21. Nerd/Dork
When Santana arrives home from works she finds her daughter sitting on the couch watching television.
"Hey Mia, where is your brother?"
"He's upstairs doing his homework."
"Shouldn't you be doing your homework?" Santana asks.
"I'll do it later" Mia replies.
"You have an hour. I want it finished before dinner."
Santana makes her way upstairs and into her bedroom so she can change out of her work clothes. She slips on a pair of jeans and a plain black t-shirt before heading over to her son's room.
She knocks on the door and waits for him to answer, something she's had to learn to get used to ever since her children had turned into teenagers.
When Santana enters the room she finds Brice playing on his game console instead of at his desk like she expected.
"Hey Mia said you were doing your homework."
"I finished it. I even finished my English paper early" Brice says not taking his eyes off whatever fantasy game he was playing.
"Did you get your result for your history test?" Santana asks.
"I got an A+."
"That's great Brice."
"Thanks Mami."
Santana knew she wasn't going to get much else from her son especially when he's playing on his video games. She can't really complain though, he's a really good kid and a straight A student.
"I call you when dinner is ready" Santana says as she leaves.
As Santana walks through the living room she notices Mia who is still sat on the couch watching television. She should have guessed that her daughter wouldn't have even attempted to start her homework yet.
She makes her way down to the basement where they had created a soundproofed music room. As soon as she opens the door the sound of Rachel's voice floods out of the room.
Santana quietly closes the door behind her and watches as her wife sings. It is a few minutes before Rachel notices that Santana is watching her from the door.
"Hey, how long have you been standing there for?"
"Just a few minutes. You sounded beautiful as always baby."
"Thank you."
"Where are the kids?" Rachel asks.
"Brice has finished his homework and is currently in some fantasy world on his console and Mia is still watching television even though I told her she has to finish her homework before dinner."
"I have noticed that our daughter has turn into quite the procrastinator recently. I think she's taking after you."
"I don't procrastinate" Santana argues.
"Then how come you still haven't repainted the bathroom?"
"I told you that I'll do it when I have time."
"All I was saying was that she has your genes" Rachel says.
"I wasn't like that in high school. I acted like I wasn't bothered about school but secretly tried hard and I always got good grades. Mia doesn't even put any effort into things other than cheerleading it's probably a trait she got from the sperm donor we used."
"Stop trying to put the blame on other people besides that makes no sense because we used the same sperm donor for Brice too and he isn't like that. It's not that Mia isn't smart she's just idle."
"Let's see how idle she'll be with my foot up her ass" Santana says.
"Maybe we need to coax her a little bit but we can't push her too much or she'll start to resent us."
"She already resents us. She's a teenage girl and we're her parents. That's pretty much how it works."
"I never resented my parents" Rachel points out.
"That's because you were like their golden child. You probably never did anything that they had to punish you for."
"I'll have you know I was grounded for a week once."
"Why what did you do?" Santana asks.
"I might have thrown a tantrum when my dads wouldn't let me watch Funny Girl again when I was eight. I had to stay in my room for the whole of the next day, it was horrible."
"You were grounded for a day? Try being grounded and having your car keys taken off you for two weeks."
"Why what did you do?"
"Which time?" Santana smirks.
"My mom caught me trying to sneak out of house and sent me back upstairs but then later on she found me sneaking back into the house a two o'clock in the morning."
"If Mia ever does that, I'll know who to blame" Rachel says.
"I guess we should go back upstairs to reality. I love our kids I really do but I can't wait to send them to my parents this weekend and spend the whole of two days with my beautiful wife."
"How about one day with your beautiful wife and you can spend the other repainting the bathroom?"
"Very funny."
Rachel laughs before pecking Santana on the lips.
"I'm going to start dinner. Is vegan lasagna okay?" Rachel asks.
"Perfect. I'm going to check on Mia and then I'll come and help you."
When Santana walks into the living room she finds Mia still on the couch with her cell phone in her hand.
"Have you started your homework yet?"
"I told you I'll do it later" Mia replies not looking up from her phone.
"It's later now. So I want you to start it and will you please look at me when I'm talking to you."
"I said I'd do it" Mia says finally looking at her mother.
"Don't make me take that phone off you. Now go and get your homework" Santana says turning off the television.
Santana walks into the kitchen to find her wife preparing dinner. She grabs a knife and helps her wife chop vegetables.
"Had she started her homework yet?" Rachel asks.
"Nope, she's fifteen she shouldn't need me to tell her to do her homework, she should just do it. I'm not going to remind her anymore and let her face the consequences."
"You're right we should let her learn by her own mistakes, but we should still gently guide her in the right direction."
"At least we only have to go through this once unless Brice has a sudden personality change. Speaking of Brice do you think he's a bit of a nerd?" Santana asks.
"Santana! That's our son you're talking about."
"I know and I'm proud that he's really smart but he spends all his free time reading old comic books or playing on the video game equivalent of dungeons and dragons."
"He's not ashamed about his individuality and neither should you be" Rachel says.
"I'm not ashamed. I just know what it's like for kids like him in high school."
"How do you know what it's like for a child like him? You were a cheerleader and besides the one time you got slushied you were fine in high school, you were popular."
"Exactly and I know what the popular kids do to kids like him."
"Brice is a good kid, we should just let him be who he is" Rachel says.
"I know. I'm sorry; it's just sometimes I worry about him."
"It's your job as his mother to worry. Will you set the table?" Rachel asks.
"Sure" Santana replies.
It's half an hour later when Santana makes her way up stairs and knocks on her daughter's door. She doesn't get a reply but she can hear music coming from the other side so she knocks a little harder.
Santana gets impatient so she opens her daughter's door and walks into her room. Mia is sat at her desk doing her homework so Santana walks over to her music station and turns off the music.
"Dinner is ready" Santana says.
She's about to leave to get Brice when she notices something on Mia's desk.
"You got a C- on your Spanish paper. You should be doing better since it is your second language."
"I don't understand why I need to take Spanish if I can already speak it" Mia says.
"It's about more than just speaking the language you have to learn every aspect of it, even Brice is more advanced at Spanish than you are."
"Yeah well Brice is a Nerd."
"Don't talk about your brother like that. Just go downstairs for dinner."
Santana follows Mia out of her room and knocks on Brice's bedroom door. She enters when she hears her son answer and finds Brice sat on his bed reading George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty Four.
"I thought you said you'd finished your homework."
"I have, this is just for fun."
"Okay well dinner is ready" Santana says.
She takes a quick look around Brice's room at the figures he has on his book shelf and the posters of various sci-fi films. She wasn't going to ask her son to change who he is but maybe she could get him to add to his individuality.
The next day Santana comes home to an empty house. Rachel was at the theatre and Mia and Brice were at their friends houses. She decides to catch up on some of the shows she had missed during the week. She was half way through her first show when Brice comes home.
"Hey did you have a good time?" Santana asks while pausing her show.
"Yeah, Johnny and I were practicing chess. I have my first tournament next week. Johnny also got the new Dragon Fantasy game so we played that for a while too."
"I'm glad you had fun and I'm proud you joined the chess club, but have you ever thought about expanding you extracurricular activities?" Santana asks.
"I was thinking of joining the Mathletes."
"What about something more athletic, you like sports right?"
"Sure I like football and basketball" Brice answers.
"Why don't you try out for one of those or maybe both?" Santana suggest.
"Do you think I'm a nerd?"
"What?"
"Is that why you want me to try out for something athletic?" Brice asks.
"Of course I don't think you're a nerd. I just think that maybe you should branch out a bit and make yourself an all-rounder. You're really smart Brice but you're also quite athletic so I just thought you should try and show that side of you too. Mia has the Cheerios and I just thought you could have something like that too."
"Okay Mami, I'll think about it"