A/N: Special thanks to QuinnAbrams for giving me some ideas for this chapter and helping me spot a few continuity issues between this and my other stories in the same 'verse. Thanks to WildeAbrams for some continuity catches as well! They are super sleuths! And thanks to you both for your amazing reviews!

Quinn returned from hanging out with Mercedes, after waiting for what seemed like long enough for Tina and Artie to have a decent pool date. Quinn showed up at the driveway just as Tina was climbing into her mom's car. After giving Tina an awkward wave, Quinn let herself into the backyard through the gate, figuring that if Artie didn't accompany Tina out, then he must still be swimming.

Sure enough, she found him still doing laps in the pool. When he was swimming, you almost couldn't tell he was any different than another person. If you paid attention, only then did you notice his arms doing all of the work, his legs trailing limply along behind. But he swam so fluidly that it wasn't obvious unless you really watched closely.

"Why didn't you drive her home?" Quinn wanted to know, stooping beside the edge as he paddled over and grabbed onto the side.

"Oh." Artie seemed dumbfounded by the question. "Yeah. I guess that would have been smooth of me, huh? But her mom was out anyway and you know how long it takes me to get in the car..."

Quinn just shook her head at Artie's cluelessness.

"Is she coming to the lake tomorrow?" Quinn wanted to know.

"She is," Artie confirmed. "So I think that'll work out, don't you? You and Tina can share one guest room, Amy and Mom can have the other, Mimi and Pops will keep their room, and I'll take the study downstairs this time."

"Definitely." Quinn hoped her enthusiasm was convincing. "I'll hang with Amy and let the two of you have your time together."

Artie frowned a bit. "You don't have to do that..." he started to say, but giving it a second thought, he seemed to understand better. "Well, maybe."

"It'll be fun," Quinn assured him. "I like Amy. We'll hang out and give you and Tina your space. I know it's your only chance to hang out before she leaves for the summer."

Artie nodded. "She's actually going home to finish packing now so she can come tomorrow," he said. "She can spend the night but she's going to get a ride from the lake straight to camp on Sunday morning. It works out, since her camp's in Columbus."

"You guys needed to do this," Quinn told him.

"Tina's never seen me water ski before," he casually mentioned, at which point Quinn's eyebrows had gone way up in surprise. (She was always kind of expressive with those arched brows, a speciality of hers.)

"You can water ski?" she echoed, in shock. "Why didn't you do it at the lake when we went with everyone?"

"It's a water ski you sit in," Artie explained. "It's kind of tricky to use. Pops bought it for me and insisted I learn. But I still fall a lot when I'm trying to get up. I didn't want to bore everyone."

"It wouldn't have bored anyone!" Quinn exclaimed, which made him smile.

I always used to go water skiing at the lake before the accident," he shared, uttering three words that rarely seemed to leave his lips, or so she'd observed. "Pops looked into water skiing for paraplegics while I was in the hospital. Told me he really didn't want to see me quit." Artie then smiled fondly. "He's always been that way."

"I'm looking forward to seeing your Mimi and Pops again," Quinn said. "So, are you coming in or anything?"

"I'm trying to savor all the time I can get in this pool before I have surgery." Artie made a face. "You want to join me?"

"Sure!"

Quinn hurried inside and put on a one-piece black suit that she owned from the times when she'd swim laps at the fitness center pool, back when she had a membership with her family. She surveyed herself in the mirror. Pumping was slowly melting her tummy away. She could still pass for being about three months pregnant, but she definitely looked and felt a lot better than she had a few weeks ago.

When she returned, Artie had yet to stop savoring his pool time. He continued swimming back and forth. Saying nothing, she simply joined him, noting that swimming was one of the few exercises she could handle right now. Maybe she would have to make a point to come out here more often and swim, by way of getting back into shape before school started again next fall.

When they finally came up for air and stopped in the shallow end, Artie made a comment she wouldn't soon forget. "The pool is where I feel the most free," he said. "Swimming makes me feel almost normal."

Artie Abrams couldn't keep from breaking her heart, again and again. She'd never taken the focus off of herself and her own troubles to properly notice, until now.

...

Everyone slept in a little on Saturday morning, even Artie who usually got up really early, or so she'd learned. After a quick and simple breakfast, they got in the family car, Mrs. Abrams, Artie, Amy, and Quinn. On the way, they picked up Tina to join them.

Tina and Artie were trying really hard at this relationship thing. Since Amy was riding up front with her mom, that left Quinn to sit in the back with these two. Artie tried to find any and every excuse to pay attention to Tina. Tina, in turn, was extra giggly.

Maybe I was wrong about these two being headed for a break-up, Quinn thought. In all honesty, she was rooting for them. She was all for whatever made Artie happy. And right now, that seemed to be Tina.

After the two and a half hour drive past Columbus to the lake house, they finally pulled into the driveway of the picturesque, little yellow house with the wrap-around porch. Amy grabbed Artie's chair parts out of the trunk and set it up just as fast as he typically would. As they headed up the walkway, Quinn thought back to when she'd visited in her heavily pregnant state. She would be able to have a lot more fun this time around.

"Well, look at you!" Mimi's eyes went straight to Quinn when she answered the door, so much so that she'd seemingly forgotten her grandchildren and Tina. "I want to hear all about it, if you're up to sharing later. Congratulations, dear."

Quinn still didn't mind being congratulated, even though she didn't have a baby in her arms. And Mimi asking to hear about the birth made sense, given her past as a midwife. Quinn remembered, as they talked about the baby, that it was past time for her to pump. As they all made their way inside, she quietly asked Mimi about a private place to take care of her business.

"Feel free to head up to the guest room," Mimi told her. "I'm so pleased to hear you decided to go ahead and pump. I know it's a pain, but your body and the baby will thank you later."

After thanking Mimi, she headed upstairs, taking one of the guest rooms with the twin beds. She supposed it didn't matter which one she took, so she went with what looked to be the slightly smaller of the two for herself and Tina, giving the bigger one to Amy and her mother.

As she pumped, she surveyed the decor in this room. Mimi sure did like family pictures. She made sure to feature both of her daughters and their families equally.

There were three of those oval-shaped frames that featured school pictures through the years. Amy's was complete, with her senior picture in the middle. That was back when she'd had the long brown hair that Quinn remembered. The highlighted pixie cut did suit her personality better.

The cousin, whose name had been mentioned once but Quinn had forgotten, had pictures all the way through sixth grade. She looked enough like Artie and Amy to pass for a sister, not a cousin, which made sense because their mothers were identical twins.

Artie's frame of school pictures stopped at his most recent photo for ninth grade. When she was able to unhook herself from her pump, she moved over to examine his more closely. She studied the picture from third grade, fairly sure that this was taken from his second round of third grade, because he looked so much older than the picture right before it. His second grade picture was the first one that showed him in glasses. It was hard to believe so much had happened to him between those two photos.

Quinn wasn't close to either set of her grandparents. She doubted either set had more than maybe a couple pictures of she and Frannie in their home. If she had been close to them, well, then she might have reached out to them when she got pregnant for help. But no, they weren't really an option, which was why Quinn ended up with friends instead of extended family. She couldn't help but look at these three shrines to each of Mimi and Pops' grandchildren and feel a little bit jealous.

She finished up her pumping and came downstairs to find that everyone had just dumped their luggage in the living room and had gone outside for lunch on the back porch. Mimi was in the kitchen, cutting up a watermelon when Quinn walked up with her full bottles of milk and the bags to transfer it in.

"A big hassle, but it's well worth it in the end," Mimi commented, as Quinn quietly and expertly went to work. She nodded as she carried out her task without spilling a drop, as she'd learned to do.

"I guess," Quinn said, with a shrug as she sealed up the second of the two bags she'd just filled. "Sometimes I'm not sure how much longer I can keep it going. My goal is for the summer. Doing this at school was hard, and it was just two weeks..."

"And that's perfectly fine," Mimi said, quickly. "I didn't mean to imply that you had to do it. It's certainly okay if you quit too. I used to tell all my new moms that."

And then suddenly, without warning, something about that comment — maybe Mimi's reference to her as a new mom — set her off again. It had been a minute since the last time she'd cried over Beth.

Mimi immediately wrapped her up in a tight hug, right there in the kitchen, and Quinn marveled over how wonderful it must be to have a grandmother to hug you like this. She was certain Mimi would be coming around to help when Artie had his surgery.

"I didn't mean to upset you, sweetheart," Mimi was saying. "You did such a brave thing, carrying this baby and then giving her up like you did. Not many people your age could do that with such dignity and grace."

Quinn sniffled and wiped her eyes then, smiling back at Artie's amazing grandmother. "Would you like to see a picture of the both of us?" she asked. "I have a lot, actually, since I wound up living with the adoptive mother for the first couple of weeks."

"Would love to!"

...

After lunch, which Artie barely touched owing to the plans for water skiing, they headed out to board the boat. Artie's grandfather was pretty strong for an older guy, strong enough to give Artie a piggy-back ride out to the lake. Quinn was pretty sure Artie didn't let just anyone do that for him.

Once they were in the boat (Quinn got in much easier this time around), they got to work getting Artie set up in his water skiing equipment. The sit ski was a work of art, and it must have been an expensive purchase, but you could tell that Pops had no regrets about buying it.

Once he was in the water and had a hold of the end of the rope, it did take Artie several tries to get up. After each failed attempt, he had to stop and struggle to reset himself for the next..

Just when Quinn was sure Artie would give up on the next try, it was then that he positioned himself fully upright in the seated position, pulling back against the rope and using the resistance to propel himself through the water. The entire boatload letting out a loud whoop, as Nancy hurried to film him on her camera phone.

Artie kept himself upright in the center of the wake for a long time, and then, when Quinn had been certain he was about to let himself drop back into the water, instead, he ventured out of the wake. Artie let himself drift out to the side of the boat for awhile, as the rest of them cheered. Then, he somehow knew how to hop his way back into the wake for a moment, before venturing off to the opposite side.

He'd definitely impressed Tina, whose jaw just about dropped to the bottom of the boat when he did that. Quinn watched her watching Artie. She wondered if Tina had noticed the way every muscle of his deceptively strong arms and chest was clearly defined when he used nothing but his upper body strength to accomplish this task. Quinn had tried not to notice, but you couldn't help but appreciate his strength.

When Artie finally chose to let go of the rope and sink down into the water, Quinn realized what Artie's life was really missing. More than anything, he'd needed some way to show off his athleticism. Now that he'd done so, Quinn just hoped he'd earned himself a little of Tina's respect.

As Artie half-climbed and half-got-pulled back into the boat, he made a point to look expectantly at Tina. Quinn all but held her breath until Tina wrapped him up in a huge hug. As for Quinn, she kind of wanted to hug him, too, but it would be weird with his girlfriend there. So, she settled for a high-five instead.

Amy went water-skiing next, then Tina went tubing, and finally, Tina and Artie went tubing together . Quinn wasn't cleared by her doctor for this kind of activity yet, so she just enjoyed cheering on the others and took in the feeling of the breeze whipping her across her face as she went along for the ride.

Afterwards, they all headed inside to take showers and settle in for the evening. Quinn had to get in another pumping session after hers, of course, and Mimi had made space in the freezer for Quinn to use while she was there.

Everyone was inside trying to choose a DVD from Mimi and Pops' impressive collection of old movies, but Quinn noticed Artie was missing. She peered out the back door and spotted him sitting on the back porch, staring out at the waves. They'd gotten their lake time in just in time for dark clouds to come rolling in.

"Kind of ominous," Artie commented, when she headed out to join him. Quinn could see that something had his wheels turning, and not the wheels on his chair. He gestured to the sky. "About sums up how I feel about this surgery on Monday."

"You still aren't telling Tina," Quinn observed, with a careful glance over her shoulder to ensure she hadn't been followed.

Artie pursed his lips but shook his head, stubbornly. "No," he said, absolutely resolute. "I'm keeping her out of the loop. You're only in the know because you live with us."

"I know, I know." Quinn still couldn't believe he'd keep a thing like that from his girlfriend, but maybe her first inclination about the potential breakup on the horizon had been the correct one. "I won't say anything."

...

She'd finished her last pump before bedtime while Tina was out on the porch, spending some quality time with Artie. Knowing Quinn's routine by now, Tina knocked before re-entering the bedroom. Quinn was just putting everything back in place and getting ready to go downstairs to stow her milk in the freezer as Tina slipped inside.

"That is a lot of work."

Tina was just now noticing that Quinn put an awful lot of time and effort into supplying Beth with her meals. Quinn just nodded and excused herself to the kitchen. It was weird to be spending so much time doing something most people her age knew nothing about.

And that right there was Artie's life, in a nutshell, too.

She returned to find Tina lounging in one of the twin beds, looking through some sort of album.

"I found the grandparents' photo albums," she said, grinning wickedly. "You want to see some pictures of little Artie? This is volume one of the grandkids, so it starts with Amy, of course."

Quinn tentatively sat down on the bed next to Tina, who flipped past the pictures of Amy quickly, to get to baby pictures of Artie. She opened her mouth to protest, but stopped when she noticed the photographs.

"I just knew he'd be a cute baby," Tina commented, as she flipped to one where Artie's enormous blue eyes stared back at them, his tell-tale ears sticking straight out. He couldn't have been more than six months old here.

"Kind of like what your kids are gonna look like," Quinn teased, and Tina's lack-of-response to that spoke volumes as she continued to the next picture as though Quinn hadn't even spoken.

"You think this was his first time playing soccer?" Quinn commented again, when they came to a photo of Artie when he looked to be about three, in a soccer uniform, holding a ball.

"I guess so," Tina remarked. "I never have heard him say much about his soccer days. I think it was a competitive team though."

"It was," said Quinn, who was surprised to know more about this than his best friend of three years and now-girlfriend. "Finn and Puck were on a team with him, too."

"Wow, is this Finn then?" Tina commented. The soccer uniform was different in this picture, and Finn and Artie were a little bit older here, maybe four or five, but Finn was already a tall kid for his age here. It was unmistakably him.

"I feel weird about doing this," Quinn admitted, casting a glance over her shoulder. Artie wasn't going to be coming upstairs tonight, but there was still the risk of Amy walking in. Quinn couldn't exactly explain why it felt weird, but she remembered Mimi's comment about how guarded Artie could be, when it came to his past life.

"It's just pictures," Tina argued, as she continued thumbing through the book. "I'm sure Artie wouldn't really care that we looked at them."

Do you know Artie? Quinn thought, ruefully. She thought about countering that with an argument but she wasn't going to talk Tina out of looking through the rest of these.

The back of the album contained some photographs of Artie in his wheelchair, the first one he'd had, the one that had been blue. Quinn was glad to see there were still pictures here where his smile reached his eyes once more. He looked happy in ones where he did silly poses with his sister. The family still went on plenty of outings. There was a long series dedicated to then building of the backyard pool. Life goes on, that was the message here, and Quinn was sure he'd bounce back one more time this summer.

"Time for bed," Tina announced, when they'd reached the end and she'd closed the album. She yawned. "Mike has to pick me up really early so we won't be late for our first counselor meeting."

"Mike Chang is coming here to pick you up?" Quinn repeated, aghast, as she felt some of the color drain from her cheeks.

Tina gave her a funny look. "Well, yeah," she said, as though it should have been obvious. "It was on his way. Who else would be picking me up and taking me to camp?"

Quinn wanted to yell at Tina for being so clueless, but she didn't. She just asked, "Does Artie know Mike's picking you up?"

Tina genuinely didn't get it. She was inexperienced enough to be confused about these things. "Why does it matter?"

Quinn wasn't going to be the one to try to explain it. It just infuriated her that Tina hadn't even been able to stop and think about why riding with Mike and being alone with his was inappropriate.

"It doesn't," Quinn flat-out lied. "I'm ready for bed, too. Goodnight."