A New Beginning

The next day, Puck and I walked into school hand-in-hand. Obviously, nobody thought it was out of the ordinary, considering everyone already thought the two of us were an item. A couple of people looked at us questioningly, since we weren’t typically so outward with affection, but we mostly went unnoticed.

As we passed Finn’s locker, I called out his name, a grin taking over my face.

He turned, a book still in his hand that he hadn’t been able to drop into his backpack. “Congrats,” he greeted, nodding politely at Puck. “I knew you’d figure it out eventually.”

“What are you talking about?” I raised an eyebrow at him. After taking my hand away from Puck, I crossed my arms in front of my chest in an attempt to seem more intimidating.

“I’m not dumb, Sydney. I know you, and it was pretty obvious that you liked Puck from the way you look at him and how you talked about him. You just had to figure it out on your own.” His eyes darted behind me again, as if he was uncomfortable discussing the whole thing in front of Puck.

“I appreciate your help with the whole thing,” I granted, putting my hand on Finn’s arm for a second. “I’ll see you at lunch?”

“Uh, yeah. Sure.”

Puck hooked his hand through mine again, clearly a way to show his ‘ownership’ of me. “Did you know that Finn’s totally in love with you?” he said in a low, slightly gravelly voice.

I snapped my head back, shooting him an irritated look. “No, he isn’t. You’re on crack or something.”

Puck burst out laughing, causing a few kids to see if we were okay. “Alright, I just wanted to see if you were tempted.”

“God, who do you think I am?” I replied, rolling my eyes. “Friggin’ Bella Swan?”

That got me another laugh as we stopped in front of my classroom. “I don’t think so,” he responded. As he leaned closer, he whispered, “And, just to be up front about it, I’m not a vampire.”

“Thanks for the reassurance.” I shoved him away from me lightly. “I’m going to class now.”

“What? I don’t get to kiss you for real now?”

“Don’t push your luck,” was my only response before I slipped into the classroom.

Once I was in my seat, I snuck another peek at the doorway, seeing that Puck was still standing there. He shook his head a couple of times after catching my eye and turned to continue down the hallway.

It was funny, how obviously different Puck and I acted to each other. To me, it was pretty damn clear that we were a couple now, and not before, but no one seemed to notice anything out of the ordinary. God, teenagers were stupid.

But maybe I was just placing too much importance on myself, figuring that everyone was watching our every move. Sure, I was considered ‘popular’, but that didn’t necessarily mean that every kid at McKinley High had a shrine of me in their closets.

At least, I hoped not.

* * *

At lunch, Finn kept glancing over my shoulder obsessively. When he first started doing it, I ignored him, but after about the millionth time, I snapped in front of his face. “God, what is so interesting over there? Is there some hot new girl that I wasn’t informed of?”

“I wish,” Finn responded. “Puck’s watching you like a hawk. I’m not sure he’s too happy with the idea of you eating lunch with me.”

“Well, I don’t care what he thinks about it.” My voice sounded much snobbier than I meant it to be, so I toned it down a bit. “I mean, I’ve been sitting with you since my first day here. I feel like it’s a tradition, like we have to do it.”

“We don’t have to do it. I’d be cool if you wanted to sit with Puck. I get that you guys are a couple now.”

“However nice that is of you, Finn, you didn’t let me finish my reasoning. I also want to keep this part just to myself, my friendship with you. It’s like in a marriage, I guess. No spouses want to do everything together.”

“Puck didn’t propose, did he?” His eyes looked like they were going to pop right out of his head, and I could almost hear his heart rate get to extremely dangerous levels.

“Whoa,” I laughed lightly, taking a deep breath in hopes that he’d do the same, “of course not. I’m relating it to one because they’re both relationships. God, what kind of girl do you think I am?”

“No, I wasn’t trying to say anything like that,” he rushed, trying to cover up his mistake. “I was just, um…Puck would totally do something like that to get you to sleep with him before breaking up with you the next day. So…he could have done it.”

“But you think I would have accepted it?”

He opened his mouth to open again, his expression panicked, but I chuckled again to let him know I was kidding. “Calm down. I hope Puck knows anyway that sex is certainly not something that I’m going to rush into.”

I swallowed the emotion that was threatening to well up in my throat. Although I was mostly cured from my therapy, I was still attending sessions regularly with my therapist when I was uprooted from Texas. It was just hard thinking about certain things without linking them to my attack sometimes. Which is why I had such issues when I first moved to Lima. And why tears were threatening to fall in the middle of the cafeteria, simply because I was reminded of the physical aspect of a relationship.

“We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it,” I whispered, suddenly feeling like I didn’t have an appetite.

“Sydney, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to say anything…”

“It’s fine. I’m fine. Really.” I coughed, trying to cover up my slight lie, as I got to my feet. It only took me a second to throw out my garbage before I took the seat back at the table, suddenly all too aware of Puck observing my every move.

* * *

“I won’t have sex with you,” I burst out in Puck’s truck after our respective practices, my thoughts unable to stay quiet any longer.

“Uh…” he trailed off before clearing his throat. “Ever?”

“Not never, per se,” I sighed. “I just…I don’t know how long it’s going to take for me to feel comfortable enough, for me to feel like it’s not an attack. I don’t even know…” I didn’t want to get too graphic, so I just rushed to the point, “I don’t know how I’m going to feel about it at all.”

“Well, with what I’ve seen in chick flicks and stuff, it usually takes a while to get girls in bed, anyway. So we’ll just have to see, I guess.”

“What you’ve seen in chick flicks?” I laughed, thankful for the subtle subject change.

“I do have a little sister, even though I usually pretend I don’t. And I have to go by those, since it usually takes me about ten seconds to get a girl in bed with me.”

“Except for me,” I responded cockily, subconsciously making myself sit up straighter in my seat with pride.

“Yeah. But you’re kind of a special case.”

“Better than being an ordinary case,” I shot back.

My words echoed in my head, sounding truer all the time. No matter how messed up I was, it still made me who I was. And it was better to be my own person than to be some boring no-name.

Right?