Prologue: starts partway into Episode 1.13...

Having planned out every nuance of what she was about to say and do, Rachel Berry headed confidently in Quinn's direction. Thanks for the acting lessons, Dads! she thought. Jewish baby tests, of course! Why hadn't she come up with this before? Quinn was sure to be dumb enough to fall for it. If Finn really was the father of her child, no harm, no foul. But if he wasn't…once he found out the truth, Finn would be so grateful to Rachel that he might just finally realize that she was the one for him and they would walk around school holding hands together for the entire rest of high school, opening every Glee club performance with a romantic duet together-she had her eye on Faithfully by Journey, because that's exactly what they would be forever-and then they would go off to college together, then become huge stars so that he could propose to her on a stage in front of millions of people and she could finally have a million dollar wedding and become Mrs. Rachel Berry Hudson and give birth to twins named Ayden David and Aria Destiny that would grow up to be superstars just like their parents.

And all she had to do was find a way to prove that this baby that Quinn was about to have wasn't actually his.

"Hey, Rachel, you got a moment?"

"I really don't, Kurt, later," said Rachel briskly as she walked by his locker.

Kurt closed his locker and started after her. "It's kind of important, actually," he said.

"Nice try, I won the diva-off, solo for sectionals is mine," said Rachel. She wasn't quite sure why she had won that, actually. She was pretty sure that he could've hit that note if he wanted to badly enough. Not that she was dumb enough to say that to her only real competition.

"This is about Quinn's baby," said Kurt.

That made Rachel stop in her tracks and turned around. "Yeah?" she said eagerly. Did he have the same suspicions as her? If he did, maybe she could get him in on her plan and they could share the blame. That would take away from some of the hurt her otherwise flawless reputation would undoubtedly suffer when she exposed Quinn.

"It's a big secret," said Kurt. He smiled and leaned in and whispered. "Puck is the father of Quinn's child."

Rachel froze. The blood drained from her face. "Really? You know this…for sure?"

Kurt nodded. "Artie told me about it this morning."

"Artie?" said Rachel. What did he have to do with anything?

"Tina overheard Santana and Brittney gossiping about it in the girls' bathroom and told him," said Kurt. "Of course you'd think that Mercedes would've told me herself-she's the one who heard from Puck in the first place-but she was afraid to tell me about it because, well, of the same reason every single one of us was afraid to tell you."

It took Rachel about three seconds to figure out what that was. "Everyone's trying to keep it from Finn?" Rachel shook her head and grabbed Kurt's hand. "No way, you and I have to go tell him-now! Together!"

"At first when I found out I was tempted to tell him myself," Kurt admitted. "You know, so that he would be so grateful that it might just make him realize that I'm the one he's been in love with all along and we would walk about holding hands for the rest of high school, open every Glee club performance with some romantic duet or another, and then go off to college together before becoming huge stars so that he could propose to me on a stage in front of millions of people and we could fly up to Canada for a million dollar wedding and adopt triplets named Barbara, Judy, and Liza that would grow up to be superstars just like us."

Rachel blinked at the disturbing similarities of her and Kurt's visions for the future. She was almost about to blurt out that they were more alike than she'd thought when he continued.

"Then I realized that that's never going to happen."

"Right," said Rachel. "Because Finn's not gay. Let's go tell him anyway!"

"No," said Kurt. "Because I realized that the way to gain happiness is never by destroying someone else's."

Rachel waited for a moment. "That's very…big of you. But don't you think that letting Finn know the truth is the right thing to do?" Kurt didn't react. "Come on, Kurt!" said Rachel hopefully. "What's more important than the truth?"

"Finn will find out the truth," said Kurt. "Eventually. Maybe one of the club members will even be the one to tell him. But it can't be one of us." Before Rachel could even ask why not, Kurt said, "Let's face it: if either of us tells him the truth right now, we wouldn't be doing it for him, and he'd know it. That would only make it hurt even more. And come to think of it, he'd probably just resent us for a while. Not to mention that we'd have to face the wrath of Quinn Fabray."

Rachel blinked back the tears in her eyes. "Oh my god," she said. "I never thought I'd be saying this but…I actually agree with you."

"Good, I'm glad," said Kurt. "So we're agreed not to say one word about this until and unless Finn finds out some other way?"

Rachel sighed, nodded, and held out her hand for him to shake. He smiled a little as he did so. "This sucks for me as much as it does for you, believe me."

Suddenly Rachel felt compelled to tell him something. "You know, I think you actually could've done just as well as me in the duet competition if you'd tried hard enough."

"I could've hit that note," said Kurt. "I just…I don't know."

Rachel just smiled and decided not to ask him to explain. "Why don't we go ask Ms. Pillsbury if we can sing Defying Gravity at sectionals-as a duet?"

"Sounds perfect!" said Kurt. "What else do you think we should do?"

"I don't know," said Rachel. "Maybe some journey songs?"

"No romantic duets with Finn," said Kurt. "For either of us."

Rachel sighed. "Right." Then she took Kurt's arm and they walked down the hall to the choir room together.

Meanwhile, Quinn stepped into Will's empty classroom. "Did I do something wrong?" she asked him.

He closed the door and turned around. "Want to explain to me how you decided it would be okay to help Terri trick me into thinking that your baby was our baby?"

Quinn's face turned pale instantly. "Oh, shit. She promised me that you wouldn't find out."

"Well, I did," said Will.

Quinn looked up into his hurt eyes and started crying. "Mr. Shu, I…I just wanted my baby to have a good family, that's all! I wasn't doing it to deceive you!"

"You wanted your baby to have a good family so you handed her off to Terri?" said Will.

Quinn shook her head tearfully. "To you."

Will sighed. "That's not the right way to get a good family for your baby, Quinn. I know Terri probably made it seem that way to you. She's manipulative like that. But there are plenty of families out there who would be willing to adopt your baby. And I think you could also make it work if you wanted to keep it yourself. There are plenty of services for teen moms. Just go ask Ms. Pillsbury, I'm sure she's got a pamphlet or two." Just then the phone in the classroom rang, and Will opened the door for Quinn to leave and wordlessly walked over to the desk to answer it.

Quinn turned around and began making her way down the hall. It felt weird to be heading to the choir room for Glee practice while Mr. Shu was grading papers. But she had something more important to think about. She was confident that she or any woman she might consider giving her baby to would be a good mother. Maternal instinct came naturally. But she was far more worried about her daughter having what she had never had: a good father. Quinn's father had come around when he'd felt like it and played with her and her sister, but for the most part had remained distant and relied on her mother to take care of them. The one time she'd tried talking to him about a problem, all he'd done was tell her to go talk to her mother. "She'll know what to do," he'd said. Quinn had been too young at the time to realize that the implication was that he didn't. And right now, all she wanted was to know that her little girl was going to have a father who would be just a much a part of her life as her mother would and who would be there for her when she needed him. And after the failed test drive she'd taken Puck on and the money he'd tried to steal from the wheelchair fund, Quinn knew that there was only one way to make that happen.

"That's a great idea for a duet, you guys," said Emma approvingly to Rachel and Kurt sitting together at the front of the room. "Are there any other ideas for sectionals?"

"Maybe we should wait for Finn and Quinn to get here before we decide," said Mercedes.

"Where are they?" asked Puck.

As if on cue, Finn and Quinn walked through the door right then. "Hey, Finn," said Tina. "You think we should do Proud Mary for sectionals or Keep Holding On?"

"Maybe both," said Finn. "But first we have an announcement to make."

"Oh?" said Emma.

Quinn smiled and took Finn's hand. "Finn and I are keeping our baby."

"Woohoo!" said Mercedes. She stood up and clapped, most of the other club members following suit. Rachel and Kurt stood up slowly and clapped politely rather than excitedly. Rachel visibly bit her lip and Kurt glanced at her as if to say, Not one word. Then they joined in when everyone went over to Finn and Quinn to hug them and congratulate them. There was only one person who remained seated.

"Puck?" said Emma gently. "Is something wrong?"

"No," snapped Puck. "Everything's fine." Only when everyone in the room glanced up at him did he walk over and grudgingly offer his own congratulations to Finn and Quinn on the fact that they were about to raise his child.