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 61st cycle. Now cycle 62!
TOP 15 COUNTDOWN - Something I do once in a while, if you will recall, where I take my favorite characters, ships, friendships, series (from my daily stories) and put them in order, the number 1 of which gets a seven-chapter story in the end :)
Coming in at number 10: Santana Lopez
This is a shift day. There are two updates today.
"The Dreams We Had"
Santana
The last thing she would ever want would be to disappoint her family. She was discovering more and more as she followed this post-McKinley path just how much it meant to her.
She had spent many years, too many, being afraid of letting anyone know what she really wanted in life, and that included her, too, for a while. But things had begun to change, and so had she. It began with honesty, smaller things at first and then bigger, much bigger ones, but there were still pieces of herself left to be uncovered.
Not choosing New York right away had been what she always had been. She was afraid of embracing the things she wanted, too afraid that she'd be let down, or ridiculed, or that it simply wouldn't work out. It had taken people, much braver than her, to show her that she couldn't keep running anymore, not unless it was to get herself to where she wanted and needed to be. She had to embrace the jump, the sacrifices, all of it, and go for it.
And now she was here, living in New York, with friends who fit exactly to her lifelong M.O. She had started off thinking of them as the last people she would ever call friends, or even family, but then that had started to change. Even then, she had guarded this change for some time, thinking for sure she would be deceived. But Rachel and Kurt were and would forever be family, for better or for worse. She had other family, the kind she was born to, and she wasn't forgetting them either.
She had discussed the idea with her mother for a while, to have her come up for a visit, so she could see the city, have it shown to her by her daughter now that she'd made herself a home there. But then Santana would always give excuses, claiming that the time wasn't right, that she had a crazy week ahead of her, or that she needed to help Kurt or Rachel, and they would put it off.
When she would hang up, or hit send, she'd stop and wonder to herself why she'd done it. She was dying to see her mother again, but then she kept telling her not to come. It shouldn't have been so hard, to tell her to come. They would be reunited, everyone would be happy. They'd go out to dinner, maybe see a show, visit some museums and other sites… Her mother would tell her how proud she was that she was following her dream…
She's not going to do that. You'd have to actually be following your dream in order for her to say that. Right now the best you can say is you're 'dream adjacent.'
That was always it though, wasn't it? Right next to the dream but really too chicken to go for it. How could she tell her? How could she even begin to explain she wasn't even sure what her dream was anymore?
She knew she wanted to perform; she knew that much. She could sing, and she could dance, and she loved them both, but… she had to choose something. She had to choose and be able to tell herself 'that's what I want, that's who I want to be,' and then she could go after it with everything she had. She definitely knew how to do that.
Maybe that was what she needed though, to have her mother there. Maybe it would help her to stop kidding around and finally figure out what it was she was going to do. She reminded herself of everything that had happened around graduation, when her mother had given her that money. She was so scared of telling her mother, of looking like she was failing, but then her mother did believe in her so much. She could be the one who would know what she was supposed to do.
When she'd called her back, she'd told her that she'd spoken with Rachel and Kurt and that she had rearranged her week, so if she was still free to come up and visit her, she would really love it. Now her mother was on her way, within a few days' time, and she needed to get ready. She had enlisted her reluctant roommates, and they had given the apartment the works, cleaning it from top to bottom, getting rid of some questionable things, adding some others, making it show that she was doing well for herself.
The day she went to pick her up, she felt like a little girl who hadn't seen her mommy all day and couldn't wait to leap into her arms. She didn't need Kurt or Rachel seeing her that way, so she had gone on her own. Her mother looked just as anxious when she saw her, and they had a solid reunion embrace before a single word could be spoken.
Her mother would be staying three days and two nights at a hotel, and Santana had helped her settle in before they headed out to dinner. Santana had forgotten how nervous she could get, and she had nearly made a mess of things, right there at the table. Now her mother knew something was on her mind, and the questions had begun. Had something happened to her? Had she been in a new relationship that ended badly? Was it about work?
So she had told her. She told her about being in New York, in the place that was supposed to be where her dreams became reality… and she had no idea what she was doing or what she was supposed to be doing. She asked her mother what she should do. Maribel Lopez had looked at her daughter, and she had told her as plainly as could be, that she couldn't help her. She told her that she had to figure things out for herself, and that no one else could decide it for her. This was her life, and if someone else decided for her, she could end up regretting the outcome. It was better that she took her time and really figured it out for herself, because then she would know what she truly was meant for. So long as she didn't take so much time that it never happened, then it would be fine. But Maribel did not worry. Her daughter was so much stronger than she realized, and even if it took longer than some people, she would get it right. This was where she was supposed to be, and no one was giving up, not Santana, nor Maribel.
She had never been prouder to be her mother's daughter. They'd had their visit, the two of them taking on New York together, and after they'd said their goodbyes, Santana felt as though she had been given an extra bounce in her step. Her mother was right; she had made it this far, and she wasn't giving up.
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!