Pink and Green (1/2)
Title: Pink and Green (1/2)
Pairing: Santana Lopez/Brittany Pierce
Rating: R
Disclaimer: Nothing owned, no profit gained.
Spoilers: Through S3, to be safe.
Summary: Nine moments when Brittany Pierce looks at Santana Lopez and just knows she’s holding on to something special.
1At age six, all Brittany Pierce wants in life is to be the Pink Power Ranger. It’s a simple enough goal, she figures; all she has to do is fight her way past mean older boys and scary clown toys, until she’s the bravest, prettiest girl in the whole neighborhood. And then Zordon will have no choice but to recognize her talents and call her into the Mighty Morphin’ fold.
It’s a very particular, easygoing brand of logic, and it keeps her going when first grade gets too taxing. A Power Ranger, after all, doesn’t give up just because reading is much harder than Mom said it would be. Or because Noah Puckerman likes to kick sand in her face and drop beetles in her hair at recess. Or because Daddy’s a little late picking her up from school…
A normal girl might cry, but not Brittany S. Pierce: Inevitable Pink Ranger. Crying is for sissies, as Noah proclaims joyfully as he forces Kurt Hummel’s head into a bucket one day. Brittany doesn’t cry.
Or, if she does, it’s only with her face pressed close to the peeling green fence, where no one can see.
She’s not really crying, she tells herself, because she’s not a wimp. It’s just that this is the fourth time in recent memory her daddy had to work late, leaving her the last kid on the playground. For a fourth time, she can see Mrs. Gallagher out of the corner of her eye, repeatedly checking her watch and shifting her purse from one shoulder to the other. And that’s just…kind of embarrassing.
She’s okay with Daddy working late, because Daddy works for the money, but why should kind Mrs. Gallagher have to suffer?
Her face rests against the cool chain-links, her eyes wrenched shut against the tears that keep bubbling through, and somehow, she doesn’t realize she isn’t alone until a hesitant hand finds its way onto her shoulder. Brittany jumps, whirling around with both fists raised, and tries her very best to look like a teenager with attitude.
Which might be slightly easier if not for her being the third smallest girl in her class…
She’s expecting her assailant to be Noah Puckerman, maybe flanked by Finn Hudson and his perpetually runny nose. It’s surprising to find, instead, a person she’s never seen before. Or, at least, she thinks so. It’s a little hard to tell, given that the slightly-shorter individual is wearing a green helmet over its face.
Brittany stares, forgetting to hold her fists at the ready, because even though the person is wearing scuffed light-up sneakers and standing with their hands in their pockets, and even though there is a tangle of dark hair resting against slim shoulders, she’s pretty sure she’s just met the Green Ranger.
It’s a humbling moment, to say the least.
“Tommy?” she whispers reverently. The person’s head tilts, the slightly-too-big helmet nearly falling off in the process. Brittany claps her hands together.
“It is you!” she announces gleefully, and promptly throws her arms around the (surprisingly tiny) Green Ranger. Shockingly, her Ranger in question jerks back from the hug, arms windmilling to prevent Brittany from grasping hold again.
“What are you, crazy?” a muffled voice struggles to escape through the helmet. “You can’t just go hugging people you’ve never met. Geez! I could be an evil force in disguise!”
Brittany lurches backward, arms wrapping around herself instinctively. “Well,” she says hesitantly. “Are you?”
“No,” the Green Ranger replies gruffly, kicking at the pebbles beneath their feet. “But I could be. You gotta be more careful, for cryin’ out loud.”
“Sorry,” Brittany mumbles, head bowing. This isn’t at all how she’s imagined meeting her Green Ranger. They’re supposed to be best friends right away, to storm off and save the world together. She isn’t supposed to come away feeling stupid; that already happens with everyone else, it isn’t supposed to happen with him.
Or her, because that voice doesn’t really sound like any boy she’s ever met-except maybe Kurt, but everyone knows Kurt is her greatest rival for the Pink morpher.
Either way, the tears are starting to come again, and Brittany can’t think of a way to stop them. She swivels around, palms brushing unhappily across her cheeks, and stares desperately across the parking lot. Now would be a very good time for her daddy to come wheeling in with his tie and his briefcase and his I’m so sorry, babygirl smile. Anything’s better than crying in front of the Green Ranger.
The hand touches her shoulder again, even more gently this time. “Are you-are you crying?”
“No,” Brittany sniffles, shrugging her shoulder until the hand falls away.
“Sure sounds like it.” There’s a pause, followed by a muffled, “Look, I didn’t mean to make you cry.”
Brittany inhales, turning reluctantly back to face her again. The tiny Ranger is tugging uncomfortably on the strings of her hooded sweatshirt, bouncing slightly on the balls of her feet. She sighs.
“I mean, hey, clearly I’m not a bad guy. Right? Bad guys are always ugly and mean and-ugh, this helmet.” Tiny hands adorned with Batman band-aids reach up and yank the helmet off, revealing a girl with a purple bruise under one brown eye. She huffs in a deep breath, mouth stretched comically wide. “God, that’s so much better. I don’t know how you’re supposed to breathe in these things.”
Brittany smiles despite herself, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear. “You’re not ugly.”
“’Course not,” the girl replies, almost as if she’s insulted at the very idea. “And I’m not Tommy, either. The name’s Santana. The real Green Ranger.”
“Brittany.” She hesitates, then plows on with, “The Pink Ranger. Someday.”
“Cool.” Santana grins and reaches out her hand, giving a shake that’s just a little too rough. Brittany shyly beams back.
“You wanna fight the forces of evil together sometime?” Santana asks, tucking her helmet more securely beneath her arm. Brittany nods eagerly. “Good. It’s tiring, doing it all by myself. I mean, not that I need the help or anything. It would just be nice. The company, or whatever.”
Brittany’s grin stretches even bigger. No one has ever asked her to help them with anything before-well, besides her mom and daddy, but they totally don’t count. She’s usually too little, or too stupid, or too much with her “head in the clouds” (as Mrs. Gallagher likes to say) to be any good to anyone. But Santana is looking at her with bright eyes and a determined smile, like she thinks they could do anything together-just like the Pink and Green Rangers on TV. It sends a warm thrill through Brittany’s chest, to think that she might just have made her very first friend.
And, if this girl really is the Green Ranger, maybe she’s one step closer to meeting Zordon, too.
2Eight years old, and can’t even read. Brittany sinks down in the coat closet, head leaning back into the puffy winter jackets and Hello Kitty-themed backpacks that line the wall. This is just embarrassing.
She hates Popcorn Reading, hates it more than anything in the whole wide world, because every single time they call on her, she screws it up. It isn’t that she’s not following along, because she is. She knows just what’s happening in the story, can remember all the little details that led them to this point-she could pass a quiz on it with no problems at all. It’s the moving forward part that sucks, because the words just tend to bleed together in awkward shapes that don’t really resemble words, and…well, she can’t be the only person this happens to, right?
Except, in Mr. Jameson’s class, she is. And everybody knows it. Stupid Brittany can’t even read a simple story without choking. Stupid Brittany ruins everything.
There’s a fumbling noise that sounds kind of like a bull tripping over a fire hydrant, followed by a garbled word that Brittany isn’t allowed to use at home. She bows her head close to her knees, not bothering to look up. Only one person walks-and talks-like that.
“Hey, why’re you hiding?” Santana asks, crouching beside her. “It’s almost recess, you’re gonna miss it. We’re supposed to fight the zombie hordes today, remember?”
Brittany says nothing, inhaling the tang of the orange juice she wiped on her jeans at lunchtime. Santana sighs.
“The reading thing again, huh?”
For a second, she wants to bite back with, No, duh, but then she remembers: Santana wasn’t in the classroom this time. She’d pulled Noah Puckerman’s chair out from under him and been sent-again-to the principal’s office to explain herself. This sort of thing happens a lot with Santana.
“Yeah,” she mumbles finally. “The reading thing.”
Santana’s arm loops around her shoulder, head touching gently to hers. “Aw. It’s okay, Britt. You’ll get it-“
“No, I won’t,” Brittany growls, wrenching away. “I’ll never get it. I’m too stupid.”
“Hey!” Santana clamps a hand over her mouth, scowling. “You’re not allowed to say that word, remember? Mama says it’s bad for your self-esteem.”
It’s sort of funny to hear Santana say that, since Santana is forever calling other people stupid-and far worse names, come to think of it. But this is different, because this is Brittany, and Brittany knows that. Santana’s always different when it comes to her.
“Fine,” she says grudgingly, trying to sound like she’s not on the verge of tears. “But I’m still not getting better. I can’t-I can’t figure out-“
Santana’s arm comes down around her again, yanking her close with a fierceness belonging solely to her best friend. “Shut up,” she insists, her mouth right up against Brittany’s ear. “You’re gonna get better. I’m gonna help. I’ve got this in the bag, you know, I’m in the Eagles and everything-“
The Eagles make up the highest reading group in the class, the one Brittany knows she’ll never touch. Only four kids-Rachel Berry, Santana, Kurt Hummel, and Artie Abrams-are smart enough to be Eagles. Brittany’s barely smart enough for the Sparrow Squadron.
“I’ll help you,” Santana repeats. Brittany closes her eyes, feeling the first traitorous tears trickling down her cheeks. Santana means well, she knows, but she just can’t help but think it’s no good. She’s never going to be smart enough-not for Santana, not for Popcorn Reading, not for anything at all. She’s stupid, and she’s always going to be stupid. End of story.
They’re silent for a few moments, listening to the rattle and roar outside the coat closet as the other kids hack away at group projects. Brittany hates it, hearing how easy everybody else has it, how happy they all sound. They couldn’t care less about words muddling together, about “moth” looking like “math.” All they care about is recess.
She’s so jealous, it makes her stomach sour.
Santana is smoothing her hair with clumsy fingertips, her mouth still resting gently against the side of Brittany’s head. She’s quiet for a while, and then, out of nowhere, she begins to hum.
“You can't hurry love…no, you just have to wait…”
“What-,” Brittany begins, but Santana’s fingers close over her mouth again, gently shushing her. She turns her head to find her best friend’s cheeks glowing bright red with embarrassment, her eyes firmly closed as she sings softly against Brittany’s hair.
“She said love don't come easy, it's a game of give and take…”
It’s her favorite song; her mom plays it all the time, usually at night when Brittany’s trying to go to sleep. She doesn’t have a clue how Santana would know that, or why she would choose to sing it now-but she likes it. Santana’s voice is raw, shivering across the lyrics like she’s cold, but somehow beautiful. She doesn’t know if it’s the words to the song, or the fact that Santana is actually singing-not just to the radio, but actually singing to her for the first time in their lives-but Brittany can feel herself slowly relaxing. The anxiety is seeping away, bit by bit, replaced by a warmth she can’t quite explain.
As Santana makes her way through the song, Brittany finds her hand in the shadows and holds tight to it. She’s stupid, and she knows it, but Santana doesn’t seem to think so. And maybe that means there’s some hope that she won’t be stupid forever. Maybe, as long as Santana doesn’t believe it, as long as Santana keeps singing quietly into her hair, she can find the strength to leave the coat closet and fight those zombies at recess.
But maybe Santana should sing it again first, just in case.
3“I don’t know what they want from me!” Santana gripes, kicking at one of the footstools they keep in Brittany’s treehouse. “God, I’m not a bad kid. I just really don’t give a fuck about stupid people. Is that so wrong?”
“Maybe if you stop pushing their heads into Jell-O, people won’t get so angry?” Brittany suggests. She scoots a checker across the board, wincing when Santana immediately leaps on it with one of her own. “Crap.”
“Hey, Hudson deserved more than a Jell-O bath. That asshole just walks around like he owns the whole fucking world, just ‘cuz he sprouted six inches over the summer.” Santana shakes her head. “I hate that fucker.”
“Mom’s not gonna let you come over for another week if she hears you say the F-word again,” Brittany informs her, glancing nervously out the window. She half-expects to see her mother on the back lawn, hands planted stubbornly on her hips. “She doesn’t want Cathy to hear. Again.”
“Teach one kid one bad word, you’re branded for life,” Santana complains, but she’s laughing. Brittany tosses a pillow at her head.
“You’re silly.”
“You love me.” Grinning, Santana hops another checker over Brittany’s. “I’m gonna winnn.”
“Are not,” Brittany grumbles, which probably isn’t true; Santana always wins games like these. With anyone else, Brittany would hate that, but with Santana, it’s okay. She’s just glad there’s one person in the world who doesn’t just let her win on a regular basis.
“Anyway,” Santana is saying, reclining back against her beanbag chair. “I’m just gonna threaten him with blackmail next time. That’ll shut his stupid face up.”
“Blackmail?” Brittany sits up a little straighter, sensing fresh gossip. “What do you have on him?”
Santana wiggles her eyebrows. “I might have seen him and Puckerman practicing on each other in the gym last week.”
A frown steals across Brittany’s face. Santana jumps another checker. “Practicing? What, for basketball tryouts or something?”
“No, practicing.” If Santana keeps wiggling her eyebrows like that, Brittany’s afraid they might leap right off her face. She hopes not; Santana’s always pretty, but nobody looks good without eyebrows.
“I don’t get it.”
“Practicing,” Santana huffs, like she can’t understand why this isn’t getting through, “like with their lips. Practicing for girls.” She pauses, brow furrowing. “I think for girls, at least. I hope for girls. Yuck.”
Brittany’s eyes go wide. “They were kissing?”
“Full tongue action,” Santana announces proudly. “It was super gross. I mean, can you imagine having Hudson’s fat tongue in your mouth?”
Brittany isn’t sure why anyone would want to imagine that. “Is that normal?”
“Tonguing each other?” Santana shrugs. “I guess so. You see it in all the movies. Looks hella hard to breathe around that shit, though, right?”
“No, I mean…” She pauses, rubbing the back of her neck. “I mean, practicing. Are you supposed to do that?”
Santana seems to consider this for a long moment, her fingers splayed across her mouth. Brittany finds herself staring as those fingers tap, rubbing back and forth along her bottom lip. Everyone’s got a mouth, obviously; it’s strange to think she’s never really noticed that before.
As mouths go, she guesses Santana’s is pretty nice.
“I guess it’s normal,” Santana says at last, mumbling against her fingertips as they continue their suddenly-distracting dance across her lip. “I mean. Not for them. They’re gross on their own, much less stuck together at face level. But I guess, for other people…for not-gross people…why not?”
Brittany tries not to look as though she’s eyeing her best friend’s mouth like it’s a candy jar. “Um. So. Does that mean I-we-you-“
“Should probably practice sometime?” Santana tosses her hair back. “I guess, yeah. I mean, we’re going out for the squad in a couple of years, right? We’re definitely going to have to know our stuff by then. I mean, if we want to be the most popular girls in school…”
Brittany’s not sure that’s what they want, truth be told. She’d probably be happy just hanging out with Santana every day, like they’ve been doing for the past five years: dancing in their bedrooms and baking cookies, while Santana teaches her everything from science to how to make the perfect water balloon. She’s not sure she needs much more than that in life; just Santana, singing and laughing and letting Brittany do her hair in exciting new fashions.
But Santana wants the Cheerio squad more than anything right now, and Brittany figures that wouldn’t be so bad, either. It’s mostly dancing, after all, which is her very favorite thing to do, and those skirts look pretty awesome…
“How about now?” Santana says abruptly, ratcheting up onto her knees. Brittany tilts her head curiously.
“What about now?”
“I mean, we could practice.” Santana’s eyes are bright, her face completely devoid of the anxiety that has suddenly exploded in the pit of Brittany’s stomach. “Right now. Why not, right?”
“I don’t know-“
“Come on.” Scooting closer, Santana reaches for Brittany’s hands. “Just a little bit. Just to see how it is. You don’t want to be totally humiliated when you go on that first date with a football hunk, do you?”
“Of course not,” Brittany says, mostly because she knows that it’s what Santana is expecting. Truth be told, she can’t imagine herself dating a football hunk-or anyone at all. The idea has never crossed her mind, that someday she might have to do more than just have fun with Santana. That she’ll be expected to date boys-and kiss them, and let them put their tongues in her mouth-makes her feel a little like throwing up.
But she can’t tell Santana that, not when Santana is looking so excited about the whole prospect. She feels herself nod from a thousand miles away, her hands clenching around Santana’s.
“Okay. Sure.”
She tries to remember to breathe as Santana shuffles nearer, tries to remember that this is her best friend, and so what if she’s never really thought about kissing as a viable option before-at least it’s Santana, and not some stranger. At least Santana is the one reaching up to cradle her jaw, clumsy and unpolished in every motion. At least it’s Santana, leaning in, dark hair falling across her face and getting very much in the way. At least it’s Santana whose mouth presses against hers, too soft to feel-and then a little bolder, a little more prepared.
She barely moves, can barely remember how to remain conscious through all the nerves, as Santana’s mouth catches her bottom lip and holds to it for a moment. The world feels fuzzy, like it’s fading away, as Santana experiments with more pressure, with pulling briefly away and coming in again, with opening her mouth over Brittany’s and waiting for her to do the same…
Brittany breaks contact, breathing hard, fully aware that her face probably resembles a fresh apple. Santana’s forehead touches to hers, her lips still parted.
“You okay?”
“Sure,” Brittany says again, trying not to pant. Santana almost smiles, but her eyes seem nervous for the first time.
“We don’t have to do it again,” she says softly. Brittany’s head whips from side to side.
“Practice makes perfect,” she replies, a grin slowly spreading across her lips. Santana grins back.
Maybe it’s a bad idea, maybe it’s not at all what she should have said-she probably should have insisted, no, that was enough, thanks, but no thank you, ma’am-but Brittany can’t help it. That was her first kiss ever, and she got to share it with her best friend. Her best friend, whose mouth is actually very pretty, and whose hand on her cheek feels warm and safe. How many people can say that?
She can’t say she particularly wants to make out with a hunky football player, but practicing with Santana…that might be a different story altogether.
4Sleepovers are an underrated pleasure, her mother told her once; most girls don’t realize how amazing it really is, to trust someone enough to let them sleep beside you in your own room. Or your own bed, as the case always has been with Santana, who thinks sleeping on floors went out of style with their Power Ranger helmets.
She’s sprawled out on her back in Santana’s room, tossing a baseball at the ceiling and catching it. Santana is fiddling with the DVD player, swearing under her breath.
“Piece of shit won’t-there! Yes!” She bangs her hand down on the TV in triumph as the menu screen pops into place. “God, I’ve got to talk Dad into getting me a better one. This thing is fucked.”
“Bring It On is the best,” Brittany muses, half to herself. “We never watch the sequels, though. Why is that?”
“Because sequels blow,” Santana informs her, throwing herself onto the bed in time to catch the baseball. “Interception! Seriously, though, you watched the Matrix trilogy. You remember how that went?”
Brittany laughs, batting the ball out of Santana’s hand and watching it roll under the nightstand. “I think you just want to be Elijah Wood.”
“Eliza Dushku,” Santana corrects, giggling. “I don’t want to be a damn hobbit.”
“Close enough.” Brittany waves her off. “You totally want to be her. All hot-shot, badass-“
“Smokin’ and sassy, that’s me.” Santana flings a leg over Brittany’s hips and perches there, grinning. “I could totally pull off Dushku.”
“Does that make me the captain?” Brittany asks, reaching up to hold Santana’s waist steady. It’s an awkward position, given their habit of lapsing into make-out sessions whenever they get bored, but she’s unwilling to push Santana away. She can live with awkward as long as Santana’s involved.
“I dunno.” Santana pushes her hair back, thinking. “I always thought the captain and Dushku had kind of a thing goin’ on. Don’t you?”
Brittany’s breath catches, her chest tightening. “I dunno. There’s the rocker guy-“
“There’s always a guy,” Santana interrupts. “Doesn’t mean the girls can’t, um…appreciate one another.” She’s doing that eyebrow thing again. Brittany can never decide if she hates that or finds it an extremely inappropriate turn-on.
Just as inappropriate as the way Santana is moving her hips now, playful and entirely too intimate. It takes every ounce of Brittany’s self-control to keep from responding in kind, allowing her body to roll up to meet each of Santana’s ridiculous little dance moves with boldness of her own. She bites her lip.
“Thought we were gonna watch the movie.”
“What do you mean?” Santana laughs, hands propped on Brittany’s shoulders. Her hips pump down, her body smoothing, breast to breast, upward until her chest is hovering tantalizingly above Brittany’s face. She gives a taunting little wiggle. “Movie’s on. Watch it.”
It’s not the first time Santana has pulled something like this, and Brittany can never quite figure out her motivations. Is this her playing around, an elaborately sensual practical joke meant to amuse? Or is she legitimately trying to knock Brittany off her game? It’s impossibly difficult to imagine Santana messing with her head-anyone else’s, sure, but not hers; there’s a line there-but if she isn’t…
It’s all too complicated, and the only thing Brittany can do is play along and hope for an explanation somewhere down the line.
The problem is, ever since that first kiss, their “practicing” has felt a lot less like practice and lot more…well, real. To Brittany, at least, who has spent the three years since pretending this is much funnier than she really believes. Pretending like the sensation of Santana’s strong legs on either side of her pelvis isn’t immensely distracting. Like the vision of Santana above her, dark waterfall of hair cascading into her laughing eyes, isn’t the most beautiful thing she’s ever seen.
Like the way Santana is rolling her upper body right now, breasts pressed nearly to Brittany’s nose, isn’t just plain cruel.
Santana’s just playing around, she’s fairly certain, but what it’s doing to Brittany is anything but funny. Nice, oh yes, very nice-but absolutely not funny. And all she can do is laugh, and bite her lip, and resist the urge to retaliate.
It’s just not fair.
Still, she’s holding out nicely, she thinks-until Santana brushes their lips together, too softly to even really call it a kiss. It’s a joke, a tease, nothing more; Brittany should just let it go. After all, if she hadn’t done that, if she’d just left well enough alone with her perfect boobs in Brittany’s sexually-frustrated face-but she doesn’t. She just has to go that extra step, just has to tempt her in the hardest way possible to deny, and before Brittany knows it-
“Hey!” Santana protests, clearly surprised out of her wits when Brittany rocks up and flips them both over. Suddenly, it’s Santana on her back, Santana in submission, with Brittany staring down into startled brown eyes. Suddenly, Brittany has all the control in the world.
She falters. “Hey.”
“No fair!” Santana exclaims, half-laughing. Her hips jerk up to meet Brittany’s, her hands flexing against the pillows. Brittany’s grip loosens around her wrists.
Now she’s lost. With Santana on top, the world makes sense, but with their positions reversed…
Santana, too, seems confused by the abrupt shift. Her smile is stuttering, her body tensing beneath Brittany’s. She draws in a breath.
“Movie?”
She should say yes, Brittany knows. She should nod and roll aside, curl up against Santana’s back with her eyes fixed on comedic pom-poms. She should absolutely, under all circumstances, remove herself from this position atop her best friend, because riding Santana like a pony is just not a good idea.
Neither is what her head is deciding to do, this thing where it bends down and presses her lips tenderly against Santana’s. This thing where her tongue eases Santana’s lips apart and swallows the moan her best friend probably doesn’t even realize she’s making. This thing where one thigh shifts between both of Santana’s and flexes, Brittany’s whole body gracefully following the motion.
She shouldn’t be doing this, and, honestly? Santana shouldn’t be responding. Her kisses should not be growing rougher, her hips pistoning up against Brittany’s thigh, her hands yanking free only to grasp hold of Brittany’s back, her shoulders, her hair. She should not be making that noise, that desperate little whimpering sound Brittany has only ever heard in her darkest dreams. She should not be scrambling to drag Brittany’s bright yellow shorts down her hips…
They shouldn’t. There is so much shouldn’t here, it nearly sends Brittany off the deep end. She may not know much, may not be the smartest person in the world, but she does know this: If they continue doing this…if she leans back far enough for Santana to slip her t-shirt over her head…if she caresses Santana’s newly bared shoulders…if she allows her teeth to scrape across Santana’s collarbone, her fingers kneading soft breasts like she has any right to them…
If Santana’s hand slides down to cup her through barely-present fabric…
If she spreads her legs wide enough to allow that burst of pain, that tight discomfort, that heady sensation of so wrong, so bad, so yes please…
Things are never going to be the same again.
They probably should have just watched the damn movie.
[Part 2]
Pairing: Santana Lopez/Brittany Pierce
Rating: R
Disclaimer: Nothing owned, no profit gained.
Spoilers: Through S3, to be safe.
Summary: Nine moments when Brittany Pierce looks at Santana Lopez and just knows she’s holding on to something special.
1At age six, all Brittany Pierce wants in life is to be the Pink Power Ranger. It’s a simple enough goal, she figures; all she has to do is fight her way past mean older boys and scary clown toys, until she’s the bravest, prettiest girl in the whole neighborhood. And then Zordon will have no choice but to recognize her talents and call her into the Mighty Morphin’ fold.
It’s a very particular, easygoing brand of logic, and it keeps her going when first grade gets too taxing. A Power Ranger, after all, doesn’t give up just because reading is much harder than Mom said it would be. Or because Noah Puckerman likes to kick sand in her face and drop beetles in her hair at recess. Or because Daddy’s a little late picking her up from school…
A normal girl might cry, but not Brittany S. Pierce: Inevitable Pink Ranger. Crying is for sissies, as Noah proclaims joyfully as he forces Kurt Hummel’s head into a bucket one day. Brittany doesn’t cry.
Or, if she does, it’s only with her face pressed close to the peeling green fence, where no one can see.
She’s not really crying, she tells herself, because she’s not a wimp. It’s just that this is the fourth time in recent memory her daddy had to work late, leaving her the last kid on the playground. For a fourth time, she can see Mrs. Gallagher out of the corner of her eye, repeatedly checking her watch and shifting her purse from one shoulder to the other. And that’s just…kind of embarrassing.
She’s okay with Daddy working late, because Daddy works for the money, but why should kind Mrs. Gallagher have to suffer?
Her face rests against the cool chain-links, her eyes wrenched shut against the tears that keep bubbling through, and somehow, she doesn’t realize she isn’t alone until a hesitant hand finds its way onto her shoulder. Brittany jumps, whirling around with both fists raised, and tries her very best to look like a teenager with attitude.
Which might be slightly easier if not for her being the third smallest girl in her class…
She’s expecting her assailant to be Noah Puckerman, maybe flanked by Finn Hudson and his perpetually runny nose. It’s surprising to find, instead, a person she’s never seen before. Or, at least, she thinks so. It’s a little hard to tell, given that the slightly-shorter individual is wearing a green helmet over its face.
Brittany stares, forgetting to hold her fists at the ready, because even though the person is wearing scuffed light-up sneakers and standing with their hands in their pockets, and even though there is a tangle of dark hair resting against slim shoulders, she’s pretty sure she’s just met the Green Ranger.
It’s a humbling moment, to say the least.
“Tommy?” she whispers reverently. The person’s head tilts, the slightly-too-big helmet nearly falling off in the process. Brittany claps her hands together.
“It is you!” she announces gleefully, and promptly throws her arms around the (surprisingly tiny) Green Ranger. Shockingly, her Ranger in question jerks back from the hug, arms windmilling to prevent Brittany from grasping hold again.
“What are you, crazy?” a muffled voice struggles to escape through the helmet. “You can’t just go hugging people you’ve never met. Geez! I could be an evil force in disguise!”
Brittany lurches backward, arms wrapping around herself instinctively. “Well,” she says hesitantly. “Are you?”
“No,” the Green Ranger replies gruffly, kicking at the pebbles beneath their feet. “But I could be. You gotta be more careful, for cryin’ out loud.”
“Sorry,” Brittany mumbles, head bowing. This isn’t at all how she’s imagined meeting her Green Ranger. They’re supposed to be best friends right away, to storm off and save the world together. She isn’t supposed to come away feeling stupid; that already happens with everyone else, it isn’t supposed to happen with him.
Or her, because that voice doesn’t really sound like any boy she’s ever met-except maybe Kurt, but everyone knows Kurt is her greatest rival for the Pink morpher.
Either way, the tears are starting to come again, and Brittany can’t think of a way to stop them. She swivels around, palms brushing unhappily across her cheeks, and stares desperately across the parking lot. Now would be a very good time for her daddy to come wheeling in with his tie and his briefcase and his I’m so sorry, babygirl smile. Anything’s better than crying in front of the Green Ranger.
The hand touches her shoulder again, even more gently this time. “Are you-are you crying?”
“No,” Brittany sniffles, shrugging her shoulder until the hand falls away.
“Sure sounds like it.” There’s a pause, followed by a muffled, “Look, I didn’t mean to make you cry.”
Brittany inhales, turning reluctantly back to face her again. The tiny Ranger is tugging uncomfortably on the strings of her hooded sweatshirt, bouncing slightly on the balls of her feet. She sighs.
“I mean, hey, clearly I’m not a bad guy. Right? Bad guys are always ugly and mean and-ugh, this helmet.” Tiny hands adorned with Batman band-aids reach up and yank the helmet off, revealing a girl with a purple bruise under one brown eye. She huffs in a deep breath, mouth stretched comically wide. “God, that’s so much better. I don’t know how you’re supposed to breathe in these things.”
Brittany smiles despite herself, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear. “You’re not ugly.”
“’Course not,” the girl replies, almost as if she’s insulted at the very idea. “And I’m not Tommy, either. The name’s Santana. The real Green Ranger.”
“Brittany.” She hesitates, then plows on with, “The Pink Ranger. Someday.”
“Cool.” Santana grins and reaches out her hand, giving a shake that’s just a little too rough. Brittany shyly beams back.
“You wanna fight the forces of evil together sometime?” Santana asks, tucking her helmet more securely beneath her arm. Brittany nods eagerly. “Good. It’s tiring, doing it all by myself. I mean, not that I need the help or anything. It would just be nice. The company, or whatever.”
Brittany’s grin stretches even bigger. No one has ever asked her to help them with anything before-well, besides her mom and daddy, but they totally don’t count. She’s usually too little, or too stupid, or too much with her “head in the clouds” (as Mrs. Gallagher likes to say) to be any good to anyone. But Santana is looking at her with bright eyes and a determined smile, like she thinks they could do anything together-just like the Pink and Green Rangers on TV. It sends a warm thrill through Brittany’s chest, to think that she might just have made her very first friend.
And, if this girl really is the Green Ranger, maybe she’s one step closer to meeting Zordon, too.
2Eight years old, and can’t even read. Brittany sinks down in the coat closet, head leaning back into the puffy winter jackets and Hello Kitty-themed backpacks that line the wall. This is just embarrassing.
She hates Popcorn Reading, hates it more than anything in the whole wide world, because every single time they call on her, she screws it up. It isn’t that she’s not following along, because she is. She knows just what’s happening in the story, can remember all the little details that led them to this point-she could pass a quiz on it with no problems at all. It’s the moving forward part that sucks, because the words just tend to bleed together in awkward shapes that don’t really resemble words, and…well, she can’t be the only person this happens to, right?
Except, in Mr. Jameson’s class, she is. And everybody knows it. Stupid Brittany can’t even read a simple story without choking. Stupid Brittany ruins everything.
There’s a fumbling noise that sounds kind of like a bull tripping over a fire hydrant, followed by a garbled word that Brittany isn’t allowed to use at home. She bows her head close to her knees, not bothering to look up. Only one person walks-and talks-like that.
“Hey, why’re you hiding?” Santana asks, crouching beside her. “It’s almost recess, you’re gonna miss it. We’re supposed to fight the zombie hordes today, remember?”
Brittany says nothing, inhaling the tang of the orange juice she wiped on her jeans at lunchtime. Santana sighs.
“The reading thing again, huh?”
For a second, she wants to bite back with, No, duh, but then she remembers: Santana wasn’t in the classroom this time. She’d pulled Noah Puckerman’s chair out from under him and been sent-again-to the principal’s office to explain herself. This sort of thing happens a lot with Santana.
“Yeah,” she mumbles finally. “The reading thing.”
Santana’s arm loops around her shoulder, head touching gently to hers. “Aw. It’s okay, Britt. You’ll get it-“
“No, I won’t,” Brittany growls, wrenching away. “I’ll never get it. I’m too stupid.”
“Hey!” Santana clamps a hand over her mouth, scowling. “You’re not allowed to say that word, remember? Mama says it’s bad for your self-esteem.”
It’s sort of funny to hear Santana say that, since Santana is forever calling other people stupid-and far worse names, come to think of it. But this is different, because this is Brittany, and Brittany knows that. Santana’s always different when it comes to her.
“Fine,” she says grudgingly, trying to sound like she’s not on the verge of tears. “But I’m still not getting better. I can’t-I can’t figure out-“
Santana’s arm comes down around her again, yanking her close with a fierceness belonging solely to her best friend. “Shut up,” she insists, her mouth right up against Brittany’s ear. “You’re gonna get better. I’m gonna help. I’ve got this in the bag, you know, I’m in the Eagles and everything-“
The Eagles make up the highest reading group in the class, the one Brittany knows she’ll never touch. Only four kids-Rachel Berry, Santana, Kurt Hummel, and Artie Abrams-are smart enough to be Eagles. Brittany’s barely smart enough for the Sparrow Squadron.
“I’ll help you,” Santana repeats. Brittany closes her eyes, feeling the first traitorous tears trickling down her cheeks. Santana means well, she knows, but she just can’t help but think it’s no good. She’s never going to be smart enough-not for Santana, not for Popcorn Reading, not for anything at all. She’s stupid, and she’s always going to be stupid. End of story.
They’re silent for a few moments, listening to the rattle and roar outside the coat closet as the other kids hack away at group projects. Brittany hates it, hearing how easy everybody else has it, how happy they all sound. They couldn’t care less about words muddling together, about “moth” looking like “math.” All they care about is recess.
She’s so jealous, it makes her stomach sour.
Santana is smoothing her hair with clumsy fingertips, her mouth still resting gently against the side of Brittany’s head. She’s quiet for a while, and then, out of nowhere, she begins to hum.
“You can't hurry love…no, you just have to wait…”
“What-,” Brittany begins, but Santana’s fingers close over her mouth again, gently shushing her. She turns her head to find her best friend’s cheeks glowing bright red with embarrassment, her eyes firmly closed as she sings softly against Brittany’s hair.
“She said love don't come easy, it's a game of give and take…”
It’s her favorite song; her mom plays it all the time, usually at night when Brittany’s trying to go to sleep. She doesn’t have a clue how Santana would know that, or why she would choose to sing it now-but she likes it. Santana’s voice is raw, shivering across the lyrics like she’s cold, but somehow beautiful. She doesn’t know if it’s the words to the song, or the fact that Santana is actually singing-not just to the radio, but actually singing to her for the first time in their lives-but Brittany can feel herself slowly relaxing. The anxiety is seeping away, bit by bit, replaced by a warmth she can’t quite explain.
As Santana makes her way through the song, Brittany finds her hand in the shadows and holds tight to it. She’s stupid, and she knows it, but Santana doesn’t seem to think so. And maybe that means there’s some hope that she won’t be stupid forever. Maybe, as long as Santana doesn’t believe it, as long as Santana keeps singing quietly into her hair, she can find the strength to leave the coat closet and fight those zombies at recess.
But maybe Santana should sing it again first, just in case.
3“I don’t know what they want from me!” Santana gripes, kicking at one of the footstools they keep in Brittany’s treehouse. “God, I’m not a bad kid. I just really don’t give a fuck about stupid people. Is that so wrong?”
“Maybe if you stop pushing their heads into Jell-O, people won’t get so angry?” Brittany suggests. She scoots a checker across the board, wincing when Santana immediately leaps on it with one of her own. “Crap.”
“Hey, Hudson deserved more than a Jell-O bath. That asshole just walks around like he owns the whole fucking world, just ‘cuz he sprouted six inches over the summer.” Santana shakes her head. “I hate that fucker.”
“Mom’s not gonna let you come over for another week if she hears you say the F-word again,” Brittany informs her, glancing nervously out the window. She half-expects to see her mother on the back lawn, hands planted stubbornly on her hips. “She doesn’t want Cathy to hear. Again.”
“Teach one kid one bad word, you’re branded for life,” Santana complains, but she’s laughing. Brittany tosses a pillow at her head.
“You’re silly.”
“You love me.” Grinning, Santana hops another checker over Brittany’s. “I’m gonna winnn.”
“Are not,” Brittany grumbles, which probably isn’t true; Santana always wins games like these. With anyone else, Brittany would hate that, but with Santana, it’s okay. She’s just glad there’s one person in the world who doesn’t just let her win on a regular basis.
“Anyway,” Santana is saying, reclining back against her beanbag chair. “I’m just gonna threaten him with blackmail next time. That’ll shut his stupid face up.”
“Blackmail?” Brittany sits up a little straighter, sensing fresh gossip. “What do you have on him?”
Santana wiggles her eyebrows. “I might have seen him and Puckerman practicing on each other in the gym last week.”
A frown steals across Brittany’s face. Santana jumps another checker. “Practicing? What, for basketball tryouts or something?”
“No, practicing.” If Santana keeps wiggling her eyebrows like that, Brittany’s afraid they might leap right off her face. She hopes not; Santana’s always pretty, but nobody looks good without eyebrows.
“I don’t get it.”
“Practicing,” Santana huffs, like she can’t understand why this isn’t getting through, “like with their lips. Practicing for girls.” She pauses, brow furrowing. “I think for girls, at least. I hope for girls. Yuck.”
Brittany’s eyes go wide. “They were kissing?”
“Full tongue action,” Santana announces proudly. “It was super gross. I mean, can you imagine having Hudson’s fat tongue in your mouth?”
Brittany isn’t sure why anyone would want to imagine that. “Is that normal?”
“Tonguing each other?” Santana shrugs. “I guess so. You see it in all the movies. Looks hella hard to breathe around that shit, though, right?”
“No, I mean…” She pauses, rubbing the back of her neck. “I mean, practicing. Are you supposed to do that?”
Santana seems to consider this for a long moment, her fingers splayed across her mouth. Brittany finds herself staring as those fingers tap, rubbing back and forth along her bottom lip. Everyone’s got a mouth, obviously; it’s strange to think she’s never really noticed that before.
As mouths go, she guesses Santana’s is pretty nice.
“I guess it’s normal,” Santana says at last, mumbling against her fingertips as they continue their suddenly-distracting dance across her lip. “I mean. Not for them. They’re gross on their own, much less stuck together at face level. But I guess, for other people…for not-gross people…why not?”
Brittany tries not to look as though she’s eyeing her best friend’s mouth like it’s a candy jar. “Um. So. Does that mean I-we-you-“
“Should probably practice sometime?” Santana tosses her hair back. “I guess, yeah. I mean, we’re going out for the squad in a couple of years, right? We’re definitely going to have to know our stuff by then. I mean, if we want to be the most popular girls in school…”
Brittany’s not sure that’s what they want, truth be told. She’d probably be happy just hanging out with Santana every day, like they’ve been doing for the past five years: dancing in their bedrooms and baking cookies, while Santana teaches her everything from science to how to make the perfect water balloon. She’s not sure she needs much more than that in life; just Santana, singing and laughing and letting Brittany do her hair in exciting new fashions.
But Santana wants the Cheerio squad more than anything right now, and Brittany figures that wouldn’t be so bad, either. It’s mostly dancing, after all, which is her very favorite thing to do, and those skirts look pretty awesome…
“How about now?” Santana says abruptly, ratcheting up onto her knees. Brittany tilts her head curiously.
“What about now?”
“I mean, we could practice.” Santana’s eyes are bright, her face completely devoid of the anxiety that has suddenly exploded in the pit of Brittany’s stomach. “Right now. Why not, right?”
“I don’t know-“
“Come on.” Scooting closer, Santana reaches for Brittany’s hands. “Just a little bit. Just to see how it is. You don’t want to be totally humiliated when you go on that first date with a football hunk, do you?”
“Of course not,” Brittany says, mostly because she knows that it’s what Santana is expecting. Truth be told, she can’t imagine herself dating a football hunk-or anyone at all. The idea has never crossed her mind, that someday she might have to do more than just have fun with Santana. That she’ll be expected to date boys-and kiss them, and let them put their tongues in her mouth-makes her feel a little like throwing up.
But she can’t tell Santana that, not when Santana is looking so excited about the whole prospect. She feels herself nod from a thousand miles away, her hands clenching around Santana’s.
“Okay. Sure.”
She tries to remember to breathe as Santana shuffles nearer, tries to remember that this is her best friend, and so what if she’s never really thought about kissing as a viable option before-at least it’s Santana, and not some stranger. At least Santana is the one reaching up to cradle her jaw, clumsy and unpolished in every motion. At least it’s Santana, leaning in, dark hair falling across her face and getting very much in the way. At least it’s Santana whose mouth presses against hers, too soft to feel-and then a little bolder, a little more prepared.
She barely moves, can barely remember how to remain conscious through all the nerves, as Santana’s mouth catches her bottom lip and holds to it for a moment. The world feels fuzzy, like it’s fading away, as Santana experiments with more pressure, with pulling briefly away and coming in again, with opening her mouth over Brittany’s and waiting for her to do the same…
Brittany breaks contact, breathing hard, fully aware that her face probably resembles a fresh apple. Santana’s forehead touches to hers, her lips still parted.
“You okay?”
“Sure,” Brittany says again, trying not to pant. Santana almost smiles, but her eyes seem nervous for the first time.
“We don’t have to do it again,” she says softly. Brittany’s head whips from side to side.
“Practice makes perfect,” she replies, a grin slowly spreading across her lips. Santana grins back.
Maybe it’s a bad idea, maybe it’s not at all what she should have said-she probably should have insisted, no, that was enough, thanks, but no thank you, ma’am-but Brittany can’t help it. That was her first kiss ever, and she got to share it with her best friend. Her best friend, whose mouth is actually very pretty, and whose hand on her cheek feels warm and safe. How many people can say that?
She can’t say she particularly wants to make out with a hunky football player, but practicing with Santana…that might be a different story altogether.
4Sleepovers are an underrated pleasure, her mother told her once; most girls don’t realize how amazing it really is, to trust someone enough to let them sleep beside you in your own room. Or your own bed, as the case always has been with Santana, who thinks sleeping on floors went out of style with their Power Ranger helmets.
She’s sprawled out on her back in Santana’s room, tossing a baseball at the ceiling and catching it. Santana is fiddling with the DVD player, swearing under her breath.
“Piece of shit won’t-there! Yes!” She bangs her hand down on the TV in triumph as the menu screen pops into place. “God, I’ve got to talk Dad into getting me a better one. This thing is fucked.”
“Bring It On is the best,” Brittany muses, half to herself. “We never watch the sequels, though. Why is that?”
“Because sequels blow,” Santana informs her, throwing herself onto the bed in time to catch the baseball. “Interception! Seriously, though, you watched the Matrix trilogy. You remember how that went?”
Brittany laughs, batting the ball out of Santana’s hand and watching it roll under the nightstand. “I think you just want to be Elijah Wood.”
“Eliza Dushku,” Santana corrects, giggling. “I don’t want to be a damn hobbit.”
“Close enough.” Brittany waves her off. “You totally want to be her. All hot-shot, badass-“
“Smokin’ and sassy, that’s me.” Santana flings a leg over Brittany’s hips and perches there, grinning. “I could totally pull off Dushku.”
“Does that make me the captain?” Brittany asks, reaching up to hold Santana’s waist steady. It’s an awkward position, given their habit of lapsing into make-out sessions whenever they get bored, but she’s unwilling to push Santana away. She can live with awkward as long as Santana’s involved.
“I dunno.” Santana pushes her hair back, thinking. “I always thought the captain and Dushku had kind of a thing goin’ on. Don’t you?”
Brittany’s breath catches, her chest tightening. “I dunno. There’s the rocker guy-“
“There’s always a guy,” Santana interrupts. “Doesn’t mean the girls can’t, um…appreciate one another.” She’s doing that eyebrow thing again. Brittany can never decide if she hates that or finds it an extremely inappropriate turn-on.
Just as inappropriate as the way Santana is moving her hips now, playful and entirely too intimate. It takes every ounce of Brittany’s self-control to keep from responding in kind, allowing her body to roll up to meet each of Santana’s ridiculous little dance moves with boldness of her own. She bites her lip.
“Thought we were gonna watch the movie.”
“What do you mean?” Santana laughs, hands propped on Brittany’s shoulders. Her hips pump down, her body smoothing, breast to breast, upward until her chest is hovering tantalizingly above Brittany’s face. She gives a taunting little wiggle. “Movie’s on. Watch it.”
It’s not the first time Santana has pulled something like this, and Brittany can never quite figure out her motivations. Is this her playing around, an elaborately sensual practical joke meant to amuse? Or is she legitimately trying to knock Brittany off her game? It’s impossibly difficult to imagine Santana messing with her head-anyone else’s, sure, but not hers; there’s a line there-but if she isn’t…
It’s all too complicated, and the only thing Brittany can do is play along and hope for an explanation somewhere down the line.
The problem is, ever since that first kiss, their “practicing” has felt a lot less like practice and lot more…well, real. To Brittany, at least, who has spent the three years since pretending this is much funnier than she really believes. Pretending like the sensation of Santana’s strong legs on either side of her pelvis isn’t immensely distracting. Like the vision of Santana above her, dark waterfall of hair cascading into her laughing eyes, isn’t the most beautiful thing she’s ever seen.
Like the way Santana is rolling her upper body right now, breasts pressed nearly to Brittany’s nose, isn’t just plain cruel.
Santana’s just playing around, she’s fairly certain, but what it’s doing to Brittany is anything but funny. Nice, oh yes, very nice-but absolutely not funny. And all she can do is laugh, and bite her lip, and resist the urge to retaliate.
It’s just not fair.
Still, she’s holding out nicely, she thinks-until Santana brushes their lips together, too softly to even really call it a kiss. It’s a joke, a tease, nothing more; Brittany should just let it go. After all, if she hadn’t done that, if she’d just left well enough alone with her perfect boobs in Brittany’s sexually-frustrated face-but she doesn’t. She just has to go that extra step, just has to tempt her in the hardest way possible to deny, and before Brittany knows it-
“Hey!” Santana protests, clearly surprised out of her wits when Brittany rocks up and flips them both over. Suddenly, it’s Santana on her back, Santana in submission, with Brittany staring down into startled brown eyes. Suddenly, Brittany has all the control in the world.
She falters. “Hey.”
“No fair!” Santana exclaims, half-laughing. Her hips jerk up to meet Brittany’s, her hands flexing against the pillows. Brittany’s grip loosens around her wrists.
Now she’s lost. With Santana on top, the world makes sense, but with their positions reversed…
Santana, too, seems confused by the abrupt shift. Her smile is stuttering, her body tensing beneath Brittany’s. She draws in a breath.
“Movie?”
She should say yes, Brittany knows. She should nod and roll aside, curl up against Santana’s back with her eyes fixed on comedic pom-poms. She should absolutely, under all circumstances, remove herself from this position atop her best friend, because riding Santana like a pony is just not a good idea.
Neither is what her head is deciding to do, this thing where it bends down and presses her lips tenderly against Santana’s. This thing where her tongue eases Santana’s lips apart and swallows the moan her best friend probably doesn’t even realize she’s making. This thing where one thigh shifts between both of Santana’s and flexes, Brittany’s whole body gracefully following the motion.
She shouldn’t be doing this, and, honestly? Santana shouldn’t be responding. Her kisses should not be growing rougher, her hips pistoning up against Brittany’s thigh, her hands yanking free only to grasp hold of Brittany’s back, her shoulders, her hair. She should not be making that noise, that desperate little whimpering sound Brittany has only ever heard in her darkest dreams. She should not be scrambling to drag Brittany’s bright yellow shorts down her hips…
They shouldn’t. There is so much shouldn’t here, it nearly sends Brittany off the deep end. She may not know much, may not be the smartest person in the world, but she does know this: If they continue doing this…if she leans back far enough for Santana to slip her t-shirt over her head…if she caresses Santana’s newly bared shoulders…if she allows her teeth to scrape across Santana’s collarbone, her fingers kneading soft breasts like she has any right to them…
If Santana’s hand slides down to cup her through barely-present fabric…
If she spreads her legs wide enough to allow that burst of pain, that tight discomfort, that heady sensation of so wrong, so bad, so yes please…
Things are never going to be the same again.
They probably should have just watched the damn movie.
[Part 2]