Due to the time difference, it was past midnight when they landed back in Columbus, and they were glad of the last-minute decision they made to stay in the airport hotel before embarking on the drive back. Two hours wasn't a long way to go at all, but it felt like it when they had been travelling all day.
The next morning, they were up early and ready to go, and they spent the whole car ride happily reminiscing over their blissful vacation together; happy in the knowledge they were officially together now and going back to reality wasn't going to change that. They had travelled to the airport separately on the way here, so not to rouse any suspicion, but on the way back they could get away with saying that Santana was picking Brittany up from the airport since they were going with the narrative that Sam was getting an interconnecting flight to LA for work. In reality Sam of course was already in LA, and had been all along, and their cover story seemed bullet proof. But as the road signs indicated they were getting closer and closer to Lima; Santana began to sense a change in Brittany's mood. She took her opportunity when they stopped at a red light and reached out across the centre console for Brittany's hand.
"You okay my love? You seem quiet"
She stroked her thumb across Brittany's hand, patiently awaiting a response.
"I just feel so bad for lying to my parents like this" Brittany sighed "In my head the plan that Sam and I have sounds good, and it's probably going to cause less drama than if we were to admit we never even made it on honeymoon, but now we're getting closer I'm like…am I going to be able to hold this together? I feel so guilty for lying."
"That's understandable Brit. Nobody likes lying to their parents. Are you thinking of reconsidering and telling them earlier?"
"I can't. Sam and I have an agreement, it would be unfair to tell my parents before he has the chance to speak to his. Besides I'm in the thick of the lies now. They already think I went on honeymoon with him, if I backtrack on that and say all this time that I was with you then they're going to flip out. But I just don't know how I'm going to answer all my mom's questions about the nice time we had there and all the things we did…"
"Well," Santana chewed her lip thoughtfully "I guess you could answer that part honestly. Talk about our vacation, talk about the things that you and I did. That way you're not really lying, you're just telling a different version of the truth. They don't need to know it was with me and not Sam."
She looked at Brittany and hoped it would give her some reassurance. Whether Brittany wanted to tell her parents now or later, she was fully supportive, but Brittany was saying she couldn't tell them now so all she could do was try and make her feel better about holding off on telling them. Brittany still looked unsure though, so Santana continued.
"It's not like you plan on lying to them for weeks babe. In 10 days; they'll know the truth. Your reason for holding back isn't that you're wanting to deceive them, you're just trying to prevent more drama and hurt, and waiting so that Sam has the opportunity to tell his parents at the same time. I think that's fully understandable".
"I guess so, but I just hate that our beginning has start like this. Like some sordid secret. I just want to shout to the world about how happy we are together, but I can't".
Santana's face softened at the sadness mirrored in Brittany's eyes.
"Hey, there's nothing that I want more than to shout to the world that you're mine too. I'm so proud to be with you, but at the same time, I think it's nice that we have this little bubble still. It doesn't matter when people find about us, all I care about is you and I being happy. The rest of the world can wait".
"I guess when you put it like that, it does sound a lot better. Just you and I in our happy bubble, that no one can touch".
"See! Loads of couples wait a while before telling everyone they're together, for that same reason. Or sometimes because they're not sure if they're going to be in it for the long-haul, but that's obviously not an issue for us. It's going to be ridiculously hard keeping my hands off you in front of everyone at Mila's party on Saturday, but…I actually like being your sordid little secret"
Santana winked, causing Brittany to smirk and go all doe eyed.
"Oh yeah…"
Santana giggled, happy that her girlfriend looked more relaxed as they neared Brittany's parents' house where she was dropping her off.
"Do you know someone I am just dying to tell more than anyone though?" Santana asked, a smile appearing on her face at the thought.
Brittany could guess, but she played dumb anyway, her own smile mirroring Santana's.
"Who?"
"Mila. She is going to be so happy about this when she finds out"
"Yeah?" Brittany smiled wider, butterflies popping in her stomach at the thought.
"Seriously. When I think about how she's going to react, I get so excited! It'll be like telling her she's going to Disney World all over again except the vacation never stops."
"You're confident she's going to react well then? She won't be, I don't know…weirded out or anything?"
Santana shook her head adamantly.
"Someone I love with all of my heart once told me that this child of mine only cares about one thing. My happiness."
Brittany gestured to herself bashfully, remembering it was in fact herself that told Santana that.
"Yeah…you" Santana laughed, before stopping to look at Brittany for a second, swallowing her emotions. "I'm serious I mean, living my life with you is one of the only things that's as good in real life as it actually is in my imagination. Not only will Mila feel that, but she adores you herself. She sees you as part of her family already. You mean the world to both of us."
"Wow, you really know how to make a girl soft huh Miss Lopez?" Brittany laughed, wiping tears from her eyes that suddenly brimmed, as Santana laughed along with her. When the laughter died down and they had stopped at another red light, she reached out for Brittany again and gave her hand a gentle squeeze.
"I'm serious. You make me so happy"
Brittany raised Santana's hand to her lips, opening it out flat and placing a kiss against the heel.
"And I am never going to stop doing just that. As an astrophysics buff, I am one of the few people who understands the concept of infinity, and I…will love you until infinity Santana Lopez"
Santana let out a shy smile, her chocolate eyes becoming lost in Brittany's sparkling blue ones.
"And I will love you until infinity too Brit."
Santana dropped Brittany back at her parents (but not before Santana parked up the street for a good 5 minutes so she could kiss Brittany goodbye without anyone seeing), with the plan for her to spend the night there before coming by Santana's early the next morning ready for Mila's birthday. As she drove away from the Pierce's, opting to wave from a distance rather than going in because she was desperate to see Mila by now, she took out her cell to call Quinn. It rang just twice before Quinn's voice appeared in her ear.
"She's here and ready for you. And I made sure to hop her up on alllll the sugar ready for her to come back to you"
"That had better be one of your jokes, Q" I scowled playfully, even though she couldn't see me.
Quinn let out a throaty laugh.
"Where are you?"
"I just dropped Brit off with her parents, so I can come by now and pick her up if that's good with you?"
"Well, I was joking about the sugar for the most part, but I have taken her to IHOP for a pre-birthday breakfast, her pick, so there is about to be some serious pancake consumption going down. We're just waiting for our food, so I can drop her off when we're finished if you want? Unless of course you want to meet us here".
Santana smiled to herself thinking just how much Quinn despised IHOP but was happy to go there for Mila. She was a great person in her child's life, and she felt so glad she picked her to be second godmother.
"No that works great actually if you could drop her off. Gives me time to start on the unpacking and give the place a tidy before my beloved daughter comes home like a hurricane and messes it all up again" Santana laughed.
"Okay, well I'll be about an hour then. See you soon!"
Sure enough, an hour later an excitable 10-year-old burst through the door, Santana finding it emotional that this was the last day she'd be able to call her a 10-year-old.
"Mama!" Mila cried, running straight for Santana's open arms and wrapping her legs around Santana as she picked her up and peppered her with kisses. She may have been 11 tomorrow, but Santana was clinging on to this side to Mila for as long as she could, before she no longer wanted her cuddles and kisses. Maybe she'd be lucky and Mila wouldn't go through that hormonal stage, she could hope, but either way her days of being able to lift her daughter weren't going to last much longer. It was only the fact that Mila measured small for her age (there were some 8-year-olds taller than her at school) that she was able to do so now. Santana was also small though, so she knew scooping her up the way she just did wasn't going to be possible soon.
"My angel! I missed you so very much" said Santana, closing her eyes as she breathed in the familiar smell of her daughter,
"I missed you too Mama" she said earnestly, as Santana set her back down on the floor, Quinn watching them with a smile.
As Mila ran upstairs to put her bags in her room, Santana turned to Quinn. She had already thanked her for having Mila, and Quinn had told her every time that she didn't need to thank her, but still Santana had to thank her once again and Quinn had to respond by telling her it was no problem, and it was a pleasure to look after Mila and spend time with her.
"Do you want to stay for coffee? Or tea?" Santana asked, once the round of thank yous were out of the way.
"Ordinarily I would but I'm gonna have to pass…I actually have a date I need to start getting ready for"
"A date hey? Who's the lucky guy this time?" Santana winked, but for once she noticed Quinn was actually being shy about it.
"Look at you acting all coy!" Santana gasped "Okay now you have to tell me who it is! Do I know him? Is he from here?"
"Well…you could say that. You know how I hooked up with your school friend at the wedding…"
Santana gasped even louder.
"No effin' way! Finn!? Finn Hudson? You're going on a date with Finn Hudson?"
Quinn laughed nervously in a way that Santana had never seen her before, and she realised their usual playfulness might not have been appropriate in this situation when Quinn for once seemed genuinely modest.
"Aw Q that's seriously sweet. Finn is a lovely guy. He could be good for you." Santana offered, even though in her head she thought they were the most unlikely couple. Finn was the complete opposite to the type of guy Quinn usually dated, but maybe this actually could work in her favour.
Quinn seemed to relax a bit more at that, and she seemed grateful Santana didn't ask any more questions or tease her about it. But after Santana had called Mila back down to say her goodbyes, she couldn't help but throw just one playful comment in as she took Quinn into a hug to say goodbye herself.
"I always knew you were after my sloppy seconds, Fabray" Santana whispered, and to her relief, Quinn did see the humour in it and laughed too.
"Me with Brittany Pierce and Quinn with Finn Hudson, who would have thought it all those years ago hey?" Santana laughed to herself.
"Come here and snuggle with me my big, grown up girl" Santana had requested, as soon as Quinn and left, and for the past hour she had enjoyed catching up with her daughter and hearing all about her time at Quinn's. Mila had asked about Hawaii in return, with Santana just feigning it off as a boring business trip, nothing for her to feel she had missed out on.
She was well aware that she needed to talk about the Lily situation, but she decided to leave that until later on and just enjoy a nice day with her daughter.
"So, are you all excited for your big day tomorrow munchkin?" Santana asked, ruffling Mila's hair.
"Mamiiiii, you gotta stop calling me that" Mila complained, though with a slight hint of a smile on her face.
"What? Just because you're about to turn 11 tomorrow missy, doesn't mean you're too old to be my munchkin"
Mila simply laughed before changing the line of conversation.
"Will my Aunty Brit be here early in the morning?" she asked, excited at the fact Brittany was coming over tomorrow to spend the day with them.
"She sure will angel. And we can spend the day however you like, then we have your sleepover at night"
Mila bit her lip and swallowed, a gesture that didn't go unnoticed by Santana, and she was about to question her when Mila spoke out and answered for her.
"I'm not so sure I want a sleepover Mama. I think I just want to spend the day with just you and Aunty Brit" she shrugged.
Santana was shocked by this, because Mila always loved having a birthday sleepover, and the fact her birthday fell on Spring Break this year meant she could have one on her actual birthday.
"Oh…okay darling well, it's your day. We can spend it however you want to spend it. You always love your sleepovers though, is there something you're not telling me?"
Mila shrugged again.
"I guess I just feel too big for sleepovers now. I'm already having a party at the weekend; I don't need two of them. Some kids in my class don't even get one".
Santana looked curiously at her daughter, trying to work out if she was hiding things from her. She knew from her own experience as a kid, that Mila definitely wasn't too old for sleepovers, in fact this was prime sleepover age. But much like Brittany, Mila was a real empath. It wouldn't be unfeasible for her to feel guilty about having two parties if the other kids in her class didn't have one at all.
"Well, that's very nice of you to think about the other people in your class Moo, I'm very proud of you for that. I'll give the girls mom's a call and let them know, maybe we can have a non-birthday sleepover instead one time?"
"Okay" Mila nodded.
"Why don't you have a think about what you want to do tomorrow instead?"
Mila nodded again, and Santana went off into the kitchen to make herself a coffee before calling the girls moms. Mila had 3 friends invited: Lily, Madison and Brianna. She didn't know Madison's mom so well since Madison had only transferred to Mila's school this year. The little impression she did have of her was that she looked down on people, so she called her first, figuring she'd get the more awkward one out of the way. To Santana's surprise, Madison's mom insisted she knew nothing of a sleepover. She thought that maybe Madison didn't want to come and so hadn't passed the message onto her mother, but then Brianna's mom said the same thing. Brianna was never aware of any sleepover. Maybe Mila wanted it to be just her and Lily, the way Santana had always wanted it to be just her and Brittany but a call to Lily's mother confirmed the opposite when she too knew nothing about a sleepover.
"I thought it was strange when Lily said Mila wasn't having a sleepover this year" she had said.
Now Santana really was confused, and she made a mental note to talk to Mila about it that evening, when she had planned to talk to her anyway.
When the evening rolled around, Santana walked into Mila's bedroom the way she did every night at 9:30pm to tell her to put her book down because it was lights out now, but instead of crouching down to give her a kiss goodnight, she did something a little different.
"Can I squeeze in for the last ever cuddle with my ten-year-old?" she asked, gesturing to the bed, and Mila nodded. As much as she was trying to act like she was growing too big for pet names and constant cuddles and kisses, she did still love these moments.
Santana climbed in and just cuddled Mila for a second as she braced herself for the conversation ahead. She really wanted to get to the bottom of a few things with her, and she hoped the vulnerability of night-time would help Mila open up more, in the same way it had helped her and Brittany. If pillow talk was something she was going to regularly implement with Brittany, maybe she should make her own mother-daughter version for her and Mila, to make sure in the challenging years ahead of her budding adolescence, that they stayed close.
"Amorcita, I wanted to talk to you about something" Santana began carefully "I was speaking on the phone earlier to Lily, Madison and Brianna's moms, and they mentioned that you didn't invite them to your sleepover…"
She looked at Mila's deep brown eyes, darting from side to side, before pressing her further.
"Talk to me, Meels. Is there a reason you didn't want to invite them? You can tell me anything, you know that…"
And suddenly Santana saw something in Mila that frightened her. It was herself. Her young, defensive herself.
"I just didn't wanna okay!"
"Mila…"
"No Mama, I don't want to talk about this!"
And as Mila sat up to get out of the bed, Santana grabbed her hand to stop her.
"No, come on. We're not doing this. We're not locking our feelings up inside and not talking about them because that's not good for you" she said firmly, pulling Mila back to sit on the bed.
"Come on baby, I know that something is bothering you, and I can't help you if you don't talk to me…" said Santana, softening her approach. She waited in a hopeful silence, but still nothing, so she continued on again. "I was your age once you know. And do you know what, I used to do exactly what you're doing now to your Abuela."
"Not doing anything." Mila huffed.
"Yes, you are. You're being snappy and you're shutting me off because something is hurting you inside. But I know better than anyone that it only hurts more, so I don't want you to do that. I want you to talk to me because you can tell me anything. I love you more than anything in this world so it really hurts me to see you sad, but if I don't know what's wrong, I can't help you. So please just talk to me sweetheart?"
Mila sighed heavily, but to Santana's relief, she began to soften slightly.
"I just really didn't want a sleepover okay? Sleepovers are fun sometimes, but now we have to tell Ghost Stories, and I don't like them so much. I miss old sleepovers where we would play games and tell nice stories, but everyone says we can't do that now we're 11 because it's babyish. But I don't like being scared."
Santana studied Mila carefully before letting out a sigh of relief. She didn't know what she was expecting, but it wasn't that.
"Oh Moo. You don't have to be worried about being scared. You're still so young! I'm a grown-up and still now I don't like Ghost Stories. This is your birthday and if you want to tell nice stories instead, that's totally okay. Never let anybody discourage you from being you okay? You and your friends are all growing at different paces, there's no set way to be my corazoncita."
"Really?" Mila asked, her voice small, with all the vulnerability of a small child that reminded Santana she really was just a little girl still.
"Really." Santana nodded firmly, taking Mila into a warm hug and just holding her close for a minute or so before breaking the silence. "You know, you remind me so much of your Aunty Brit. She always used to get scared of things like this too. You remember that I told you she was scared of the dark don't you?"
"Mm-hm" Mila nodded "And you got her the glow in the dark stars."
"That's right. Aunty Brit never liked Ghost Stories so much either."
"What did she used to do?"
"She used to ask to hold my hand under the blankets."
"And you did?"
"Of course. I would have done anything to make her feel better. Just like I would do anything to make you feel better."
Mila smiled at that.
"But you know one thing about Aunty Brit?"
"Mm-hm?"
"She was never, ever afraid of being herself. She didn't care if she liked something different to everybody else. If she liked it, she liked it. It never mattered what anybody else thought. So that's what I want you to do for me, okay?"
Mila nodded, seemingly feeling a lot better about things after a talk with her Mami.
"How about things with Lily. Things are okay with you now? Because I was so sad to hear that you'd been fighting with her. Lily is your best friend".
"Everything's okay now" Mila shrugged.
"Can you tell me about what you were fighting about?" Santana asked softly. "I won't be angry, I promise, I just want to know".
There was a long pause before Mila spoke up again, her mother's eyes looking expectantly at her.
"It was a fight about a boy in my class. We both fancy him, but I liked him first and Lily stole him, so I lost my temper"
Now it was Santana's turn to sigh heavily.
"Well, that doesn't sound very like you to lash out and lose your temper like that"
"I know, I'm really sorry Mama. It won't happen again. I promise." Mila looked down sadly, and while Santana did believe she genuinely was sorry and wouldn't do it again, she couldn't believe an elementary school crush had caused her to lash out in the first place. But then she herself had been known to have similar fights, although in middle school and high school, boys weren't even on her radar in Elementary. But there again, she is a lesbian, she mused.
"It's never right to hit somebody Mila. I've brought you up better than that. You could have really hurt Lily. You don't fight with your best friend, especially not about boys, understood?"
"So, you and Aunty Brit never had a fight about boys?"
Santana shuffled uncomfortably because technically, yes, but not that kind of fight about boys.
"I've never had a fight like that with Aunty Brit. It's not right to hit anybody, but least of all your best friend" she said firmly, before softening slightly after she was sure Mila could feel her disappointment sink in "But…I do believe you won't do it again, and I believe that you are sorry, and I know you have already been punished so I'm not going to punish you anymore. If you ever feel angry like that again, I want you to count to ten in your head and take some deep breaths."
"Okay, I really will. I promise".
"Just promise me that everything is okay between you two now?".
"I promise".
"Good girl" Santana whispered softly, feeling relieved to have finally talked everything out with Mila, and taking her into another hug.
"Mama?"
"Yes sweetheart?"
"Since you want me to be myself…I would really, really love a unicorn themed sleepover with you just you and Aunty Brit tomorrow. Everyone says unicorns are for babies, but I love them. I think they are so pretty."
And Santana stifled a laugh, because if she didn't physically push Mila out almost exactly 11-years-ago, and if she wasn't such a carbon copy of her in the looks department, she could swear Mila was Brittany's biological daughter and not her own.
