Vindicated, I am selfish, I am wrong
I am wrong, I swear I'm right
Swear I knew it all along
And I am flawed, but I am cleaning up so well
I am seeing in me now the things you swore you saw yourself
So clear…

- "Vindicated," by Dashboard Confessional

"What?"

For the first time in a very long time (right around the time Quinn showed up on his doorstep with a half-finished wine cooler in hand, dragging him down to give him a pretty convincing kiss, wine and all), Puck was actually stunned into silence. It was bad enough he was forced into throwing Finn Hudson, his best friend and the QB of the football team (coincidentally, also the lovingly boyfriend of one Quinn Fabray) this pathetic little 'bachelor' party. Forced because when their director of glee, Mr. Schue, found out the girls were throwing Quinn a baby shower, he not-so-subtly hinted that Puck should put together some kind of shindig to make the poor oaf feel better.

Pathetic because, despite assurances that Finn would only feel better otherwise, Schue put the kibosh on hiring strippers and getting beer. Which was a damned shame, because Puck was the man when it came to getting booze, and if this was going to be a bachelor party they should have a keg or at very least a couple six-packs.

So here they were, the men of glee, chilling in the music room with sodas and a discount white sheet cake (Puck got it half off when he winked at the semi-cute cake lady- oh, yeah, he's a stud), while he had no doubt Rachel was wining and dining Quinn and the other girls as she hosted the baby shower at her house. It almost made him wanna drop by. Even crazy Berry in full-on hostess mode had to be better than this downer of a sausage fest.

And yet he was still here, paralyzed into silence at his best friend's infallible stupidity. He never actually bothered to ask Quinn how she managed to convince Hudson that he was her baby-daddy- he knew she was a virgin when they had sex, but he figured there must've been some sort of close call between the two of them that could've convinced Finn. Quinn was no doubt about it smart- she managed to balance straight-As and a full Cheerios schedule, in addition to that retarded Celibacy Club that went out the window the second she got a little booze in her.

Still… a hot tub? She had like the fourth highest GPA in the class and that was seriously the best she could come up with at the time?

"Finn, you can't get a girl pregnant that way," Artie explained slowly, pity filling in his eyes behind his glasses. "You especially can't get a girl pregnant when your both still clothed."

Finn laughed, and then looked over at Matt and Mike, and then (ironically, of all the guys in the room) to Puck for backup. Because they've all had sex, and it's not like there were a lot of girls clamoring around to hop in Artie's wheelchair. Except for that Tina chick. Puck saw the looks she shot Artie when she thought everyone else wasn't looking. They mirrored the looks Rachel shot at Finn, and, if no one was around to hear him, the looks he admitted he would (occasionally) shoot Quinn.

But even when Finn glanced at them, he had to notice how none of them were smiling. Even Mike was aware that this was wrong, and Mike's brain had been a little screwy after he got that third concussion back in the beginning of freshman year during tryouts.

Finally, Mr. Schue broke the tense silence. "Are you sure there wasn't any, uh, sexual contact before or after this incident?" he asked, voice hesitant. Clearly, this so wasn't how the guy expected their innocent little bachelor party to go.

Mike snickered after the words "sexual contact" (there he is, the brainiac), but otherwise that was the only sound.

"No, we've never had sex sex before, and Quinn said the hot tub made my junk, y'know, swim faster," Finn explained patiently with that classic What's going on here? look on his face. "And we didn't do anything but kiss after that."

Okay, that was kind of hard to laugh at. Puck was a supporting best friend (well, when he wasn't trying to steal Quinn out from under Finn), but that was just fucking retarded. The hot tub made his junk swim faster? Did his mom inhale glue or something when she had him?

"Honey, did you sleep through Sex Ed?" Kurt asked pityingly. While Kurt objected to being forced to attend the bachelor party in favor of the baby shower, he ultimately caved when Mr. Schue glared at him and Finn stared with hurt eyes, which just further confirmed in Puck's mind that Kurt had a thing for Finn.

"Well… parts of it," Finn admitted, once again glancing at his football buddies for backup. Puck sort of wanted to help him, which he kinda did, if only to continue Quinn's baldfaced lie. He may have wanted to take care of his little girl, but he knew that lying would keep Quinn happy and he actually kinda enoyed keeping Quinn happy.

Even with his help, there was no way he could save Finn from this conversation. "Finn, were you and Quinn fully clothed in the hot tub?" Mr. Schue asked, setting down his can of Coke on the riser next to him.

Finn sat up straighter in his seat and chuckled to himself, "Well, we were in our bathing suits, Mr. Schue."

Puck had to resist the urge to groan. "Dude, you can't get her knocked up if she was still in her bikini and you were still in your trunks," he finally snapped, unable to take the tension anymore. He wanted to keep Quinn happy and all, but this was just friggin' dumb. It was more important to him that Finn grasped the concept of 'the birds and the bees,' even if it meant he was possibly running the risk that his secret would be found out.

"Of course I could," Finn replied hotly, ever the stubborn idiot. "How else could she have gotten pregnant?"

The silence that stretched on after that simple question was almost unbearable for Puck. He did feel pretty guilty. He really did. It wasn't his fault he'd always sorta had a jones for Quinn, even after she started dating Finn. Granted, it was totally his fault for not turning her down when she showed up at his door, but he was a red-blooded male and she was hot and willing. Not to mention basically his dream girl.

But Finn wasn't this stupid, at least they wouldn't all have to have this insanely painful conversation.

And just when Puck had completely given up on Hudson ever connecting the dots, his face suddenly twisted and contorted and he was sprinting out of his seat and out of the band room before anyone could get their shit together and react.

His departure left a change in the air, from tense and awkward to a more morose, resigned silence. Everyone now knew what Puck had known (well, minus knowing who the real father was) and none of them had a damned clue what to do about it.

Finally, Puck couldn't take it any more. "This bachelor party officially sucked."

There's something 'bout the way you looked at me
And you think for a moment that maybe we were meant to be
Livin' life separately
And it's strange that things change but not me wanting you
So desperately

- "Desperately," by Michelle Branch

After their week-long hook up, Puck had managed to worm out Berry's digits, so by Saturday night he was already spending a little too much time pacing his too-small room and dialed her number almost without thinking.

In usual Berry fashion, she talked too much and too fast, but through the AP English diction and the SAT-level vocabulary he was able to figure out that Finn had burst through their baby shower, ranting and raving about hot tubs and bikinis and demanding to know who was the real father. From there, it was a lot of screaming and shouting and crying and, at one point, Brittany backhanding Finn with one of Rachel's heart-shaped pillows when he called Quinn what Berry referred to as "a completely abhorrent and totally uncalled for name." Knowing Berry that could mean just about anything, but knowing the often absent-minded but almost always good-intentioned Brittany it meant that Finn must've really crossed a line to inspire violence.

Quinn followed Finn out to his car after Rachel kicked him out for using "that word," crying and pleading that Finn was the father of her baby, regardless of the actual facts that Puck knew all too well to be true.

"But what I still don't understand is why Finn could possibly believe that he managed to impregnate Quinn through the process of a Jacuzzi," Rachel said, winding down in her extremely long-winded tirade on the phone. "And on that subject, how did Quinn get pregnant? While I admit I find it hard to believe that a woman such as Quinn who claims to profess so much ardor for her boyfriend would actually cheat on said boyfriend, I'm even more curious to discover who this other man may be. Do you have any clue?"

Puck hesitated on the line, trying to decide how best to respond to Rachel's probing question. Honestly, he wasn't totally sure how he'd made it this long without anyone finding out he was the real dad, and this was after letting it slip to Mercedes, who lived off gossip the same way he lived off dip when it got around to baseball season.

And he really didn't want to tell Rachel. Doubtlessly she would side with Finn, because she still wanted in his pants about as badly as wanted one of those Tony things. He didn't mind Rachel so much after they hooked up, because she was still a pretty hot fellow Jew, who also managed to stay herself after all the shit everyone put her through- after all the shit he put her through.

"Quinn and I had sex."

Fuck. He wasn't supposed to tell her that. Oh, God, now she was gonna start ranting and using words he didn't understand and he'd be even more screwed than he was before.

The shocking silence on the phone was almost deafening, and he wondered if this was going to be the only time he'd ever actually gotten Berry to shut up.

"Oh, Noah…"

He wanted to hang up when he heard those two words. She managed to sound so damned disappointed in him, but pitying and sad like even though she wanted to yell at him she just couldn't because she suddenly, finally figured out that they were basically in the same boat together. He could handle her anger, he could handle her disappointment, but it was that fucking sadness that made him want to rip out his mohawk and just shake her. Where was batshit crazy Berry when he needed her?

"Can you just not?!" he growled, pacing his room once more in attempt to not punch something. Most likely himself. Possibly the wall. "Bitch about Broadway or something. Rant about your awards. Just do. Not. Pity. Me."

She was silent again. "…Everyone's going to hate you when this gets out," she whispered, stating the obvious in the worst possible way but ultimately in a comfortingly Berry-like fashion.

"No shit," he snapped, running his hands through his short patch of hair, gripping the ends in the hope he could snap himself back into his old Puck badass self.

It wasn't really working.

"Will it make you feel better if I go on pretending as though you never told me?" she asked, even quieter before.

She stunned him then. He was horrible to her, made it his job to make her life miserable, and when he wasn't doing that he didn't even have a second thought about her, and yet here she was, offering to act like this incident never happened, willing to forget just because it would make it a little easier for him when everyone around him was ready to rip his throat out.

Puck flopped onto his worn bed, stretching out on his back as he finally let the wave of terror and stress hit him like a truck. He needed to sleep. He didn't want to, but his body was screaming at him that he need sleep.

"I don't want you to lie for me," he finally told her tiredly. "Listen, Berry, can you just…" He trailed off. He didn't know what to say, or how to say it.

"Yes?" she asked gently, prompting him.

"Can you sing to me?" Another day, another Puck would be ashamed as all hell to ask Rachel Berry something that pathetic, and in such a whiny, plaintive tone, but this Puck was tired and worn out and positive that, come Monday, his life as he knew it would be over.

Without questioning him, Rachel began to sing softly.

And that's all that I need
Someone else to cling to and
Someone I can lean on until
I don't need to
Just stay all through the night and if the morning gets me down
That's all that I need right now

- "All I Need," by Matchbox Twenty

The bachelor party was Friday, after school. By the time Monday rolled around, Puck was actually a little concerned that neither Finn nor Quinn had responded to his texts. Not that he was freaking out or anything. At all. He was cool, and they were adults and capable of sorting out their own shit on their own.

Even though it was kind of just as much his shit as it was their shit.

It took him about 6 minutes of hunting down and stalking through hallways before he tracked down Quinn. Finn was less important at the moment. She was, after all, his baby-momma, and he was kind of worried what Finn had put her through.

When he found her, well… she didn't look like Quinn. It was like something in her eyes, that spark that made her, yes, evil (at times) and possibly homicidal but also vibrant and vicious and absolutely beautiful… well, it looked a lot like that spark had sorta died. Her blonde hair was matted and pulled back into a sloppy ponytail, and she was dressed entirely in sweatpants. There were dark circles under her eyes, and combined with the bloodshot red rims he had a sickening feeling she opted to cry all night instead of sleep.

When she finally noticed him in the hallway, barely an arm's length away, her body kind of crumpled, shoulders slumping and knees buckling and even though he could probably bench three of her, he was struck with such fear and absolute helplessness that he couldn't even slap himself together to reach out and just pluck her from the air.

She didn't fall. He was sure she was gonna crumple to the floor in a big heap, but instead she managed to maintain whatever self-preservation instincts she had left and stopped her body from collapsing. Her head was bowed, arms wrapped around her waist, and if it wasn't for her hoodie he could probably see the slight bulge on her otherwise trim belly.

He was finally able to push his stupid fear aside and reach out for her, one arm moving forward to grab her shoulder reassuringly, maybe try to pull her closer to him. He just needed that contact. He needed to be near her. He couldn't watch her suffer, even if she was still in love with Hudson.

He didn't get the chance to comfort her- a heavy hand on his shoulder stopped him from doing so. That was all his warning before Finn Hudson pulled back and decked him for all the dopey QB was worth.

Like I need to defend my own innocence
So what, I did it, I admit & I'm pleadin' the fifth
One more anthem for the know-it-all
I won't be standin' up for long I better learn how to crawl
Learn how to crawl
In ten minutes I'll be laying out flat on the floor

- "Flat on the Floor," by Nickelback

When Puck finally woke up, he was pissed.

He wasn't pissed so much at Finn (actually, he was pretty impressed the dumbass actually worked up the 'nads to hit him hard enough to knock him out), or even at Quinn for keeping him out of the loop the whole weekend (what? It wasn't really his fault that the thought his flashed mind once or twice, and he sorta deserved a warning), or even being basically locked up in this stupid freaking hospital room with his neurotic mom and his crazy little sister in this fucking paper dress while some ugly old nurses pretended to give a shit about him (unlike most people, Puck didn't hate hospitals or whatever- he just hated not being able to leave whenever he damn well wanted).

He was just pissed that he passed out in the first place. He didn't mind losing the fight. This was actually one of the only times he could admit that to himself honestly. Maybe it was beyond screwed up, but for all the shit he (and Quinn, too) put Finn through, it was kinda only fair that Finn won the fight. Puck kicking his ass on top of everything else just wouldn't have been fair.

But if Finn hadn't knocked him out so soundly, he probably would've let Finn win anyway, and he would've gotten suspended right along with his (ex) best friend, and he would've been able to calmly tell all the teachers and Ms. Pillsbury and whatever whackjobs that surrounded him to pull Finn off that he did not need to go to the hospital because Noah fucking Puckerman was too badass to go to a hospital.

Especially for something as nancy-boy as a "possible concussion."

To make matters so much freaking better for him, because he was carted off to the hospital unconscious with Quinn apparently bawling her brains out and Finn just shouting shit at him, there was no one to talk to the principal and Mr. Schue and Coach Tanaka and explain to them why their two best football players/singers lost their shit in the middle of the hallway.

Shockingly, Rachel Berry of all people actually offered to try and defend them, claiming that they were both under extreme duress brought on by the stress of juggling football practice, glee performances, jobs, and an upcoming baby (after their conversation Saturday, he guessed she was including him on that one for once). While it sounded like Rachel managed to sway Mr. Schue and Coach Tanaka, Principal Figgins wasn't quite as pleased. It only got worse when Quinn, who was quiet up until that point, started crying again and spilled everything- sleeping with him, getting pregnant, telling Finn the baby was his, getting kicked out of her house, and finally Finn connecting the dots.

If Puck had been awake at this point, he would've backed crazy Berry (because, seriously, even though she was cuckoo for Cocoa Puffs or whatever, she was still loyal as shit) and kept Quinn from losing it and telling everybody everything. It was bad enough that it was basically his fault that her parents disowned her and kicked her out of her house- he didn't want to make her life miserable at school, too. Once it got out that he was the one that knocked her up and not Saint Finn, she would be the most hated student by the end of the week.

Worse, her actions lead his mother to get a phone call he had never wanted her to hear, and now it seemed like she was planning on spending the next few weeks (at very least) crying about her very first grandbaby.

As a result, it had taken two and a half hours after he woke up to convince his mom that she did not need to stay overnight with him at the hospital. Besides, his annoying little sister needed to haul her ass to school every day because even if Puck had turned into an all-around fuck-up, there was no way in hell he was gonna let her fall through the same damned cracks.

He had a lot of shit to sort through, and he didn't need his mother freaking out, crying and hovering over him the entire time.

But, because his whole year had sucked so hard so far why should this particular day be any better, maybe four minutes had passed by since his mom and sister finally got the hell out, a tiny little midget in a tan trench coat and a too-large, floppy brown hat slipped into his room.

For whatever fucked up reason, he immediately knew who his mystery guest was, but even if he didn't, the brown flats with those stupidly sexy pink knee-high socks peeking out from under the hem of the trench coat.

"Berry, what the fuck are you doing here?" he demanded, sitting up further in his hospital bed. He tried to shoot her his best glare, the one that sent the hockey players scattering like a bunch of little girls. With a big ugly white bandage over his forehead, a black eye, and a split lip, not to mention a few Tylenol with codeine in his system he wasn't exactly on his game.

She took off her ridiculous hat and trench coat, revealing her usual bizarre outfit of a pink button-down, brown sweater, and pink-and-brown plaid skirt that always was just a little too short and way too distracting when he was trying to stay mad at her.

"Noah, you know how I feel about curse words," she said, flipping her long brown hair over one shoulder and fixing him with a stern glare. Her glare was a hell of a lot more convincing than whatever sad look he must've shot her, but there was no way he was going to cave at this point. He already looked like a pansy- he wasn't gonna act like one, too.

He was badass, dammit.

"I wanted to make sure you were doing well," she said, dropping her hands from her hips and walking over to the side of his bed. She went back to her usual Berry-level of insecurity, chewing on her bottom lip and studying him with shining brown eyes.

Why was it that everything about her was so damned shiny?

Dispelling his thoughts, he eyed her closely and snapped, "Why do you care? Shouldn't you be off licking Hudson's wounds for him?"

She flinched back like he'd just slapped her, big round eyes blinking rapidly. "I-I know that after the tussle today and the rumors that will be out by the time you are through with your suspension and allowed to come back to school you will become a social pariah amongst our fellow teens and may possibly more hated than I am, despite my innocence and simple dream to achieve stardom at any age possible." She stopped her little rant when she noticed his look, and then hastened to add, "But despite the dubious opinions our fellow classmates, I must say that I intend on sticking with you throughout this whole messy ordeal because I know that you need support the most."

He rolled his eyes when she finally stopped talking, but once again in true batshit Berry fashion, she had somehow managed to worm her way under his skin. She was actually picking him over Finn. Granted, everyone else may have wanted her dead and he had a few thoughts every so often about shaking her when she started talking and forgot about breathing in between, but she was willing to stick by his side just because she knew he'd be fucked and alone once he went back to school.

He didn't respond to her, and when he remained silent for about a minute she pulled one of the plastic chairs over and sat down, twisting her fingers and continuing to search his face for any signs. He didn't know what the hell she was searching for, but it was definitely something.

"There's one more thing you need to know before you go back to school," she said, hesitating and going back to chew on her bottom lip. "Has anyone talked to you about Finn and Quinn yet?"

Puck furrowed his eyebrows, even though that screwed up the four stitches hidden under the bandage on his forehead. "Of course people talked to me about Finn and Quinn. Mr. Schuester came in this afternoon and told me basically everything that happened after Finn knocked me out."

"Everything?" she repeated, her own brows coming together in apparent confusion while her (admittedly) full mouth pursed.

"Yeah, everything," he said, nodding. "Y'know, you spouting off to Principal Figgins, Quinn flipping shit and telling them all about me."

Her face went blank, shoulders slumping a little. "That's all he told you?" she said, after a very lengthy pause. Her voice was very un-Berry, not shrill and in-your-face but instead quiet and tiny.

This wasn't good. He liked to delude himself that he didn't know anything about Berry, but despite this he found himself using the information that he'd unknowingly been cataloguing about her to know that something very wrong was going on. "What the hell is going on?" he asked, jaw clenching and unclenching unconsciously as he studied her face. When she was silent, and remained silent, eyes cast down to the linoleum tiles, he grew even more worried and impatient. "Rachel, tell me. Now."

She jumped when he used her first name, like she was recognizing how serious he was just by that insignificant (or maybe not so insignificant) detail.

"Quinn's been hospitalized."

And you see the things they never see
All you wanted I could be
Now you know me, and I'm not afraid
And I wanna tell you who I am
Can you help me be a man?
They can't break me
As long as I know who I am

- "I'm Still Here" by Goo Goo Dolls