A/N: Thank you all for your comments, favorites and alerts. It's truly humbling to me that anyone would read and enjoy what I write. I want to thank my beta, grownupspashley, for doing an amazing job helping me. I hope you enjoy this one. I'm hoping to update fairly regularly from here on out. Please review!

Chapter 3

At 10AM New York time, Rachel woke up groaning, feeling bone-tired even before she opened her eyes to the annoying light. By habit, she picked up her phone, only to remember the network was down, and with it, the only civilized form of communication. She really should have let Quinn install a homeline, but who still had those nowadays? Well, it really would have come in handy right about now. She needed to hear Quinn's voice, telling her it was no big deal, that there was a life before cell phones and email and Internet in the palm of your hand.

Rachel knew it wasn't as a big deal as she was making about it, maybe she wouldn't send her complaint letters after all. It was just inconvenient timing, what with five week old twins who were tired and cranky and adorable and sweet all in one (or two) and Quinn being out of town for the whole week. Rachel had counted on phone calls at bedtime, with Quinn's soothing voice singing the babies to sleep and calming her at the same time.

But alas, things never seemed to go the way she imagined, and not only were the babies scared and crying from the admittedly really bad storm, the network had gone down with it. Beth had gone online and found news that they were working on it, but that it might be out the rest of the week. Rachel sighed, pushing herself up wearily after sleeping for just a few hours. The babies were quiet for now, and Beth was still out cold after staying up rocking Ethan for hours.

Rachel smiled as she made her way down the hall into their spacious kitchen and contemplated making coffee. Quinn usually made it, or Beth, and Rachel could never quite get it right. She decided against it, and got out the fresh orange juice they had picked up yesterday before the storm hit. She was glad they had provisions. Maybe being stuck inside wouldn't be so bad. She just hoped it wasn't going to be the whole week. With that thought, she turned on the TV in the kitchen, already tuned to the weather channel. The news wasn't good. From what she gathered, there was a system of thunderstorms moving through the region and it was supposed to rain for the better part of today and tomorrow.

"Great, just great. I thought it was 'Spring Break.' Doesn't Spring mean nicer weather?" Rachel knew she was talking to herself, even in her over-tired mind. Shaking her head to wake up more, she changed the channel to CNN, hoping for some news about the cell networks. The anchor was finishing up a story about the weather and its consequences and Rachel caught the tail end. Apparently, the network failure was unprecedented and no one was really prepared for such widespread outage.

"Well, no kidding, Captain Obvious." Again, with the talking out loud. Rachel listened more as she moved around the kitchen, grabbing a banana from the counter and sitting down on one of the barstools that lined the island. The companies were working non-stop to fix the problems, but had to rely on email and landlines to communicate and it was slow moving. The earliest anyone would have service again was Friday. Today was Tuesday.

The word "email" made Rachel perk up. She had sent a note to Quinn before she finally crawled into bed last night (more like this morning), apprising her of the situation. Rachel couldn't even remember the last time she had signed onto her email account, it had been so long. Thankfully Quinn had her password and screen name saved and she didn't have to create a new one.

She hated email. She could never capture the tone of what she meant to convey and was always afraid she was saying too much or not enough in her message. Thus, as she moved through college and finally into a thriving career, she relied more on plain old calls and now had a capable staff who handled emails for her. However she was thankful that she was able to get the message to Quinn last night. She knew the blonde would be worried sick all day if she was unable to get Rachel on the phone this morning.

Rachel smiled to herself again; Quinn was so protective and anxious now that their family had grown by two. Rachel understood completely; she was having the same feelings. She had known it would be difficult to get her wife to attend the conference that had been set for months with the babies this small, but in the end it had been Beth that convinced her they were going to be fine. Beth – the brunette wondered how any of their lives might have been different without her.

Well I know I'd be utterly miserable, she thought and felt her eyes tearing up. She had been doing that a lot lately – latent hormones from the pregnancy. Only when she said that, Quinn gently reminded her that she'd always been a crier. She usually got smacked with a pillow for that comment.

Rachel got up from her seat and moved out of the kitchen, shutting off the TV so the aparment was engulfed once again into comfortable silence, save for the rain outside. She could hear faint thunder somewhere and knew it was going to get worse again before too long. She checked the nursery one more time; both babies had finally cried themselves to sleep after fighting fatigue for too long. They looked peaceful now, as if they hadn't been screaming at the top of their lungs a few hours ago. Rachel wondered how something so loud could come from something so small. She knew she should really get them up to feed them and work on getting them back into their "normal" schedule they'd been working on for the last week, but she was too tired and they looked too serene to wake up. She figured she'd let them sleep for another hour, if they lasted that long.

She checked on Beth next, two doors down from the nursery. Her door was still open; the teenager hadn't even bothered shutting it when she went to sleep. Rachel found her on her bed, her head buried in so many pillows Rachel wondered how she was breathing. Beth had the long blonde Fabray hair and, save for the piercing gray eyes, was a carbon copy of Quinn. Just in looks though; her personality was all Rachel with some of Quinn's moderation woven in.

Beth was the ultimate trump card when the "nature vs. nurture" argument would come up in conversation, which was more often that Rachel would care to admit, given their unique family situation. Right now though, Beth resembled Quinn more, looking as if she was concentrating very hard even while she slept. Rachel moved closer to the bed and sat down on the side gingerly, careful not to disturb her sleeping daughter - their daughter. She smoothed some of the hairs on Beth's head and leaned down to kiss her cheek, the only place visible under the mountain of pillows. Beth murmured in her sleep, and Rachel whispered quietly, "Sleep a little while more, angel. We'll have to do it all over again soon."

With that, Rachel got up, pulled the curtains shut to darken the room and quietly closed the door behind her. Then she moved to the end of the hallway to the home office she shared with Quinn. They each had their own desk and Rachel had long given up on coordinating any décor in this room. Quinn's desk suited her perfectly; light wood without any frills or even drawers. Everything was perfectly organized, with medical texts lining the shelf behind her and her Macbook Pro sitting in the middle of the desk. Well, usually it was, but Quinn had taken it to the conference, along with most of the papers that usually sat next to it. The chic modern look was completed by a white desk chair that looked deceptively comfortable, but gave Rachel a backache after ten minutes. Quinn loved the simplicity of it all.

Rachel's desk, directly opposite, was made from rich, dark, mahogany wood, with drawers on each side, scripts and sheet music strewn on all available space. Instead of a bookshelf, there were several framed playbills behind her well-worn leather desk chair, which she had had since her first year at Julliard and was not planning on giving up anytime soon. Or ever. She did cave in and buy a matching Macbook Pro when Quinn had to upgrade hers, even though she had hardly used during the last two months.

The three weeks prior to her delivery had been chaotic, with Quinn working double shifts to save up leave time for when the babies came and Rachel had put in as much time as she could with her understudy to fully prepare her for her show. Thankfully, the costume designer in her current show was a genius and even at eight months pregnant, Rachel had been able to perform, but had bowed out as she began her last month . On top of everything else, Beth had been cast in her school's spring musical and Rachel was asked to come work with the cast there as well.

When the twins finally arrived, it was almost nice just to have to worry about them for a while, though Rachel knew if she told anyone outside of her family that, they would just look at her funny . Yes, the last eight weeks had been challenging, but she wouldn't trade it for anything. They were living the life they had always wanted, though no one except those in their immediate family ever thought they would actually make it.

Listening for any noise from the kids' rooms, Rachel relished the silence. She thought how odd it was and how it had taken thirteen years, marriage, and three children for her to appreciate stillness. She sat down and dug her laptop out from under the script she had been asked to read by an up-and-coming playwright. So far, she'd made it two pages into the play, babies taking precedence to art for the moment. She'd eventually circle back around to it; she always did find time for young talent.

Rachel opened her laptop and checked her email for the second time in a few hours time. This really was turning into an interesting week. She had a generic message from the cell network provider, stating they were aware of the problems in the coverage and working on resolving them as soon as humanly possible. She also had a message from their Internet provider, suggesting to use video chat to communicate with loved ones while the cell networks were down and a quick tutorial on how to use it.

Rachel's interested perked up; why hadn't she thought of that? That would solve her problems at bedtime and the twins could see Quinn's face. It would be great! Then, as quickly as her excitement had risen up, it deflated. There had been some kind of problem with the camera on Quinn's laptop; she remembered a quick conversation last week as they were bathing the twins. A colleague of Quinn's needed a consult and they tried using video chat because Quinn didn't want to make the trip to the hospital, knowing she would be there much longer than she planned on. Quinn mentioned the camera wasn't working and wondering if it was still under warranty. She'd had the laptop for at least six months but never tried the camera before. Rachel wondered if her wife had fixed it, but knowing how little sleep the blonde had had between caring for the children and getting ready for the conference, she knew with almost complete certainty that the answer was no.

Rachel moved through the messages, glad that this was her personal account and not the one she used for work. She could only imagine how many emails she was getting there and was thankful her assistant would take care of most of those. She did have a message from Haley, said assistant for the past five years, asking her if she needed anything and to get in touch with her through video chat or email if she did. Rachel was beyond grateful for her, knowing there were probably requests for interviews or other work-related things in the pipeline, but Haley knew to shield her boss from those requests for now. The diva still had almost three months before her maternity leave was up, and though she had vowed to not worry about work much, she found she missed the stage . But she knew she needed to be home for a while and it was a trade she made gladly. Nothing was better than this time with her children. She could always have the stage; the kids were this age only once.

Finally, she saw Quinn's email and read it quickly. Leave it to her wife to answer her page long rant with five sentences. They really did balance each other out perfectly; they were strong where the other one was weak and had learned everything about each other since that fateful night after Regionals. Quinn's P.S. made Rachel think about her decision to share her grandfather's money with the young mother, not knowing how things would go from there. That she would end up in New York was inevitable, but that Quinn would be with her, would be hers and that they would be a family? That was something not even Rachel had dared to imagine.

Rachel had never thought much of the money; she didn't have access to it at all growing up, and her fathers only told her about it when they felt she was old enough to understand how to use it responsibly. Even at 12 years old Rachel had been an old soul, and had perfectly understood that if she made the money public knowledge she would suddenly find herself with a plethora of "friends." Therefore, instead of using her wealth as a shield of sorts from the bullying and slushies that kept coming her way, she chose to keep the knowledge to herself. She wanted friends that wanted her for herself, not for the trust fund in her name.

Her fathers had told her that her grandfather had come to the United States from Poland after escaping the Nazis and changed his last name to Berry. A neighbor in his village had hidden him at great risk to himself and his family, and gave Rachel's grandfather exactly half of the money he had saved. Though not much by any standards, somehow it got Rachel's grandfather on a boat to the United States, literally saving his life. Once in the U.S., he found work, married and had three children one of them Rachel's daddy, Hiram. He used the same determination he had to stay alive to provide for his family. Clever investments and a shrewd mind - all very stereo-typical Jewish things - had let to great wealth for the family, though they were never showy with it.

Hiram's college fees had been covered, as had his home, but he still held a job to pay for his other expenses and worked hard on receiving his medical degree with highest honors. After graduation, he explained to his father he no longer needed his financial assistance and to give anything he were to give to him to put in a trust for grandchildren. Rachel's grandfather had agreed, and Rachel's trust had grown over the years.

She was destined to be the only grandchild in the family, which was curious considering the circumstances of her conception. Her grandfather had stipulated that Rachel would come into the money at eighteen and had urged her before he passed away to use it wisely. He knew she was a smart girl and wasn't going to jet set the world, but reminded her of his own youth and how one person's sacrifice had meant life and comfort for all of them.

Rachel had never forgotten his words, and when she made her way through the hospital hallway that night to talk with Quinn, she resolved to use the money finally. She had braced herself for rejection and had mentally prepared a speech to convince Quinn of the benefits of accepting her help. She had forgotten all of it when she found herself in the blonde's room, seeing Quinn carefully cradling her newborn daughter as if she was the most precious thing in the world, which she definitely was.

Quinn had been crying silently, anguish plain on her face. Rachel quickly made her way to the bed and took the blonde in her arms, never mind they'd never hugged or shared more than a couple of civil words to each other in their whole lives. But Rachel had always had feelings for the blonde, feelings that she couldn't quite place at that time. All she knew was that she had to offer the young mother another way out of her situation. She held Quinn as she held Beth for what seemed like hours, thought it could have only been a few minutes. Then, composing herself, she explained everything; about Shelby, her own adoption, and her trust fund, insisting the whole time that "no" wasn't an option.

Quinn had protested, of course, but in the end had accepted. Rachel felt that nothing in the world could stand in their way then, though they would both quickly learn that plenty would. Rachel wasn't there for what happened between Judy Fabray and Quinn, but her wife had filled her in on enough of the conversation a few years later to make Rachel furious and glad that New York was not anywhere close to Lima.

The brunette heard faint stirring over the baby monitor and hit reply in her email program, wanting to wish Quinn good luck one last time before her speech. She knew her day would be packed and the babies would keep them busy here, so it seemed that email would be the only thing to keep them in touch for the foreseeable future.

Hey Beautiful,

I hope you got some rest - dealing with the time change must be horrible. I promise I will make up for you not being home. BUT I didn't make you go anywhere, Beth and I merely used perfectly logical arguments to convince you that we are more than capable of taking care of two small children by ourselves for a few days. We miss you though; I could tell Ethan in particular misses your voice. He would only quiet down for Beth - I think he might have thought she was you with her blonde hair.

I have no news on the network front, though CNN was saying it could be out the whole week. I'm just glad both of us are on maternity leave right now - could you imagine if we had jobs to worry about? Haley already emailed me (aren't you proud of me?) and told me everything was fine and not to worry. I really need to give her a raise when I go back to work. Remind me, would you? I thought about using video chat for you to sing to the babies but then remembered your camera. You never fixed that, right?

Anyway, I can hear the babies waking up; they're probably hungry, it's way past their "normal" time. I can't wait to hear how the speech went; I am so proud of you and of being your wife. Write back soon? I love you.

Love,

Me

PS: I was just thinking about that night too. Crazy it turned out this beautiful, right?