A/N: I can't believe it's been nearly a month since I updated this…isn't it awful, how real life gets in the way of fan fic? :) Anyway, mucho *mwahs* to all of you who've reviewed and put this on alert. There is lots more coming, hopefully soon!
As you will no doubt notice, I have incorporated some dialogue from the actual episodes for continuity purposes.
Enjoy!
Chapter Four: Bad Reputation
William McKinley High School, September 2009
Red and white flash in unison. Sneakers squeak a syncopated rhythm on the polished wood as the group flips, jumps, leaps, lifts.
Then—silence. (Though the glare reflected off fifteen brilliantly blinding smiles makes its own statement.)
A perfect pyramid. And poised at the very top, a perfect cheerleader: blond hair smoothed into a high ponytail, green eyes sparkling, arms raised in victory.
She feels a wobble under her left foot, a tiny hesitation from the girl holding her up. Carefully, her smile never wavering, she presses the toe of her shoe down until the girl's fingers clench (possibly in pain).
Just a subtle reminder: Nobody drops Quinn Fabray.
January 2010
She navigates the crowded hallway, leaving a trail of audible whispers in her wake.
"Did you hear?"
"Yeah, but he's not the father—"
"She danced in a black dress—"
"With that stomach?"
"—kicked out of her house—"
Sighing, she opens her locker, hunts for her English notebook. Suddenly, he's there, arm slung over the locker door.
"How's my girls?" he asks, eyes traveling toward her baby bump.
"Puck, I'm not—"
"I know, I know," he interrupts, raising his hands in protest, "the whole 'independent' thing. But can't I walk my baby mama to class?"
They head to Room 134, his lean form curved toward her, dark eyes laughing at something she's said. She sees the others (especially the girls) watching them, noticing, wondering.
The whispers stop.
She holds her head a little higher, and smiles.
March 2010
Spring should have come a week ago, but it hasn't. Just inside the school doors, she steps into a puddle, the residue from 500 pairs of slushy snow boots.
Her own shoes—flimsy flats; she was feeling optimistic—fly out from under her, and she lands with a thump, water soaking through the back of her maternity leggings. Her bookbag slides across the floor; the notebook she was carrying flaps open, scattering a few loose pages.
She waits for the laughter. Or for someone (maybe him) to help her up.
But nobody laughs. And nobody (not even him) helps. People just keep walking and talking, stepping over and around her and her stuff.
Apparently, she's a ghost. She's nothing…the absence of a person.
She struggles to her feet, gathers the notebook and bag. Hair falling loose over her face, she soldiers on down the hall.
She's on her own now, just like she said she wanted to be.
It feels terrible.
April 2010
I'm. Still. Here. (With each word, she slaps the Glist onto a locker, a wall, a door.) Still. Me.
Finally, she stops—she's run out of copies. Hearing the swish, dunk, swish of the custodian's mop behind her, she walks as fast as she can, around the corner and out the door by the Science wing.
Tomorrow, she'll once again be at the top of something. In a way that would have horrified her six months ago…but at the top, nonetheless. She'll be recognized, inspected, talked about.
And maybe things will change—a little. Maybe this empty feeling (how can she feel so empty, when she is, so literally, full?) will go away.
When he sees it, he'll think someone else did it, of course. Maybe he'll be mad; he knows (better than anybody) that she doesn't belong on that list…maybe he'll want to hunt the perpetrator down, defend her honor, prove that he's not going to let anybody say stuff like that about the mother of his child.
Of course, that's not what happens...
Santana, bored: "Why are we playing this game? We all know Puck did it."
"Back off—I didn't do squat!"
"Oh, yeah?" Tina demands. "Then why is your girlfriend number one on the Glist?"
(She winces at the "girlfriend" reference, but she doesn't think anybody notices.)
Rachel, as usual, is righteously indignant. "And why am I last? Aside from the fact that I wouldn't put out for you?"
"OK, enough. No one is accusing anyone of anything," Mr. Schue asserts. Then pauses. "Seriously, Puck, did you do it?"
"I said no! I'm a delinquent, sure—I like setting stuff on fire and beating up people I don't know. I own that. But I'm not a liar." He does look offended—but only at the accusation, not at the implications of the Glist.
So much for defending her honor.
She got it wrong.
People weren't talking about her, buzzing about the Glist; they merely pulled them off their lockers with a quizzical glance and shot them in the nearest trash can.
President of the Celibacy Club to (apparently) sex-crazed Gleek in six months…and it hardly even rated a shoulder shrug.
Nobody cared.
She was steaming her way to the cafeteria when Kurt caught up with her. "Listen, Quinn," he started. "Figgins is serious about ending Glee—Coach S. must have him in her pocket or something. So your boyfriend had better fess up to this stupid Glist business—"
Disappointment made her bitter, and it came out before she could think. "He's NOT my boyfriend."
Kurt's blue eyes widened. Damn! Could she have picked a worse person to tell? "Oh, dear," he sighed with mock sympathy, adjusting his messenger bag across one shoulder. "Has strife entered the nonmarital home? You and the fetus out on the street again?"
"I'm still living there…we're just not dating." She tried for a little of the old Quinn Fabray authority, poking him in his turquoise cravat. "Look, Liza, what's between Puck and me is nobody's business, OK?"
Patting her shoulder conspiratorially, he whispered, "I understand completely. Oh, is that the time? Must be off—I'm skipping fifth period; it was the only time my facialist could squeeze me in." He glided away on polished loafers, fingers tapping busily on his phone.
Damn, she thought again.
-0-0-0-
For the sake of counteracting the KurtWire, she walked out to the parking lot with Puck.
"I can't believe Tanaka made me scrub out those showers—übergross!"
"Maybe you shouldn't have coated Karofsky's locker in peanut butter," Quinn sighed, shifting her heavy tote.
Puck took it from her. "Douche has been flushing Artie's glasses—he deserved it!"
"His windpipe closed up, Puck!"
"How was I supposed to know he's allergic? Anyway, he's got nothin' to whine about. I shot him up with that freaky epi-thingy…eventually. Dude, blue is NOT his color."
Quinn rolled her eyes, but said nothing; what was the point? They were almost to her car when his phone beeped.
He scanned the message. "Huh…that's weird."
"What?"
"Nothing." His face closed in a way that made her nervous. She snatched the phone.
Can u come over
at 4:00? Thx.
Her cheeks burned. "Another one of your clients? Needing a service?" She wasn't jealous; it was just disgusting, thinking of these old—
"No!" Puck grabbed the phone back. "Lay off, willya? It's just Berry."
Oh, for God's sake. Rachel again! Was she systematically trying to appropriate everything (and everyone) that was, or had been, Quinn's?
"Not that you care," Puck taunted.
She fixed him with her iciest glare. "If you want to spend the afternoon with Holly Hobbie, that's up to you. Maybe she'll let you rearrange her Care Bears." Climbing into the car, she nearly slammed the door on Puck's fingertips.
The next day, she sat in Mr. Schuester's office and lied, with perfect composure and a vicious sense of satisfaction. "It was Rachel. Let's face it, I'm kind of a bitch to her."
Mr. Schue didn't buy it.
-0-0-0-
Stretching her cramped legs out in front of her, Quinn glanced at the clock: 9:57. No sign of a certain dark gray truck. For the third night in a row.
No time to dwell on it, though; she still had five geometry proofs to do. Rifling through her notebook, she came upon the sketch she'd done two months ago.
God, she'd been stupid.
Had she really thought that Puck would be ready to be a father? That, somehow, they'd make it, juggling homework and no sleep and Glee and diapers and whatever miserable jobs they could find?
Ridiculous, she saw now. Puck was still such a...boy...sometimes, lapping up female attention and orchestrating stupid revenge pranks.
Not that she was a model of maturity herself. Hadn't she made the Glist because she was tired of being ignored? Tired of feeling like she'd had everything taken from her?
The baby deserved better.
She pulled the pamphlets out of the filebox where she'd thrown them after her last OB/GYN appointment: Adoption in the State of Ohio and Open Adoption: Is It Right for You?
Her doctor had already given her a list of agencies, and she knew that Puck's mom thought they should give the baby up. (Her own parents, of course, were maintaining radio silence; she thought bitterly that they'd probably prefer a holy retribution scenario where mother and baby died tragically in childbirth.)
Adoption would make everything easier. She was due on the 25th of June; she could be back in shape—back in her old life—by fall…as if this whole miserable year never happened. Like a rock thrown into a lake that makes a huge splash…but then sinks, the water closing smoothly over it.
It was the right thing to do. The best thing to do.
So why did it hurt so much?
The shiny paper blurred, photos of hopeful-looking couples swimming in her watery vision. She threw the pamphlet down and collapsed on the desk, sobbing.
The little sketch family puddled and ran, borne away on a tide of inky tears.
-0-0-0-
In the end, Mr. Schuester figured out that she made the Glist…because, he said, she had "lost so much." He covered for her, of course; he was just that kind of teacher. And she felt a little better, hearing his vision of her future as the new-and-improved Quinn Fabray. (Even if something in her twisted at the thought of being alone in her body again.)
It was over. She couldn't fight anymore. When Rachel debuted her "Run Joey Run" video, she just sat, mutely accepting that her time was past. (She couldn't help the pang of hurt that danced across her face when she saw Puck, or the tiny burst of triumph she felt when Finn accused Rachel of using them all.)
And later, when Puck took her hand in his version of an apology, she let him. They left the choir room linked not by the shivery thrill of romance, but the raw weight of their unhappiness.
Once upon a time I was falling in love
Now I'm only falling apart
Nothing I can do
Total eclipse of the heart
TO BE CONTINUED
If you have the time, I'd love to hear your thoughts…thanks!