A/N: I just wrote Chapter 8 for you guys! It's extra long and it's extra good ;) But for now, here is number six :)

Disclaimer: I do NOT own Glee!

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It was morning, and I was heading to work at the diner. It wasn't like I had much else to do, anyway. All I seemed to have in my life at the moment was work. I couldn't help but wonder if this was what a midlife crisis was, and whether or not it was happening much too early. It sure didn't feel like the middle of my life.

I hit the radio on and flipped to Z100 in NY. Just in time to hear a voice talking about a new song that was coming on. I rolled my eyes, just wanting to hear music for once, and started to go to another station.

"Yes, we are all excited to hear this mysterious Danielle Taylor's new song!"

My heart froze inside my chest, but I quickly swallowed and shook my head. Dani's last name was Tyler. And her name wasn't Danielle. If she ever were to come out with a song, she wouldn't have everyone thinking her name was Danielle.

Just as I was about to overcome my strange emotions and change the channel, the song came on. And I nearly threw on my breaks with surprise. Luckily, though, I didn't.

This was Dani's voice. There was hardly a doubt. I swallowed thickly as I listened to her singing this song, her song. Was this her first song? Was that why Santana had only just heard this girl's voice for the first time in eleven years?

The song ended just as fast as it started, and the radio commentator explained how the song would up on iTunes any day now.

When I got to work, I used my owner privileges to take a break before I'd even started working. I took out my smart phone and went on Facebook. Instead of searching for Dani Tyler, I searched for Dani Taylor. Nothing came up. I blinked, and then tried Danielle Taylor.

There she was. Her hair was blonde now, but there was no way I'd be able to forget her face. Some of the stuff on her page was public, like her beautiful profile picture and her cover photo. The cover photo's date was the previous day, so it must've been a recent picture. A picture of a large group of people, Dani at the center. They looked to all be drinking and laughing and smiling.

I sighed and scrolled down on her page. There were few things public from that point on. I saw some other pictures, like a selfie that Dani had taken with a guy. I almost got worried, until I did an analysis of this guy and came to the conclusion that he was as queer as a three dollar bill. I clicked on his name on Dani's page and found that some of this stuff was more public. His name was Davis, and his other pictures definitely confirmed that he was gay.

Some of his posts had Dani tagged in them, and I had a sneaking suspicious that he was Dani's best friend. I bit my lip. That could've been me. I could still be Dani's best friend. No, I could still be her girlfriend. Maybe if I'd told Dani that I would've run away with her. Something like that. Or maybe, I could've stopped her from running away.

I wiped at my cheeks, even though I wasn't crying yet. I went back to Dani's page and saw that of the few public things she had up, she did have her location. Los Angeles. I wasn't surprised, although I did wonder how she'd gone from our small town in Texas to such a big glamorous city alone. I know that she stole her mom's car— no one had noticed until after we found out that she'd run away. But they found it abandoned in Austin, with the keys inside. She'd meant to leave it there. But how did she make it from Austin to LA with hardly any cash or any possessions?

The friend request button was mocking me, wondering if I had the guts to press it. I bit my lip so hard that I broke the skin as I stared at it. The taste of blood in my mouth broke me out of my staring match with the button, and I hit the back button out of my Facebook search for Dani. I wasn't going to click my way into Dani's life. Dani hadn't wanted to interrupt my life, and I didn't want to interrupt Dani's life, which was clearly much more put together than mine.

Still, I couldn't stop thinking of what could have been.

By the time work was over, I had decided something. I needed a change. A big one, and maybe a break as well. As I drove home, I grabbed my phone and called Rachel.

"Hey, Santana!" Rachel answered. "Kurt told me about the breakup. I'm so sorry."

"Whatever," I muttered, shaking my head. "I'm over it. It wasn't meant to be."

"Alright," Rachel answered doubtfully. "What did you need?"

"I'm going to move. Into a new apartment. Maybe a smaller one," I decided.

"Are you sure?" Rachel asked, sounding baffled.

"Yes. And after I move into it, I'm going on a vacation."

"To where?" Rachel asked.

I took a deep breath as I debated the two different locations in my head. "Texas," I decided on the spot. "I need to go back… there. Just for maybe a week. See my family… just get a breather. Remind myself why I left and what I left to do. Rachel, I feel like I'm in an early midlife crisis. I just need some thinking time."

"Alright. Well, I know a real estate agent who actually just listed a small apartment in my building. Interested?" Rachel asked.

"Of course! Can you get me a showing of it?" I asked.

"Of course," Rachel answered, and I could hear the smile in her voice. I loved having her as my best friend, she really was a good person.

"Thanks, Rach. Call me about it later? I'm almost home, and I think I need some sleep," I told her.

"Did something happen today?"

I swallowed thickly. "No. Nothing. I'm just overtired. Talk to you later, Rachel."

"Yeah, bye."

I hung up and turned my radio on. Just my luck, too, that Dani's song was playing. How could I still miss her so much after eleven years? Or more importantly, how could I still be in love with her after eleven years?

DANI

It was a week after my song had come out, but I was still feeling utterly impressed by the fact that it was even possible that my music could go anywhere. Davis and I were hanging out that night, and I was on my way back to my place from a meeting with major producer Neal Webster.

When I got back to my place, Davis was already there, vigilantly scrolling through something on his phone.

"What are you looking so happy about?" I asked him, dropping my purse on the small dining table in my apartment before going over to the couch where my best friend was sitting.

"If I tell you, you're going to kill me," Davis admitted. I raised a suspicious eyebrow.

"Davis," I growled warningly.

"Alright, alright. So, I got here about an hour ago, and I thought that I'd clean up around here a little bit," Davis started. I didn't like where this was going. "So like I went into your closet and found a shoebox that I hadn't seen before. You know, I figured that you'd bought some killer heels you hadn't told me about, so I opened the thing."

I searched my mind for memories of this shoebox he was talking about. I couldn't really pinpoint what might be in it, but I guess I was about to find out.

"And well… there were some pictures in there. Pictures of you when you first came to LA, some before that. I was, you know, looking to see there were any of me in there, but then I found this really old looking picture. It was in the middle of like the woods or something, so I figured it had to be from Texas. And well… there was this gorgeous Latina in the picture," Davis explained.

"Davis!" I exclaimed. "I am going to kill you! What the hell did you do?"

"I took a picture of the picture on my phone and reverse image searched for it on Google. It came up with some other pictures, some old and some new. Also a name! Santana Lopez," Davis explained.

"Kill me now," I groaned. Then I sighed and sat down next to him. "What'd you find, asshole?"

"Well, I went to her Facebook. She doesn't have a whole lot public on there. It says she's in New York City. Also, all of her Timeline Events are public, and the last one that was posted on it was last week sometime. I guess she just ended a relationship with some girl named Brittany Pierce," Davis explained. "She's gorgeous, but besides her Facebook, there isn't much else out there about her."

I nodded, sighing slightly as he showed me her most recent picture. She did look older, but that wasn't surprisingly of course. It had been eleven years.

"Should I friend her?" Davis asked teasingly.

"You do that and I'll kill you," I threatened.

"Come on! She just broke up with her girlfriend!" Davis exclaimed.

"No, Davis. We are not contacting her, end of discussion," I snapped.

Davis huffed. "Fine. How'd your meeting with Neal go?"

"Fine," I answered. "He said he'd love to have me record some in a few weeks."

"That's great! I knew that guy was the right guy for you!" Davis said, the way he said it making me laugh and roll my eyes. "What are you going to do for the next few weeks then?"

I shrugged. "Enjoy my off time? Can I see that box you were looking through before?"

Davis nodded and went into my bedroom, before coming back out with an old shoebox in his hands. I opened it up and saw all of the printed pictures sitting there. Thinking about it now, I realized that I had wanted to put all of these up at one point, but hadn't found the time, or something like that. At the top of the pile was the last picture Davis looked at. The one of me and Santana. I sighed as I looked at the picture. It would've been the summer before I ran away. My hair was still brown back then. I wore a wide smile, and so did Santana, in the picture.

"You looked happy," Davis commented.

"I was," I agreed. "At least when we were away from everyone else."

I looked through some of the other pictures, and found a weird one of me and my parents. I looked about fifteen, so it might've been when we went on a weekend vacation for a weekend to the beach in Galveston. Santana hadn't been with us.

I sighed as I looked at the picture. "What's that?" Davis wondered.

"Me and my parents," I answered.

"Did you ever go back to see them after you…" Davis trailed off as he asked the question.

"No," I answered.

"Maybe you should. It's been eleven years. They're probably worried sick, even still."

I snorted. "Doubt it. If they saw my note to Santana, they were probably thanking god that I was gone."

"Dani, I don't know your parents, but people can change. Especially of something like that happened to them," Davis reasoned.

"I hope you're not trying to make me feel bad about running away," I muttered, half joking.

"I'm not, Dani. I just think that maybe they deserve to know what happened to you," Davis answered, shrugging.

I nodded slowly. "Maybe I can find them on Facebook," she joked. Davis gave her a pointed look.

"Come on, look. You have a few weeks off, right? Go back to Texas. I'll even come if you want me to," Davis insisted.

I held his stare for a few moments. He quirked an eyebrow up at me, something I was sure he got from me. "Fine. I'll go to Texas. You don't have to come, though. One gay visitor is probably all they can handle."

Davis chuckled lightly. "I'm proud of you, Dani."

"Can you do me a favor and check flights going out tomorrow?" I asked.

"You want to leave tomorrow?" Davis asked.

"I'm going to get this shit over with," I explained. "Please? Don't I pay your for that kind of stuff?"

Davis rolled his eyes at me. "Not enough," he joked, but I saw him click a few things on his phone, which told me that he was checking flights. I smiled and headed into my room to start packing. I wasn't going to procrastinate on this. I was going to get to Texas tomorrow, rent a car, drive all the way to my tiny little hometown, and stay in a tiny hotel for a night, two tops. Maybe I would drop by the Lopez family, too. Ask them how they were doing. It wasn't like Santana was going to be there, anyway. She always told me that once she got to New York, she would never look back.

I had made that promise to myself a lot, too. And here I was, about to break it.

"I can get you on a flight at noon. Good?" he called to me.

"Perfect! Thanks, Davis!"

"Don't mention it."

I thought of Texas and sighed. So long ago, it had been my home. And now it only held memories. Painful ones, happy ones, sad ones. Taking a shaky breath, I kept packing while Davis scheduled my flight for me.

I wasn't ready for this.

But I had to do it.

Coincidence, or fate? ;P

Like it? Love it? Hate it? Let me know in a review! :D Or a PM, if reviewing isn't your thing! Also, follow me on Twitter at BrittzandTana :D Tweet me that you read my story and I will follow you back c:

I posted a new Emison story last night (if you ship Emison from PLL, go check it out!) and for 4 hours after I did, I didn't get like any reviews or favs or follows and I was kinda bummed out. But then I went to bed and I woke up and I had about 60 emails from FF! Some of them were reviews/favs/follows for this story, but most of them were for my new story and I was like wowowowow sleep is a magical thing hahaha. Anyway, moving back to this story, thanks for all the support you all have been giving me :D I'm so glad you like this story! Also, thanks to the people giving me flashback ideas! Two of them have been written into Chapter 8, because they both fit perfectly with what I was writing. Both of you know who you are, and I will be giving you credit shoutouts whenever that chapter comes around :D

Keep telling me what flashbacks you guys want to see, though, because I plan on including them all the way up until the end of this story =D I really like them c:

Anyway, you may get another update for this story today, and possibly CD or IDDA as well. Probably not my new story, Read Into My Soul (RIMS), but possibly because ya know, PLL comes on tonight and that might give me some fresh inspiration haha. :P

Have a great day lovelies! :D Please review!