Spoilers: Up to 2.22
Warnings: None.
Disclaimer: RIB and FOX own everything ever.
Beta: rdm-ation on LJ

Enjoy, and by all means comment should it strike your fancy, my best beloveds.~

Rachel's problem was this: she didn't want to be a statement.

It only was after the heady atmosphere of "Barbra Streisand" had evaporated that she figured out the one thing that was still bothering her – Kurt hadn't called her pretty. He'd just called her brave.

She put the pieces together during phys ed a couple of weeks after her brush with cosmetic surgery. She and Tina were on the same dodgeball team, and they were both hanging back from the fray. Rachel knew why she was sheltering herself - the last time they'd played, Strando had used her as a ball and claimed it was an honest mistake. But Tina was athletic and had good hand-eye coordination as well as excellent muscle control; she usually enjoyed sports.

Rachel sidled over to her, only partly in order to use her as a human shield. "Why aren't you participating more actively?" She crossed her hands behind her back, fingers twisting together. "I thought success in group physical activities was supposed to be a bonding experience, and we're winning."

Tina patted her hair gingerly. It was coiled around her head in a thick plait, wound through with a string of black beads which blended in nearly to the point of invisibility. "I can't mess up my hair," she said.

"I hear that," said Mercedes from the bleachers, and studied her nails minutely before she resumed filing them.

"Oh," Rachel said; and then, "Really?"

Tina's hair was very pretty, but it was also very out of place. At least with her elaborate little purple ball gown, lacy gloves, and gleaming high-heeled boots she had just stood out. Now, in gym shorts and an outsize t-shirt, she looked outright strange.

"I am not endangering this," Tina said, glancing over her shoulder for any lurking adults and sidestepping a stray player. One of the beads caught the light for an instant. It glittered, then faded into her hair again. "My little sister loved it when she saw it this morning. She'll be so happy if I still have it tonight."

Rachel scoffed, unable to stifle herself – unable and unwilling; stifling was unhealthy for a developing artist. "I'm sorry, but – you can tease me for my clothing choices with a straight face, but turn around and take fashion advice from a kid?"

"Wow, Rachel."

"That's just sad," said Mercedes with a kind smile.

"Someone's an only child," Tina added, and nodded wisely.

"E-excuse me? Of course I'm an only child; I display every major hallmark of the type, including an expectation of undivided attention, a sense of isolation, and difficulty relating to my peers or taking their points of view into account. What does that have to do with your fashion choices?"

"Rachel, seriously, stop," said Mercedes. "I'm gonna explain this because I feel for you, but you have got to shut up before you kill my mercy." She looked at Rachel and raised her eyebrows. She also did the commanding thing with her mouth. Rachel was jealous of the commanding thing.

"Okay," she said, and shut up.

Mercedes nodded and settled regally into place. "It's real simple: Sibling compliments trump everything. Everything."

"But -"

"No." When silence had been reestablished, Mercedes continued, "We're talking about someone who is among the most important people in your en-tire life, someone who is there for you forever, and someone you spend eight days out of seven fighting with and hating. You bet your plaid skirt if they like something you got on enough to say so, you keep it on."

Rachel turned this over. "What if –"

"No. A pink boa over a green tracksuit. I don't care."

Tina nodded. "Maybe you can't get it without a sibling, but it means so much to them think you're pretty. Way more than just a guy."

"When my big brother likes my shirt or something, I feel like a million bucks all day," Mercedes said, flipping her hair over her shoulder. "Not even Kurt can bring me down off that high."

Tina, who would know what it was like to have Kurt genuinely "help" with her clothing choices by way of scathing commentary, laughed. They high-fived.

"But Tina's right," Mercedes sighed. "Without a sibling, maybe you just can't get it."

"Actually." Rachel said. She smiled and nodded and backed away. "I... um, I think I do."

Rachel tried not to be over-invested in her looks. She had her talent and drive, after all; those set her apart in a way mere beauty never could have done. And she wasn't unattractive. So she tried not to think about it.

Sometimes she was successful. Often she wasn't.

And Rachel was an independent, self-sufficient young woman usually – God knew she had to be, being the heart and soul of a glee club filled with lackadaisical, uncommitted teenagers and pulling straight As besides. It was just that it was lonely at the top, knowing that everyone qualified as "the little people," and she got lonely. So she had a few weak spots.

One of them was Finn, obviously. There were her dads, and almost Puck and Jesse. And somehow, without her noticing, Kurt became another.

She had liked hearing that Finn thought she was beautiful and that Puck thought she was hot, but it just – hadn't been as good as feeling pretty on her own.

Kurt telling her she was one in a million, though. That had been as good as believing it herself. Which was a little scary, when she thought about it. But there it was. Rachel was a teenage girl in showbiz; the odds against her feeling sufficiently attractive in herself were astronomical and would have been even if she looked like Quinn. She couldn't be perfect, as close as she admittedly came. Finn helped, but... but.

Kurt was Kurt. He was focused and unruffled and beautiful. He understood her drive and passion. He was going to New York with her; Finn never would.

And the only time she felt completely beautiful, right down to her bones, was when Kurt stared at her.

It happened for the first time in biology, one of their few shared periods. She had craned around in her seat to ask Finn for an extra pen - he always had green ones, which he said made notes more fun, and she needed a cool color for her coded notes.

Finn didn't notice her wave. Kurt couldn't have missed it. He flushed furiously and kicked Finn's ankle, pointing him Rachel's way. Rachel smiled automatically; she had no idea what Kurt had been up to, staring at her like that, but she was sure it was fine.

"What?" Finn asked in what he thought was a whisper.

Rachel put a finger to her lips, then mimed writing in the air.

"You lost your voice and came down with arthritis?"

Kurt smacked his shoulder and passed Rachel a pen without meeting her eyes.

Rachel smiled some more and faced the front of the class, more in order to think than to listen to Ms Kingsley. Kurt had been staring at her with an intensity she'd never seen outside of smoldering scenes in old movies. Aside from Kurt's orientation, smoldering was plainly not the case; she had seen his crush-struck looks, and they did not smolder. They were positively soppy. They would probably extinguish a smolder. The point being, this was a new look. And quite honestly, she liked it.

The pen Kurt had given her was red. She used it anyway.

"You don't usually wear your hair like that," Kurt had said to her later that day, materializing behind her at her locker.

Rachel, who was sporting a low, loose braid, beamed and tucked a stray lock behind her ear. "Oh, do you like it?" Experimentally, she spun in place.

Kurt smiled. It was a pretty smile. It was not friendly. Rachel got a distinct sad clown hooker feeling in her gut. "It's a lovely hairdo," Kurt said. His smile grew, tone slip-sliding into casual cruelty as he continued, "So it really doesn't suit your facial structure." He looked her over, expression fading to blank, before turning and walking away.

Kurt hadn't talked to her like that in almost a year. And as odd as it was to say about someone who used to pull worse this on a weekly basis, it wasn't like him. Not anymore.

Rachel hid in the bathroom and thought about asking Finn what was going on but couldn't summon the energy to maneuver her relationship with him and Quinn and - just everything. Once she was sure she wasn't going to cry, she called Blaine.

"Rachel?" Blaine picked up almost immediately. "What's up?"

"Hi," she said, and swallowed. "Blaine, is Kurt... okay? Is he angry with me? I realize that I have difficulty picking up on social cues at times; have I been crowding him?"

"What? No, Kurt adores you. I mean, for someone who offers to kill you so often, he's actually very fond of you. Why, what's wrong?"

"Nothing. You know, never mind. I must have misunderstood. I'm sure there's an explanation –"

"For what? Rachel."

"No, it's – you'll laugh. Kurt didn't like my hair today, is all." She laughed first, in order to get him started.

Silence crackled down the line. "Should I be more upset when he insults my hair?" Blaine asked finally. "I thought that was kind of his thing."

"Yes, it is. He does it all the time. It's just been so long since he... since he was mean about it..."

"Kurt? Mean? Maybe you did misunderstand something."

"You didn't hear him. He hasn't talked to me like that since we were competing over Finn."

"Okay, well, take me through this," Blaine asked in his especially indulgent voice. "What did you do to your hair?"

"It was in a braid! And he said - he said it was nice but I wasn't pretty enough to wear it that way."

"Oh," Blaine said. He was quiet, then added, "That is... harsh."

"So I thought maybe something was going on..."

"Rachel? I'm going to send you a picture, okay? I have to hang up to do it, but I'll call you right back."

"Okay." She sniffed bravely and cradled her phone until it buzzed. Blaine had sent her a picture of Kurt in profile, propped against his pillows and reading. Unless his point was that Kurt's hair was a minor disaster at night, she didn't get it.

over his shoulder, read the text.

It was barely visible, and plainly hadn't been the focus of Blaine's picture, but she could just make it out: A small framed photograph on Kurt's bedside table. In it was a smiling woman with light eyes. She held up a baby boy dressed in an appalling fuzzy green onesie. Her hair was long and thick and brown; it fell over her shoulder in a loose braid.

Rachel's phone buzzed. She answered it and the picture disappeared. "Oh," she said into it.

"Yeah?"

"It was the same kind of braid." She touched her hair, which was a mess from being tugged free so quickly.

"He keeps the picture in a drawer, usually," Blaine said. "I think it makes his dad kind of sad to see it."

"Oh," she said again.

"I'm sorry he hurt your feelings. Do you want me to –"

"No," Rachel said. It occurred to her that she had essentially tattled and that Kurt might not be thrilled with her if he heard about it. "Thank you, Blaine. I feel much better now. I'm sure we'll make up soon."

"Oh, yeah. He'll want to apologize and everything. I'm glad you're okay - let me know if I can help later on."

"I will."

"Rachel?"

"Yes?"

"You're one of the prettiest girls I know."

"Thank you," she said, and almost started crying. But it didn't feel any different than when Finn or Puck said it.

Kurt did not apologize. Rachel had never seen him acknowledge he was wrong about anything, much less apologize for it, and hadn't expected him to. If she and Finn had been together, they could have laughed together about Blaine's optimistic view of Kurt's not-in-love personality. As it was, Finn was with Quinn, and Rachel was not very amused on her own.

Instead, he went back to being her friend and did not acknowledge the incident. Rachel chose to allow this.

She didn't braid her hair again. She didn't need to; Kurt stared without it.

She sat a few chairs away from him in math, and if she looked sideways without turning her head she could see him looking. She didn't risk turning around in biology, but she was pretty sure he did it there too.

And he looked – parched, like she was the only water for miles, an oasis, and a mirage, but she would settle if he would. That look made up for the comment in the hall, and for how she felt even when Finn or Puck complimented her, so yes. She would settle for being a mirage.

Rachel's house had the fewest people, so they usually had sleepovers there. She occasionally lobbied with subtlety and a carefree air for a night at the Hudson-Hummel household, but Mercedes would point out that Kurt's new room was too small and Kurt would say, "Rachel, seriously, give it up," cruelly denying her a chance to run into Finn in her nightie entirely by accident. Mercedes, for her part, had a live-in grandmother and not enough room for two guests at once.

So they were piled on Rachel's bed the night Mercedes said, "Kurt, hold this, I need water."

"Oh, me too," Rachel said.

"And me." Kurt made a face as he looked up from his essay on the mock-heroic epics of Alexander Pope, about which he had spent the last fifteen minutes ranting. Rachel was still unclear on whether he hated the poems or was just very impassioned about their subjects. "Every time, I forget how thirsty chocolate makes you. What am I holding?"

"This." Mercedes waved the lock of Rachel's hair she'd been twisting. "Let it come undone and so help me, I will use my gran's embossing powder and heat gun on your Dior jacket."

"Fine," Kurt sighed, rolling closer on the bed and grabbing said hunk of hair. "I want ice, then."

"Hah," said Mercedes, and exited.

"I'm not getting any ice, am I," Kurt mourned.

"Tough it out, Hummel."

"You should use conditioner," Kurt said absently, carding his fingers through her hair where it was still undone.

"I tried, but it made my hair all slippery. It already won't do anything because it's so straight. It just falls out of most things I try to do with it."

"You should use good conditioner," Kurt amended. "Remind me to take you shopping next week." He tucked her hair behind her ear and smoothed it down a few times.

"Okay," she said, "how about Monday after school?"

"Mm, if Finn can get another ride. I doubt he'll want to come."

"Oh, Puck will drive him." Or Quinn.

"Water," said Mercedes, fumbling to set the three glasses down. "And I just got to see some pictures of Rachel in her first school play. Because her dads have them framed. And pointed them out."

"They're my biggest fans," Rachel said happily. " Mr. Schue excepted."

"I would make fun of you, but I think Mr. Ryerson is my biggest fan," Mercedes said.

"As the only person besides Rachel who is consistently moved to tears by the two of you, I object to being left off those lists," Kurt said, and then looked horrified. "Dear god, that criterion makes my biggest fan Noah Puckerman."

"Poor boy," Mercedes laughed, and took Rachel's hair back.

Kurt didn't stare at her hair outside of class. He didn't need to; he'd found a pretext for playing with it.

Rachel found that Kurt was, for all his ease with most grooming-related issues, incapable of anything beyond a ponytail when it came to hair over four inches long. This didn't matter, since a ponytail was all the excuse either of them needed.

Rachel turned the magazine in a few different directions, then gave up. "I can't read this upside down."

"It's not upside down," Kurt said. "Just... high up."

"Is this even English?"

"Of course not!" Kurt tugged her hair out from under her where she lay at the edge of his bed, letting it fall over the side so that he could brush it from his seat on the floor. "Honestly, Rachel. It's French. What kind of friend would I be if I gave you some diluted English version of all that is holy?"

"Is she wearing a shoe on her head?"

"The picture's sideways." Kurt started teasing the odd knot out with a comb from his extensive collection.

"Oh." Rachel turned the magazine some more; her arms were already getting tired of holding it aloft. She had excellent stamina and lung capacity, in addition to extremely healthy legs (qualities both necessary for Broadway and indicative of a long lifespan), but her arms apparently needed work.

As well as her fashion sense. "It still looks like a shoe."

Kurt sighed. "Maybe we should start with something more basic." He tossed the comb on the bed and started running a brush through her hair; she was fairly certain it was the one with boar bristles. This was apparently good, as opposed to disgusting. Boys.

"More basic and in English," Rachel voted, dropping the magazine and looking around instead. "Your room is so white," she added. "And your ampersand is backwards."

Kurt sniffed. "Finn helped me move."

"So you left it that way?"

"It's eccentric. And blackmail material."

"Hm." Rachel couldn't imagine Finn begging to be allowed to do the dishes if only Kurt wouldn't tell his teammates that he couldn't correctly place a metal piece of punctuation on a bookshelf, but she also felt more like falling asleep than arguing the point. Kurt's fingers toyed through her hair after the brush, tugging gently, the uneven pressure making its way over and back across her head. "Kurt?"

"Mm-hm?"

"What do you remember about your mom?"

Kurt's right hand stilled with the brush; his left spidered through her hair regardless, as though on its own. "She was pretty," he said. He started brushing again. "I don't," he added abruptly. "I don't remember her, really. Sometimes I think I do, but it's usually... a story. My dad has lots of stories. We have pictures and home videos. I know that she was funny, and she was brave, and she was very kind. But all that I remember on my own is that she was beautiful."

"And that she loved you," Rachel said, not quite a question.

"And that she loved me." He curled the hair back from her ears, tucking it into a coil. "Rachel, I'm sorry about Shelby."

Rachel realized he had no idea what she'd meant to bring up, and then decided it was just as well – she certainly didn't have the courage for another try right now.

And to be fair, she didn't want to talk about Shelby, either. It wouldn't have been an even trade.

"Me too," she said.

"Do you think Ms Corcoran was pretty?" He untwisted her hair and started brushing again.

"Of course I do. She's stunning. Don't you think so?"

"I think she's gorgeous. You look just like her."

"Except for my nose."

"Well." He pulled on her hair.

"You really think I look like her?"

"Yes."

Rachel turned over, wincing when the movement yanked her hair free, and rested her chin on her arms. "That means a lot," she said, "coming from you."

"Yes, I know." He smiled. "I do have truly remarkable aesthetic taste." He clambered up on the bed behind her, tapping her shoulder till she sat up with her back to him, and pulled her hair over her shoulders. "No," he sighed, "it's better, but it could be flawless. We'll try another brand."

"I thought we had to give each conditioner two weeks in order to be fair."

"We do. I can just tell this one isn't going to be the one. We'll keep looking when the two fair weeks are up."

"Okay," Rachel said, and leaned back against him.

"Oh," said Kurt, but put his arms around her and rested his chin on her shoulder.

"You really should turn that ampersand around."

"You should stop fixating on my ampersand. It's neurotic. Very you." But he was holding her hand, finally, instead of a brush.

When Kurt left the room to get some poor slaughtered creature out of the freezer – to thaw for dinner – Rachel slid over to his bedside table. She opened the drawer slowly, as if it might creak like the door on an old house, alerting him to what she was doing. It didn't.

Inside, a dusty French-English dictionary Kurt must have been beyond the use of occupied most of the available space. A pencil case fit beside a glossy notebook, and a carved box was wedged behind everything else. Front and center, though, as the framed picture of Kurt's mother.

She was lovely. Kurt, Rachel thought now that she had something on which to base the comparison, looked more like his father. Still, the resemblance to his mother was there in his mouth and cheekbones, in the way he held his chin. And Mrs. Hummel had been beautiful too.

Her hair was dark brown and straight, escaping in threads from the braid reaching over her shoulder, just to her chest. The resemblance to Rachel's was striking.

Rachel put the picture away and closed the drawer.

The next time they had gym, Rachel caught Mercedes on the way out of the locker room. "I need to ask you something," she said.

"Well, we should be out there running in place like hamsters on a wheel, but okay." Mercedes grinned. "What's up?"

"Do you remember what you and Tina said about being pretty – about your siblings thinking you look pretty?"

"Yeah," Mercedes said slowly. "But you know, Rachel, we did talk about how you can't have one of Sam's siblings just because you don't want to be an only child. Remember?"

"No, that's not what this is about - I'm beyond that plan, and anyway Brittany had a very good point about me leaving for New York too soon for it to be worth the legal fees. I was just wondering... what if your brother never really... thought you were pretty?"

Mercedes raised her eyebrows. "I don't get it. He does."

"I know, it's just hypothetical. But... if you had a different brother. And you loved him and respected his opinion, and he was one of your best friends in the world - one of the only people who understood you – and you wanted him to think you were pretty more than you wanted to sing a duet with Aretha –"

"Well now I know you're crazy."

" – but he just... didn't."

"That is whacked, Rachel. Where did you come up with that?"

"It just came to me. I mean... what if."

"Okay," Mercedes sighed, "if that happened to me... I would learn to live with it. Like I do with most people. I know I'm beautiful, and yeah, it's exhausting as hell sometimes, but it's enough. It has to be."

"Right," said Rachel.

"Good. So, we set, or...?"

"Well, what if - what if there was one thing he thought was pretty about you. Would you... you know, go along with it? Would you pretend?"

Mercedes looked at her, lips pursed "Do you remember when I was on the Cheerios and I fainted in the cafeteria, because I wasn't eating?"

"Oh," said Rachel, who remembered but hadn't known why Mercedes fainted. "Yes."

"I get it, Rachel. Really, I get it. If you'd asked me before, or I didn't have the brother I do, I guess I would have said yes. But – no. I think it's worth having people who really think you're beautiful." She smiled crookedly. "Anyway, Kurt's amazing, but trust me: don't hold out for him realizing what he can do to you."

"I didn't say anything about Kurt!"

"Got you, though."

"It's just," Rachel said, "he likes my hair. A lot."

Mercedes opened her mouth and someone knocked on the door.

"Hey, um - Mercedes?"

"Sam!" she said, a little frantically. "We're coming! Rachel's with me!"

He paused. "Are you guys dressed?"

"We're decent," Rachel sighed, and opened the door. "Are we in trouble already? I'm getting to class."

"Actually I don't think anyone's noticed," said Sam.

"Go ahead," said Mercedes. "We'll catch up."

"Rachel," Kurt said, sliding into the seat next to her for glee club. "Nice knee socks."

This was the kind of friendly ribbing allowed between friends, said with a genuine smile, and Rachel laughed.

"No, I'm serious," Kurt said absently, and then groaned. "Oh my god, I actually am serious. What is Blaine doing to me?"

Rachel examined her dark gray socks, cut through with severe triangles in ochre and navy. "Giving you a school uniform fetish?"

"Ah, yes. That's why all my friends are girls. Who needs boys when you're just as bad?" He reached over and adjusted her Peter Pan collar with a wince. "I do like the socks, though."

"I like them too," said Rachel.

She tagged along for date night, since Kurt and Blaine weren't going to be alone anyway.

"Kurt's watching Stevie and Stacy," Sam had volunteered when the subject came up.

"Sam," Kurt snapped.

"Blaine's watching Stevie and Stacy," Sam corrected himself. "With Kurt. At Kurt's house. Where Kurt will be present at all times."

Kurt rolled his eyes fondly. "Blaine likes kids," he told Rachel. "They sense his weakness and exploit it."

"Last time they convinced him sugar was a vital food group and they were missing it," Sam said.

"Stacy convinced him to wear a green plastic lei," Kurt said. "For hours. And she knows better. She did it on purpose."

At one point during their group babysitting stint, Kurt and Blaine disappeared together for over fifteen minutes, and returned with their clothes perfectly in order but Blaine's hair tellingly disheveled. Since this had been Kurt's idea, he apparently felt guilty enough to take the kids himself when Rachel retreated to the kitchen for a breather and Blaine followed her.

"They're very energetic," Rachel commented through gulps of water.

"Well, they're cooped up in one room a lot."

"They also show no regard for pure and staggering talent. Neither of them would sit quietly for my impromptu concert experience."

"They're young," Blaine said. "Give them time." He touched Rachel's arm. "So listen, I wondered... how are you and Kurt now?"

"Oh, that," Rachel said, and laughed. "We're fine! I was feeling irritable that day, is all - I'm sorry I dragged you into it."

"No, it really wasn't a problem," Blaine said quickly. "And - I mean, if you think about it, it was kind of a compliment. That you reminded him so much of his mom."

It wasn't. He didn't even believe that. Rachel could see the same fumbling overabundance of earnestness in him that her dads used on her when kids on the playground called her a witch because of her nose. "Just jealous," they'd say.

"Yes," she said. "I guess it was."

It was Past Bedtime; Kurt started calling it that five minutes before bedtime in order to expedite the process. The kids had been allowed to choose a movie to fall asleep to, since they'd have to be carried out to the car at some point anyway. They had selected, from their bag of DVDs, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader; Kurt had put it in with a fixed smile and spent a quarter of an hour hissing complaints about the overt Christian allegory in Blaine's ear.

"Are they asleep?" Kurt leaned forward now to peer at Blaine. "I'm taking it out if they're asleep."

"No," said Stevie gamely, eyes at half-mast. "We're watching," he added, in defiance of Stacy's light snores.

Kurt slumped back, defeated; Rachel smiled and kicked his ankle in friendly schaudenfreude.

"Blaine's asleep," he complained. "Not Stevie. Blaine."

Rachel leaned around him; Blaine had passed out with a twin under each arm and his mouth hanging open. Rachel snorted.

"Shhh," said Stevie.

Kurt tugged Rachel over to lean against him, tucking her under his arm, her head falling onto his shoulder. He started combing her hair with his fingers.

(Onscreen, Lucy opened a book and was beautiful.)

"I used to do this for my mom," Kurt said. "Brush her hair." He quieted, then added, "A lot."

Rachel curled into him. "You don't talk about her much."

"No." His fingertips tickled the back of her neck. "This one definitely isn't good enough. We'll try something a leave-in conditioner next."

"Okay." Rachel buried her face in his neck. He smelled like peppermint, and faintly of something spicier – it took her a few seconds to place it as Blaine's cologne. "You don't have to," she murmured against his skin. "You can play with my hair without the stupid conditioners." She felt noble, suddenly, instead of cheap. It was nice of her to let him re-create moments with his mother, probably one of the only things he remembered doing with her at all. Yes.

"I never thought I'd have to say this, Rachel," Kurt sighed drowsily, "but please - enunciate."

Rachel sniffed. Kurt's hand fell still on her shoulder, his head dropping heavy against hers.

("But where am I," asked Lucy, in a perfect fantasy where she was beautiful because she looked like her sister, because her brothers thought so. "I mean - where's Lucy?" and one of her brothers asked, "Who's Lucy?")

"Never mind," said Rachel.