Head Over Feet Chapter 1, a glee fanfic

Head Over Feet

Disclaimer: I don't own. Song belongs to Alanis.

June

It started with the Tony Awards.

She had invited Finn over to watch the show with her and her dads. As usual, they were going to forego dinner and just stuff themselves on h'ordeuvres and wine (for her dads) and sparkling cider (for her). Rachel was going to dress up, had already written her speech and performed it in front of the full-length mirror in her bathroom, and was ready to make a list of all the new soundtracks that she would have to go out and buy.

After explaining exactly what the Tony Awards were to Finn (with various tangents describing particular performances that she had loved (Kristin Chenoweth took a good five minutes), which performers had been robbed in the past, and the dramatic upsets of the years prior), Finn had told her they really didn't sound like his thing and that she should have fun with her dads. He would see her tomorrow at school. She didn't bring up the fact that when they had been dating for a couple of days in the spring she had been to his basketball games and sat through two more on television while his mom brought them buffalo wings she wouldn't touch.

But as much as Rachel had hoped that he would express interest in one of the most important nights of her year, she was glad that she would not have to spend the evening explaining everything about Broadway to Finn. There had already been similar conversations in which her dads had looked on with polite smiles that hid their embarrassment on Finn's behalf. Finn hadn't exactly impressed her fathers the few times that they had already met, but he and Rachel had only officially been a couple for three weeks and Rachel was sure that time, if not her sheer will, would change their minds.

Rachel and her dads watch the entire show. Always a vocal and argumentative family, they criticize performances, laud favorite performers, and yell at the television when the person they had hoped would win won or lost. The Best Actress in a Musical category in particular had Rachel fuming. The award went to some Hollywood starlet of the year who was "slumming it" on the Great White Way to see what theatre life was like. Sure, she had a semi-decent voice to back up the casting choice but she could never compare to the Broadway veteran that had been the favorite, an actress whose career Rachel had followed since she was four. This put such a damper on her spirits that she delivered her faux acceptance speech to her dads without her regular gusto, and when she thanked her amazing boyfriend, she almost choked on her words.

After showering and removing all her makeup she crawled into bed and grabbed her computer to check her email. She only had one new message and the name of the sender made her gasp out loud and started her heart beating forcefully.

Jesse St. James had sent her a message.

She hadn't spoken to him since that day in the parking lot. The day with the eggs, or well, the one egg that had really mattered. She hadn't seen him since she had sneered in his direction after he had been announced the winner at Regionals. She hadn't thought about him since, well, that confession was about to get her into dangerous territory.

The message had no subject, but how could she not read it? She clicked it open. She didn't realize that she had closed her eyes to prevent her from the pain she was sure to feel until she had to mentally will her eyes open to see what the boy who had broken her heart had to say to her.

The email read, in its entirety, "Highway robbery. Madeline Feraria is legend."

Though he couldn't see it, the wry smile on her face voiced her complete agreement.

She is nowhere close to forgiving him so she doesn't respond, doesn't even think of it. But she knows that he knows, in that traitorous way that he always knows, that she appreciates the message.

July

Her lack of response to his initial email doesn't deter Jesse from sending more. Every week or thereabout she receives a short email without a subject line from him. Its always about something that interests her: Broadway news, Barbra news, or a link to a funny theatre article, interview, or video. She looks at every picture, reads every article and listens to every song he sends. But still she doesn't respond.

The day they announce the opening dates for Spiderman, the Musical on Broadway, he simply sends her a message that says: "Spiderman, seriously?" It unnerves her that she can hear his exact intonation in her head and can picture the smirk that would accompany his words. She begins envisioning the conversations that they would have if their discussion wasn't one sided, elaborating on them when she is bored, as is she is writing a script for a movie.

Sometimes she will stumble upon things that she wants to send to him and has to remind herself that she hasn't forgiven him, that she can't let on that she enjoys his messages, that she has to keep up the pretense.

September

The day she responds to him, she does it without even thinking about it. She has just watched the pilot for a new television show – a comedy that promises to bring musical theatre to primetime. She doesn't expect it to be much, but the previews are somewhat interesting and she recognizes the main actress from a Broadway show that she had briefly obsessed over when she was a freshman.

She ends up loving it and clears her Tuesday night schedules so she's able to watch it every week. She wonders if he has watched it too. He must be in LA by now and isn't part of LA life obsession with television?

She gets her answer later than she expects, right after midnight, and she remembers that there is probably a time difference.

He writes, in his usual way:

"That performance of On My Own was passable at best, but the Harvey Fierstein references are pure gold."

She loves that he doesn't need to introduce anything. He knows that she's watched the show and he knows she knows exactly what he is talking about. She hits reply immediately and responds:

"Did you catch the Barbra reference?"

She knows that it's a challenge, and she wants to see if he's up to it. How good are you really Jesse St. James? She shuts her laptop, confident in the fact that when she awakens in the morning, there will be a response waiting for her.

(He gets the Barbra reference. Of course he does. For the first time, he addresses her directly in his message. She finds it odd that though his previous messages were never personal by any means, she knows there is no other person other than her that he could be sending them to.)

Along with the answer to her question, he writes:

"After all the time I've spent with you, Berry? I learned from the best ;-)"

The wink sends a shiver through her body.

October

Once she responds to him, he pops up in her Gchat contact list. Instead of waiting for his messages, she now has a new obsession: interpreting his status messages. She tries to gage his mood. Happy? ("out for a run by the beach") Busy? ("college sucks") Neutral? ("insert clever status here").

Her heart stops when she reads one that may or may not be talking about a date ("dinner and a movie.") The amount of time she spends obsessing over this particular message is impressive and she is more relieved than she should be when he changes it again two days later to "college sucks."

It is around this time that she starts closing her laptop when Finn is around, or at the very least signing out of Gmail. It gives her a rush every time she hides something from Finn, and she tries not to worry that she is beginning to like the feeling.

Now, when she imagines the conversations she and Jesse would have, they always serve as the opening act to something else – something that ends with him holding her, kissing her, undressing her. She and Finn haven't gone any further than kissing and a heavy hand high on her thigh (that's all he can usually handle), and she wonders exactly where her imagination is getting all these images.

It's obvious to her that he knows her better than anybody else, and probably anybody else ever will. Her body seems to think that this knowledge shouldn't only stop with her mind.

Weekly emails from Jesse turn into almost daily Gchat conversations and they get more personal as time goes on. He asks about her day and she about his. They talk about New Directions, and the on campus productions he is involved in. She learns the name of his friends and his roommates, but they stay away from anything too hard to discuss like her relationship with Finn. Though she longs to ask, she doesn't actually know whether he is seeing someone as well.

She wonders if the fact that they don't discuss their relationships with each other means that he only thinks of her as a friend now. That premise deflates her but then she realizes that friends do talk about their relationships. The fact that they can't probably means there is something more there than friendship.

That thought cheers her up a bit.

November

Towards the end of November his emails become less and less frequent and he is hardly on Gchat. His status is frozen on "rehearsal" for days. She fears the worst – he is obviously being occupied by some sexy, beautiful girl whose dorm room he sleeps in and doesn't take his computer to.

She reminds herself that she can do the same and calls Finn to set up a dinner date. She won't allow Jesse St. James to get her down again.

When she gets back from dinner there is a chat message waiting for her and its as if he knew she wanted, no needed, the explanation:

"Sorry for being AWOL. Finals and rehearsals. Kill me now." He's already offline.

She finds the Youtube video of the song she wakes up to every morning and sends the link to him in an email. In the subject line she writes: "Don't let it break your stride."

She wonders if reminding him of what she wakes up to every morning is putting the images of them waking up together in his mind as well.

December

She becomes swamped with her own classes and exams, but even finals can't take away from the wondrous fact that December 18th is her birthday and the day is all about her.

Finn buys her a gift card to Starbucks. It's not a very generous amount, so not even its practicality can make up for its lack of sentimentality. Her dads tease her about it after Finn has left her pre-birthday dinner, which her dads hold so that Finn could be part of the Berry birthday festivities without infringing on the fathers/ daughter dinner on her real birthday. She covers for Finn, shielding him and his gift (or maybe its her ego) from their laughter. Neither of them have much money, she tries to explain and she does have to have her coffee.

It doesn't bother her as much as it should though, because she realizes she's expecting an amazing birthday message/ email/ conversation from Jesse. They hadn't been together for Valentines Day or any other "gift holiday" in their short relationship and she's always wondered what type of person he would be on special occasions.

Sentimental, like her, she's betting.

She wakes up on her birthday and checks her email. Nothing from him. He's not on Gchat either.

Now she's mad.

She goes to school and it's a normal day except for the fact that Tina and Mercedes bake her a cake and all the Glee kids sing Happy Birthday to her. Finn brought her chocolates, forgetting, she thinks, that she hates nuts in her chocolate.

It's a great day. She can't complain, really. She's just disappointed. She's been to the library twice to check her email and there is still nothing from him.

Finn drives her home, kisses her goodbye, tells her to enjoy dinner with her dads and the rest of her birthday. Her dads are both home so he doesn't even try to come inside. She's glad. She doesn't really want to pretend to be enjoying her sweet sixteen anymore.

She grabs the mail on her way into the house and sifts through it, looking for college brochures that she's asked for online, birthday cards from relatives.

She stumbles upon a small flat package, the size of a CD, and its addressed to her, return address somewhere in California.

She can't help the smile on her face as she unceremoniously drops the rest of the mail on the hall table and goes racing up the stairs, ignoring her dads' questions as to why she suddenly blew a gasket.

She rips the package open and it is a CD. There is a post it note on the cover that says "Happy Birthday!" On the CD itself is a label: Jesse St. James, Final Project, Voice I.

She puts it in her CD player and hits play. There is no introduction, but she's come to expect that from him. He just gets right to her.

The music starts and she struggles to place the song, until she realizes that it is one that she loves, that she's heard a million times. He's singing to her, and realization dawns on her. She's always thought this song described the perfect relationship between two people, a sort of molding to fit each other and she has always wanted a relationship like it. She never realized how perfectly it applied to them, how much it already fit.

I had no choice but to hear you
You stated your case time and again
I thought about it

You treat me like I'm a princess
I'm not used to liking that
You ask how my day was

You've already won me over in spite of me
And don't be alarmed if I fall head over feet
Don't be surprised if I love you for all that you are
I couldn't help it
It's all your fault

Your love is thick and it swallowed me whole
You're so much braver than I gave you credit for
That's not lip service

You've already won me over in spite of me
And don't be alarmed if I fall head over feet
Don't be surprised if I love you for all that you are
I couldn't help it
It's all your fault

You are the bearer of unconditional things
You held your breath and the door for me
Thanks for your patience

You're the best listener that I've ever met
You're my best friend
Best friend with benefits
What took me so long

I've never felt this healthy before
I've never wanted something rational
I am aware now
I am aware now

You've already won me over in spite of me
And don't be alarmed if I fall head over feet
Don't be surprised if I love you for all that you are
I couldn't help it
It's all your fault

She listens to it continuously, soaking the words in, his intonation. There are tears running down her face. For the first time in months she is not second-guessing what he might have meant by certain words. His voice breaks with emotion on the line, "You are the bearer of unconditional things," and she knows that he is thinking of that egg.

Her dads knock on her door hours later and she is still listening to him sing. They leave for dinner and though she enjoys her dads' company, as she always does, her mind is on him. She's planning her response.

She gets home and doesn't even open Gmail. She does something that she hasn't thought to do in the months since they have initiated this contact – she calls him, all the while praying that his number stays the same. He answers.

"Rachel?"

"I love you too."

And just like that, they know where each other stands.

But she's Rachel Berry, and a simple phone conversation (though it lasted hours with proper apologies given, desires confessed, promises made, logistics worked out) just isn't going to suffice.

She tries to come up with a song that will work just as well for him, to rival how he so perfectly captured their relationship.

She soon realizes that the hurt in their previous relationship had gone both ways, and in fact, the same song can work from her to him.