Never asked to feel your halo (Faberry)

17: My Body's Lying Somewhere In The Sands Of Time.

Quinn's head repeatedly lifted off and then slammed back into her white down pillow to a chant of, "Why? Why? Why?"

She was such an idiot!

Why hadn't she just left Berry at the front door? What did she care if the girl stumbled and hit her head on the floor? It wasn't her fault Berry couldn't handle her alcohol and had gotten so drunk; in fact, Quinn had spent a good portion of her evening trying to keep her sober!

See, this is what came from playing nice with Berry! She'd given the girl a chance and . . . and Rachel had abused it! She'd taken advantage of her kindness and . . .

If you can really make yourself believe that for one second, I'll eat my sandals.

As the voice of her conscience spoke up, Quinn stopped banging her head on her pillow and cut her savior a steely glance.

"This is all your fault!"

Excuse me? Am I the one who gave in to temptation?

"No, but you said it was okay and look where it's gotten me!"

I said it was okay to hold her hand, don't try and pin the rest on me.

"This is why you're so big on abstinence, isn't it? Holding hands is a gateway drug to the harder stuff."

Are you sure you're not over-reacting?

"Am I? Maybe I am. It was only a little kiss, barely even that. It was a peck, it was pretty much nothing. Right?"

Did it really feel like nothing at the time?

"I was caught up in the moment, and probably drunk off of her breath, and it was just a thank you anyway. She's been . . . helpful recently, I just wanted to thank her."

'Say it with flowers' is a slogan for a reason, you know?

"Oh Jesus!" She pulled the pillow over her head. "Maybe she won't remember? Maybe I'll get lucky and she was so drunk she's blacked the whole thing out. We can just carry on like normal and pretend it never happened and that way we'll never ever have to talk about it."

Maybe . . . of course, that's kind of unlikely considering . . .

"I know, okay!" Quinn growled into her pillow. "Why? Why? Why? I'm such an idiot!"

Halfway across town Rachel woke up and really wished she hadn't. Her mouth felt like a family of mice had moved in over night and died, probably from her breath. Her head was full of woodpeckers – big, strong, possibly mutant woodpeckers. And her stomach, oh dear, her stomach was spinning slowly, going around and around and around like a sushi turntable . . .

Oh Barbra, don't think about raw fish!

What had happened to her last night?

She remembered going to Puck's party. She remembered drinking her first beer and thinking it was gross but also wonderful. She remembered trying other types of alcohol - some worse, some better - all in that same way wonderful. She hadn't had enough to get drunk though, had she? She couldn't have because she distinctly – well not that distinctly right now – remembered that someone had kept taking her drinks away. Who? Her date? No, she could remember Mike fetching her plenty of drinks at her request, but she couldn't remember him confiscating any of them, so why was she convinced . . .

Quinn! It had been Quinn. Definitely not her date then.

Quinn had been mean all night! Stealing her drinks, kicking her out of chairs and making horrible comments. Rachel knew she should have expected it, Quinn had even told her to expect it, but it hurt now in the harsh light of day. When she was already feeling so physically fragile, it wasn't a big leap to get to emotionally fragile too and she turned on her side, snivelling quietly into her pillow as she tried to piece together what else she could remember.