This is actually the first Glee fic I've written. It ended in a completely different way than it started. It's a Quick, but only sort of. Ah just read, your smart people, you'll get it. As usual I apologize for my atrocious grammar and spelling. I try to be good, but things slip through the cracks, ya know? Title is taken from a song of the same name by Within Temptation. Thank you rainedrop56 for not offing yourself trying to beta my fanfic, I know it's hard. Just for you, "I iz never proofreadin' ur stoopid dokumentz agen!" (Yes I went back 12 pages in you tumblr to find that.) But enough shenanigans! Glee!
It was her last night in the Puckerman house. Quinn couldn't sleep. She swung her legs out of bed and pulled herself over the edge. She made her way to the door and opened it a crack. There was light from the TV flooding the living room. 'Good' she thought to herself. He was still up. She slipped through the door and closed it with a small click behind her. She tried to get down the hall and the stairs without making any noise. She didn't want to wake his mother or sister. She paused when she got the bottom of the stairs. She wasn't 100% sure what it was the she was doing, 'Well, I'm already down here' she thought. She peeked around the corner into the living room. He could have just fallen asleep with the TV on.
"You suck at sneaking up on people." He said, clearly from his place on the couch. Quinn rolled her eyes and walked fully into the room. He was spread out on the loveseat, his feet resting on the arm chair. Some old black and white movie was playing on the screen. Quinn, not sure what she was doing down here in the first place, had no idea what her next move was going to be. He moved his feet and nodded at the chair. She smiled quietly and walked purposefully across the room to the chair. She sank into it, curling her legs up underneath herself. She sat there in silence with her hands absent mindedly stroking her stomach. She watched the scenes of the movie flick past. After a couple minutes Quinn tried to move her foot into her lap. Her baby bump was clearly having none of it, so to ease her swollen feet she settled for pressing it into the corner of the coffee table. Content with this she leaned back in the chair and closed her eyes. Suddenly he foot was no longer on the table and someone was rubbing it. She opened her eyes and Puck was rubbing her foot, eyes still focused on the movie. They sat like that for half an hour, until he switched seamlessly to the other foot.
"I'm sorry." Quinn said. Her voice came out weaker than she had intended. His eyes flicked from the TV to hers, then down to her foot.
"For what?" he said, still not meeting her eyes.
"For what I said when you told me you wanted to name her Jack Daniels." Quinn said now dropping her eyes.
"You were right. It was a stupid name for a baby girl." He said continuing to work at her foot.
"No. Not that part. Though..." Quinn left off. She didn't want to talk about the name of the baby. At least not right now. "I meant when I said I was giving her up so I didn't have to do this to with you." She said. The sentence had started out strong but as Quinn remembered how the sentence ended she lost the vigor in her voice. She shouldn't have said that.
"Well you made it clear that you wanted to do this alone. I should have just stay out of it." Puck said. His eyes were still on the TV. Quinn wanted his full attention on her. She pulled herself out of the chair and sat on the coffee table directly in his line of sight. His gaze jerked from the TV as soon as her foot left his hands and focused again on her face. It was the first time he had noticed what she was wearing; it was one of his favorite outfits. Whenever she went out in public she always wore long dresses or sweaters, like she was trying to hid the baby. But at night she wore sweatpants and one of his old t-shirts that would have normally been big on her, but was always stretched taut over the baby bump. He liked it when she wore this, because he actually got to see his daughter, sort of. She wasn't lost under tons of fabric.
"I did want to do this alone, but I'm not. She is your daughter to, and I didn't mean it when I said that was why I was giving her up. I'm giving her up because it's what's best for her. We are sixteen. I'm homeless and your mom had enough problems before I moved in, let alone adding a baby. I know that at school you say you clean pools to meet sex crazed moms, but I know that you do it to help your mom. We might love her, but we wouldn't be good parents if we kept her." Quinn said looking at him.
"I could get another job. I could make more money so that we could support her." Puck pleaded. She could see the hope in his eyes, and she hated to be the one that took that away.
"When would you have time for another job? You are already at Sheets-N-Things all the time to pay for Vocal Adrenalin's tires. You're not going to keep any of that money anyway. Terri might fire you as soon as you get enough to pay back Ms. Corcoran. The only reason you got the job in the first place was so she would look good for Mr. Schue." She explained. She saw some of the light leave his eyes. Then it snapped back again.
"I'll get another job, something else that will support her." He said look her straight in the eye. She had worked extremely hard to convince herself that this was the right thing for their baby. He was started to break her resolve. But it was due solely to the fact that she didn't want to see the heart broken look on his face anymore.
"You remember how hard it was for Finn to get a job at Olive Garden before he was fired. No one is hiring, not for the amount of time or money we would need for the baby." Quinn continued, he tried to interrupt but she continued on. "And even if you do get multiple jobs to support her, what are we going to do with her during school, carry her with us to Spanish? We would have to get her into a daycare, which they do not give spots in daycares to teenage pregnancy babies." The glimmer of hope was almost snuffed, she saw it go dimmer.
"Noah." She said grabbing his hands. Unexpectedly he gripped her hands tightly. She smiled a sad sort of smile. "We are sixteen, even if everything worked out, and the next two years went perfectly, what about after graduation? I know that you get decent grades despite your best efforts. So do I. What would we do about college? What if we go to different ones? What about after college? We tried being together as a couple, it doesn't work. We would have separate lives and she would have to live between them. It is better for her if she could grow up with a stable family, not the dysfunctional circus that we would be." She said. There is was, the radiance of hope blinked out of existence. Now she recognized what she saw in him, the cloudy color of pain and sadness. It was cliché, but it's what she recognized, it was why she avoided looking in the mirror.
"I get it." He said after a couple minutes. Their hands were still linked; she squeezed them a little in support. "Deep down, I always knew why you picked Finn over me. I'm not a good guy. The last thing I said to you that night was 'Trust Me'. You did and it blew up in your face. I was angry that you chose him, but I always knew why. I don't want to be like my dad, but I already am. You said you want to do this alone, and I just let you. I got out of your way. Maybe if I had fought for her earlier we wouldn't have to give her away. Maybe I would have gotten to at least have this time with her." Puck said. She could hear the emotion in his voice, but she knew he wasn't crying. He would never let himself, not in front of her or anybody.
"I'm sorry. I treated myself like the victim, because of everything I lost. I isolated myself to protect me. It wasn't right that I blamed you for everything. It's not fair, she is yours too. I'm not the only one that is going to lose her. You care enough about her to come up with names." She told him.
"Yeah." Was all Puck managed out.
"I think I figured out her full name."Quinn said quietly. "What if we name her Bethany Jacqueline?" She said looking up at him.
"Hmmm, no Daniels, that's ok. I like it. I'm still calling her Beth." Puck said resolutely. Quinn nodded.
"Finn is probably still going to call her Drizzle regardless of what her name is." Quinn said. Puck hung his head a little. She was pretty sure he was remembering the time lost, when Beth belonged to Finn. Quinn was suddenly struck with an idea.
"Scoot back" she said dropping his hands. She sat on the couch and reclined against the armrest. She put her feet up on the couch and positioned him so his head was resting on the top of her belly. She took his hand and put it on the far side of her stomach. The look on his face was priceless. He looked so very confused and awkward. He wasn't sure what she was doing, so he just looked up at her with a slightly terrified look on his face. Then she felt the baby kick. She planted one right on his cheek bone. His head sprang up and for a slit second he looked pissed. Then as the gears clicked away, he realizes what had just happened. She didn't think she would ever see a smile that wasn't a smirk on Noah Puckerman's face, but there is was.
"She just kicked me in the face!" He yelled in a whisper. Quinn laughed.
"Try having dribble on your bladder like it's a soccer ball. That's lots of fun." She said back quietly. Puck put his ear to her stomach and started listening. She kicked and punched him a couple more times, on his face and hands.
"Your getting beat up by an unborn baby." Quinn told him as the baby connected with him chin.
"That's ok, she training to be a bad ass." He said putting his face down again. Quinn shook her head and leaned her head back. Within seconds she was asleep. The next morning she woke up to the fingers on one handed threaded in Puck's Mohawk, his head using the side of stomach as a pillow and her other hand holding his resting on the other side of her stomach.
The next day she moved in with Mercedes. She had her own room with double doors that lead to the back patio. Mercedes dad was a very successful dentist in Lima. Puck came over almost every day. They had fostered a relationship. It wasn't romantic, but it was a bond over the life they had created. It was one she thought they would probably have forever.
The fell into a pattern. Quinn and Puck would sit and talk about anything and everything. They no longer held back talking about Beth. It gave them strength for what was going to come. They also sang to her and Puck played the guitar. Mercedes parents would always kick him out around ten, so the girls could get homework done and sleep. Every night, after his mom went to sleep, Puck would come back, park his truck around the corner, jump the fence, walk through the open door that Quinn left open, shut it behind him and lay down next to her on the bed in the same position he had that first night. Only once had the baby had given him a black eye, by hitting the exact right spot. Quinn had nearly got them caught, because she was laughing so hard. Puck had been a little upset with their daughter that night and refused to put his head back on her stomach, until her gave her a stern speech about giving him visible injuries.
Three weeks after she moved to Mercedes', was Regional's. Quinn's due date was a week away. Quinn had had cramps all morning long, but she didn't tell anyone. Puck suspected, but didn't confront her. She kept it together during their performance, her face slipping into the mask of happiness that she perfected as Head Cheerio. As soon as she walked off stage she doubled over. She felt someone pick her up and could feel rather than hear Pucks voice resonating through his chest. She was engulfed in pain. She could feel them moving through the halls and then out of the darkness into sunlight. She was being placed in the back of a car she didn't recognize, but Puck was still beside her, holding her hand. Ms. Pillsbury got into the driver's seat and began to calmly drive to the hospital.
"How are you doing Quinn?" She asked her voice calm and stable.
"I'm fine." She lied through her clenched teeth. She was not fine. She was in serious pain. This was ridiculous. Nothing should hurt this bad. She found herself recalling Sunday school stories and cursing Eve for eating that stupid apple. Why couldn't she just leave well enough alone? Why did she have to pay for the stupid woman eating some fruit?
When they got to the hospital, she was put in a wheelchair and taken to a room. She changed into a light scratchy gown and was hooked up to monitors and an IV. The doctor came in to examine her. All he said was that she was two centimeters and that she was doing fine, but it would be a while. Her water hadn't even broken yet. Puck had been with her until the doctor had come in to examine her and now she was alone. She didn't like being alone. When Puck was here she was distracted. They hadn't found any suitable parents to adopt Beth. The social worker told them that she would be fostered out until someone adopted her. Quinn didn't like this idea at all. All she could think about was the show Life Unexpected. She didn't want to find her beautiful daughter years later, only to learn she had never been adopted and was instead bounced from foster home to foster home. Thinking about this caused her to start crying. Hard.
"Hey what's wrong? What did he say?" Puck asked alarmed. He nearly dropped the cup of ice chips he went to get her.
"I don't want our baby to be a foster child! I want someone to love her!" Quinn sobbed. Puck was thrown but he wrapped his arms around her anyway and rubbed her back.
"There is nothing wrong with being a foster child, I don't think…" Puck said. He really had no idea. Everything he had ever seen on TV suggested otherwise, but he wasn't about to voice that opinion.
"What if no one adopts her and she doesn't have a stable family like we want and she thinks nobody loves her!" She continued wailing.
"Hey, she will be adopted. And she will now that we always love her."He said wiping tears from under her eyes.
"How? I don't want to hope that she gets adopted!" Quinn began to sob again, leaning on the bed.
"So don't…" Quinn and Puck turned toward the door. Quinn nearly fainted. Judy Fabray stood at the door to the hospital room, not in all her glory, but the most humble way Quinn had ever seen her mother. "You could come home… with me." She said not daring to come into the room. Puck moved so that he was slightly in front of Quinn.
"Why? What has changed?" Quinn said. She desperately wanted to say yes and fall into her mother's arms and cry some more, but the woman had stood there and said nothing as her father had thrown her unceremoniously from their house. She had been hurt to many times to not be cautious.
"Me." Spoke a voice behind her mother. The door opened and Quinn saw her older sister standing in all the glory of the entire Fabray family. "What's up sis?" She said a smile beaming on her face. Quinn couldn't remember the last time she had seen her sister, the last time they had talked was almost six months ago when Quinn was still pretending her pregnancy wasn't happening. Her sister had left to go to study in England. Her sister walked boldly into the room and stopped in front of her sister and her sister's shield. "What no hug?" she said holding out her arms. Quinn gently pushed Puck aside and went into her sisters arms.
"I'm sorry I didn't come back sooner, no one told me, and they kept making excuses for why you couldn't talk. I should have noticed something was wrong. Why didn't you tell me?" Her sister whispered into her ear. Quinn had missed this; her sister was always there for her.
"Rosalie. I'm sorry; I was scared, I thought you would react like them. I didn't want you to be disappointed in me. I'm sorry." Quinn started sobbing again. Rosalie held her tight, rocked her back and forth, while she stroked her hair. It was moments like these that both Quinn and Puck realized how young they were. Quinn was going to give birth sometime in the next day (they both hoped) and all she still really wanted was for someone in her family to hold her and tell her everything would be ok, because she was terrified.
"Quinn Elizabeth Fabray, you are a very stupid girl. You are my little sister for better or worse. Two Musketeers remember, all for one and one for all. The roles haven't changed since we were young kiddo." The older girl said wiping the tears from her sister's cheek. They had missed each other so much. "Now." She said stepping back and rubbing her sister's arms, "Let's have a baby! Hi, you must be the sperm?" Rosalie said turning to Puck, as he awkwardly shook his hand. Quinn heard her mother gasp and giggled to herself. Her sister had always been the wild child, always pushing the envelope, but never too far. Now they talked for hours taking breaks for Quinn's contractions, with either Puck or Rosalie holding her hands. Her mother had felt only comfortable enough to come into the room and sit in a chair. After hours of talking and weighing the options they reached a decision. They were going to keep the baby. They would take it one step at a time, but now Quinn realized it wasn't just them and Beth. They had a support system (some parts more supportive then others). Quinn's father was still not happy, but Rosalie had shouted at him for the past two days (nearly getting disowned in the process). In the end he received an ultimatum from his wife, had conceded.
A couple hours later the Glee Club came by, hoisting the second place trophy about their heads. They were thrilled, they had beaten Vocal Adrenaline, but Oral Intensity had come out of nowhere and beat them. Still they had done their best. It was at this time, when Rachel hugged her and told her she was going to be a great mother (using many more words than that) Quinn's water had broken, all over Rachel's feet. She could see Puck's look of delight (both at her water breaking and the fact that it was all over Rachel's shoes), Rachel's look of horror that was quickly masked by compassion and understanding. Things moved quickly after that, the glee club was shuffled out and with Rosalie's shout of "Let there be a third Musketeer!" Quinn began the long intensely painful process of the last stages of labor.
At 11:13 P.M on June 13, 2010, Bethany Jacqueline Fabray-Puckerman came screaming into the world. Quinn was exhausted. All she really remembered was Puck shouting that she had ten kickass fingers and toes and what looked like the beginnings of a Mohawk. She also remembered he was crying. The next thing she knew her daughter was placed on her chest in a pink fuzzy blanket. She was beautiful. She yawned and blinked at her mother.
"Big day for you too huh?" She whispered to her daughter.
They went home two days later. Everyone had come to the hospital to visit, saying how beautiful and precious she looked. Brittany had remarked that she looked like a pale kidney bean. 'What? I like kidney beans.' She defended, mostly to Santana, who just held her hand and kissed her on the cheek. The glee club also said they had a surprise for her when she got home. When Quinn walked into her room, she nearly dropped all the flowers and things she was carrying (she knew there was a reason Puck had insisted on carrying Beth). She had always had a big room, but this was intense. Her mother said the Mercedes and Kurt had rearranged her room to make it more 'baby friendly' and that the glee club had helped with everything else. The room was done in medium purple and light yellow, and came equipped with a crib, changing table and rocking chair. She still had most of her old furniture it had just been rearranged. It looked perfect.
That night Quinn and Puck lay on her bed with Beth in between them fast asleep. Her mother or father insisted that her bed room door remain wide open at all times when he was there, and they would pass by every ten minutes just to make sure they were not make more grandchildren. But Quinn and Puck were content to just stare at their daughter.
"Umm…" Pucks voice broke through the silence. "Do you remember at the hospital when I said that I would make sure she knew that we loved her?" Puck said quietly rubbing Beth's belly. Quinn nodded silently. "Well I got her this, before we decided that we were going to keep her around." He gave Quinn a small black velvet box. "I had some money left over from my paycheck at Sheets-N-Things, so I got her that." He said looking down.
Quinn opened the box. Inside was a silver locket shaped like a guitar pick and on the front one of his had been set into the metal. She turned it over and on the back was inscribed 'Bethany Jacqueline'. She popped it open and inside was a picture of herself on one side and Puck on the other.
"So she would know what we look like." He said, acting as though it came out lamer than he had intended.
"It's gorgeous, there is no reason she can't still wear it. When she's older and won't choke on it." Quinn said smiling and putting it into the top of the dresser.
"Good, I got you something too." He said pulling out another box. She opened it and inside was a locket identical to her daughters, except the inscription on the back was Beth's birthday and inside was two pictures of her daughter, one from a sonogram (which looked like static it so small, but the thought was nice) and the other was one of her minutes after she was born. "I figured you would want something else to remember her by." Puck said.
"Thank you Noah." Quinn said. She walked over to him and kissed him on the cheek and pulled him into a hug. She knew that this whole situation wasn't supposed to happen and that it was going to be difficult at times, but right now she was ok with her life. She wasn't alone; her baby had her mother and her father, two biological aunts, two grandmothers, a grandfather, and several unrelated aunts and uncle to dote on her. Right now, sitting in her room/nursery with her Puck, life didn't seem so bad. They would be parents, together, and get through it. This was all she needed.
And that's all she wrote. I wanted a story where Puck and Quinn weren't together, but didn't hate each other. Also I am tired of Quinn's 'I'm alone' attitude on the show, and I really wanted to meet her sister. So I made her up. I'm not saying I need applause to live like Tinkerbell or Rachel Berry, but if you feel so inclined, click the lovely purpley/blue/gray button and tell me your thoughts. Or flame it, all criticism is constructive and flames amuse me.