A/N: Not sure where this idea came from or when I even wrote it, but I found it saved on my computer and decided to post it. Enjoy :)
Brittany was born with a pink triangle on the inside of her wrist.
Or, at least, she's pretty sure she was born with it. The first time she noticed it, she was probably about four, and her newborn kitten Charity had licked her wrist, and then when she looked down at it and moved to wipe off the spit…there it was. She'd gone to show her mother and had gotten yelled at for asking questions, and after that, she'd left it alone and just accepted that she was just born different.
She vaguely remembers having to wear long sleeves in public for most of her life, even in Kindergarten on the playground when it was hot. Kurt Hummel did the same thing until one day at recess he just didn't, and Brittany only got a glimpse of the triangle on his wrist before everyone else was teasing him and picking on him. (Even in high school, they still do.)
After that day on the playground she started looking for other people with triangles like her and Kurt. Finn Hudson wore embarrassing Christmas sweaters a lot but when he finally wore a T-shirt one day, his wrists were bare. Noah Puckerman loved sleeveless shirts, and he didn't have a triangle. Rachel Berry, Quinn Fabray, and Artie Abrams didn't have one either, so Brittany just figured she and Kurt were on their own.
They were never really friends, but she always tried to be nice to him even while everyone else picked on him. She figured maybe the triangle meant they were in some sort of secret club together and that they weren't allowed to tell anyone else about it. And she was thankful for one thing Kurt taught her: it would definitely be better for her to keep her wrists covered like her mom always made her.
So she did: all the way through elementary school and her first two years of middle school. If anyone noticed, they didn't question it, and while Kurt spent most of his middle school life in trashcans and lockers, Brittany spent hers in janitors' closets and at parties. By the time she was thirteen she was the Make Out Queen of both McKinley Middle and McKinley High. Boys, girls…you name the person and she'd probably kissed them, as long as they'd been willing. When she hit eighth grade she started getting invited to high school parties, and it was at the third one, or maybe the fourth (it's hard for her to remember) when she got completely wasted and ripped off her long-sleeved shirt in the middle of the dance floor, choosing instead to run around in her bra. The people who noticed her wrist were far and few between, but the few guys who happened to see it only deemed it hot and then moved on.
She decided she felt more comfortable not covering it up, and a tradition started: her mother still made her wear long-sleeved shirts, so she snuck another shirt into her backpack and changed in the bathroom every morning at school.
Prior to doing this, her girl-boy make out ratio had been about even, but the girl half skyrocketed when she started wearing short-sleeved shirts, to the point where she actually kind of started to miss kissing guys a little bit. Some of the girls who kissed her wore bracelets or long-sleeved shirts, but most didn't, and their wrists were normal. The ones without triangles almost always had boys around to impress, and the ones who had something to hide were sometimes nervous but always more enthusiastic. Brittany liked those better.
Her first day of ninth grade was when she met Santana Lopez. They had Spanish together and they were both trying out for the Cheerios, and apparently that was enough of a reason for them to get to know each other. Quinn Fabray from Kindergarten hung out with them as well, but most of the time, it was just Brittany and Santana.
If Santana had a problem with Brittany's wrist, she didn't say anything about it. She made Brittany cover it up with a bracelet or two when they went over to Santana's house together, but Brittany always had the feeling that was mostly for Santana's family's benefit, not Santana's. Santana always covered her wrists herself, as well, even during sleepovers, and Brittany was always hesitant to ask about it, remembering when her own mother had yelled at her all those years ago for asking questions. Whatever the pink triangles meant, it was taboo enough that she hadn't been able to overhear a discussion of what they meant yet. Other than Kurt Hummel, a few girls she'd kissed, and Rachel Berry's two dads, the only person Brittany had ever met who had had a triangle was Dave Karofsky. She'd accidentally gotten the signs for "boy" and "girl" mixed up and walked in on him changing his shirt in the boys' locker room. His wrist didn't have a triangle on it but it did have a giant black spot, like it had been scribbled over with black sharpie, like Karofsky wanted to pretend it wasn't there. He gave her the meanest look she'd ever gotten when he saw her, and she made sure she left the room as quickly as her feet would take her.
Santana wasn't nearly as mean as Karofsky, but she was awfully protective of her wrists, and no matter how much closer they grew to each other, Brittany never caught a glimpse of them. Even when the lines of friendship blurred between them and they started to make out…nothing. Santana even wore bracelets during sex.
By the time they hit the second semester of their sophomore year, Brittany was ready to confirm what she was pretty sure she already knew. She'd given Santana plenty of time to show her herself, but evidently her best friend was intent on keeping it a secret forever.
On their last sleepover of the school year –held to celebrate making it through another year of high school- Brittany let Santana change, let her climb on the bed, even let her pin Brittany's arms over her head and be on top like she loved. And then, when Santana's lips were on her neck and her hand was lax on Brittany's wrist, Brittany took her by surprise and rolled them over, trapping Santana under her and grabbing hold of both of her wrists. Santana stared up at her with wide eyes, still breathing a little heavily, and stiffened when she saw Brittany's eyes on the bracelets covering her left wrist. "Brit-"
Brittany leaned forward and kissed the palm of Santana's hand gently, smiling when Santana moved to cup her cheek with it and swallowed hard. Gently, she released Santana's other hand and reached up to slide the bracelets away from Santana's wrist. Up close and right in front of her face, there it was: a tiny pink triangle. The old, faded scars covering it registered a second later and Brittany turned to look at Santana's face, confused. Santana chewed on her lip for a moment, then quietly admitted, "I just wanted it to go away."
Brittany frowned, not understanding, but knowing that for whatever reason, this triangle had caused Santana a lot of pain. She gingerly kissed her wrist once, before raising her own wrist for comparison. Brittany's triangle was paler, almost faded, like maybe she was halfway to being like everyone else, like maybe she had a chance at being "normal". Santana's was different, darker, more full. There was no room for flexibility like there was with Brittany's.
"Santana, what do these mean?" she finally decided to ask. If anyone would tell her, it'd be Santana.
There was a long silence while Santana seemed to mull that one over, and Brittany watched Santana's eyes trace her body from the spot where Brittany was straddling her, until finally their eyes met. The corners of her lips curled upward and Brittany smiled back, waiting for an answer. After a moment, she got one.
"They mean that we love each other."
Brittany's eyebrows furrowed in confusion. "That's all?"
"That's all."
She laughed at that, rolling off of Santana and snuggling up beside her instead. "I already knew that, silly. Why is that such a big deal?"
Santana sighed beside her. "I'm really not sure, Brit."
"Hmm." She mimicked Santana's sigh with one of her own and buried her face in Santana's neck, a little confused about what all the fuss had been over for so many years, and heavily underwhelmed by an answer she'd expected to be a little more complicated.
But then she smiled. Because if she and Santana got triangles for loving, then that meant maybe Kurt, Dave, and all of those girls she'd kissed had somebody to love now, too.