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 69th cycle. Now cycle 70!

GLEEKATHON FOURTH ANNIVERSARY CYCLE - It's October again, which means another year of Gleekathon is about to wrap up! At the end of the month it will have been four years since I've started doing my daily stories! As always, I will be celebrating this with a special cycle of stories to touch on my favorite stories I've done throughout the year. There will be two installments each on Thursdays, Saturdays, Mondays, and Wednesdays. The remaining days will feature, as they have in the last several months, new chapters of the latest story in my Doctor Who/Glee crossover series. As far as the anniversary stories go, it will be as I've done before, taking those past stories and either doing a prequel, sequel, POV swap, genre swap, alternate ending, or additional scenes.

This story is a PREQUEL to "One Day We'll Dance" a Chang Squared series story originally posted September 7 2013.

(This is a shift day, which means there will be two stories posted today!)

"The Day We Became Three"
(Older) Mike/Tina, Lily (OC)
Chang Squared series extra
(all series now listed under the communities tab in my profile)

It would have been understandable for their lives to be hectic, when any day now their little Lily was due to be born, but in that week it seemed the universe had banded together to make things as crazy as they could get. If it wasn't enough that a pipe had burst at the house, forcing them to move in with friends for a few days, but the assistant choreographer, who was supposed to handle the show Mike was working on while he stayed back to tend to his very pregnant wife, had just up and quit on them, forcing Mike to step back in. And now Tina's due date had come and gone and the baby was two days late, which they could have dealt with fine, but then hearing Mike talk about the show had made her despise sitting back and doing nothing.

That was how she ended up at the studio that day.

Mike was in the middle of observing one number being rehearsed when one of the other dancers caught his eye and nodded behind him. He turned to look, and there was his wife, sitting in a chair and observing the number like he was. He looked back to the dancers and held up his hand.

"Stop, hold on!" he called to them, and they stopped. He stood and went to Tina.

"What are you doing, they were…" she protested.

"Are you okay? What's wrong?" he asked, crouching in front of her.

"Nothing," she promised him. "I was going crazy sitting around, so I figured I'd come in and help. Sure, I'm massive right now, but my eyes work fine, so I can give you a hand."

"You should be at home resting."

"That's all I've been doing, come on," she groaned.

"I just worry… about both of you," he put his hand to her belly and she smiled, covering his hand with both of hers.

"We're fine," she looked him in the eye. "And I do find it sweet to see you all concerned like this," she teased, and he laughed.

"Fine, but you have to stay right here," he begged.

"I don't think I could move even if I wanted to," she reassured him.

Mike returned to the dancers, apologizing for the interruption and calling for them to start again. He finished what he'd come there to do, and everyone was free to leave, which they did. He and Tina would be the last to leave, and he found his wife smiling.

"What?" he asked.

"I just have a lot of memories of you and me and an empty dance studio," she pointed out and he smiled. "It was a different studio, a different place, but…" He kissed her when she'd risen to her feet and he could feel her smile.

"If it weren't for this little girl right here," he looked down at her, "I'd ask you to dance with me right here and now. But we should probably get you home."

"How sad is it that I am all for that right now?" she sighed, and they headed out the door. They'd nearly made it back to the car when she stopped. "Mike?"

"Do you want to stop for something on the way back to…"

"Not unless you can get it from the hospital cafeteria," she breathed, and he blinked, finally noticing something was going on.

"Now?" he asked, and she nodded rapidly. "Can you get to the car?"

"Better hope so."

Tina made it to the car, and they drove off to the hospital. Mike had called their friends and current hosts so they could swing by the house and get her things. He would maintain for many years after this how time had gone by so fast, even though it took hours before they made it to delivery. He remembered everything in between as going very, very fast. And then suddenly he was holding his wife's hand, his wife and greatest love, since they were teenagers in Lima, Ohio. He wouldn't have changed a single part of it, not if it meant risking them getting to this point in time when, at 7:18 in the evening, their baby girl came crying into the world.

"She looks like you already," Mike tried to keep from crying too noticeably as he sat there and looked on their daughter, in her arms.

"She's beautiful," Tina smiled.

"That's what I said," he leaned his head to rest with hers and she beamed. "Hey, Lily," he stroked the back of her tiny hand. "You were absolutely worth the wait," he promised her. "I can't wait to tell you all about you got here."

"Mike," Tina frowned at him.

"You know what I meant. Think about all these stories we have to tell her. How we met, how we fell in love…"

"My favorite part," she had to smile.

"And how we ended up here, all of it… Enough stories to last her a lifetime. If it can take a guy nine years to tell his kids how he met their mother, then we've got nothing to worry about."

"Ready to switch?" Tina asked.

"What do you think?" The newborn girl was passed from her mother to her father, and Mike was careful with her, though Tina still instructed him in how to properly get a hold of her.

She knew she didn't have to worry. From the day he had found out they were expecting this child, he had been all about getting ready. Sometimes it would feel like he knew more than she did. He had fallen in love with this little girl long before this day, and that he got to hold her at last was the reward to those months of anticipation. Their Lily would have the best father a girl could hope for. They were a family, as of that day, and she could see how he couldn't wait to tell their daughter about the past. She wouldn't have existed without it, and what a sad world that would be.

THE END

A/N: This is a one-shot ficlet, which means that signing up for story alert will not bring you any alerts.
In the event of a sequel, the story will be separate from this one. And as chapter stories go, they are
always clearly indicated as such [ex: "Days 204-210" in the summary] Thank you!