Turn your back on these awful things, and they'll be gone.
(Even though that tiny voice inside her screeches no, don't.)
A whisper, a tangling hand in that pretty long hair, and a mouth that's colliding with hers, and teeth scraping over her lips, brusque fingers digging inside her, like a revenge and a magic trick that makes everything else slip away.
And a moan, and nothing sweet, and nothing nice, and no love at all.
When the lights find their way through the drapes, butterflies and dust in the faint stillness that surrounds the morning, Brittany is alone.
So alone that she can't help but get up, naked and coloured tragical white, and sit next to her doll-house.
She's waiting for Barbie to come home and tell her about her adventures and paramours.
She's waiting patiently for Santana to come back, too. And tell her that it doesn't matter that she's dumb, that they can still be together.
She stays there, right next to her ideal house, for hours. The colours coming from her window cut the darkness like a cacophony of restlessness. Ken is worried sick –upset to his plastic bones-, Barbie left without saying goodbye and she tries to tell him she will come back, you know? she always comes back.
But he doesn't ever answer.
(Brittany's mom finds her like that, sitting in the dark and crying, clutching her knees to her exposed chest; all broken, and languid, like a little child made of glass, and so disengaged from the outside world that she has to call her repeatedly, and even shake her once or twice, to bring her back.)
:::...:::
Dream on, expect, have faith. Take a thousand leaps.
He's not like everyone else. He makes her feel something peculiar, something unearthly. He is so beautiful, so perfect and so utterly flawless that she wants to cry everytime she looks at him. She wants to cry and to hold him, and tell him don't leave me, please. don't leave me.
He doesn't touch her like Santana (or any of those countless faceless others) does. He doesn't touch her anywhere beneath the waist, and has ever only touched her brests once –for about a second or two- . He kisses her like he doesn't know how to want her, but talks to her like he would if he knew how to, if he could.
And she looks at him and she wants to cry, to cry for hours until her face looks so ugly that Coach has no choice but to kick her off the squad . Because he is the nicest thing she's ever had, the one single thing she wishes she could hold on to, for the rest of her life (and that's a lie lie lie lie filthy lie, but she's like a shadow, Brittany just can't reach her, and that's going to kill her, and...).
When he finally tells her that it's over, she just nods and tells him your baby hands are so beautiful, can i still hold them?
And he smiles (the sun, the stars, a basket full of cupcakes, her cat stretching lazily in the morning, and her granny knitting her something for Christmas) and murmurs of course, honey before hugging her tightly, tightly like a morning glory.
And she wants to cry, but doesn't. Instead, she skips over to a freshman and invites him over to her house.
(They have sloppy sex; only half naked, and panting and being totally alienated from each other.)
...If something goes wrong, just start again.
:::...:::
Be patient. All things worthy take their time. All things precious come in their due time.
She gets trapped inside a bathroom stall, once. Maybe it was because she accidentally put the latch (she knows how to lock them, but unlocking them is too hard).
She sits there for maybe fourty minutes until sombody comes looking for her.
"Britt?"
It's Quinn. She always recognizes that voice. Quinn always sounds like someone bathed her on honey, like she was dropped into a pool of glitter, like there should be a dosage spoon near her, like she should be measured and put into the remedy to all illnesses.
She sounds pretty, she sounds the exact way she looks.
"Quinny?"
"Sweetie, can you get out of there alone?"
"No, Q, I can't. Help me?"
"Oh, Britt. Wait a minute, I'll go get San, I can't crawl inside with the whole..."
The baby Brittany remembers. Pretty, perfect Quinn is expecting a child. A little thing that will look like her, and will smile like her, and will be so adorable that Brittany's going to cave to everything they want the moment they bat their eyelashes in her direction.
"Ok, Q, I can wait."
She can. And she will. And besides, everyone knows that she's always waiting for San. So she can wait a few more minutes.
(By the time Santana crawls under the door –disgust all over her gorgeous face-, Brittany has drawn two birds, three bunnies, four cats, and five ducks all around her with this one bright pink sharpie she always carries around.)
:::..:::
And if you're good, if you behave, if you smile, and laugh, and dance, and sing, you will be rewarded.
(When Sanatana doesn't kiss like a tornado -angry, and fast, and whirling like a downwards spiral that will eventually land in misery-, she kisses like her soul's being taken away from her, like she has to keep making out with Brittany or order to feel again, like this is the only thing that will save her. )
:::...:::