fic: Arguing Semantics, for firecracker_x

[octopunk]

 

Rachel handed her two slips of paper.

“What’s this?”

Brittany had been doodling something between the lines of some of the sheet music Mr.Schue had just handed out. He was on the other side of the classroom running through male vocals, giving Rachel license to trot over to her as full of purpose as ever.

“They’re report cards, the top one there is yours, I had it pulled from the academic files in the office, and the bottom one’s mine.”

Brittany opened and observed both of them, not seeming to comprehend.

“These don’t make any sense, all mine says is fuhhhhh and yours is scared.”

“Scared?”

“Aaaaaaa? It’s screaming right?”

“Quite the opposite, Brittany your grades are abysmal and now that you’re off the cheerios there’s nothing stopping Coach Sylvestre from calling academic eligibility, getting you disqualified from Nationals and Glee club altogether, ending our run for National champion and my chance to impress Broadway scouts thus launching my career.”

“Okay, you just went ten years past anything I’ve even tried to think about.”

Rachel rolled her eyes and retrieved the report cards from Brittany’s hand.

“That’s the whole point!”

“Don’t you ever think of, you know, now?”

“Now isn’t important when compared to the eclipsing inevitability of my fame.”

“Okay.”

“So we’re in agreement, I’m going to begin tutoring you to get you’re grades up so you can stop putting everyone in danger.”

“You’re not going to scream at me are you?”

---

She was surprised that Rachel could carry all of those books; it must have been half of her weight in books. She piled them all on Brittany’s kitchen counter as Brittany sat on her hands, “Is there…more?”

“No, my dad’s didn’t have any room in the trunk. Okay, so we’re gonna start with something easy, how about Bronte.”

“Dinosaurs write?”

“No, she writes love stories, you’ll have to write an essay on one of her books at the end of the year so you’ll need to read something. I suggest Jane Eyre, it’s about a generally average looking girl who gets the rich man of her dreams over her crazy counterpart.”

Rachel heaved a book into Brittany arms.

“A story I have a particular understanding of.”

“Why’s that?”

Brittany flipped through the pages all at once as Rachel blinked.

“Well, I just see a little bit of myself in that story.”

“But you’re pretty.”

She wasn’t often speechless.

“I mean, Santana always said your wardrobe violated the Geneva Convention but I always thought it was kind of….” she smiled and tilted her head, “Cute”

“Oh, uh, thank you Brittany but you should get started, I’m here if you have any questions.”

Brittany cracked the book open on her thigh as Rachel sorted through bits of paper, some homemade handouts constructed from teacher sites, she took everything seriously. Blue eyes flickered between the page and the impending work she would be forced to complete because of it, neither option was particularly seductive.

“Hey Rachel what’s this word?”

“Infallible?”

“Uh-huh.”

“When you can’t be wrong or fail.”

“Okay.”

Another couple of seconds passed by.

“How about prep-…”

“Preposterous, something that reasonably shouldn’t happen.”

“Okay, thanks….how about prepossessing?”

Rachel sighed; this wouldn’t be getting them anywhere.

“It’ when something is beautiful appearance wise, this isn’t going to be easy is it?”

Brittany put on the clueless look she normally wore around Rachel Berry, most of the time she just sort of tuned her out but she’d gone through the trouble of trying to help her, even if it was in a fashion designed for self-advancement. She’d at least give it a try.

“We could do rewards?”

“Like treats?” Rachel deadpanned.

“Uh…I don’t know, I just know that when Santana taught me how to drive if I did good she’d kiss me.”

Rachel blushed.

“I don’t think that’s going to work here Brit.”

Brittany squirmed in her seat, trying to look back into the world of the book.

“It works really well though.”

“What would Artie think?”

Brittany shrugged, “It’s not that big a deal for us.”

Biting her bottom lip she tried to devise a substitute, the anxiety that had been created regarding Brittany’s grades had been following her around for weeks, the ramifications of Coach Sylvestre remembering the stunt Mr. Schuester had pulled on her Cheerios the year prior. It would be disastrous if they lost another member, Brittany especially, her and Mike’s dance moves had won them Sectionals, and an asset she was counting on for their National debut.

Take one for the team, Berry.

Not that it could be all that bad.

“Okay, you get through a chapter and you’ll get a reward.”

Brittany’s eyes lit up.

“Really?”

“Yes, now go ahead.”

Rachel couldn’t focus for the next twenty minutes, watching Brittany from the corner of her eye to mark her progress, face hot. There was a funny kind of dread, a dread that was also exhilaration, like a roller coaster. Finally she looked up from the pages with a grin on her face.

“Okay, so her adopted brother is like Karofsky right? Actually her entire adopted family is like Karofsky and then she gets locked in a room with a ghost.”

Rachel nodded, the teacher-student bond had developed quickly in her mind and the success felt shared, as did the sort of mischievous look Brit gave her.

Rachel nodded, once twice.

“Okay, close your eyes.”

“What?”

“You want your reward or not?”

Brittany complied, grinning happily with her eyes so tight shut it was making wrinkles appear on her forehead.

Rachel dragged it out about as long as she could looking from her hands to Brittany, back down to her feet and taking an inch a minute to close in, when she kissed her it tasted like lip-smackers. A kind of faint flavor of something fruity and easy to swallow, the lesson continued.

Brittany’s eagerness to charge through the following chapters was almost off-putting and with each kiss the tension seemed to ease though the drama of the moment didn’t. By the time Brittany managed to get through the first scenes of Mr. Rochester Rachel had taken to tangling her hand through blonde hair for a bit more control and the embrace latest noticeably longer.

She pulled away breathless.

“Okay it’s late so…”

“I did good?”

Brittany looked proud of herself, probably for more than one reason.

“You did amazing Britt, I can come back and we can work through the rest of it.”

“You could sleepover.”

Rachel paused midway through the process of gathering up her large pile of paper, her shoulders tight, she didn’t respond.

“I mean I did good didn’t I?”

“I don’t think I can Brittany.”

Her pseudo-student pouted.

“Why not? If I did good you could stay, that’d be a pretty cool reward.”

“But, okay may I be frank?” Brittany didn’t know who that was but she nodded, Rachel continued, “Glee club is already teetering on the precipice of destruction with our web of self-destructive relationship and I don’t want to add another dimension to that destruction by….consummating any kind of newly developed relationship with you.” This Frank guy sounded a lot like Rachel Berry, “and while I know that you don’t consider consequences in the slightest I don’t want anything bad to come of our tutoring session, especially with how much I enjoyed it.”

There was a gleam in her eyes of the truth in her; it was the constant desire to break her own rules, a nagging what if.

Brittany started giggling.

Confused Rachel took a breath, preparing a further explanation of consequences.

“We don’t have to do anything, I just thought, it might be nice to have someone to sleep near.”

Brittany’s eyes started at the ground before looking up to her, there was an empty space there hollowed out by a body not present, by someone sorely missed and pain in her gone in the blink of an eye when Rachel pulled out her phone and began to dial her dad.

Nothing happened, exactly how nothing was supposed to happen, Brittany had a big bed, the mattress was fluffy and she lost herself in a litany of pillows. When Brittany threw an arm over her stomach and nuzzled into her shoulder she could almost feel her heart leap up, thinking of promises she could break and choosing not to break them, the same way she always chose not to break them. It was soft and warm, the way happiness must be and the two of them filling the roles. She’d never considered herself lonely before but she’d never really had anything like this. When she had been dating Finn he’d never slept over and while he was enough of a good guy not to pressure her constantly you could see it on his mind, a beast she wouldn’t tempt with a whole night together. When she was younger there had never been many opportunities for sleepovers between voice lessons and dance recitals and her lack of friends.

She covered Brittany’s hand with her own and felt the girls smile into her hair.

Rachel didn’t talk to her in Glee club that Monday.

She’d kept trying to chat with Santana instead much to the Latina’s obvious annoyance and Brittany didn’t want to get to close to her, it gave her a weird pain in her chest that she didn’t like very much.

They had been supposed to plan another study session but Rachel didn’t follow any of her normal routes to and from classes and Brittany began to think she’d done something wrong. Not that she could figure out what. She’d been good, she’d made sure that she’d been good and it had apparently gotten her as much as being bad would have which didn’t really seem fair in the least.

It was the curiosity that got her to leave English ten minutes early in hopes of catching her outside of her Math class, a plan that in her mind required the utmost level of espionage, a task she nearly failed at when she turned the corner without checking and came across Rachel and Santana. She’d been too distracted by the spy music she was humming.

Brittany tucked herself behind the lockers and tried to catch what she could of the conversation.

“What goes on between me and Brittany is none of your business dwarf.”

“Brittany and I.”

“Excuse me?”

“Brittany and I, not me and Brittany.”

“You got about two seconds to get across a state border of your choice, Berry, because I am in no mood.”

“That’s what I wanted to talk about, ignoring her is effecting you too. I don’t see what there is to gain from that.”

“You’re seeing things, there’s nothing wrong with me, she’s happy with Wheels.”

“No she’s not, okay Santana? She’s lonely.”

Brittany couldn’t see Santana’s face but she could see clearly the uncomfortable look she was surely wearing.

“You and her can start a club then, huh?”

Santana stalked off, she didn’t see it but she could hear the heavy thumping of the boots she’d worn today, Rachel must have stayed still.

“You can come out Brittany, I can see your hat.”

Brittany grabbed the floppy sunhat from off of her head and looked around the corner, apologetic.

“Sorry, I was-“

“It’s fine, I’m the one who’s sorry, sorry you had to hear that.”

Brittany bit her lip and started playing with the tip of her shoe, pressing it back and forth on the schools linoleum.

“Rachel, you don’t have to do that, me and…” She recalled Rachel’s most recent correction, ”Santana and I, we’ll figure it out. I don’t blame her for it and it’s not something you have to deal with.”

“As captain of glee club I feel it’s my responsibility to-“

“But its not,”

The blonde gave a halfway smile.

“Its not. Lately you’ve been talking about focusing on yourself but you’re not Glee Club, Rachel. You’re you, and I know you’re lonely too.”

Rachel nodded, only slightly surprised she was receiving such important wisdom from Brittany.

“Y-your right,” She looked like she might cry.

“I know.”

“What’re you here for anyway?”

She rubbed the space underneath her eye, as if clearing the area might discourage tears. Brittany smiled.

“Just to tell you that you look prepossessing today.”

Rachel laughed, that Rachel Berry ‘I’m laughing through the tears laugh’ that mixed all the best and worst of her feelings together and she walked up to Brittany and kissed her with that same potent mix of emotions.

“What was that for?”

“You get rewarded, remember?”

“Does this mean we get to do another study session?”

“Yes Brittany.”

Her face lit up, easy happy, something Rachel wondered if she’d ever have, probably not, but she thought maybe being close to it would help, knew that it would.  And hell, maybe if Brittany past her English paper she could stay the night again, this time in a more rewarding capacity.