The Transfer: A Glee Fanfiction

Chapter 14

Luckily for him, he behaved through the whole class. Rachel could feel him staring at her for a few minutes here and there, but he looked away before she could say anything. When Ms. Evangeline dismissed the class, Rachel prepared herself for an ambush of questions and flirtatious remarks. To her surprise, Jesse was silent. She looked over at him, wondering if he had been replaced by a nice, respectful twin. He was putting his notes in his bag, an uneasy expression on his face. Rachel wondered what he was thinking for a second before she remembered not to care.

She got up and walked out of the classroom, not at all surprised when she heard him follow. She got all the way to her locker before he spoke.

“What happened to you?” he asked, undeniable concern coloring his words. Rachel swapped her Calc stuff for her Spanish textbook and shrugged.

“I told you,” she said, closing her locker and turning away. “I fell.”

“Rachel, come on,” he said, following her down the hall. “Falling down doesn’t give you a black eye. What happened? Did somebody hit you?” Rachel could hear anger creeping into his voice, and she felt her own temper flare up. If he was going to be mad at anyone for hurting her, it should be himself.

“That’s none of your business,” she snapped.

“Are you okay?” he asked, putting his hand on her shoulder. She swatted it off immediately. “How was your dinner with Kurt?”

“Just peachy,” Rachel said, scowling at him. She felt a little bad about how rude she was being, but right now, it was all she could manage. He deserved it, after all.

“Do you want to talk about it?”

“Oh, yes,” she said with a short, humorless laugh. “I would love to sit down with my ex-boyfriend to have a nice heart-to-heart about my other ex-boyfriend and what was probably the worst night of my life. That sounds absolutely wonderful!”

“Wait, Kurt’s your ex?” he asked, wide-eyed. “I thought he was gay.”

“No, I didn’t mean-” Rachel started. She cut herself off. “Why am I telling you anything? I have to get to class, and you have to leave.”

“We have to talk about our duet, though. I was thinking-”

“Excuse me?” Rachel stopped short, her eyebrows raised.

“Our duet for your audition,” he said, as though it were obvious. “I was thinking about reprising ‘Hello’, since we already know we sound amazing with it, but then I thought we should do something new. I have a few ideas that I want to run by you-”

“Wait a second,” she said, holding up her hand. “Did you just assume that I would want to sing with you?”

“Well, yeah,” he said, confused. “You don’t know anyone else here, and we have killer musical chemistry. It only makes sense.”

“I asked Nicky to help me,” Rachel said. She was almost to her class now, and she practically sighed with relief. She would be safe from Jesse’s intrusive arrogance in just a few steps.

“Nicky?” he asked, incredulous. “Nicky Oakman? The dark haired one? Why did you ask her?”

“I was told I could ask anyone I wanted,” Rachel said. “And I wanted to ask her.”

“I- I just-” he stammered. He looked confused, and Rachel could see in his eyes that she had damaged his pride. He looked genuinely hurt that she had chosen someone else, and she couldn’t help but feel a little bad.

“I know you expected me to come here and just put it all behind me,” she said. “All the lies and the pain and the damage you caused. Just sweep it all under the rug and forget it ever happened. But it did happen, and you broke my heart. So for now, I’m not going to go out of my way to be around you.”