So Close, and still so far

Chapter 6: Quinn

Friends. He wants us to be "just friends".

My heart sinks a little at the thought as I look at his handsome dark, impassive face. It may not what I hoped for, but at least a little bit of him wants to open up and he is talking civilly enough.

Wait! Hang on a sec.

Why on earth should I care so much for someone who obviously doesn't want to have anything to do with me but feels obligated to stick around because he feels sorry for me.

Being around Iain is so confusing.

He reminds me of this guy I had a big bad crush on during my Lucy Caboosey days when I was fat, overweight, and unloved. His name was Phillip Creed and I was obsessed with him. He was the star of the soccer team and was popular, rich, gorgeous with the same dark hair but he had hazel brown eyes. Phil had a girlfriend who picked on me the same way I did to Rachel Berry during sophomore year. Angelina Wilcox wasted no time at all making me feel like I never had a chance with her boyfriend because of who I was. Fast forward a few years later minus the fat and rhinoplasty, I still find myself feeling the same way around Iain minus the bitchy girlfriend.

At least this time, Iain is smiling and he looks more relaxed than usual. As much as I would never admit this, I have only been around him for less than a week and I missed him terribly when he was away for those three long days. Some part of me wanted to ask why he was gone. Did he go home to a girlfriend during those days he was at Lima? The thought of him with some unknown woman leaves me feeling bereft.

To the point that I blurt my thoughts out loud.

We were in the middle of one of our tutorials when I express my worries vocally.

I throw Iain a horrid look, instantly regretting my spontaneity. Way to go, Fabray. Just perfect. It's like those days when I greeted Phil along the halls and he looked right through me.

Iain's eyebrows shoot up in surprise. He was in the middle of discussing the laws of thermodynamics. Which by the way, was actually pretty sexy considering physics is boring and how he describes it makes it sound so easy. Never mind that he looks ridiculously hot in a dark blue grey sweatshirt that brings out his blue-gray eyes and cream pants that are immaculately clean. He hesitates for a moment before he throws me a quizzical look.

"Well, you've been gone for three days. Don't I at least deserve an explanation for that? I mean, what if you're out and gone again for a longer time period? Maybe your girlfriend misses you terribly? I might be forced to get a different tutor who isn't tied down."

Iain sighs in relief, probably thinking I worried about him being with somebody. Not that it was the whole truth, but I do deserve some explanation.

"I went on a personal leave. I had some, uh, business to attend to that required me to be out of town for more than a day. I hate to dash your delusions that I've got some girl waiting for me, but for now, I'm single."

Was it me, or did he just emphasize on the word 'for now'?

I avoid his piercing gaze because he's giving me that look that makes me completely uncomfortable. It's as if he's trying to break the walls I've built up my whole life. These were the walls that have protected me from ever being disappointed, hurt, and heartbroken.

With Finn, there really wasn't anything there. I thought there was at first, but it turns out he wasn't what I wanted. It was more like I had this urge to relive those 'glory days' of him being the town football hero and I was his number one girlfriend, but things have changed through the years and what I felt around him didn't matter anymore. It felt the same way with Sam, except I had much more history with Finn hence the sentimental factor.

Puck, on the other hand, was a disaster. I admit that I care about him because he is after all, Beth's father. However, other than having a baby in common, we weren't right for each other. He's too reckless, selfish, and immature.

For a moment, I actually convinced that I might even be a repressed lesbian. I mean all the petty hatred towards Rachel Berry was unnatural until I finally admitted to myself that I actually envied her.

Mainly because way back when I was Lucy Caboosey, I was her. It's true what they say about you hating the things on others are ironically the flaws that you don't like about yourself.

She was a daily reminder of what I was back then. And she ended up getting Finn anyway despite being such a loser, with the horrendous Pippi Longstockings dress attire and nose that is begging for a rhinoplasty.

Moving further along the string of exes, Sam Evans was a sweet guy. I guess even though he was perfect on paper with his Christian background, Ken doll good looks and sandy blond hair. But even all that wasn't enough to make my heart pound furiously the same way I react towards this impermeable, mercurial young man sitting across me.

And here was Iain looking for a way right into it. If I wasn't careful, he was probably going to break all those walls in a heartbeat.

All he ever had to do was ask.

But for now, I sigh with relief despite feeling a stab of disappointment, when he doesn't. The man leans calmly on his chair, linking his hands behind his back as if waiting for me to answer or throw a quip at what he had just said.

Focus, Quinn. Don't let him get the best out of you.

"Okay, that makes sense. But why are you here? You aren't from around these parts, I can tell. So why Lima?" I ask instead. I notice he's still debating whether to tell me. So I put on the pressure. "I mean, you can tell me since we're "friends" after all." Gosh, I didn't mean to sound so sarcastic on the we're friends part, but I feel like after what we've been through, he owes me some sort of explanation.

"If you must know, I have a younger brother who doesn't know I exist."

My eyes widen in shock at the news. In my mind I had played over that maybe Iain was a serial killer, a man with a wife and a kid, or a double agent working for the secret service. Amongst other creative things that I had thought of his life, this was the last thing I was thinking he was going to say.

I wasn't sure if it was the way he just said it out bluntly or was it another one his methods of throwing me off my guard but I look at his face to see some kind of reaction and he was honestly telling me the truth. In fact, I catch a small sight of something that seems like he's showing a vulnerable side which he quickly squelches and resumes his impassive mask.

"I was eight when my mother left my father because she felt......abandoned and they had a big misunderstanding. She went home to Ohio to live with her sister. After the divorce papers were settled, she wasn't heard from again until a few months ago I received word that she had died from cancer. I went through her records and found out that she had left a will to a young boy who was born six months after she was thrown out of the house by my father."

"So your father never knew your mother was pregnant?" I couldn't believe what I was hearing. How could anyone be so cruel and cold-hearted to just to drop someone they chose to marry? Exactly whatever that misunderstanding that passed between Iain's parents was, it was that big of a deal to do something so drastic and tragic. My heart went out to Iain, who was such a young boy that he probably couldn't understand or comprehend anything at the time.

"At the time, when he divorced her. He'll never meet my brother now since he's also dead. He died in a plane crash before I graduated high school."

This just gets more depressing as he keeps going on about the details on his parents' divorce.

"Do you still remember her?"

"Barely." He answers, but I know somehow that Iain is lying because he just stares blankly at the wall.