Hi! It's been a minute, but here's the update. All I'm gonna say is, prepare for a couple time jumps from here on out and the italics indicates a flashback to the summer. Hope you like it, and sorry for any mistakes I missed.

Sam was trying not to lose his cool. It had been a week, and she was still with Shane. When he asked her about it, she'd say she was working on it and leave it at that. To say it irked him would be the understatement of the century. So when his phone rang at midnight in the middle of the week, he got a little excited.

"Hello?" he said, answering the phone.

"Hey…it's me," she said on the other end. He rolled his eyes.

"I'm aware, 'Cedes, I have caller ID and a personalized ring tone."

"Oh? What's my ringtone?" she asked.

"Have you ever heard the song Miss New Booty?" He heard her laugh, and even though he couldn't see her, he knew she was shaking her head.

"It better not be."

"I guess you'll never know," he said, smirking. He actually hoped she never found out what it really was: Burnin' Up by the Jonas Brothers. After the flack he got for liking Justin Beiber, he decided to keep all other musical guilty pleasures out of conversation.

"I'll find out one day."

"So…why are you calling me?" He heard her sigh.

"I can't call you anymore?" He rolled his eyes again.

"Of course you can call me, I was just hoping it was a special occasion," he told her, referring to the Shane situation.

"Oh. Not yet," she said quietly. He closed his eyes and rubbed his hand down his face, lying back against his pillows.

"Honestly Mercedes, I'm not sure how much longer I can deal with this."

"Are you about to give up?" He blew out a breath and looked at his ceiling. Why would she ask that?

"No. Never. But it's kind of an asshole move for you to test that theory."

"Did you just call me an asshole?" she asked.

"Yes."

"Sam!"

"What?" He was not as happy as he was at the beginning of this conversation, and he was suddenly tired.

"I promise…"

"You'll do it soon," he said, finishing her sentence with the excuse she'd been giving him for a week now.

"I will," she told him.

"I should get some sleep. English test tomorrow."

"Can you stay on the phone a little longer?" She really called because she severely missed hearing his voice, and couldn't get to sleep that night thinking about him. She knew it was her own fault, but she was still miserable.

"Fine," he said, remembering how she used to call him at night during the summer so she could get to sleep when she was having trouble.

"Thanks, Sam."

"Mmhm. So what are you wearing?" She laughed and a grin threatened to appear on his face.

"Footie pajamas," she responded.

"Wow. I'm getting hard thinking about it."

"How much do you love me?" he asked her, resting his head on top of hers.

"More than Rachel loves herself," she answered jokingly. He laughed and held her tighter, looking out at the lake.

"That's a lot. Almost too much to handle," he said, grinning.

"I know. To think, I said more than that."

"But really, how much?" he asked again. He wanted to hear it. He was confident that she loved him; he just wanted to know how much. He'd come to terms with the fact that he wouldn't be able to live without her and the flash-forward had nothing to do with it. Sometimes he was afraid she loved him because she felt like she was supposed to; like he'd felt a long time ago.

"Do you really wanna know? Do you want me to list it out?" she asked. He simply nodded into the top of her head. She pulled away and sat across from him with her legs crossed.

"Shit just got real, didn't it?" he asked, laughing. She laughed as well, but it faded and she looked at him seriously.

"I love you more than I can really put words into, though I'll try. It's weird, but it feels like you're a limb." He smiled and raised an eyebrow, while she let out a small chuckle. "Like, if I ever were to lose you, it would be like someone cutting my leg off and expecting me to go bike-riding. It doesn't matter how the rest of the world sees you or how many flaws you may have, because in my eyes you're perfect, and that's because I love you.

"I love every part of you, Sam. Your dance moves that leave a lot to be desired," He scoffed. She just smiled. "your big hands, right down to your obviously bitten down fingernails, your ability to make me laugh or make any situation more awkward, your lips, and how they curl into a straight line when you're in deep thought, and your green eyes that change in intensity depending on your mood; light green when you're having fun, dark green, almost black when you're turned on. I even like your feet, and I hate feet." He laughed at that.

"You can do no wrong, Sam. You can piss me off, and honestly you do on a regular basis, but you could never do anything to make me fall out of love with you. Even if one day you leave me and break my heart into a million pieces, it'll always belong to you. I love you as much as it's possible to love anything, and it blows my mind every day that you're mine and I could feel this way." She leaned forward and resting her chin on her knees, smiling at him. Sam felt the back of his eyes burn and closed them so he wouldn't start crying in front of his girlfriend.

"So you love me a lot, then." She giggled.

"Yes, I love you a lot."

Sam wasn't really sure why he was still in synchronized swimming, considering it had been confirmed Mercedes still had feelings for him and didn't need convincing, but for some odd reason he felt a certain loyalty to Coach Roz. He walked into the locker room after practice and sat on a bench wiping his face with his personalized towel.

He heard some other guys come in and gather in the locker block next to him. When they began talking, he could immediately identify one of the voices as the same one that said he would "pull through" after getting slushied the week before. He rolled his eyes. The mere sound of Shane's voice bothered him.

"So, Mercedes," one of the guys said. "You hittin' that Tinsley?"

Sam held his breath, praying the answer would be no.

"Hey. Don't talk about my woman like some kind of object," Shane said. Sam liked that the guy obviously respected Mercedes if anything, but kind of wanted him to answer the question.

"My bad. Have you guys made love?" If possible, Sam swore he could hear the other guy rolling his eyes.

"No, man. Mind your business. We're both virgins and we're gonna do all that on our wedding night," Shane responded. If Sam had been eating something, he would have choked on it.

He wasn't sure which to focus on first: the fact that she officially had not slept with Shane (though he knew; but to hear the guy say it was great), or the fact that she'd obviously lied to him about the status of her virginity, which was non-existent.

That afternoon after the God Squad meeting, he stopped her at the door. Quinn and Joe had just left and they were alone.

"So I heard something interesting today," he started. She rolled her eyes.

"That Shane's not a member of the God Squad? We established that."

"No, that you're still a virgin." Her eyes widened and she backed into the room. He followed her and sat on the table.

"Unless there's a magical virginity restoring fairy, that's quite false."

"That's what I said! But Shane insisted…"

"WHAT?" she yelled. She calmed herself and tried to continue in an even tone. "Please don't tell me you talked to Shane."

"So you did tell him you were a virgin. You're lying to him now?" he asked.

"I panicked! He was talking to me about marriage and how we'll both give ourselves to each other and all I could do was agree with him. How bad would it have been if I interjected and said, well actually…"

"I had sex with the guy I'm in love with multiple times over the summer and I still have his Magnum condoms in my bedside drawer?" he finished for her. She glared at him.

"Okay, yes. What does it matter?"

"You're right!" he said. "It doesn't matter because you're about to break up with him so we can be together and continue to lose your virginity many more times." He smirked even though he was dead serious and basically asking her why she hadn't done it yet.

"Today!" she yelled.

"Wait…what?"

"Today. I'll tell him today."

"Don't joke around about this," he told her.

"I'm not. I'll go find him and do it now," she said.

"What? Seriously? Just like that after you've been dragging this out?"

"I know, and I'm tired of dragging it out. I just need to do it. Like ripping off a band-aid." He jumped up and went to kiss her, but his lips met her palm. "Not yet."

Mercedes drove home that day feeling awful. She'd gone over how telling Shane could go in her head a million times before, but when it actually happened, she wasn't prepared. When he started crying as she told him about kissing Sam, she felt like the worst person in the world. She'd been dreading the moment since Sam returned, but now that it was happening, the weight of what she'd been doing hit her like a ton of bricks.

Not only did she feel bad about cheating physically, she felt terrible because all the times she'd been with Shane, she was thinking about Sam. It wasn't fair to him, and she thought she was a better person than that. She felt like she wasn't any better than Quinn, Santana and Rachel. Mercedes Jones would have never done these things to someone, yet she had.

"I can't…I don't know what to say, Mercedes. It feels like you just punched me in the heart."

Those words replayed in her head right up until she'd gotten home, gone up to her room and snuggled under the covers. Sam kept calling her and sending her texts like 'How'd it go?', 'Did you do it?' and 'Can I come over?'

She couldn't bring herself to respond, so she'd simply shut her phone off. She closed her eyes and tried to go back to the summer where things weren't complicated and he never left. Where she'd been a good person.

She decided she couldn't just be with Sam like she'd planned to hours before. She couldn't imagine being in Shane's shoes; having your girlfriend make you cry, break up with you, admit to cheating, and skip down the halls the next day on another guy's arm. The idea of it was sick, and she refused to be that girl. She also felt like she didn't deserve to go back to Sam and be happy again. How dare she think she could just do that to someone and then go back to how things were? This whole situation had her wondering who she even was anymore. Getting back together with Sam wouldn't fix that.

Sam sat on his bed staring at the unanswered texts on his phone. He tried calling her again, but this time it went straight to voicemail. She was ignoring him. He figured there could be only on reason she was, and jumped to the conclusion that she hadn't broken up with Shane. That annoyed him, but not as much as the fact she wouldn't even take his calls. He sighed and gave up, setting the phone on his nightstand.

He figured he might as well get started on her Valentine's Day gift.

On the list of shittiest things to ever happen to him, Sam would have to put this V-Day third on the list, after losing his home and having to move and leave Mercedes. When she told him she actually did break up with Shane, he was ready to be all over her right there in the hallway, but when she stopped him, he felt his heart sink into his stomach. They were supposed to be together now. That was the plan, right?

Apparently not. She told him how she lied, cheated and didn't know who she was anymore. If he wasn't blinded by how much he loved her and the fact that they were both free now, he would have really listened. But he only heard one part.

I can't be with you.

So Shane felt like he'd been punched in the heart, but right now Sam felt like she'd grabbed his heart, placed it in the door of her locker, slammed it repeatedly, taken it out and done river dance on it with metal shoes.

If there had been any chance of him making it through the day without breaking down, it was obliterated with she sang him that song in Glee club. He sat there, tears streaming down his face in front of all their friends until he couldn't take it anymore and ran out of there.

When he got outdoors, he screamed and punched a locker. The pain shot up through his wrist and arm, but he ignored it and continued to the parking lot. He couldn't think rationally; the only thing going through his mind was the idea that she was trying to hurt him. She looked beautiful and sang beautifully, but all he could think about was the fact she'd just told him they couldn't be together. It was ridiculous, because they were supposed to be.

He walked home, leaving his truck at the school.

The only silver lining in this situation was the fact that Sam no longer had to see her hugged up to Shane. After having time to think about it though, he felt bad. All he could think about earlier on was Mercedes and her turning him away. Now he realized they'd actually hurt Shane. Yes, he hated the guy for sweeping her up when he left and being a constant cock-block when he returned, but all in all, he was a good guy.

However, he didn't feel nearly as bad as Mercedes. Yeah, what they did was wrong, and Shane didn't deserve it, but she was his and he was hers. Shane was just unfortunate enough to get caught in the middle because she'd lost faith in them. He understood now that she needed time, but he hoped she'd remember how real they were. She knew they'd never cheat on each other, yet she suggested it could happen unless she found herself.

He knew he did all those things because he wasn't thinking about anything but them. He loved her so much, that everything else ceased to matter. He shouldn't have been so blinded, and he admitted that.

All he could do now was wait for her. He was sick of waiting, but he was going to anyway. There was no way he would stop; she was his future and if he had to sit around for years, it would suck, but he would do it.

If Mercedes had planned on talking to Sam about their relationship in the next few weeks, the universe was telling her no. With Karofsky attempting suicide and Quinn getting hit by a truck, the timing just wasn't right. She was beginning to think these were signs. Maybe she shouldn't be thinking about a relationship with him so soon, but honestly a few weeks seemed like enough.

Now it had been two months, and part of her was afraid he wouldn't care anymore. Then she told herself to remember who she was talking about.

She tried not to think about their supposed future together and their son. Maybe she really wasn't supposed to be with anyone for a while. She would always catch him staring at her though. She should have been used to it, but every time she looked up to find those green eyes trained on her, it drove her crazy. Whenever she felt like caving, she tried to remind herself of what she did to Shane. It used to work, but it was losing its effect.

She figured the best approach was to avoid thinking about Sam. But it was hard when he'd look at her or smile or speak, or send her those annoyingly sweet texts like 'You look gorgeous today' or 'Hope you do well on your test. :)' He was being a dick and he knew it.

She walked out of the school at the end of booty camp and headed to her car. She took her sweet time changing back into her clothes in the locker room and almost everyone was gone now. So when she saw a figure leaning against her front door, she tensed.

When she walked up, the man who'd been waiting for her stood up straight and grinned, bearing surprisingly white teeth, contrasting his scruff and long beat up coat.

"I don't have any money on me…" she started.

"Oh, I don't need any money, Mercedes."