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 82nd cycle. Now cycle 83!

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

a/n: Final installment in the series!

Grace had been at the Schuesters, playing with the daughters, when she'd gotten a message from Nora, asking her to come to her father and stepmother's house as soon as possible. She didn't say why, but Grace didn't need to know. She quickly apologized to the girls and she went.

When she got to the house, she let herself in.

"Nora?" she called.

"In here," her voice emerged from the living room. Grace went there, finding the both of them there. They were laid out on the couch, their heads side by side in the middle, while the rest of them was stretched out until the armrests, where their legs dangled. They both looked a bit dazed, like they'd just run a marathon or… Nora more or less let herself tumble to the ground in order to get up. Emily pulled herself right side up in a more straightforward manner, though she remained seated, looking up to Nora with hesitation in her eyes. "Go on. You're the one who asked me to get her here."

"What's going on?" Grace asked, starting to be worried. Emily let out a breath.

"I'm pregnant," she said it, and it was the first time she did say it aloud. When she'd stepped out of the bathroom, she'd just given a short nod, unable to speak. Now that she'd said it, it felt at once like a weight had been lifted and another had replaced it.

"What?" Grace almost lost her balance. She looked to Nora, who nodded. Moving to sit next to her on the couch, Grace put her arms around Emily, who held on to her, relieved for her second best friend's presence. "I guess this is as good a time as any to let you know I'm staying?" Grace spoke at her ear, though her eyes had gone to find Nora with a smile. Emily held her tighter.

"You are? Swear it, right now. I'm not in any state for jokes and I will hurt you if you're lying."

"Well, you're going to be a ball of nerves, aren't you?" Grace blinked. "I swear I'm not lying." Emily pulled back.

"What are you hugging me for right now, go hug that one," Emily pointed back at Nora. Grace didn't have to be told twice. She got up and Nora was already pulling her into her arms, both of them teetering about on their feet as they held on to one another.

"Are you sure?" Nora asked, and her voice was garbled by tears.

"Never more sure," Grace promised her, and they both laughed. Nora kissed Grace, hugged her again.

"Okay, that is a lot of news and a lot of feelings right now, we need food. If I'm eating for two now…"

"Or ten," Nora piped in, and Emily's finger shot out at her.

"We agreed that joke wasn't funny," she squinted. As scared as she'd still been a moment before, right now she had her friends, and she had the knowledge that Grace wasn't leaving, and, if only for a little while, she wasn't going to let the stress run her into the ground.

Somehow they'd ended up at the mall, in the food court. With trays before each of them, they'd eaten in silence for a while, and yet…

Nora would look to Grace, and Grace would look to Nora, and just knowing that they weren't about to get separated felt like so many roads had been closing away from them, but now… Now they were all opening again, one after the other, and suddenly the future was bright again. They may not have been able to see far enough down those roads to know what they held, but they were ready to find out.

More than that though, they would look at Emily, and it was hard not to watch her like she was a ticking time bomb. They could have looked at this sudden turn of hers as a sign that she had gotten past the initial shock of finding out she was about to be a mother, but they'd known her too long, in Nora's case all her life, to think that this might be the case. It might have been very, very direct of a way to knock her back to her senses, but Nora knew what she had to do to get through to her.

"You should call Kelly, get him down here." Emily looked up at her.

"What? Why?"

"Because that's his baby, too, and you need to know if he's going to do anything about it. Might as well go through with it and know now than wait and let it torture you. If he's half the guy I think he is, he's going to want to be going through this with you."

"And if he's not?"

"We'll unleash the Scottish Fury on him," Nora nodded over to Grace, who looked at once willing to step up and do whatever was needed of her and uncertain that she could pull it off. "This is old news already, just think of me as your conscience right now. Call him."

"This is eerily familiar," Grace looked between the two of them, smirking.

"Yeah, when you made me go and ask him out," Emily nodded.

"And how did that turn out?" Nora tipped her head.

"Oh, I don't know, Nora, how did it turn out? Right, I've got a person growing inside me," she leaned forward, lowering her voice.

"Do you love Kelly?" Nora did the same. Emily took a breath. "So there. Now call him."

Emily called Kelly, and by the time he arrived, they had finished eating and disposed of their trays. When he came up to their table, Nora and Grace stood and quietly walked off, leaving them alone.

"Should we go somewhere else, or…" Grace asked as they distanced themselves, but Nora just found her hand and pulled her aside. They could still see Emily and Kelly, though they couldn't hear a word they said. "It's a private conversation isn't it?"

"Which she'll tell us all about once it's over," Nora pointed out. "And, well, Scottish Fury, remember?"

"And what are you?" Grace frowned. Nora looked at her, smiling.

"Sunshine Girl," she winked.

The Scottish Fury and the Sunshine Girl were never called into duty. Though they couldn't rely on voices, the body language spoke for itself. Emily was her nervous self cranked to max, but going by Kelly's face, she did get around to tell him about the baby. When she did, he looked like he'd had his head rung good for a while, and Emily passed him what she still had left of her drink. He took a few sips, and then they kept on talking. Then he reached over and took her hand, and whatever he said, it had to be something along the lines of 'I'm not going anywhere.' Emily looked so relieved, letting herself appear as scared as she was in that moment. Kelly had both of her hands after that.

Eventually they'd gotten up and walked off together, still hand in hand. Nora and Grace let them go. As much as they wanted to be with Emily, they knew that those two were going to have plenty to figure out.

"Well, looks like it's just you and me, kid," Nora drawled, turning to Grace, who laughed. "Hey, so you're staying," she recalled.

"I am, yes," Grace nodded.

"So this is the first night of the rest of your… foreseeable future… in Lima, Ohio. Grace Mackenna, what do you want to do?" The redhead took a breath, taking her girlfriend's hand.

"I want to go dancing."

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!