Disclaimer: None of Glee belongs to me; I'm a) not Ryan Murphy and b) so not that creative/epically awesome.
AN: None of this is Betaed; I'm the only one who's edited it so sorry for any mistakes.
Chapter 2: Satan and Noah
Being a teenager was hard, sometimes the only part of the day Santana looked forward to was late night movies and gab fests with her best friend. Watching the latest episode of America's Top Model and getting a self esteem boost, or lounging around with a big bowl of popcorn and a few action movies, and every once in a while letting him pick some lame musical to show her. Good thing she demanded no repeats from him because 'West Side Story' was only slightly less offensive than she'd made it out to be (really the Jew should've known better than to show the Latina a musical about a Hispanic gang vs. a white gang). Yeah, her best friend since second grade, Noah Puckerman, was way more into music than either of them let out; he wrote songs, could play four instruments, and do that freaky thing where he could play any song he heard without needing the music. High school was ruled by survival of the fittest, she'd basically created Puck to make sure Noah became popular and didn't get picked on.
Anyways tonight was her night and she'd picked a Mission Impossible marathon, for the hot guys and the kickass spy-ness, duh. She'd already painted Noah's toenails a blinding shade of neon green, he couldn't refuse her demands and it amused her to no end to see him so adorably uncomfortable, but she'd lend him her nail polish remover tomorrow at lunch or something since she'd left it in her locker. They were curled up on the couch in their pjs eating the salted butter-free popcorn when freaking disaster struck in the form of her, supposedly their, friends.
So the Glee girls decided that she was so depressed (i.e. she forgot to insult Rachel during Glee today) that they needed to come over to her house for an impromptu 'Glee Girls' slumber party. It was probably Quinn feeling bad about getting her demoted to the bottom of the pyramid and Brit feeling bad for rejecting her combined with the feel-good togetherness the rest of the club preached. Whatever the reason the stupid maid had let them just waltz in on her and Noah during movie night. It looked way worse than it could have; the well established rumor that they put the 'benefits' in 'friends with benefits' added to the fact that they were wearing matching sleepwear and cuddling on her couch (her in red drawstring shorts and a white tank with an adorable penguin plastered across the chest and him wearing a white 'wife beater' and red flannel pj pants with more of that same penguin all over them). At least they weren't watching one of his movies, they were mostly pretty sappy and some were borderline gay (normal straight boys so didn't own RENT).
"This is so not what it looks like," Santana exclaimed as she jumped up from the couch almost upsetting the popcorn bowl that had been sitting next to her. Quinn, Brittany, Tina, and Mercedes stood in the hallway and stared. When Puck shifted and started to rise too she snapped out of her shock. "Noah sit, girls I'll explain in my room." Ushering them down the halls ahead of her Santana called back over her shoulder, "You can just leave everything for the maid I think movie night's probably canceled tonight, I'll text you later."
"So you can get your story straight?" Quinn sneered as they reached Santana's bedroom. Obviously she thought she was cheating on Sam, who Santana was currently dating, with Puck. "Really, Santana I thought even you had better morals. What happened to being faithful and not sleeping around, or does that just not apply to Puck as usual?"
"I've never cheated, if I'm in a committed, monogamous, relationship I stay faithful. And Puck wouldn't have done anything with you if you hadn't gone over to his house while he was drinking and gotten drunk with him and then kissed him when all he did was reassure you that you weren't fat!" Quinn looked like she'd been slapped, which verbally she sort of had been. "That's right, you started it and if he hadn't been so drunk he could barely tell which way was up Puck would've stopped it right away. Did you know he called me the minute he woke up the next morning almost ready to jump off a cliff or something because he'd just messed around with Finn's girl? No, nobody ever considered his side of it! He wanted to apologize to Finn right away, he especially didn't want Finn to be burdened with a baby because of his own mistake, but you wouldn't let him. You let it drag out until he looked like a real douche and practically ruined their friendship."
Panting for breath she calmed down as the other girls stared at her for her outburst in Puck's, belated, defense.
"Wait, Quinn kissed Puck?" Leave it to Brittany to pick up on the most miniscule of the important facts.
"More importantly you knew who the real father was from the beginning and you didn't say anything, to anyone?" Mercedes got it, as a fellow gossip whore she understood how important it was that Santana had known all the sides of the story and kept them to herself.
"Duh, I don't share my friends' secrets," rolling her eyes she decided then to give them a bit more of the truth tonight and spill the rest with Noah in Glee tomorrow, might as well, he was mellowing and his popularity was already pretty low. "And Noah, he's my best friend."
"You're getting rid of me," Brittany started tearing up.
"God Brit, no. For one I like almost never make out with Noah, and for two he's totally been my best friend since like second grade. Before I met you." Yeah, this shocking people thing was really fun. She might have to share even more than she'd originally planned at Glee just to see the shocked looks. Although she really ought to get Quinn a chair, the girl looked ready to faint. "Do you all wanna change into your pjs and get comfortable or something before Q passes out on my floor?"
A few minutes were spent taking turns changing in the in-suite bathroom, or just stripping in front of everybody like Brittany, and Santana pulled out the air mattresses out of the closet. They sat around in silence listening to the motor hum as it pumped air into the two queen sized mattresses covering all the open floor space. Oddly enough, aside from Santana, all the girls wore nightdresses: pink for Brittany, white and lacy for Quinn, long and turquoise for Mercedes, and (surprise, surprise) black with purple ribbon around the edges for Tina. Eventually Quinn was the first to break the silence, again.
"Sooo, Puck?"
"Yeah, he's secretly my bitch." There was sputtering and choking on air among the other girls, much to her pleasure.
"What exactly do you mean by, uh, your bitch," Tina almost squeaked out the last word.
"I mean he's totally my bitch. He does whatever I tell him to," Santana smirked at the doubtful expressions surrounding her. "Really, who did you think paid for his vasectomy? Me. Why do you think he waited so long to suddenly join Glee? I told him to. The reason he stayed in Glee and not football last year? I said he could. Noah Puckerman has always listened to me."
"Really?" Mercedes looked skeptically at her. Actually they all looked disbelieving.
"Fine, I'll prove it. Tomorrow in Glee, Puck will obey my every command, willingly embarrass himself in front of everyone, admit that I'm his best friend, spill a few hidden secrets, and shave off his precious Mohawk all when I demand it." Okay, now none of them looked like they believed her. Hell, if she didn't know Noah so well she probably wouldn't believe she could get him to do all that at once either. "One condition, all of this stays completely within Glee. No one outside ever finds out how much I control him and what you walked in on tonight never happened; even your diary doesn't find out about tonight."
"What about-"
"Even Kurt," she answered Mercedes's question before the other girl could finish it. "You can talk to him all about whatever happens in Glee. If, after everything else tomorrow, Noah wants to share about our movie nights then he can, but I do actually care about him so I don't want anything getting out without his knowledge or permission. Maybe we'll invite you to the next one, he's gotten very good at touching up my manicure when I get a chip." Laughing she bounced across her bed and pulled back the blankets. "Now, unless you had something planned, I'll let you ladies digest all this while I get a head start on sleeping. Just remember if any of this does get out I can make your lives hell, and if I told Puck to slushie you three times a day every day from now on he totally would, no matter who or what you are. Good night."
School had just ended and all the Gleeks were gathered in the choir room, Mr. Schuester was running a few minutes behind as usual and all the girls, besides Rachel, were watching Santana expectantly. Standing, she brushed invisible dirt off her cheerios uniform, and waltzed to the front of the room until she was directly in front of the piano.
"Excuse me everyone, I have something mostly non-musical to share with the group," by now Santana had everyone's attention even Puck, who was balancing on just two legs of his back-row chair. "Noah, come here." The chair legs slammed down and Puck had stumbled down the risers before he even realized what he was doing. Stopping halfway across to empty space he looked around confusedly.
"Uh, was I not supposed to respond or are we coming clean to the Glee club," he semi-whispered to her.
"Hey, how come he never responded so promptly when I called him Noah?" Rachel complained. Santana smirked at the other girls before responding.
"Because you haven't been training him to obey your every command since he was seven." Turning back to Puck she continued, "Of course you were supposed to, yes I've decided to share our true relationship with the club. Now, I've decided you can get rid of the Mohawk, here's a clean razor get shaving."
Handing Puck a still packaged disposable razor she stood waiting for his response, looking perfectly relaxed to the audience. Shrugging he opened the packet.
"So would you rather I do it in here or should I head to a bathroom?"
Smiling she responded, "in here. I brought a towel you can do it over." She handed over the hand towel and a full water bottle and motioned for him to get on with it. While he tilted his head, wet his hair, and started shaving she turned back to their stunned audience.
"Noah Puckerman and I have been best friends since second grade. Our relationship is one of mutual understanding; Noah understands that when I command something he will do it as quickly as he can, and I understand that I will always be obeyed. Once he's done I've decided to show you a few of his more interesting hidden talents and he and I will answer any of your questions. All our answers will be completely truthful, if he doesn't want to answer a question, or I don't want to, then we'll just respond 'no comment.'" Pulling out a nail file she leaned casually against the piano.
"First I'm going to tell you some of the basics. Noah and I have never sexted each other, I find sexting is usually boring and not as good as real sex. Also we've only ever had sex twice: once to lose our respective virginities when we were 14 and once so I could see how I felt about bondage about a year later. It's really never been about sex between us. I am the one who decided on the nickname 'Puck' and I invented dumpster dives and pee balloons. Noah's sadly not quite that mean. But I decided to save him from the fate of being some sort of band nerd and built him into one of the top dogs of the high school food chain, so you can blame all of your past humiliations at the hands of Puck on my masterful mind. There is a reason his nickname for me is Satan. Now I will take questions until he's done."
"Was it your idea to nail all of Kurt's lawn furniture to his roof?" Mercedes seemed really pissed off to discover that she'd been feeding Puck ideas all this time.
"Well, yes actually, the boys Noah was with wanted to graffiti crude things on the side of his house so Noah texted me asking for a good way to prevent that. We decided on that prank as the best option, it took effort, looked hilarious, and appeased the other jocks' need to humiliate the fairy boy. Next." No one noticed Mr. Schue slipping quietly into the room; they were so intent on Santana's confessional.
"Why did you and Puck make-out and act like you were sleeping together if you weren't?" This question came from Tina.
"Appearances. Now, Noah you're done right?" Upon receiving a nod she turned to the portable radio someone had left on a stool near the piano and grabbed it. "Okay, I'm gonna turn this to that classical station, Noah listen." Tuning it a bit she reached a station that was playing some sort of piano piece and let it play for almost a minute before abruptly switching it off. "Alright, Noah play."
"That was a duet, do you want me to play one part or should I be trying to replicate everything," asked the freshly bald teen as he sat down at the piano.
"Everything," she demanded as she folded up the towel with the razor and his hair in it. Placing everything back in her bag she waved him on. Nodding he focused on the piano and started playing exactly what they'd just heard on the radio, minus a few trickier bits that were impossible without more hands. Once he had gone through to the place she cut off the piece and stopped Santana continued to speak. "He can play anything he hears like perfectly without the sheet music, he plays piano, drums, bass, and guitar, and he writes songs. He actually loves music, he so would've been a band nerd and a Gleek right away if I hadn't stopped him, but hey it's kind of a losing battle now so I'm giving up, mostly, he still has to play football and workout. Now does anyone have any questions for Noah?"
"Wait, when I was teaching you guys about the drums you already knew how to play?" Finn looked both confused and brokenhearted at the same time.
"Yeah man, sorry, but Satan said not to let on that I could do anything beyond play guitar and sing." Puck looked so apologetic that Finn just sighed and shrugged it off.
"So, are you admitting that you've been best friends with Santana since the second grade?" Quinn asked, determined to see if all the promises the other girl had made the night before could actually be fulfilled.
"Uh, yeah. We've always been best friends, even when we're pretending to hate each other, or when we're ignoring each other for real." He responded as if this should have been the most obvious thing in the world. "She totally just told you that."
"Okay, I'll admit, Santana, you've done everything but you mentioned one last thing."
"Calm down Q, now boys, Dwarf, I've already sworn all the girls to secrecy but I'm also gonna demand it from you. If anything that's been said or done today gets leaked out of this room I'll make your life hell and, as I've already told the girls, if I tell Puck to slushie you three times a day he will. If I tell him to fight you, teepee your house, blast you with pee balloons, vandalize your car, or a million other things I can think of he will. He will obey me without question, regardless of the consequences." Here Puck was nodding along with her calm threats and everyone else was looking appropriately freaked out. As everyone else mumbled agreement to keeping everything a secret she smiled. "Excellent, now Noah take off your shoes and socks."
Over some protestations from various Glee clubbers, mainly Rachel about being sanitary, Puck obediently pulled off his footwear. Everyone fell silent as his still neon green toenails were revealed. A faint blush covered his cheeks as he avoided catching anyone's eyes.
"So last night I painted Noah's toenails, and I'm showing you not only to fulfill my goal of thoroughly embarrassing him today but also to emphasize that he will do whatever I say, no matter what. Now you can have the nail polish remover." She pulled the bottle out of her bag and handed it, and some cotton swabs, to him. "Go remove it in the corner, Mr. Schue can totally have the club back now. Thank you for your time." Bowing she flounced back to her seat as Noah shuffled over to the corner and went about removing the embarrassing color from his toes.
"Wait!" Sam called out, "Are you two in love or something?" From all the nodding and awkward glances toward Puck it was obvious that most of the club thought that he, at the least, was in love with Santana. Puck however snorted and shook his head in reaction.
"No way man, I know for a fact that Satan over there-," he ducked the nail file that flew through the air precisely where his head had been, "is completely in love with someone else, and I am only attracted to small parts of her domineering personality. Basically I'm her bitch, like prison without the rape; she chose me to be her slave ages ago so that's how it stays until someone bitchier comes along, although if that did happen I'm pretty sure I'd be helping her hide the body, so I guess I'm stuck with her for life." He sighed dramatically as he tossed the file back to Santana before starting on the next foot, the efficiency with which he cleaned off the nail polish betrayed the years of having a female best friend to any observer.
"Wow, today has been really, revealing. Does anyone else have anything they'd like to share before we start the lesson of the week?" Mr. Schuester asked as he stepped forward from his previous place by the door. "Uh, Noah, I guess we might use you on one of the other instruments we now know you can play."
"You've really still gotta call me Puck Mr. Schue, sorry, but Noah's not who we show everyone at school. So until Satan says it's okay I'm still Puck here, and I'm still going to act like it in public." Capping the bottle of nail polish remover and giving the last of his toes one more swipe with a cotton swab he pulled on his socks, straightened, slipped on his shoes, and jumped down the risers while he shoved the used cotton in his pocket. Walking calmly over to Santana he tucked the clean swabs and the nail polish remover back into her bag and flopped into the free chair next to her. "Next week you are not allowed to paint my nails, and I'm picking the cheesiest musical I can find for us to watch."
"Revenge of the best friend, I'm so scared," she responded in a monotone.
"You should be, I might ask Rachel for movie advice." At Puck's response she blanched and looked a little green as she resolutely stared straight ahead. He smirked and leaned back in his seat. "You know none of them asked the really interesting question; was it us who got Karofsky expelled and sent to a psych ward all so Kurt could feel safe enough to come back?"
"There's no proof that he wasn't an insane sadistic sociopathic stalker who tortured squirrels in his free time," she calmly replied in a way that gave everyone in the classroom chills running up their spins, and the unshakable impression that she had everything to do with the irrefutable proof the police had found in his locker, garage, basement, and bedroom.
"The answer is; there's no proof that we had anything to do with it, but I personally would never cross Satan." Puck chuckled darkly before smiling in a seeming one-eighty, "So, Schuester, what's on the agenda for today?"
It was that moment that the entire Glee club vowed to never, ever, give either Santana or Puck any reason to want revenge on them. And Sue Sylvester, who was watching them through her hidden cameras, decided to promote Santana back up the pyramid for intensely Sue-like qualities. Kurt cursed his white knight syndrome and tried to kill the small crush on Puck that had just blossomed.
PS: The musical side of Puck/Noah is based completely off of Mark Salling's talents, except for the being able to play anything he hears: I've met a guy like that and it's an amazing talent (so fun to just turn on the radio and make him play random stuff) so I just had to include it.
Also I'm totally a SantanaXBrittany and PuckXKurt shipper (also I don't care about 'positions' in a fanfic relationship or whatever: who cares about anything other than it's well written). So I had to add a little hope for a Kurt/Puck relationship in there in the end, even if just for me 'cause this story is really about Santana and Noah's friendship.
PPS: Did anyone else misread Santana's name as Satana at first and think 'cool that totally matches her bitch personality'?