She kept telling herself it was a fleeting, drunken thought.
But it never went away.
Coach always wanted her to be a fighter, knew working for what she wanted would make her stronger. Sue always was saying that she reminded her of herself at that age, and while that would probably be an insult to anyone else, it meant she could beat anything. She could win.
So Sue made her fight for the Cheerios. Ratting on Santana wasn't a great moment, but it's what she needed to do to get back in charge of McKinley and make sure she had the power to keep everyone else from questioning what was going on with her. Intimidation kept them at bay and from figuring out how distracted and scared she was.
The uniform was like a suit of armor, not because it protected her (although it did, and well), but because it hid her. With it on, she was Quinn Fabray, head cheerleader, and no one had to, or wanted to, know anything else. Tearing someone down who was a bitch on her best days, there was no question, it was worth it.
Sam was perfect. He was cute, dorky in that endearing way, and he meant so well. In a lot of ways, he was like Finn; because she liked him so much, he made her feel okay. Normal. At first, she didn't want to date him because she didn't want to have to rely on someone to make her feel like she was supposed to. It felt like a crutch. She wanted to get through this thing in her head without leaning on a boyfriend, because what would happen when Sam or Finn or whoever wasn't around anymore? It would eat her alive.
But he was relentlessly charming, and part of her just wanted to be happy. It took so much effort to keep from going insane. She lived in her head with all the awful things that terrified her, but when she was practicing that song for the duets competition with him, it turned off for a minute.
When he stuck his foot in his mouth, but ultimately made her believe that he truly didn't judge her for everything that happened to her the year before, she decided to trust him, for at least little while. Even if she was never honest with him or even herself, he was honest enough for both of them. Enough for her to breathe.
The abstinence club and her persistence kept him from getting too physical. Sam using Beiste to keep from getting too close didn't really bother her; she wouldn't, she just couldn't deal with him touching her like that. It made her anxious and want to break down in panic attacks. But she knew it should have bothered her, and she only did what she had to to keep people from asking questions, because if they did, they wouldn't be wondering what was wrong with him.
It was during their performance at Sectionals she realized she couldn't be with him anymore, because she was pretty sure she loved him, and relationships in high school were so ridiculously fleeting that she needed to keep him in her life somehow, which she knew wouldn't happen if they kept dating. He was a barely hidden dork with a huge heart, and she needed something real in her life, even if it meant losing him for a while.
(There was also a very, very small part of her that wanted to be like him, but she just dismissed that as being desperately in need of a real friend).
She couldn't stay single, though. There'd be questions, and stupid boys trying to get with her who she couldn't trust. Or worse, there wouldn't be anyone trying, because things were easily forgotten at McKinley, but a girl getting pregnant, then coming back? That was unheard of. And really, who wanted to be the one to try and get through the abstinence club morals only to knock her up again and fuck up their own life?
After breaking up with Rachel, Finn was looking to gain back some semblance of a reputation too, and being with him would be easy. He was familiar, comfortable, and she knew she could easily throw up the same boundaries she had with him before and he would probably take it. So she kissed him, and fooled around behind Sam's back because she couldn't let him go yet. She didn't want to need someone genuine so badly, but in the end she just knew that he had to be in her life after high school was over.
And so he started dating Santana and couldn't even look her in the eye anymore. It seemed like he wanted to hate her, but couldn't muster the feeling. He just looked sad. And disappointed. She couldn't blame him, she was disappointed too, that she had to cheat on a wonderful boy in order to stand a chance of having him around after she became nothing. Because even with the cheating, she still didn't think he judged her for what went on in her head. At least that's what she was betting on.
Rachel fucked everything up by wanting things so badly, things a normal sixteen-year-old wanted, like fame and a career doing something she loved. And that made Quinn want to drink herself stupid enough to have normal dreams like that. All she wanted was to stop having nightmares, and when she woke up, not to feel so utterly lost that it was in the same body she went to sleep in.
She knew she was smart enough to get out of Lima, probably as far away as she liked as long as she kept her grades up. But what was the point? She couldn't outrun whatever was constantly eating at her, why try to live the lie somewhere else.
Most Sundays, her church was no better than the halls of McKinley with the way gossip went around. She still got dirty looks every week, and it had been almost a year since she was pregnant. When the Evans lost their house and started living in a motel, it was all anyone could talk about in polite whispers with darting eyes. Her mother got in on it too, which made her nauseous, because apparently the Fabray memory was very short.
She knew he would never in a million years ask for help, so she went to his parents and asked if there was anything she could do. His mom found a night shift stocking job at Target, and Sam had just started over at the new pizza place making deliveries. His dad still spent all day looking for work, so there was no one back at the motel most nights to watch Stevie and Stacey, and they really couldn't afford a sitter.
The next day when she showed up at his door, Sam nearly slammed it in her face, but his mom told him not to be rude and he reluctantly let her in. After awkward small talk, they both went off to work and she was left with the kids. They were excited to have her around again, maybe because she was a familiar face, or maybe just because she wasn't exhausted and had the time and energy to play with them. Either way, they acted like she had never left.
For the first week, whenever she was coming or going, it would be deadly quiet, and Sam looked like he could barely keep himself from screaming at her. She didn't blame him, but she was sick of it, and he looked like he needed a friend as badly as she did.
"I'm sorry," she said one night, as he was closing the door behind her.
"What?"
"I'm sorry, Sam."
He knew she wasn't talking about being homeless. He had head that "sorry" enough for a lifetime, and that was just at church where she could hear. She had been there; "sorry" doesn't mean much then.
"Then why'd you do it?"
"Because…" He had left his coat inside and was starting to shiver, and looked impatient. "Because I needed to be your friend."
"Then why couldn't you have just said that instead of frickin' sneaking around with Finn?"
"I just-I don't know." She wanted to say because she was fucked in the head, and knew she was probably going to lose him anyways, and that was the only way she could think to eventually keep him around. But saying it out loud would make her seem as crazy as she felt.
"Goodnight, Quinn," he sighed, and went back inside.
That Saturday afternoon she showed up at the motel and before she even got to the porch she could hear Stacey and Stevie screaming. Sam opened the door and the kids practically toppled her.
"I tried calling you, but you weren't picking up your phone. My shift got changed, so I'm not working today. Sorry you had to come all the way over," he said.
"I mean, I could stay for a while. You look tired."
"They're driving me nuts."
Stacey made a face at him, but just ran over to the bed and began wrestling with Stevie.
"How about I take them out?" she said.
Sam shook his head and frowned. "You know we don't have the money to go out and do stuff."
"Let me take them to Color Me Mine." He gave her a look. "Just think of it as me making it up to you."
He looked at Stevie and Stacey, then back to her. "As long as you don't mind me coming along and showing up all of you with my painting skills," he said loud enough for the kids to hear.
She genuinely laughed for the first time in a long while. It surprised her, and Sam even more, but he just smiled and told his brother and sister to get their coats on.
On the way back to Lima, Stevie and Stacie fell asleep almost immediately, both of them clutching what they had made (Stacie had a blue and purple seahorse, Stevie a mug, like Sam, except instead of having the X-Men symbol on it, he had Sam help with the Flash's lightning bolt, after an argument over who would win in a fight, Wally West or Colossus). Sam was quiet, too, but she could tell he was thinking. He leaned against the window and let out a breath.
"Thanks, Quinn."
"Thanks for letting me," she replied, glancing over to him. "I didn't know you were so good at painting ceramic mugs."
That got a laugh. "I dunno, since I always had a hard time reading, I started getting into comics, because you can tell what's going on without necessarily having to get all the words, y'know? And the characters were all so cool, and, like, what kid doesn't want to draw superheroes? I just ended up being pretty good at it."
"I've never read a comic in my life."
"Really?"
She raised an eyebrow. "Is it that surprising?"
"No, I guess not," he said.
"I think the closest I got were the Narnia books."
"So not very close?"
"Not really, no. But the kids in those books were like superheroes to me, maybe even more than that because they were just kids, but they got to go on these adventures and fight in epic battles. I don't know. There was definitely a period of time when I was a kid that I would try and get to Narnia through my closet."
He didn't reply, just looked at her.
"But seriously. You're talented, Sam." she said.
"Thanks."
The rest of the ride was in comfortable silence.
It felt so good to slap Rachel, even if she immediately regretted it, because once she got past high school, Rachel would have everything. All she would get is a job in middle management, a stomach full of holes, and a life that was meant for a girl who would exist in name only.
That night everything was just so bad. Losing prom queen and having Finn kicked out were nothing compared to how she felt like she was drowning. She couldn't even feel normal in the one place where she still had control and power. If Rachel called her pretty one more time, she was going to slap her again.
She wanted to scream at him that she couldn't feel anything anymore, because if she did, she would have to feel everything. And feeling it would make it real. She couldn't tell him why she needed him, because the only ways she could think to word it made it seem petty, like he was nothing but part of her facade. But he was the only thing that made her functional in school and in glee. She wished that she could stand on her own without him. He didn't get that she had to hide from everyone and it was something she couldn't explain away, and Rachel was just so present and available and god, she wanted to hurt her so badly, and put her in her place.
But then she had nothing, so she grasped at straws to keep everyone at a distance. Saying she had a plan kept them thinking about what she was doing, not who she was and what was going on in her head. She didn't have a plan, but it kept everyone on edge and bought her a little more time.
Nationals made her realize a lot of things. Mostly that even if half of the glee club hadn't planned on moving there, she could never end up in New York. She thought being so small and so nameless would make her feel better, and that the noise would drown out the rest, but it just made her nervous instead. It also didn't help that the tall buildings and all the people brought back her claustrophobia
But she was thinking about maybe living somewhere other than Lima, sometimes. Most days she still figured she'd never live outside of western Ohio, but once in a while Sam would talk about maybe going to art school and trying to get into comics or animation or something he could remotely care about. She would never say anything back, but would daydream for a moment about somewhere else. It was never specific, but it was always not Ohio.
She ended up in the in the other hotel room because she wasn't getting anywhere with song ideas, so she just started writing whatever came to mind. It was a mess. There were just lines of nonsense about her body and her mom, disappointment, and Beth. She couldn't look at it, so she left the room. Santana and Brittany came knocking five minutes later.
It was hard to remember sometimes that they all used to be really good friends, not just stepping stones to the top of the pyramid, or allies when they needed to work against Sue. She missed them, but knew at this point she could probably never get them back, not really anyways. But for a couple of hours they made each other feel okay. She would never admit it, but letting Santana cut her hair did make her feel a little better, because it almost felt like she was making a choice for herself