Will The Real Rachel Berry Please Stand Up?

7

Quinn glanced again at the front door of the Berry house debating the wisdom of knocking on it. She had spent that Saturday morning lurking in the café only for Rachel not to be amongst the usual crowd. She had dismissed the idea of asking Ali where Rachel was even before the thought fully formed in her mind. Quinn began to worry that Rachel had been more crushed by Finn's remarks than she had let on to her and Tina the evening before. So here she was trying to decide if knocking on the door was a good idea – she could use the owl sweater Rachel had left at school as an excuse. If she didn't, she would be spending the rest of the weekend worrying about Rachel's well-being but if she did maybe she'd need to worry about her well-being. What if one of Rachel's dads' answered the door? Faced with the person almost single-handedly responsible for Rachel's bumpy ride at school what would they do? On the other hand didn't she deserve any anger they directed her way? This was getting her nowhere. She took a deep breath, strode up to the door and pressed the bell before she could talk herself out of it.

The short bespectacled man who opened the door gave her a puzzled look "Yes?"

"Sorry to trouble you" Quinn swallowed nervously, "Is Rachel in by any chance?"

"Who are you?" asked the man casting a quick gaze up and down Quinn.

"I'm er Quinn" she took a breath, "Quinn Fabray."

The man's face remained unchanged, no recognition of her name showed on his features. Quinn found herself slightly disappointed.

"So how do you know Rachel?" he asked.

"We go to school together. I've brought back her sweater" she held it up so the Owl's eyes blinked at the man. He looked surprised for a moment and then started laughing heartily.

"That most definitely is not Rachel's sweater." He wiped a tear away from his eye," Her other Dad and I would commit hari-kari before we allowed a garment like that over the doorstep of this house."

He laughed again "and, between you and me, there's no-one over the age of 3 who could carry that sweater off. Do the world a favour and bin it" He started to close the door.

"Also," Quinn scrambled to reorder her thoughts,"I er also wanted to borrow her history notes."

"Let me guess, she didn't answer her mobile. She always turns it off when ''honing her craft'".

He looked at his watch,"Rach won't be back for at least another hour. She spends her Saturdays working her way through various dance classes. You could try later. I'll tell her you called round. What did you say your name was again?"

"Quinn, Quinn Fabray" she offered with a faint smile," Nice to meet you Mr Berry."

Quinn turned to walk back to her car. Well that was odd, as well as being a big relief. So Rachel's dad had never heard of Quinn Fabray – Quinn's admiration for Rachel had just increased a few more notches. All that torment at school and no running to her parents – just how self-sufficient was she?

And the sweater thing was just weird – Rachel was infamous for her absolutely appalling taste in knitwear yet her father seemed to have no knowledge of such garments. What was going on? What would Rachel say when...Realisation slowly dawned that Rachel's Dad would tell her that she had called. Rachel would probably think she was being stalked. Oh well, she probably was right; after all, inhaling Rachel's scent on that jumper when in bed last night was borderline stalker behaviour surely?

Quinn returned home to be met by the surreal sight of Santana and Brittany sitting at her kitchen table with her mother drinking tea from their best bone china tea set. What was going on, some massive game of musical houses? She tried to hide her trepidation at Santana being at her house with a friendly "hi girls, what're you doing here?"