"Can't we go, like, on a weekend or something?" Lia asked, pacing the kitchen one evening as her father's eyes scanned his laptop screen.

"No tours on the weekends," Lin told her, taking a sip of his decaf tea.  The twins were in bed and Vanessa had gone to bed early.  Before going, she'd urged him to get a date in for a visit to MIT, Lia's top choice and her alma mater.

"I can't just miss school," she explained, tucking a stray piece of hair behind her ear for the third time.  "It's...it's too hard to make stuff up."

"Kids do it all the time, mija," he assured her as he watched her pace.  Their oldest had always been a bit high strung, but college applications seemed to have put her in overdrive.  She was staying up late, looked exhausted, and was impatient with her family.  "You get two days as a senior to take college tours as an excused absence."

Lia knew all this, but it didn't make her feel any better.  Since adding AP Art History and peer tutoring to her schedule, she barely had time to function.  Plus, she had to put more energy into hiding it from her family so they wouldn't freak out.  If they found out she had taken on extra classes and then lied about it, she would not be in a good place.  She just couldn't afford to take a day off school.

"Ugghhhh!!" She groaned, scrubbing hands over her face.  Lin stood up and forced her to stop walking, bringing her in for a hug.  She tried to pull away quickly, but he held on.  Both he and Vanessa were trying to figure out how to get her to chill out.  It was her senior year and she should be enjoying it.

"Ssshhh, shhhh," Lin urged her as she groaned in annoyance.

"Dad-"

Lin pulled back, putting his hands on her shoulders, looking her in the eyes.  "Emilia, I know this is stressing you out, but you need to think big picture.  It may be a little annoying to miss a day of class, but you can make it up.  You know you can do it.  You can even work in the car on the way there."

He gently steered her towards the computer.  "I think it makes sense to do a tour on a Monday or Friday so we can spend some weekend time exploring the town.  So consider your schedule on those days.  Which would be more convenient for you?"

"Neither," she said immediately, but she felt her dad squeeze her shoulder in reassurance.  She sighed as she looked at the open dates.  "I guess next Friday?"

"Sounds good," Lin said immediately, not even considering his own schedule.  He would make it work.  Not freaking Lia out was his main priority right now.  Lia started pacing again as Lin's fingers flew over the keyboard, filling out the online form.  He pressed submit and it was as easy as that.  They'd just need to book a hotel and notify her school.

"Done," Lin said, and closed the laptop lid.  Lia checked her Apple watch and went to the fridge to pull out a Five Hour Energy.  It was 8 p.m.  "Woah, woah," he took it from her before she could open it.  "Sweetheart, it's almost time for bed.  This will keep you up all night."

That was, of course, the goal.  She'd become quite the expert at managing to appear to go to bed at a decent time, but in reality she had to stay up to do homework.  If she was going to get into MIT, she needed to give herself more of an edge.  Their average SAT score for incoming freshmen was 1570.  Lia had taken the SAT twice so far and had received a 1535, then a 1550.  She was hoping to get in one more test before submitting her applications and reach the threshold of 1570.  That added yet more test prep to her busy schedule.

"No it won't," she told him, reaching for it, but he eyed her and put it back in the fridge.

"Bed," he told her, promptly turning her around and steering her towards the hallway.

"Dad-" she immediately protested.  Lia rolled her eyes as he pushed her down the hallway towards her bedroom.  "It's only 8 o'clock.  What am I, ten?"

"I think an early night would do you good," he reasoned as he stopped at the door.

"I thought we all agreed that you'd start treating me more like an adult," she told him, crossing her arms.  "You do realize I'll be by myself at college next fall?"

Lia was a kid who tended to overdo things, and they ended up having to be quite firm with her throughout high school about time management.  Many parents had the problem of kids who slacked off, especially kids who came from privilege and felt they could coast through life.  Lin and Vanessa had the opposite problem.

"I know, sweetheart," he told her.  "We just want you to learn to pace yourself.  Not to overdo things."

"When do I overdo things?" She demanded.  Lin just chuckled and stepped forward to kiss her forehead.

"Get to bed," he told her.  "I'll come check on you in a few."

He closed the door, leaving the seventeen year old to figure things out.  She looked around her slightly cluttered room, searching for her student agenda book.  She quickly wrote down her college visit for the next Friday before she forgot.  If she didn't write it down immediately these days, she tended to space things.

After writing it down, she flipped back to the current week and glanced at the pink sticky note pasted there yesterday.  It was the number for Charlie Havens, a kid who was known to help overworked students get an edge.

She sighed and shut the book, collapsing on her bed.  She was just going to take a rest, but before she could fight it, she fell asleep.

When Lin came back in minutes later, planning on having to fight the teenager on going to bed, he smiled to himself when he saw her passed out on her bed, still in a pair of jeans with the lights on and her textbooks sprawled out. He chuckled lightly as pulled the comforter over her and stacked the books on her side table. How many more nights would he be able to do this?  He only had Lia for three years, and was already talking about sending her off to college. It was a sure fire way to get him emotional and, rather than go down that route now, he left a kiss on her temple and turned off her lights. There'd be plenty more time for that.

—————

"Damnit," Vanessa muttered under her breath as she noticed a typo on the upteempth motion she had printed over the past hour. She crumbled up the paper and tossed it to the side of her desk.

Vanessa was envious of her past self. The twenty-three year old who thought life was hard as a single mother of a toddler balancing law school had nothing on the thirty-six year old who was trying to balance the demands of her job, husband, and three children. After many conversations, she and Lin had agreed on hiring Beatriz as a nanny for the twins during the week. They hadn't taken into account that Beatriz would be in Puerto Rico for the next month taking care of her mother who was recovering from a hip replacement.

It wasn't feasible for either parent to bring their children to work with them. Lin was in the midst of many projects, including getting ready to start promotion for 'Mary Poppins Returns' that was set to release that November. He was all over the city going to various meetings, and although Vanessa was stationary, a law office was no place for the very inquisitive two year olds. Thankfully, Lin's parents jumped at the chance to babysit for the week, including their weekend away in Massachusetts, as the couple tried to settle back into a routine. It was greatly appreciated, but it wasn't a permanent solution.

Vanessa slumped down in her chair, declaring that she should take a sanity break on her first official day back. She had already forgoed lunch, but needed a few minutes to reconvene herself at the expense of all the trees she was killing with each paper she was having to throw away.

She pulled out the source of her distracted mind - her cellphone. She'd been researching daycare facilities all morning. One would think with the net worth of the celebrity and attorney power couple, things like finding child care wouldn't be an issue. However, most of the higher end daycares were far too ritzy for either parent's taste, but they still wanted to find a facility that was somewhat exclusive due to wanting to keep their privacy intact. 'Daycares for celebrity kids in New York who aren't taught to be arrogant assholes' wasn't exactly a result gaining google search.

Getting back into the groove of working full time was a lot different than Vanessa had imagined it would be. The only thing getting her through the day was the idea of a hot bath and a glass of wine. All that stood between her was piles of paperwork and trying to figure out what the hell they were going to eat for dinner. When Lin called about an hour later, which Vanessa usually found to be a stress reliever, ended up being the exact opposite.

"You're gonna kill me,"

"For someone who is known for his way with words, you would think you'd have a better way of starting a phone call." Vanessa quipped, leaning back into her chair for whatever conversation they were about to have.

"I have a meeting Friday,"

"No you don't," Vanessa said slowly, "We have a noon appointment at MIT with our teenage daughter who I had to badger to death this weekend to get her to a place of being excited for this trip."

She could hear him sigh over the phone, nearly picturing his face in a sorrowed look, "It completely slipped my mind until Tommy just told me that we are meeting with all the execs from FX to go over Fosse/Verdon. It's been in the works for a month," His tone was just as matter of fact as Vanessa's as he spoke on the new tv show he would be executive producing, "I'm supposed to fly out to California Thursday night and come back Friday night," When his wife didn't say anything, he continued, "There's still enough time to reschedule for next week,"

"No," Vanessa repeated.

"V,"

"Lin, no." It was the same tone she had to use when delivering bad news to her children. It wasn't one anyone ever wanted to be on the other side of, "I'm not going to be the only parent who has to rearrange their schedule for our family. Reschedule it, call in, I don't really care. Figure the shit out, but the three of us are going to be at MIT on Friday. This is about Lia."

Lin groaned, but didn't say anything. The tension was evident, even through the phone. Finally Lin spoke up and gave a mediocre okay. Vanessa rolled her eyes at his contrite response - holding back the statement that he should have checked his schedule prior. She scribbled mindlessly on a piece of paper waiting for him to say something.

"I'll talk to you later," Lin spoke up after a few beats, "I have to call my agent and see what can be done,"

"Alright,"

Neither of them said anything else before the call disconnected. She sat back up in her chair, brushing her blazer off to the back of it. She was frustrated, and not even just because he had wanted to reschedule. If Lin had known for a month, when had he planned on telling her that he was going on a trip to the West Coast? She knew he had a lot on his plate - they both did - but a heads up would have been nice.

She scanned her eyes over her latest printing. She let out a whine of exasperation finding, yet again, things she had to change. She crumbled the pieces of paper and threw it towards the trash can, missing it narrowly. It seemed like nothing was going right these days.

——-

One of the things Lia had missed most while she had been in England was spending actual time with her boyfriend. She and Ayden were cuddled on the couch in the living room of his shared apartment style dorm. They had spent most of the afternoon together once school had let out, and had until her curfew. She hated having something so juvenile in comparison to her college boyfriend.

She had convinced him to test her on her vocab words for the SAT. He agreed when they came up with the rule that for each answer she would get a kiss. She thought that didn't give much incentive for her to get the right answer, but he quickly distracted her with a kiss which quickly turned into them making out. Lia loved having the privacy, minus the barrage of men who walked in on them mid way of Ayden unbuttoning her blouse.

The heat rose to her cheeks as she quickly buttoned her shirt back up, as Ayden and his roommates acted like this was a normal occurrence. Maybe it was, but it certainly wasn't anything Lia was comfortable with.

Once she was properly dressed again, Ayden introduced her to his five roommates, all of them freshman. She found out only one had a girlfriend, and the rest were enjoying the single life that college brought. Lia wasn't sure if that made her more or less reassured that Ayden wouldn't get any ideas on what he could be missing out on.

"Thanks again for letting us use your place for my party, Lia!" Jonas, one of Ayden's roommates, spoke up as the group all settled in the living room, munching away on the pizza Lia and Ayden had ordered.

"Yeah, no problem," Lia grinned as Ayden interlocked their fingers. She had lucked out that, on a Thursday at the end of the month, both of her parents would be at an event and her siblings would be watched by her grandparents. When she told her parents she wanted to have a few people over, they were thrilled that Lia was going to do something besides study, not even questioning that it was on a school night. "It should be fun. And I'll be able to hang out with more of the squad!" From what Ayden had told her, there were about twenty people who were constantly coming and going among the roommates.

"Plus a few more," Ethan, another roommate, chimed in with a laugh, "It's not everyday you get to have a party at a celeb's house, so we gotta make the most of it!"

Over the group's laughter, Lia sharply turned her attention towards Ayden, "You told them who my dad was?" She questioned through gritted teeth.

He held a sheepish smile as he whispered his reply, "It just kind of slipped out,"

"How does something like that just slip out?" Ayden had known Lia and her family long enough to know how much her family valued their privacy. Her dad would kill her if he thought their address was going to be posted in the middle of Columbia's campus.

She felt the eyes of the guys on her and Ayden. Ayden gave her hand a squeeze and mouthed that he was sorry. Lia rolled her eyes, but didn't want to leave a bad impression with his roommates or dampen the mood.

"If you guys can just keep it on the downlow that it's a celeb's house, that would be great," Lia tucked a stray curl behind her ear and gave them a forced smile.

"Oh yeah," Ethan gave a resounding nod, "For sure! Scout's Honor," He held his hand up like he was taking an oath, the four guys followed suit, which led to more laughs.

Lia nervously chuckled, not sure if she quite believed them, as the topic changed over to some fraternity the group was thinking about rushing as Lia sat back and listened. This was what college life was like apparently; she just had to learn to keep up.

Maybe because she was in high school it didn't quite feel right yet, but she had time to figure it out. However she couldn't quite shake the feeling the frat boys were trying to pull wool over her eyes.

Ayden gave his girlfriend's hand a gentle squeeze, and she felt some reassurance this wasn't all going to hell. Despite the stress of high school, standardized tests and college applications, not to mention the pressure of being the child of a celebrity, this one thing was going right.

Right?