Santana swung Phil up into her arms. "Hola, mjio! Se puede decir 'hola' a mi esposa?"

Phillip obeyed almost instantly. "Hello." He stuck a hand out to Quinn. "I'm Phillip."

Quinn couldn't take her eyes off the kid. She was trying not to overreact, but if you were going to marry someone it's just kind of common courtesy to let them know that you had a kid before you did so.

Hey Quinn, marry me?

Why sure, Santana.

Oh yeah, by the way I have a kid.

How hard was that? And forget that her wife had this secret child that she'd never known about, he was four freaking years old! That means that for five years Santana had this secret that she'd never told her about. Even if their activities had mostly centered on the bedroom, that's what pillow talk was for. Quinn wondered if that's where the $1,000 withdrawal had gone. She'd assumed that it was for the wedding, but now she wondered if it had gone to Santana'sotherfamily. No, correction,shewas the other family.

The Hulk!Quinn wanted to smash the information in Santana's face, but the married Quinn wasn't going to bring it up. Part of her didn't want to because she felt that it was Santana's money that she was spending, so she didn't have any say in it. But now that they had joint accounts didn't that mean that it wastheirmoney, no matter who earned it, and if it wastheirsshouldn't she know where it's going to? The other part of her didn't want to mention it because Santana had just been really awesome lately, and she didn't want to risk things with them and incite another fight. Quinn attributed this calmer her to the Lopez part of her. The Fabray part of her wanted to regulate, because hello: kid!

Quinn's emotions flickered back and forth between panic, anger, betrayal, and minor, little bitty emotions, too, but Quinn was born a Fabray, so she tucked them all behind her mask and smiled at the little boy in front of her as she shook his little hand.

"Hi, Phillip. I'm Quinn."

"Are you my mama's wife?" Quinn nodded, being very careful not to let her irritation show. So Santana had mentioned her to him, but hadn't felt the need to mention him to her? Phil leaned over and placed a hand on Quinn's shoulder. "You're lucky, cause she's a great protector." He thought about something. "But can you let her out to play every now and then cause I really miss her?"

Santana bit down on her lip to keep from smiling. "Mijo!" she scolded half-heartedly.

Hazel appeared suddenly in the doorway. "Santana, thank God!"

Santana turned enough to look at Hazel. "I know my presence is always cause for celebration, but what's that about?"

"I was worried that you weren't going to come, and I wouldn't be able to find someone last minute, and I'd have to call out of work, and I can't-," she heaved a sigh. "But you're here."

Santana frowned. "I'm almost offended that you didn't think I'd show. When have I ever broken a promise to you?"

Quinn was going to start counting how many irritated ticks this whole situation was giving her. Count: 2. Hazel didn't seemed to be too worried about Santana's feelings. "Yeah, well, getting screwed over is the official mantra of the single mom. You should try it sometime then you'll know what I mean."

Any retort Santana was obviously itching to make was cut off completely by the simultaneous sounds of a child and wife who were present, and didn't want to get lost in the moment. Santana reached for Quinn's hand. "Sorry," she apologized to Quinn, quickly brushing her lips over her cheek. She took her hand, and the four of them crossed over the threshold of Hazel's apartment. "Hazel, this is my wife Quinn, Quinn, Hazel."

"And I'm Phillip!" Phil offered again.

Santana started to tickle him. "You already said that, silly!"

He squealed and for a moment the only sound was their laughter.

Hazel turned to Quinn while they were occupied. "Nice to meet you," she said somewhat stiffly, as if she didn't know what to do with the woman in front of her. Quinn felt the same way. Hazel wasn't anything of what Quinn was expecting. She was pretty, but not very attractive. Well…it wasn't that she was unattractive, more that she was…just. She was just, just. She had a look that would easily fade into the crowd. Hair that was dirty blonde, more dirty than blonde, eyes that were brown, tired, and surrounded by bags, a waistline that was non-existent and had probably been a leftover gift from Phil's birth. She seemed to be in her mid-thirties, and with one look at her you kind of got the feeling that you knew exactly what she was: a single mother who worked in a low wage job, lived in a bare minimum apartment, didn't get much me time, probably didn't have much education, and had even fewer choices.

They shifted feet, made eye-contact and looked away, and eyed the two people in the room who didn't seem to be having a difficult time. "Congratulations," Hazel offered.

Quinn had to pull herself out of her thoughts. "I'm sorry, for what?"

Quinn realized what the congratulations were for a few seconds before Hazel said, "You're newlyweds, right?"

She smiled, slightly embarrassed. "Oh, yeah. Right. Thank you! I keep forgetting that Santana and I are married." She realized that her words were not without its irony; she could remember asking Santana on several occasions how it was that she kept seeming to forget that she was married to Quinn, and yet Quinn had just said the same words her wife often said. Quinn supposes that it's easy to forget that you're married, though, when your wife seems to know everything about you, but you know next to nothing about her.

Her eyes fell onto the spectacle that was said wife, with the boy that said wife claimed was merely her godson. Santana was currently on her back, being straddled by Phil, who was ineffectively digging his fingers into Santana's sides. Santana was giggling a little too wildly for the noise to be anything other than play. Besides, Quinn knew all of Santana's tickle spots and Phil wasn't even close.

"Are those two always like that?"

Hazel nodded, casting a look that way. "Always. Santana's his favorite toy." She took a step back. "I'm sorry, have you two eaten? There's eggs or cereal I could fix up."

"We ate before we came over, but thank you for the offer." Quinn said politely. Hazel nodded, shifting uncomfortable. Quinn could easily understand what Santana meant about Hazel being lonely; she could see it spelled out in every inch of the woman. Quinn wondered if this would have been her if she had kept Beth. Isolated from friends, working just slightly better than minimum wage, worried that any change in the routine that she set up in her life would mess up everything. Quinn blinked. Phil was much younger, and Hazel much older than her and her child, but still, this could have been her.

"How did you and Santana meet?" Quinn questioned. She had this desire toknowthis woman, to know what their connecting was. She couldn't imagine them being old lovers, because she couldn't imagine Santana being with her. Phil, obviously, seemed to be what connected them, but that just confused her because how had that come to pass. Santana said that they hadn't dated, (correction, she said that they hadn't had sex), but then…what? Was this an open adoption? Didn't you have to have money to adopt? Obviously Hazel didn't have any, especially if she was relying on Santana to cover her expenses.

"I used to live in Boston," Hazel responded. She started to play with her ear. Quinn wondered if it was a nervous tick. She sensed that she was lying. "We knew some of the same people."

Both of their eyes seemed to fall onto Santana and Phil at the same time. Santana was now sitting up with Phil in her lap, and they were having a whispered conversation, with Santana doing most of the talking.

"What do you think she's telling him?" Quinn wondered aloud.

"She's probably coaching him on whatnotto say around you," Hazel replied so quickly that Quinn had trouble doubting it wasn't true.

"Does she keep things from you, too?" Quinn questioned wryly.

Hazel head jerked, the movement something between a shake of the head and a nod. "She doesn't have anything to keep from me."

That statement rubbed Quinn all kinds of wrong. Tick count: 3. She wondered if Hazel meant to say that, at least in that way, and did that mean that Hazel was willing to share even more of Santana's secrets.

"Is Phillip Santana's son?" She really meant to finesse her way into that question. Instead it came shooting out as if Quinn had never played the manipulation came before and was a rookie at gathering information from someone.

Hazel briefly looked away. Quinn thought that it was because she wasn't going to answer, or out of guilt, but her eyes followed Hazel's to the clock and realized she was just checking the time. "It depends on who's asking. Since you had to ask me that, though, I'm going to say the answer is no."

"And why's that?" It was more of a demand than a question, delivered with that same coolness Quinn used in high school, usually preceding a hard slap to the face. Quinn was unaware that her voice had taken on a life of her own, and somewhere down the road, maybe 20 years from now when she was the CEO of either her company, or one just like it, she was going to do some serious emotional scarring to the intern who was unfortunate enough to mess up her coffee order on his/her first day.

Hazel notice the frostiness to Quinn's voice, and recognized in the same second that it wasn't meant for her, but for Santana, and she felt bad for her. "Because if she thought of him as her son, she would have told you about him." Quinn tried to discern if this fact made Hazel upset. Interesting. "Santana has secrets, yes, and I can only imagine what it's like in your position to not know them, but you are honestly the last person she would ever intentionally hurt. If she keeps things from you, it's because for one reason or another, she can't tell you them. I don't know if this makes you feel any better, but I can tell you that Phil and I aren't Santana's secret family. Me and Santana have no romantic feelings towards each other, and never have. She helped me out of a corner, and she still helps me out. She's…a good friend. If she's keeping secrets, they're not her secrets that she's keeping, they're mine."

She looked back over at the clock. "Hey, I've got to go. Santana?"

Santana looked out of her Phil bubble. "I'm going to go in a few minutes early since you're here. Is that okay?"

Santana grinned at Phil. "Yeah, I think we can manage."

Hazel turned a blank gaze at Santana. "Please, please if you give him sugar, none after four o'clock because he won't go down for the night if you do."

"I got it."

"I mean it, Santana."

"I said, okay."

Hazel looked Quinn over. "You'll keep her honest, right?" she questioned.

Quinn gave Hazel her best reserved for parent's and teacher's smile. "I will."

Hazel gave an unsure nod of her head. "Oh, and make sure he takes a nap."

Phil protested immediately. "Mommy, do I have to? Naps are for babies!"

"No, naps are for adults," she said to her son. "And I was talking to mama."

"I got it, Hazel. I've watched him before." Santana stood up, lifting Phil back into her arms. "He and your apartment will still be intact when you get home. What time will you be back?"

"Nine."

"Can I wait up for you until you get home?" Phil questioned, hopefully.

Hazel looked at Santana. "That's up to you, Santana."

Phil looked at Santana, too. "Please, Mama?"

"We'll see," Santana replied.

Hazel picked up her keys from the counter. "Thank you," she remembered to say. "Thank you for doing this, Santana." Santana nodded. "Phil, you going to give mommy some love before she goes?"

Still in Santana's arms, Phil leaned forward, and Hazel kissed him on the cheek. "Te quiero, mommy!" he said, before he pressed his lips to her cheek and blew on it, laughing at the noise it made.

Even though Santana had drawn back as far as possible, while still holding Phil in place to kiss his mom, the whole scene just felt so domestic that it was a struggle for Quinn not to feel like she was intruding upon it. Correction, that Hazel was intruding upon something. Tick count: 4. "Love you, too, baby boy. Be good for mama, okay?"

He nodded his head, sending his curls bouncing atop his head. "I will!"

Hazel was out the door, and at the stairs before she turned back. "Santana, I need you to come down to get his chair."

Santana looked from Quinn to Hazel to Phil. She sat the boy down. "Okay." She gave Quinn a quick kiss. "Be right back, babe. You two play nice."

Phil watched after Santana until the door closed, and then he turned to look at Quinn. Quinn looked back, not knowing what to say to this tiny person. She never knew what to do around children, and she wasn't quite sure what to make of him. If she was ever wondering what kind of kid Santana would make, though, she had her answer because Phil was it in a nutshell. Phil was a little Santana (with better manners than little Santana had, she was sure), but still her nonetheless. The two even looked alike. More alike than Hazel and Phil, if she was being honest with herself.

She was aware that this was a prime time to start pumping him for answers, but facing him she didn't know what to say. So she stared, trying not to notice that he looked like her wife, and that if he followed her form, he was going to grow up to be a real heartbreaker.

"Umm…," Quinn cleared her throat. Phil continued to stare. "So how old are you?"

Phil used his left hand to help him hold up the right amount of fingers. "I'm four, but I'm going to be five on September 14th. How old are you?"

Quinn blushed. "That's…," she stopped herself from telling the four year old that it was none of his business. "29. But I'll be 30 in six months."

"Wow!" Phil said. "That's a lot of years old." She frowned. Phil didn't notice. "When I'm 30, I'm going to be an astronaut like Buzz Aldrin. He's my favorite."

"Because he walked on the moon?"

"No, because Buzz Lightyear was modeled after him, and Buzz is cool!" Oh, of course. "One day, maybe when I'm 6, I'm going to go to Disney World, because mama says that's where he lives, and I'm going to meet him, and shake his hand, and tell him that someday I'm going to be an astronaut, just like him."

"An astronaut is a really tough thing to be."

Phil gave a solemn nod. "I know. Mama read to me all of the things that you have to do in order to become an astronaut. You have to be physically fit, and smart, and speak lots of languages, like mama does. I'm going to go to the air force just like Daddy Puck," Quinn's brow furrowed, "so I can get really strong, and become a pilot. And, mama told me that if I do good in school, when I'm 10, she's going to send me to Huntsville, that's in Alabama, so I can go to Space Camp!"

"You know Puck?" Tick count: 5.

Phil's face lit up in wonder. "You know him, too?"

"I went to high school with him." And had a kid with him. She was kind of furious that the man she had a baby with, didn't tell her that their baby had a half-sibling.

"Really? Do you sing and play the guitar like he does?"

"I sing."

"Mama sings too! Will you sing me something?"

"Maybe later. How do you know Puck?"

"He's mama's friend."

"So why do you call him 'daddy Puck'?"

Phil shrugged, looking confused. "Cause that's his name," he said, simply.

"Why do you call Santana your mama?"

He gave her the same look. "Cause she's my mama. What else would I call her?"

"How long has she been your mama?"

Phil gave a smile at Quinn, as if she had been trying to trick him, and he just caught on. "For always."

"Do you get to see daddy Puck often?"

Phil gave a solemn shake of his head. "No, but I talk to him, and he sends me cards for my birthday, and for the first night of Chanukah."

Quinn shook her head, because she couldn't deny the fact that it really was her Puck that she was talking about. It seemed like with every passing day she was just traveling further and further down Santana's rabbit hole,but, she thought dryly,if Santana really had coached Phil on what not to say to Quinn, she hadn't done a very good job.

Quinn realized that it'd been a couple of minutes since Santana left at around the same time that the door swung open again. Santana made a deal of surveying the living room as she stood in the doorway of the apartment, looking around deviously, as she shut the door. She rubbed her hands together. "Well now that she fell for my trap and I got rid of her, I can go through with my plan of cooking you for breakfast!"

Santana opened her mouth wide. Phil squealed, rushing to get away from her arms. "Ma-ma!" he shrieked, "Don't eat me!"

Santana looked incredibly upset. "But I'm empty and need to be Phil-eed up."

Quinn had to turn her head away from them because Santana was many, many things, but corny was one she was not prepared for.

"You can't eat me!" Phil pleaded. "I wouldn't taste good at all."

"No?"

Big shake his curly head. "No."

"But you eat lots of things that taste really good. Pizza, chicken nuggets, candy! That must mean you taste good too!"

"No, I taste like liver and unions."

"Iloveliver and onions."

He shrieked. "Please, don't eat me!"

"Well then what should I do with you?"

Phil put a finger to his lip and looked as if he was giving it some extreme consideration.

"Can we read?"

"Read? But reading is so lame!"

"No, it's not. It's cool!"

"Who told youthat?"

"You did! Did you bring me a new book?"

She thought about it. "I might have. If I did we can read together after lunch, and before you go down for you nap. Deal?"

"Do I really have ta take a nap?"

"Don't you always take a nap?"

He scrunched up his face. "Not always," he answered. Santana fixed him with a look that he squirmed beneath. Quinn didn't blame him; grown men and women squirmed beneath that look. "Well, sometimes I don't," he pouted, "which means notalways."

"Won't mommy be mad if you don't take a nap?"

It was his turn to fix Santana with a look, but not the glowering glare that Santana had perfected in high school, but another look that Quinn had seen all too often on her wife's face. He widened his eyes, looking up at Santana through his lashes and gave her a winsome pout-smile. "Only if wetellher. We can justsayI did, and it can be our secret."

Quinn had to cover her mouth to hide her snicker, but to her surprise, instead of being won over by that combination, Santana gave him a very stern look. "Are you supposed to keep secrets from mommy?"

Phil seemed to realize that he said something wrong. His winsome smile melted off of his face. "No," he mumbled.

"Are you supposed to keep secrets from me?"

He shook his head, practically wilting in front of them. Quinn wouldn't say so in front of the kid, but she didn't really think it was fair for Santana to demand honesty from Phil when she appeared to keep secrets from everybody. Except, well, Puck. She wondered if Brittany knew about this kid, too. This kid who Quinn was having trouble believing was just Santana's godson.

"I didn't hear you answer me, Phillip."

"No," he said, audibly this time. He looked close to tears. "Are you mad at me, mama?" Phil whispered, and Quinn wondered if she had missed something that had transpired between the two of them.

Santana kneeled in front of him. "No, Phil, but you don't keep anything from me or mommy, and you don't lie. That's not how superheroes behave. Superman's mom never had to remind Superman to take a nap when he was four."

"Superman was once little like me?"

Santana nodded. "But he always ate his vegetables, drank milk, never lied, took naps when he was supposed to, and obeyed his parents. So then he grew up big and strong. And you want to be like superman, right?" He nodded. "So, no lying. Now let's go get dressed, so we can go out, okay?"

"Okay!" Phil said agreeably. Quinn caught Santana by the arm as Phil went rushing to his bedroom.

"You know that's not going to work for very long, right?"

Santana gave Quinn a wink and a kiss on the cheek. "But right now it does." For good measure, she was sure to add an extra sway to her hips as she walked out of the room.

Santana left Quinn and Phil and followed Hazel down the stairs to Hazel's car, a 2015 Camry. "How's she running?" Santana questioned with concern.

Hazel pulled out a pack of cigarettes. She selected one and lit it before offering the pack to Santana. "No thanks," Santana said.

Hazel shrugged. "I forget, you only smoke cigars right?" She tossed the cigarette pack onto the seat. "With luck, she'll last me another five years. God knows what I'm going to do if she breaks on me."

Santana watched the smoke rise from the cigarette. She waved the smoke away from her face. "You don't know smoke that around him, do you?"

"No, mother," Hazel snapped.

"It was just a question."

"I know how to parent my son."

"I just asked."

"Yeah, well, I don't get why you're asking. You don't want to be a mother, so why are you so interested in mothering my kid? I'm asinglemom. As in I don't have to answer to anyone. Even you."

"I-I care because second hand smoke stunts growth, and because I care about him, and you, and-,"

"You just can't help yourself," Hazel finished for her. "You're just being a concerned mama, looking out for the son that you don't have, right?"

"Please can we not do this?"

"You didn't tell your wife about him!"

"Yes, I did."

"Then why was she asking if Phil was your son, cause she sure seems surprised by you, too."

"I never told him to call me mama."

"And you never stopped him, either. I know he's not your kid. I get that. But since he's not your kid, stop getting on to me about how I raisemyson, okay? Stop making decisions for us as if he was your son. You might not have told him to call you mama, but he does, and you let him, so either get him to stop, or you live with that!"

"Is this because you're jealous of Quinn? Is that what this is about? Are you upset that I got married?"

Hazel scowled. "You are so egotistical, you know that?"

"I'm just trying to figure out why you keep attacking me, Hazel! What do you want me to do? Not to come around anymore? You called me up! You asked me to come over today, and then you bite my head off over it!"

Again Santana wondered why she was having this kind of fight with someone who wasn't her wife. She got into enough fights with her wife, she didn't extra just for practice.

"Because I'm fucking frustrated, Santana! You, this, us, it is driving me fucking crazy! I'm doing this on my own. I'm making all the decisions, I'm doing all the night-nights and feel better hugs. In a few months I'm going to be doing all the driving him to school, and all the picking him up. All the PTA meetings. You don't get it. Yes, you show up, sometimes, and yes you play with him, and read to him, and teach him to speak different languages, and promise him things, and no, you don't break those promises, but you get to decide. You get to decide and I don't. You don't understand how frustrating that is. You get to decide when you do those things. You get to decide when you see him, when you put him down to bed. You get to play mom when it's convenient for you, and when it's not you get to live your child free life!"

"That's what you wanted, remember!"

"Because you were 22, in college, and you and Quinn were dancing around each other. That's exactly who I'd want to help co-parent a kid, because that just sounds like the kind of security I needed when I'm about to bring a new life into the world! So forgive me for not wanting to be yours, or anyone else's obligation; I thought I could handle it on my own. But you acted butt hurt, so I left the door open for you. I let you choose what you wanted to be with him, because you seemed to want to be in his life."

"I do want to be in his life-"

"You didn't even tell your wife about him! You know what that says to me? That you don't want him to be your son. So maybe I am picking fights with you over him, because I don't know what we're doing anymore!"

Santana sighed, heavily. She didn't really, either, but she didn't want to have to deal with it in this moment either. She understood that it was a dick move, but she didn't know what to do in this situation, and not making a decision was a lot easier than making one.

"Help me with his seat, will you?" Santana questioned.

To her credit, Hazel did not sigh, and she didn't look she was going to throw something at Santana either. She undid the seat from the back of her car, and showed Santana the proper way to put the seat on, to make sure all the straps were done right. "He knows how to buckle himself," Hazel said. "So all you have to do is put him in the car." She slid the child lock into place as an afterthought. "Did you have anything planned?"

"Noah, got him a glove so I thought I'd take him to the park, or something."

"That's nice. He'll like that. Lord knows I can't teach him how to throw. There's a street festival downtown, too, that you might want to check out."

"I'll look into it. Quinn would probably enjoy that. I was going to take him to get some pajamas today. Is there anything else that he needs?"

Hazel sighed. "Socks and underwear."

"Okay. Do you want me to let him stay up to wait up for you to come home? Or would you rather he be asleep?"

"To be honest, sleep."

Santana gave a nod. "Okay. Give me some time to think about it?"

Hazel barked out a laugh. "Sure! I've been giving you three years, what's a couple of weeks?"

Santana fought to keep her emotions in check. To remember that Hazel wasn't Quinn, and that even a raised voice was combative. "Hazel, I don't think you understand the position I'm in. You can take him from me at any time. You can decide at any point, whether or not I get to say he's mine. I don'thavea claim on him, no matter what."

"Santana, I don't thinkyouget the positon thatyou'rein. The only way I could do that, is if you let me. For all intents and purpose, he's your son, you're just letting me raise him. I know that that was the arrangement, that that's always been the arrangement, but it was different when we didn't live near each other. We do, now. I'm sorry I got so lonely that I wanted to be close to the place that has felt like home to me. But I'm here, and it's obvious you want to be his mom, but you won't commit to it. That's not fair tome. To him. Either you're his co-parent or you're not."

"Just…give me some time, okay?" It wasn't a decision Santana could just make on the spot. It wasn't a decision she felt she had a right to make without Quinn getting a say in the whole thing. "I'm going to Arizona at the end of the month. I'll be there for two or three weeks. I can take him with me so you can have some time to yourself."

"School starts the Monday after Labor Day."

"Oh," Santana remarked, because that he was actually old enough to start school hadn't even entered her thoughts, despite that she and Hazel had been talking about it just a few minutes ago. Santana kept forgetting that he was getting older. She couldn't believe he was old enough to actually be starting school. "I'll have an answer for you when I get back, okay?"

Hazel gave a reluctant nod. "Okay."

"Have a good day at work."

"Thanks. You too. You…know what I mean."

Hazel got in her car and backed out of the space. Santana watched her leave. Hazel was so hot and cold, but she was also right. Santana could walk away at any point. She did get to decide how and when she saw Phil, when she was in his life, and when she wasn't. Hazel didn't get that same choice. She was always mom. Santana wasn't. Santana understood that Hazel wasn't saying that she couldn't come see Phil anymore, just that she needed to make a choice on who she was going to be to him. If she was just his playmate, fine, but if she was something more, she needed to be that more consistently. Santana understood what Hazel was demanding. She just couldn't commit to it either way.

Phillip wasn't her son. Legally, she had a claim to him, but in the laws that mattered to her, she didn't. He was Hazel's son, and she would never interfere with the fact that he was Hazel's son, as much for Hazel's sanity as anything else. But she and Hazel weren't together, had never been together. Hazel could leave, would leave at some point, and she would take him with her when she went, and if Santana actually fully committed to being a parent, and she did that…it'd break her.

She looked at Phil's car seat sitting in the back of her car. Not that it wouldn't now, but not the way it would if she wasmom. If she put a picture of him on his desk, and took him to little league, and spent time on the phone with her friends telling them every little new thing he learned at school. Right now, other than Noah, no one in her life knew about him. She didn't have pictures of him on her desk. She didn't let herself think of him as herson.

What she needed to do was cut her ties, count her loses, and just look forward to starting a family with Quinn in a couple of years, which is all she ever really wanted to do. Quinn became an added complication to the equation, too, because she hadn't signed on for this. Hell, Santana hadn't signed on for this, not intentionally. She just sometimes did things that she didn't fully think through and completely weigh the consequences before she did them.

She looked up to the apartment where Phil and Quinn were alone, and her wife was, no doubt, trying to worm as many questions out of the unsuspecting little boy as possible. She had told him earlier that he could answer any questions that she asked, and the more she asked, the less she'd have to actually explain. Santana knew about Quinn searching the apartment, but knew, too, that she hadn't found anything worth knowing because if she had she would have already confronted her about it.

Santana wished that Hazel had left her a cigarette behind. She was waiting for things to get to the part where they wereeasy. She honestly had never anticipated everything getting this complicated.

"Oh well," she mumbled. She gave a glance in her side view mirrors to make sure her outside façade didn't reflect her inside turmoil, and she jogged back up the stairs, steeling herself for what she was about to walk into.

Santana watched Phil get dressed, and worried that he needed new clothes as well. She would hold off on that, though, because he'd need new clothes for the start of the school year.

"What'cha think about?" Phil questioned. He had gotten right in front of Santana's face and she hadn't even noticed.

"You," Santana said honestly.

"About how handsome I am?"

Santana gave a chucking laugh. "Yep, that's it exactly. Do you need to use the bathroom before we go?"

He thought about it. "Nope."

"Go use it anyway, and I'll be waiting by the door."

"Okay."

Santana walked out into the living room. She surprised Quinn by wrapping her hands around her waist. "Hi."

"Hi," Quinn said back.

"Hazel says there's a street festival going on in town. Do you think that'd be something that you'd want to do?"

Quinn shrugged. "We can. What'd you want to tell me before we got inside."

Santana kissed the back of her neck. "Just that Phil can be a little excitable."

"I see that," Quinn said wryly. Phil emerged from the bathroom. Santana pulled back, but she grabbed Quinn's hand. "Ready?"

"Yep!"

In the car, Santana watched Phil slide into his booster seat, and pull the seat belt around the seat. "All good?" she questioned. Phil gave the strap a little pull. "Yep!"

She checked him before getting into the driver's seat. She gave Quinn a kiss. "Thanks," she said, as she pulled back away from her. Quinn tilted her head, looking at Santana curiously, her eyes at that midpoint between gold and green. "For?"

"Being my wife, always, but more specifically, helping me baby sit."

Quinn pulled her in for a better kiss, only stopping when Phil said, "Mama, that's gross!"

"I never tell you it's gross when youdroolon me."

"I don't drool!" he squealed.

His eyes fell on the blue decorative bag that was stashed on the floor behind Quinn's seat. "What's that?"

Santana pretended not to know what he was talking about. "What's what?"

He pointed, excitedly. "That!"

Santana lifted the bag. "Oh this? I don't know. I think it might be for you."

Phil eagerly reached for the bag. "Ooh, ooh what is it? Did you bring me a new book?"

"Open it and find out, you goof!"

Phil searched through the wrapping paper, pulling out the glove and ball. "My own glove?" he seemed too awed to be gleeful. "Wow!"

"It's not from me; it's an early birthday gift from Daddy Puck."

"Can we play with it right now? Will you teach me how to throw?"

"We can play with it later. We have some shopping to do first."

Phil pouted. "I don't like to shop."

"Well, then, it's a good thing that doing what you don't like won't kill you, huh?"

"And he's down," Santana said cheerfully, plopping down onto the space beside Quinn, startling her from her book. She raised her hand for a high-five. Quinn looked at the hand, but didn't give her one, so Santana picked up Quinn's hand, and high-fived herself.

"You were in there for a while," Quinn noted. "Are you sure he didn't put up a fight?"

"Nah, he doesn't usually put up a fight for me. Three books, and he was out in fifteen. Easy." Santana shrugged. "I just like watching him sleep."

"I liked watching Beth, too." Quinn responded. "Parent's like watching their kids sleep; it's kind of a thing." Quinn didn't even hesitate. "Why didn't you tell me you had a son?"

"He's my godson."

"Santana," Quinn said leadingly. She waited until Santana lifted her head and looked at her. "That's your kid. You have a son, and you didn't even tell me."

She gave a glance over her shoulder. "Because I don't think about him as being mine," she said in a low voice. "If I did, I would have. I don't get to have a claim on him, though, so I don't."

"You don't think you have a claim on him?" Quinn rolled her eyes. "He calls you mama."

"Because I didn't want him calling me Santana. It's weird for me to hear a kid call me by my first name; I didn't do that as a kid growing up. All of the women in my life were aunt or tia and the men were uncle or tio, no matter their actually relationship with me. I was Tia Tana, and we told him I was his god mom and he mixed tia and mom together. We just never corrected him."

"As plausible as that may be, when you're around him, you two act like a mother and son would, not like a woman with her friend's kid who mistakenly calls you by the wrong name."

"Would you believe that it's because I don't realize that I'm doing it?" Santana questioned. It was an earnest question, Quinn could see that. "I pretty much had this same conversation with Hazel a few hours ago. She essentially told me that I act like a parent, without being a parent, and how it's not fair to her."

"It's not fair to anybody, including me. What is your actual relationship to him, Santana?"

Santana shifted on the couch, toying with the remote. "Around the time that he was born, Hazel really needed me. Like she pretty much couldn't function independently. Even though she's older than me, I always kind of thought of her as being like a younger sister. So I still treat her that way, and step in when I'm not needed. It's not on purpose, it's instinctual."

"Santana, I want this relationship to work just as much as you do, but every day that passes I feel like you apparently know everything there is to know about me, but I don't know anything about you. I don't know you. I don't know my wife. I get one mystery semi-solved, and then you turn around and add another to the equation."

"And I've been doing my best to answer the unknowns about me. If I wanted to keep Phil a secret, would I have brought you here with me, today? I've been working all kinds of crazy shifts at work lately; I could have just lied and said that I had to work again today. But I didn't. I bought groceries for Hazel, and took money out of our account to help her with her expenses. If it was something I was keeping from you, I wouldn't have taken money from the account we both have access to, knowing that you get an alert if any large deposit or withdrawal is made. Take into consideration how sneaky you know me to be, would I have been tossing bread crumbs if I was really trying to keep things a secret from you?"

"Why can't you just tell me things instead of playing Sherlock Holmes? Normal people talk to their spouses."

"You're accusing me of playing Sherlock Holmes when you and Mercedes went tearing through the apartment looking for clues alluding to my supposed secret identity?"

"So, what you have cameras around the apartment now?"

Santana laughed inappropriately. "What? Quinn. No."

"How do you know Mercedes was with me?"

"BecauseBrown Sugar? When would you watch that without coercion?"

"Hey, that was a really, really good movie."

Santana nodded. "I agree. Yet, I doubt you would have discovered that on your own."

"Well, if you would just tell me things, I wouldn't have to go to such extremes."

"One, I'm not used to talking about things with people who don't already know about the details of my life. I'm not used to coming home to someone who wants to know about my day. I'm getting used to. And the things I can tell you, I do, if I remember it's something that I should tell you. Other wise the only way I know to tell you something is if you ask. Also, the lock on the lockbox where I keep my gun, is fingerprint activated, so you can't open it. I got it when I lived alone. If you get a gun permit, and want access to the gun, I'll get a different lock box. My safe in the top shelf of the closet, the one you haven't discovered yet, is a combination lock, and it uses the same combination that any other combination lock that I have uses. Pretty much, if it's anything that's low to mid-level security, I use the same password and/or number combination."

"Which is?" Quinn asked, just to see if Santana would answer her, or if it was just another one of those things Santana would answer only if she half-stumbled upon it.

"I already gave it to you. In fact it's framed. It's the same numbers I use for Powerball: 02-09-15-55-13." Santana frowned. "Damn it, I forgot to get a ticket last night."

"You do realize that the odds of you winning the lotto are like slim to nil, right?"

"If Idon'tget a ticket. If I get a ticket it's slightly higher."
"You should read George's Orwell's take on the lottery."

"IknowGeorge Orwell's take on the lottery. But I buy only two tickets a week, so even if I play the lottery from now until I die at the respectable age of 90, that is only $6000…and I'm just going to round up to 300. That's only $6,300 dollars over the course of the rest of life. I'll spend more money on staples. And actually, it's almost the exact same amount that I'd spend on my Netflix subscription, if they don't raise the price, which we know they will because 7.99 will be the cost of a roll of toilet paper in 10 years."

Santana let the smile fade from her face. "I'm not making light of this. Trust, honesty, that's an issue for us. For both of us. You don't trust that I'm not going to screw you over in some way or the other, and I don't trust that you won't hurt me in the worst way you possibly can if somehow your feelings get hurt. That's not good. That's not healthy. That's why I want to work on us, but it's going to take some time."

"We're talking about a son, Santana! That's not something that takes time. That's a five year secret that you kept from me. Is he biologically yours? He looks like you."

"Don't you think you would have noticed if I was pregnant?"

"We didn't talk for nearly nine months, remember?"

"Starting in April. Phillip was born in September."

"You don't start showing for the first two to three months. For some women it's four or even five."

"You're being ridiculous!"

"I'm not being ridiculous, you have a fucking son!"

"How many times do I have to say that…"

"It doesn't matter how many times you say it, it's bullshit Santana! I don't even know if I can trust you anymore!"

"Really? You're talking about trust. You were going to go home with not one, but two different women, on the same night, and you're talking to me about trust. It's not even like you had a crisis of conscious, either. The opportunity just disappeared."

"I thought you said that was over," Quinn jeered.

"I said that it wasn't okay, and it's not. My point is that we both have our secrets. We're both hurt each other-,"

Phil's voice came suddenly from the hallway. "Mama?"

Santana jumped up almost instantly. "What is it, baby?"

"I had a bad dream."

Santana picked him up and carried back into his room, snuggling with him until he fell back asleep.