It had to have happened in the summer. That seemed like the only logical part about the two of them. It had to have happened during the two odd months that they got to remind themselves of the world that turned outside of the walls of McKinley High. So it was on a Tuesday night in late June, that Mike looked up from the reception desk at the dance studio where he worked to see Santana walking down the hall. He sat up straighter with the slightest change of expression on his face. "Santana." Mike said her name softly like a statement. He wasn't shocked or surprised to see her; she was simply there. Her eyes turned to meet his and there was a slight tone of surprise in her voice. "Mike." There was a pause, which she used to approach the desk and lean slightly against the wall with her shoulder. She crossed her arms. "I didn't see you when I came in," she starts. He shrugged his shoulders, looked down at the desk, and swiveled a little in his chair.
"Yeah I got here a little late." He looked back up at her.
"You work here?" Santana had always been in the same circle of friends as Mike, but until Glee she never spent much time with him. She still hadn't really.
"Well, I just started. I help out and they give me discounts on dance classes." Mike noticed that she seemed different. Without her cheerleading uniform on, without the backdrop of a high school hallway, and without Brittany glued to her side Mike almost felt like their conversation wasn't real.
"Oh, cool." She nods her head a little.
"Yeah." Mike gestured to her with his hand, "So what about you?"
"Well Coach Sylvester wants us to stay in shape so I figured dance class was a good option. Plus I thought it would help with," she paused and shrugged "you know." Her discomfort with acknowledging glee club in public was the only sign that indicated her reputation as a ruthless cheerio. He stopped swiveling in his chair and leaned in closer over the desk.
"I'm sure Rachel will give you a gold star for it," he replied with a small smirk. She looked at him for a second, unsure if quiet and laid back Mike Chang was joking with her or not. But she quickly laughed and painted a disgusted look on her face at the idea of Rachel, finding herself pleasantly surprised that behind his silent demeanor in glee club he sported a sense of humor. Mike smiled back, feeling the conversation move from polite small talk to something he felt more comfortable with.
"So what class did you take?" he asked. And she recounted for him which teacher she had, what song they danced to, and in great detail how (in her words) a "large skanky cow" tried to take her spot and out dance her. He in turn told her what routines he was learning and even pop n' locks a little for example. The conversation flows surprisingly easily, so that it's not until later when they both get home and are about to go to bed that they realize the peculiarity of it all. Mike has trouble believing that he could talk with a girl who until before, he had only exchanged passing greetings in the hall or discussed glee routines with. Santana simply wondered how she could enjoy having such a long conversation with someone who showed up so little on her social radar. Neither of them could explain their sudden friendliness that took place that night.
However, when she showed up at the reception desk after her class the next day, they both realized they didn't care.
Their reception desk rendezvous become a routine. Santana had classes Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays at six, and when she finished at seven thirty, Mike was there at the desk waiting for her. As the days passed, she found herself hanging out with him until he helped close the studio for the day and he would walk her to her car. One night they had driven to get ice cream because it had been particularly hot that day. Mike was nursing a mint chocolate chip cone and Santana was finishing a small frozen yogurt, when she got a text from Brittany asking her whether she had to bring her own pool to the pool party next week. Mike peeked over her shoulder to read the message.
"Oh, Britt…" He laughed and finished the last bite of his cone. Santana smiled and slightly rolled her eyes before texting back.
"She sends the greatest texts. Sometimes I can't believe half the things she says."
"Yeah, you and everyone else in glee club. Mr. Schue has the hardest time keeping a straight face." Santana glowers at him.
"You know people make fun of her for being stupid but she's a good person" she states with authority. Mike may have gotten to know her better, but it didn't change the fact that Santana Lopez was not a girl to be messed with. He stops grinning and looks at her.
"I know San, I don't really think she's stupid. Plus she's an unbelievable dancer, and you can't be stupid and be a great dancer." He hopes she hears the honesty in his voice. She relaxes and seems to sense his sincerity before smirking at him.
"I don't know about that Chang. I mean you've got some great dance moves but sometimes I think you're a bit slow up there to keep up with me" she teasingly jabs back at him. Mike goes through great lengths to pretend to be offended by her comment and throws his hands up in his defense. Inside he's secretly beaming at her hidden compliment to his dancing skills. He mentally high fives himself. Then he mentally tells himself how lame it is to mentally high five himself. She brings him back to reality.
"I don't know, I think Brittany and I get along so well because she can be a little dense at times but when it comes down to it…she doesn't judge people." Her voice lowers at the end of her sentence. For the first time since he's known her she seems almost vulnerable and shy. It lasts only a split second but Mike understood what she was trying to say: she never judges me.
They both arrive separately to the pool party. She came with Brittany and some other cheerios while he went with Matt and Finn. Despite their new friendship not much has changed in either of their social lives in regards to whom they hang out with and how they act around others. Mike is under no impression that Santana will suddenly stop being a mean girl cheerleader because he's discovered that she has a more human side. Quite frankly he wouldn't want her to; he's secretly been musing recently on how hot it is. Santana also realizes that Mike won't ruthlessly muscle his way into the super popular group of people so that their friendship will make more sense to others. They both know the power that other people's impressions have on them so they stick to old roles. But they find that having each other has been making it easier to deal with. So they can't help it when they find each other later that night when everyone is sufficiently drunk and distracted. Mike gets her another drink and refills his own and then they go sit on the back porch. It's less crowded so it offers more privacy but they can still clearly see their friends in and around the pool.
They gossiped a little about who had already hooked up with whom and made bets on who was going to throw up later. Their surrounding school friends and the party environment kept their conversation light and filled with banter. Mike had enough to drink so that when he looked at her softly illuminated from the porch lights, he couldn't hold back the wide smile he felt. He could blame the heat in his face and the blood in his ears on the alcohol when he was sober, but right then the alcohol was only making him admit the obvious. He was in the process of losing a large part of his heart to this girl.
"You look gorgeous tonight," he tells her after a lull in conversation. This isn't the first time a boy has called her gorgeous, but she likes the way he utters it without the lack of sincerity that she's heard it used on her before as a pick up line. She takes another sip of her drink and smiles at him. He's in his swimsuit without his shirt on and she's trying to remember why she never noticed how hot he was before. She doesn't answer him, but realizes at that moment that she has developed true genuine feelings for the first time in her life for none other than Mike Chang.
It was a warm Saturday afternoon when Santana was sitting at home listening to music, singing softly along. She enjoyed these little moments during the summer to just relax and do something that wasn't in the context of the complex social pecking order of school. She was interrupted when her phone buzzed. It was Mike, did she want to come over and hang out? She texted him back.
Be there in a half an hour.
When she gets to his house it's closer to an hour later. She doesn't have the best timing, especially in the summer, but she knows he won't mind. And from the easy smile on his face as he greets her, he probably expected it. His parents are gone for the weekend for some relative's wedding and his little sister is at camp, so it's just the two of them. They grab a couple of beers and sit on the couch to channel surf. They don't find anything, as it's a Saturday in the summer, so they leave the TV on in the background and start chatting instead. She starts telling him about all the scheming she was supposed to be doing for coach Sylvester during the year to bring down glee club. He nods, listens, and laughs for most of it.
"That sounds way more elaborate than I could have imagined," he says after she tells him one of the various well-detailed plots.
"Well, you know school politics are never easy," she shrugs her shoulders. He nods and absentmindedly plays with a pillow on the couch.
"I don't know. You seem to be a pro at it." He looks up at her from the pillow.
She realized that he may never talk much, at least in school, but he had some of the most expressive eyes she had ever seen. His whole thought process could be expressed simply by one look. And it was just such a look that she was getting right then that she could see just how much he understood her. He never called her a bitch or asked why she was so mean when she recounted her stories of scheming to him. He never expected her to abandon her cheerleading post or stop being friends with them. He just listened and understood what it was like to be unsure of your future in Lima, Ohio after high school. He understood the need to take life in high school by the neck and rule it as best as you could, because who knew when you would ever get the chance to be so in control again?
So when she saw him leaning in towards her on the couch she moved to meet him half way. Because she could see that he understood her for all the same reasons she understood him. She understood why he needed to dance in the privacy of his own bedroom for so long and the fear of enjoying something that jocks and cheerleaders weren't supposed to. She understood why he still dedicated his time to staying in shape for football and basketball. And she respected that he could understand and observe without gossiping away everything he had heard to someone else.
When their lips met it just felt right. It was so natural and it felt like they were meant to be doing this. She wrapped her arms behind his neck and in return he snaked his arm around her waist. It wasn't hot and heavy like her other hookups, well barring Finn, but it's still passionate and enjoyable in an entirely new way for her. She knows he won't use her as a bragging point to his friends in the locker room so she moves to deepen the kiss. When Mike feels this, he knows that he's not a social climbing hookup to her. So he uses both his arms to grab her and hold her tighter.
She decides that making out with Mike is her new favorite pastime. And from his lack of any opposition she would guess it's his too. They still hang out after dance classes and watch bad TV together, only now it's broken up with kisses in between. She's never been a flowers and poetry type of girl, Mike knows this, so they don't hold hands and cuddle at the mall. Instead they settle for lying together on Mike's bed while they watch a movie or helping each other with their dance routines and making out after. Theirs isn't a passionate summer romance that Santana would roll her eyes at in "The Notebook" but the summer seems to pass a lot faster now. They haven't really told their friends yet and they keep a low profile in public, because they both know they're not ready for that yet.
However it doesn't stop Santana from sinking her claws into some girl who got a little too flirty with Mike at a party one night.
They're hanging out at her house before her parents get back from some party on the last weekend of the summer before school starts. He's the first guy she's actually invited over to hang out with one on one.
"I don't know if I'm ready for school to start again," Mike muses from where he sits at the end of her bed, playing some game on his phone. She's at her desk checking her facebook.
"What do you mean?" she asks. He sighs and shrugs his shoulders, putting down his phone.
"I dunno. I just feel like I don't know what to expect from this year, with glee and football and…" he trails off for a bit. She turns to look at him.
"And us," he finishes just a little hesitantly. She gets up to sit next to him and holds his arm, showing a rare sign of tenderness that he spent the last two months learning she was capable of.
"I honestly don't think it will be that different. We'll still do glee, you'll still play football, and I'll still do cheerleading. Only now we can make out after games." He laughed at that.
"On second thought, I can't wait to go back to school," he grins. She gives him a light kiss smiling back.
"But honestly," he continues, "Don't you feel that we've changed somehow. I'm not just talking about over the summer but all year with glee and everything. I just feel a little different." He gives her a pensive look that she still finds adorable. But she understands. She's changed too, even if she won't let it show as outwardly as him. She knows she's been different since realizing how upset she was when she thought that glee club was over.
"It will be different I guess. But since when was that not kind of exciting," she says. They're both sitting on her bed facing each other.
"You're right," he grins at her. "Hey you never know you might get that solo I think you deserve this year." She laughs at him.
"Maybe you might speak like five words during practice this year," she responds. He rests a hand on her knee.
"Okay. So this will be the year of new beginnings," he triumphantly states.
"Alright, I can live with that," she tells him. He smiles and leans in to kiss her. She pulls him down to the bed, and when they're lying next to each other after she thinks that this is the first time that she's slept with someone for the right reasons. She finds it's way more satisfying than she could have thought.
Rachel Berry held her books to her chest and turned to look at the front entrance of McKinley High. She mentally steeled herself to enter yet another year, reminding herself that she was a star and that this year, this year glee club would be recognized for the talent that it was. She was about to start walking to the entrance when she noticed Santana in her cheerios uniform walking by her on the way to go in. She held her breath and braced herself for whatever torment she was sure to go her way. When Santana reached her, she simply looked at her and gave her a small smirk that was not malicious but a silent acknowledgment of sorts. She breezed on by and Rachel couldn't believe that was it.
"What just happened?" she quizzically asked herself. Before she could think about it Mike popped up near her.
"Hey Rachel! Have a good break?" He greeted her with cheer. She was stunned, Mike never really talked much to anyone from Glee except for Matt, and Puck and Finn to a lesser extent.
"Yeah, um really good," she managed to respond through her surprise. What was going on this morning?
"Great, see you later!" He ran off, and Rachel watched as he caught up to Santana, wrapped an arm around her and gave her a kiss. She nearly fainted. Santana wasn't actively mean to her, Mike spoke more than two words, and now they were apparently a couple?
"What in the holy name of show choir happened over the summer?"