AN: Thank you so much for those who took the time to review. In my head I know where this is going and I hope you guys stick with me :)
PS- if it isn't already abundantly clear - this is AU and will deviate from the actual show's story line, like, alot!
Noah Puckerman was prowling the party restlessly, his eyes flickering over the faces of everybody he came is contact with and dismissing them quickly, deeming them unworthy of both his time and his company. As he went to exit the kitchen, a wasted meathead that he recognized from the hockey team swayed unsteadily toward him, a red plastic cup full of beer clutched in one hand, tipping precariously close to Puck's favorite button down shirt.
"S'up Man?" the douche bag slurred with a wide grin as he stumbled past, spilling the alcohol as he went.
Puck grunted in annoyance and jostled the jock roughly, "Watch it," he growled warningly as he moved past. His hazel eyes intently surveyed the next room which, he discovered, was essentially a makeshift dance floor, filled almost to capacity with drunk teenagers attempting to dance (or grope each other) to some techno shit version of Britney Spears. He snorted in disgust as he leaned against wall, hands shoved in the pockets of his jeans, as far away from the writhing bodies as he could get.
Well this blows, Puck thought as he asked himself, not for the first time since his arrival barely an hour before, what the hell he was doing there. Six months ago he would have been in his element at a party like this. He would have already drunk his way through the better part of a keg, fucked some random, slutty cheerleader (Santana probably), and been rubbing himself up against a number of willing girls on that dance floor, selecting his lucky partner for round number two. And they would have loved it, because he was a fucking stud.
He ran a hand over his Mohawk and sneered at a pretty redhead who was licking her lips provocatively at him from across the room. He'd had her already, twice actually, and while he appreciated her compact body and the 'more than a handful' she possessed, the chick was all throaty "Ohhh baby"s but a total dud in bed. Or, as was the case of the second hook up, the back of his truck. Chick didn't know how to move her hips, or where to put her hands; she didn't warrant a third invitation aboard the Puckerman express, even if he was in the mood - which he wasn't. Not when all he could focus on these days was a single photograph of a red faced newborn, lying securely wrapped in a plastic hospital crib marked 'Babygirl Fabray'.
The mayhem of the party seemed to fade into non existence as Puck's mind wandered back a few months.
Quinn, true to her word of not wanting the Mohawked football player to have anything to do with her or their unborn baby, announced tersely that she had found a nice Christian couple through the pastor at her church, who were eager to adopt her, his daughter.
The former Cheerio had thrust a thick A4 envelope into his hands in front of his locker scarcely a week before Sectionals, after the scandal the Gleeks had dubbed "Babygate" had broken; it was a term that the rest of the student body had delighted in adopting, which pissed him off to no end.
He had tried to talk Quinn out of her decision several times throughout the remainder of the school week. As it turned out, he was wasting his breath.
She had repeated, in that infuriating ice princess tone of hers, that while she had (at one time) considered keeping their daughter, she had come to the conclusion that what was the best course of action was to stick with her current plan of giving the baby up for adoption . Putting her brief indecisiveness down to hormones, Quinn was adamant that she had no intention of venturing into the world of teenage motherhood - not now, with Finn out of the equation.
Her life was going to be more than this stupid cow town, and a bastard child to Lima's resident man whore was not going to hold her back from the promise she saw in her future.
He had stared at her with something akin to contempt as he listened to her speech (that sounded so well rehearsed he would swear she had practiced it in front of the mirror) as she went on about confession and penance, and how God would forgive her for her one moment of weakness, and at that moment, for the life of him, he could not figure out what he had ever saw in Quinn Fabray.
His hatred lasted only a second though until her slim hand had reached out to touch his forearm and a sheen of moisture had pooled in her expressive green eyes, her long lashes catching tiny droplets of tears. "I know how you feel about her, how hard you're trying," she had acknowledged with a bow of her golden head as her free hand ghosted over her visible bump. "But don't you want more for her Puck? We can't even take care of ourselves and you think we can raise a baby? Tell me, how are we supposed to do that when I can't even look at you without hating myself for what we did to Finn?"
Puck didn't have an answer for her. Quinn smiled at him sadly, "We would never work. She deserves better than that."
She deserves better than you is what Puck knew Quinn had wanted to say. The words 'Lima Loser' would forever linger silently between them and he feared it was a tag he would never shake.
Following his conversation with Quinn, he had locked himself inside his room for the entire weekend, with the papers she had forced upon him sitting in the middle of his desk. Mocking him.
He stared at them between long sips of scotch straight from the bottle, swiped from the 'emergency' supply above the microwave cupboard that both Puck and his mother pretended he knew nothing about, ignoring the pounding on his bedroom door. His mother would yell from the other side that she was calling the police if he didn't come out, but he knew that her threats were empty.
Puck's periodic cursing alerted his mother to the fact that her son was actually alive at least back there behind the locked door. Mrs Puckerman was further reassured when he answered the notes his sister pushed under his door (mostly pictures of smiley suns, rainbows and childish scrawls of 'I love you Noah' that had him tearing up) with scribbled 'luv u 2 brat' on scrap paper, that he slipped back to the expectant 9 year old.
By the time Monday morning had arrived, after virtually no sleep and constant deliberation that saw him toy with the idea of fighting Quinn's decision and look into the prospect of sole custody, he gave in and set about signing his name on the dotted lines indicated with obnoxious fluorescent yellow 'Sign Here' stickers.
It had taken Puck more than an hour to pen his initials on all of the pages next to Quinn's neat script, and when the last page was signed he threw down the pen in anger and pushed his way up from the desk. Letting out a stream of strangled expletives, he'd lashed out at the wall, smashing his fist against the plaster repetitively until his knuckles were split and covered in blood and his body weakened, and slumped to the floor. His fury dispersed just as quickly as it had come, leaving only bitterness and the hollow feeling of failure.
Puck had shown up at school, dishevelled and reeking of booze just as the bell was ringing, signalling. He had stalked up to his baby Momma as she was navigating the halls with Mercedes of all people by her side, and shoved the offending papers back at her.
After allowing himself one last longing glance at her swollen stomach, he turned burning eyes back to her face. Ignoring the grateful gaze she was flashing him, he snarled that she might want to cut back on the milk duds because she was the size of a fucking whale.
Puck almost smirked at the look of shock and fury that settled over the pregnant blondes' features as he spun on his heel and retraced his path back to the parking lot.
It was the last words he had spoken to her.
She had dropped out of McKinley soon after. The elder Fabray daughter, who had been kept in the dark about her little sister's predicament up until that point, had shown up for Thanksgiving with her rich husband in tow. After break, Puck had heard through the Gleek-vine that they had taken Quinn back with them to Long Island and had secured her attendance at an exclusive private girl's school there once the baby had been delivered and signed over to the adoptive parents.
That had been three months ago.
An envelope addressed to him with a New York State postscript had arrived a few week ago, its contents- a single colour photograph.
On the back of the picture were the words "They called her Missy."
With an ache in his chest, Puck had thought that 'Missy' was the most ridiculous name he'd ever heard. Were the adoptive parents just asking for his little girl to grow up and dance around a pole for a living? The envelope was now tucked in the drawer of his night stand; he hadn't been able to look at the image since.