Quinn's belly is getting bigger. Like, a lot bigger. She's gone from hiding under cute smock dresses and comfy cardigans to rocking the honest-to-God maternity clothes. She feels like a heifer. Walking from French to Chemistry leaves her winded and she has to pee every ten minutes. She yearns for the simplicity of her Cheerios uniform; when the biggest pain in her ass was having to shave her legs every day before school.
Then there's glee club. Schue is on the warpath, ranting every single day about regionals and insisting that everyone needs to step up their game. The choreography is getting kind of intense – it takes twice as long for everybody to learn it now, especially Tina who is kind of rhythmically challenged, and Finn who is just sort of…challenged. Quinn never complains or asks for a break. She's Quinn Fabray, for God's sake (sorry, God), and Quinn Fabray is no quitter.
This week's assignment was to create an 80's mash-up, so now they're working on choreography that will blend "Heartbreaker" and "Rock You Like a Hurricane". There's a segment where the boys twirl the girls around them in a circle, then the girls trade places and twirl some more, and honestly it's kind of making Quinn dizzy. She bites her lip as Schue stops them once again and demands they take it from the top. She takes her place between Puck and Mike, closing her eyes to steady herself. The music starts, she reaches out for Puck's hand and just as he's starting to spin her, Baby Drizzle Fabray lands a swift punt right into Quinn's stomach lining. The air whooshes out of her and just like that, she's on the ground.
And this is her nightmare. The music screeches to a cacophonic halt and everyone is abandoning their dance positions to huddle around her. Puck's face is drained of color and Mr. Schuester looks like he might need a new pair of pants.
"I'm fine," Quinn manages, as soon as she can breathe again. "Seriously, guys, it's ok." She gathers herself, preparing to stand. Then there's this pressure keeping her down – Puck's hands are resting on her shoulders.
"Stop," he says quietly. "Just sit down a second, Ellen Page." (The Juno jokes are getting old, she really has to tell him that.)
"Puck," she says, a tinge of the familiar Queen Bee tone in her voice, "it's fine. She just kicked, that's all. Let me up." Puck's face is unyielding, but it's Mr. Schue who speaks up.
"Everybody take five." Everyone kind of disperses at that, and Quinn is left feeling embarrassed and incapable, like the fat kid at cheerleading camp. She feels her face flush but she holds her tongue, reigning her anger and humiliation in. Suddenly, Puck's hands move from her shoulders to her armpits and he hoists her up with surprising ease. (Not exactly romantic, but surprisingly effective.) He walks her over to a chair and she sits down, battling a strange combination of resentment and relief.
Schue follows them over there, looking for all the world as though someone's just told him that someone somewhere kills a puppy for every bottle of hair gel he goes through.
"Quinn, I'm so sorry," he starts and she really has to fight the urge to cringe. "I been so blinded by regionals that I haven't even considered the strain that the new choreography must be putting on you."
"Mr. Schuester, it's really okay," Quinn says with as much patience as she can muster. "If I was having trouble keeping up, I would have asked for a break earlier."
"No, you wouldn't." Finn has magically appeared next to her, and Quinn fights the urge to kick him in the shin by remembering that he used to know her better than anyone else. "Uh. Here, I had this left over from lunch." He thrusts a fruit roll-up into her hand. Puck's eyebrows are all the way up to where his hairline would be if he didn't have that stupid mohawk (what would she tell her grandchildren?) and when Finn catches him staring, he goes a reddish around the ears and rubs the back of his neck like he always does when he's uncomfortable.
"Thank you," Quinn says politely, mostly because she's not sure what else to say.
The other members of New Directions start to trickle back into the choir room. Brittany bounces over to show Quinn a new picture of her cat in a Santa costume, and Santana hands over the latest issue of Cosmopolitan, a shared tradition they haven't indulged in since BabyGate unfolded. Mike and Matt walk in and launch into an impromptu, a capella version of "Baby" and Mike's even combed his hair across his face like Justin Bieber, just to make her laugh. Tina brings over an extra chair for Quinn to put her (ugly, swollen) feet up on and Artie quotes Billy Madison in his perfect Adam Sandler impression ("she's gonna be a soccer player! She is……she i-iss!"). Mercedes and Kurt fuss over her ensemble, calling her "hot mama" and debating whether the baby's color palette will be a spring or an autumn.
Then Rachel freaking Berry walks in and hands her a cup of water, and now Quinn's nightmare is just getting progressively worse because she can't help but to start crying. Seriously, four months ago she was tormenting half of these people, and if it weren't for this stupid baby she probably still would be, and they're all just being so nice. When school started in August, she never would have predicted that she'd be here in this room, with these people, and actually enjoying their company.
"Thank you," she says again, to everyone this time, as she commands herself to stop crying. She sniffles and dabs the corners of her eyes with her sweater, trying to regain composure (secretly hoping deep down that they won't burst into another overly-sentimental rendition of "Lean on Me" because really, she cannot handle that right now). She kind of wishes, really for only a split second, that she could keep the baby – because this is what real family should feel like: no guilt or shame or hiding anything, and everybody just trying to make you feel good and wanted and accepted. And there is that saying about needing a village to raise a child, or whatever, and this seems like it would be a pretty good village. But she is sixteen-going-on-seventeen and raising a baby right now just doesn't seem like the best of plans.
Puck grabs her hand and helps her to her feet as they all line up to start the dance over again. Mr. Schue cues the music and as she's spinning, Quinn feels lighter than she has in weeks. Later, she would catalogue the moment as the first time she didn't hope things would go back to "normal" after the baby was born. She wouldn't really mind if they stayed just like this.