FIC: "World Enough, and Time" Part 1/2 [Glee, Brittany/Santana, NC-17]
Masterpost (includes header, warnings, etc) | Part One | Part Two | Full Length (AO3) | aetraega 's accompanying fanmix
Santana is 19, Brittany is 22
I don't generally like admitting that I was kind of super invested in my high school show choir, especially since they never won any competitions, but when I see the flyer stapled to a bulletin board outside my First-year Honors Chem class at the University of Cincinnati calling for auditions for a women's a cappella choir, something makes me tug it free from its push-pin and stuff it in my bag. It's just… I haven't really sung since before I graduated four months ago, and I really miss it. Not that I'd ever admit that, either. I once punched this little weasel in my AP World History class, Jacob, for spreading rumors that show choir, and not volleyball or cheerleading, was the highlight of my high school career. Maybe college is different, though, since like, the art departments actually get funding and stuff.
In my dorm room that night, I take the flyer out of my satchel and smooth it on my desk. I'm supposed to be working on a paper for one of my gen eds, but I keeps getting distracted by the bolded Comic Sans words: UNIVERSITY OF CINCINNATI WOMEN'S CHORUS RECRUITING NOW FROM ALL CONSTITUENT COLLEGES FOR NEW A CAPPELLA GROUP, 4-8 pm, October 26th-28th, Dieterle Vocal Arts Center. Call or email Brittany Pierce (piercebs@mail.uc.edu) or Rachel Berry (berryrb@mail.uc.edu) for details/an audition slot.
"Jeez, Santana, just try out for it already," my roommate, Tina, says from across the room after I've looked at the flyer for the sixteenth time in probably thirty minutes. "You don't have to actually do it if you get in."
I sneer at her, because I know that. Technically. Just because I didn't have the thought first doesn't mean I wasn't going to. "Yeah, okay," I say. "Are you going to?" I know Tina used to do musicals in her high school, so it's a possibility.
"Dunno. Maybe," she says, and I nod, drumming my nails on my desk before opening campus email. I decide to email Rachel Berry, because even a pre-med/Spanish double major like me has heard of her. She's like this really big vocal major sensation at CCM, classically trained and everything, and all over UC's news page. She's the first undergrad in years to be tapped by the Cincinnati Philharmonic to sing in their annual production of the Messiah. It wasn't a solo spot, but still. Impressive. And I figure, once she hears my own impressive voice… well.
She sends me back a date and time for an audition, so I practice my rendition of Disturbia and spend the ten days I have to wait vacillating between thinking that I really want this and thinking that I don't have time for another extracurricular.
October 27th is rainy as fuck. Of course. I do my usual psych-up routine, which mostly means that after my Spanish lit class, I go for a late lunch at that bagel place a couple of blocks from campus instead of eating in the caf. I'm done in plenty of time to get back to Dieterle with over ten minutes to spare, but not in time to go back to my room for a change of clothes, so of course on the way up the hill to the CCM buildings, I slip on some muddy flagstones and rip my jeans. Great.
I bust into the bathrooms on the same floor as the auditions and have an emergency speedy paper-towel laundry session, but I'm only looking marginally better by the time I have to go into the auditorium and sing.
I slog my way up to the stage and put on my brightest smile, ready to blow Rachel Berry and Brittany Pierce away, when I look up at the chairs they're sitting in and -
oh shit -
holy fuck -
Brittany Pierce is Brittany, my Brittany, and she's sitting there all blonde ponytail and expectant expression and she obviously doesn't have the faintest clue who I am, but I don't care. She's there, and I can't even sing like Rachel is requesting me to for what feels like five hours (but is probably less than five minutes), because I'm so slackjawed that I've run into her here, finally, at last. But then I manage to compose myself - well, as much as I can - and I cross my arms and raise my eyebrows and take a deep breath.
I really don't want to blow this audition now, though, because she told me last time that when we met next, she wouldn't know me yet, and I really want to impress her. So I spontaneously pick a different song. Opening my mouth, I say, "Hi, I'm Santana Lopez, and I'm going to sing Brittany's favorite song, 'cause I haven't seen you in so long and I really really missed you."
And then, even though I haven't sung it since she was teaching me to harmonize with her in the field behind my house when I was like, fifteen, I start belting out "Come to My Window." And even though I'm a little bit rusty with it - I haven't listened since last year, because listening made me miss B too much - I'm pretty damn good at it, if I do say so myself.
When I'm done, I look straight at Brittany and say, "So will you go out with me tonight?"
It's her turn to be slackjawed, because she doesn't know me and shit, but she nods, and I whoop and basically sail out of that auditorium, without even waiting to hear any feedback.
Brittany is 22, Santana is 19
Dance majors aren't supposed to party a lot, especially in the middle of the week, but Artie and I had another huge fight last night about how I'm never around and that obviously means I must be cheating on him with half the campus or something, I don't even know (honestly, one night of confusion where a younger you has random sex with someone current-you isn't with, and you can never live that down), so I let myself indulge a little bit with a bottle or three of wine before I went to bed. I mean, okay, like I know there's other people like me out there - there's even this book about this family in Chicago with it and stuff - but that doesn't mean I go around telling just anyone that I have Chrono-impairment. Not even my sort-of boyfriend. Especially because if people found out, I'd probably lose a lot of potential dance gigs - like, who wants to cast someone who might be temporally incapable of showing up to rehearsals or performances or whatever? I wouldn't, to be honest. Well, I mean, I'd hire me, because I'm a pretty great dancer, but I wouldn't hire someone else with my disease.
So I'm not terribly happy to be sitting with Rachel listening to a lot of girls who can't sing (and some who can). I'm still nursing a bit of a headache, and the only meds that usually help my wine hangovers almost always send me off into, like, the plaid-infested 90s or something. By the time we're just past the lunch crowd, I'm slumped over in my seat, head resting on one hand, just whiteknuckling it through some girl with no sense of tone whatsoever. "Thank you," I call out, before she's done - Rachel elbows me, but I think she also looks secretly relieved that I interrupted this girl, too. "We'll let you know. Next?"
The next girl is this brunette with ripped-up jeans that look like they could probably use a wash. Ugh. Seriously, can this day please end?
Rachel glances down at her paper. "Santana Lopez?" she asks, and the girl, Santana, nods. She looks pretty distracted. This should be over quickly. That is, if she ever starts to sing. Rachel prods her. "So, Santana, what are you going to sing for us today?"
The girl shudders and smiles. "Hi, I'm Santana Lopez," she says. Yes, we already know that, can we move on? I start to slump in my seat.
What she says next, though. That makes me sit up and listen. Is she really saying that she's going to sing my favorite song? Have I met her? Will I meet her? Well. I guess I'm meeting her now, if I'm to be quite honest. I lean forward in my seat again as she starts belting out a pretty good rendition of "Come to My Window."
I'm still trying to puzzle this out - she knows me, obviously, and not just because very few people realize that I like girls just as much as guys, but which me does she know? - when she finishes singing and asks me out.
"Uh, sure," I say, nodding, mostly because I'm too surprised to think of anything else to say, and then I'm watching her dance out of the auditorium. Huh.
"I didn't know Santana was your ex-girlfriend," Rachel says, primly, correctly interpreting the shocked expression on my face, but in the wrong way. Rachel's been around in my life long enough to know about the me being into girls thing, but not the me having Chrono-impairment thing.
I figure that saying "I don't even know who this person is" is probably… not a good idea, because I'm obviously important to her and knowing me, this Santana girl is someone future-me knows, and not actually a creepy stalker, which is what saying that would imply. So I just shrug and say, "She isn't."
Brittany is 16 and 35
I'm pretty sure I just failed another chem test. I mean, I don't know if there's another me taking it right now or if I'll get back in time to take it, but displacing to this random house - I don't know when or where I am - certainly won't be helping my grade even if I do make it back in time. I just really hope that I don't get in trouble, because I'm naked in some stranger's kitchen and those situations are always tough to get out of. God. At least I haven't hurt my feet or anything. Dancing is the only thing I like, basically, and I don't know what I'd do if I couldn't dance anymore.
"Honey, is that you?" someone calls from some other room. The voice sounds familiar. "What are you doing back so early?" It's getting closer. And then I - old me, apparently - poke my head in the door. Well. That's a relief. At least no one will call the cops on me.
"Oh. Hi, Brittany," other me says. "Would you like a robe?"
"What I'd really like is to be able to take my chem test," I mutter, but I nod anyways.
Other me nods knowingly. "I remember this trip now," she says, holding up her finger as she leaves the room. I wait for a minute, and she comes back with a robe.
I put it on. "Do I make it back in time?"
"No," she says, making a face. "You won't be here much longer, but unfortunately you get back after the test."
Well. I guess that at least this is better than the time that I displaced into some sewers, God knows where, and was stuck there for several days, completely lost. Still, though. I must look pretty discouraged, because she steps closer and gives me a hug. "Brittany, I promise it gets better," she says. "You'll - you'll get into the perfect college and meet the perfect person and find a job that doesn't care about your, uh… unregular hours."
And yeah, I guess I could have figured out that it gets better. I mean, other me doesn't have any acne. Thank God that goes away. But still. "Thanks," I tell her. I can already feel the familiar sensation of a building displacement, so I also say, "Bye." And then I'm gone and all that's in front of me is the inside of a high-school bathroom stall and shit but I think my clothes are two stalls over.
Santana is 19, Brittany is 22
When I get back to my dorm after the audition, I take the longest, most indulgent shower that I can remember taking in - well, since the last time I saw Brittany, to be honest. I put my hair up in a towel and proceed to experiment with approximately a hundred different outfits. Tina comes in when I'm just about done, and watches silently as I hold three shirts up in succession. I'm reaching for a fourth when she speaks up. "What's the occasion?"
"Hot date," I say. There's a dauntingly huge pile of clothes on my bed. The fourth shirt gets tossed onto the pile, discarded. Brittany is the only person who could make me this flustered, I think.
"I thought… you didn't do that," she says, haltingly. "That you were… waiting, or something."
Which - yeah. I'm definitely no saint - I've loved Brittany for what feels like my whole entire life, but when she first stopped displacing to my yard… well. Let's just say that I had recently learned how phenomenal sex could be, and I was weirdly angry at her for not being able to see me and for not telling me when I could see her again, and, quite frankly, I am awesome at everything - school, sports, singing - so it kind of made sense for sex to be included in all of that, which meant practice. So I went on this sex bender - my frenemy Quinn, who was my biggest competition for cheerleading captain, and a bunch of the guys on the football team, and this really loudmouthed dyke named Lauren Zizes - but by the time I started at UC, I had realized that I wasn't getting anything out of those hookups. At least, nothing like what I had with Brittany. So I stopped with the random sexcapeds and started actually making a point of avoiding the subject in general, and finally, feeling very guilty after one night of pretty awful decisions, I sort of told Tina that I wasn't going to be with anyone until I found the right person, and that was that.
"This is kind of a special occasion, though," I tell her. "A special person." I'm too excited and nervous to keep it in.
Tina looks at me critically. "How special?"
"Very," I tell her, pulling a shirt from near the bottom of the pile for reconsideration. Ick. I discard it and pull open my closet doors.
Tina reaches out and stops me. "The purple dress," she says.
I've already considered that one and discarded it as too fancy. "Yeah, but…"
"With a pair of boots," she adds, pursing her lips. "The ones that hug your legs. No tights. Ummmmmm - curl your hair off of your face but leave it loose. I'll lend you a lipstick."
"That actually… makes a lot of sense," I say, after re-considering. The boots would make it more casual, especially if I forgo jewelry. "Thanks, T."
"Yup," she says, crossing over to her bed and hoisting herself up, pulling out a textbook to study. "Oh, and if you think you might go for getting lucky - definitely the lacy underwear."
"Shut up and read your medieval literature," I say, throwing a shirt at her.
I try not to get to the restaurant - this delicious Indian place just a few blocks from campus - too early, but I still end up waiting for Brittany for almost twenty minutes. I'm beginning to worry that she's not going to show, for one reason or another (hopefully she's time traveling and not just reluctant to see me), when I see her come into the restaurant and look around. I wave her over. I want to greet her with a kiss. Should I greet her with a kiss?
I settle on a smile. "Hi, um, Brittany. It's. Really good to see you again."
She blinks at me as she sits down. "You know me quite well," she says. It doesn't really seem like a question. "I - um. I'm assuming you know about my condition?" She waits for my nod, and then adds, "I hope you don't mind that I like, don't know you. Um. Yet, apparently. Obviously."
"Yeah," I say. It's hard to imagine a Brittany who doesn't know me frontwards and backwards. "I've, uh. You've been displacing to this little clearing in the woods behind my house since I was like, five."
Brittany frowns. "I don't usually go to places that regularly, unless they're…" she trails off, considering the implications, but I know where her thought process is leading.
"I know," I say. I wink. I'm in my element here. "I'm a major life event."
Brittany is 22, Santana is 19
Well, this is a bit of a lot to process. Santana is showing me this pink diary with a cute little-kid lock on it and hearts doodled on the cover and inside of it is a long, long list of dates - somewhere between one and two hundred, all within the same eleven-year period - written in a child's round and careful handwriting. Apparently, I've visited her on every single one of these dates.
We order our food - she knows I'm vegetarian and orders accordingly, and I remember she's underage just in time to refrain from getting a proper drink. As we talk, she keeps reaching over to touch my hand and smiling. It's cute. It's also kind of frightening, because she's obviously in love with me, and I… I've known her for less than a day and I have a sort-of boyfriend (or at least, regular fuckbuddy with a side of feelings) who doesn't even know that I'm into sweet lady kisses beyond the random party make-out. But something about Santana tells me I could text Artie now and end it and not regret it. Which - is a pretty big deal, I guess, but it almost doesn't seem that way, with Santana sitting in front of me, playing with her hair and smiling so wide that I could probably count all of her teeth.
"So," I say, re-focusing on the conversation. "You grew up… where?"
"Lima Heights Adjacent," Santana says. She must see confusion in my expression, because she laughs and adds, "It's this really bougie neighborhood in Lima. Huge houses, huger back yards. Our yard bordered on this little mini-forest, and I used to play in there all the time. My brothers and I convinced our parents to build us a tree house in this huge oak by a little clearing, but they had mostly outgrown it by the time you started showing up." She shrugs. "We used to have all sorts of tea parties and stuff in that tree house."
"Ah." I nod. I look at her. As a dancer, I have a good read on body language, and hers is just… well. She's leaning in towards me, and I swear she's pushing her boobs out, at least a little bit. She keeps biting her lips, too. She wants me bad - that much is obvious. And, well. Her hair is tumbling over one of her shoulders in this cute little mess, and her eyes are bright, and she's just so beautiful. I need a distraction, or else I'll end up making some decisions that might be questionable, considering where we are right now. "So… we know each other pretty well. In the future. Or rather, in your case, the past."
"Well, yeah," she says. "I mean, sort of. I know that you like peanut butter and marshmallow fluff sandwiches and that cats are your favorite animals and that you name them all the same thing, like Lord Tubbington the First and Lord Tubbington the Second and so on -" I blink. I don't want to think of needing to get another Lord Tubbington. He's seen me through so much - how can I replace him? I shake my head a little, quickly. Santana is still talking. "- French toast with fruit syrup instead of maple syrup. But I don't know most of the important things. Well, I know who you marry, because you told me that one da-"
"Who do I marry?" I interrupt, curious.
Santana's face falls for a split second, and then she's smiling again. "Well, I probably shouldn't let you know. You're pretty into living your life as normally as possible, so…"
"Yeah, I guess," I say. I make what I hope is a cute, imploring face. "Not even one little hint?"
"Well," Santana says, biting her lip again. "I guess I won't name any names, but your wife-to-be is the hottest Latina around."
The hottest Lati… oh. Oh. "Oh," I say, looking Santana over again. Well, that would explain all those times I show up in her back yard. And she's certainly gorgeous, and I'm sure that I love her very much.
Santana looks at me, concerned. "Is this too much?" she asks. "You told me to go easy on you… I'm sorry if I…"
"No, no," I say, even though it is pretty overwhelming. "It's totally fine. It's uh, good to know that, you know, gay marriage gets legal and stuff."
"Yeah," she says, and she laughs, this bright happy laugh, and, well.
After dinner, when we end up in my tiny off-campus apartment, naked and kissing languidly on the couch, I'm not thinking about the mess I'll have to clean up with Artie. I'm just thinking about how the girl that I'm going to marry has found me, and that she knows about my condition, and that she loves me even though I can get confused sometimes, even though I'm unreliable on the best of days, even though… yeah.
And when I wake up to her kissing me, a hand dancing down the side of my body, I know what I have to do.
Brittany is 22
Artie is waiting outside the Graeters downtown, just like I asked him to be. He's smiling and cute and my heart hurts at the thought of what I have to do, but… knowing that I've been dating him when my future wife has been attending the same college that we do, well. I don't know whether not knowing about her means that I was cheating on her, since she knew about me and about us getting married and stuff, but now that I know about both of them, I can't go on dating the two of them at the same time. Also I'm pretty sure that neither of them would go for a three-way relationship, and the fact of the matter is, Artie just doesn't know about so much of my life. I'm probably doing him a favor.
"Hi baby," he says, as I walk up to his table. "I got you a black raspberry chip." He tilts his face up to me, which is what he does when he wants a kiss, but… I just can't. I can't. "It's good to see you."
"Yeah," I say, my mouth dry. I take the ice cream. I'm not above that. "Artie- we need to talk."
His expression changes from happy to one that makes me think he's unsurprised and unhappy about it. "This isn't working, is it?"
"Artie - I really do love you. You're one of the first people who ever made me feel like I wasn't completely lost and stupid all of the time, and you're so great at explaining current events and stuff to me."
"But," he says, looking at me expectantly.
I take a bite of my ice cream. "I'm awful for you. There are so many girls out there who would love to date you - not that I don't, but I'm completely unreliable, and I know you can't be that satisfied with the way things are, can you?"
"Well, I'll admit that it's difficult," Artie says, slowly. "I mean, it's why we've never been completely official, isn't it? I mean. I'd be willing to - I'd be willing to try…"
Artie looks very sad. I can't bear this. I'm usually great at people (and dancing), because time traveling doesn't really affect my ability to learn those things like it does just about everything else, but I feel completely out of my element right now. "There's something else," I say, because I can't not tell him. I am eating the ice cream he bought for me and sitting in front of him and even though we fight all the time about my unexplained absences he still keeps me up to date on when I am, when I'm in the present and he is honestly a great guy.
"It's because I can't dance with you," he says, seriously, and I drop my spoon.
"What? No, baby, that honestly isn't important to me at all. It's just…" I take a deep breath and grip the edges of the table. God, this probably makes me such a bitch, because I still can't explain that my fucked-up genetics sometimes rip me into different times and places and that this is how I know that I found the person I'm going to marry, and it isn't him. Even I know that sounds completely retarded. Even if it is true. There's no good way to do this. I don't want to hurt Artie, but I absolutely can't hurt Santana by putting this off. I take another deep breath, and mumble: "I met someone else."
"What? Who?"
"Her name is Santana," I say. "I'm pretty sure she's the one."
"Her?" Artie seems surprised at first, but he adjusts quickly, following that up with, "And how long have you known her?" He doesn't look completely crushed, just - cautious, I guess. That's a good sign, right?
I don't know how to answer the question, though. The technical answer is approximately fifty-six hours, but then again, she's known me her whole life. "It feels like forever," I say, honestly. I owe him that much. "But in truth it's been about a week."
Artie blinks at me, his mouth hung slightly open. "A week. Seriously. That's typical, Britt."
I bristle. "What do you mean by that?"
He laughs. It sounds bitter. "I can't be too upset, obviously; it's what drew me to you in the first place. You're so full of love, and you just keep… sharing it. Always, always with the sharing of your love. I probably should have figured that it would have, you know. Passed on to someone else."
"That's not - it's not like that," I protest, feebly.
"Yes, Brittany," Artie says. "That's exactly what it's like."
I sigh, nod, stand. Maybe later, Artie and I will be friends. For now… well. I just don't think that it's going to happen.
Santana is 19, Brittany is 23 and 34
Brittany's birthday party is shaping up to be a proper bash. All of her friends from CCM are attending, with what seems like all of their friends. I brought a bunch of my own friends, too, and things are going great. Britt and I have been going to see a bunch of old movies lately, and she decided to (ironically) theme her party after Somewhere In Time, going so far as to rent out the ballroom at a nearby hotel. She's dressed up like Richard Collier, all suited up with her hair pushed up under a wig. I'm having a very difficult time not undressing her. I'm also having a hard time maintaining my bouffant Elise McKenna hairstyle. No one else at the party understands the true implications of our outfits, but that doesn't matter.
We dance, slowly. I have a drink in one hand that is sloshing gently with our movements. To keep true to the theme of the party, Brittany decided to exclusively use cocktails that were served in 1912. It took me two weeks to convince her that this one drink called 'beef tea' was inappropriate, because who in the world - besides Britt, apparently - would drink hot beef stock with sherry? She settled on a couple of drinks with really weird names - balaclava nectar, fish-house punch, ginger gin cordial - and the nectar is really fucking delicious.
I look around. Rachel Berry is in one corner, cuddling and talking to this guy from my hall, Sam. Tina and her boyfriend, Puck, are hanging out by the punch bowls. Puck is staring at me. We had a fight earlier about how he doesn't like Brittany, about how he hears she sleeps around and that isn't good for me. He doesn't know how positively untrue that is. Anyway, no matter what he tells me, I'm not going to repeat the mistake I made with him at the start of last term.
I take a sip of my drink, enjoying the bubbles from the champagne and seltzer crossing my tongue, and my mind immediately takes me to other things that might cross my tongue tonight. And I swear, sometimes I suspect that Brittany is psychic, because just after I swallow, she crooks her hand around the back of my neck and pulls me in for a kiss.
Our kiss is languid, full of soft tongues and gentle lips. As we kiss, my perception of the entire world shrinks down to just the two of us. Which is probably why I don't notice a guy in a wheelchair enter the room and move to the edge of the dance floor - not at first, anyway.
Mike, one of Brittany's dancer friends, apparently does, though. "Well, hey, Artie," he says, loudly.
Brittany jerks away from me, and I feel stung by the suddenness of it. "Babe, what -" I start to ask, but I fall silent at the look on her face. Her expression is twisted, practically unreadable.
"Hi, Artie," she says.
"You invited me," he says. "Before. So I decided to come."
"I never said that I didn't. Invite you, that is," Brittany says. I still can't read what's going on with her face.
"Right," he says. I'm about to cut in, ask who he is, what's going on, when he speaks again, this time to me. "You must be Santana."
"Yeah," I say. I realize that I sound somewhat belligerent. I don't know why, but something about this guy is making me feel - defensive? Protective? Something.
He wheels closer to me. "So you're the girl that Brittany left me for, hmmm."
I - what? I glance at Brittany. She had a boyfriend when we met? I'm about to question her when I recognize the look on her face. Her expression has shifted to the one she always has when she's trying to resist displacing. Shit. I glance around the room. People are staring, mostly openly, at the three of us in the middle.
I grab Brittany's arm. "We need to talk," I inform her, and drag her over to a door which, if I remember correctly, leads to a bathroom. To my relief, it does.
Brittany looks at me seriously, places her hand on my cheek. "Santana, baby, I swear I'll explain when-" she says. Before she can finish her thought, though, she is wrenched away from me and I am left with a pile of clothes.
This is not what I had in mind when I thought about wanting to get her undressed.
I give up waiting after fifteen minutes and four knocks on the door. I fold Brittany's clothes up and put them on top of the paper towel dispenser, scrawling a note on a mirror with my lipstick - entertaining ur guests, hope u make it back safe xo - before slipping out back into the ballroom.
Artie is waiting by the door. "Where's Brittany?" he asks, studying my face.
If he dated her, then he probably knows about her Chrono-impairment. "She got called away unexpectedly," I say.
"She does do that," Artie says. "I assume… you know why?"
"Well, obviously," I say. I don't know where I put my drink. I want another. "Of course I do."
Artie's face seems to fall at that. "I never - I mean, she never told me. Where she went. Why she had to go," he says. Well, shit. He doesn't know?
I decide to test that question. "But did you figure it out?"
He sighs. "Maybe. Maybe not. It's not like it matters at this point, anyway. She dumped me within a week of knowing you, you know. Apparently you were also, you know, special enough to tell, and…"
But I stop listening to him. I'm too distracted by what he said: within a week. There was overlap? There was another person in the equation when we made love for the first time in three years? My stomach roils. "Excuse me," I say, politely as I can. "I believe I need to go blow chunks."
But I don't head to the bathroom, where Brittany's empty clothes are waiting. I stumble past the drinks table, grabbing another nectar as I do and downing it in three large swallows, and then burst out into the lobby of the hotel and down towards the vending machines, where I sag against the wall, washed in the sickly pale light from the machines.
That's where Brittany, clad in one of those hotel-issued robes, finds me. "Hi, baby," she says, and I look up, dully.
"Nice of you to show up," I tell her. I know I sound petulant. I don't care.
"When is it?" she asks, sinking down into a crouch so that she can better put her arms around me.
I'm about to shrug her off when I take another look at her. Laugh lines around her eyes, bangs fully grown out, hair slightly darker… this isn't the Brittany who displaced less than an hour ago. This Brittany is the Brittany I know from the tree house and the clearing - my Brittany, the one who knows me as well as I know her.
I turn into her embrace and kiss her immediately, hard, and start to hug her back. "Your birthday," I whisper, between kisses. "Twenty-third."
"I probably could have guessed from the costume," she says, after a beat, and I laugh a quivery, sniffly sort of laugh, burying my face in her gorgeous hair. "I'm sorry," she adds, stroking my back.
"I missed you so much," I say in return, kissing her again. "I mean, you're wonderful now and all, but I have no idea what's going on right now, and it's just…"
"I'm in a very complicated place right now," Brittany says, stroking a strand of hair that has escaped its updo in defiance of the two bottles of hairspray that went into its creation. "I've never been in a truly functional, loving relationship before, and I just met the girl I'm going to marry, like, two months ago, and I was in the tail end of this sort-of relationship when it happened, and I was so confused for, like, three days. But I didn't ever want you to find out, Santana." It's her turn to kiss me. "I just really didn't want you to know how messed up my life was before you met me. Never knowing that I would find someone that I could trust enough to tell them about my Chrono-impairment, a complete roller coaster of fights with people for being a total flake, finding out that my landlord did not support me keeping a bird and trying to find a home for it in the dance lockers for two days…"
I snort at the last one. I love Brittany's absent-mindedness and the way that she gets so confused about when she is after she time travels - it makes me feel like I get to protect her, for once, and return the favor after all those years of her protecting me - but I missed the Brittany who could laugh at her own confusion and shortcomings.
Feeling suddenly needy, I stretch into a kiss, running my hand down her side to determine whether she found underwear to go under that bathrobe. My assessment reveals that no, she did not, so when I kiss her again, it's with a different intent. She responds immediately to the shift in my approach, her mouth opening under mine, her legs falling slightly wider. She sinks lower, until she's fully seated, and I straddle her lap, slipping a hand into the slit of her robe and cupping one of her breasts. One of her hands glides down my back, lower and lower until she is gripping my butt. I bite at her lower lip, carefully, running my thumb over her nipple as I do so. It hardens in my hand, so I pinch it, twisting the way that I've learned that she loves.
"God, Santana," she says, leaning into my hand, heavily. I smirk, pushing all thoughts that we're in front of a vending machine off a hotel lobby and, as such, are extremely in public as I move my hand from her breast down her stomach to the heat between her legs.
She shifts against my hand as I slip it into her folds - "Jesus, Britt, you're so wet already" - and crook my finger against her clit, rubbing in quick, small circles. She gasps, and I press a kiss to the corner of her mouth, then tongue over to her ear, teasing the lobe between my teeth. I feel a gush of warmth grow in the pit of my stomach and spread down my thighs as she jerks - spasms - as I pinch her clit, one of her legs pushing up and against my own cunt. I pull back from her ear. She's biting her lips, hard. I know this face. She makes this face right before she's about to make noise, so I cover her mouth with my own and swallow her moans with a kiss.
I move my hand lower, still working her clit with my thumb as I slip a finger inside of her. I want to feel her come. I add another finger, scissoring them carefully as I rub her. Two minutes later, and she jerks again, lets her head fall down enough to bite my shoulder, clenching around my fingers as she comes silently. I continue touching her, but slower, carrying her through her orgasm until she takes my chin in hand and pulls me in for a kiss.
I take my hand out of her robe and, pulling away from the kiss, lick it clean. I love the taste of her. I'm about to tell her as much when she looks up and stiffens. "Artie," she says, sounding completely shocked, and I fall to the ground as she displaces in time.
Behind me, Artie clears his throat. "What the fuck was that?"
Brittany is 26, Santana is 7
I'm changing into street clothes after an audition when I feel the familiar tug behind my navel. Well, great, I think, as I displace into a tiny clearing in a densely wooded area.
"Hi Brittany!" someone - it's a young voice - says, and I whirl in shock.
Standing in front of me is a tiny little kid who looks vaguely like - "Santana?" I ask carefully, taking in the brightly polished Mary Janes and red plaid school outfit.
She rolls her eyes a me. "Duh, who else would I be?"
"Uh… right, sorry. This is the first time I've been here."
Santana frowns for a moment, then grins. "First time you've met me, but not the first time I've met you," she says, triumphantly.
"Atta girl," I say. She's so much quicker on the uptake then I ever was at that age. When I was seven, I was just learning that my Chrono-impairment wasn't a fluke occurrence or a dream and I was so confused.
She smiles at me importantly. "I keep clothes for you in a box in my tree house," she says. "It's up there, see?" She points, and I notice a rope ladder and a wooden platform with a half-built roof.
"Wow, thanks," I say. "I'll, uh. Go and get that now."
She follows me up the ladder and watches, silently, as I pull on the tank top and boxer shorts that I find in the box. "I brought you a sandwich," she says, after I finish. "I stole one that Antonio made this morning. Peanut butter and banana."
"Thank you," I say. "So, uh… what's going on in your life right now?"
"Arturo and Antonio are about to start middle school," Santana says. They're her older brothers. I've met Antonio. Arturo still refuses to meet me. "And Mama says that I get to pick out a new pair of shoes for school! My friend Quinn is totally jealous, she says that she wants new shoes too but she isn't allowed to because she told her daddy that she didn't want to go to Sunday School anymore."
I lean back against the trunk of the tree, tearing my sandwich into bite-sized pieces as I listen to Santana talk on about her life. It's sunny, warm. I let my eyes close and the sun play though the leaves, across my legs. When I wake up, I'm back in the changing room. My watch reads that I've been gone less than ten minutes.
If traveling back to Santana is this easy, then I can't wait for the 173 more dates that she has written down in the little notebook that she still keeps in the bookshelf in our bedroom.
Brittany is 23, Santana is 19
I slam back into the bathroom and, losing my balance, fall against the door. My Richard Collier costume is folded up on top of the paper towel thingy, and I shove it on, not really caring what I look like. My concern is finding Santana and explaining it all to her.
When I exit the bathroom, Rachel is by the door. "Where's Santana?" I ask her, glancing at the clock as I do so. I've been gone for almost an hour. Not long - I was so worried that I'd be stuck in my apartment three years ago for days - but definitely not short, either, especially for the birthday girl.
Rachel gives me a good look-over. "Brittany, are you doing well? You were in there for quite a while, and so-called party fouls are rarely your style."
"I'm fine," I say. "Santana?"
Rachel looks at me steadily for a moment, then nods. "She went through those doors, about half an hour ago," she says, pointing behind her.
"Thanks," I say, already on my way out there.
What I see when I get out of the ballroom and into the lobby is Santana and Artie, sitting across from each other, Santana in a puffy chair and Artie in his wheelchair, an open single-serving bag of pretzels on the table between them. They're just sort of staring at each other, leaning back. I can't tell whether this is a stare-down or not. I clear my throat. "Um, hi."
They turn to me simultaneously. "You time-travel?" Artie says.
"You were dating both of us at once?" Santana says.
"You told," I say. I don't know who I'm talking to.
Santana answers. "Artie had the distinct, er, pleasure of watching you displace," she said. "Older you."
"Oh," I say. I don't know what else I can say. "Uh. I'm sorry."
"It's okay," he says, glumly. "I understand why you can't be with me, though. Since you couldn't even trust me with that secret. And since you obviously have had a soulmate forever that you obviously couldn't be fucked to tell me about."
"Artie, it's not -" like that, I start to say, but I cut myself off because he's right. I never felt like I could tell him. I sigh. "I'm sorry."
"You know, I wouldn't have told anyone," he says. "About the time traveling… stuff."
I sit down on the armrest of Santana's chair. "I'm sorry I didn't feel comfortable telling you about the time traveling," I tell him. "I didn't know that I had a soulmate out there, which is why I didn't tell you about her until after I met her." I turn to Santana. "I'm also sorry I didn't tell you about Artie. He was - it was - I was shocked to meet you and I didn't want you to think I wasn't the Brittany you knew, so I just sort of, you know, neglected to mention that I was sort of involved with someone when we met."
"Right," she says, sort of tightly. "I see."
I'm about to pursue this further when Artie sighs loudly. I look at him. He looks totally gutted. "I guess I'll just, like. Leave you guys to your conversation. Sorry to be a bother and stuff."
"I did invite you," I say, hoping this will make him look less upset. "Forever ago."
He flashes the tiniest of smiles at me. "Yeah. I guess." He wheels off and I'm left with Santana, whose arms are crossed. I'm pretty sure the anger in her eyes could probably kill something.
"I'm sorry," I tell her. "I should have told you."
"Yes, you should have," Santana says. "Just because we're forever doesn't mean that you don't have to work on making this relationship work."
I feel like I've been punched in the stomach. "I know," I say, quietly.
"Do you, Brittany?" she asks. "I know that you learn, but have you really learned it yet?"
"I'm learning it," I say. "I've only known you for a few months. You've known me, like, most of your life. I'm just. I'm learning what you already know and I'm sorry if waiting for me sucks so bad."
"I'm used to waiting for you," she says, tightly. "I just wish you would fucking catch up sometimes." She stands. "I'm going home. You should probably go entertain your guests or something."
I watch, desperately, as she follows Artie out of the hotel.
Santana is 19, Brittany is 23
I don't see Brittany for a couple of days.
It's not really on purpose. She just doesn't call me and I don't call her and we don't run into each other anywhere.
I do see Artie once, in Tangeman. He's in the Taco Bell line when I head in to get some self-pity sushi the day after Brittany's party. He nods at me, looking vaguely awkward, and I nod back. Weirdly, despite everything, I feel close to him. I almost go to hug him, but by the time my sushi is paid for, he's nowhere to be seen.
I almost don't even go to that week's a capella rehearsal, but Tina rolls her eyes at me and tells me, "I don't even know, or particularly care what kind of drama you've been having, you're soloing on Disturbia, which we are rehearsing today, so you're going to come with me and show that bitch how great you're living. Or whatever is going on with you two."
So I go.
Brittany's waiting outside of the practice room when we get there. When she sees me, her face lights up. "'Scuse me, Tina," she says, coming over and wrapping a hand around my upper arm. "I need to borrow your roommate for a second."
Tina looks at me, like is this okay? so I nod and she nods and goes on into the room. Brittany pulls me into an adjacent room and looks at me seriously. "Santana," she says, taking my hands in hers and holding on tight. "You know I really, really love you, right?"
"I guess," I say, prickily. That's all I'm willing to give her right now. Seeing her older self at her party just made me realize how different the Brittany I know best is from the Brittany I'm with. Does it count as emotionally cheating when your feelings are for the same person? I wonder, absently, and then blink back to Britt and what she is saying.
"Look," she says, sighing. "I know that you're probably super pissed at me, and you have every right to be-"
"Damn fucking right, I do," I interject, challenging her with raised eyebrows.
"Anyway," she says. "If I'd had any idea that you would be coming - or, well, an older me told myself once that it gets better, that I meet someone who, like, is legitly the absolute best and that's obviously you, but I didn't tell me that it was you and I didn't tell me when you'd be coming, either… like, if I'd known you were on your way, I would have ended things with Artie so much sooner, and… yeah."
"So instead, you continue dating him after you meet me?" I ask. "Yeah, I'll really support you for that one, B."
"Really?" she asks, before catching my sarcasm. "Oh. Well. I mean. I know that's, like, repre- ugh, what's that word, it means not good, um-"
"Reprehensible," I supply.
"Reprehensible, that's the one. But Santana - I had to do it in person, you see. Right? I mean. You strike me as, well, if I'd dumped him over text or a phone call or an email right after I met you, I don't know, I guess I thought that you wouldn't really respect me for it. I know that I wouldn't respect me for it. So I ended things with him the first chance I had to see him face-to-face after I met you, which unfortunately was after we started, you know. But please, can't you give me credit for that?"
I consider this. She has a good point - at least she didn't text message breakup? Not that I would have anything to worry about on that front. But then again, she wasn't honest with me about Artie, either. I point that out, acidly, and she just nods and then hangs her head.
"I just didn't want to hurt you," she whispers. "Finding you was like the light at the end of a tunnel, Santana. I just. Didn't want to disappoint you."
I'm about to mutter that she did, when I suddenly recall what her older self told me at her party. I need to let this go, I think. We're inevitable. I've loved her since I was a kid. Just because she's not the her I'm used to doesn't mean I need to punish her. I look at her. Her bangs are falling over her eyes, so I reach forward and tuck them back, following them with a brush of my lips over hers - nothing more, nothing less. "You're keeping a bird in your dance locker?"
She looks relieved but confused. "How do you know that?"
"You traveled back to your party while you were gone," I tell her. "Told me about it then." I sit back and look at her. "Brittany - I love who you become but I love who you are, too. Just don't fucking keep this kind of stuff from me, okay? I can be endlessly patient -" she chuckles. I make a face at her and amend my statement. "Okay, I can be passingly patient, like, waiting for you isn't a problem, as long as you don't, like. Make it harder on me by keeping shit like this from me."
"I promise," she whispers, leaning in for a kiss.
Next part
Santana is 19, Brittany is 22
I don't generally like admitting that I was kind of super invested in my high school show choir, especially since they never won any competitions, but when I see the flyer stapled to a bulletin board outside my First-year Honors Chem class at the University of Cincinnati calling for auditions for a women's a cappella choir, something makes me tug it free from its push-pin and stuff it in my bag. It's just… I haven't really sung since before I graduated four months ago, and I really miss it. Not that I'd ever admit that, either. I once punched this little weasel in my AP World History class, Jacob, for spreading rumors that show choir, and not volleyball or cheerleading, was the highlight of my high school career. Maybe college is different, though, since like, the art departments actually get funding and stuff.
In my dorm room that night, I take the flyer out of my satchel and smooth it on my desk. I'm supposed to be working on a paper for one of my gen eds, but I keeps getting distracted by the bolded Comic Sans words: UNIVERSITY OF CINCINNATI WOMEN'S CHORUS RECRUITING NOW FROM ALL CONSTITUENT COLLEGES FOR NEW A CAPPELLA GROUP, 4-8 pm, October 26th-28th, Dieterle Vocal Arts Center. Call or email Brittany Pierce (piercebs@mail.uc.edu) or Rachel Berry (berryrb@mail.uc.edu) for details/an audition slot.
"Jeez, Santana, just try out for it already," my roommate, Tina, says from across the room after I've looked at the flyer for the sixteenth time in probably thirty minutes. "You don't have to actually do it if you get in."
I sneer at her, because I know that. Technically. Just because I didn't have the thought first doesn't mean I wasn't going to. "Yeah, okay," I say. "Are you going to?" I know Tina used to do musicals in her high school, so it's a possibility.
"Dunno. Maybe," she says, and I nod, drumming my nails on my desk before opening campus email. I decide to email Rachel Berry, because even a pre-med/Spanish double major like me has heard of her. She's like this really big vocal major sensation at CCM, classically trained and everything, and all over UC's news page. She's the first undergrad in years to be tapped by the Cincinnati Philharmonic to sing in their annual production of the Messiah. It wasn't a solo spot, but still. Impressive. And I figure, once she hears my own impressive voice… well.
She sends me back a date and time for an audition, so I practice my rendition of Disturbia and spend the ten days I have to wait vacillating between thinking that I really want this and thinking that I don't have time for another extracurricular.
October 27th is rainy as fuck. Of course. I do my usual psych-up routine, which mostly means that after my Spanish lit class, I go for a late lunch at that bagel place a couple of blocks from campus instead of eating in the caf. I'm done in plenty of time to get back to Dieterle with over ten minutes to spare, but not in time to go back to my room for a change of clothes, so of course on the way up the hill to the CCM buildings, I slip on some muddy flagstones and rip my jeans. Great.
I bust into the bathrooms on the same floor as the auditions and have an emergency speedy paper-towel laundry session, but I'm only looking marginally better by the time I have to go into the auditorium and sing.
I slog my way up to the stage and put on my brightest smile, ready to blow Rachel Berry and Brittany Pierce away, when I look up at the chairs they're sitting in and -
oh shit -
holy fuck -
Brittany Pierce is Brittany, my Brittany, and she's sitting there all blonde ponytail and expectant expression and she obviously doesn't have the faintest clue who I am, but I don't care. She's there, and I can't even sing like Rachel is requesting me to for what feels like five hours (but is probably less than five minutes), because I'm so slackjawed that I've run into her here, finally, at last. But then I manage to compose myself - well, as much as I can - and I cross my arms and raise my eyebrows and take a deep breath.
I really don't want to blow this audition now, though, because she told me last time that when we met next, she wouldn't know me yet, and I really want to impress her. So I spontaneously pick a different song. Opening my mouth, I say, "Hi, I'm Santana Lopez, and I'm going to sing Brittany's favorite song, 'cause I haven't seen you in so long and I really really missed you."
And then, even though I haven't sung it since she was teaching me to harmonize with her in the field behind my house when I was like, fifteen, I start belting out "Come to My Window." And even though I'm a little bit rusty with it - I haven't listened since last year, because listening made me miss B too much - I'm pretty damn good at it, if I do say so myself.
When I'm done, I look straight at Brittany and say, "So will you go out with me tonight?"
It's her turn to be slackjawed, because she doesn't know me and shit, but she nods, and I whoop and basically sail out of that auditorium, without even waiting to hear any feedback.
Brittany is 22, Santana is 19
Dance majors aren't supposed to party a lot, especially in the middle of the week, but Artie and I had another huge fight last night about how I'm never around and that obviously means I must be cheating on him with half the campus or something, I don't even know (honestly, one night of confusion where a younger you has random sex with someone current-you isn't with, and you can never live that down), so I let myself indulge a little bit with a bottle or three of wine before I went to bed. I mean, okay, like I know there's other people like me out there - there's even this book about this family in Chicago with it and stuff - but that doesn't mean I go around telling just anyone that I have Chrono-impairment. Not even my sort-of boyfriend. Especially because if people found out, I'd probably lose a lot of potential dance gigs - like, who wants to cast someone who might be temporally incapable of showing up to rehearsals or performances or whatever? I wouldn't, to be honest. Well, I mean, I'd hire me, because I'm a pretty great dancer, but I wouldn't hire someone else with my disease.
So I'm not terribly happy to be sitting with Rachel listening to a lot of girls who can't sing (and some who can). I'm still nursing a bit of a headache, and the only meds that usually help my wine hangovers almost always send me off into, like, the plaid-infested 90s or something. By the time we're just past the lunch crowd, I'm slumped over in my seat, head resting on one hand, just whiteknuckling it through some girl with no sense of tone whatsoever. "Thank you," I call out, before she's done - Rachel elbows me, but I think she also looks secretly relieved that I interrupted this girl, too. "We'll let you know. Next?"
The next girl is this brunette with ripped-up jeans that look like they could probably use a wash. Ugh. Seriously, can this day please end?
Rachel glances down at her paper. "Santana Lopez?" she asks, and the girl, Santana, nods. She looks pretty distracted. This should be over quickly. That is, if she ever starts to sing. Rachel prods her. "So, Santana, what are you going to sing for us today?"
The girl shudders and smiles. "Hi, I'm Santana Lopez," she says. Yes, we already know that, can we move on? I start to slump in my seat.
What she says next, though. That makes me sit up and listen. Is she really saying that she's going to sing my favorite song? Have I met her? Will I meet her? Well. I guess I'm meeting her now, if I'm to be quite honest. I lean forward in my seat again as she starts belting out a pretty good rendition of "Come to My Window."
I'm still trying to puzzle this out - she knows me, obviously, and not just because very few people realize that I like girls just as much as guys, but which me does she know? - when she finishes singing and asks me out.
"Uh, sure," I say, nodding, mostly because I'm too surprised to think of anything else to say, and then I'm watching her dance out of the auditorium. Huh.
"I didn't know Santana was your ex-girlfriend," Rachel says, primly, correctly interpreting the shocked expression on my face, but in the wrong way. Rachel's been around in my life long enough to know about the me being into girls thing, but not the me having Chrono-impairment thing.
I figure that saying "I don't even know who this person is" is probably… not a good idea, because I'm obviously important to her and knowing me, this Santana girl is someone future-me knows, and not actually a creepy stalker, which is what saying that would imply. So I just shrug and say, "She isn't."
Brittany is 16 and 35
I'm pretty sure I just failed another chem test. I mean, I don't know if there's another me taking it right now or if I'll get back in time to take it, but displacing to this random house - I don't know when or where I am - certainly won't be helping my grade even if I do make it back in time. I just really hope that I don't get in trouble, because I'm naked in some stranger's kitchen and those situations are always tough to get out of. God. At least I haven't hurt my feet or anything. Dancing is the only thing I like, basically, and I don't know what I'd do if I couldn't dance anymore.
"Honey, is that you?" someone calls from some other room. The voice sounds familiar. "What are you doing back so early?" It's getting closer. And then I - old me, apparently - poke my head in the door. Well. That's a relief. At least no one will call the cops on me.
"Oh. Hi, Brittany," other me says. "Would you like a robe?"
"What I'd really like is to be able to take my chem test," I mutter, but I nod anyways.
Other me nods knowingly. "I remember this trip now," she says, holding up her finger as she leaves the room. I wait for a minute, and she comes back with a robe.
I put it on. "Do I make it back in time?"
"No," she says, making a face. "You won't be here much longer, but unfortunately you get back after the test."
Well. I guess that at least this is better than the time that I displaced into some sewers, God knows where, and was stuck there for several days, completely lost. Still, though. I must look pretty discouraged, because she steps closer and gives me a hug. "Brittany, I promise it gets better," she says. "You'll - you'll get into the perfect college and meet the perfect person and find a job that doesn't care about your, uh… unregular hours."
And yeah, I guess I could have figured out that it gets better. I mean, other me doesn't have any acne. Thank God that goes away. But still. "Thanks," I tell her. I can already feel the familiar sensation of a building displacement, so I also say, "Bye." And then I'm gone and all that's in front of me is the inside of a high-school bathroom stall and shit but I think my clothes are two stalls over.
Santana is 19, Brittany is 22
When I get back to my dorm after the audition, I take the longest, most indulgent shower that I can remember taking in - well, since the last time I saw Brittany, to be honest. I put my hair up in a towel and proceed to experiment with approximately a hundred different outfits. Tina comes in when I'm just about done, and watches silently as I hold three shirts up in succession. I'm reaching for a fourth when she speaks up. "What's the occasion?"
"Hot date," I say. There's a dauntingly huge pile of clothes on my bed. The fourth shirt gets tossed onto the pile, discarded. Brittany is the only person who could make me this flustered, I think.
"I thought… you didn't do that," she says, haltingly. "That you were… waiting, or something."
Which - yeah. I'm definitely no saint - I've loved Brittany for what feels like my whole entire life, but when she first stopped displacing to my yard… well. Let's just say that I had recently learned how phenomenal sex could be, and I was weirdly angry at her for not being able to see me and for not telling me when I could see her again, and, quite frankly, I am awesome at everything - school, sports, singing - so it kind of made sense for sex to be included in all of that, which meant practice. So I went on this sex bender - my frenemy Quinn, who was my biggest competition for cheerleading captain, and a bunch of the guys on the football team, and this really loudmouthed dyke named Lauren Zizes - but by the time I started at UC, I had realized that I wasn't getting anything out of those hookups. At least, nothing like what I had with Brittany. So I stopped with the random sexcapeds and started actually making a point of avoiding the subject in general, and finally, feeling very guilty after one night of pretty awful decisions, I sort of told Tina that I wasn't going to be with anyone until I found the right person, and that was that.
"This is kind of a special occasion, though," I tell her. "A special person." I'm too excited and nervous to keep it in.
Tina looks at me critically. "How special?"
"Very," I tell her, pulling a shirt from near the bottom of the pile for reconsideration. Ick. I discard it and pull open my closet doors.
Tina reaches out and stops me. "The purple dress," she says.
I've already considered that one and discarded it as too fancy. "Yeah, but…"
"With a pair of boots," she adds, pursing her lips. "The ones that hug your legs. No tights. Ummmmmm - curl your hair off of your face but leave it loose. I'll lend you a lipstick."
"That actually… makes a lot of sense," I say, after re-considering. The boots would make it more casual, especially if I forgo jewelry. "Thanks, T."
"Yup," she says, crossing over to her bed and hoisting herself up, pulling out a textbook to study. "Oh, and if you think you might go for getting lucky - definitely the lacy underwear."
"Shut up and read your medieval literature," I say, throwing a shirt at her.
I try not to get to the restaurant - this delicious Indian place just a few blocks from campus - too early, but I still end up waiting for Brittany for almost twenty minutes. I'm beginning to worry that she's not going to show, for one reason or another (hopefully she's time traveling and not just reluctant to see me), when I see her come into the restaurant and look around. I wave her over. I want to greet her with a kiss. Should I greet her with a kiss?
I settle on a smile. "Hi, um, Brittany. It's. Really good to see you again."
She blinks at me as she sits down. "You know me quite well," she says. It doesn't really seem like a question. "I - um. I'm assuming you know about my condition?" She waits for my nod, and then adds, "I hope you don't mind that I like, don't know you. Um. Yet, apparently. Obviously."
"Yeah," I say. It's hard to imagine a Brittany who doesn't know me frontwards and backwards. "I've, uh. You've been displacing to this little clearing in the woods behind my house since I was like, five."
Brittany frowns. "I don't usually go to places that regularly, unless they're…" she trails off, considering the implications, but I know where her thought process is leading.
"I know," I say. I wink. I'm in my element here. "I'm a major life event."
Brittany is 22, Santana is 19
Well, this is a bit of a lot to process. Santana is showing me this pink diary with a cute little-kid lock on it and hearts doodled on the cover and inside of it is a long, long list of dates - somewhere between one and two hundred, all within the same eleven-year period - written in a child's round and careful handwriting. Apparently, I've visited her on every single one of these dates.
We order our food - she knows I'm vegetarian and orders accordingly, and I remember she's underage just in time to refrain from getting a proper drink. As we talk, she keeps reaching over to touch my hand and smiling. It's cute. It's also kind of frightening, because she's obviously in love with me, and I… I've known her for less than a day and I have a sort-of boyfriend (or at least, regular fuckbuddy with a side of feelings) who doesn't even know that I'm into sweet lady kisses beyond the random party make-out. But something about Santana tells me I could text Artie now and end it and not regret it. Which - is a pretty big deal, I guess, but it almost doesn't seem that way, with Santana sitting in front of me, playing with her hair and smiling so wide that I could probably count all of her teeth.
"So," I say, re-focusing on the conversation. "You grew up… where?"
"Lima Heights Adjacent," Santana says. She must see confusion in my expression, because she laughs and adds, "It's this really bougie neighborhood in Lima. Huge houses, huger back yards. Our yard bordered on this little mini-forest, and I used to play in there all the time. My brothers and I convinced our parents to build us a tree house in this huge oak by a little clearing, but they had mostly outgrown it by the time you started showing up." She shrugs. "We used to have all sorts of tea parties and stuff in that tree house."
"Ah." I nod. I look at her. As a dancer, I have a good read on body language, and hers is just… well. She's leaning in towards me, and I swear she's pushing her boobs out, at least a little bit. She keeps biting her lips, too. She wants me bad - that much is obvious. And, well. Her hair is tumbling over one of her shoulders in this cute little mess, and her eyes are bright, and she's just so beautiful. I need a distraction, or else I'll end up making some decisions that might be questionable, considering where we are right now. "So… we know each other pretty well. In the future. Or rather, in your case, the past."
"Well, yeah," she says. "I mean, sort of. I know that you like peanut butter and marshmallow fluff sandwiches and that cats are your favorite animals and that you name them all the same thing, like Lord Tubbington the First and Lord Tubbington the Second and so on -" I blink. I don't want to think of needing to get another Lord Tubbington. He's seen me through so much - how can I replace him? I shake my head a little, quickly. Santana is still talking. "- French toast with fruit syrup instead of maple syrup. But I don't know most of the important things. Well, I know who you marry, because you told me that one da-"
"Who do I marry?" I interrupt, curious.
Santana's face falls for a split second, and then she's smiling again. "Well, I probably shouldn't let you know. You're pretty into living your life as normally as possible, so…"
"Yeah, I guess," I say. I make what I hope is a cute, imploring face. "Not even one little hint?"
"Well," Santana says, biting her lip again. "I guess I won't name any names, but your wife-to-be is the hottest Latina around."
The hottest Lati… oh. Oh. "Oh," I say, looking Santana over again. Well, that would explain all those times I show up in her back yard. And she's certainly gorgeous, and I'm sure that I love her very much.
Santana looks at me, concerned. "Is this too much?" she asks. "You told me to go easy on you… I'm sorry if I…"
"No, no," I say, even though it is pretty overwhelming. "It's totally fine. It's uh, good to know that, you know, gay marriage gets legal and stuff."
"Yeah," she says, and she laughs, this bright happy laugh, and, well.
After dinner, when we end up in my tiny off-campus apartment, naked and kissing languidly on the couch, I'm not thinking about the mess I'll have to clean up with Artie. I'm just thinking about how the girl that I'm going to marry has found me, and that she knows about my condition, and that she loves me even though I can get confused sometimes, even though I'm unreliable on the best of days, even though… yeah.
And when I wake up to her kissing me, a hand dancing down the side of my body, I know what I have to do.
Brittany is 22
Artie is waiting outside the Graeters downtown, just like I asked him to be. He's smiling and cute and my heart hurts at the thought of what I have to do, but… knowing that I've been dating him when my future wife has been attending the same college that we do, well. I don't know whether not knowing about her means that I was cheating on her, since she knew about me and about us getting married and stuff, but now that I know about both of them, I can't go on dating the two of them at the same time. Also I'm pretty sure that neither of them would go for a three-way relationship, and the fact of the matter is, Artie just doesn't know about so much of my life. I'm probably doing him a favor.
"Hi baby," he says, as I walk up to his table. "I got you a black raspberry chip." He tilts his face up to me, which is what he does when he wants a kiss, but… I just can't. I can't. "It's good to see you."
"Yeah," I say, my mouth dry. I take the ice cream. I'm not above that. "Artie- we need to talk."
His expression changes from happy to one that makes me think he's unsurprised and unhappy about it. "This isn't working, is it?"
"Artie - I really do love you. You're one of the first people who ever made me feel like I wasn't completely lost and stupid all of the time, and you're so great at explaining current events and stuff to me."
"But," he says, looking at me expectantly.
I take a bite of my ice cream. "I'm awful for you. There are so many girls out there who would love to date you - not that I don't, but I'm completely unreliable, and I know you can't be that satisfied with the way things are, can you?"
"Well, I'll admit that it's difficult," Artie says, slowly. "I mean, it's why we've never been completely official, isn't it? I mean. I'd be willing to - I'd be willing to try…"
Artie looks very sad. I can't bear this. I'm usually great at people (and dancing), because time traveling doesn't really affect my ability to learn those things like it does just about everything else, but I feel completely out of my element right now. "There's something else," I say, because I can't not tell him. I am eating the ice cream he bought for me and sitting in front of him and even though we fight all the time about my unexplained absences he still keeps me up to date on when I am, when I'm in the present and he is honestly a great guy.
"It's because I can't dance with you," he says, seriously, and I drop my spoon.
"What? No, baby, that honestly isn't important to me at all. It's just…" I take a deep breath and grip the edges of the table. God, this probably makes me such a bitch, because I still can't explain that my fucked-up genetics sometimes rip me into different times and places and that this is how I know that I found the person I'm going to marry, and it isn't him. Even I know that sounds completely retarded. Even if it is true. There's no good way to do this. I don't want to hurt Artie, but I absolutely can't hurt Santana by putting this off. I take another deep breath, and mumble: "I met someone else."
"What? Who?"
"Her name is Santana," I say. "I'm pretty sure she's the one."
"Her?" Artie seems surprised at first, but he adjusts quickly, following that up with, "And how long have you known her?" He doesn't look completely crushed, just - cautious, I guess. That's a good sign, right?
I don't know how to answer the question, though. The technical answer is approximately fifty-six hours, but then again, she's known me her whole life. "It feels like forever," I say, honestly. I owe him that much. "But in truth it's been about a week."
Artie blinks at me, his mouth hung slightly open. "A week. Seriously. That's typical, Britt."
I bristle. "What do you mean by that?"
He laughs. It sounds bitter. "I can't be too upset, obviously; it's what drew me to you in the first place. You're so full of love, and you just keep… sharing it. Always, always with the sharing of your love. I probably should have figured that it would have, you know. Passed on to someone else."
"That's not - it's not like that," I protest, feebly.
"Yes, Brittany," Artie says. "That's exactly what it's like."
I sigh, nod, stand. Maybe later, Artie and I will be friends. For now… well. I just don't think that it's going to happen.
Santana is 19, Brittany is 23 and 34
Brittany's birthday party is shaping up to be a proper bash. All of her friends from CCM are attending, with what seems like all of their friends. I brought a bunch of my own friends, too, and things are going great. Britt and I have been going to see a bunch of old movies lately, and she decided to (ironically) theme her party after Somewhere In Time, going so far as to rent out the ballroom at a nearby hotel. She's dressed up like Richard Collier, all suited up with her hair pushed up under a wig. I'm having a very difficult time not undressing her. I'm also having a hard time maintaining my bouffant Elise McKenna hairstyle. No one else at the party understands the true implications of our outfits, but that doesn't matter.
We dance, slowly. I have a drink in one hand that is sloshing gently with our movements. To keep true to the theme of the party, Brittany decided to exclusively use cocktails that were served in 1912. It took me two weeks to convince her that this one drink called 'beef tea' was inappropriate, because who in the world - besides Britt, apparently - would drink hot beef stock with sherry? She settled on a couple of drinks with really weird names - balaclava nectar, fish-house punch, ginger gin cordial - and the nectar is really fucking delicious.
I look around. Rachel Berry is in one corner, cuddling and talking to this guy from my hall, Sam. Tina and her boyfriend, Puck, are hanging out by the punch bowls. Puck is staring at me. We had a fight earlier about how he doesn't like Brittany, about how he hears she sleeps around and that isn't good for me. He doesn't know how positively untrue that is. Anyway, no matter what he tells me, I'm not going to repeat the mistake I made with him at the start of last term.
I take a sip of my drink, enjoying the bubbles from the champagne and seltzer crossing my tongue, and my mind immediately takes me to other things that might cross my tongue tonight. And I swear, sometimes I suspect that Brittany is psychic, because just after I swallow, she crooks her hand around the back of my neck and pulls me in for a kiss.
Our kiss is languid, full of soft tongues and gentle lips. As we kiss, my perception of the entire world shrinks down to just the two of us. Which is probably why I don't notice a guy in a wheelchair enter the room and move to the edge of the dance floor - not at first, anyway.
Mike, one of Brittany's dancer friends, apparently does, though. "Well, hey, Artie," he says, loudly.
Brittany jerks away from me, and I feel stung by the suddenness of it. "Babe, what -" I start to ask, but I fall silent at the look on her face. Her expression is twisted, practically unreadable.
"Hi, Artie," she says.
"You invited me," he says. "Before. So I decided to come."
"I never said that I didn't. Invite you, that is," Brittany says. I still can't read what's going on with her face.
"Right," he says. I'm about to cut in, ask who he is, what's going on, when he speaks again, this time to me. "You must be Santana."
"Yeah," I say. I realize that I sound somewhat belligerent. I don't know why, but something about this guy is making me feel - defensive? Protective? Something.
He wheels closer to me. "So you're the girl that Brittany left me for, hmmm."
I - what? I glance at Brittany. She had a boyfriend when we met? I'm about to question her when I recognize the look on her face. Her expression has shifted to the one she always has when she's trying to resist displacing. Shit. I glance around the room. People are staring, mostly openly, at the three of us in the middle.
I grab Brittany's arm. "We need to talk," I inform her, and drag her over to a door which, if I remember correctly, leads to a bathroom. To my relief, it does.
Brittany looks at me seriously, places her hand on my cheek. "Santana, baby, I swear I'll explain when-" she says. Before she can finish her thought, though, she is wrenched away from me and I am left with a pile of clothes.
This is not what I had in mind when I thought about wanting to get her undressed.
I give up waiting after fifteen minutes and four knocks on the door. I fold Brittany's clothes up and put them on top of the paper towel dispenser, scrawling a note on a mirror with my lipstick - entertaining ur guests, hope u make it back safe xo - before slipping out back into the ballroom.
Artie is waiting by the door. "Where's Brittany?" he asks, studying my face.
If he dated her, then he probably knows about her Chrono-impairment. "She got called away unexpectedly," I say.
"She does do that," Artie says. "I assume… you know why?"
"Well, obviously," I say. I don't know where I put my drink. I want another. "Of course I do."
Artie's face seems to fall at that. "I never - I mean, she never told me. Where she went. Why she had to go," he says. Well, shit. He doesn't know?
I decide to test that question. "But did you figure it out?"
He sighs. "Maybe. Maybe not. It's not like it matters at this point, anyway. She dumped me within a week of knowing you, you know. Apparently you were also, you know, special enough to tell, and…"
But I stop listening to him. I'm too distracted by what he said: within a week. There was overlap? There was another person in the equation when we made love for the first time in three years? My stomach roils. "Excuse me," I say, politely as I can. "I believe I need to go blow chunks."
But I don't head to the bathroom, where Brittany's empty clothes are waiting. I stumble past the drinks table, grabbing another nectar as I do and downing it in three large swallows, and then burst out into the lobby of the hotel and down towards the vending machines, where I sag against the wall, washed in the sickly pale light from the machines.
That's where Brittany, clad in one of those hotel-issued robes, finds me. "Hi, baby," she says, and I look up, dully.
"Nice of you to show up," I tell her. I know I sound petulant. I don't care.
"When is it?" she asks, sinking down into a crouch so that she can better put her arms around me.
I'm about to shrug her off when I take another look at her. Laugh lines around her eyes, bangs fully grown out, hair slightly darker… this isn't the Brittany who displaced less than an hour ago. This Brittany is the Brittany I know from the tree house and the clearing - my Brittany, the one who knows me as well as I know her.
I turn into her embrace and kiss her immediately, hard, and start to hug her back. "Your birthday," I whisper, between kisses. "Twenty-third."
"I probably could have guessed from the costume," she says, after a beat, and I laugh a quivery, sniffly sort of laugh, burying my face in her gorgeous hair. "I'm sorry," she adds, stroking my back.
"I missed you so much," I say in return, kissing her again. "I mean, you're wonderful now and all, but I have no idea what's going on right now, and it's just…"
"I'm in a very complicated place right now," Brittany says, stroking a strand of hair that has escaped its updo in defiance of the two bottles of hairspray that went into its creation. "I've never been in a truly functional, loving relationship before, and I just met the girl I'm going to marry, like, two months ago, and I was in the tail end of this sort-of relationship when it happened, and I was so confused for, like, three days. But I didn't ever want you to find out, Santana." It's her turn to kiss me. "I just really didn't want you to know how messed up my life was before you met me. Never knowing that I would find someone that I could trust enough to tell them about my Chrono-impairment, a complete roller coaster of fights with people for being a total flake, finding out that my landlord did not support me keeping a bird and trying to find a home for it in the dance lockers for two days…"
I snort at the last one. I love Brittany's absent-mindedness and the way that she gets so confused about when she is after she time travels - it makes me feel like I get to protect her, for once, and return the favor after all those years of her protecting me - but I missed the Brittany who could laugh at her own confusion and shortcomings.
Feeling suddenly needy, I stretch into a kiss, running my hand down her side to determine whether she found underwear to go under that bathrobe. My assessment reveals that no, she did not, so when I kiss her again, it's with a different intent. She responds immediately to the shift in my approach, her mouth opening under mine, her legs falling slightly wider. She sinks lower, until she's fully seated, and I straddle her lap, slipping a hand into the slit of her robe and cupping one of her breasts. One of her hands glides down my back, lower and lower until she is gripping my butt. I bite at her lower lip, carefully, running my thumb over her nipple as I do so. It hardens in my hand, so I pinch it, twisting the way that I've learned that she loves.
"God, Santana," she says, leaning into my hand, heavily. I smirk, pushing all thoughts that we're in front of a vending machine off a hotel lobby and, as such, are extremely in public as I move my hand from her breast down her stomach to the heat between her legs.
She shifts against my hand as I slip it into her folds - "Jesus, Britt, you're so wet already" - and crook my finger against her clit, rubbing in quick, small circles. She gasps, and I press a kiss to the corner of her mouth, then tongue over to her ear, teasing the lobe between my teeth. I feel a gush of warmth grow in the pit of my stomach and spread down my thighs as she jerks - spasms - as I pinch her clit, one of her legs pushing up and against my own cunt. I pull back from her ear. She's biting her lips, hard. I know this face. She makes this face right before she's about to make noise, so I cover her mouth with my own and swallow her moans with a kiss.
I move my hand lower, still working her clit with my thumb as I slip a finger inside of her. I want to feel her come. I add another finger, scissoring them carefully as I rub her. Two minutes later, and she jerks again, lets her head fall down enough to bite my shoulder, clenching around my fingers as she comes silently. I continue touching her, but slower, carrying her through her orgasm until she takes my chin in hand and pulls me in for a kiss.
I take my hand out of her robe and, pulling away from the kiss, lick it clean. I love the taste of her. I'm about to tell her as much when she looks up and stiffens. "Artie," she says, sounding completely shocked, and I fall to the ground as she displaces in time.
Behind me, Artie clears his throat. "What the fuck was that?"
Brittany is 26, Santana is 7
I'm changing into street clothes after an audition when I feel the familiar tug behind my navel. Well, great, I think, as I displace into a tiny clearing in a densely wooded area.
"Hi Brittany!" someone - it's a young voice - says, and I whirl in shock.
Standing in front of me is a tiny little kid who looks vaguely like - "Santana?" I ask carefully, taking in the brightly polished Mary Janes and red plaid school outfit.
She rolls her eyes a me. "Duh, who else would I be?"
"Uh… right, sorry. This is the first time I've been here."
Santana frowns for a moment, then grins. "First time you've met me, but not the first time I've met you," she says, triumphantly.
"Atta girl," I say. She's so much quicker on the uptake then I ever was at that age. When I was seven, I was just learning that my Chrono-impairment wasn't a fluke occurrence or a dream and I was so confused.
She smiles at me importantly. "I keep clothes for you in a box in my tree house," she says. "It's up there, see?" She points, and I notice a rope ladder and a wooden platform with a half-built roof.
"Wow, thanks," I say. "I'll, uh. Go and get that now."
She follows me up the ladder and watches, silently, as I pull on the tank top and boxer shorts that I find in the box. "I brought you a sandwich," she says, after I finish. "I stole one that Antonio made this morning. Peanut butter and banana."
"Thank you," I say. "So, uh… what's going on in your life right now?"
"Arturo and Antonio are about to start middle school," Santana says. They're her older brothers. I've met Antonio. Arturo still refuses to meet me. "And Mama says that I get to pick out a new pair of shoes for school! My friend Quinn is totally jealous, she says that she wants new shoes too but she isn't allowed to because she told her daddy that she didn't want to go to Sunday School anymore."
I lean back against the trunk of the tree, tearing my sandwich into bite-sized pieces as I listen to Santana talk on about her life. It's sunny, warm. I let my eyes close and the sun play though the leaves, across my legs. When I wake up, I'm back in the changing room. My watch reads that I've been gone less than ten minutes.
If traveling back to Santana is this easy, then I can't wait for the 173 more dates that she has written down in the little notebook that she still keeps in the bookshelf in our bedroom.
Brittany is 23, Santana is 19
I slam back into the bathroom and, losing my balance, fall against the door. My Richard Collier costume is folded up on top of the paper towel thingy, and I shove it on, not really caring what I look like. My concern is finding Santana and explaining it all to her.
When I exit the bathroom, Rachel is by the door. "Where's Santana?" I ask her, glancing at the clock as I do so. I've been gone for almost an hour. Not long - I was so worried that I'd be stuck in my apartment three years ago for days - but definitely not short, either, especially for the birthday girl.
Rachel gives me a good look-over. "Brittany, are you doing well? You were in there for quite a while, and so-called party fouls are rarely your style."
"I'm fine," I say. "Santana?"
Rachel looks at me steadily for a moment, then nods. "She went through those doors, about half an hour ago," she says, pointing behind her.
"Thanks," I say, already on my way out there.
What I see when I get out of the ballroom and into the lobby is Santana and Artie, sitting across from each other, Santana in a puffy chair and Artie in his wheelchair, an open single-serving bag of pretzels on the table between them. They're just sort of staring at each other, leaning back. I can't tell whether this is a stare-down or not. I clear my throat. "Um, hi."
They turn to me simultaneously. "You time-travel?" Artie says.
"You were dating both of us at once?" Santana says.
"You told," I say. I don't know who I'm talking to.
Santana answers. "Artie had the distinct, er, pleasure of watching you displace," she said. "Older you."
"Oh," I say. I don't know what else I can say. "Uh. I'm sorry."
"It's okay," he says, glumly. "I understand why you can't be with me, though. Since you couldn't even trust me with that secret. And since you obviously have had a soulmate forever that you obviously couldn't be fucked to tell me about."
"Artie, it's not -" like that, I start to say, but I cut myself off because he's right. I never felt like I could tell him. I sigh. "I'm sorry."
"You know, I wouldn't have told anyone," he says. "About the time traveling… stuff."
I sit down on the armrest of Santana's chair. "I'm sorry I didn't feel comfortable telling you about the time traveling," I tell him. "I didn't know that I had a soulmate out there, which is why I didn't tell you about her until after I met her." I turn to Santana. "I'm also sorry I didn't tell you about Artie. He was - it was - I was shocked to meet you and I didn't want you to think I wasn't the Brittany you knew, so I just sort of, you know, neglected to mention that I was sort of involved with someone when we met."
"Right," she says, sort of tightly. "I see."
I'm about to pursue this further when Artie sighs loudly. I look at him. He looks totally gutted. "I guess I'll just, like. Leave you guys to your conversation. Sorry to be a bother and stuff."
"I did invite you," I say, hoping this will make him look less upset. "Forever ago."
He flashes the tiniest of smiles at me. "Yeah. I guess." He wheels off and I'm left with Santana, whose arms are crossed. I'm pretty sure the anger in her eyes could probably kill something.
"I'm sorry," I tell her. "I should have told you."
"Yes, you should have," Santana says. "Just because we're forever doesn't mean that you don't have to work on making this relationship work."
I feel like I've been punched in the stomach. "I know," I say, quietly.
"Do you, Brittany?" she asks. "I know that you learn, but have you really learned it yet?"
"I'm learning it," I say. "I've only known you for a few months. You've known me, like, most of your life. I'm just. I'm learning what you already know and I'm sorry if waiting for me sucks so bad."
"I'm used to waiting for you," she says, tightly. "I just wish you would fucking catch up sometimes." She stands. "I'm going home. You should probably go entertain your guests or something."
I watch, desperately, as she follows Artie out of the hotel.
Santana is 19, Brittany is 23
I don't see Brittany for a couple of days.
It's not really on purpose. She just doesn't call me and I don't call her and we don't run into each other anywhere.
I do see Artie once, in Tangeman. He's in the Taco Bell line when I head in to get some self-pity sushi the day after Brittany's party. He nods at me, looking vaguely awkward, and I nod back. Weirdly, despite everything, I feel close to him. I almost go to hug him, but by the time my sushi is paid for, he's nowhere to be seen.
I almost don't even go to that week's a capella rehearsal, but Tina rolls her eyes at me and tells me, "I don't even know, or particularly care what kind of drama you've been having, you're soloing on Disturbia, which we are rehearsing today, so you're going to come with me and show that bitch how great you're living. Or whatever is going on with you two."
So I go.
Brittany's waiting outside of the practice room when we get there. When she sees me, her face lights up. "'Scuse me, Tina," she says, coming over and wrapping a hand around my upper arm. "I need to borrow your roommate for a second."
Tina looks at me, like is this okay? so I nod and she nods and goes on into the room. Brittany pulls me into an adjacent room and looks at me seriously. "Santana," she says, taking my hands in hers and holding on tight. "You know I really, really love you, right?"
"I guess," I say, prickily. That's all I'm willing to give her right now. Seeing her older self at her party just made me realize how different the Brittany I know best is from the Brittany I'm with. Does it count as emotionally cheating when your feelings are for the same person? I wonder, absently, and then blink back to Britt and what she is saying.
"Look," she says, sighing. "I know that you're probably super pissed at me, and you have every right to be-"
"Damn fucking right, I do," I interject, challenging her with raised eyebrows.
"Anyway," she says. "If I'd had any idea that you would be coming - or, well, an older me told myself once that it gets better, that I meet someone who, like, is legitly the absolute best and that's obviously you, but I didn't tell me that it was you and I didn't tell me when you'd be coming, either… like, if I'd known you were on your way, I would have ended things with Artie so much sooner, and… yeah."
"So instead, you continue dating him after you meet me?" I ask. "Yeah, I'll really support you for that one, B."
"Really?" she asks, before catching my sarcasm. "Oh. Well. I mean. I know that's, like, repre- ugh, what's that word, it means not good, um-"
"Reprehensible," I supply.
"Reprehensible, that's the one. But Santana - I had to do it in person, you see. Right? I mean. You strike me as, well, if I'd dumped him over text or a phone call or an email right after I met you, I don't know, I guess I thought that you wouldn't really respect me for it. I know that I wouldn't respect me for it. So I ended things with him the first chance I had to see him face-to-face after I met you, which unfortunately was after we started, you know. But please, can't you give me credit for that?"
I consider this. She has a good point - at least she didn't text message breakup? Not that I would have anything to worry about on that front. But then again, she wasn't honest with me about Artie, either. I point that out, acidly, and she just nods and then hangs her head.
"I just didn't want to hurt you," she whispers. "Finding you was like the light at the end of a tunnel, Santana. I just. Didn't want to disappoint you."
I'm about to mutter that she did, when I suddenly recall what her older self told me at her party. I need to let this go, I think. We're inevitable. I've loved her since I was a kid. Just because she's not the her I'm used to doesn't mean I need to punish her. I look at her. Her bangs are falling over her eyes, so I reach forward and tuck them back, following them with a brush of my lips over hers - nothing more, nothing less. "You're keeping a bird in your dance locker?"
She looks relieved but confused. "How do you know that?"
"You traveled back to your party while you were gone," I tell her. "Told me about it then." I sit back and look at her. "Brittany - I love who you become but I love who you are, too. Just don't fucking keep this kind of stuff from me, okay? I can be endlessly patient -" she chuckles. I make a face at her and amend my statement. "Okay, I can be passingly patient, like, waiting for you isn't a problem, as long as you don't, like. Make it harder on me by keeping shit like this from me."
"I promise," she whispers, leaning in for a kiss.
Next part