Hey, guys! This is a little piece (possibly continued) as requested by my lovely friend, Ariana.

I don't own.

Shelby was on the road when she got the call.

Of course, when confronted with her sobbing biological daughter asking to be picked up, she halted her course to Akron and spun her Range Rover around (or, in simpler and more legal terms, she waited until the appropriate U-turn, since, while badass it would look, turning a vehicle around jerkily on a highway just wouldn't be safe). Driving quickly, she made her way to McKinley High, keenly looking around for a teen wearing a puppy-sweater or other equally ridiculous clothing.

Shelby found her sitting on the front steps. Shelby didn't bother to park correctly, pulling up on the curb instead, then jolted up to her daughter. "Rachel? Rach, what—Oh my God…"

Rachel's left cheek and eye were starting to swell, growing redder by the minute, accompanied by a spilt lip and a bloody nose. Her crying had calmed, but her eyes were still set and grim, not showing any of that signature Rachel Sparkle. "Can we go? Someone slashed my tires."

Shelby nodded. "Yeah. Are you alright? What happened?"

After taking a deep breath, Rachel answered, getting up with Shelby's aid, "There was a debate in history today, about gay marriage. Some—some jocks found out about my dads—they jumped me after school."

Fire lit in Shelby's throat and belly, giving her a nauseous edge. She kept a firm, but gentle grip on her daughter's shoulder, walking her to the Range Rover and unlocking the door. "Rat bastards. Do you need to go to the hospital?"

Rachel shook her head lightly and stiffly, wincing slightly as she climbed up. "No, no…it's alright. Just—can you take me home? I want to go shower."

At that, Shelby stopped in her tracks, her stomach twisting, memories of shower-scenes in Law and Order: Special Victims Unit popping into her head. "Rachel, they didn't do more than beat you up, did they?"

"No—thankfully, no. Please, can we go?"

Shelby gave a tight nod and raced around the car, hopping into the driver's seat. She eased off the curb as siftly as she could and followed Rachel's directions to the Berrys' house. Rachel was silent, which worried Shelby more than the bruises. When Shelby saw that there were no other cars parked in the driveway and the garage door was open and empty, she asked, "Would you mind if I stay until your dads get home? Just incase you need anything?"

Rachel smiled slightly and sadly. "No, Shelby. It—it's alright. You don't need to stay—I can handle myself."

Shelby took a slow breath. "I know that, but I'm not going to just drop you when you were assaulted, good grief. When are they getting home? An hour? Two hours? It's getting late."

Looking down, she shook her head. "Dad is out tending to Mawmaw—she broke her hip last week—and Papa's on a business meeting—he left this morning. Dad doesn't know how long it's going to be and Papa's gone until Tuesday."

It was Wednesday. They're leaving her alone for an entire week. Shelby resisted grumbling—she'd heard worse, of course. Kids being nearly independent by the time they had finished grade school—but it just depressed her when it was her own kid she was dealing with.

Rachel must've noticed Shelby's frown and followed her line of thoughts. She cleared her throat. "Please note that this doesn't usually happen—twice, so far, and this is the longest. They keep it so that I'm never home alone at night, but he had to go help Mawmaw…It was out of their control—they're not bad parents, I swear."

"Oh, I know, sweetie. Let's go on in. I just want to stay until you get settled."

Rachel opened her mouth—probably to protest—but just huffed and closed the door, leading Shelby inside. The house was clean, kept, in true Berry men style. There were tons of pictures of Rachel, almost as if the building was a shrine to her greatness. Shelby resisted chuckling. The Berrys went all-out (not that Shelby could blame them, of course; she'd have done the exact same thing).

Shelby called in Chinese delivery while Rachel was bathing (since she couldn't cook worth a shit!), and then sat down with a nearby magazine, until she realized that it was a gay men's magazine and figured she looked ridiculous reading The Cock. Once the food was delivered, she moved to setting it up in the living room (since she remembered that the men ate in the living room; not too much could've changed, could it?). She had Rachel's vegan dish—it was highlighted on the brochure sitting on the table—but wasn't sure where to put it. Where did she sit? There was no evidence of her in any of the spots on the sofa. She was stuck trying to decide, her perfectionist nature coming forth. She couldn't—

"You can set it at the end—that's my spot," Rachel said, her hair wet in pigtails, wearing pink pajamas, making her look like a little girl.

Shelby grinned at her, her maternal instant coming forward even more, and put down the plate with utilities. Rachel curled up in 'her spot'. "Are you feeling any better?" Shelby asked.

"Yeah. I, uh, a shower helped. You—you didn't have to—"

"No. I wanted to. And I was hungry—I skipped lunch today and only had a yogurt and some toast for breakfast. I figured you needed to eat something as well. Chinese is good comfort food." Shelby gestured to the spot opposite Rachel. "Is—can I sit here?"

Rachel agreed, causing Shelby to plop down with her mu gu gai pan. Rachel flipped on Bravo, mostly for background noise. She sighed. "I don't suppose that you're going to be leaving anytime soon?" she asked with no malice, but plenty of exasperation.

"Not necessarily planning on it. I'm not too keen on sending you back there without a little talk with the principal. I know he's an idiot, but I'd like to scream at him for not having more control over his students."

Rachel let out a small, humorless chuckle. "It's funny—last time we talked, we agreed to keep our distance."

"Hon, all bets are off if you get hurt," Shelby said, scoffing.

"Would you please make up your mind? I mean, this is really nice of you and all—but would you decide if you want me or not? Because, if you don't, I might—just please be consistent. Please."

Shelby set her plate down, clearing her throat and taking a calming breath. "Rachel, I've always wanted you. Always. From day one—"

"Then why did you push me away?"

"I thought that was what you wanted. When you said that I had came to say goodbye—I thought that was my hint."

"Wait…" Rachel stared at her, lips parted slightly. "What were you coming to do, then?"

"Ask if we could slow down. Going from not knowing who you were to being called 'Mom' was just a little too much for me, in that amount of time. I mean, I loved it, but it was just too fast. I just needed some time for our, you know, our relationship to grow before becoming your mother-figure. I mean, it's not the role—I've been way too many kids' mother-figure—it's just—we'd only known each other for about a week—and—it was just—do you understand what I'm getting at?" Shelby asked, getting flustered at her inability to form a coherent sentence without putting her foot in her mouth.

Rachel, black eye and all, nodded. "I—I get it. So, you definitely want to be in my life?"

Shelby resisted scoffing and said, "Definitely."

"Okay. That's good to know." Rachel sighed and shifted in her seat, briefly watching the the television—those idiotic housewives—and then turning to Shelby. "Can we start hanging out again? I mean, if you still want a little distance, that's fine, but I just liked doing that quite a bit and you're such a cool person and I think I could learn a lot from you, if you're willing, and it would be such an honor to have any training by one of the best vocal coaches in all of the nation and—"

"Rachel, Rachel, honey, yes. You're welcome to come over and we can do whatever you want. Well, within reason. I wouldn't give you booze or any shit like that, but we could watch movies and such. You haven't even see my office—I have so much sheet music—you'd have a ball."

Rachel smiled genuinely for the first time in the night. "Thanks. And you are welcome to stay, until my dads get back, if that'd make you feel better; we have a guest bedroom."

Shelby gave a quick and curt nod. "Thank you. Though, there's no way in hell I was going to leave you anyway."

Rachel giggled.

"What? I'm not going to leave any kid—let alone one I freakin' birthed—alone after being attacked. I'm harsh, but not cruel."

"Birthed? You make me sound like some twisted science experiment gone wrong," Rachel commented, lightly laughing.

Shelby raised her arms. "It's alive!" she quietly yelled, deepening her voice to make it more Frankensteiny. "Well, in my case, it was more, 'Get this goddamned baby out of me before I fucking pull her out myself!'"

Rachel fell into a fit of cackles. "I—I'm really sorry about that. My fathers said I had a big head."

"Yeah, tell me about it. I had to get stitches because of that watermelon," she said, gently bopping Rachel on the temple. "But it was worth it. Very much so."

"D'aww," Rachel cooed. "Now we're getting sentimental." She crawled over to Shelby on the couch, hugging her. "Thank you though. For picking me up. And birthing me."

"Anytime, darling. On the first thing. The last thing…not as much. I don't even have the proper equipment for that, anyway."

Rachel scrunched her eyebrows together. "What?"

"You didn't know that? I had a hysterectomy a few years ago. Stage-one cancer. It was early enough that they could catch it before it could spread, so that's good."

Rachel nuzzled back into her side. "Cancer? God, that's awful. Why didn't you call my dads? I mean, they could've brought me to see you then—if it would've helped."

Shelby was at a crossroads. She could tell the truth—that she did, yet Hiram rejected her—or she could lie and keep the peace. She didn't want to lie—that would demolish their relationship if Rachel found out the truth. Yet…she didn't want to make any rifts between Rachel and the men. She didn't know—

"You did. I can tell by the look on you face."

Okay, Corcoran. Just downplay it. "Well, yes, but he said to call back if it got worse. I mean, it was looking like I was definitely going to be alright, so there was no need in freaking you out, and—"

Rachel sat back, huffing. "My fathers are jackasses."

"Rachel!"

"You had cancer and they wouldn't let me—I'm your only daughter—they didn't take me to see you! That's just cruel."

"Rach, it was more about legal matters. I got what I wanted—I needed some of your information for—just in case something happened during surgery or, you know—I wanted you to get some money for college and such."

"You put me in your will? Before you even knew me?"

"Well, you don't have much competition, exactly."

An air of sadness gushed out of Rachel's eyes. "Who else do you have? Family? Boyfriend? Girlfriend?"

"No, not really. The Corcorans were never really close and I was an only child. I mean, I was kind of close to my mom, but she passed away a few years ago, so…it's pretty much just me," Shelby said, trying not to sound bitter and whiny. She didn't want for Rachel to take on anymore problems then she already had (and Shelby knew Rachel would take it upon herself to 'fix' Shelby's situation, if allowed).

"That's depressing. You could be a character out of some melancholy musical. You'd have the biggest torch song, of course."

"Duh!"

"Though, seriously, you should come over to dinner some. Dad—he doesn't like you that much—but Pop has nothing but good things to say about you. He even made a note that he missed you, sometimes."

Shelby loosely nodded. "We'll see. However, for now, I think I'm going to put this up and then get some rest. I've been busy today so I'm spent. I recommend you doing the same," she said, picking up their finished plates. Of course, Rachel protested, saying that Shelby had done enough already, but Shelby persisted so that everything was clean once again (which wasn't hard since most of it was disposable plastic).

After bathing herself, Shelby tucked into Rachel's room—it's the first time she's been in there. It was surprisingly yellow, but accented with gold stars and pink pinkness. Including a pink guitar. Rachel was sitting on her bed and grinned when Shelby picked it up. "You play?"

"Of course I play. Here," she gave it a strum. The clang of off-key notes rang through the room.

"I haven't tried it in awhile. It might need to be tuned."

"Yeah, no kidding." She put the guitar back up. "I'll show off tomorrow. I'm going to bed." She gave Rachel a snug little hug. "Goodnight, sweetheart."

Rachel smiled. "Goodnight, Shelby. I'll see you tomorrow."

Shelby nodded and went off in the direction of the guest bedroom. Now all she had to do was plan out her lecture for Principal Figgens. And somehow figure out how to make her mediocre guitar playing sound magnificent. She couldn't make a fool out of herself in front of her daughter, now could she?

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