Puck is growing impatient with her, which is no surprise.
Puck is always impatient with her, which is probably their Achilles heel.
He could have pried her away from Finn, minus the cheating, with time. He could have waited. He could have chosen not to give her another wine cooler, not to push her so far that one night.
When he was trying to woo her away from Finn when she was pregnant, he could have waited for her to feel ready to open herself to him intimately again. He could have waited and not sexted Santana and kept on sleeping with her.
He could have had her again, after that summer, before Sam joined the glee club. But he couldn't wait it out and not get into any trouble. He stole an ATM and ended up in juvie.
Puck can never wait.
Especially not when it comes to her.
Now he's tired of waiting for her to want to meet their biological daughter.
Even if she did want to communicate to him why she doesn't want anything to do with Beth, she's not sure she could fully articulate it. But she doesn't even want to.
Perhaps there was a time where that sort of emotional vulnerability between them would have made sense, but she doesn't feel the connection to him that she feels like she should.
A year and a half ago, they had a baby together, and while she knows that they'll always be bonded in a way, he just doesn't feel special to her the way that he used to. If one of them were really in trouble, they'd have the other person's bond, but that's about as far as it goes.
(Maybe she's really in trouble right now, but she's not going to tell him that.)
They were supposed to be family.
But they haven't been able to get on the same wavelength since their daughter was born, and Quinn suspects that a good chunk of the wedge between them is Puck's inability to forgive her for giving their baby up for adoption.
And she's sure that her refusal to see their baby now that Shelby brought her back into town is just rubbing salt into the wound.
She wishes that Puck could see that it's not because she doesn't care.
It's because she cares too much.
She's been making reckless decisions for the past two years and going crazy trying to fill the void and if anyone should be able to tell, it's Puck.
She wants to not care about Beth, but she's so far from being there that it's laughable.
Her phone buzzes, and when she looks down and sees that she has yet another text from him, she promptly deletes it without even opening it.
He probably thinks she's heartless, and it saddens her a little bit, but Puck pretty much dropped her after she had his baby. He's just as responsible for the breakdown of their relationship as she is.
Maybe having a baby isn't enough to keep two people in each other's lives, and especially not when they're not even raising that baby.
I would've been fine she thinks, I would've been fine without him.
If we hadn't crossed paths, I would have never gotten like this.
Maybe I'd still be Finn's girlfriend and we'd be prom king and queen.
It's not that she still loves Finn, and she's not sure that she ever truly has, but he was her before. Before Puck, before Beth, before her parents kicked her out, before all the mess and bad decisions. He was before.
Last year she had tried to go back, to the before, but she found out that being with Finn again didn't make her feel any different. It's didn't take away her pain or fix all the problems brewing inside her. All it did was break up her and Sam, and pave the way for another Finn and Rachel rendezvous.
She didn't know how to tell Sam I'm sorry that I cheated on you because I thought being with Finn would make me feel like I did before I had a baby and my life turned to shambles, so she just told him she was sorry, and that was apparently enough for him to forgive her enough to be her friend again.
She really doesn't understand Sam and his seemingly endless patience and compassion. She hasn't ever met anyone so fundamentally good. She wishes she could be a little bit more like that sometimes, but she figures that's how you get taken advantage of.
(She wasn't too drunk to not be able to give consent, but she does feel a little taken of advantage of by Puck, and she decided that she never wanted to feel that way ever again.)
Sam is still, despite it all, her friend, and both Mr. Schuester and Ms. Pillsbury's words ring in her head.
They both encouraged her to let some of her friends know what's been going on with her, but the thing is, Quinn really doesn't have many friends.
She has Sam, but the fact that she can't stop obsessing about what she does and doesn't eat and is making herself throw up seems a little too heavy for her ex-boyfriend who just transferred back to McKinley and is trying to win back his other ex-girlfriend.
She doesn't want to burden him. She doesn't feel like she deserves his support. And beyond that, she feels ashamed.
Mr. Schue and Ms. Pillsbury both vehemently told her not to feel ashamed but their words aren't nearly enough to assuage the burning fires of shame within her.
She feels stupid and she feels weak.
She feels useless.
She feels like this is all she's good for.
And that's enough to deter her from talking to Mercedes, either, who is probably her only other actual friend.
(She hasn't spoken to Santana or Artie in the week since they ratted her out to Mr. Schue.)
"Sup, MILF?"
She freezes up immediately and the books that she's holding fall to the floor. The same words he used the day he found out she was pregnant. He was angry then, and he's angry now.
"Not now, Puck."
"If not now then when? Do I have to schedule in an appointment? Because if you can't even make time for your kid, then-
"Shut up, Puck," she growls.
It's not the most clever comeback that she's ever come up with, but she's panicking and she's desperate to shut him down. She doesn't want to have this conversation at all, but especially not in the middle of a crowded hallway where people are already beginning to stare.
"What the hell is wrong with you?"
"A lot of things," she quips, already turning on her heels to walk away from him.
"So what? You can just have a baby and then not care about her anymore?"
"Puck-
"I knew you were the fucking ice queen, but I had no idea you were this fucking cold. Grow a heart will you?"
"That's rich coming from you," she says, even though she's been internally repeating to herself don't engage, don't engage, don't engage. Puck has always been able to get underneath her skin.
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"That you're not exactly a model citizen, either."
"Yeah, well at least I still care about my kid!"
"She's not our kid anymore, Puck."
"God, Quinn, you really are just a heartless bitch, aren't you?"
"Don't talk to her like that," calls a familiar voice, and as he wheels herself toward her, she rolls her eyes because he is the one person that she doesn't want to come to her aid in diffusing this very loud and very public confrontation.
"Watch your mouth, Puckerman," yells another voice, and Quinn rolls her eyes, because no, there's a second person she doesn't want to come rescue her who is actively doing so.
"Well, isn't this nice. Wheels and a slut have come by to help protect the bitch queen."
"They haven't done anything wrong, Puck," Quinn finds herself saying despite herself, because yeah, she's pissed off, but angry Puck is a particular type of hell that they do not deserve to be subjected to when she's the one that set him off.
"Yeah, but you have. So they should leave us alone so that I can-
"Oh no," Santana chuckles darkly, "we're not leaving. You are."
"Like I take orders from you."
"We could get Mr. Schue and tell him that you were screaming at Quinn in the middle of the hallway," Artie says, and Quinn can tell that he's trying his hardest to sound serious, but Artie is about as threatening as a teddy bear.
"Ah, you two getting Mr. Schuester involved with something. What a surprise," she mutters, and Artie looks slightly dejected for a second, and Santana rolls her eyes, but neither of them are seriously deterred.
"There are razor blades in my hair, Puck. You know this."
"What are you going to do? Attack me in the middle of the hallway?"
"If you don't leave Q alone," Santana says calmly, as if attacking him with razors if he doesn't walk away from her friend is the most normal thing in the world.
"You guys, you're all being… oh."
"Quinn, are you okay?"
"Q?"
She doesn't answer, just tries to blink away the dots that had suddenly appeared in her vision. She feels herself swaying a little bit on her feet, and Santana notices immediately, gently pushing Quinn so that she's sitting down in Artie's lap.
"Talk to me, Quinn."
"Is she okay?" Puck asks quietly, and from what Quinn can make out from Santana's face, she's surprised that he isn't slapped right then and there.
"Get lost, Puckerman."
"But-
"We got her," Artie assures him, "but you need to leave her alone."
"What the fuck happened, Q?" Santana asks, kneeling down and resting her hands on Quinn's knees.
"I just… felt like I might pass out for a second. But now that I've sat down I feel fine," she says as she tries to stand up, feeling more and more acutely embarrassed for sitting in Artie's lap in the crowded hallway with each passing second.
"No, no, no," Santana says, pushing Quinn back down, "no moving."
"But-
"Quinn, I can't feel my legs, it's fine," Artie jokes, obviously just trying to make her feel a little bit better, but the only thing that is going to make her feel better is getting away from all the passerby's who just heard Puck scream that she was a heartless bitch that didn't care about her child.
"When's the last time you ate something?"
"That's none of your business."
"Oh yes, it is, Quinn. Do you even know me at all? Everything is my business. I'm just that kind of bitch."
"Well you didn't have to make it Mr. Schuester's business, too."
"Nice deflection, but I told you that if you weren't going to talk that I was going to tell him."
"You still didn't have to."
"Yes," she says emphatically, "I did. And you almost passing out in the middle of the hallway stint just now pretty much proves it."
"I'm fine," she says bitterly, "It was just Puck."
"Puck has done a lot of things to you, Q," Santana sighs, "but he's never made you literally weak in your knees before."
"Do you want me to wheel you to the nurse?"
"No," she shakes her head, "I'm okay."
"Sure, you're just fine and dandy," Santana hisses.
"Santana-
"What I think Santana was trying to say," Artie says diplomatically, "is that she's really worried about you and that you telling her that you're fine when you're quite obviously not isn't helping."
"Well, that's flattering of her, but-
"No, don't you two start fighting," Artie interrupts Quinn again, "I just helped break up one fight, and I don't want to do it again today."
"Look, Q, what if we just ditch class and go get lunch? There's that diner with those blueberry pancakes you go fucking crazy over within walking distance of the school for me, and rolling distance for you and Artie."
"Santana, I'm not-
"Your choices are lunch with us or the nurse's office."
"Fine. But Artie's not wheeling me the whole way there."
"We'll see about that, Q, we'll see."