A/N: School's going to be a pretty big handful for me even with just the few classes I'm taking. I have a couple days off during the week though so during that time I'll try to get updates done for you guys. I woke up today with the idea for this chapter in my head so I figured since it's been a week or so again I would update. Hope you guys enjoy it :) –Kay.

Chapter 6-

It was during glee club rehearsals that Rachel first noticed the way things had changed with Quinn and Sam. They talked more, they exchanged glances and smiles when they thought no one was looking, but what was even more strange was the way Sam took to rushing to her aid every time something was wrong. The other day during dance rehearsals, Quinn had slipped and fallen. Both Finn and Sam had rushed to her side.

"Are you okay? Is the baby alright?" Finn had asked in a rush.

"Maybe we should take her to the nurse." Sam had offered, only for them both to receive a glare and a snappy response for Finn to help her up from the blonde.

At first Rachel had just thought the newly blossomed smiles and conversations between her two blonde teammates was because her and Sam's plan with the break up had worked out for them, but she wasn't having any luck with Finn and while Quinn and Sam seemed to be on better terms now, Quinn was still with Finn and spending nearly all her time with him. Something else was up.

It had been two weeks since Finn had come over to her house. They were supposed to have been making plans for Sectionals since it was coming up in the next few weeks, but all he did was rant about all the things going on with Quinn. She had tried to give him advice and help him out, but she wasn't sure she had made any impact. She was trying to show him that she cared –obviously more than Quinn did about him- but he still seemed to be focused on nothing but his pretty little blonde girlfriend and their baby.

She had stayed in the choir room a few minutes later than normal today, finding Mercedes, Kurt, Tina, and Artie had stayed to. She made it a point to make sure that Quinn, Finn, and Sam weren't actually in the room or about to come back in before she moved over toward the piano where Kurt and Mercedes were standing. They nodded to her and she decided to get to the point quickly.

"Don't you guys find it a little strange that Sam rushed to Quinn's side the other day in rehearsals?" she asked.

Mercedes and Kurt exchanged a look she wasn't sure how to measure.

"Why would that be strange? Sam's a nice guy, he helps a lot of people." Kurt said indifferently.

"Yeah, it's no big deal." Mercedes added.

"But he seemed so concerned, like almost more so than Finn did." Rachel noted thoughtfully.

Once again, Kurt and Mercedes eyed each other then looked over at Artie and Tina.

"Look Rachel, we gotta go." Mercedes blurted out quickly.

The four of them shuffled –or rolled in Artie's case- their way out of the choir room. Rachel frowned and folded her arms across her chest.

.

"Wait, so you mean to tell me that Manhands knows?" Santana asked into the receiver of her cell phone. "Look Wheezy, I didn't go telling Britts and you so that everyone and their mother could find out the baby drama. If Berry knows, Q is screwed."

Santana knew she probably shouldn't have said anything to anyone in the first place after she had found out the news from Sam, but it kind of just slipped out. She had told Puck first and he had wanted to say something to Sam about it, make sure his boy was okay and whatever, but she had made him swear not to tell anyone. The same promise had been required of Mercedes, but obviously the girl ran her mouth a bit more than Puck did. Pretty much everyone in glee club knew now.

"We didn't tell her anything, we just left the room, but I'm pretty sure she knows. She was getting all suspicious." Kurt added on the other line.

"Q doesn't even know all of you guys know, shit, she doesn't even know that I know okay. If the dwarf knows something is up, you know she's gonna go tell Finn, and then everything's going to blow up. And do you think I want that on my head? No, I don't." Santana snapped.

She turned her leer at no one down the hallway, her eyes narrowing even more as she saw Puck approaching her. He had that stupid crooked smirk on his face that he usually did right before he came and told her she was being a pain in the ass and he wanted them to get back together –again- just like usual.

"Gotta go. Make sure the midget says nothing." She finished, snapping her cell phone closed and adjusting it into its regular place in her bra.

She turned to the mirror on the inside of her locker door, feigning a look of indifference as she fixed her Cheerios ponytail and put on some more lip gloss. She could see Puck standing behind her, but she didn't turn to look at him.

"San, come on, quit." Puck muttered behind her.

Santana rolled her eyes and put her typical sneer on her face as she turned around to look at him, arms folded across her chest.

"Oh, I'm sorry, I can't talk to you. My boyfriend doesn't like it when I talk to other guys." She sneered.

Puck laughed dryly, "You don't do boyfriends unless they're me, so I'm calling you out on that one."

She glared at him, her arms tightening where they were folded. He knew her way too well. She didn't want any other boyfriend, this was all just a part of the charade she usually put on when they got in an argument and frustrated with each other and 'broke up.' It usually didn't last more than four or five days, today was day three.

"You'd be surprised what I do that's not you." She smirked tauntingly.

Puck rolled his eyes, "You're full of shit. Now stop being a stubborn pain in the ass and just get back together with me already."

Santana's eyes moved up the hall a little ways to the small janitor's closet that the two of them got more use out of than any of the janitor's that worked here. She knew what was coming next, it was always the same. The smirk on her face turned less taunting and angry and more sly and seductive. She grabbed the front of his t-shirt and dragged him with her down the short distance to the closet.

As soon as they were in the small space and the door was closed behind them, Puck was kissing her and they were already tugging at each other's clothes. She knew that was all the answer he needed to the question of their getting back together. Right now she didn't care about Quinn's issues.

.

Rachel stood at her locker, tapping her fingers against the metal of the open door. She was looking down the hall at Quinn at her locker, her lip caught between teeth. Sam was standing with Quinn and obviously the two didn't realize that people were actually paying attention to them based on how close they were standing to each other. Rachel had a gut feeling that something else was going on with the two of them, something that everyone else but she and Finn seemed to know about. She had her own suspicions, but she was just waiting for something to actually confirm it before she went to tell Finn. She had to tell him if something was wrong, it wasn't fair to him not to know about something going on with his own girlfriend –even if Rachel's motives for telling him about it were not just to be a good friend.

She squinted her eyes as Quinn's face lit up in a smile. She tried to make it as unobvious as possible as she maneuvered, trying to get a look at what was going on in the small space between the two blondes. Finally she came to realize what it was. Sam had his hand resting on the bump in Quinn's stomach. He said something to her that caused her to blush and laugh as she pushed his hand away from her stomach.

Rachel's brow furrowed. Pieces were all coming together in her head. Sam had always looked worried about Quinn when the announcement that she was pregnant had first been let out. He always had a sad, dejected look on his face when he saw Quinn with Finn, and it was worse than the way that Rachel looked when she saw the two of them –like there was more to it for Sam. Since Quinn had been left alone a couple weeks ago when Finn had gone over to her house, Sam and Quinn had been a lot closer. Then there had been the incident the other day when he had rushed to her side when she'd fallen. And now.. now they were talking and smiling and laughing in the middle of the hallway together… while he touched her stomach. Not even Finn did that. But Sam couldn't be…

Well, she really didn't know much about Quinn and Sam's past. She had heard that Quinn worked at a Summer camp all summer, and while she didn't know what Sam had done, she knew that he hadn't been around to run into in Lima while they were out of school. The pieces fit, and it made some sort of sense of things.

She had to tell Finn. Quinn was allowing him to believe that he had to stay with her and had to take responsibility for the unborn child because she was telling him it was his. It wasn't.

"Hey Rachel." She flinched the moment she heard the voice beside her.

Sam had already left Quinn she noticed –probably because he had seen Finn coming. Rachel turned to look up at Finn, her lower lip still clamped tightly between her teeth. The friendly smile on Finn's face faltered and his brow furrowed as he took in the distressed look on her face.

"What's wrong?" he asked.

"I-I have to tell you something…"

.

The punching had come out of nowhere. One second they were all standing in the choir room waiting for Mr. Schuester to get there, Quinn talking to Sam since Finn hadn't actually showed up yet, and the next, suddenly there was Finn, and his fist was colliding again and again with Sam's jaw. Sam had thrown in a few good punches to Finn too, but whatever had Finn's anger fueled just kept him going.

Quinn stood with her mouth hanging open, tears stinging her eyes as she watched Puck try to tug Finn back off of Sam, Mike grabbing hold of Sam's arms to hold him back from going after Finn as soon as they were separated. They weren't separated for long though, Finn swung out again and landed a blow right to the side of Sam's face. Santana was yelling in Spanish in the background, her words definitely sounded very far from friendly.

"Stop it, Finn, stop!" Quinn shouted, only taking a couple steps closer to their fight before she was recoiling back as fists were flying again.

Finally Mr. Schuester came running into the room, coming in between them.

"Break it up, now! What's going on?" he raised his voice, looking seriously at Finn.

"He just came in here out of nowhere and started sucker punching me!" Sam snapped as he rubbed his already bruising jaw.

"You're lucky I had to stop, Evans." Finn snapped back, pushing forward toward him.

"Finn, stop it!" Mr. Schue yelled, holding him back with Puck's assistance.

"No, they're both lying to me!" Finn yelled loudly.

Quinn felt her chest tighten and her stomach drop. The baby in her belly that had been moving about ten minutes ago wasn't moving at all now. She kept her hands on her stomach as if she were trying to protect the baby girl inside as she took a step closer to Finn.

"Who told you that?" She asked.

"It had to have been Rachel." Kurt blurted out.

"What? I-I didn't do anything.." Rachel stammered guiltily.

"Yeah, it was Rachel, okay, but that doesn't matter. Just tell me, is it true?" Finn asked.

Quinn sucked her lower lip into her mouth and her teeth immediately dug into it. Her eyes flicked over to Sam for not more than a second before looking back at Finn, suddenly blurred with the tears that filled them. She nodded once slowly.

"Yes…" she whispered, "Sam is the father."

Finn's face contorted into a combination of confusion and betrayal. She should have known better than to think that nothing bad would come of all of this.

"All that stuff you said about the hot tub… you just.. you just made that up?" he asked, his brow furrowed.

"You believed her." Sam mumbled.

Finn lunged forward toward Sam again, but between Puck and Mr. Schue they kept him held back again. Quinn felt the tears rolling down her cheeks already and shook her head back and forth slowly.

"I'm so sorry, Finn." She sobbed.

Finn scowled at her and shook his head, "I'm done with you!" He turned his glare on Sam and then the rest of club and threw his hands up in frustration. "I'm done with all of you!"

He turned and kicked over one of the chairs near the piano before storming angrily from the room. Quinn hid her face in her hand as she cried. She counted back from thirty in her head, somewhere amongst the dull mumbles of people talking to each other around her in the choir room, she heard Sam's voice calling her name, so she too hurried from the room. Not after Finn, just to get away from it all. She felt entirely too ashamed of herself to continue standing there with all of them.

She rushed down the hall –unable to really run properly like she would have liked to in her current state- and stopped only when her body was ready to collapse there in the center of the hall. She slowly moved over to one of the benches in between the lockers and sat down, sniffling to herself as her hands moved to her seven month baby bump without thinking.

She had already had a very trying week. She had found out that Mr. Schue learned of Terri's fake pregnancy, and now she had no one she actually knew to adopt her baby. Some days she was positive that adoption was what she wanted to do and then there days that Sam was around more that she felt when he had told her when she had been over at his house could be true, they could be good parents and make it through high school still if they had each other to rely on. Today was not one of the better days.

She had thought that she had things so under control, that no one, especially not Finn, would ever know about the secret that she was keeping, the lie that she was telling. She would have had Finn, had whatever social standing came with still dating the quarterback and having 'his' baby, and hopefully getting everything they had worked for before she had gotten pregnant back after the baby was born, but all chances of that now were gone. Finn hated her, and he had plenty good a reason too, but that didn't make accepting the situation any easier on her.

Quinn's eyes, still brimming with the last of her tears, moved up to look at Rachel as she came up to where she was sitting. She couldn't figure out why Rachel, of all people, would be coming to talk to her. This was her fault after all, she was the one that had somehow, miraculously found out and told Finn. Quinn knew somewhere in the back of her mind that she was being completely irrational. She hadn't had the strength to tell Finn the truth and she was going to keep him wrapped up in her lie for as long as possible, Rachel had merely been able to do what she couldn't.

Rachel sat down next to her hesitantly and Quinn kept her hazel-green eyes locked straight ahead at the lockers across the hall from where they sat on the bench.

"Quinn, I'm really sorry. I shouldn't have-" Rachel cut off as she saw Quinn shaking her head slowly.

"Don't be sorry." Quinn said softly, "You just did what I couldn't do."

Rachel sighed, "But my reasoning for wanting to tell Finn in the first place when I found out was selfish. I didn't mean for it to hurt either one of you the way that it has now."

"Well, it's a little late to take that back now." The blonde muttered indifferently.

"I'm so-"

"Can you just go please? I really want to be alone right now." Quinn cut her off, her eyes closing.

She opened them slowly again to watch as Rachel walked away, only to nearly bump into Sam as he came out of the choir room and down the hall. So much for being alone. Quinn thought to herself. Sam and Rachel exchanged an awkward look and then he moved so that he was sitting down on the bench next to Quinn. She didn't turn to look at him at first, still keeping her eyes focused straight ahead.

"I-I wish I knew what I was supposed to say right now, but I don't." Sam said softly.

Quinn shook her head slowly, still not looking at him. Part of the thing with Sam was, as much as he showed much more maturity than Finn did sometimes, and he had her honestly believing that he would be able to take care of her, he had the same kind of naivety. It wasn't quite the same as Finn's, but they both had very childlike qualities about each of them. Sam's seemed to be coming out more at the moment.

"Right. Let me talk then." She said slowly, careful to think through each of her words before she actually said them. Very slowly she half turned so that she was looking at him. "I know you have it in your head that everything's going to be fine, even now with Finn and everyone else knowing, but it's not Sam. I still don't want this for myself."

"But Quinn, if you and I just.. worked together, we really could handle taking care of that baby. Our baby." Sam began to argue, his hand reaching to touch her stomach.

It had been almost a comfort lately, knowing that someone actually still did want to touch her in the state she was in. She was used to the judgmental glances and the whispered gossip about her in the hallways, the fact that anyone took time to acknowledge her in any way was nice, but with Sam it was a different kind of nice entirely. It was a comfort that she didn't want now though because it would only throw off her train of thought.

She shook her head and stood, gently pushing his hand away from her. His mouth hung open and closed again slowly, his teeth clenching together. She could see the purple bruising of his jaw already and mentally reminded herself that that too was her fault. Finn's pain, her own pain, Sam's pain, they were all her fault. She didn't want to be responsible for hurting anyone else, especially not hurting Sam again.

She didn't want to be a mother at sixteen, that was that. She may not have had the assurance of having Terri and Mr. Schue parent her daughter, but there were plenty of other families out there who wanted babies too, and this baby could go to one of them. She wanted all of this to stop, to be over. She wanted her old life back, being a Cheerio, living at home where her parents actually cared and accepted her, people knowing who she was for all the good reasons. She hated the way that she felt in her own skin now, and she certainly wasn't going to allow the feelings to continue after the baby was born because she was taking care of her all the time.

"I'm sorry, Sam, but… I have to do this my way. On my own." She said and though her voice was quiet, it rang with a certain kind of finality that indicated that no arguing would change her mind.

Sam must have recognized that in her tone of voice, because just before she turned and walked away from him –once again, her arms cradling the bump in her belly- she noticed the glaring glossiness that could only come from the light's reflection off the tears that had collected there.