The Running Back

Football practice went on for a few hours. By the end of it, Rachel was covered in sweat, dirt and success, but mostly success. Although Coach Beiste had already let her join the team, Rachel still had a lot to prove. They ended up running a lot of running plays to test out Rachel's skills. She proved to be superb when going to the outside. All she needed to do was get a little space between her and the defenders and she was gone.

Sadly, she wasn't as good when going through the middle. It was easy to tell just by looking at her, but Rachel simply lacked the upper body strength to shove the defensive tackles out of the way. Her small stature did help in trying to slip under them, but if she stood any chance of consistently breaking through their defensive line she would need some help from her blockers.

Rachel ended up getting hit a couple of times, and she was sure that she'd have a bruise or two in the morning but she felt good. She headed back for the girl's locker get changed and to clean up. It was empty when she got in because Cheerios' practice was always longer than football practice. It gave Rachel some privacy to take off her football gear. She didn't know exactly how long they'd be out there though so she decided to try and be quick about changing.

She moved swiftly, removing her helmet, jersey and pads. She smelt a bit, but not too bad. For a moment she considered whether or not she take a shower or just head home. But before she could make a decision, Rachel heard the door swing open. She could hear the Cheerios chatting so Rachel hastily grabbed her top and put it on. They started passing by her just as she had gotten it straightened out. She would just have to shower at home.

After a few moments the Cheerios had all reached their respective lockers. Some of them had lockers in the same row as Rachel, and that made her a bit self-conscious. She resumed changing and tried to pretend that the other girls weren't around. Once she was done, she got her things in order and headed for the door. Just as she reached it, the door swung open. Enter Quinn Fabray, and Rachel's knees buckled. Despite her hours of practice Quinn didn't have a drop of sweat on her. Her skin was flawless. She was breathtaking.

Rachel opened her mouth and said hi, or at least she tried to. She had never been this close to Quinn before, never been able to see her beauty in such detail. For once Rachel Berry was completely and utterly speechless which was just great. As far as first impressions went, this had to be the worst. But it wasn't because Quinn didn't even seem to notice her awestruck behavior. "Excuse me," she said politely before walking past Rachel.

She slowly turned with each step Quinn took, carefully following her movements. Rachel watched as she walked away. "No, don't go," she whimpered out, but Quinn was already too far away to hear, which was a good thing of course. She hastily made her exit to avoid making a bigger fool of herself. Once she got outside she found that it was getting late. She would need to get home soon, but unfortunately Rachel didn't own a car.

Noah would give her a ride though, so long as he was still around, which he mostly likely was as he would almost always stick around for a while whenever Rachel left school late. He would always have a number of different explanations for why he would do so, but Rachel knew better. She knew that he stayed around because her cared and wanted to make sure that she got home safe. She always thanked him. Rachel headed for the parking lot, and just as expected Noah was there, leaning against his car. He pushed himself up and strode over to her.

"You sure took your damn time, didn't you?" he complained playfully.

"It's not easy looking this good," Rachel joked back; if only avoid having to tell her best friend of her most embarrassing behavior in the locker room. He would never let her live it down. Noah chuckled and shook his head. He opened the passenger side door and held his hand out to help Rachel into her seat. Rachel took it graciously. "Ooh, this is a surprise. And here I thought that you didn't know the first thing about chivalry."