Started my daily ficlets to make the hiatus pass, then decided to keep going with a 2nd cycle, and then a 3rd, 4th, etc through 43rd cycle. Now cycle 44!

INTRODUCING "CHEAT SHEET" - If you want to know ahead of time when a certain series will be updated next, just reassemble the link below and check out the list, save it, print it, bookmark it, whatever you need!
Go to: gleekathon [dot] tumblr [dot] com [slash] cheatsheet

** UPDATED WITH CYCLE 43 CHEAT SHEET ** Check it out to find out about shift days!

This is a shift day [see above]. There was another upload this morning: Stage to Screen to Stage.

"Steps 16-36, Time Is On Your Side"
Kurt & Brittany, Santana, Brittana...
Paper Heart Series #17 (following 'Step Fifteen...')

1. Step Sixteen, Look Ahead

It was kind of startling the way one singular and simple thought could just snake out and link to five more. In this case, the thing that had started it all was a calendar page. They'd been sitting in the doctor's waiting room, and the receptionist woman had gotten up to change the page, realizing she was behind by a few days, and they had seen it. June… It was June now, and that was enough to send them thinking.

It was June now, and soon it would be summer, and then it would be fall, and then it would be October, and then, well… then they would be parents.

After that, things had just moved forward, and they didn't remember the appointment much more than the fact the baby was the picture of perfection, coming along nicely… The rest was forgotten, and then they were back at his place. They had taken to spend more time together, the closer they were getting. Even months away they knew things were about to change for them big time. Their lives were forever interlocked. Right now those lives were both focused in on the well-being of that little boy or girl – though she was still firm in her belief it was a boy – growing inside her.

"It's still like four months away," Brittany had spoken as they sat in his living room.

"That'll have come and gone in a heartbeat, especially without school to worry about," Kurt pointed out.

"Right," she drummed her fingers along her belly. There was some quiet, and then he had to ask.

"How are we going to do this?" She looked to him, unsure what he meant. He searched the words. "If this was like… how most people have babies, you and I would be a couple, we would be living together… we'd probably be a bit older. But we're not. We're a couple of sophomores, living at home, who are never going to be a couple… never going to live together," he spoke with some sadness. The feeling rubbed off on her, which he saw by the way she held to the belly now.

"But we could, you know?" she looked to him.

"Be a couple?" he asked, incredulous.

"What? No, no," she shook her head. "I mean live together. Why not?" she shrugged. "I'd do it for him, and you would too, wouldn't you?"

"Of course I would, but how?" he asked, and she paused, thinking.

"I don't know," she had to admit.

"Well we're going to have to add that to our list then," he spoke, trying to inspire positivity.

"Do we have a list?" her face scrunched up – it was working.

"No, but we can make one. I'm excellent at those," he told her, and she smiled.

As much as the whole situation could be worrisome at times, in the end they would always remember that, considering their general predicament, they weren't doing that bad. There was still plenty that could come and throw them off balance, but that never lasted long. The hardest was still to come, but they were confident that they could do it.

Then there was Santana. Kurt didn't have to dig very deep to know that she hadn't said a thing to Santana yet, despite the talk they'd had. At the very least, she was taking steps toward allowing herself a presence, as he'd told her she could. She didn't come to every doctor's appointment, still hesitated most of the time, but at others she would be there. She continued to look after Brittany whenever he wasn't there; that wouldn't ever change.

"I should probably go. Promised Santana I'd meet her at Breadstix. Whenever I show up there now and they see I'm pregnant, they bring way too many breadsticks and then she eats them all," Brittany smirked.

"Well, that's… No, that sounds about right," Kurt nodded, and she laughed. "Okay, I…" he pressed a hand to her stomach. "Bye, there," he bowed his head. She got up, with a small wave goodbye before letting herself out.

He went off to his room, feeling suddenly exhausted. He lay down on his bed, staring to the ceiling. The living arrangement, they had to fix that, first and foremost. They couldn't just move out of their homes and into an apartment with their infant son or daughter, when he or she would be born. That just wasn't possible. So either he'd have to go live over there, or she'd have to come live over here… at least some of the time…

He sat up, looking around the room for a moment as an idea began to form in his mind. He got up and headed toward the guest bedroom. It was plain, mostly a collection of old furniture that had once been his or his father's that had been put there when they were replaced. Maybe he fixed it up… It could be a room for Brittany, a nursery for the baby… He was certainly always up for an interior decoration project, and if it was for people he cared about deeply, then even better. He could fix it up, and he could surprise her with it… He needed his swatches…

It was June; it really was coming soon. Just a few short months, they would go by so fast. It was already had to believe that their fateful encounter in his basement had been so many months ago… They were more than halfway through this pregnancy. Every day it felt like that belly of hers was reaching new sizes. She was expanding, and they all took notice. People at school, they had finally started getting bored of them, and he could at least be thankful for that. He didn't want to have to keep worrying about those losers. He was about to become a father, in just a few months, and that mattered more to him than any and all words they could ever toss his way. They were leaving her alone, too, for which he was probably even more thankful. She was already being put through enough as it was.

TO BE CONTINUED (TOMORROW)