning to find a stranger sitting at the table, bawling into a glass of orange juice.
"Where's Noah?" She asks, and the blond looks up with puffy eyes.
“Who are you?” the blonde throws back.
“I live here,” she says, crossing her arms. “I’m Noah’s sister.”
The girl looks back into her orange juice, mumbling “He told me he was an only child.”
He would.
“Well, you wouldn’t be the first to fall for it,” she replies and the other girl flinches. “What’s your name?”
“Quinn.”
“Do you think you can make me some breakfast?”
It turns out she can’t. She burns the toast, breaks the eggs and snaps when Sarah tries to give helpful directions. Twice she bursts into tears over the pop-tarts they end up having.
“Are you friends with my brother?”
“Yes. No. I don’t know.”
“Are you his girlfriend?” She misses Santana. Santana Lopez would never cry over burnt toast.
“No, definitely not,” Quinn answers. She gives a small smile and says “I’m dating Finn Hudson.”
Sarah drops her pop-tart.
“Get the hell out of my house.”
Sarah finds a bright red stain on the couch after Quinn leaves. She flips the pillow over and watches cartoons until Noah stumbles in from the backyard.
------
She walks in on him one night.
Dancing.
"What are you doing?" She says, mystified as she watches him bob awkwardly in front of his mirror.
Her voice startles him, and he turns on her, glowering and blushing. "Get the hell out of my room, twerp." He pushes her out into the hallway and is slamming the door before she can even reply.
"I'm gonna tell everyone I caught you dancing!" She yells, giving his door a swift kick.
The next night, he approaches her while she's watching cartoons and blurts out, "Ok seriously, last night. How bad did it look?"
She eyes him warily. "Your dancing?" He looks everywhere but her and nods, and she continues, "I think you're pretty much the worst dancer I've ever seen."
"Well fuck," he mutters under his breath, "Fine. Help me, then."
He lets her stand on his feet as they dance around the living room, and that's how Mom finds them when she gets home.
Her mom cuts in, because she's taller; Sarah watches from the couch and laughs when Noah dips her.
-----
Chores suck. They’ve both become pros at avoiding them.
Grocery shopping with Noah however is fun, and when their mom asks them to run to the store, they never complain.
Noah calls her his perfect partner-in-crime, because nobody ever suspects a little girl.
They’re about to get away with at least 20 chocolate bars stuffed in her jacket when some creepy lady stops them in the parking lot.
She has her hand on Noah’s chest and she keeps going on about her husband’s business trips. Noah looks annoyed and she doesn’t know why he doesn’t do anything about it.
“Hey, old lady,” she shouts. “Leave my brother alone.” The woman throws Sarah a nasty look and he lets out a bark of laughter.
When they get to his truck, she gets first dibs on the chocolate.
-----
After their yearly viewing of Schindler's List, she has nightmares. She goes to Noah's room in the middle of the night, but she can't bring herself to wake him. So instead she stands at the head of his bed, staring at him for a few minutes until he wakes with a start and swears under his breath when he sees her.
"God damn it, Sarah," he groans, rubbing a hand over his face.
"I had a bad dream."
"Whatever, kid. Get in." He pulls back the covers and scoots to the far end of the bed, and she wastes no time in clambering in after him.
He keeps throwing weird looks at the window, so she pats him on the shoulder and whispers “It’s okay, Noah, I don’t think Nazis can get in from there.”
He leans back down onto his pillow and mutters, “Yeah, I know,” before falling back asleep.
-----
Rachel Berry amazes her.
The first time she meets her, Rachel uses more words than she's ever heard in her life. She speaks so fast she's impressed she doesn't lose her breath, and she wears skirts that look like they came right off of Barbie.
But that's not what amazes her.
What amazes her is when Noah interrupts her and says, "Whatever, Berry, let's just get upstairs," she says, "I find that completely inappropriate and I would appreciate it if you didn't interrupt me when I'm talking."
Sarah half expects him to call her a name, but instead he just rolls his eyes and says, "Yeah, yeah, I'm sorry."
Rachel Berry amazes her.
-----
Their mom invites Rachel over for dinner. She spends the whole time talking about herself.
Noah spends most of the time rolling his eyes.
But he also actually uses his utensils and chews with his mouth closed, so that’s a welcome change.
-----
A week after Rachel showed up for dinner, Sarah finds Noah in his room, plucking at his guitar. He doesn't notice her at first, and it isn't until she says, "I know that song," that he looks up.
"Yeah," he says, and looks back down at his hands on the strings.
"Where's Rachel?"
"I'm not her type. Close the door on your way out."
-----
Finn Hudson comes over the following Saturday, and Sarah spends the afternoon hovering around the boys.
"Sarah, seriously, get out of my room," Noah snarls, throwing a pillow at her in the doorway.
"Nah man, she can stay, it's cool," Finn says, grabbing a pillow from Noah before he can throw that one at her too. "I always kinda wanted a little sister."
"Fuck, dude. You can have her."
Sarah hurries off to pack a bag, but when she comes back, dragging Mr. Hunnybunny with her, Finn's already gone home.
-----
She finds Noah in his room one day with two black eyes and a fat lip.
"What happened to you?" She breathes, and she's a little frightened because anyone who could beat up her brother must be a big, strong man. She wonders if he knows where they live.
"Your boyfriend," he grumbles, adjusting the bag of frozen peas over his face, "Just leave me alone."
She closes his door and heads downstairs. She finds his cell phone on the coffee table and she only hesitates for a second before grabbing it and going through his contacts.
Her first choice is obvious, she thinks.
“I don’t care if that douchetard is dying on the side of the road,” Santana tells her.
When she tries Brittany, all she gets is, “Sorry little girl, but Santana doesn’t care if Puck is dying on the side of the road. Tell him I say hi!”
Quinn answers the phone sobbing and doesn’t make much sense; once she starts blubbering about drizzle, Sarah decides to hang up on her.
There’s only one other person she can call, really.
But when Rachel shows up and manages to get Noah to eat something and let her clean his cuts, she admits to herself that maybe Rachel Berry should have been number one on her list.
-----
After Rachel leaves, she walks into the living room to find Mom and Noah sitting on the couch together.
Her mom is crying, and Noah is staring at the ground with his jaw clenched, and when Sarah steps towards them, her mom just shakes her head. "Not right now, Sarah. Go upstairs and play."
She hears the two of them screaming for the rest of the night and she can only catch bits and pieces, but she knows them well enough to know when it's serious.
Her mom screams that he's throwing his life away and he screams that she has no idea what she's talking about and then she hears the front door slam and Noah's truck rattle to life.
They don't see him again for two nights.
-----
She’s going to be an aunt.
When she announces this in class the next day, nobody believes her. Her teacher asks her if maybe she’s mistaken.
“No, it’s true,” she proclaims hotly. “I’m going to be Aunt Sarah.”
During recess, the rest of the teachers are already all talking about it.
Playing near the huddled group, Sarah tries to seem as though she doesn’t know they’re talking about her.
“Well, if it was going to be anyone,” one mutters, “it was going to be him.”
"I don't believe I know him," one of the newer teachers replies, "Is that the one that cleans Jo's pool?"
-----
She loves Finn Hudson. She does.
But Noah spends a lot of his time moping around the house now, his bruises still dark.
Prince Charming isn’t supposed to beat up your brother.
At least not in any of the fairytales she knows.
-----
She comes home from school one day to find Rachel and Noah sitting on the couch together. Rachel is doing homework, but when she sees her standing in the doorway, she smiles at her.
"Hi," she says, "did you have a good day at school?"
As she's about to reply, Noah pokes the older girl in her side. "Berry, go make me a sandwich."
She gives him a dirty look and makes one for herself and Sarah instead.
Sarah thinks Rachel could be better than Santana, maybe.
Then Noah says something about Rachel's "giant girl boner for Finn Hudson."
She doesn't know what a girl-boner is, but she knows she isn't about to share Finn, and she narrows her eyes at Rachel until the older girl hands her a peanut butter sandwich and asks if she wants milk, too.
-----
She hears shouting coming from Noah’s room. She hesitates about going to eavesdrop, but the decision is taken out of her hands when her brother raises his voice even louder and she can hear him clearly say, “Fuck, Berry! What’s it going to take to make you see what he’s doing?”
“He didn’t mean it that way-” Rachel cries but she is cut off by Noah coming out of his room and barrelling down the hallway past Sarah. He flies down the stairs and slams the front door on his way out.
She finds Rachel in the room, sitting on his bed, crying. Sarah sits down next to her, putting her hand on her back awkwardly.
"Noah yells at me sometimes, too," she says sagely, and Rachel laughs a bit.
"No, no, it's not Noah," she says, wiping at her tears and planning her words carefully. "He's mad because my friend hurt my feelings, is all."
"Finn Hudson?" She doesn't answer, and Sarah glowers, "Finn is like Prince Charming. He wouldn't hurt anybody. And if he did, he must have been under a spell."
Rachel chokes out a laugh, "A spell?"
"Every time Prince Charming does something wrong, it's ‘cause of bad magic. Real Prince Charming wouldn’t hurt you.”
“No, I guess he wouldn’t,” Rachel whispers.
-----
Rachel’s parents invite them over for Shabbat dinner, which means Sarah gets to wear a pretty new dress.
While the three of them get ready, her mom tells her that Rachel has two fathers.
“Well, that’s good then isn’t it?” she asks, letting her mother brush her hair. “We can ask her for one of them if she has a spare.”
Noah throws her a panicked look. “Don’t say anything fucking stupid tonight, Sarah,” he warns.
He goes back to fiddling with his tie so he doesn’t see her stick her tongue out at him.
-----
Rachel comes over to watch a movie, and they send her to her room because “it’s not kid-friendly.” So she watches from the stairs.
It’s one she’s seen before; it had a lot of blood and guts in it, and she had nightmares for a week. Noah didn't seem to care about it then, so she doesn't know why he's pretending to care now.
The show on the couch is a lot more interesting, in her opinion.
They jab each other with elbows, toss popcorn at each other and when Noah tugs on her hair, Rachel yells at him to knock it off, but doesn’t actually do anything to stop him.
And then he starts tickling her. It’s a move Sarah recognizes.
This is usually the part when he slips his hand up a girl’s shirt.
But he doesn’t. Just keeps on tickling her, as if he’s forgotten or something.
“This is the part where you put your hand up her shirt,” she blurts out. They both spring away from each other, Rachel beet-red and Noah with a scowl on his face.
He throws a pillow in her direction. “Get out of here, you little perv.”
They spend the rest of the movie sitting on opposite sides of the couch.
-----
She’s still the competition, but Sarah’s not stupid. She knows there is a lot she can learn from Rachel Berry.
“Is Finn a good kisser?” she asks her one day over coloring books and wax crayons.
Rachel stops her coloring abruptly and flushes a dark red. “He’s a perfectly fine kisser,” she says with a firm nod.
Noah, who had been drawing squiggly lines across Rachel’s paper to annoy her, cracks a crayon in his hand.
Sarah abandons her own paper and puts her chin in both hands. “I bet he’s the best kisser in the world,” she says dreamily.
Even though it’s not a question, Rachel still answers under her breath. “No, not the best,” she mumbles softly but they both hear her.
Noah gets up and helps Rachel to her feet. “Come on, Berry,” he says with a stupid smile on his face, “Time to go work on our homework. Upstairs.”
Rachel gets the same stupid look on her face and follows him, and Sarah thinks they’re both stupid to be doing homework on a Saturday, anyway.
------
Rachel likes projects.
They re-wallpaper Sarah’s bedroom. She makes a chore wheel to help out her mother.
The wall-paper gets ruined during a game of indoor football that goes a little too far and Noah just sets the chore wheel on fire after Rachel leaves, but it’s still fun to watch her come up with crazy new ideas that fail spectacularly.
When Rachel decides she is going to clean their garage, nobody complains. At the end of it, Sarah stands with Rachel, watching the last of the boxes get tossed into the back of the garbage truck.
“Um, that last one was Noah’s pool cleaning stuff,” she warns, her eyes following the truck turning around the corner.
Rachel smiles. “Oops.”
-----
Rachel comes over a lot, lately.
Sometimes she stays for dinner, and on the nights Mom works, she is still here long after Sarah goes to bed. She wakes up one of these nights to the sound of raised voices, some of which she doesn't recognize, and she leaves her room and peeks down the stairs into the living room.
Rachel is standing between Noah and Finn, separating them with her hands, and Quinn is crying on the couch. Sarah thinks that she seems to do that a lot.
Finn notices her first, and when he sees her standing at the top of the stairs he backs away from Noah and nods in her direction. Four sets of eyes turn to her, and Rachel is the first to speak.
"Hi, Sarah," she says in that matter-of-fact tone of hers, "I realize how scary this must look, but we need you to go back to sleep."
She just nods dumbly at them and heads back towards her room, and she can hear Finn say, "You know Sarah?" as she closes the door.
They stop yelling though, and she falls back asleep easily.
Finn starts coming over again. So that’s good.
-----
On Friday nights, Rachel convinces Noah to let Sarah stay up with them.
She can never make it past midnight, though, and she always ends up falling asleep on the loveseat and waking up to Noah carrying her upstairs. One night she wakes up to hushed voices instead. "C'mere," she hears Noah whisper, followed by the sound of people moving on the couch; she doesn't look at them, horribly afraid that she'll find them with his hand up her shirt.
There is a long silence and after what feels like forever, she risks a glance at the couch.
Noah is on his back with an arm thrown over his eyes, and Rachel is curled up next to him on the inside of the couch with an arm and leg thrown over his body. Their eyes are closed and they don't see her staring at them when Rachel mumbles, "Night," and he presses a kiss to her forehead.
She wakes up in the morning to the thump of the newspaper against the door.
They're both in the same position as last night so she throws a blanket over them and decides to go learn how to make breakfast for herself. Noah and Rachel wake up to the sound of the smoke detector.
-----
She wakes up in the middle of a Saturday night to a thump coming from Noah's room. The first thing to come to mind are Nazis, and she sneaks from her room and tiptoes down the hall, hoping to not disturb them.
Whispers and noises are coming from behind his door and just as she is almost there, she steps on a creaky floorboard. The noises stop, and she can hear Noah saying, "hang on, shhh."
A second later, his door flies open and he steps into the hallway shirtless, staring right at her. "What are you doing up," he says nervously, pulling his door closed behind him.
"I heard Nazis."
He snorts out a laugh and rubs his hand over his scalp. "It's not Nazis, kiddo. Go back to bed." Noah heads back into his room, and before his door clicks shut she hears him whisper, "just Sarah."
Rachel is there when she wakes up, and she cooks them breakfast.
She burns the toast and makes the eggs all wrong, but at least she doesn't cry about it.
-----
She is woken up in the middle of the night by her mom pulling her out of bed.
"C'mon, get up," she says breathlessly, "we gotta get to the hospital."
"Is someone hurt?" Sarah mumbles, rubbing the sleep out of her eyes as her mom helps her into her jacket hurriedly.
"Quinn's having the baby, grab your shoes."
She lays across two chairs in the waiting room at the hospital while her mom paces the other side of the room; Noah is with Finn in Quinn's room.
She is almost asleep when Rachel Berry rushes into the room still in her pyjamas.
"Rachel--" Mom starts, but she cuts her off.
"Noah called me."
She can't go into Quinn's room since she's not (one of) the fathers, so she sits next to Sarah and lets her sleep on her shoulder while her mom continues her pacing.
-----
She didn't know it was possible for a human to be so tiny.
Sarah is finally allowed in to see the baby a little past 3 AM, and the Puckerman family + Rachel + Finn all crowd around the bed, cooing and awwing at the tiny pink bundle in Quinn's arms.
"Her name is Barbara." Quinn whispers when Mom asks, and Noah has to nearly hold Rachel back from tackling the blond in giddiness.
"It has nothing to do with Streisand, Berry!" he says, but she does not deflate.
"Can I call her Barbie?" Sarah says excitedly, and Quinn nods at her as she smiles through tears.
She doesn't understand how someone can cry so much, but she lets her touch the baby even though Noah hovers over her the entire time.
-----
Everyone gets to hold Barbie but her. “Come oooooon, Noah, pleeeeeease?” she begs. She reaches her hands out for her niece but he holds her up out of her reach.
“No,” he says firmly. “You’ll drop her. You don’t know how to handle a baby.”
Oh really?
She gets up and points an angry finger in his face “You’re the one who lost her two days ago!”
Everyone in the room stops what they’re doing. Right, right, she wasn’t supposed to mention that.
“I - I fucking didn’t!” he swears. His eyes immediately go to Quinn and he passes Barbie off to his mom hastily before getting up and backing out of the kitchen. “I didn’t!”
She runs to Quinn and nods fervently. “He did, cross my heart,” she rambles, following the blonde as she advances on her brother. “He put her down to answer his phone and then when he came back he couldn’t find her and he spent at least a million hours looking and then Mommy found her.” She’s breathless and probably going to pay for this later in a big way but she can’t help but add, “In the sink."
Quinn chases Noah out of the house and Rachel follows to make sure she doesn’t do too much damage.
Nobody gives Sarah a chance to explain how Noah had almost passed out from relief and then spent the rest of the day with Barbara in his arms, not letting her go once. From the screeching and thumping coming from the front yard, she figures she’ll need to mention that part to Quinn.
But it can wait, because her mom beckons her over. She makes her sit on a chair and places Barbara on her lap, putting her hand behind the baby’s head.
“Hi Barbie,” she whispers. “It’s me, Aunt Sarah.”
-----
After school on a Friday afternoon, Sarah comes home to find a seemingly empty house. Her mother is at work, she knows, but she knows that Noah and Barbie should be here (and if they are here, Rachel most definitely is, too). So she wanders the house, calling her brother’s name, and finally when she's decided that the bottom level is all clear, she heads upstairs.
At the top of the stairs, she can hear voices coming from Noah's room, and the door is wide open so she assumes that his "Don't Knock when Rachel is over" rule doesn't count and heads towards the sound.
She finds Noah curled up on his bed opposite Rachel, with Barbie in between the two. They're talking in low tones, and she is about to turn and leave them alone when Noah looks up and sees her.
"Hey, brat," he calls out, and Rachel turns to follow his gaze. "Wanna hop in?"
She nods, but as she moves towards the bed, he says, "Just go make me a sandwich before you get comfortable."
-----
Her brother is an asshole.
Sometimes.
But that’s ok, ‘cause she still loves him.