Chapter Seven:

"DADDY!" Larry shouted as Sam came through the front door.

"Hey sport" he replied hugging his son.

"Hey Quinn, I'm home." He called out, "Larry where's your Mum?"

"Upstairs I think" he replied. Sam made his way upstairs and found Quinn on the balcony. He slipped his arms around her waist and kissed her neck. "Hi" she simply said

"What's wrong?" he asked.

"Nothing" Quinn lied.

"I know you well enough to know that there's something wrong. Has Doctor Connolly called?"

"No. It's nothing honestly."

"Quinn!" Sam demanded.

"Shelby's back!" Quinn blurted out. "Shelby's back, which means Beth's back too." She told him.

"What? How do you know?" Sam asked. Quinn began recounting how she'd noticed her around but wasn't sure if it was her. She told him about the encounter with her at the supermarket, Sam listened intently until she'd finished. "When were you planning on telling me this?" he asked pulling away from her. "I don't know, I didn't think it was important. I can't do anything or make contact with her. I lost those rights when I put her up for adoption."

"I can't believe you didn't think it was important! What about Larry? What if this gir-"

"That girl has a name, Sam!" Quinn said angrily.

"-this girl, Beth, turned up on our doorstep and told Larry she was his sister?" Sam's face tightened.

"We've gone the past seven years not telling him."

"That was different Quinn! They weren't living here!" He shouted.

"Sam, we don't even know that she knows she's adopted. She might not even know about me! About us!" Suddenly the phone rang, interrupting the argument.

"Hello? ...Yes this is Mrs Evans... Right, ok, what does this mean?" Sam watched as Quinn's face fell. He stood and watched her as she seemed to take in a lot of information. Quinn's eyes were blank and were fixed to the wall. "Is there anything we can do? ... I'll speak to him... Thank you. Bye." Quinn said hanging up the phone. Slowly she sat down on the bed and burst into tears. Sam immediately rushed to her side and sat down beside her. He put his arm around her and he felt the anger and rage left his body as he held his wife closely. "Quinn? What did Doctor Connolly say?"

"We can't...conceive." She said through her tears. He pulled her closer as he felt tears slowly falling down his face too. "Quinn, did she say why?" He slowly asked, wiping the tears from his face.

"I have a condition that's known as 'poor egg quality'..." she began. "Egg quality is affected by age. In your early twenties and thirties a woman will have a large number of good eggs, but a few bad ones. As a woman ages into her late thirties and early forties, eggs begin to decline in quality as well as number, which makes it harder to conceive.

Sam, we did conceive, that's what they found when I had the pregnancy test, but because of the quality of the egg that made the difference between carrying it to full term and losing it in the first few weeks. Many poor quality eggs don't implant properly once they are fertilised which unfortunately happened to us Sam. When Doctor Reid noticed this she thought it would be best to make an appointment with Doctor Connolly." She finished, her eyes were red. Sam held her tighter than he ever had. The tears were running down both their faces. "Shhh" Sam whispered, "It's ok, it's ok." He kept repeating. They sat in silence just holding each other, eventually Sam asked "Is there anything we can do?"

"IVF or adoption" Quinn mumbled. "Sam, I'm so sorry I didn't tell you about Shelby."

"Hey, hey, hey... It's ok, I'm not mad. This is more important. Shhh" he said. Quinn began to dry her eyes. Sam took the tissue paper off her and wiped her eyes for her. "Sam, I'm so sorry." She mumbled. "You have nothing to be sorry for." He said softly, he kissed her and hugged her tightly. "We're in this together. We have been since we placed these on each other's fingers." He said touching his wedding ring. "Forever" he uttered. "I'll take Larry out for some dinner, you get yourself into bed and just try and rest." Sam said.

"Thanks Sam. I mean it. Thank you for being my best friend, my soul mate and husband. Thank you for being such a wonderful father to our son." Quinn said kissing him lightly. "You're everything I could have hoped for in life."

"Don't mention it." He laughed. "I kind of like you as well, you know that." He said as he left the room. Even at the lowest point of their marriage he still made her smile. He still made her laugh. Quinn was consumed with love.

Quinn heard the front door shut, she walked over to the window and saw Sam and Larry walking down the road. Quinn got into bed and thought about everything that had happened in the past twelve hours. She'd spoken to Shelby, argued with Sam for the first time in thirteen years and found out she and Sam wouldn't be able to conceive. She'd never known such a long twelve hours. She closed her eyes and just lay there, her brain refused to switch off. She had no idea what they were going to do. Her phone buzzed on the table beside her, 'Hope you're ok and dreaming peacefully xxx" Quinn smiled. Sam was always thinking about her. Quinn wanted to call Kurt but didn't want to pull him away from Blaine again. She knew neither of them would mind but that wasn't the point. She looked at the clock; it was 19:00pm. Sam and Larry had been gone over an hour, they'd be back soon. Quinn needed to put on a brave face for Larry; she didn't want him knowing she was upset.

"Quinn, are you awake?" Quinn heard a voice calling in the distance. She slowly opened her eyes and looked around. Sam was standing in the doorway, "Sorry baby, I didn't mean to wake you."

"Oh you didn't. I must have just drifted off, I've been waiting for you to get back. What time is it?" She asked. "It's nearly 20:30pm, Larry and I got back about half an hour ago. I came to check on you but you were practically dead to the world. I thought you'd want me to wake you up when I got back." He told her.

"Gosh, the last time I looked at the clock it was only seven o'clock. I needed that little nap. It's sort of cleared my head." She told him, Quinn got out of bed and put a sweater over her pyjamas.

"Where's Larry?" She asked.

"In bed, he was beat when we got home, so I just put him to bed." Quinn smiled at her husband. "You really are the best, you know that?" She told him laughing.

"Come on, let's go make some popcorn and put on a movie." He said putting his arm around her and guided her down the stairs. "Sam?" she said.

"Yeah?"

"Not Avatar again." She laughed.

"But-"

"No buts, no Avatar" Sam smiled at her trying to change her mind. "Never mind smiling, no Avatar."

"I know, I was just thinking..." he trailed off.

"About?"

"Lor menari-"

"It means you have pretty eyes in Na'vi." Quinn finished for him

"You remembered?" He asked shyly.

"Of course, I knew at the moment that..." Quinn this time was the one trailing away.

"That?"

"...that you were a geek" Quinn burst out laughing. Sam grabbed her by her waist, Quinn let out a shriek. Sam pulled her close and whispered "I may have been a geek, but at that moment I knew I was going to fall in love with you. I knew I was at the beginning of some magical journey that one way or another would result in you and I together." He lent down and kissed her, she kissed him back. Quinn didn't want to admit but she too knew and felt the same thing at that exact moment. "Let's watch Avatar" she told him.

"Really?" Sam's eyes lit up with excitement.

"On one condition..."

"Go on?"

"You don't repeat it line by line!" She told him laughing.

"Deal!" He laughed. He kissed her again before setting the movie up. Quinn looked around their home and thought about their life. Their life was built upon words, their house built from love but the foundations of it all were built on two words 'Lor menari.'