Author's Note: First, I'm sorry for the long wait between updates! Second, thank you, everyone who took the time to review! I really appreciate it! Third, there is very little Rachel in this chapter, but she comes back full-force in the next, so hang in there all my Faberry lovers!

By the time Santana got to Quinn's house, Lily had already fallen fast asleep. Santana gently took the phone that was cradled under her ear and made sure that the blanket was pulled up to her chin. She carefully tiptoed over the scattered toys, skateboard, and sports equipment to leave the room and check on the other girls. Thankfully, Harper and Hannah seemed to have slept through whatever had happened downstairs. Santana kissed Lily on the head and tiptoed into the kitchen. Quinn was crying quietly in the corner, the red wine sticking to the floor all around her in thick, sticky, puddles. She had her knees pulled up to her chest.

"Quinn…"Santana said. Quinn stopped sniffling and looked up to see Santana in her sweats and her hair tied in a loosed ponytail.

"Get the fuck out of here," Quinn croaked out. "I don't need your judgment right now."

"I'm not judging, Q, I'm not judging. You've seen me much worse than this. I just want to make sure you're okay," Santana said, gently, crouching near her friend. She took her hand. "What happened, Q?"
"Nothing happened, Santana. This is my life. Welcome!" Quinn said, faking cheerfulness. "Welcome to the wonderful world of Quinn Fabray-Scott," she spat out.

"You're bleeding." Quinn looked down at her hand. She was, in fact, bleeding. "Let me get you cleaned up, Q."

"I don't want your help, Santana. You and your perfect life, with your perfect wife, and perfect family."

"I just want to help, Q, please let me help you." Quinn nodded and allowed Santana to help her upstairs. She barely moved as Santana helped her shed her clothes and placed her in the bath, letting the shower wash the wine and blood of Quinn's body. Santana helped her into her robe, and sat her on the toilet while she wrapped her hand with some bandages; she must have cut it on some broken glass. Santana tucked her into bed, much like she had Lily just an hour earlier.

"Thank you," Quinn said, cupping Santana's cheek as Santana sat on the edge of the bed.

"Always, Q." Santana said, brushing her friend's hair out of her eyes. "You know, it doesn't have to be like this." Quinn tensed up.

"You don't understand, Santana. You'll never understand. This is my life." Quinn paused for a moment, taking her hand away from Santana's face. "You can leave now."

"Baby, have you seen my Donna Karan suit?" Santana asked Brittany, looking up from a pile of clothes in her closet. Brittany simply shook her head, gently bouncing Nico on her hip. Santana returned to shuffling through clothes. She was exhausted, and knew it was going to take way more makeup than usual to cover the bags under her eyes.

"Please stop crying, baby," Brittany whispered to Nico as she started to sort through the clothes that Santana had flung around the room.

"Fuck!" Santana yelled. "Why is there so much fucking laundry, Brittany?"

"Watch your language, Santana…" Brittany said, attempting to conceal the hurt in her voice. On the other side of the room, Santana used every ounce of willpower she possessed to not lash out about using whatever fucking language she fucking wanted to use when she was in her own fucking house and had an important meeting, and every single one of her fucking suits was dirty. "Santana, why don't you wear a different suit?"

"If I could find a different suit, Brittany, I would wear a different suit. Unfortunately, I've had to work 10 of the last 10 days, and I haven't had time to go to the dry cleaner, and the only suit I haven't worn is nowhere to be found."

"What are you trying to say, Santana?"

"I'm not trying to say anything, Brittany! I just need something to wear to work today!" Santana yelled from the bathroom. Before Brittany could respond, the sound of Olivia crying could be heard over the baby monitor.

"You know what, Santana? I'm so sick of you not taking my job seriously."

"Britt. I didn't say anything about your job. I really don't need to deal with this right now."

"You didn't say anything just now, but this last week all I've heard is about how my job doesn't count, how my job isn't stressful, how I should find the time to take your Donna Karan suit to the dry cleaner because it doesn't matter if I take time out of my work."

"Why is my Donna Karan dirty?" Santana asked, genuinely confused.

"Because it was peed on last week by the puppy and I haven't had time to clean it. Because I'm not your little housewife here to take care of all of your bullshit all the time and you were there when she peed on your suit. Because I love my job and my job takes work and I'm so sick of you making it seem stupid!" Brittany said all in one breath, her flush reaching up to her ears.

"Brittany, I wasn't implying anything! I just need my damn suit!" Santana said, exasperated and confused by her wife's outburst.

"I have to go check on our daughter," Brittany said, storming out of the room.

Quinn's head and hand were throbbing when her alarm clock went off the next morning. She struggled to piece together the night. She remembered there being a mess…and Santana, but why was Santana at her house? She vaguely remembered being naked…god, she hoped Santana hadn't been around for that. She didn't have time at the moment to worry about whatever had happened the night before, she had to get the kids off to school. Hannah was easy these days. Having Rachel around all summer must have worn off on her and she was always up before Quinn and intent on starting her morning routine. Lily, however, was still in a deep sleep. Quinn carefully stepped over her skateboard and a soccer ball and scattered toys and her guitar. She sat on the edge of her daughter's bed, gently rubbing her back.

"Time to get up, darling," Quinn cooed into Lily's ear. She smiled as her daughter gingerly rubbed her eyes with her fists and let out a big yawn. "You look like a little puppy," Quinn said. Lily shook her head, sleepily.

"I'm not a puppy. I'm a big girl." She said, through another yawn.

"Okay, big girl. It's time to get up."

"Are you okay, mommy?" Quinn was taken aback.

"Yes, honey, why?"

"You were crying last night and you broke the bottle and there was lots of blood," Quinn looked down at her bandaged hand. She hadn't remembered how she'd hurt herself and felt an overwhelming sense of shame at having her daughter be the one to tell her.

"I'm so sorry, darling, mommy is fine. I was just having a bad night."

"Aunty S sang me to sleep."

"I think she sang me to sleep to," Quinn said, sadly rubbing her daughter's back.

"She's good at that, isn't she?" Lily asked, wrapping her arms around her mother's neck, giving the universal gesture that she wasn't going to be walking around on her own this morning. Quinn grunted slightly as she lifted Lily off the bed and carried her toward the bathroom. "She has a pretty voice."

"Yes, she does," Quinn said, softly. "Let's get you washed up and ready for school, okay?"

Santana couldn't stifle the yawn that emerged from her as her boss yelled about some client who she hadn't even met before during her first meeting of the morning. She could feel the daggers piercing her skull as she tried to play it off. The contract with Paramount had fallen through, she gather, although she was pretty sure this wasn't even on her caseload and she wondered why she was here to begin with. She would never represent this sexist douchebag, and just listening to him talk about his story featuring a bunch of dissatisfied career women looking for a husband made her stomach turn.

"Lopez. My office. Now." Her boss barked as they exited the conference room. She silently followed him toward his back office, only breaking her stoic face briefly as his assistant raised her eyebrows at the scene. It was certain; she was pretty sure this firm only hired hot lesbians as assistants.

"What's this about?" She asked, unable to remove the petulant tone from her voice as she sat down across from his desk.

"What's this about, Lopez? This is about your apparent inability to do your fucking job lately."

"I think this is about you apparent inability to keep us fully fucking staffed lately and laying a bunch of extra shit on my desk in the last minute!"

"That's your fucking job, Lopez. I can't afford to be losing clients right now because you are too tied up playing husband and daddy right now because that bimbo of a wife you have can't handle it on her own." Santana was so shocked with his words that she couldn't think of a comeback. It was as though the air had been punched out of her and the room had begun spinning with her anger. "Every fucking time one of my best lawyers' blond wives get knocked up, I get stuck with a useless, dick sucking, piece of shit lawyer crying to me about their hours." Santana laughed. "What the fuck are you laughing about Lopez."

"Oh, I don't even know where to begin. Should I start with your blatant homophobia, your lack of humanity, your sexism, or your simple idiocy?" Santana said, rising from her seat. "One. Sir. I am neither daddy nor husband. I am a lesbian, meaning I am a wife and a mother, neither of which have ever interfered with my ability to do my job. Yes, I have 16-month-old twins at home, and no, have I ever allowed my family life to interfere with my work life. Two. My 'bimbo' of a wife is an award winning choreographer who refuses to let us represent her because she thinks it would be a conflict of interest, despite the fact that her personal success would be a huge asset for this company and she gives up numerous jobs every year because you are too lazy to do the job you started this firm for. Three. You have put me in charge of 23 clients with active contracts to handle, which is unprecedented. If I were a single man this workload would be impossible to sustain. And yet, I have somehow managed to get our clients the contracts they deserve and you're still bitching at me." Her boss didn't speak. "So, I suggest that unless I stop doing my job to your satisfaction and am thereby forced to leave and take my clients with me, that you get off my fucking ass and return to the dick sucking you call a job." Santana picked up her briefcase and stormed out of the office. She didn't look at anyone as she exited the office afraid that if she made eye contact she would burst out in tears. She was pretty sure she had just lost her job. If she didn't lose her job, it would be a fucking miracle. She slammed her car door and leaned her head on the wheel and allowed herself to cry, to let it all out. She could feel her phone buzzing in her pants so she took a few deep breaths before putting the phone to her ear, not bothering to check the caller ID.

"Santana Pierce-Lopez," she managed to choke out.

"So formal for your mami."

"Sorry, I didn't check the caller ID."

"What's wrong, mija?"

"Everything. Work is shit. Life is shit."

"Language, mija."

"I just have so much work and Brittany doesn't understand and isn't helping out at home. Meanwhile, Quinn is having some crisis and Lily called me, terrified, in the middle of the night, so I was there well into the morning and I got no sleep, and I yelled at Brittany this morning and I yelled at my boss, and I'm probably going to get my ass fired."

"Mija, you have to learn to deal with your stress in a productive manner."

"Mami, can't you just ever talk to me on the phone and say, 'I'm sorry, Santana, things sound stressful. Is there anything I can do?"

"No, because there are clear solutions to your problems and I'm not, nor have I ever been, one of those mothers that pretends that life is perfect."

"I know that, mami, of course I know that," Santana said, trying to choke back her tears. "Can't you just be sympathetic?"

"I am sympathetic, Santana, I just think more than sympathy right now you need some advice. And my advice is that you need to find a way to make your parenthood, spousal, and work situation manageable instead of crying about it."

"You know what, mami, I don't want to talk about this anymore. Why don't you go give some of your motherly advice to one of your other three children." Santana slammed her phone shut.

"Hello?"

"You figured out your shit yet, Q?"

"Oh, I'm doing fine Santana, thanks so much for asking. It's always so good to hear from you and know that you're thinking about me!"

"Whatever, Q, I've had a shit day and I'm not going to pussyfoot around it with some pathetic small talk with my best friend whose life is even more in the shitter than mine."

"What's wrong with your life?"

"Fighting with Britt, fighting at work, fighting with my mother. You know…fighting is what Santana Lopez does best, but I really just don't have the energy to deal with this shit right now. I'm too fucking old, you know?" Quinn snorted.

"Unfortunately, I do."

"Let's go do some Bikram."

"Right now?"

"There's a class at 4:30. It was either that or go to the shooting range but Britt gets hella pissed when I do that and I really don't need her anymore mad at me than she already is."

"Well, I mean, it's kind of creepy that you feel the need to shoot at things when you're angry."

"It's not like I would ever shoot a person, Q! It just relieves some tension…anyway, we're not talking about the gun range, Quinn, I just want to see if you want to go to some nice, peaceful, hot yoga?"

"Can we go get carnitas afterward?"

"Yeah, Q. I'll pick you up in an hour."

"Hi, Brittany, how's it going?"

"Santana already called you?"

"How can you tell?"
"I just can."

"How are you doing, honey?"

"Not great. I hate to do this to you, Maria. I know you're on vacation…"

"You'd like me to look after my grandbabies for a bit. I would love to, obviously. Not that I don't love you two, but you know they're the reason I came out to visit."

"I know, I just don't want to make it seem like we are using you as a babysitting service or something."

"Never, dear. I'm out at lunch with Rita now, we'll be by to pick them up in a half and hour."

"Thanks so much, Maria."

"Always, mija."

"You hear that?" Brittany said after hanging up the phone. She walked over to the playpen the twins were in and picked up Nico, bobbing him up and down. "Your abuela is going to come pick you up! That way mama can do some choreography and you won't have to listen to mami scream and be angry with all of us for no good reason when she comes home from work!" Brittany said in her baby voice.

"Oh, come here, my darlings," Maria said as she walked into the house. Brittany handed her Nico and handed Olivia to Rita. "Your abuela and tia are going to have so much fun with you today."

"First, though, Brittany, what is going on with my niece?" Rita asked.

"It's really nothing," Brittany said. "I just need some time to work out some choreography for a gig I have next week and Santana's having a bad week at work."

"Oh, do not give me that, girl," Rita said, using a very Santana-like Lima Heights Adjacent voice. "You know nobody lies to Aunt Rita. Aunt Rita's been around." Maria rolled her eyes at her sister. They all walked into the house and took a seat at the kitchen table.

"I don't even know why I'm telling you this." Brittany began, bringing coffee to the two older women.

"Because even though we all pretend that it's not true, you've been telling us this stuff for the last 15 years." Maria said.

"Seriously," Rita said, "do not pretend like we haven't been having incognito girltalk for ages."

"I know, but, she's your niece, and daughter." Brittany pointed out.

"Brittany," Maria said, using her hand that was not holding Nico to hold her daughter-in-law's. "You know you are every bit as much a part of this family as Santana is. I believe you are the only one who knows my mother's secret five-layered dip recipe, correct?" Brittany smiled.

"Well, Santana knows now too…abuelita said I could tell whomever I marry."

"Oh, I'm going to get that bitch to crack," Rita said with a smirk.

"Back to the subject," Maria interjected, "what's going on with you two?"

"We're just both under a lot of pressure. It's really not a big deal," Brittany said. The older women waited, clearly not satisfied with that response. "I'm working again, and Santana suddenly got a huge new workload, and I guess neither of us is used to it. Plus, two babies, the dog…and you know how she gets when she's feeling stressed and insecure and doesn't have a hold of her life."

"She lashes out," Maria finished.

"And we keep doing things to keep it under control. Taking trips, going on dates, making sure we're making time for one another…but in the end…we just can't keep doing the day to day like this. No amount of romantic dates will make up for both of us working 12 hours a day and having two children."

"I think you two really need to talk."

"I know," Brittany said, with just the hint of sadness in her voice.

"I fucking hate Bikram," Quinn said as she climbed into Santana's car.

"No, you don't."

"Yes I do, and I'm hungover as hell and not sure that I'm actually going to be able to stay in the room for the whole class. You know better than I what it's like to do it hungover." They both burst out laughing at the memory of Santana vomiting all over her mat during a 9am hot yoga when they were in college.

"So," Santana said, catching her breath from the laughter, "how's that hand doing?"

"I don't want to talk about it."

Shockingly, Quinn did make it through hot yoga, and by made it, she managed to stay in the room for the full 90 minutes without throwing up and she could do some of the positions that required mainly laying on the mat.

"That was pathetic, Q." Santana said after they had showered and put their drenched clothes in plastic bags.

"I told you, Santana, I hate Bikram. Besides, at least I stayed in the room the whole time, isn't that the whole goal?"

"Well, I think they'd appreciate it if you at least tried some of the moves from time to time."

"Whatever," Quinn said. "Let's go get food."

"Quinn, you know I love you, right?" Santana said, slicing into her burrito.

"Okay, this is weird, Santana."

"I'm about to get harsh with you, Quinn, and my therapist told me that I could still keep it real, as long as I make sure the people I love know that I'm doing it with good intentions," Santana said, rolling her eyes. "So, you should know that what I'm about to say comes from a place of love."

"Okay, Santana, go ahead," Quinn said, the nerves very apparent in her voice.

"Brittany, Rachel, and I have all been coddling you for the sake of your feelings for months now, Quinn. Years, even. But it's well past time that you grow the fuck up. Life is not easy, Quinn. Every time you realize that you're going to have to do any sort of emotional work, you check out and revert to what is easiest. I get where you're coming from, I have children now too, and you know that I would do anything for them, but staying in a relationship you've been unhappy in for years is not doing your children any favors. They only know parents who fight, and a mother who drinks too much because she's unhappy."

"That's enough, Santana. Who do you think you are to judge me about my life and my life's choices? You come in here, all high and mighty because you have everything figured out. I happen to remember a younger Santana who was a raging bitch to everyone because she was so lost. It took you nearly a decade to figure out what the hell was going on in your life, and you put Brittany through hell because of it."

"That's exactly my point, Q." Santana said, more calmly than Quinn expected. So calmly, in fact, that it made her stop talking. "I'm not sitting across from you right now claiming to be some sort of paragon of stability. I know what it's like to be a mess, Q. I know what it's like to be so lost inside yourself that the only thing you can do is be destructive because it's the only way you can feel anything real. The point isn't whether or not I'm perfect or have ever been perfect or will ever be perfect, for that matter, the point is finding a way to deal with yourself and your problems so that you can be happy and your not bringing down the people around you." Santana looked at Quinn, waiting for a response. She took Quinn's silence as a good thing and continued. "I have what I do today because I did the hard work to get here. I found a therapist who could help me deal with all my issues about my sexuality. I put myself in situations that were uncomfortable, but I knew would help me be a better person. I picked a career that allowed me to get my bitch on, without destroying the lives of everyone at home." Quinn smiled at this. "And despite all of this, I still have days where I worry about what my coworkers say behind my back. I still have moments when I'm having to come out to someone new where I wonder what would have happened if I had followed the original plan and married a reliable football player instead of a slightly daffy blond dancer. It will never be perfect. We are human, and we're going to feel insecure sometimes. But this, Quinn, this is not sustainable. No matter what you think you're doing to keep your family together, to keep yourself together, it's already unraveling. You can either deal with it now, or you can wait until its hit rock bottom and there's nothing left to do about it. This is my therapist's phone number. You should really call her." Santana stood up and started toward the front of the restaurant.

"You should really take your own advice, Santana." Quinn said before Santana could get out of the door. "Your problems aren't going to solve themselves either."

Santana threw her briefcase on the kitchen table as soon as she entered the house. She opened up the fridge—she wasn't hungry, it was just habit.

"Hey," Brittany said.

"Oh my god! You scared me," Santana said.

"Sorry," Brittany said, softly. "You're home early."

"I took the rest of the day off, after my meeting."

"Oh."

"Where are Nico and Olivia?"

"At Rita's with your mother."

"You were working?" Santana asked, eyeing Brittany's sweaty clothes.

"I was dancing…it's not work, remember, Santana?" Brittany snapped back at her. They just stood there awkwardly. Santana didn't have the energy to fight, and Brittany was not going to back down. They made eye contact briefly before Santana fixed her gaze at the floor.

"I'm going to take a nap, Brittany," Santana said. It wasn't angry, it was defeated. It was sad, and the sadness in her tone did not escape Brittany as she watched her wife stalk off toward their bedroom.

It had been two weeks since Quinn had first sat back down at her computer and written. Two weeks and she hadn't read what she had written that first night.

You don't exist anymore. You walk around your big house and the space moves when you enter and the space comes back to fill the absences your body has left behind, but you are no longer there. You can't remember a time when you were. You wish time would stop, would pause somehow, and give you a moment to think about what's going on around you. Sometimes, when you've had enough wine, it feels like it has. Like the lines between who you are and who you've become and where the physical world begins have faded and you can just sit in the stilled time. It only ever works for a matter of seconds before the emotions of the alcohol remind you how messed up everything has become. You think of late nights in Ohio where there was more open space and time moved more slowly; maybe it was your age, or maybe it was the space, the smallness and the slowness of the town that allowed you to feel at peace with yourself. Although it's debatable whether you felt the peace even then. You remember nights sitting in Finn's beat up old truck, looking at the stars through the window, before Beth, before Puck, before Justin, and feeling so content with the world. You remember later, sitting in the same seat and Finn asking you if you even felt anything anymore. You didn't. You knew then that you didn't feel anything anymore. Feeling was hard and feeling caused pain and it was better, easier to not let it in than to open yourself up what the world had to offer.

Sometimes you are brought back, but only for a moment. You never know what will trigger it. Sometimes it is a memory of Lima, before Beth, or a memory of standing on stage and singing as though no one else existed. Sometimes it's watching your best friends share a look, so much like the looks they shared when they were still in cheerleading uniforms and linking pinkies as they defiled the yearbook. Sometimes it's your youngest daughter's face as she tells a story or your eldest daughter's when she cries. Sometimes it's the memory of the daughter you knew for one day who will be celebrating her 16th birthday soon. Sometimes it's hearing her voice, how even in her laughter she is singing because she is singing with everything she does. She is always emoting and with every word she utters, every time you hear her sharp inhale, you hear her voice, clear and pure, singing. You can't get her voice out of your head.

You know they're there, on some level. Those feelings lurk beneath the surface and threaten to burst through and destroy all the work you've done all these years to make sure you couldn't be hurt, to make you the infallible, bionic housewife. It's never more than a glimpse anymore, a millisecond of humanity before you can shut down again, and make sure that no one ever gets to close. When they get to close, they run away, and if you make sure that they never know you, then you won't have to be sad again.

Sometimes you dream of something better. It is slower, and there is grass and dogs and your daughters never stop smiling. There are real stars in the sky and when hands wrap around your waist to say they love you, they mean it and you feel whole and connected again to this world. There is singing and soft kisses and the smell of fresh cut grass and morning dew. You wake from these dreams at once sad and relieved. To be happy again just means hurting later on.

It's preferable, not to exist anymore. To wake up and drink your coffee and make sure your kids are fed and off to school. It is safe to know that you are nothing more than an object to take up space, and always the air moves in to fill the spaces where my body's been.

"Mark Strand," Quinn says aloud to herself. She'd had a class her senior year that had Mark Strand as part of the required reading. It was her third class with this professor he'd always encouraged her writing and thought that she showed promise. Quinn and Santana had planned on getting tattoos the day after they graduated, and Quinn was going to get the Mark Strand poem tattooed on her ribcage. She had applied for jobs in journalism and Santana had just been accepted into law school. Before they got the chance to get the tattoos, or before Quinn even got the chance to go on any job interviews, Quinn found out she was pregnant and plans changed. Life changed. She hadn't thought about the poem in years. "Wherever I am," Quinn said, "I am what is missing."

It was late when Santana finally woke from her nap. She was hungry, and she couldn't help but wonder whether Brittany was still even here anymore. Of course she is. She's always still there, and yet somehow Santana always feels relieved after moments like these to find out she hasn't finally gotten sick of her bullshit and left.

"I'm sorry," Santana says, walking into the room.

"I know," Brittany replies.

"I know that dancing is your job. I admire you so much for it, Brittany."

"I know you do, Santana."

"Please, don't be angry with me anymore."

"I wasn't angry, Santana. I was hurt."

"I know," Santana said, sitting down at the kitchen table. Brittany pulls out some leftover Thai food and puts it in the microwave. "Thank you," Santana says softly.

"We have to figure this out," Brittany says as the microwave beeps and she piles food on to a plate for Santana. Santana smiles; the plate is from the first set of dishes they purchased from Target when they moved into their first apartment. Santana wanted to get the plain brown set that cost twenty dollars, but Brittany insisted on the forty dollar plates with rainbow stripes. They were plastic, and they had since upgraded to nicer dishware. When they bought the house after Santana had been hired by the firm, she'd wanted to donate them to Goodwill, but Brittany insisted they keep them as a reminder of how far they'd come, and in case they ever had children and needed something unbreakable and bright.

"This reminds me of our old apartment," Santana says, as Brittany takes a seat across from her and hands her the plate. "It was so small."

"It was cozy."

"And it had that annoying dog always yapping in the courtyard."

"With that avocado tree."

"And all of our couches were broken."

"So you were always forced to sit in the middle and cuddle up together." They sat in silence for another few moments. "We still have to figure this out." Brittany finally said.

"I think I'm going to get fired." Santana replied.

"What happened?" Brittany asked, quietly, laying a hand on Santana's forearm.

"I yelled at my boss. Lost my temper. Like usual."

"I'm so sorry, Santana. Well, we have our savings, and I'm back to working."

"I'd been thinking about starting my own firm anyway," Santana said, tentatively making eye contact with her wife. "I know all of my clients would come with me. It would just be a lot of work at first, you know, to get it off the ground." Brittany nodded. "But then I could set my own hours, work from home…" she trailed off, thinking about the prospect.

"I think that could be a good idea, Santana. You know, your mother offered to stay here for awhile. Until the holidays. Christian's children are older, Carlos' wife is a stay at home mom, and Daniel doesn't have children. She said she's lonely in Ohio."

"God, my mom, living with us…I don't know, Britt."

"It'd be like your abuela when we were growing up. Also, she could always stay with Rita, if you'd like."

"Why don't we talk to her about it when she comes by tomorrow?" Brittany nodded. "I'm so sorry, Brittany," Santana said, looking up at her wife with her eyebrows raised and her eyes wide, signaling to Brittany that she was about to cry. "I'm so sorry that I'm me, and that I yell, and that I can't be the perfect wife you deserve all the time."

"Honey," Brittany began, taking both of her hands across the table, "you are the perfect wife, I couldn't ask for anyone more perfect. We're just adjusting right now, and I'd never ask you to change. Not for anything." Santana nodded, gripping Brittany's hands like a vice. "Now, stop apologizing and eat. You must be starving. We'll talk to Maria tomorrow." Santana nodded again, and dove into the food. She was starving.

Quinn had read what she wrote. Read and reread and then read again. She was unhappy. Everyone knew that she was unhappy but her. Or maybe she knew on some level, but seeing it written out like that made all the difference in the world. She picked up her phone.

"Hello, you've reached Rachel Berry, I'm not available to take your call. Please leave a message with your name, phone number, and the time. Thank you, and have a lovely day!"

Quinn quickly hung up the phone.

3000 miles away, Rachel was dancing with Kurt and a few of her friends.

"Who was that?" Erica asked, glancing at the phone in Rachel's hand.

"Nobody," Rachel said. "Let's get another drink," she grabbed Kurt's hand and they headed back to the bar.