AN: This started as my way to reconcile the fact that Quinn and Puck haven't spoken all season. It's been driving me nuts that it appears everyone is choosing to act like they never had anything – a relationship or a baby. But, as I was reading up on them on their Wiki pages (which also claim, ridiculously, that Puck didn't use protection because he wanted to have a baby with his best friend's girlfriend at seventeen,) I discovered that there had been looks and things I'd missed, but still, no conversations, so, I wrote a conversation to explain that.
She found it strange that they hadn't spoken in nearly two months. But then, she remembered she'd asked him to leave, she'd asked him not to call, or come over, not even to think of her if he could.
He'd had some trouble with it at first, she knew – the phone would ring and her mom would answer, then hiss something to the person on the other end before hanging up. But he respected her wishes for the most part, until now.
Taking a deep breathe when she spotted his mom's Volvo across the deserted lot, Quinn pulled over a few spaces away and stepped out, walking to him as he came to her.
"She's three months old," he finally said, the first words shared between them since he told her he loved her in an attempt to quiet her demands that he leave and not try to contact her.
He said it as if she didn't know, as if she hadn't considered just rolling over that morning and sleeping through the entire day, rather than getting up and pretending she was ok. As if she hadn't dreamt about the night she'd screamed at him that he sucked, before holding the baby who was, today, three months old, and living with Rachel Berry's mother.
"What am I doing here Puck?" she asked, refusing to look at him, instead focussing on an oil stain on the ground by his foot. His message had been vague, just a plea to come, that, for some reason she couldn't ignore.
"I though we should talk about what we're going to do."
"What we're going to do?"
"About school,"
"I'm just going to go, and get through it, same way I always have."
"Meaning what exactly? Cheerios? Campaigning for prom queen, being a bitch?"
"Yes, exactly. I'm going to be a bitch."
"Quinn, look, I thought maybe we could spend some time and talk..."
"What makes you think I want to do that?"
"Because in eight days we'll be back in the choir room, and I'm sure that some people will be interested in how we act around each other. And… honestly I just wanted to see you. I'm not doing too well,"
"That's not really my-"
"Yeah, it is, actually. Because I'm pretty much a mess right now and I only held her for a few minutes. You carried her for nine months so I thought that you might need…"
"What I need is for you to give me some space. I need freedom, and I need people to stop looking at me like I'm about to fall apart. I can't sit and talk to you while we wonder about whose nose she'll get, or whether or not she'll be good on her feet, what college she'll end up at or what her wedding day's going to look like. None of that has anything to do with us – not now. And frankly, I just–"
Quinn stopped when she noticed the strange look on Puck's face and reached up to push a piece of hair out of her face, brushing against her cheek on the way. Her fingers came away wet and she stared at them, amazed, letting out a pathetic laugh.
She hadn't even realised she was crying.
Puck took a step forward and placed a hand on Quinn's shoulder. She quickly pushed him away, but then he was reaching for her again, and she was wrapped up in his arms, one hand on her back, the other in her hair as she sobbed into his t-shirt.
"I thought about running," he finally said, once Quinn's shoulders had ceased shaking as much. "Pretty much from the minute your waters broke, until… probably a week after we left her. I thought I could just slip into the nursery, bundle her up and just run away with her." He spoke around a lump that had curiously formed in his throat. "And I thought that maybe if I could just get you to see what I saw in her, then you'd come too and we could be a family."
"If you had asked me just one more time…" Quinn stepped back, putting distance between them again as she turned her back on him and wiped away the mascara staining her face. "But we couldn't have made it, you knew that."
"Didn't make me want it any less. Doesn't,"
"I'm sorry. About this summer, I mean." Quinn told him, turning back around to face him. "I wanted to make it work, I really did, but it was just too hard, seeing you everyday, talking to you, it hurt, and I couldn't do it."
"You want me to quit glee club?"
"No. Of course not. But I just think, maybe for a while longer we should sort of keep our distance."
"Ok…"
"And maybe we could try and act normal."
"You mean, act like it never happened? We never happened? Beth-"
"Yes. We act like last year was just a regular year, no babies and no drunken hook-ups. If we show everyone that's how we want to play it then, they'll follow."
"That's really how you want to do it?" he asked incredulous.
"I think so, yes."
"I don't know if I can do that Quinn."
"You have to at least try." Her tone implied she wasn't merely asking, but almost begging. "It's the only way I can see myself getting through this next year. Please, Puck."
She could see him thinking about it for a moment; weighing up the options and then he nodded. "I'll give it a shot."
"Thank you,"
"What are the terms exactly? We just don't mention last year? Or, we pretend we know nothing about one another, haven't met before and never saw each other naked? Do you want me to quit glee?"
"Don't be ridiculous! I already told you not to do that. We should just not talk, I think. Not allow ourselves to get stuck alone together. Keep doing what we've been doing."
"So, basically, dodging Rachel and her attempts to unite the team? Sure. That'll work."
"I don't know why you're being this way."
"Because I don't understand you! You've had almost the whole summer shutting me out and ignoring my existence as well as our daughter's and I don't think its fair you get to keep doing it. And I just have to find a way to get through everything on my own, without you. Then when you find a new guy, I just have to deal with that too right?"
"I'm not going to find a new guy," Quinn protested. "I'm focussing on myself this year."
"Well, I don't know, you might change your mind. I mean, you've been making all the decisions since day one here – you picked Finn to be the baby's dad, you decided to give her away, and you're setting the rules on how we're going to be at school, so I just want to be prepared for when it happens."
"I'm going home."
"You can't keep doing that to me. We're not done here."
"Yes, we are. You wanted to know how we're going to handle things at school, I told you, so we are done. Now I'm tired so I'm going home. I'll see you at school."
Quinn turned and walked away, leaving Puck under a street light, and making it to her mom's car just as she felt a wet patch begin to form under her shirt.
As Mr. Schuester announced to the group that Puck was in juvie, Quinn felt horrible. She knew no one would say it, but she felt it was because of her – because of all the things she'd demanded of him for the last year, and especially the things she'd said the week before. She needed space, and he was trying to give that to her.
Of course only he would take it to this extreme.
Stealing an ATM, she shook her head. He couldn't just cut school or something? She wondered, realising that it probably wasn't all for her, maybe he needed this too.
In all the time she'd been avoiding him and failing at not thinking of him, she'd forgotten that while she was hurting, he was as well, but since that night she hadn't been able to stop thinking of what he'd said, 'I thought about running, I thought I could just bundle her up and just run away with her. And I thought that maybe if I could just get you to see what I saw in her, then you'd come too and we could be a family.'
She hadn't been fair on him, he was a mess too. As Mr. Schue was explaining that week's assignment, Quinn vowed to be kinder to Puck when he returned to school.