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 "Questioning & Helping" a Sunshine Girls 2 series story originally posted on April 28 2013.

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

"Winding & Running"
Grace (OC), Emily (OC; Nellie V.), Nora (AU!Beth)
Sunshine Girls 2 series extra
(all series now listed under the communities tab in my profile)

It had been the first day they'd spent time together in a week, and maybe that was what had done it, what had made her realize what she couldn't see up until then.

Yes, she had been battling with these revelations, the first – indirectly – from Francesca, when she'd figured out her best friend of many years had feelings for her, and the second from Emily, when she'd gotten it out of her that these feelings had existed for a long, long time. This battle had been ignited off of questions, important ones at that, primarily why it mattered so much for her to know. It had all been coursing through her thoughts without any sort of order. All the thoughts were going through her head, but she couldn't even make out what they were, and that was the part that caused her the most distress. She didn't know what was happening, and if she couldn't figure that out, then she would never know how to get out of this mess.

This had kept her from spending too much time with Nora, and she hated that it had to be that way, but if there was one thing she knew, it was that her mental turmoil could risk wrecking Nora's happiness, and that was the very last thing she wanted. Now today they had been tossed back together by this Glee Club assignment, and it had been her intention to be completely on her game. They were going to get through this with maturity and that'd be that. All she had to do was to spend time with her friend, how hard could it be? For a while, it had been just like old times.

There had been something missing from her life in the last few weeks, and it didn't take a detective to figure out that she missed Nora, but it was more than that, and it wasn't until sitting at that table that it all fell into place.

The closest she could describe it in words was to say she'd gotten a contact high. They'd been normal with one another, and that hadn't happened for weeks, and her whole self had apparently forgotten what that felt like; she had been scrubbed clean of it. Now here she was, and something had returned, found its old home and dug in so deep it might never leave again. She hadn't been this happy in weeks, and it wasn't just that Nora was her best friend, because Emily was, too. This wasn't how she felt with Emily.

But she remembered that one afternoon, standing in her backyard, after Charlie Chang had clocked her with a ball and Nora had tended to her cheek. She remembered that moment when time had stopped and she'd seen that look in the blonde's eyes. Quiet adoration. Sitting with Nora, she was feeling it, finally, truly seeing it for what it was. It wasn't just that she'd recognized it in her best friend; it was that she had seen herself in that look, and when she did… it was like lifting a veil she'd never known she was wearing.

She had to get out of there, as soon as she could.

After dessert, she had promptly excused herself and left the Hudson-Fabray house. Her house was across the street, she would have been there in a minute. That wasn't where she went. She got to the sidewalk and she kept on walking. She didn't know where she was going, but she needed to breathe, and the air was slowly helping her.

What was she doing? What was she going to do? There was no outlet that could result in all of them being happy, and she would never dare to get in between Nora and Francesca, no matter that she had these feelings and…

It came at her like a gulp of air too cold and too sharp and too big, and she stood stock still right then. It was the first time she had been ready to let herself think it, and she didn't process it at all the way she'd thought she would. In that moment, she wasn't thinking: she was feeling. She wasn't thinking about whether or not anything could or would come of how she felt about Nora. Instead, she was feeling that spark, that contact high, and it felt… strong. It felt good… terrifying, a little, confusing, definitely, but not bad for even a second. For six blissful seconds, she smiled like an idiot, standing on the sidewalk.

And then reality hit her like a ton of bricks. How many years had Nora had these feelings for her, how many years had she waited for something she had to figure would never happen? If she'd figured this out back then, Grace could have told her just how not so far off she'd been. She couldn't do that anymore: she'd missed her time. Nora had found someone who made her happy, really and honestly, and Grace couldn't get in the middle of it. It was too late, she was too late. She had found her feelings, congratulations for her… now she had to bury them, because there was nothing she could do with them.

Her smile turned to tears so fast the teeniest push could have been the last straw, knocked her over. It was too much, too many ups and downs in one day, she couldn't bear it anymore. She had to go, she couldn't keep standing here or someone might see her and think she'd gone mad.

And then she saw where she was. If she kept walking, another two blocks, she would be at Emily's street. Maybe she'd been heading there all along. Emily was the only person in the world who knew what was happening. She could go to her, she would…

As much as she tried to compose herself before she made it to the door, by the time Emily's aunt Tina opened the door, holding her young daughter wrapped in a towel like she'd just had her bath, Grace still had streaks on her face to give her away. She'd asked if Emily was there and her aunt had ushered her in right away. Grace sat in the stairs, feeling numb.

How was she even supposed to face Nora again? She wasn't an idiot, she'd know something was going on, wouldn't she? The tears started again when Emily came to sit with her. If ever anyone could help her, it would be Emily Holt, she believed it… She had to.

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!