More angst from me. What can I say, I have a thing for it. If you're looking for something nice, stop reading. If you're looking for something not so nice, or a little Hummelberry, keep reading.

"I have feelings too. I am still human. All I want is to be loved, for myself and for my talent."

The foreboding lay in the atmosphere, even before they played the tape. The group gathered around the CD player, mumbling amongst themselves and stealing glances at its ominous shape. It was not the object that unsettled them, but the note that was attached to it, a regular yellow post it that seemed too cheerful for the words inscribed upon it. And there was something else, something the club could not quite grasp, something that although unreachable, seemed very important indeed.

It was not until they pushed the play buttonand her voice filled the room, soft and haunting, something they had never heard to her tone before, that they realised she was not there. They looked to one another as the words bounced from the empty walls and filled the empty space of her absence with their melody, as if the answers would be scribbled across one member's face. But as the words filled one void, they created another; an uncertainty that caused the prickle felt by each one of them to creep into the core of their souls, chilling them. Why?

The lyrics made no sense, it was a song that none, bar one member, had heard her sing before. Why was it taped? Why left with no hint, other than a post it note, as if she could not be there to sing it herself? The lyrics themselves gave no clue to the answer. I still need your love, after all that I've done. For one member, the words stirred something inside. A hand grasped at the back of his mind, searching for something buried long ago that had hardly seemed to matter at the time.

"Oh please, not another one of her diva tantrums. If this is her dramatic, mysterious way of saying she's left the club then we should be praying it's for good. She's got our hopes up far too many times only to come back in as the same totally irritating hobbit she always has been," Quinn snipped with a wicked grin. A few laughed shakily, emerging from their confused trances and brushing away the uncertainty.

Kurt stole a glance at Finn, the hand still grasping in his memory. He waited for him to defend Rachel, but his step brother stayed silent, saying nothing for the girlfriend who was not there to speak for herself. Kurt scowled.

"You know Quinn, I actually hope Rachel doesn't return too. Perhaps then you will see how much we will struggle without her, and not just because we need her voice." Quinn just rolled her eyes, but Finn had the grace to look ashamed. He knew it should have been him.

"Why would we ever need her, we're better off without that thing." Santana smirked at Kurt, expecting him to jump to Rachel's defence again, but he had stopped listening. He had heard her sing that song before and he heard again her reasons for singing it, resounding in his head as if she were there, whispering them like a ghost haunting his memories.

Too late.

The world ceased to function around him. He no longer heard Santana's taunts or saw Finn's guilt. He stopped listening to the sniggers and murmurs that followed the bullying of someone they were supposed to love. The one thing he could not stop hearing was her voice as the song continued to play on the tape.

Have I said too much?

There's nothing more I can think of to say to you

Kurt ran, ignoring the questioning stares as he tore past his friends. He didn't notice the post it note that caught the breeze caused by his sudden departure and fluttered away from the CD player, flying into the air momentarily before floating to the ground where it lay still.

…

"Rachel!" Kurt pounded on the door to her home, wishing he had thought to bring his phone, but he had left it on top of the piano with that note when he had fled. His hands were red and stinging, but he did not stop pounding. He called her name again, louder and more frantic. He was almost screaming, but still, no one came. Kurt gave a quiet groan, barely able to manage any more sound as the panic of her silence engulfed him. It was just a song, just a simple note, just a CD player, it didn't have to mean anything, but somehow he knew it did. It meant everything.

"Princess," he sobbed, pressing his forehead against the closed door as his hand made one more useless swing. In that moment, he hated himself for running off and not dragging someone along with him. Someone like Puck or Finn who would be strong enough to knock down the door that his weedy, pathetic body could do nothing to.

Rachel

The first time she came second, Rachel was just five years old. It was in a dancing competition, ballet, and she was the only girl in her class to be chosen for it. She had felt like a princess in her pink leotard and snow white tutu. Even when her dad had tried and failed to pull her hair into a tight bun for the night, the smile did not leave her face. He struggled with it in the dressing room until one kind lady with one of the other girls kindly offered to take over. She had pulled Rachel's hair into such a tight style that her eyes were difficult to shut, but still, she smiled.

When her music had began to play, Rachel had glided on stage, still smiling as though her very reason to live was waiting on the stage for her to collect. She remembered her steps, she even remembered to smile at her audience and patter to the front of the stage to curtsy after her performance. The applause she received for her dance made the smile stretch so wide she was sure her mouth would split. It was what she lived for, it was what she was born to do and as long as she had her applause, she cared about little else.

When they announced her name for second place, Rachel was momentarily disappointed, but hearing the roaring thunder that came with the call set the smile back on her face. She hurried on stage to collect her prize and take another bow and searched for the glowing, proud faces of her daddies, but she could not find them amongst the sea of strangers. She liked the cup she got anyway. It was smaller than her usual prize, but it was silver and she thought it was pretty. It made a change from gold.

As soon as they were allowed to go, she ran outside to find her dads and spotted them quickly, standing alone at the far end of the large hall. She had bounded over, already chattering excitedly about the pretty new colour they had to add to the mantelpiece. Her dads had said nothing as she ran to them, instead they stared down at her as if it were not their daughter who had approached, but a stranger.

"Daddy?" Rachel had enquired, a frown appearing across her tiny features, but they hadn't spoken to her. They had not even looked at her, and her daddy had taken her wrist tightly in his hand and practically dragged her out of the hall. Rachel had quickly decided they must just be in a hurry to get home and had soon began to ramble again, chattering on and on about each step of the dance she had perfected.

"Shut up!" Her dad had snarled as soon as they were out of sight of the other mommies and daddies. "I don't know what you think you have to be proud of." He sneered down at the award in her hand as if it were made out of shit. Her other dad snatched it out of her hand and Rachel's eyes had followed it, wide and tear filled as it was flung from his arm and into the gutter below.

"There's no room for second place Rachel," he had snapped. "Not now, not ever. Age is no excuse." His fingers burrowed deeply into her arm, bruises already blooming underneath them. "You'll be the best from now on." It had not been a suggestion.

Rachel had spent the next twelve years devoting every second of her spare time to winning. To being the best. She was careful to never get one step wrong, never lose a note or hit it too high. She went obediently along with every class she was enrolled in, and within the month she had better be the top of it. Glee Club had been no different . Every solo was expected to go to her if she wanted to be good enough to be their daughter.

The last time she had failed, they had taken down every picture of her, every trophy and pushed them all in the cupboard under the stairs. Then they had given her five minutes to pack one rucksack and told her not to come home until she could be a winner. They did not allow losers to live in their house. Three days later, she had landed the lead for the assembly performance and had been allowed back home.

On the day of the assembly, she'd been sick. Days living under the oak tree at the park had taken its toll on her and she had been running a fever that was through the roof. But she'd had to go into school. If she didn't perform, she would be a failure. So she had gone, she had struggled through the performance even when she was sure she would pass out and when she had spent the celebratory 'party' at having not been booed off stage in the bathroom throwing up, she'd told herself it was worth it. She'd been perfect.

…

The gate clattered loudly as he clambered over it, toppling over the other side onto the soft grass below. Unfortunately, the splintering wood was not so soft and when Kurt picked himself up from the floor, he saw the blood smeared across his wrist from the gash engraved on the back of his wrist. He wiped it on his shirt, past caring about the designer label and ran towards the open window. Climbing through it was another job, his shoes had next to no grip and they would not hold onto the wall, but adrenaline coursed through his veins at the thought of Rachel, passed out from poison pills of bleeding from slashes on her wrists, staining her perfect white carpet crimson.

Another bang sounded through the house as Kurt fell through the window and as absurd and inappropriate as it was, he found himself thinking that he should not ever become a robber. "Rachel!" He called again, but the house remained silent. He ran through to the lounge, half expecting to find her engrossed in Funny Girl, too much so to have heard him. Or perhaps asleep in front of Beauty and the Beast, but the room was empty and the television screen black.

The stairs were his next destination, he flew up them several at a time and barged into the first room he came across. It was not her room, but her fathers' and it looked like it had not been slept in for a while. The bed sheets were arranged perfectly, not so much as a crease in the pillow case and the rest of the room was much the same. It would be Miss Pillsbury's heaven on earth. Kurt shook his head and backed out of the room. What was it with him and stupid, pointless thoughts when there was something so very wrong?

He barrelled into the bathroom next, but that too was empty. That one relieved Kurt. He had been dreading finding Rachel floating in scarlet water. It didn't come as a surprise that she was not in the airing cupboard and he hesitated at the last room, although if she was in the house at all, there as nowhere else left she could be. It both repelled and drew him towards it.

Kurt closed his eyes and pushed on the door handle. He felt the door swing underneath his hand and he whispered her name, begging her to answer him. When he heard her reply with his name, his legs began to shake and if he had not still been holding onto the door, he would have collapsed with relief. He opened his eyes, a wide grin spreading across his face. He would shout at her and demand explanations later, but right then he wanted nothing more than to hold her so tightly she would not breathe.

The grin faded as she came into focus. She was lying on her bed, curled on her side and watching him, curiously, but something was wrong. Her eyes were glazed and barely seeing, her skin a little too pale. Her arm was flung out to one side, hanging limply from the bed. She looked sick, or...

"Rachel," Kurt gasped, flinging himself several feet across the room to land on his knees at her bedside. "Sweetie, what have you taken?"

…

Rachel

Rachel had always dreamed of her mother. She longed for someone to love her unconditionally, and from what she had heard, mothers did. She did not doubt that her dads loved her, so long as she was perfect. The Glee Club loved her voice, when they needed it. But they did not love her. The club were a family. They were close even when they fought, they were strong together and even when one of them left, the others were there for them. Moving out did not make you any less part a family.

Only she was the outcast. She was the one tolerated because of blood ties only. The blood ties that came in the form of her voice. In her sophmore year, when she had almost lost it, she had been terrified of losing everything she cared about. Performing, her dreams of Broadway and the closest thing to friends she had ever had. If she lost her talent, her dads' love would go with it. She'd been so scared in those weeks, everything she loved and lived for was on the line and no one understood.

When Finn had told her she had many other redeeming qualities that weren't her voice, Rachel had pounced on it. She hadn't been able to keep the eagerness out of her voice as she asked him what they were, never before had anyone told her she was good for anything else, but the silence that had followed had broken off another piece of her heart that would never be restored.

Somewhere to belong. Someone who would love her for something other than her talents was all she wanted, and her mother had seemed like the solution to that. So when Jesse had asked her what her dream was, what filled up the emptiness inside, the thing that she knew if she ever had, all the hurt would go away, Rachel had said her mother.

To Rachel, she had been the solution to everything.

…

Kurt grasped Rachel's hand with one of his own and used the other to press to her forehead, feeling for the signs of an overdose. She wriggled away from him and smiled shakily. "I'm okay Kurt," she said quietly. He smiled sadly and clasped her hand more tightly. It was obvious from the way the smile only lingered on her lips that she was lying. There was nothing about the situation that could possibly be 'okay'.

"I couldn't do it," she continued and he did not question how she knew what he was there for. "I tried..." her eyes travelled to her bedside table where sat an open bottle of pills and a partially empty bottle of gin. "I swallowed a few, but not enough. And then I lost it. I couldn't carry on." She didn't cry, her face remained passive as she spoke, as if she were talking about a bag of sweets rather than pills that intended to be deadly. She wasn't squeezing his hand back either, but neither was she pushing him away.

A closer examination of the pill bottle told him she was telling the truth. It looked almost full. Relief crashed through Kurt, so strong that his knees almost gave up on supporting him for the second time in five minutes. It was relief he had to force away, because she her life may not have been in immediate danger, but she had still wanted it to be. She'd left a subtle goodbye and actively chosen a bottle of poison and the alcohol to wash it down. The two paired together would have been lethal, and she had known that. Rachel Berry, his best friend Rachel, his Princess, actually wanted to die.

Despite the lack of pills she had consumed, he was still worried for her. As he had noticed as soon as he had seen her, she didn't look right, but at the very suggestion of the hospital, Rachel glared at him and whisked her hand away. She pushed herself into a sitting position, struggling more than she should have done and slid away from him, as if putting a few more inches of bed between them would protect her.

"Rachel..." he pleaded and climbed slowly to his feet. He perched on the edge of the bed as soon as he had done so, not wishing to intimidate her.

"Why?" The word came out as a whisper, like there was a sheet of delicate, thin glass between them that he was afraid of shattering with his voice. Rachel bowed her head and her hair fell in front of her face, making it impossible to read. Silently, her shoulders began to shake, but before Kurt could reach out and put his arm around her, she spoke and he retracted it like her voice and his touch could not meet.

"They don't want me," she gasped, her words broken by sobs. "NYADA, they rejected me." Kurt stared. He kept staring. All the time he stared at her, she would not look at him. She wouldn't lift her face and make eye contact. And for good reason.

"NYADA," Kurt repeated, as if it were the most offensive word she could utter. He felt his rage building inside him, his body shook with the effort of holding it in. "That's what this," he glared at the almost full bottle of pills and not quite so full gin. "Is all about? Because NYADA rejected you? Well guess what Rachel, you can't always get what you want! There are going to be setbacks in life, disappointments, rejections, it comes with the life path you've chosen to follow! You can't pull stunts like this every time something doesn't go your way you selfish, stuck up, spoiled princess!"

It was not at all with the same tone that he usually called her Princess. That time, he spat it at her with cold fury in a way he had never spoken to her before, not even before they were friends. Rachel's head stayed down and her shoulders shook harder. She registered vaguely, somewhere deep inside, that his words hurt, but she could not find the mental energy to hurt. She did not even feel the tears that ran down her cheeks. Her body was reacting to the pain, but her mind was numb.

Rachel leapt from the bed suddenly, launching herself past Kurt, who had jumped up in his anger. He hadn't stormed out like he had wanted to, something was rooting him to the spot where his eyes followed Rachel, still narrowed and glaring. Guilt, perhaps. He could never remember feeling so angry with her, but the person inside him who was her friend still wanted to comfort her. She searched under her bed for several seconds before pulling out a large box. It was square and made of solid cardboard. Black, decorated with her signature gold stars.

Without a word, Rachel thrust the box at him and curled back up on the bed, facing towards the empty space on her opposite side. Kurt frowned down at the case in his hands, but didn't ask questions as he sat carefully back down on the edge of her bed and lifted the lid. Books. The box was packed full of books. Notebooks, to be precise and Kurt's immediate thoughts were that they must be her diaries. Years of them, all stacked together in this one space. On a closer look, he saw each one had a number. The top one being twelve, and sure enough underneath that was eleven and so on, right down to number one.

Curiously, Kurt reached to the bottom of the box and pulled out number one. Surely Rachel did not expect him to read them all? He stole a glance at her, but she was still staring at the far end of her room, perfectly still. He could not see her face. With a light scowl, Kurt opened the first page of number one and skimmed his eyes over the first entry. It was nothing special. Just the innocent ramblings of five year old Rachel and he sighed irritably, wondering what on earth he was supposed to be looking for.

With a flick across a few pages, he found the answer.

Something weird happened today. I had a dancing comption and I danced all my steps like I was supposed to dance them and then they gave me the silver award. My name was called second instead of first but I didn't mind because the cup was silver and it was pretty. I've never had that color before but then daddy said it was wrong. He said I was wrong and he took it. I saw him throw it in the gutter and he said it wasn't good enough and I had to be perfect. He hurt my arm when he dragged me away.

Kurt's eyes quickly skimmed over the next entry, growing wider with each word.

Daddy wouldn't talk to me today. I tried to climb on his lap and he pushed me off and said he didn't want a loser. I wanted to cry, but I know he doesn't like it when I cry and he's already mad.

The diary went on, many of the entries as normal as he would expect from a five year old rising star, but there were far too many of the same horrifying content. Ones that described Rachel's dads freezing her out for missing a step in dance, or hitting the wrong note as she sang. Many contained the same stories of them throwing out or destroying her awards right in front of her eyes because they were not first place.

As Kurt worked his way through the diaries, he felt more and more sick. Especially when he reached number ten and they began to talk about him and the rest of the Glee Club. She had joined for somewhere to belong. She'd hoped they'd love her like her dads couldn't. The thoughts she'd written down told him how excited she was to be accepted into the club, even though she'd stumbled over a note. She thought it meant they didn't care that she wasn't perfect and her dads were so proud of her success.

The excitement of the entries soon vanished as she realised they were just the same. They wanted her only when she was perfect, when she was singing obediently and not shouting or storming out. They wanted her only for her talent, just the same as her fathers. Who expected her to get every solo. Each time she didn't, the punishments got worse. She was old enough, they said, to know better. So instead of simply ignoring her, destroying what she had won, they began to lock her away.

Out of sight, out of mind. They didn't want to see the failure. They didn't want a loser living with them. So they pushed her into the cupboard without enough room to so much as crouch and left her there, standing on her feet for an entire night. They they would let her out on no sleep and tell her without question that she was to go to school and make up for her failure. Exhausted, Rachel would stumble into school and struggle thought each note in class, each lyric in glee. She'd force her way through the day, not once faltering, not once failing. She'd be perfect. For every single second.

Eventually those punishments had evolved too until she was no longer welcome in her own home. A rucksack of the barest necessities was trust into her chest and she was thrown roughly onto the streets with instructions to come back only when she was good enough to call herself their daughter.

Then she met Jesse, and for the first time, she heard someone utter the words 'I love you'. She'd been almost bursting when she wrote that entry, Kurt could tell by the slight wobble of the letters that told him her hand had been shaking with happiness. The entries after that were filled with her gushing and had they not been so sad, they would have been embarrassing. Because he knew how the story ended.

Shelby's entries came next. She was what Rachel had dreamed of. Her mother, someone to love her unconditionally at the same time as she finally had a boyfriend, someone who loved her for something other than her talent. She was happy, she wrote. Finally, she was happy.

And then she fell apart. Jesse took her heart with him as he swaggered off their stage, he shattered it with the egg he crushed on her head. Then Shelby too, had taken the broken pieces. The page was crinkled, as though it had once been very wet. Perhaps with her own tears. The writing was messy and jumbled. She wrote of how her mother had told her Rachel wasn't what she expected. She had a family who loved destroyed her and a life in which she was happy breaking and Shelby could not be who she wanted her to be. Rachel just wasn't good enough.

Underneath it all, separated from the rest of the words, Rachel had written:

I don't want any of that.

And the line that shattered the last pieces of Kurt's heart:

I just want her to love me.

She didn't believe Finn when he told her he loved her. Who could? The only thing good about her was her voice, her performance. So she was going to be the best. She was going to put everything she had into being the best. She had to be. Perfection was the only way to earn cold appreciation- the closest thing to love she deserved.

Kurt blinked as he turned the page to find it blank. It had not taken him up to the present day. For some reason, Rachel had just stopped writing. Her last entry had been nothing extraordinary. Just her own ramblings and ideas of a set list for Regionals and quiet pain at the continued taunts of her 'friends'. Kurt finally dragged his attention away from the phantom Rachel in the diary to the real, flesh girl who suddenly looked like the five year old she had been in the beginning of her story.

Tremors over powered his hand as he reached helplessly towards her, letting it fall onto her still shoulder. She did not respond, she didn't even flinch, neither did she turn when Kurt called her name. Somewhere between the ages of five and seventeen, she had fallen asleep.

As silently as possible, Kurt replaced the lid of the box and slid it back under her bed before laying down beside her. He draped an arm around Rachel's waist and spooned himself around her, burrowing his head amongst her soft dark hair. She smelt of cranberries and princesses' castles. He whispered to her, his words tickling her ear and disturbing the weak ties of her sleep.

"I love you."

The quote at the top is from the one and only Marilyn Monroe.

Written in a combination of English lessons when I should have been taking notes, drama rehearsals when I should have been rehearsing and the small hours, in which I should have been sleeping, but I was convinced The Woman in Black was going to get me.