"Why? Why would you do something like this?" Lena asked in anger as she paced the living room back and forth while Stef and Callie sat on the couch. "You know better than this Callie, I know you do so why would you steal?"

She had been asking the same questions over and over again even though Callie wasn't actually answering her. The truth was that Lena hadn't given Callie a chance to answer her yet; she just kept on asking the questions and said that Callie knew better and that she was very upset and disappointed. Stef had made Callie tell Lena stating that it would be better if it came from her but Callie was sure that it was going to be bad no matter who shared the information.

"I am so disappointed in you." Lena said for the fifth time before coming to a halt right in front of Callie, clearly ready to move forward with the conversation. "Why?" She asked one final time, actually pausing long enough to receive a response.

"I'm sorry." Callie finally said though she already knew that it wasn't going to be enough, if Lena even accepted it in the first place.

"Sorry doesn't cut it." Lena said predictably making Callie sigh in defeat.

"I was just too embarrassed to actually buy them." The girl replied, wishing she could make Lena understand just how torturous the whole episode had been.

"Then why not come to us?" Lena questioned forcefully. "If you had explained the situation to one of us we could have gotten them for you and you know that. Neither of us are unreasonable or prudes for that matter so that's not really an excuse."

"I didn't plan on stealing anything, I just didn't anticipate it being so weird until I got there." Callie explained. "Yeah it was weird going in and trying to pick out a box of condoms but I really thought I could do it; it was only after this one woman looked at me like I was buying a one-way ticket to hell that I chickened out and I didn't want to have to come back and do it again so I tried to just…" But she trailed off, nervous to even say the words out loud for Lena was already more and just angry.

"Well you are going back there tomorrow and you are going to apologize to the store and explain why you did what you did." Lena stated. "Embarrassed or not this is unacceptable behavior and you owe them an apology."

Callie just nodded though she wasn't at all happy about any of this. It had been the worse day of her life - she'd been judged for looking at condoms, embarrassed by the sight and labeling of them, humiliated at being escorted out of the store by two police officers while several onlookers stared at her and then had to listen to not just one but two lectures on her behavior. Returning to that store was definitely the very last thing on Callie's wishlist but right now, in the moment, she didn't dare argue with her mother.

"You are also grounded." Lena continued, deciding that Callie needed a bigger punishment than just an apology. "You are to go to school and come straight home for a month - no shopping, no friends, no T.V. and no phone. You may have your computer for homework but only out where either Stef or I can check on you and nothing more than that. This should give you plenty of time to finish the project and anything else you have to get done. We can buy your condoms tomorrow and if there is anything else you need then you better pick that up tomorrow as well."

Once again Callie nodded miserably and gratefully left the room the moment that Lena dismissed her. She was more than done with this conversation and while she did have to give up most of her entertainment for the foreseeable future, the one thing she was most desperate for right now was some privacy.

"I really don't think she meant to do anything wrong." Stef said softly once Callie was gone and they heard her bedroom door close.

"That's beside the point." Lena practically yelled, still too wound up to lower her tone. "She knows that stealing is wrong."

Stef nodded in agreement though there was more she wanted to say but it wasn't really her place. She was, at most, a friend and nothing more. She wasn't Callie's mother or guardian and she, of all people, had no right to parent her or advise Lena on her parenting methods; after all, look where that had gotten them the last time.

"What?" Lena asked, noticing the look on Stef's face. "You disagree?"

Stef opened her mouth but quickly closed it again. She wasn't sure what to say or where her place was in this entire situation.

"Just say it." Lena demanded, frustrated enough without playing games.

"She knows it's wrong." Stef agreed, finally just having her say. "But she's also a fifteen year old girl buying condoms for the first time." She said, feeling somewhat sorry for the girl. "I remember buying a pregnancy test at that age and it wasn't fun." She reasoned, remembering having to go to a pharmacy almost an hour away in order to not be recognized as the daughter of one of the most established men in the city.

Lena finally calmed down a notch and recalled her own embarrassing moments as a teenager - her item of doom had been maxi-pads for while she had been underdeveloped in the chest area she was the first among all her friends to have a giant red patch at the back of her pants during lunch one day at school. Lena sighed as she looked to Stef, wondering what the woman though of her now that she'd actually seen the monster that unnecessarily came out occasionally. "So what do you suggest?" She finally asked Stef for her opinion on Callie's punishment.

"Two weeks maybe?" Stef questioned. She herself was new to the punishment thing but she did feel that a whole month was more than the crime warranted considering the circumstances.

"What would you have done?" Lena asked curiously for while it was Stef's opinion to lessen the length of time it was still Lena's punishment.

Stef shrugged as Lena took a seat beside her. "I don't know." She answered honestly. "I couldn't figure out what was appropriate and besides, it wasn't my place." She said looking at Lena.

"It is." Lena answered certainly. "You were the one here when she came home and you talked to her about it, you have a right to discipline her. I know that you will do right by her."

"It didn't feel right." Stef replied. "You guys live here, this is your home too but I'm not…" She trailed off, still hating to say the words not her mother."

"But you love her and you want what's best for her." Lena finished instead. "Stef I trust you and if something doesn't feel right then we'll work that out between us but we made this arrangement so that Callie could have another parental figure in her life so you don't have to be afraid to discipline as well."

Suddenly the scales were balanced between the two - Lena had always felt uncomfortable with Stef's wealth and the fact that Stef was so willingly sharing it with them in so many ways but Stef felt like the outsider in the family and while they were making room for her; she still felt like it wasn't her place. Hopefully it was just time and a little practice before they all began to feel like they belonged right where they were.