September:

Though she would have liked to claim it was Ava who reminded her, when Ava came up to tell her that she had something important to tell her, Santana knew exactly what it was about. Brittany's birthday was coming up and considering she knew that Cass had planned her last two birthdays, she figured she actually had to do something to make it kind of special. She used to do special things for her birthday all the time, including the time she let Brittany eat cake off her body because she claimed that was all she wanted for her birthday, but it couldn't be like that anymore. It had to be something special from the kids and she had to figure that out.

While Brittany was teaching the night before her birthday, Santana took Ava and JJ to the party store. She let Ava go totally wild, picking out every possible decoration that she wanted. Santana planned to wake Ava up early so they could decorate together and make Brittany breakfast and she was beside herself about it. She picked out balloons, streamers, two banners, a tablecloth and confetti and Santana had to laugh, thinking that giving her free reign might have been a little excessive. After the party store, she took them to the mall, where Ava decided she wanted to buy Brittany sneakers for her birthday. Santana thought it was funny, but when Ava picked out purple converse that matched her own, she understood why Ava thought that was the best idea in the world.

The next morning, Ava was up even before Santana and she was standing at the side of her bed when she rolled over. In order to keep JJ from waking up Brittany, she took him out of the crib even though they ordinarily let him self-soothe for a while, and she brought him downstairs and put him in his high chair. Ava excitedly helped Santana wrap Brittany's purple shoes and then they decorated the kitchen and living room together, even blowing up more balloons that Santana had found in her closet from when it was Cass and John's. They cooked breakfast together, making chocolate chip pancakes, eggs and bacon and Santana helped Ava carry it up the stairs before she stepped away and went back down to feed JJ breakfast.

"Ava, did you do all this?" Santana heard Brittany ask when she came downstairs and saw all of the decorations.

"Aunt Santana helped me! Why didn't you want to eat your breakfast in your bed?"

"I'd rather eat it down here with you." Brittany came into the kitchen.

"Hey. Happy birthday." Santana gave Brittany a small smile.

"Thank you. You didn't have to—"

"Aunt Brittany!" Ava shouted. "Look! Look at all the balloons we did! I even learned how to blow them up! Aunt Santana helped me so much and now you're going to have the bestest birthday ever."

"This looks amazing." Brittany scooped Ava up into her arms and kissed all over her face. "I can already tell this is going to be an amazing birthday. Thank you for that, baby girl."

Santana put pancakes on Ava's plate and she sat down at the table across from Brittany. She noticed that she kept smiling at her, but she didn't say anything and hoped that Ava wouldn't either. It had been a really rough year and as much as she could say that she'd done it for the kids, part of the reason that Santana did all of what she did was because she too wanted Brittany to have a good day. She was glad that she was enjoying what they'd done so far and she figured that while Brittany was at work, she'd go and get a cake and make something special for dinner. Maybe it was stupid on her part, but she wanted to do it, so that was that.

"Thank you." Brittany told Santana as she stood at the sink washing the breakfast dishes.

"You love your birthday…it's like your favorite day of the whole year."

"I wasn't feeling particularly birthday-y this year." She shrugged. "Cass and I talked about doing a girls weekend like, forever ago, so it's kind of a sad reminder of that. You made it a little better."

"Everyone deserves a birthday."

"Lots of people don't have them."

"But you're not lots of people."

"What does that mean?"

"It just means that you're special. You deserve special things and even if you don't have someone special in your life to give them to you, the kids and I can step in and make you have a good day."

"It feels really good to feel special."

Once Brittany brought Ava to school and JJ to daycare, Santana sat down at her computer and started working. She responded to a text from Wendy and then tried to get a much done as she possibly could early in the day. By two, she felt like she'd made enough progress and took a shower, got dressed and went out shopping. She stopped herself from buying Brittany a gift, but she did pick up some steaks and the mint chocolate chip ice cream cake that Brittany always really liked. Then she went to get the kids and brought them home to color cards for Brittany.

"Aunt Brittany! It's still your birthday!" Ava cried out when Brittany walked in the door. "We're cookin' you a fancy dinner?"

"You didn't have to do that." Brittany said to her, but looked right at Santana as she said it, picking up JJ from his high chair.

"It's no big deal." Santana shrugged. "We had to eat anyway, so…"

"I know, but it was really nice of you to do something for my birthday. I really didn't make any plans, so…"

"It was all Ava's idea, right kiddo?"

"I just wanted to decorate! You knew all about making the food! Aunt Santana even picked you out the bestest birthday cake."

"Aves, that's supposed to be a surprise."

"Everyone knows they get cake on their birthday." Ava rolled her eyes. "And Aunt Santana says that grownups deserve a steak dinner too. I think steak is yucky, but I'm not allowed to have ice cream until I eat it."

Throughout dinner, Brittany just beamed and when Santana took out the ice cream cake, she gave her the softest look she'd seen from her in years. Santana could physically feel something shifting and it made her incredibly nervous. She couldn't exactly pinpoint why, but she felt strange inside. After dinner, Brittany opened Ava's gift and she gave her the biggest hug Santana had ever seen. Of course, Ava insisted on putting on her purple shoes too and the two of them did a fashion show, strutting around the living room while JJ sat on the floor and clapped and Santana just laughed and laughed.

When Brittany's mom called, Santana took the kids upstairs. Ava went into her room to play while Santana rocked JJ to sleep. Sometimes he was difficult to get down, but given how much excitement the day had been, he went down easily and Santana went into Ava's room once he was in his crib. She watched Ava from the door and smiled, she figured the day had been good for all of them, Ava was happily playing and she almost hated to interrupt. But it was bath time and Santana called her to come to the bathroom. In the tub, Ava splashed around and then she looked up at Santana with her big eyes. Santana rinsed out her hair and waited for her to say something, knowing it was coming.

"Aunt Santana, when's your birthday?"

"Coming up in November. Why?"

"Because I want to help Aunt Brittany make you a special birthday too."

"We'll see what happens." Santana laughed. "Did you have fun today?"

"I had so much fun! I'm so happy I get to match my shoes with Aunt Brittany! She loved my present so, so much!"

"She did. You did a really good job picking it out."

"Do you love her?"

"I…care about her a lot as my friend." She told Ava, trying to keep it simple for her. "And we do nice things for our friends, right?"

"Uh huh." Ava nodded. "But I love her and I do nice things for her."

"You can definitely do nice things for people you love, but sometimes it's just for people you care about."

"Are you going to make a birthday for Wendy?"

"I…actually don't know when Wendy's birthday is." Santana confessed.

"Hmm. Maybe you don't care about her then."

"I do care about her. I just haven't known her as long as I've known Aunt Brittany."

Santana thought about what Ava had to say, even after she tried to justify herself. She was having fun with Wendy, that was for sure, but she didn't even think they were close to the point of doing birthday things for each other. Doing something for Brittany's birthday was just for the kids anyway, and she guessed, for the fact that she really did care about her as human being. It didn't have to be anything weird, Brittany would have done the same thing for her. At least, she thought she would, with how whiplashy things were between them, Santana could never be sure. But they were in a good place, a really good place, and she was trying not to do anything that screwed it up.

Once bath time was done, Santana got Ava into her bed and she sat down with a book. Just as she was finishing up the first story, Brittany came in and sat on the edge of the bed, listening to the second one. Ava was falling asleep by the time Santana was done and then she kissed her head and left the room, giving Brittany some time with her. She went downstairs to finish cleaning up the kitchen and when she got settled on the couch, Brittany came down and sat beside her.

"Santana, you don't know how much I appreciate what you did for me today."

"It was really no big deal."

"It was to me. I was really dreading today and you made it so much more special than I could have imagined."

"Ava wanted to do something and I just figured I'd follow it all the way through."

"You have such a big heart, do you know that?"

"Brittany."

"How is it possible to miss someone who you live with?" Brittany asked, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear.

"I…don't know."

"I miss you every day, Santana."

"I don't let myself miss you." Santana murmured. "It hurts too much."

"I just…hate that everything broke. I'm sorry."

"We're not supposed to talk about the past. You're right, it's too hard for me. The more I think about it, the more I regret that I walked out without talking to you. I was just so mad."

"I know, you're right. It's just that some days, everything comes rushing back to me. Like today, I kept thinking about how you used to make me breakfast in bed on my birthday, how you'd send me flowers at work and then blindfold me in a cab on the way to whatever restaurant you picked out so that I would be surprised. There's no one who ever knew how to love me like you did."

"You…loved me really well too. But…"

"You're right, we shouldn't talk." Brittany leaned in, her lips getting dangerously close to Santana's. Santana felt so much electricity between them but she knew she couldn't let it happen. She knew that if Brittany kissed her she would go spiraling out of control. Nothing would ever be the same again and everything they'd done since they managed to make up again had been to have an easier relationship. But still, Santana couldn't help but look deeply into Brittany's blue eyes before she quickly backed away.

"It's a bad idea." She shook her head. "It's a really bad idea."

"You're right." Brittany looked down. "I'm sorry."