Never asked to feel your halo (Faberry)

14: Out Of The Frying Pan (Into The Fire)

"Have one anyway. Might help the rest of us enjoy you." Puck twisted off the cap for her and held it out. "Go on, down it."

Rachel was about to decline again but then she caught the half-amused, half-disapproving look in Quinn's eyes and against all rational thought she took the bottle.

"Okay. Cheers, everyone!"

She drank from the bottle neck like it was water. It was cold and she didn't like the taste much and she hadn't ever realized that beer was fizzy but she had excellent control over her breathing and no gag reflex to speak of and triumphantly drank the entire bottle down in a series of lengthy swallows.

Only on her fifth gulp did she realize how stupid she was being to give in to peer pressure like this. By her seventh she'd stopped worrying so much about that and by the time the last of the beer was sliding down her throat she decided Puck's ridiculous hairstyle was obviously hindering his brain power in some way, making him an idiot, because Quinn's cheerleading uniform was pure awesome.

She hiccupped as she openly admired it, and the girl inside it who was glaring her down. She had such a pretty glare. Rachel wondered if anyone had ever told her that before. Somebody should, she decided.

"Wow, you are just really unbelievably pretty, Quinn, I just . . . I just can't even . . ." The beauty was so overwhelming she couldn't even finish the sentence and trailed off in awed wonder.

Quinn hoped her eyeroll was subtle and then turned her back on Rachel to search the fridge for any form of juice. She wasn't stupid, she knew she couldn't really have alcohol, but she didn't want people to start asking her why she was suddenly teetotal either. Her impatient request for a beer had been a ruse and those three idiots might as well have just blurted out the news of her situation with how obvious they were being.

It occurred to her that now that Rachel was drunk – within ten minutes of arriving at the party, that had to be a new world record – she was only going to be less subtle about the pregnancy. And . . . other things, as her sudden proclamation had just proved.

Quinn was going to have to watch her like a hawk all night now so that she could intervene if Rachel opened her big stupid mouth; and, seeing as she clearly couldn't handle her alcohol, to stop her from dying or, you know, getting pregnant in Puck's bedroom.

She groaned, allowing her forehead to bump lightly against the refrigerator door as she pushed it closed. Babysitting Rachel Berry was not how she'd planned to spend her evening.

"I agree, it's complete insanity. Quinn Fabray giving Rachel Berry a ride to a party." Rachel tried unsuccessfully several times to untwist the cap on her beer. "I was surprised an earthquake didn't rip open the road and swallow me whole or a . . . a horde of singing zombies didn't swarm the car and eat my brains. But I'm still actually waiting for the disaster part of this disaster movie to befall me."

Mercedes did the job for her and handed the bottle back. "I'm sure it's coming. This is Quinn we're talking about; let no good deed go without a full on major bad deed right behind it."

"Thank you." Toasting her with her beer, Rachel guzzled a mouthful or two. "You know, Mercedes, I'm just not so sure about that anymore. I mean, yes, obviously she is pure evil wrapped up in a hot sixteen year old body but sometimes . . . sometimes . . ."

"Sometimes?" Mercedes prodded, and then her eyes widened, "Uh-oh, disaster at twelve-o-clock."

"Right after news at eleven." Rachel giggled.

Unaware of what her fellow Glee-clubber was referring to and still thinking wistfully of a certain hot sixteen year old body, she raised her bottle to her lips for another gulp but it never made it there. It was snatched smoothly from her hand and then Quinn was walking away with it without even slowing down.