Disclaimer: I do not own the Fosters.

This was the day from hell. Lena was completely sure that it had to have been one of the worst days of her life. The morning started out hectic as usual as she tried to herd her own three kids to school with very little success. They had managed to be ten minutes late thanks to Jesus conveniently forgetting his back pack. It was bad enough trying to get everyone ready when Stef was there to help her, but she had been called into work early which left Lena with three children who really didn't want to go to school.

Not only had getting to work been a challenge, but as soon as she walked in the door, she had been called to her bosses office. As it turns out, now she had to deal with a staff problem. One of their high school teachers had been refusing to conform to a new curriculum and after having been talked to, and having promised Lena that she would work on integrating it, she had done completely the opposite. This left Lena in the position to either make sure that she altered her teaching to the new curriculum today, or be out of a job. Lena hated being the person in the middle, but as the vice principle, she was stuck dealing with the majority of the staffing problems.

At lunch, she finally found herself having a moment to herself after having been working for what seemed like hours without so much as a bathroom break. She hated how busy her job could get. Unfortunately her somewhat peaceful lunch was interrupted by the secretary calling to let her know that there was a student there to see her who had a discipline slip. This was certainly one of her least favorite duties. It could be hard enough to deal with staff members and their attitudes, but dealing with misbehaving students was also no fun.

After having assigned a week's worth of detention to the unruly high schooler, she managed to start tackling the mountain of paper work on her desk. As she worked, she let her mind wander just a bit and started to wonder what Stef was up to at that time. She started to puck up her phone and call her partner, but was interrupted again by a phone call from the secretary. It seems that everyone was out to test her patience today. After dealing with the two boys who had gotten into a fight and four other children with disciplinary slips, she had been abruptly called into the principle's office. It was there that she received a less that friendly questioning about why the grant proposals were not done yet. After attempting to explain that she had been dealing with the staff issue as well as all of the student discipline issues, she was informed that that was just a part of her job, but that those grant proposals were as well. She knew that Karina could be difficult and demanding, but she didn't think that she actually knew what it was like to have to write grant proposals in between disciplining both the staff and the students.

She quickly worked to get what little was left of the grant proposal that she was working on done and then informed the secretary that she was not feeling well and was going home for the rest fo the day. As much as she hated to do it, she even called Mike and asked him if he could pick up the kids and take them for the night. She was already feeling stressed out and didn't think that she could take dealing with three kids tonight. A massive headache had set in so she was glad that she decided to go home. Now she just hoped that Stef would be home in a few hours and wouldn't have to work late again tonight.

Once she managed to make it home after having fought a mountain of traffic that she was sure shouldn't have been there at 2:30 in the afternoon, she made her was inside and to the fridge where she grabbed a bottle of water and an ice pack. She then made her way upstairs to her and Stef's bedroom. She decided to lay down for a bit and after taking some aspirin, laid down clutching Stef's pillow. Finally she let the events of the day catch up with her and she found herself starting to cry. She knew it was stupid and that she had just had a bad day, but she hated the fact that she managed to have to deal with all of those people today adn then get yelled at by her boss for not doing her job well enough. She had had a few of these days before, but sometimes you just have to let out all of those pent up emotions and anger. What she didn't realize was that Stef was standing by the door watching her as she started to cry

As she began to relax, she felt strong arms come up and hold her from behind. She quickly tried to wipe away her tears and make it seem as if everything was fine, but Stef just knew better.

"Hello Love. What's wrong?"

"Hey baby. Nothing, everything is fine," Lena managed between sniffles. "What are you doing home so early?"

"The captain let us out early since we all went in so early and we were all dead on our feet. Now do you want to tell me what is wrong? I came home intending to take a nap, not find my beautiful girlfriend lying in our bed crying, so don't tell me that its nothing."

"Oh Stef, I promise, it really is nothing. I just had kind of a bad day."

"Well my love, a bad day is not nothing. Why don't you tell me about it?"

Stef made her way to her side of the bed and carefully pulled Lena into her arms. They sat there with Stef gently rocking them back and forth until Lena finally started to speak.

"Well, the day didn't star out very well to begin with. None of the kids wanted to go to school and then as soon as everyone was in the car, Jesus realized that he forgot his backpack. By the time we finally made it to school, we were already ten minutes late. Then I got called into Karina's office to discuss a staffing issue. I ended up having to fire one of the high school science teachers because she wouldn't conform to the new curriculum that Karina just instated. The bad thing was that he was a really great teacher. I hate it when the administration forces educators to alter their teaching methods when they are already doing well as it is. After having had to deal with that, I handed out more detention slips than I know what to do with. I can't believe how many students ended up in my office today. It was crazy. The worst part of the day came when I was summoned back to Karina's office so that I could be yelled at for not having finished all of the grant proposals."

"Oh baby, I am sorry you had such a hard day. It never seems to fail that one of these days shows up at least once a month. I am so sorry that the kids were such a problem. I will talk to them we they get home. I am also sorry that I wasn't here to help you. I am sure that it really sucks to have to discipline both the kids and the teachers. We both know that you work so hard, so don't listen to Karina, okay. I know that you did everything that you could possibly do so just know that. Karina doesn't seem to know how hard your job really is."

"I called Mike and asked him to take the kids. I hope that was okay? I just didn't know if I could handle dealing with them, especially if you had to work late."

"Baby, don't ever worry about that. It is fine that Mike took them. You are their mother too, and you don't ever have to ask for my opinion or permission. I wish i had thought about that when I was having one of those days. I am glad that you are ready to take a break. How about I order us some food and then we have a movie night, just the two of us?"

"That sounds great. Do you mind Chinese tonight?"

"Not at all Love, you can have anything you want."

"I love you Stef."

"I love you too Lena."

Lena knew she always felt safe in Stef's arms and just the fact that her wife was there holding her now made it that much easier to get over the day. What she really loved was that even just having a bad day led Stef to be there for her. She truly had an amazing girlfriend and knew that after their movie night, she would be able to get up and start out fresh in the morning, with her amazing partner by her side.