Title: Sanity

Pairing: Faberry, Brittana

Rating: T for now.

Spoilers: None

Summary: After a tragic event, the legal system threatens to tear away the only thing Rachel Berry has left.

Disclaimer: These characters belong to FOX.

A/N: This is an idea that I had after seeing all of the genre swaps on tumblr; I got this idea of Faberry written as a Jodi Picoult novel. This first chapter that will be in present day, then every other chapter will be in the past, aka the high school years. This is definitely AU from the beginning of the show. It has the same basis, but the story lines are different. Enjoy!

The doorbell wakes her up. The first thing that she sees is blonde hair across the pillow and for a moment she forgets. She forgets until she hears a small voice ringing out with one word. "Mama?" Rachel sighs as she snaps her eyes close. This isn't right, but nothing is right anymore. She reaches a hand out, pulling the small body closer to hers. No, the blonde should be larger and should be pulling her closer. "Mama." The small voice calls out again as the doorbell rings. This time her eyes stay open, gazing around the room.

The bed is too tall. It was something they had argued about for weeks before Rachel agreed to the one that she had wanted. Now it just seems wrong. "Come on Beth," Rachel says holding her hand out for the small blonde to take. Beth has always woken up quickly, but something tells Rachel that she's been awake longer than she would say. She's just like her mother that way. The walk is quiet; Beth's hand feels heavy in her own. They sleep in the same bed now. It was something that had taken months for Beth to abandon and it came back full blast within a day. The little girl isn't as heartbroken as Rachel, but she doesn't understand. She's too small to understand the implications of forever.

Once they reach the downstairs, Rachel hands Beth a book before moving towards the door. When she opens it, she isn't surprised to see who's behind the door. "Aunt Brittany! Santana!" Obviously they would have heard. Rachel wasn't the only one to know. They were her best friends. Rachel couldn't bring her to call them. She couldn't bring herself to talk to anyone but Beth. Rachel finds herself being hugged before she can say anything. Seeing the two girls makes it real again, and she can't help the tears that come to her eyes.

"Squirt, show me the kitchen." Santana says with an armful of groceries, knowing Rachel doesn't want her daughter seeing her like this. Rachel breathes out as soon as she can hear her daughter's voice farther away, tucking her head further into the blonde's neck. She doesn't know how they end up on the coach, but Brittany's matches her sobs.

"I'm sorry," Brittany whispers into her ears, but it doesn't help. To Rachel, it feels like nothing could ever stop this pain. The only thing that she holds on to is Beth. "You should have called." Brittany adds innocently. Rachel knows she isn't trying to guilt her, yet the words hit her hard. "Santana cried. She never cries." She whispers, not knowing what to do. Brittany never has to be the strong one.

"I couldn't." Rachel says quietly and it's the truth. She allows herself to let out the pain and suffering into Brittany's neck. She knows the blonde is stronger than anyone gives her credit. She has to be to have stayed with Santana for all those years.

When the doorbell rings again, Brittany gets to it before Rachel can even think to respond. "Here for Beth?" The blonde's confused voice pulls Rachel off of the coach. Her heart beats faster at the sound. "I don't understand. Rachel's her mom."

Three days after getting her heart ripped from her chest, it's stomped into the ground, leaving Rachel Berry an utter mess.

"Rachel." She pulls the covers up farther, trying to squirm down farther into the warmth in the bed. "Baby." The voice slowly pulls her awake, although she can never tell if Quinn is a dream or not. "Don't make me send Beth in here." The threat is playful and Rachel can't help but smile.

"Mmph." Rachel mumbles, trying to gain a little more time before awaking. "Send the girl in, she'll snuggle." She says with a sigh, opening her eyes to see her wife. Rachel knows that Beth's at Puck's for the weekend. "Good morning." She says with a lazy smile playing on her face. She can't help it. Just looking into those hazel eyes had an effect on her.

"Good morning, baby." Her wife spoke softly, something that Rachel had, rather successfully, gotten used to. The mornings were different now than they were in high school. Instead of an intense workout, they were filled with soft touches and quiet words. "I have to go get Beth." She says softly, looking at Rachel expectantly. "Want to come with?"

"I can't." Rachel says sitting up in the bed, her hand reaching out to take Quinn's. "I have to call Angie to schedule my next meeting." Rachel adds, not wanting to mention that she wants to see Puck as little as possible. Their relationship would never be the way it had been before Beth. She would be always grateful that Beth was born, but the fact of how she came to be was a different story. He was no longer Noah to her, just Puck as he had been to everyone else in high school.

"Alright." The blonde replies before slipping out of the bedroom and into the adjacent bedroom. Rachel doesn't even realize that she fell back asleep until the knock came on her door.

"What the fuck?" Santana says, too loudly for Rachel's liking. "What the fuck does this all mean?" Santana takes the anger in and lets it roll through her chest. Brittany sits, her hand in Rachel's. Rachel's quiet, too quiet. Brittany has never seen Rachel like this, and it's scary.

The only sounds for the next few moments are the sounds of short breathes from Santana as she paces back and forth and then fragments of Spanish. Before Rachel can lose it, she goes to her daughter. The blonde is the exact replica of her mother and she's being torn away just the same. Rachel wipes the tears off of her face before entering her daughter's room. "Beth." She speaks quietly, the blonde looking up from her book. "Let's pack you a bag for daddy's." She tries hard to keep her voice steady, already walking to the closet to get out the girl's suitcase.

"Mama! I'm reading!" The small blonde says diffidently. Her gaze is captured completely by Where the Wild Things Are. Rachel swallows back tears as she starts to put her daughter's things in the suitcase. She never expected this to happen. She knows the real tears will come once Beth is taken by the social worker to her father's.

"Beth, please." Rachel begs, wanting this to be fast, she can't do it any other way. "Please come help me. You're going to be staying at daddy's for a bit," she forces out. Her whole world has been taken away in the past few days and now she is being forced to go along with it.

"But why Mama?" The six year old asks, the book totally forgotten on the table. It surprises her how much Beth likes to know why. A look of questioning crosses the little blonde's face before she looks back up to her mother. "And when is Mommy coming home from Heaven?"

The question makes her drop to her knees.

"Quinn!" Rachel yells down the staircase. Of course her wife had forgotten her keys, it was almost as if it happened everyday. "I swear to God that I'm going to duct-tape those ke-" She's cut off when it's not her wife standing in front of her, but instead Finn and a younger police officer. "Finn! This isn't an appropriate time to visit." She sighs, pulling her robe closed over her petite frame. "You really do need to call, plus Beth and Quinn aren't even here." She's stopped mid-rant when she sees the look on his face. "Finn?" She asks quietly, her gaze flickering from his face to the other man's. "This is a social call, right?" The sound of hope in her voice is desperate, but she needs the hope

"Rach." Finn's voice was hoarse and she could tell this affected him. Her heart pounded hard in her chest.

"No."

"Rach, Quinn was in a-"

"No."

"She was in a car accident."

"No."

"Rachel, please."

"No. Stop."

"She didn't make it. I'm so sorry."

"No."

She hugs her daughter for the last time before she is drove off with a woman she doesn't know. This can't be right. This can't be. Rachel barely makes it back into the house before she collapses into herself. This is all too much. She barely notices when strong, Santana arms carry her to the couch. She doesn't know how she got to the bathroom, but she's puking and a soft hand is holding back her hair as another rubs her back.

There wasn't enough time. She didn't have enough time to mourn the death of her wife and now her daughter had been stripped from her. It was wrong. They must be wrong.

"Rachel." Santana says quietly and Rachel is jolted back into reality on her bed, the bed she bought with her wife. "Do you need anything?"

"Quinn," she says in a low tone that Santana has never heard before. She never knew Rachel could be this quiet. "Beth," It's that one that stabs Santana in the gut. Santana has always been able to help people, go out and beat someone up. She's good at that sort of thing. This, this pain that she feels, she can't solve with shoving her fist in some guy's face. That doesn't mean she doesn't try with the wall.

Rachel doesn't even flinch when Santana punches through a wall. The old Rachel, the Rachel before all of this happened would have thrown a fit. Santana desperately wished that Rachel would throw a fit, hit her, do something other than just sit there.

"Santana." Brittany breathes as she walks back out of the living room and into the kitchen for what Santana supposes to be ice. Brittany has always been there to clean her wounds.

"Rachel, please. Just tell me what to do." Santana begs. Rachel and Beth are the last pieces of Quinn that Santana will ever had, she wants, needs to protect them at all costs. They're family.

When Santana's words don't do anything, she knows whom she needs to call.