even though you don't have time to write and I realise jakeverse is kaput (it really sucks when life gets too busy and gets in the way of the smaller things that we enjoy) I did always wonder if there was a short summary of how that universe's pezberry got together...
a short summary you say? let me tell you this: the entire story from start to finish has existed in my head since the day i first came up with it.
– so where i left the main story before the first interlude was chapter two ends with santana’s father dying. santana and jake go back to lima and rachel has arranged for her dads to have santana and jake stay with them. rachel’s dads are awesome, santana’s mom is… not. she ahngs out with sam and puck and it’s a whole round of closure that is pretty eye opening while she spends every night there talking to rachel on the phone as literally the only person on the planet who gets every aspect of how fucked up the disconnect between her life pre and post leaving lima is. (read: rachel is the best person you want on your side when you just want to be mad about the disappointments in your life.)– she goes back to boston and they have this very awkward new dynamic where santana has shared a whole bunch of stuff into the telephone and now she can see the person she was spilling it to. (oh, santana.)– jake’s concert! santana finally caves and actually invites rachel, and… she can’t come. and oh, santana is so crushed but, you know, it’s cool. cool cool cool cool cool. (oh my god, santana is jake peralta.)– plot twist: rachel shows up juuuuust in time. of course she does. afterwards rachel comes back to their apartment at jake’s invitation, and rachel’s like, oh i wouldn’t want to impose, and santana’s like …no, you should come hang out.– and they walk home and jake’s like crashing hard, to the point where santana’s carrying him inside and rachel just kind of wanders in after them, and santana puts jake to bed and when she comes back (and i realised just now that i have always ALWAYS had this scene in my head from rachel’s POV, not santana’s, which doesn’t fit but whatever) she comes back and rachel’s in her house, sitting in her living room on her couch and rachel’s just like… there. and then she stands up and comes over to where santana is still standing in the doorway and is like, “you’re a really great mom” which is a thing that santana had accidentally blurted out being one of her many fears in life when they’d been phone calling every night, and then proceeds to kiss the hell out of santana.
END OF PART THREE, THE OFFICIAL MIDWAY POINT OF THE ENTIRE STORY :D
after that, in brief:– SO THEY’RE DATING??? there’s a lot of cute dating. it’s great, things are amazing, please remember this entire fic is a love letter to how great rachel berry is.– rachel’s show ends and she has to go to new york.– :((((((((((((– but no, fuck that, they’re not just over before they even get started because of that. there are airplanes and trains and they’re grown ups with jobs.– but man, it’s hard it’s hard it’s very very hard, because god, santana just doesn’t know why this is so hard?– but they’re back and forth-ing as much as they can, and one weekend rachel gets sick while she’s in boston. just a cold, but it’s rachel, so she’s dying, but it does mean she can stay and santana has to go to work but jake stays with her and she comes home to find jake practicing a song for rachel while she’s holed up in santana’s bed and she just. flees. she doesn’t know what the fuck to do, and she cries on mike’s shoulder, and mike is like, dude, do you want to move to new york? and santana is like wtf how is that even an option? and mike’s like, i live here because you and jake are here, i could proooooobably be a dancer in new york. and this is like a shoking revelation to santana, who didn’t even realise wanting to just up and be where rachel was was even an option.– and idk if i ever posted this here but:
The sun is completely set by the time she returns, the tv off in the bedroom and all the lights out. The street lamp is casting a glow through the bedroom window where the curtain and window is open to let in the humid night air — the aircon was just making Rachel’s cold worse — and from the entrance to the hallway she can see a sheet draped over a still form on her bed.
Santana sets her things on the hallway table, everything she’d had in her hands before she’d fled into the heat earlier, and kicks off her flip flops before making her way down the hall. Jake’s room is empty, and when she reaches her own doorway she can see why.
Rachel is lying on her side, sheet bunched at her waist and hair in a messy knot. Her lips are parted, tiny gusts of air passing over cracked lips every time it gives up trying to escape her nose, and the fist under her chin is wrapped around a kleenex. She’s wearing, of all things, a Boston Ballet t-shirt with a bleach stain down the back. Her spine is at the edge of the mattress, curled around where Jake is sprawled across the rest of the bed in nothing but a pair of boxer shorts with dachshunds chasing each other, arms and legs everywhere. They’re not touching except where Rachel’s hand rests on his elbow.
The sight makes Santana’s heart pound erratically, her blood carrying a buzz to every surface of her body.
This is what she wants, all she wants, basically all the time.
It doesn’t matter that she’s only at the first step in making it happen; she feels alive in the reality of that want for the first time.
The possibility makes her dizzy — no seriously, she’s kind of clutching at the door jamb, but that might be dehydration from all the damn crying she just did — so she moves to the other side of the bed and sinks down onto the mattress.
She rearranges Jake’s arm so she can move closer, close enough to be able to reach out and brush back the wisps of hair clinging to Rachel’s forehead. Her fingers trace the curve of Rachel’s cheek, the swell of her lip and then up, along the dark smudges under her eyes.
Santana might not be ready to say the things she needs to say just yet, and maybe Rachel’s not ready to hear them, but her awareness of the way her body is catalyzed when Rachel’s near has released some previously unknown tension and there’s nothing but her hand on Rachel’s face and—
Rachel’s eyelashes flutter.
It’s so fucking obvious, now, that a tiny puff of laughter escapes her.
“Hi,” Rachel whispers, once her eyes blink open fully. Even in the shadows, Santana can see her smile all the way to the crinkle at the corner of her eyes.
Rachel shifts, nudges Jake’s other arm closer to his body, and shuffles closer. Her hand curls around Santana’s waist, and she sighs, her eyes fluttering closed.
“You were gone,” Rachel mumbles, frowning a little.
“Sorry,” she replies, not just a reflex.
“Don’t do that again,” Rachel says, already half way back to sleep.
“Okay,” Santana whispers.
– and then they all move to new york and fight about the yankees for all eternity, the end.
