It had been a normal day- or so Santana had assumed.

She'd gotten up at six- in the fucking morning- spitting and cursing as she rolled over, falling out of the bed and succeeding in starting the day in the worst way she could think of. Expect maybe waking up to Barney the fucking purple ass dinosaur dry humping her leg or some shit-

Fucked up drinks give you fucked up dreams, she remembered not to mix vodka and some random green shit that someone had handed her.

After a few seconds of laying in a daze, she pulled herself off the carpet and stood up, stifling a yawn with the back of her hand as she looked at the side of the bed opposite hers. A rare smile graced her lips, taking in the side of long, blonde hair draping over naked shoulders and the few strands that trailed off, making their place over parted lips. Santana couldn't help but lean over slightly, one hand on the bed to steady herself as the other brushed the few wandering hairs out of the girl's face. Looking at her like this, quiet and at ease- so contrasting to the memories of dazed eyes, flushed face, loud whimpers and long dancer's legs wrapped tightly around her waist from hours prior- she could feel a smirk tugging at her lips as she felt the urge to lean forward just a bit more, and claims those lips for her own once again.

She did- but only a small brush of skin; she had no urge to wake her just yet. As much as she loved seeing those pretty blue eyes flutter open- she wanted to let her rest. After all, she'd been running around constantly nowadays.

Santana couldn't help but sigh, adoptions were such a pain in the ass- why couldn't they just give them the kid, and leave it be?

Yes, she and Brittany were going to adopt a child.

It was the only thing left to completely their family- or so, Brittany had said- but Santana didn't bother to complain, or to question it too much because no matter what she had thought, watching Quinn go through the horror of losing a child- a small part of her longed for it. It wasn't really maternal- she didn't have the urge to coddle the baby, cooing sweet words and making funny faces- that wasn't her style.

What she longed for was to see that- to see Brittany with a small child in her arms, to wrap her arms around her waist from behind, lean her chin on her shoulder and look down quietly at small hands stretching up towards them both.

She'd never been so sappy before- Santana had never longed for something like this, something so meaningful- but she found recently that the very thought of being away from the girl in the bed beside her was painful. She'd do anything to keep around this precious shard of happiness that she'd finally been granted after all the years of meaningless sex and hollow relationships.

Highschool had been a long, torturous time. Endless months of self harm- though she never made a physical mark, the psychological damage was done- she hid who she was, desperately putting on a mask of cruelty and throwing her body around like it didn't matter. Though, at the time- she didn't think it did.

But she'd always had Brittany; sweet, innocent, naive Brittany- the girl who had been by her side, no matter what- forever loving, forever faithful. The times when Santana felt like the world was meaningless, she was meaningless- when the urge to pick up her Father's hunting gun and just pull the trigger became too great- she'd always be there, with a ear to speak into, and a shoulder to lean on, comforting words and sweet smiles, enough to give to the entire world if needed. She was the girl every guy wanted- no, needed- even if they didn't know it, and she felt selfish for the fact that she wanted to keep that to herself, to hide Brittany away from everyone else and have her love her, unconditionally.

It was obsessive- a feeling that frightened Santana, such a strong pull on her heart- something so deeply rooted into her that she couldn't understand it, didn't want to- so she hid from it.

As it turned out, she could only hide her feelings for so long.

She certainly didn't expect her confession to go smoothly- and she'd been completely right. Brittany had tried to reach out to her afterwards- but the wounds, the humiliation- it was all too fresh. All too real in a world that had been made up of nothing but fantasies- and Santana couldn't handle it.

In hindsight, dating Karofsky wasn't the smartest of ideas.

Back then, thinking things through hadn't been her priority, mind you.

It hurt Brittany to see them together- Santana knew that. Though, not that she had much choice- one rainy day made sure of that.

Santana had found Brittany, alone in the park- sitting on one of the swings by herself- she'd been soaking wet, and even while avoiding her feelings, Santana wasn't about to leave her there. So she'd held her umbrella out to the other girl- scolding her for being stupid enough to forget her umbrella, though it wasn't unusual for her- and before she'd knew it, she'd had an armful of sopping wet blonde. She'd hit her, hit her, and did things all around out of character for the usually sweet girl.

Which meant that Santana had majorly fucked up this time.

Eventually she'd stopped striking out at her, and Santana spent around an hour, sprawled out on the grass, under the rainclouds as she ran her hand through wet locks of hair as she sniffled into her neck. Santana had murmured gentle words, apologies and as much truth as she could give her.

She'd told her how much she really loved her- because in that moment, she didn't fear Brittany rejecting her. As long as it dried those baby blues- she didn't care if she got rejected a hundred times over.

Though she didn't complain when Brittany accepted this time.

That had been it. After that, they had dated through highschool, attended college in Newyork together- and were currently living in an apartment that they both paid for, Brittany with her dancing lessons and Santana still in school, attempting to earn her degrees and get a job at a law firm.

While she wasn't studying, she worked at Starbucks.

Yeah- it fucking sucked- and she almost got fired the other day for dropping a cup of coffee down some dickwad's pants, but it was worth it.

Sure there were struggles, some days where they worried about making rent, or about paying off student loans-

"Santana?"

She smiled at the sleepy murmur that rose beside her, leaning over as Brittany leaned up, their lips meeting in the middle- "Good morning, Brittany."

But for the moment, she had everything she ever wanted right here, and as soon as the forms went through, their family would be complete.

At the time, it didn't seem like anything could possibly ruin all of that.

How wrong she had been.

Just a small authors note here, to say—this is pretty old, by my standards. A couple months, and to be honest, the ideas kind of sketchy throughout—I may go back and re-write things, just for consistency purposes.