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 40th cycle. Now cycle 41!

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** UPDATED WITH CYCLE 41 CHEAT SHEET ** Check it out to find out about shift days, starting in cycle 41!

This is a shift day [see above]. There will be another upload this afternoon: Flying Solo, chapter 1.

"The Family Box"
Sue & Brittany
Sylvesters series #34 (following 'Cordially Decline')

She never had to wonder when the Glee Club had a competition coming up, she could always tell, just with how Brittany would get. And now she'd gotten like that again, so it could only mean Sectionals were approaching.

There was something different about this one though. Over a number of days she'd seen her daughter's moods alternate so sharply she had almost wondered if she'd gone and gotten pregnant. She tried to coax the information out of her, but apparently in all her turmoil she could still remember to be mad at her mother.

Then one day, doing her regular sneaking about, she'd overheard a conversation in the teacher's lounge. She overheard Will and Emma talking about Sectionals, how their set list was progressing. And then Will had started talking about the number that was to highlight Mike and Brittany's dancing. Sue's listening folded back, leaving her to think.

So that was it: her daughter had a feature in this year's Sectionals. It was like seeing a movie again after finding out who the villain was; suddenly the past week made sense. She could track the first dip in Brittany's moods as her finding out about the feature. Her daughter may have been one of if not the most talented girl out there, but Sue knew about her stage fright. But afterward she'd gotten better… So someone had comforted her… Who? Her mood had dipped again after that, in a way Sue recognized as meaning she'd lost something. That was the part she couldn't identify just yet, but it didn't matter.

What did matter was the rest: Brittany had not told her, about any of it. Used to be that she'd run to her mother and tell her anything she considered as good news, from 'I got a date for the dance' to 'I found a dime in my belly button.' But now something like this, something reasonably big, she kept to herself, left her to find out elsewhere.

Getting home that day, part of her could have decided to just go ahead and pretend like she didn't know. But the moment she'd seen her coming through the door, she had to know.

"So you're performing at Sectionals, a feature?" she asked. Brittany froze.

"How did you…"

"A little bird told me," she shrugged.

"Damn it, Fred…" Brittany muttered under her breath.

"Why didn't you tell me?" Sue asked, and Brittany looked back to her, hesitant.

"I… I didn't want you to…" she started.

"To go?" Sue filled in, and Brittany balanced on her heels with something like shame, not wanting to look her mother in the eye when she'd admit…

"To ruin it." That was almost worse.

"Oh… I see." It physically pained the girl to have to tell her this, she could see the start of tears on her face. Instinctively, Sue moved up to hug her, and the fact Brittany didn't push away already told her more than she could realize. "Listen to me. Are you listening?" she asked, still wrapped in the other's arms.

"Yeah?" she sniffled weakly.

"I know I don't exactly show much love when it comes to Glee Club, but that is so far from when it comes to you, understand?" she asked, dropping all pretence. She felt Brittany nod into her shoulder. "So I'm not going to interfere, won't ruin a thing, I swear." She didn't know just how much weight her words still carried with her daughter these days, but she just wanted her to know these were an absolute truth.

They'd had a quiet dinner after that, the after effects of Brittany's breakdown were still being felt, by both of them to some degree. Sue knew she'd made her decision, that she would go, but in not wanting that thought to disrupt her she kept this from Brittany. It wasn't like she could go and sit with the other parents, that area… By her own design she had no place in that box.

But more and more she didn't know anymore. She didn't know why she did these things anymore… Hid her daughter, nudged her away… No, she did know, but even then she couldn't see the worth of carrying this on if it meant having to lead this life where her daughter couldn't tell her things and where her hugs could be denied.

She didn't look at their secret like it wasn't manageable. They'd been doing fine with it for years, so mechanically everything was fine. But the emotional toll only increased with time, now more than ever. In her head she had reasoned with it, something like 'as soon as my mother drops dead, we'll come clean.' Of course her mother apparently had the fortitude to outlive them all, just to spite her…

Sometimes she could feel so much of her mother in her. It wasn't like she didn't know how she was with most people, but that had always been her choice. Now instead, sometimes it didn't feel like her exuding power, strength, it felt like Doris Sylvester had inhabited her body like a ghoul. She feared that too much contact with this side of her would end up affecting Brittany. They weren't like this at home, no, at home she was fine, so that was good. It was the Cheerio factor she had to scrub out. Only in trying to get Brittany to come to that decision on her own, all she'd accomplished so far was to lose her comfort zone, the part where they were meant to be okay with one another.

And meanwhile Brittany was still hanging on to the Cheerios. Was this out of fidelity to her, to Santana, and Quinn? Did she just not get it? She wanted her to come to this on her own, and despite her failings on some points she knew her daughter could still see through that. And to some degree she felt they had to be getting close. Just one significant nudge and they'd be there… How this would affect things afterward, that was still left to be seen, but all in time… So as difficult as it was and had been, she knew she owed it to them both to hang on a little longer.

On Sectionals day, she'd gone down to that auditorium, in secret. She saw the first group, the second… saw Kurt up there, which still reminded her of how she'd failed him, too… Finally when it was time for McKinley to go on she barely had time to hide from being seen by either Sam or Quinn as they passed… Why did Schuester have to use that back of the aisle move again? Eventually she knew it must not have been the first song, and indeed it was in the second one.

Her stage fright was gone, Sue could see, and despite all, trying to hide, she had a mother's smile as she watched her. She was always proud of her, always, but this one was special.

She wouldn't tell her she'd been there. Maybe at some point she would, but for some reason right now she couldn't. Yet if she had stayed in her seat earlier she would have seen her, seen Brittany peek through the curtains, eyes searching the sea of faces for the one that belonged to her mother. Sue had made her mistakes, but Brittany knew she had as well, the biggest of which being not telling her she'd wanted her there.

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!