She's just trying to get to sleep on a Saturday night when the screen of her phone illuminates her room, and she squints her eyes to read the text message.

can you sneak out

It alarms her, because Santana is surprisingly well-spoken through text message, and generally uses proper capitalization and punctuation.

Not to mention the time of night.

I don't have to sneak out. Daddies trust me. Where are you?

She pulls on some sweats, instead of pajamas, and tip toes into her dads' room, wakes up her dad, the lighter sleeper of the two of them, and tells him Santana needs her and she's going to stay there. He sleepily tells her to drive safely and call in the morning.

Santana's sitting on the front steps to her house when Rachel pulls up. She'd had to program the address into her GPS because she's never been here before. The thought startles her.

Santana looks terrible. Rachel can't really place why, because the girl's still wearing the outfit she presumably went out in tonight, which is a very tight dress and not much else. She's not wearing shoes, though, and she's got tears streaming down her cheeks. Is it possible to feel underdressed for an SOS call in the middle of the night? If so, that's where Rachel's head is. She's likely trying to distract herself from the fear she's feeling over why Santana's called her over in the first place.

As she walks up the steps, Santana stands. Rachel gets a flash of the girl's robin's egg blue panties as she moves. That shouldn't make her blush, but it does. "Is it like, possible for you to be quiet? 'Cause my parents are sleeping," Santana says. It's the meanest thing she's said to Rachel in a while, but she lets it slide, because Santana is clearly upset.

Once they're in the girl's room, Rachel sits down at the end of the unmade bed and Santana starts moving around, getting a pair of pajamas from her dresser and pulling her messy hair up into a clip. She stumbles a bit on her own feet and Rachel realizes she probably had something (too much) to drink wherever she was before this. She desperately wants to know what's going on, but she doesn't want to ask, because she thinks she knows Santana well enough to realize that the girl will talk when she's ready to talk.

Santana unzips her dress at the side and pushes it down off her body. She's not wearing a bra and Rachel averts her eyes immediately, looking to her lap instead of at her friend's admittedly beautiful body.

Then she hears, "Oh, my god, virgin, I'm dressed now," in a tone that reminds her of the first two years of high school, and she feels something building in her throat and wants to leave right now if all Santana's going to do is be mean to her. "Would you please stop looking like it's torture to be sitting here? God."

"What do you want me to do, Santana?" Rachel asks, suddenly angry herself. "You called me over here and now all you're doing is taking your emotions, whatever they are, out on me." Santana rolls her eyes and leans back against her dresser. "And I'm sorry if I'm uncomfortable with you very randomly taking your clothes off in front of me."

"Whatever," Santana laughs. "It's just a body, Rachel."

"Maybe that's your problem," Rachel says, standing up abruptly. "You should respect yourself and others a little more."

"What the fuck are you talking about?"

"It's not just a body," Rachel snaps. She has no idea how she got so upset, but she is. "Maybe if you realized that there's more to a person than just skin and...and parts, and that people, yourself included, have actual emotions, you'd be a little happier and people would use you less." Santana just stares. Her lips part a bit, as if she's surprised, but she doesn't say anything. "And you should use them less, too."

"Fuck off," Santana says, indignant. "You think you know everything? Who the fuck are you to judge?"

Rachel isn't even sure that makes sense, but she's not going to point it out.

"I'm the person you called to come console you in the middle of the night, and now you're treating me like you're a million times better than me!"

That doesn't make sense either.

"So leave!"

"Fine!"

Rachel stomps towards the door (and that keep quiet request has clearly been forgotten), but Santana grabs her arm. "Fuck. I'm..." Rachel figures Santana isn't built for making proper apologies. "If you weren't so fucking right all the time, people would like you more."

"Well, sorry for having half a brain and more emotional depth than the people we go to school with," Rachel says, turning as she crosses her arms. "What do you want?"

"Can you put away the bitch act?"

"I don't know. Can you?" Rachel spits back. They lock eyes and Santana smiles first, and it's kind of contagious, and they both end up laughing as they stand there in Santana's big bedroom in the dim lighting.

"Probably not." Santana sits at the edge of her bed, then sighs and moves back so she's against the pillows, and tucks her legs under the covers.

"What happened tonight?" Rachel asks delicately, because apparently they're done fighting and Santana's ready to actually have a conversation.

"I tried to hook up with Puck." Rachel turns her head quickly to Santana, who pulls her top down and reveals a hickey on her breast. It's unnecessary, because Rachel would have believed her even without the evidence. "I..."

"You couldn't," Rachel states. Santana's chin trembles a bit and she shakes her head. "Because you're gay." She's not saying it to be a bitch, she's saying it so Santana will actually admit it. Which she does, with a nod of her head. She swipes at a tear and Rachel moves closer. "How do you feel?"

"I don't know."

"Did you tell Noah?"

Santana shakes her head. "I told him I felt like I was gonna puke and bailed. And I mean honestly, swallowing might have actually made me gag, so."

"Santana!" Rachel can feel how wide her eyes are, and she knows her skin is flushed. Either she needs to get more comfortable with hearing things like that, or Santana just needs to stop saying them.

"Fuck. Sorry. I forgot you aren't familiar with how he likes to finish." That's not helping. "I still can't believe you dated him for a whole week and a half and you're still a virgin. It's practically a sex miracle."

Rachel rolls her eyes and blows out her breath. "Can we please focus on your sexuality and not my romantic history?"

Santana wiggles down into her bed, then moves to the other side and pulls the covers back, inviting Rachel to lay down. She obviously expected to spend the rest of the night here, so she lays down and lets Santana cover her over with the blankets, even though she hates sleeping in clothes this heavy and she'll probably be too hot to have a restful REM sleep.

"I thought it was just Britt, you know?" Santana says after a minute, as she reaches over and turns off the light. "And I mean, Puck's the hottest guy in school and I know how fucking good he is, but it just wasn't...I couldn't even..."

"Please be as vague as possible," Rachel says seriously, making Santana laugh.

"I didn't feel anything," Santana admits.

Rachel doesn't know how this is going to go over, but she turns on her side and drapes her arm across Santana's body, right above her chest. She ends up lifting her leg up over Santana's thigh a bit, because it's very hard to hug someone when you're both laying down.

"You know it's going to be okay, right?" Rachel asks quietly as she pulls away. Her hand slides across Santana's shoulder and the girl squirms a bit.

"Yeah, I know," Santana insists. "It's just..."

"Go to sleep, okay?" Rachel suggests, getting a little more comfortable. And then because she thinks they need to lighten the mood; "You'll still be gay in the morning."

Santana laughs and puts her hand on Rachel's hip for a second, then leans over and kisses her shoulder through her sweatshirt before rolling away and turning her back to Rachel.

Rachel is standing right there on Monday morning when Santana asks Noah in the hallway whether or not he's pissed at her for not sleeping with him at the party. He says he's not, and Rachel believes him (Santana does, too) and that he just 'took care of it' himself before trying to find her and make sure she was okay. Rachel smiles, because if she ignores the dirty parts, that's actually kind of sweet. She thinks Santana and Noah have always been better friends than anything else. She also thinks Noah knows a lot more about Santana's situation than the girl wants to admit.

He walks them to the cafeteria, but the chivalry ends there, because he says they can 'buy their own damn coffee and shit', as he's not made of money.

Santana acts like nothing ever happened. Rachel asks her about it after school, and Santana shrugs her shoulder and says, "Why should I act any different now that I've got a label or whatever? That's fucking stupid, and totally like...Whatever. Way to perpetuate the stereotype of the gay teen, Rachel."

"Do you even know what you're saying?" Rachel giggles from the passenger seat.

Santana shrugs her shoulder, then they both laugh and Santana invites herself over for dinner, but neither Rachel nor her dads really mind at all.

They're sitting with Brittany, Mercedes and Tina, and all three of them are talking non-stop about prom. Rachel speculates that the only thing worse than this conversation right now would be if Quinn were here to be a completely obsessive maniac about prom.

Rachel used to think prom would be some kind of magic evening, with a dress matched to a boy's tie, and a corsage made of sweet pea or cherry blossoms. She actually thought she might have that, for a while. She and Finn had talked about it in the summer, what colour she might wear and what song he'd request for them to dance to. It was silly, probably, just time spent daydreaming in her room or wherever.

"I'm not going," Santana says as she tosses a Cheeto into her mouth. The four other girls stare at her. "What? I don't have a date. I'm not going alone, and it's super lame anyway."

"Take Puckerman," Mercedes says as she picks at her cuticle. She shrugs her shoulder when she looks up and sees the expression on Santana's face.

"You could," Rachel says, mostly just to be a brat. "I mean, he'd want to have sex with you at the end of the night."

"Please. That boy wants to have sex with any one of us right now," Mercedes laughs.

"True," Santana adds. "I'll probably just stay home and watch slasher movies or something. You know, like the anti-prom."

Rachel gasps. That's a brilliant idea! She doesn't necessarily want to go alone either and watch Quinn and Finn be crowned prom court and parade one another around like show dogs. She's already decided that Quinn would be a standard poodle and Finn something dopey. She hasn't picked a breed. There's a chance she's spent a little too much time thinking about this.

"I think that sounds like a great idea," she says, and Santana just laughs and shakes her head.

"You two are not ditching out on prom," Mercedes says indignantly. "I don't have a date either, and I'm going."

"Yeah, but you're a lo..." Rachel covers Santana's mouth with her hand before she can finish. She pulls it away after Santana rolls her eyes. "Whatever. If I'm going, Rachel's going."

"We should all go together!" Rachel cries, excitement coursing through her. "It'll be like...like, a triple friend date!"

"You're so lame it hurts me. It physically hurts me." Santana shakes her head. "If we're doing this shit, we're fucking not matching our dresses or anything gay like that."

Rachel doesn't mean to laugh. She presses her lips hard together and holds it in as best she can. "We could all do shades of pink," she suggests.

Santana gives her a look. "I don't do pink."

"You wore pink two days ago," Rachel points out. "Anyway, I love this idea."

Mercedes ends up being asked by Sam, and Santana makes fun of them both for far too long about it, considering she's been making fun of the Triple Friend Date since they agreed to do it. Rachel figures out pretty quickly that this is just her deflecting. Santana doesn't want to be exposed at prom just because she doesn't have a date, and tearing down other people is kind of just what Santana does when she's trying to take the attention off herself.

They're getting ready at Rachel's house, since Santana's dad apparently has work friends over for dinner or something. Santana's curling Rachel's hair and they're listening to Beyonc and talking about nothing, really. Well, talking about Finn and Quinn, and the fact that Brittany, Artie and Noah are all going to prom alone. Rachel sincerely hopes that Santana won't ditch her for Brittany halfway through the night. She knows that's selfish, but she doesn't exactly care. Santana doesn't talk a lot about her feelings for the blonde, but Rachel knows they're there and they're strong. Or at least that they were strong and they're not completely gone. She supposes that if Santana does end the night with someone else, Rachel can just find Noah and adopt him as her date. She's a little nervous about what it'd mean to be his prom date, though. Obviously they're friends and he'd never expect her to do anything, but he no doubt wants to end his night with a girl who'll let him take her dress off, and she'll feel uncomfortable keeping him from that.

She's thinking too much. They're supposed to be having fun.

"We don't have to do this, you know," she finds herself saying. Santana gives her a strange look in the mirror. "I mean, go together. If it's too much for you, or..."

"Shut up, Rachel. Girls go to proms together all the time and no one thinks anything of it. It's totally a double standard, too, 'cause look at Kurt and how hard it is for him to bring Blaine. Fucking bullshit."

"That's not what I'm saying."

Santana rolls her eyes and reaches for the rhinestone encrusted headband she picked out for Rachel at the mall. (It looks like a tiara, she'd said, and it'll piss Quinn off. Rachel can't say no to that. Besides, she likes sparkles.) She secures the headband without messing up Rachel's perfectly curled hair, and then gives it a healthy dose of hairspray and fiddles with the curls at the back of Rachel's head.

"I want to," Santana finally says, but she's not even looking at Rachel. "I think it's really fucking dumb that two girls as hot as ourselves didn't even get asked to prom. I mean, really, what is up with that? Is everyone gay?" Rachel laughs despite herself. "It'll be fun, and I won't have to worry about putting out at the end of the night."

So that's that.

The dance itself is fun, even if it is rather low-budget. Rachel has to actually hold Santana back from telling Quinn how incredibly cheap the entire place looks. They're seated at a table with Mercedes and Sam, Tina and Mike, and Noah. There's an empty chair, so Santana says she and Rachel will sit on either side of Noah so it doesn't look like he's a complete loser. Rachel doesn't know what it is, exactly, that he whispers in Santana's ear, but it makes her laugh and call him a horrible name, so Rachel figures being kept in the dark is best in this instance.

Noah brushes his hand over Rachel's backside when Finn and Quinn are announced as Prom King and Queen. Santana pushes his hand away.

The three of them leave before the night is over and end up at Denny's with Mike and Tina, sharing plates of fries and laughing about how this is the most fun they've had all night. Santana falls asleep next to Rachel in her bed, and Rachel's too tired to move away when Santana's hand lands on her stomach under the covers.

Nationals is a complete mess, because no one seems to understand that their level or unpreparedness is going to make them lose. Santana has this whole thing with Brittany, so even she's not an ally right now. Finn and Quinn are too wrapped up in their own little world to do much of anything productive, and Mike and Tina have been arguing since they got to the airport back home. The only people who seem to be taking this seriously whatsoever are herself and Kurt, and all the songs they attempt to write, the group calls out as 'too showy' or 'who said you two could sing the leads?'

She's frustrated beyond belief, and when her pen runs out of ink, she throws it across the room (narrowly missing Santana's head) and bursts into tears. And apparently that's enough to get Santana's attention for the first time since they got to the city, because she stands up and stalks across the room, grabs Rachel by the elbow and pulls her hard up out of her chair. She says, "I got this," to whoever in the room might actually care that Rachel's mid-breakdown (so probably no one) and pulls Rachel down the hall and straight into the stairwell, where she pushes her back against the concrete wall and says, "Breathe, you fucking psycho."

Rachel doesn't appreciate the name-calling, but she breathes anyway.

"What the hell is wrong with you?"

"I wasn't aiming at you," Rachel says. And yes, she does believe it makes a difference in the whole situation. Santana just rolls her eyes. "It's just the stress of the competition."

She gets a glare for her lie. "Don't fucking bullshit me, Rachel. I mean, please, I know you well enough by now to..."

"No, you don't!" Rachel shrieks. It's not a flattering sound, and it's terrible for her vocal chords, and what's worse is that it echoes through the entire stairwell, from what she can tell. Santana is clearly taken aback. "You obviously have no idea how important anything is to me, if you can't even stop cuddling with Brittany long enough to take this competition seriously!"

"I'm not cuddling with anyone!"

"Well, you're certainly not helping me write a song, are you?" Rachel knows she's right, and she can see that Santana recognizes it, too. The girl doesn't break eye contact, but she doesn't say anything, either, which, with Santana, means she realizes she has nothing to say. "I don't even know why I bother."

Rachel pushes herself off the wall and starts back towards the door, but Santana stops her with, "What? Why you bother?"

Rachel tosses her hands up, then turns and glares. "You're clearly more interested in having sex with Brittany than in winning the competition. I guess I'll just have to pick up the slack and...and...save our asses. Again."

"I'm not trying to have sex with Brittany," Santana insists. It's actually really convincing; however, it's not the point right now. "Rachel, don't be..."

"No." Rachel puts her nose in the air a bit and crosses her arms. "Really, it's okay. I'm used to it by now. Maybe when we lose, which we will do, no matter what, since we left everything to the last minute and our director has been completely absent the last couple weeks, you'll all vote for me to receive some consolation trinket again."

"You're being such a bitch right now," Santana says, smiling bitterly as she shakes her head.

"Well, you're being a terrible friend."

Santana's face drains of colour and Rachel is happy enough with getting the final word that she leaves the stairwell and she and Kurt find a different one entirely, take advantage of the acoustics and write a song that, if she may say, is really, really good.

Light Up The World is so catchy and happy that she can't help but smile as she sings it, both the first time and then when they sing it in competition. They're not going to win (they don't) but Santana wrote this song with Artie, of all people, and Rachel can tell from the bags under Santana's eyes that the girl was up all night working on it.

As they're packing their things, Rachel walks up behind Santana and hugs her, and Santana laughs as she straightens up and turns around. "I'm sorry I said you're a bad friend," Rachel says, voice muffled by Santana's hair. "I didn't mean it."

"Yeah you did," Santana says. "But you were right. I'm a bitch like, all the time." She pulls away and wraps her arms around herself, and Rachel just watches. "I was just...Whatever. With Brittany, it's..."

"You take your opportunities when you get them," Rachel says knowingly. She really does understand that. She had a whole relationship with Finn based upon it.

"Well, she's in love with Artie, so."

Rachel smiles sympathetically and looks into Santana's suitcase, where there are two fluffy white hotel bathrobes. "Santana," she giggles.

"Whatever," Santana laughs. "One's for you."

Rachel stops caring about the school being charged for the theft.

The first party of the summer is at Santana's house, and Rachel goes because it'll look bad if she doesn't, not because she really wants to. She knows all of glee club will be there, as well as some of the cheerleaders Santana has deemed are 'not too sucky' to lounge in the backyard by her pool while people drink alcohol Rachel doesn't even want to know how they've procured.

She pulls on her most flattering one piece under her denim shorts and tee shirt with the panda screen printed on the front of it. It's loose-fitting, but not frumpy, and she just bought it at Forever 21, so she knows it's in style. She also picks up some raspberry lemonade on her way over, because it's her favourite summertime drink, and it's pink, and her daddies always say you should never turn up to a party empty-handed. And because large bags of licorice are on sale, she buys one of those, too.

The party is in full swing when she arrives. That's because Santana told her it was starting at 8:00 and it's pushing a quarter after nine when Rachel actually walks through the gate to Santana's backyard. She can see Tina and Mike in the pool, and Finn talking to Noah on the other side of the deck. Santana's by the table she's got set up for snacks, talking to Quinn.

Rachel almost turns around and leaves. It's not like anyone's noticed her, so she really could. She could text Santana and say she's not feeling well. Santana would inevitably see through the excuse, though, and honestly, Rachel knows she can handle this. She's been to parties before. There aren't too many people here she's never spoken to before, and even the ones she sees haven't ever really been all that mean to her.

So she walks over to the refreshment table and sets the two cartons of raspberry lemonade into the cooler that's filled with ice, then tears open the licorice and pulls out a piece for herself as Santana smiles at her.

"Hey."

"Hi," Rachel says. She tosses a faint smile Quinn's way, and the girl rolls her eyes. Rachel's so over trying to impress her.

"Nice of you to show up," Santana says, sarcasm dripping from her words.

Rachel shrugs and bites a piece off her licorice. "I was hoping to make more of a grand entrance, but it seems the people you've invited don't understand how to treat a star."

She says it mostly because it's marginally funny, but also because Quinn seems to have zero sense of humour on a good day, and Rachel's gotten to the point where the exaggerated eye rolls she receives from her ex's new (old) girlfriend are amusing to her. Like, how long before Quinn actually hurts herself expressing her disdain for Rachel?

"Rachel!" she hears screamed from across the lawn, drawing everyone's attention to her, even over the music Santana's got blaring from her outdoor speakers. "I love pandas, oh my god!" It's Brittany, and she's rushing over, dripping wet from just getting out of the pool. Her two piece is, well, barely there, which Rachel supposes kind of works on a girl with a body that incredible. Then she flings her arms around Rachel and asks, "How did you know?"

And really, she didn't, and now her top is soaked from Brittany's body and she just laughs as the girl pulls away and everyone stares. "They're cute, right?"

"So cute," Brittany agrees. "You're wet. Come swimming!"

Rachel can't think of a reason why she shouldn't, so she peels off her clothes and leaves them in a pile near where Brittany has said hers and Tina's are, and ignores the way Noah whistles at her from across the yard as she stands near the deep end of the pool and dips her foot in to test the temperature.

Really, the party isn't all that bad. It's better than she expected, really. Noah passes her a bottled vodka cooler at one point, and she sips it slowly through the night, so slowly that she doesn't even get a buzz from it, which is good. It's already been determined that she's spending the night (Santana is definitely buzzed and a while ago insisted Rachel sleeping over). She even has a halfway decent conversation with Finn without Quinn getting jealous (Rachel's word) and bitchy (Santana's). Brittany starts a game of chicken and climbs on top of Sam's shoulders, and Rachel sits out most of the game, until Mike insists that Tina can't play this game 'for crap' and they should team up. So she gets onto his shoulders and ends up somehow pushing Brittany into the water, which feels like a bigger victory than it should, but that's probably because everyone's cheering her on.

Most people have designated drivers, and Artie's mom comes to pick up him, Brittany, Mike and Tina, which Rachel thinks is somewhat odd because of the history, not because Artie and Mike live in the same neighbourhood. Noah and Sam decide to crash at Santana's, Noah claiming the spare room as his and 'forcing' Sam to take the pull out couch in the basement rec room, like it's some sort of punishment or something. Rachel's sleeping in Santana's room, though that's not discussed so much as it is just a given. She's slept in here a several times and it's not as though it's a strange thing for the two of them to share a bed.

The fact that Santana is a lesbian really doesn't affect Rachel whatsoever. It's strange, she thinks, because were Noah to suggest she sleep in the same bed as him for a night, she'd call him insane and possibly ask him to stop making advances. With Santana, she just trusts the girl. They're simply friends. So what if when they sleep in the same bed, they somehow manage to end up cuddling, pressed closely together? It's just something that happens. It's not something they talk about.

Anyway, Rachel's wearing a set of pajamas borrowed from her friend and Santana's standing next to the bed in a tee shirt that Rachel thinks was Matt Rutherford's, once upon a time, and pulling her hair up into a knot at the top of her head.

"Did you see her tonight?" Santana asks, not bothering to look at Rachel.

"Brittany?"

Santana nods and slips between the sheets, keeps her back to Rachel. "She looked really happy, right? Like, with Artie, I mean."

Rachel watches as Santana looks carefully over her shoulder. "Yeah. She's definitely happy. And not just because that's her natural disposition. They're sweet together."

She's being very honest because that's what she and Santana tend to do with one another, even when it hurts to hear the truth. She's really not even all that sure it does hurt Santana anymore.

"Yeah," Santana says. She switches off the light and sighs. Rachel knows Santana definitely had more to drink than her. "It's good. That she's happy."

Rachel leans a little closer and finds Santana's hand, weaves their fingers together. Santana rolls so she's flat on her back, and the two of them lay there side by side, looking up at the ceiling.

When she says she wants to do something instead of laying around at one of their houses, she really doesn't think Santana's going to tell her to dress appropriately for Cedar Point, which means 'nothing with fucking animals on it, Jesus Christ'. Rachel hasn't been to an amusement park in ever, so she doesn't now what 'appropriate' is for this day trip. She settles on denim shorts, a plain black tank top and Converse sneakers, and Santana doesn't tell her to change when she arrives to pick Rachel up, so she figures she chose well.

They stop for iced coffee (kind of a staple of the summer so far, even though they're just three weeks in) on the way out of Lima. Rachel buys, since Santana is driving. Then, as she flips through Santana's iPod and tries to find something fun to listen to on the drive, she mentions never having been to an amusement park, and Santana asks how that's even possible.

"Daddy doesn't like rides and Dad doesn't do well with the heat," Rachel explains, shrugging her shoulder. "I wouldn't have had anyone to come with me."

"But the school takes a trip like, every year."

Rachel laughs and gives Santana a look. "Why on earth would I sign myself up to go on a trip out of town with people who hate me? I'm sure someone would have found a way to humiliate me spectacularly."

Santana doesn't say anything, but nods her head, and then a few moments later, turns up the Aaliyah song Rachel chose. "Well, I'm totally taking your amusement park virginity today. We're gonna do it up right."

Rachel's face flushes and she sips her drink. Statements like that really shouldn't make her uncomfortable, but, well, they kind of do. Santana obviously knows she's actually a virgin, though they really don't talk about sex all that much, considering who Santana is and what her dating history looks like. Sure, they talk about it in the abstract, like just in general, but never really in specifics. Rachel knows details about Santana's sex life that she could handle not knowing, yes, but Santana has never so much as asked Rachel how far she let things go with Finn. She certainly hasn't asked about Rachel's relationship (and...whatever it was she did with him during her breakup with Finn) with Noah. She's already figured out that it's probably because Santana already has all the details from him, which doesn't upset her as much as it probably should. Possibly because there's really nothing to tell.

They get to the park and pay their way, and Santana insists the best way to do the park is to get the water rides out of the way first, so you dry (quickly, in this sun) throughout the day and don't have to sit in wet clothes for too long. Rachel figures this logic is sound. After that, they go on two other roller coasters that are completely terrifying to look at, but not all that scary to be on. Rachel refuses to scream, and Santana tries to act nonchalant about the entire thing, but her hands are gripping the railings so hard her knuckles are white. Rachel doesn't say anything about that. They (yes, both of them) flirt with a group of college-aged boys to get them a better spot in line and no one seems to care. Rachel thinks it's hilarious that Santana can still lead boys on as well as she can, but then again, it's really not all that hard. She doesn't think she's faring too poorly herself, and one guy even asks for her number, but Santana's tugging her hand and starting to jog away, so Rachel just smiles at him over her shoulder.

"That was fun!" Rachel giggles as they slow to a walk near the next ride Santana wants to line up for.

"Yeah. See what happens when you actually pay attention to the opposite sex?" Rachel laughs even harder and Santana rolls her eyes, but she's smiling. "Or, like. Whatever. The sex you're interested in. God."

"They were really cute."

"They were frat douches and I knew we could play them to get ahead in line," Santana says, her tone indicating that Rachel's being naive about the whole thing, which she doesn't think she is. "Look, whatever." Santana weaves their fingers together as they walk side by side. Rachel doesn't know where they're going, but for once, she's just happy to be led. "Like who you want, but those guys were idiots. If you're gonna go for an older guy, at least find one who has half a brain."

"You don't know that one of them didn't. You're being awfully quick to judge."

"The whole point of dating college guys is that they're better than high school boys in like, every way. Since you're not gonna fuck anyone any time soon, you should at least be able to talk about like books or whatever without wanting to smack him."

Rachel laughs far harder than she should.

Towards the end of the day, when they've gone on all the rides they want to and they've had far too much sun exposure, they grab some food and eat it while walking through the park. There's this little store that sells souvenirs and other little trinkets, and Rachel finds little leather bracelets that are braided, and buys two of them while Santana's off looking at something else. When they're outside, she pulls them out of her pocket and hands one to Santana, who looks between the bracelet and Rachel dubiously.

"Seriously?"

"Put it on!" Rachel laughs, and yes, she's far too happy about this. She fastens the bracelet around Santana's wrist, then puts her own on.

Santana looks at her wrist, then drops it by her side again. "This is by far the gayest thing I've ever done, and I've had sex with a girl."

"Shut up," Rachel giggles. "They're friendship bracelets."

"Well, fuck. At least you didn't like, have mine engraved with your initials or something." Rachel gasps. That's such a good idea. "Don't even, Rach. You're lucky I've even got this thing on."

"I am not. You love it."

Santana says nothing, just grins and takes Rachel's hand again, and they head for the exit of the park after deciding they're done for the day.

(It takes only about three days for them both to have tan lines from their bracelets. Neither of them take them off, even so.)