@empathos said : ❝ i’m cute about everything. ❞ ( jesse )
more than anything, rachel wants to protest. she wants to be mad, furious, at the way he’s reappeared in her life after being missing for so long. ( high school is high school, and rachel knows that first hand. she’s spent the better part of her first year in new york attempting to get over the horrible things she was put through by her peers, and now that she’s a happy, confident adult, seeing a ghost from the past feels like a setback. like she’s back to that little girl, animal sweaters and knee highs and so, so much desperation to be liked. to be loved. )
jesse st. james did love her, once. until he broke her heart. and though she’s forgiven him for the way things ended, there’s still something bubbling under the surface of her skin as she holds his eye contact, lips curled into a grimace. regret, maybe. anger. disappointment that she let something -- someone -- like him slip away, be it as a friend or... well.
her fists unclench, and rachel’s shoulders roll as she begins to stride towards him across the small dance studio. ❛ i see the years haven’t changed you much, ❜ she teases, a smirk threatening to tug at the corner of her mouth. arms fold across her chest, and freshly manicured nails dig into the flesh of her forearm, brow cocked in his direction.
❛ and even if your words hold a modicum of truth to them, ❜ she relents, stepping into his space with an air of bravery that sixteen year old rachel berry could never imagine, ❛ there’s nothing cute about mistakes. you’re focusing too hard on counting instead of letting your body actually do what it wants to do. ❜ lips pressed together, rachel challenges him, eyes wide as her head tilts up to meet his gaze.
❛ my broadway debut won’t be sullied by someone who can’t keep an eight count -- surely, you understand, right? ❜
( brooklyn nine nine prompts | accepting! )