The Rivalry
On the way back inside of her home/shop, Mercedes felt someone's hand on her leg and she startled. "Hello?" She called out to the one touching her. He wasn't understandable as he grumbled something. It was probably a homeless person. "Do you need something to eat?" She asked, and reached into her purse. $1 were folded in half, $5 folded three times, $10 folded four times…
"Mmmm," he said and she could smell the alcohol all over him. She reached down and helped him onto her shoulder and brought him inside with her. She helped to sit him down at the bar and reached out to touch his face. It was banged up terribly and he groaned when she touched him.
"Sorry," she said, scaling a hand over his Mohawk. "Let me get my friend to make you some coffee," she said and called Quinn. She never announced that she was blind. Soon enough, people would notice, but it was not something that she would simply say, upon meeting someone. "Hey, there's a guy downstairs who is beat up really bad and he's drunk," she said after memory dialing her friend and roommate.
"Well… you want me to come kick him out?" She whispered to Tina, "Some drunk guy's in here. How'd he get in?" Quinn asked as she and Tina got on the elevator to come down to the shop. "Tina's got a weapon. Is he near you? Make sure you keep a distance."
"He's at the bar. I want you to come make him some coffee," Mercedes said. She heard the elevator door open and Tina and Quinn walking over.
Tina immediately began, "Sir, I know that you've had a rough night, but I'll need you to leave…"
He groaned, "T..T…"
Mercedes repeated, "Make him some coffee, and do we have some food that he could have? I'm gonna let him sleep in the backroom and rest up until he heals up some."
"Oh my God!" Quinn said. "Puck?" She questioned. He nodded.
Mercedes asked, "What do you mean, Puck?" Her hands went to his head and she felt the Mohawk on the man. Could this beat up, Mohawked drunken guy really be one of her best friends from the past?
Tina said, "This drunk beat up guy that you let in… it's Puck." They had not seen Puck in almost two years. When they left the institution, they heard that he got arrested for fighting shortly after, and they had not heard anything or seen him since. They did not keep in touch with anyone, but Emma, at the time and she had no word on him. Now, here he was.
They whispered, "I don't think it's a good idea. I mean, I know that we were cool at the institution, but we don't know anything about him, now. He's a drunk. He's beat up. He could have changed. He could be dangerous," Tina said.
"It's Puck, though," Mercedes said. "And, I'm not putting him out on the street." She touched his shoulder and said his name…
"Puck," Mercedes mumbled and Sam froze. He had just kissed her neck… then, she said that. His heart felt heavy in his chest and he wanted to shake her, wake her up and confront her; but instead, he grabbed her hand and stroked it over his face, the tattoo on his neck and the ones on his chest and arms. She moaned, "Sam," and moved in closer to him snuggling to him and resting her head in his chest.
He didn't know what or why she was thinking about Puck, but at least she realized, even subconsciously who was there with her, there for her… he couldn't expect Puck to go away overnight, or even easily. But, his mother had mentioned that she thought there was still more to the Puck and Mercedes issue than Mercy wanted to admit, and he supposed it got to him. Shake it off, Sam. She loves and trusts you. Give her the same respect.
Sam awoke to the sound of someone singing "Broken," which was initially by that hot vocalist woman from Evanescence and another guy that Sam didn't know off hand. But someone else was singing this version. He was only partially awake, vaguely hearing Tina and Mercedes talk about walking the dogs and such made him more alert and he jumped up.
"Good morning!" Tina cheered when she saw him. Mercedes and Tina appeared to be in exercise clothes and Mercy was tying her shoes.
"Sammy?" She said over her shoulder and reached for him. He crawled to her and kissed her good morning, chastely on the lips and softly once, on her exposed right shoulder.
"What's this I hear about the dogs being taken for a walk?" He asked.
"They need to," she said. "So, Tina and I were going to…"
"Would you get mad at me if I asked you not to do that?" Sam wondered. "It's just such an unsafe time, right now. I know that you're fearless, but maybe we ought to lay low – not just you and me, but everyone here. Stuff has been going on for a couple of weeks and we don't know that there isn't a plot against us in the works." He laid his head on her shoulder, nuzzled her neck with his nose and rubbed her arm, "So, if you don't mind?"
Tina said, "You know what? I can take them out back and bring them back inside." She nodded at Sam and touched the side of Mercedes' face. "Mike's already gone for work. Hope we didn't bother you guys this morning."
"Sam slept right through it," Mercedes said. Sam shrugged, but he had actually buried his head with a pillow to try to drown Tina's soft little moans out. She was quiet enough that the pillow sufficed. Mercedes added, "And I put on some headphones."
"Is this you singing?" Sam asked, pointing at the CD player on the nightstand, as the female lead sang in the rendition of Broken through the speakers. Mercedes looked uncomfortable as she turned to music down. "Yeah, it's an old CD that Puck made me a while back. I'm on a couple of the songs, but it was mostly an after we broke up thing…"she said, and eagerly added, "Tina put it on!"
"She gave it to me. It's one of my favorites," Tina said with a shrug, and handed Sam the CD case. "Never cared too much for Puckerman, but that guy's got a great voice." He was reading the CD case: To Be With You: Mr. Big, Broken: Seether and Amy Lee, Burning Bright: Shinedown (They'd sang that at karaoke that night), Until the Day I Die: Story of the Year, Absolutely (Story of a Girl): Nine Days, Let You Down: Three Days Grace, Enigma: Trapt, Wasting My Time: Default, Collide: Howie Day. Sam held the case so hard, he thought it might crack in his hands.
When Tina looked at the look on Sam's face, she reached over to just turn it off. "I didn't realize that Puck was a problem," she said. And truly, she thought that Sam had Mercy in the bag and wasn't worried about Noah Puckerman's absent ass one bit. After Mercy's show of love last night, it surprised Tina that Sam would actually have any care in the world about Puck or any other guy.
Sam smiled tightly and shook his head. "About Puck, how is he?"
Mercedes tilted her head and then quietly said, "Sam, you should know that even though I'm done with Puck, I would never lose concern for him. He's recently lost five years of sobriety, and has to be in essence locked up and away from his family and friends…"
"For a month that's almost over," Sam commented handing Tina the CD case back.
"That's almost the same amount of time that I would've been without them and I wasn't handling it extremely well, either…" Mercedes contended.
Tina uttered, "I'm gonna take Cluster and Kissy outside, now," and she made haste to leave them alone.
Mercedes said, "Not everyone is as strong as you, Sam… and I'm gonna need your strength if I'm going to be able to keep myself together while everyone's dealing with their stuff and whatever else is going on. How am I supposed to feel when you get upset about Puck?"
"If I said another woman's name in my sleep, how would you feel?" He asked.
Mercedes froze. She had not realized that she had said Puck' s name in her sleep, but she remembered her dream and she remembered that it was completely historical and not remotely a threat to Sam. "I suppose that I would be scared. But, Sam – I would just ask you about it. If you'd asked, I would tell you that Quinn and I talked about him last night and I dreamed about when I took him in after meeting him again for the first time in the real world." She huffed out a breath, insulted and annoyed.
Sam watched her for a moment, and knew that she was angry and upset, so he didn't want to add to that. He certainly didn't want to undo all of the good that he'd done the previous night, either; especially not by acting like Puck would have, in a jealous and possessive manner. That wasn't him, she didn't want that and the best thing to do was to listen to her when she told him how to handle her. "Noted," he said, after a moment. "Please, try to understand that this is the first real relationship that I've had, and you'll have to correct me sometimes." She sighed and nodded. Hell, the same was going to apply for her. All that she knew about real relationships were what she picked up from those around her. She didn't have that whole experience/ application thing under control, either.
"If you need to talk to me about him, I'm here," Sam told her and placed a hand on her knee.
"Quinn said that he hasn't been doing too well. He's felt upset and angry with himself for messing up, because he's worried that he's made a negative impact on Beth's life. Plus, now that he's supposed to be staying clean, he has no idea how to deal with his bad emotions. I hate to hear that. I've known Noah Puckerman at his best and worst and at his best – his is a wonderful man, friend, and father. I mean, when you first met him, you saw how great he was with Beth and with the kids at the center. You saw how great he was with Beth and Artie and me. After he realized that I had feelings for you, he started to regress. He had been doing so well, Sam. I promise that Puck had not been the guy that was provoking you and degrading me for years! He just showed up again and came back so intensely, and he is really doing a number on the Noah that I know and love."
Mercedes was such a loving and caring person that Sam knew that there was no way that she could have ever simply tuned Puck completely out of her life, but it still bothered him that she was worried about another man – another man that she once was in love with. He wanted to believe that her love and concern for Puck was just her usual overabundant love and concern; but he wasn't sure and that made him uncomfortable. Sam said, "Well… I can't say that I want you in each other's lives. You don't have kids together or share property or anything that should tie you to him. It's unhealthy for you to get back into his life, not just for you and your growth, but for his. Mercy, if all it took to make him spiral out of control was for you to move on with someone else, he can't handle your friendship – especially while he's trying to get better."
"I know," she said. "And I don't want to be in his life. I just want to know that he's fine without me in it." Her voice was so sad and sweet that Sam's heart hurt to hear it. He hoped that if someone else was going through something in the midst of her possibly being targeted for murder that she would be so concerned about them and not herself. But, even if she wouldn't be, Sam's main concern was her safety and getting this mess off of their backs.
"He will be," Sam said confidently. He waited for several moments to see if Mercedes had more to say about Puck and when she didn't, he told her, "I received a text message from Aphasia last night, before I went to bed." He then reached for his phone and read it to her.
"You think it's legit?" Mercedes asked. "Last time you saw her, she hated you," she reminded him.
"I saw her once after Jesse died. She looked good; I mean happy, or at least not the depressed angry person that I'd last seen." Sam watched Mercedes as she twiddled with her hands and wondered what made her nervous. "Do you think that I should contact her?" He asked.
"I don't know," Mercedes said. "It was strange to me when you and Tina ended up on the same team. Quinn still seems to be on the fence about you. I feel really bad about this Aphasia thing. What if it blows up in your face like Mrs. St. James trying to make a murderer out of you, even though she knew that her husband was abusing her? Maybe, if I had a chance to get a feel for this Aphasia person myself, I'd feel better about it."
"Maybe we could ask Tina? Tina knows her from the crisis center," Sam said. He wasn't sure if he wanted Mercedes to have to face Aphasia. What if she was hostile towards his love because of who she chose to be with? What if she was simply a hostile, period?
"Even still, you just said that we should lay low. Maybe you can text her back that you're out of town for the next few weeks," Mercedes suggested. "Tell her that you'd love to hear her idea, but you're busy right now, and you'll contact her no later than Monday."
"Is that like a business type thing?" Sam asked.
"Yes," Mercedes said. "Also, it's a safety thing… Because how the hell does she even know Matt and why would she want you to help him? I don't want to be judgmental, but with everyone finding out all of these different things… we have to be careful. I don't want to lose you. If this is one of Matt's tricks to smoke you out, let them think that you're still out of town, but don't call her back until we actually are."
Sam snuggled himself up, with his head on her lap. I don't want to lose you. He smiled and wrapped her arms around himself.
"Breakfast!" They heard Emma cheering from the hallway, repeatedly, probably traveling all of the halls, to let the guests know.
Mary Evans called her son to check on him. "How are things out there, right now? No longer hectic or…?"
"We're just laying low. We're staying at a friend's bed and breakfast. It's lunchtime, when the shop's usually closed, so we're taking the time to entertain each other…" Sam began to laugh, then said, to someone in the room with him, "It was 'an entire vagina,' it wasn't 'all the vaginas!"
Artie laughed, also and said, "Whatever! My girl put you on blast!" Others were laughing at Artie's retelling of the night that the guys went out with Sam for the first time.
Sam laughed some more, then cleared his throat and said, "I'm sorry, Mom. Uh.. did you need anything else? We had a heavy kind of night with the prayer thing and some of the guys are atheists, so it wasn't even their deal and stuff. Now, we're doing a bit of something that everyone can truly appreciate and enjoy – chillaying.."
Artie roared, as the others laughed, "Now, who's sounding off? Now, who's wrong? It's 'chillaxing,' not 'chillaying." Mary heard Sam's soft laughter, again.
Then, a voice that she preferred not to have to hear, and from the close proximity, she must have been right up under Sam, "Is that Mary?" Mercedes whispered. He must have nodded, because Mercedes told the group, "Hey, don't say anything obscene. Sam's mother is on the phone. So, be sure to not disrespect her. I've been on the phone with all of you when the room was this full and you all say some things that his mother shouldn't have to hear."
"Evans was just talking right in her ear about a vagina," Artie defended himself. Mercedes threw her head in his general direction. "Oh, alright. Hey, Evans, tell yo' moms I say "WASSAP?" Artie screamed out, eliciting laughter from several people, including Sam.
"Mom, our friend Artie says…"
"Yeah, I heard him. Is he another colored?" She asked, sounding more annoyed than intended.
Sam scoffed and sighed, then said, "No, Mom; and I have to go. I'll call you when we're heading back, tonight. I love you."
"I love you too, Sammy," she said before listening to him disconnect the call.
Mary hung up and let out a frustrated groan. When Sam and Mercedes had been at the house and one of these people called, she had watched as one or both of them talked, passing the phone and/or messages from the person on the phone to each other. Now, suddenly, they had to dedicate their attention to the people actually in the room? Stacie came in, wearing a sundress and a headband and asked, "You want to ride to the store with me to get some gardening stuff?"
That should be a good distraction, and lately, it had been nice to be with Stacie. "Sure. I'll get my shoes. I didn't know that you wanted to start gardening again," Mary said. After the family had to move around so many times, Stacie had gotten sick of losing her flowers and vegetables.
"Yeah, but things have been pretty chill here for like a year, now. Maybe we're good. Besides, I told Mercy that I'd teach her some things about gardening, so she can grow her own tomatoes and stuff. She loves tomatoes and she's really big on flowers with strong scents. It could be something therapeutic for her and Sammy after those rough days of other people's hatred." Stacie answered, grabbing the keys from the hook in her mother's bedroom. Mary should have known. Mercedes. Again.
"You two really do like each other, don't you?" Mary asked, following her daughter to the truck.
"Well, yeah. She's family, now, or she will be, some day," was Stacie's answer. The girl got into the driver's seat, started the truck then sighed and looked at her mother, "Mom – I really need for you to give her a chance. I mean, Sam needs it; but I need it too. It is really hard on me to be the only person in the whole house that actually accepts her. Whether or not she notices it, I feel stressed out about it, and Sammy's eventually gonna stop looking at you as his mama and start seeing the woman that's condemning his lover."
"Stacie… I'm glad that you and Sammy's little, or I guess little's a poor choice of words, 'girlfriend' have taken a liking to each other; but don't get too attached. I don't know if you know this, but they've only officially actually been a couple for a couple of weeks, and all of that time was spent with us. We have no idea what's going to happen with them by the time they're away from our family and back with her friends, who all have only ever been disapproving and judgmental of Sam. I don't think that their so called love is going to last any longer than a few months, and neither does your father." Mary said.
"Well, how about in those alleged few months you be the best mother that you can be and be happy for Sammy. Daddy's doin' it." Stacie suggested.
"How can I be happy when I know that girl is just going to break his heart when she decides that her friends are right about him or when she decides that she wants that Puck boy back?" Mary asked.
"Puck? Mom, what are you even talking about?" Stacie asked, frustrated as she drove the little truck.
"She's got an ex-boyfriend named Puck and any time his name comes up, Sammy gets stressed out and upset, she's flippant about it and if you ask her, she just says that it's in the past," Mary said. "And I can tell that it isn't in the past when she says it."
"Mom, please don't take this the wrong way, but everyone isn't you. Some people are uncomfortable when they're answering a question honestly – especially if it's none of the other person's business and she's just giving you the short answer to be nice. She doesn't want to say 'None of your damned business' to her future mother-in-law."
"I'm not," Mary said, shortly, then, "I don't even know why I'm discussing this with you. You clearly are biased towards her."
Stacie sighed and shook her head, "I'm so sorry that you feel this way. It says a lot about what you think of yourself," the girl said. "I mean, I love you more than any other woman I've ever known, but for some reason, you always only see the bad side of stuff. You been like this every since we found out the truth about your affair…"
"Don't ever mention that again!" Mary snapped at the girl. Stacie frowned, fought tears, but they began to fall, before she could think of something to make them go away. Mary rubbed her leg, to try to comfort her.
Stacie admitted through her tears, "It has been so good to have Sammy in our lives again. I'm older, so me and him have had the chance to bond closer, now. If you drive him away again, you're gonna be driving him away from all of us, not just you." They remained in silence for the rest of the trip.
"I'm gonna make her a CD," Sam said. Tina sighed and rolled her eyes. Quinn gave him a confused look. Lauren lifted an eyebrow.
Tina said, "You don't have to compete. You have her. I seriously didn't know that the CD would bother you like that. I had it in one of my old bags that I hardly ever use and when we were packing, I ended up bringing it with me."
Lauren asked Quinn, "Do you have any idea what these people are talking about?"
"Not at all, but I can't even stay to find out. I've gotta head back to the shop to reopen." She got up and gave Sam a funny look, before shaking her head and making her way to hug Mercedes before she took off, because they probably wouldn't be seeing each other again for a few weeks. "And Santana's only taking another week off, so by the time you get back, things should be back to normal, business wise…" Quinn called out as she made her leave.
Sam watched as Mercedes resumed dancing with Mike and Brittany to some hip hop music. "I'm not competing. I just think that it actually was a great idea, though I'm gonna make sure that I put the guide in Braille. I need some suggestions on songs to put on it. I know that I'm putting the song that I sung for her birthday and Over by Blake Shelton. I sung that to her at my folks' house and she really liked it," Sam said.
"Evans, are these drugs doing something to me, or do you sound incredibly country, right now?" Lauren asked.
"His Southern accent totally shined through with all that he said," Tina commented.
"That was hot," Lauren commented. Sam just smiled, slightly. Mercedes told him something similar when he was talking while he was inside of her. There was something about her that just brought out of him everything that he truly was – the not so bad stuff, at least. In fact, now that he thought about it; he had not had an inappropriate or culturally, racially or sexually insensitive thought or comment in the past few weeks that he could remember. It was like she was bringing out the best in him and also bringing out good in him that he did not even know that he had. Mercy was shaking her tail-feather and Mike and Brittany were dancing all around her.
It had nothing to do with competing. It was more like – just make sure that there is no room for any competition. Was it messed up that he was slightly grateful for the hardship that they were going through together? Because he knew that a good deal of her connection to Puck had been based upon hardship they shared. Another portion of it was based upon him being there for her whenever she was falling… then there was when he saved her life! Well, Sam intended to save her life, too. He intended to save everyone within his reach! He chuckled to himself… She must've been rubbing off on him.
Sam expected all of the tears that accompanied them getting back into the van to leave again. What he had not expected was for a few of them to be his own as he picked Artie up out of his chair and hoisted him up, then put him back, thanking him for the laughs. He hugged everyone and helped his really, really saddened Mercy into the van. "We'll see them again, soon."
Puck wrote the date on the label to the tape and stuck it on. There were so many times that he had mistreated Mercedes that he wanted to apologize for each and every moment, individually. Being not only sober, but away from the intoxication that was her gave him the clarity that he had been missing, in his attempts to recover, in the past. Puck could now see things with eyes that were not drunk with something – be it alcohol or Miss Mercedes Jones, and he was terrified and repulsed at the things that he saw within himself. All of this time, he thought that he had been loving her… He shuddered again and wrapped himself up in his little blanket.
He put the tape in a holder, with the others. Quinn had refused to bring them to Mercedes for him, claiming that Mercedes was in Kentucky with Sam and his family. As impressed as he had been with Quinn's creativity, he was frustrated that his words would take so long to be heard. What if by the time Mercedes knew that he said all of these things, she would in fact belong to Sam Evans? That would KILL him! He took a deep breath. No, no, no… That will not kill you, Puckerman. You do not need her to live, he reminded himself. You do not need her to function.
The photograph of Beth in her angel costume that she wore in the Christmas play at Quinn and Joe's church last year sat on his nightstand. His counselor thought it wise for him to not have any photographs of Mercedes in his room, but he did hide one beneath his photo of his angel. It was one of he and Mercy, hugged up, with the sides of their faces pressed together and bright smiles. That had been taken the week before Sam Evans showed up. Puck and Mercedes had a long conversation about moving forward and, for the first time in years, she seemed like she was ready to give him another chance. She seemed like she had some hope for a real future for them. She told him that she had to think about it and he waited.
They were to have lunch the next week and talk about "them," but by the time the lunch date came, they ended up talking about her taking Sam in, instead. So, Puck continued to wait. He waited as patiently as he knew how. He mentioned it when she had come by the community center that night to give Sam a message. Puck knew from the start that Sam could be a threat and quickly thought he put that mess to rest when he successfully convinced Sam to hit on one of the lovely ladies at the bar. It went better than he presumed, because Evans chose a winner and scored that very night. Then, more perfectly, Mercedes witnessed the fact that he was with someone that night.
When she and Puck took the ride back to her shop, Puck was confident that it was only a matter of time. Just a short wait longer, and Mercedes would finally be his again, and this time, he would do it right. He had been waiting for this for years and had no intention of messing it up, at all. He had redeemed himself for his past transgressions and finally EARNED the love that he truly desired from her. Then, suddenly… after the whole Sam-kissed-Quinn thing, Mercedes told him that she had decided that they were better off as friends and she never wanted to lose his friendship again – which apparently, she felt she had for the time that they were a couple. Gracefully, Puck accepted her answer and promised that he could live with that, no matter how much it hurt. Naturally, being Noah Puckerman, he broke his promise. He found that he couldn't keep it, not while Mercy got increasingly closer to Sam and even seemed like she was actually crazy enough to perhaps fall in love with him!
But, he screwed up. He shouldn't have pushed her. He should have remembered how stubborn she could be. He should have let her see for herself how this thing would end… The only problem with that was that this thing didn't seem to be ending. This thing seemed to be growing. This thing seemed to be real. This thing seemed to be love. Puck wanted so badly to just wish Mercedes the best and see her happy, even if it was with someone else. But, hell – could she ever really be happy with that man? He took a deep breath and got up from the bed to see if there was anything on television in the common room. Maybe he could occupy himself for a bit, before group.
He saw the new dude – some blonde kid with glasses, doing something really suspicious. Puck purposefully looked everywhere else, but at the dude. He didn't want to get involved, but then he saw it. He saw the bottle and he asked, "Hey, Bro – what the hell? Get rid of thate HeH! How'd you even get it inside?"
Thad smiled at him and said, "Actually, I had it brought in, just for you," and waved it around in his face.
"Dude!" Puck said and pushed the bottle from his face.
He tried to walk away but, Thad kept up with him, taunting, "I know more than people think that I do. I don't know everything, of course. I do know bits and pieces and I sometimes can catch things on film." He gave Puck a photo and Puck tried to ignore it, but couldn't resist when he caught a glimpse of Mercedes. He snatched it and looked at it with shaking hands as he recognized the people in the photo, hugging Sam Evans and Mercedes… his friends, embracing that guy – like he was family… like he was accepted! Puck flicked the photograph and kept walking, with his eyes stinging with tears that he did not want to come out. "Didn't your kid's mom tell you that they were out of town or something? I mean, this had to either have happened since you've been inside, or it happened while you were out there and everyone left you out. Either way, isn't this messed up?" Thad picked up the photo and followed Puck again."
"You can't provoke or manipulate me, Man," Puck told him. "I'm the king of that kind of thing. I hate seeing that, but I have a daughter to think about, and I've already let her down once behind that sh*t. I refuse to do it, again."
"Sooooo… not even a sip, eh?" Thad asked. Puck just kept walking. He didn't even bother to award Thad with a glance. If that was how it was, he could be upset about it, but he couldn't afford to let it devour him. He couldn't afford to let it ruin his chances at being the father to his daughter that he should have reminded himself to be the night that he took advantage f that bottle of liquor that Artie had felt behind. Puck felt something prick his neck and his hand flew up to the spot, as he hissed. He turned around and looked at Thad, who had a syringe of some sort in his hands.
"Bastard…" He muttered, as he stumbled over his feet.
"I apologize, Mr. Puckerman. But, you clearly have no idea of how important you are to Miss Jones. That means that you are important to us and we have plans for you. Unfortunately, these plans are of no advantage to you." Puck feel to his knees and his hands slid across the wall. Thad glanced around. If his timetable was correct, which he was sure it would be, he was still going to beat the crowd. He took a huge syringe of the bottled up concoction and injected it into the vein in Noah's wrist.
Then, he took the bottle and pressed it to the man's lips, to try to get some of it inside of him, least the scent of it. He had never tried this before and hopefully, it would prove alright. He took the photograph of Puckerman's friend's and a tattered envelop, addressed from Matt Rutherford, placed the envelope inside of Noah's shirt and the photograph in his hand. Then, he left, flipping his cell phone open and making the call: "Noah Puckerman has been eliminated."