Disclaimer: Still don't own Glee, despite asking to on my Christmas list...
Author's note: In this story, the Brittana break up still happened; however, Brittany's relationship with Sam ended towards the end of January, fizzling out as she realised she'd rather have him as a best friend than a boyfriend. Santana and Brittany, after much talking, officially got back together at the start of their spring break and have been together ever since.
"...Why don't you come on over, Valeri-i-i-ie?"
Santana grinned as the crowd erupted into applause, hollering and calling for an encore. Sure, it was only a small bar, one of many that littered New York, yet it drew quite an audience on its weekly live music nights, locals and tourists alike cramming in for a chance to see the next big thing before their career really kicked off.
"Thank you, thank you, you've been amazing tonight..." She winced as the guitarist tripped over the microphone lead, a piercing sound filling the bar as it was tugged slightly out of its socket. Blushing underneath the playful glares being sent his way, the guitarist plugged it back in hurriedly, no desire to take the attention away from the singer's big moment. "I'm afraid we can't do any more songs, that's our time up for this week, but hopefully we'll be ba-.."
"Two beers and a rum and coke, no ice." Santana jumped, the gruff voice dragging her attention away from the singer still busy thanking the crowd to the customer leaning on the bar. Nodding, she fixed the man's drinks as quickly as possible and gratefully accepted the change as a tip; she knew it was more to do with the fact she'd worn a lower cut top tonight than because of her service but hey, a tip's a tip.
The brunette had no time to watch the band traipse off the stage as people crowded the bar, trying to get a drink before the next act came on. Drink order after drink order was thrown at her as people leant on the bar, trying to get served ahead of anyone else; the tactic never worked as Santana often left the more obnoxious customers till last, but who was she to stop them if they wanted to ruin their clothes by leaning on the sticky bar? She hated the crowd on live music nights ('And you hate the fact that you're behind the bar instead of on the stage' whispered the bitter voice at the back of her mind, the one she could never fully ignore), the polite regulars that took the time to chat replaced by tourists and arrogant music fans with little care for those serving their drinks.
Santana shot a glare along the bar at the other girl on her shift in between mixing what felt like her thousandth drink of the night and fetching two beers for a particularly irritating customer in a rather disgusting shirt. Hummel probably would have bleached his eyes after seeing it. Alyssa, the owner's daughter, had made it clear from their very first shift together that she couldn't stand the 'snarky bitch from Ohio'; she seemed to have made it her life's work to do as little as possible whenever the two were on shift together, preferring instead to flirt with her god-awful boyfriend at the end of the bar, knowing that her family links meant she'd never get fired. Honestly, she didn't know why Alyssa didn't just ask her dad to never put them on the same shift, though it was probably because Santana would never complain about how little work she did. Both of them knew the Latina needed the job more than she wanted to complain, and it just wasn't worth the risk.
She sighed wearily as the next act began to play, the crowd turning away from the bar to watch some electro band she really couldn't care less about, and grabbed a bottle of water from one of the fridges. Pausing only to mutter quickly to Alyssa that she was taking a break, she stalked out through the back of the bar to the stock room, tapping her back pocket to make sure her pack of cigarettes hadn't fallen out.
She'd had to downgrade from cigars. Too expensive.
She pulled open the door that led out onto an alley and leant in the doorway to watch the rain drizzling miserably outside, lighting a cigarette with practised hands before frowning at the near emptiness of the packet, resolving to buy another on her route home. She really ought to give up the habit, her nicotine addiction eating into what little money she had left after paying her share of the rent and bills each month, yet she'd become so dependent on it recently to relieve her stress that she couldn't bear the idea of quitting.
She took a large puff of the cigarette before blowing out the smoke in a steady stream, her phone vibrating with a new message as she did. Sighing, she pulled it out of her pocket, thumb sliding to unlock the phone; she half expected it to be Alyssa, bitching at her to get back inside because there was a customer who needed serving. That had happened before...
'Te echo de menos y te quiero. B x'
Warmth shot through Santana as she read and re-read Brittany's text, the corners of her mouth pulling up into a small smile at the simple message. She'd never understood the blonde's ability to do that, to momentarily help Santana to forget all the crap going on in her life with just a few words or a soft smile, yet it was times like these where she was most grateful for it. Her girlfriend always seemed to sense when she was feeling particularly low, whether the two were lying in bed 'star-gazing' (Brittany hated not being able to see the stars because of all the city lights, so had stuck glow-in-the-dark plastic replicas all over their bedroom ceiling) or separated by thousands of miles.
It was nice to hear that Brittany missed her, that she wasn't too busy to forget about Santana, but it didn't change the fact that the blonde was halfway round the world. At that thought, her smiled dropped, the thoughts that had been plaguing her throughout her entire shift returning, and she slipped her phone back into her pocket while taking another long drag of her cigarette. She couldn't help but be a little envious of Brittany, currently in London dancing back-up on some generic pop sensation's world tour. Serving beers was never the career path on which she'd expected to end up.
Everything had gone Brittany's way, from the moment the two had made it to New York. Santana had dropped out of Louisville after a year (with her parents' blessing - they expected it to happen, her father had told her, and were just glad she'd given college a try first) to move to the city with Brittany around a month after the blonde's graduation. They'd thrown themselves into trying to 'build their dream', Brittany trekking back and forth across the city for dance auditions while Santana contacted what felt like every bar she could find that held a live music or open mic night in the hope of performing; but, while Santana had received very positive few responses, forcing her into picking up several jobs to pay her half of the rent (the money her mother had given her would only stretch so far), the blonde had found that every choreographer, director or musician she danced for was desperate to get her onto their projects. Quite the buzz had grown around Brittany. Santana had accompanied her to enough parties to learn that those in the know considered her a rising star in the industry and, in the words of one particularly important choreographer (tongue loosened by the unlimited champagne), 'the best thing I've seen in fucking forever'.
Only Brittany's complete innocence kept her jealousy in check. The blonde had never expected things to be as easy for her as they had been, and was often bewildered by her success. She'd even confessed, murmuring quietly in the Latina's ear as she sat behind her in a bath ready for the minute Santana trudged through the door after working a closing shift (she'd nearly cried at the gesture), that she was sure it would be the other way round, that Santana's career would take off while she struggled to get anything from her auditions. "It'll happen soon," Brittany had whispered softly as the brunette relaxed in her arms. "Soon someone will see just how awesome you are and give you your chance."
Yet here she was, four years after moving to New York: waitress and shop assistant by day, bartender by night.
'Coach Sylvester would be so fucking proud' she scoffed internally, shaking off the ash collecting at the end of her cigarette before taking another drag. Her thoughts often strayed to McKinley when she worked music nights, back to when she'd actually meant something, been someone other than one of the thousands of young hopefuls whose dreams had been crushed beneath the skyscrapers. She could only imagine how scathing some of her former classmates would be if they saw what she'd been reduced to, though she wasn't sure if it would be better or worse than the traces of sympathy, and even pity, she sometimes caught in the faces of the former Glee club members whenever they saw each other. Brittany still insisted they were all a family, and that families kept in touch, so they made sure to see all of the group throughout the year, some more regularly than others. She hated their annual Skype call with Rory - turns out the Irish boy was even harder to understand through a computer, and she often gave up after the sixth or so time his screen went blank, muttering darkly about 'fucking technologically incompetent leprechauns'.
She was Santana fucking Lopez, she thought bitterly as she stubbed out her cigarette against the brick doorway. She neither wanted nor needed their sympathy; so she was working crappy jobs instead of singing? Not everybody had as easy a route to their dream career, but at least she still had her girlfriend and a nice enough apartment (they could have afforded somewhere much nicer with Brittany's earnings, but Santana had felt guilty about not paying her fair share, so they'd adjusted their search to include places where the brunette could afford half the rent). If she just kept her thoughts fixed on that, rather than dwelling on where she thought she'd be by now, she could at least make it to the safety of her own bed before breaking down.
"Santana! Get back in here, there's customers that want serving!" screeched Alyssa, her nasal voice shattering the silence Santana stood in. Sighing, she closed the alley door, slamming it shut harder than necessary in an effort to keep herself from hitting the other girl. God forbid she do an ounce of work tonight... She stopped just before exiting the stock room, taking a moment to collect herself as she fixed a smile on her face before walking back out into the onslaught of orders waiting for her.
Stifling a yawn with the post clenched tightly in her hand, Santana unlocked the door to her apartment, wincing as the sound of it banging off the hall wall reverberated around her already aching head. Wearily stepping inside, she blindly pushed the door closed behind her before making her way through the small open-plan apartment to drop the post on the dining table, pushed against wall after Brittany had danced into it one too many times. The bills could wait until tomorrow morning; they would really put her in the right frame of mind to deal with fussy diners and customers who were adamant that no, that shirt really had been ripped when they bought it.
Her stomach grumbled noisily, abnormally loud against the silence of the apartment; it had taken a few weeks to get used to the quietness after Brittany left, but after four months she had somewhat adjusted to it (spending as little time as possible in the apartment probably helped). She hadn't grabbed anything to eat since...actually, she couldn't remember eating anything all day. Her alarm had decided to run out of battery during the night and it had thrown her whole day out of joint. She'd had to get changed in the stock room of the diner after sprinting to get to her to shift on time; still, it had been worth it just to see the irritating high-schooler who worked the till faint at the sight of her in a bra, having unwittingly stumbled upon her halfway through changing.
She smirked at the memory. The ego boost had been nice.
The egg that had ended up on her top later that afternoon because of some brat's tantrum, however...not so much.
Their answering machine flashed obnoxiously from the counter as she walked into the kitchen area, meaning to fix herself a small snack before bed. 5 new messages, read the small screen; maybe Brittany had rung while she'd been at work. She missed talking to her girlfriend, conversations a lot less interesting without the blonde around, and she tried to not to fell guilty that she hadn't caught her call as she pressed play.
"Yo, lezbro! It's Puck...listen, I'm gonna be in town in two weeks time, can I crash at-... message deleted."
"Hola, mija. Your father and I were just wondering if you and Brittany are planning to vi- message deleted."
"Hey, San, it's Quinn. Wanted to know what day Britt gets back, Rach and I were thinking di- message deleted."
"Hello. This is Rick from the Sundown Bar for Santana Lopez. Unfortunately, we have no openings for singers at the moment, but thanks for your interest in performing at the b- message deleted."
"Sanny!" Santana grinned, tiredness lifting at the sound of her girlfriend's voice. "I can't wait to bring you to London one day! They have like a giant ferris wheel in the middle of the city, it's so much fun...we went on it earlier today, you can see for miles..." She grinned at the excitement in the blonde's voice, imagining her pressed up against the glass of the London Eye, eyes wide as she took in the view - she'd been exactly the same their first time up the Empire State Building. "...and everyone here has really funny accents, like that guy who works at the diner with you. We went to see a football match earlier, except it wasn't really football, it was soccer...why do they have to confuse everybody like that? Oh, oh, and I had a pint at lunch! It was a really disgusting beer, but James said it was like an English tradit- end of message. To hear the message again, press 1."
She growled in frustration. The first thing she was going to do when Brittany got back was break that fucking phone. Well, obviously it wasn't the first thing (she'd spent some of her more boring shifts obsessively planning every detail of their first week back together), but the amount of calls that it had cut short was ridiculous. It was almost worse than not hearing from her girlfriend, in a way, hearing her voice for only a few sentences before she was cut off. Sighing, she deleted the message and made her way to the bedroom, no longer hungry.
She glanced at the clock as she undressed, throwing her clothes lazily into the chair in the corner of the room. It was nearly 3 am, which meant it was nearly 8 in London. She knew the time differences between New York and every stop on the tour by heart, and during one particular alcohol-and-loneliness fuelled breakdown not long after her girlfriend had left, she'd recited them all repeatedly to Quinn, who very much regretted being on Santana-duty that night. Her laptop still sat on Brittany's pillow from their goodnight/good morning chat yesterday, facing the Latina's side of the bed so they could pretend they were lying next to each other. She slid beneath the covers, lying on her side to look at the screen as she logged into Skype, calling her girlfriend as soon as she saw she was online.
"Hey, Britt-Britt."
"Heya, baby," grinned the blonde, rubbing the last traces of sleep from her eyes. "How was your day?"
She shrugged. "Same old, same old. Some little shit threw egg on my top at the diner and there was a folk singer with the most irritating voice at the bar...seriously, he sounded like a mix between a dying cat and a smoke alarm that's running out of power. Ugh. Apart from that, nothing else to report..."
Brittany nodded, her smile dropping slightly, but she chose not to comment on the bitterness that seeped into her girlfriend's voice at the mention of music night, not when she wasn't there to comfort her. "Were you working with Alyssa tonight?" she asked. Anybody who hadn't known Brittany for a long time would have been shocked by the hard edge to the usually calm girl's question, and the sour expression that flashed across her face, yet she disliked Santana's co-worker even more than Alyssa disliked Santana. It was often harder to stop Brittany charging into the bar and complaining about the girl's behaviour than it was to stop herself from stabbing the girl with a corkscrew (how many times she found herself wishing she still carried razor-blades...).
"No, it was some new hire...some guy called, uh, Duncan," she replied, feeling only the slightest twinge of guilt over lying as she watched the smile return to the blonde's face. "So, how was your show last night? Only a few left now, right?" she asked, as if she hadn't been crossing each date off the giant list taped to the bedroom wall.
Brittany smirked knowingly - Santana didn't know Quinn had told her about the checklist - and nodded. "It was fantastic, as always. I don't think I'll ever get over the buzz of dancing in front of a crowd, doing what I love in front of so many..." The dancer winced, not meaning to sound like she was bragging, but Santana nodded for her to continue, a tight smile on her face. "Um, yeah, so...There's only three more shows left...we're going to Dublin tonight for the show tomorrow then two back here next week, so I'll be home next Friday!"
A week tomorrow. She didn't think she'd be able to sit still for the next eight days, arms ready to fling themselves back round her girlfriend.
Just as she opened her mouth to reply, another female voice cut her off on the blonde's end. She couldn't really tell what was being said, but from the frown forming on Brittany's face, it seemed she was being summoned somewhere urgently. Her heart plummeted; first a broken-off phone call, and now she doesn't even get to finish her daily chat with her girlfriend?
"I'm sorry, San," she muttered, a crestfallen look painted across her face. Despite the distractions of dancing and travelling, the separation was just as hard for Brittany as it was for the brunette stuck in New York. "There's been a change to the set list for tomorrow's show, so we need to go learn some new choreography..." she explained, trailing of guiltily.
"I...it's okay, babe. You go do what you need to, I'll text you later."
"Okay...have a good sleep, San. I love you."
"Love you too, Britt. Bye..." She swallowed thickly as she ended the call, slamming her laptop shut before rolling onto her back. Tears pricked in the corners of her eyes as she gazed up at the plastic stars, her thoughts still three and a half thousand miles away with Brittany.
'Just eight more days. You can do this,' she told herself, eventually drifting into a restless sleep.
Author's note: So, what do you think? I'm still new to this (seriously new...this is only my second story) so I'd love to hear any of your thoughts.