The Running Back

Chapter 25

"I wouldn't say that," Rachel told her encouragingly, to which Gabby gave her a face.

"I told her that I thought her sister was hot," she reminded embarrassed. "I am never going to be able to face Quinn after that. To be honest, I even considered skipping out on practice today so I could avoid the all the awkwardness." She shrugged and gave a nervous laugh. "Well, I guess I've prolonged the inevitable for long enough. Wish me luck." She forced on a smile before getting back to practice.

"You won't need it," Rachel assured, although she wasn't quite sure if she was saying that for Gabrielle's sake or her own. She went back to the bleachers so she could watch them practice. Quinn and Sue had finished their talk and so it wasn't long until they hit the field to work on their routine. Sue took up a good vantage point which was, thankfully, far away from where Rachel was sitting. She had her megaphone in had at the ready to yell out in case she saw the slightly bit of incompetence among her Cheerios.

As Rachel had learnt, there would likely be a lot of yelling. She focused her attention onto her girlfriend, who had just passed by Gabrielle with a simple passing glace. Her lips had moved slightly and then Gabby's moved as well. They seemed to acting friendly enough but since Rachel was too far away to hear the words spoken or the tone in which they were said, she couldn't know for sure. She kept a close eye to see if they would talk again and they, in fact, did.

Rachel tried to read their lips, but found that she didn't have the talent to do so. Because as far as she could tell Quinn and Gabrielle were talking about stealing animals from the zoo... yeah, they probably weren't planning anything like that. Unless they were, but if they were then Rachel would have to have a talk with Quinn about how she shouldn't partake in such criminal activities. But they definitely weren't talking about anything like that.

It was fairly pointless to try and figure out so Rachel let her worry slip away and just enjoyed the show, which meant that she mostly just watched Quinn. She paid some attention to the Cheerios routine as well, and it looked flawless to her. Needless to say, Sue didn't feel the same. She had them go over the routine several more times until a readily visible mistake was actually made. Rachel cringed at the thought of what Sue would have them do for such a small misstep and she could see that Cheerios felt similarly to her. But none of them could, or would, say a word against their coach. They were forced to run laps around the field.

The football team showed up during that time. They stopped short of the field as the Cheerios ran past. Noah was up front. He looked up at the bleachers towards Rachel. Once he caught her eye, he tilted his head to the side over towards the Cheerios. Rachel made some gestures with her hands, a fairly poor attempt of trying to explain that one of the Cheerios flipped a moment too late. He nodded and waited for them to pass before going on the field.

Their practice was more or less the same as usual. Rachel had watched enough of them to know how things played out, but since having been part of the team she noticed things that she hadn't before. Finn had a tendency to hold onto the ball a few seconds longer than usual. Rachel felt that there was a bit of indecision in him; always looking to make the best possible play even with a half dozen guys trying to knock his head clean off his shoulders.

There were plenty of little things to see, to criticize. And it was much in Rachel's nature to look for flaws or potential ones. For her dream of becoming a Broadway star to become a reality, she would have to rid herself of such flaws. And reasonably, for the Titans to win that championship they would have to do the same. They were solid, maybe more than that, but they weren't perfect. Rachel watched carefully until practice ended, and once it did she made her way down to the field.

She ran up behind Noah and gave him a light punch on the arm to get his attention. "Hey, you need to stop trying to run right through people." He chuckled lightly and so Rachel gave another, harder, punch. "I'm serious. For one, you might get hurt." Again he laughed, but this time Rachel just went on and ignored his immaturity. "And two, there were plenty of time out there where you could have easily gained more yards if you had simply swerved off to the side rather than try to power your way through David."

"Okay Mother," he answered mockingly, to which Rachel narrowed her eyes at him. Noah sighed once he noticed her crossed her arms over her chest. "No promises, but I'll try, all right?" he asked while tossing his hands up in surrender. Rachel let him sweat it out for a moment before giving a swift nod of approval. Honestly, it was all that she could have really asked for. "Good, you need a ride?" Rachel looked back at the field where the Cheerios were still running laps.

"Um... I think I'll wait for Quinn."
"All right, I'll be around for a bit so if you need me..."

"I know. Thanks Noah." She gave him a brief hug before taking a seat on the lowest part of the bleachers. She couldn't recall if Sue had set a specific amount of laps, but even if she had Rachel had no idea how long the Cheerios had been running. But if she had to guess, she was pretty sure that she'd be there for a long time. Rachel decided to get a head start on her homework, just in case. An hour passed, maybe two, possibly three before she heard Quinn plop down beside her.

She practically collapsed right onto Rachel's shoulder with a soft whimper. "Homework?" she muttered out. Rachel hummed out her answer. "Sorry, things ran so late."

"That's fine. Do you need a little rest? We don't have to leave right away."

"Yeah? Maybe just a minute; my legs are killing me." Quinn stretched them out in front of her and gently massaged her calves, humming in content as she did so. "So... I saw you talking with Gabby earlier..." Rachel paused on her work and shot Quinn a questioning look. "I'm not jealous or anything," she quickly explained. "Just curious, she and I have talked since... well, you know."

"Well, she has been avoiding you." "I figured as much."
"But..."
"But what?"

"Well..."

"I'm not going to like this, am I?" 

A/N Just a quick question: Do you think i should dedicate chapters?