February 2015

A rhythmic squeal erupted from the joints of Santana's wrought iron bed as Quinn's fingers curled around the bars like ivy around a garden post, bringing the head board's movement into sync with the rolling arch of her exposed body. Soft groans flew from her throat to join the squeaks, her head pressing deep into the pillow with her eyes clenched shut. The familiar mounting of something beneath her stomach triggers the canting of her hips to speed up, to meet this impending force with all the energy she can mus…

It hits her, a blinding break in her consciousness, and steals a gasp on it's way out. A pair of hands hold her hips down from what must have been an unpleasant sudden movement for the head between her legs. Her brain stalled, ridden with static, as her muscles tensed and a voice reverberated around the room that she wasn't capable of registering as her own.

Eventually, her breathing slowed, her senses gradually picked up on their surroundings and her eyes flew open, contracting in the morning light. A creeping of kisses was moving up her stomach, and Quinn looked down to meet Santana's insatiable expression from between her thighs. Her mouth cracked a grin.

A gust of air expelled from her recovering lungs, and Quinn uttered, "Unf, I mean, fuck me, San." Santana wrapped her hands around Quinn's thighs and squeezed them before wiping her mouth and crawling up beside her. It was the languorous crawl of a girl who knew her worth, and Quinn relished it. The visual stood as a reminder of what she had at her fingertips, a girl as inexhaustible as Santana Lopez who had put an end to Quinn's voyeurism by pulling the displaced sheet around her.

"Well, that's what we should be doing but you won't let me kiss you in the morning until you brush your teeth," Santana grumbled. She rolled on her side, and propped her head up on her elbow, the sheet drooping to reveal just enough to snag Quinn's eye. It's true, it was one of Quinn's rules. To be fair, as far as these sort of arrangements go, there weren't many rules to begin with, so to Quinn it was a fair request. Everything else was fair game. The couch. The table. The wall of the shower.

Quinn sidled up to her and looked her squarely in the eye, and purred, "You don't need to kiss me to fuck me." She put on her best smug facade, but she did flick her eyes down to Santana's lips, parted and very tempting.

Santana scoffed, and her hand grasped Quinn's shoulder firmly.

"Now, Quinnie," she said sternly, "don't cheapen yourself like that. You're worth more than a half-assed roll in the sack. You're worth a full fledged fucking, complete with lip service and a few solid minutes of groping." Santana shook Quinn's shoulder as she spoke, her smile breaking through.

Quinn grasped Santana's hand and brought it back down onto the bed.

"Thanks for the confidence boost," she replied, the laughter not yet gone from her voice. Santana nodded curtly.

"Oh any time. Now," she said with a clap. "I think it's time we ventured out into the world to see if it's gone to shit without us."

Quinn pulled the covers up over her head as she fell back into the pillows, her objection muffled. Santana grabbed her bra that hung precariously off the bedpost and slung it around her shoulders before clasping it in one fell swoop.

"We've spent the past week in either your bed or mine, every night, fucking like rabbits," Santana reasoned, slipping on a pair of jeans.

"And?" 13 year old Quinn tended to make an appearance when she was denied what she wanted. Santana sat down on the bed, still with no shirt, and peeled the duvet back from Quinn's pouting face.

"Aaaand, you have a day without classes or some midterm, or whatever, for the first time in forever, don't waste it, Q," Santana scolded. She stared her down until Quinn rolled her eyes and sighed.

"Fine! You're right, you're right," she relented. "Throw me something."

Santana turned in her seat on the edge of the mattress and bent down to rifle through a pile of sweaters she that she was certain were half Quinn's. Upon finding a recognizable bulky hunter green one, she sat up, and felt her bare back collide with warm skin. Her body tensed at the sudden contact, and arms snaked around her middle to pull her back slightly into Quinn's embrace.

"I'll go out today," Quinn whispered in her ear, husky and brushing her lips against a reddening lobe ever so slightly. "If you promise to continue where we left off when we get back." A fuzzy haze settled over Santana's thoughts to the effect of Quinn dragging the pliable cartilage of her ear in between her teeth. The same haze that sent Santana's hands wandering when Quinn woke her up in the middle of the night on Tuesday and started walking her fingers up Santana's thigh under the covers. Also the very fog that compelled Santana to bend Quinn over the back of the couch Friday afternoon and rip her tights open with her new manicure, when Berry and Hummel were out shopping. Quinn kept dropping her scarf around the apartment, and bending over painfully slowly to pick it up.

Santana may have the technique to make a woman come undone, but Quinn could seduce a nun to murder if the desire ever struck her.

They piled on all of the winter accessories they could find, Santana borrowing Rachel's glove/mitten contraptions despite grousing about the unfortunate pink and orange color combination on the entire walk to the L train. The glory of a weekday excursion was not lost on them, especially on a frigid day such as this, which reduced the masses of aimless tourists to a manageable level. There were seats in abundance on the subway, sidewalk traffic flowed with remarkable efficiency, not to mention the surreal nature of it all, like each hour was on loan from some parallel universe. It was as though they were reclaiming the city and were finally able to enjoy it's spoils free of invaders. Ask any New Yorker who has ever had a weekday off. They'll vehemently agree.

The girls traversed the labyrinth of Union Square station to hop onto a well timed Q train that shot up to the southeastern corner of Central Park. Santana wanted to cartwheel down the train car. There was certainly room.

Ice skating at Wollman rink was the chosen activity of the day, also in the spirit of a reduced tourist population. It was a fine day for it. Quinn marveled silently at the veins of the dormant trees cracked across the pale blue sky, swaying in the light breeze. Clouds migrated lazily amongst the buildings, traveling in dense tufts as even they weren't immune to the chill. The two leaned leisurely against the waist high walls while the zamboni made it's sweeping circles around the rink, before following the gaggle of eager skaters out onto the fresh ice.

The sun hopped from cloud to cloud at the high point of the midafternoon, illuminating the puffs of hot air being propelled from Santana's mouth as she shouted after her elusive best friend. Quinn's childhood of excessive ice skating parties showed when she was doing laps around Santana, who hugged the sides. As she glided across the glistening surface, the crisp air flying by her cheeks and the weightless momentum carrying her around the curves, she could barely contain her glee at seeing her former co-captain so terrified. The parades of little kids excusing themselves in all languages to pass Santana only accentuated it. Even Santana had to laugh in spite of herself at Quinn very obviously enjoying every second of her humiliation.

"There are knives on my feet!" she exclaimed when Quinn attempted to pry her from the plastic wall. She was contributing wonderfully to the smattering of nicks along the bottom from the thousands of other uncoordinated skaters. Santana's countenance of stricken determination made it terribly difficult to get any words of soothing guidance out as Quinn fell to pieces at the sight of it. Eventually, Quinn was able to lure her out onto the open ice. She white knuckled Quinn's hand the whole time, but they made it around the rink quite a few laps within the hour. She kept mumbling and grumbling how her "people" were about sand not snow, and that she was not genetically inclined for this sort of death defying thing.

Eventually, as she does, Santana overestimated her learning curve and insisted she be released to make it on her own. There was never anything anyone could do at that point. Just watch and get ready to clean up the mess.

It ended just as Quinn feared; the clicking of Santana's blades clipping and the arms pinwheeling before she hit the ice with a resounding grunt of frustration. Quinn hockey stopped beside Santana's head and didn't bother to suppress her tongue-in-teeth grin looking down at her fallen friend. Her hair was fanned out around her head and her limbs had all succumbed to their defeat. Quinn would have this up on Instagram in a second if her phone was readily available.

"Get me. Off. This fucking. Glacier." The words sliced through her gritted teeth. Santana maintained a vicegrip on Quinn's arm, out of fear or revenge, some combination of the two, as they coasted to the edge and found a bench to retire to. Their appendages were all chilled to the bone and the tiny gold cross around Quinn's neck was nearly frosted over.

"You were doing so well— " Quinn lauded, as they approached 59th street to head down 6th Avenue.

"Oh, please. You enjoyed every second of that. We will never speak of it again, Fabray," Santana curtly spat. She pushed her aviators further up her nose, and tugged down her hat. The white walk sign appeared across the way, and Quinn dragged her pouting friend forward, before the wall of stagnant cars and trucks, expelling clouds of exhaust behind them. Maybe she did enjoy watching Santana meet her match. Quinn could be sadistic. There were probably a handful of miscreants picking sticky slush from their hair still who would vouch for that. Those instances with Santana, however, were so far and few, she had to soak them in when she was lucky enough to witness them.

It was only a few blocks before the pair sought refuge through a revolving door and into the lounge of Le Parker Meridien, where the gust of insulated air left their frostbitten cheeks pleasantly tingling. The corridor stretched out grandly before them with plush seating lining the walls, and the skyward reach of the ceilings accentuated by the mirrors running up them, cut smartly in the shapes of wood paneling. They seated themselves quite easily in one of the sinking couches, and piled their hats and gloves and other woolen items beside them to huddle in the center. Thier knees knocked together while they held a menu between them to choose from.

A snooty waiter took their order, and they relaxed into their hideaway. Warm air toasted the feeling back into their legs, emanating from an unseen source beneath the couch. Cascading down the walls, opulent scarlet drapes, secured with oversized gold tassels, seemed to cocoon the room. A veritable oasis in the arctic tundra beleaguering the city this year. They picked out a few patrons to slander, Santana fabricating the most outlandish possibilities, and Quinn surprising her best friend with her crass in between her bouts of muffled laughter.

Eventually, the waiter brought Quinn her tea and Santana a hot chocolate that required tableside presentation. The one where they pour the milk over the chocolate and all that. Santana sat transfixed while the chocolate took to the milk like paint on canvas, saturating it with a rich mocha color, while Quinn dropped two sugar cubes into her cup. She had a feeling Santana would get a kick out of that. She supposed it was a fair tradeoff for the embarrassment she put Santana through. They both took long regretful slurps of their beverages, but they hardly minded the scalding liquid burning their tongues. Heat was heat at this point.

Quinn peered at Santana over her teacup as she happily gulped at her drink.

A darting of her tongue to swipe her chocolate lips and Santana asked, "Jesus, what now?"

"Hot chocolate. Really." Quinn took a dainty sip of disdain.

"Oh, don't sit there all smug, Fabray," Santana scoffed, without missing a beat.

Quinn laughed her way arrogantly into a breathy, "Yeah?"

"You think you're hot shit with your tea and your sugar cubes, all classy and whatnot. Hate to break it to you, but you look like an uptight bitch," Santana began. She received a patented Quinn Fabray eyeroll at that elaboration. Indisputable superiority denouncing the subject entirely all in one quick ocular arc. It was the ghost of the high school cheer captain floating to the surface, always imposing her skyward nose where it was unwanted. Lets not forget the tight smile, equally as halting. Santana hardly flinched, not unused to such special treatment.

"Maybe I'm not a sex-crazed nympho like you, not everyone is, you know," Quinn finally retorted, although her tone and pointed stare dragged her opinion with it, as the answer she'd already decided. Santana's hot chocolate seemed to cleanse her of her resentment towards Quinn's snide remarks. With each sip, her spine stretched itself out leisurely on the sofa, like a taut ball of yarn unwinding itself inch by inch.

"Q, first of all, nympho means sex-crazed so maybe lay off the big fancy words for a while, and second of all, I highly doubt that," Santana replied. She did a sweep of Quinn's pin straight body with her charcoal eyes. Might as well practice what she preaches.

Quinn, ever insistent on making her point, tried not to lose her momentum, "Whatever, so I'm uptight because I drink tea? That's absurd."

Santana took a long drag on her mug of steaming chocolate. She smacked her lips, exalting the quality of the beverage.

"Exactly," she confirmed, "Besides the fact that it makes you look as fuckable as an eighty year old wooden dildo found in grandma's attic, right now, my sweet chocolatey lips are primed and ready to make out with anyone in this room. If someone, by some miracle, found you attractive, the first thing they get to taste is your sour dead grass hippie breath. You would need a mint or six before anyone locked lips with you."

Quinn's drew another sip of the scalding liquid past her lips, her eyes narrowing in search of a rebuttal, but all she could scrape together was a haughty, "Is that so?"

"Well, you're more than welcome to put it to the test," Santana offered, suggestively leaning forward and gesturing vaguely to her lips in a Vannah White fashion. Leave it to Santana to jump on every opportunity to make out.

"Tempting, but I'll pass," she declined. Santana shrugged back into her blasé lounge position.

"Whatevs. I bet kissing you would be like kissing the old bag over there." She waved her thumb at an older woman, waspy no doubt, in her stately suit across the way. She poured her tea and scowled at their general existence. However, that only provoked Santana to blow her a kiss, to which the woman bristled and turned away in a huff of "how dare she!"

Santana beamed at her successful antagonizing. Quinn scolded her in good fun. The latter went to sip from her cup and found it curiously drained. Funny how time escapes her, consumed by the flames of her mirth, while in Santana's company.

The thought tumbled into the crevices of Quinn's mind, where all her fanciful notions are ushered, while she placed the silver strainer gingerly, and poured herself another cup.

...

"We wanted Oregon Pinot Noir, not the Italian!"

Santana spun on her heel, her hair whipping her in the face, and put on her best condescending smile.

"Oh, my apologies, guys!" she said, sickly saccharine enough to cause cavities, "I thought you were after a more sophisticated palate. Won't make that mistake again!"

The table took it just as she hoped they would, taken aback but too flustered to respond before she slipped through the crowded dining room and through the kitchen doors. Door, singular actually, due to the stereotypically cramped size of the restaurant. She slipped past the steel tables and between the cooks shuffling amongst each other not unlike a deck of cards. The wine room's slim glass door swung open with ease and she barely needed to push half her torso in to grab the bottle she sought.

It was so fucking ridiculous, and her exasperation showed plainly on her face. She hated these people, the downtown yuppies that stuffed this godforsaken place with their tweed blazers and their shirts unbuttoned halfway down. Girls, on daddies dime, draped with whatever bohemian dress shirt combination they just pulled off some rack at Scoop and voices that make nails on a chalkboard sound melodic. There were those guys getting martinis, which was the most laughable practice of them all, especially come summer when the place whips up watermelon ones. What a fucking joke. Sometimes it wasn't so bad when a pair of roommates just wanted to treat themselves to an overpriced plate of bolognese, and sometimes it was worse when their parents were in town.

Santana preferred to hang back here with the kitchen staff. In the steam and cacophony of pots thrown about, they shared her values, just like they shared the rejected open bottle of wine between them now, each taking greedy swigs as it reached their hand. They hardly spoke to her, and she to them, and those were Santana's favorite type of co workers. All of that might have been due to a language barrier but she was none the wiser for lack of ever trying to communicate.

Santana barely noticed a blonde ponytail poking itself through the door gap before she heard it.

"San, table 14 wants their check. Haul ass, mamasita," shouted Becca. Her full body slid into the florescent light and she perched a bony hand on her leopard hip. Santana straightened her own leopard dress, the ones all the waitresses donned. They actually had a rotation, each day of the week the manager picked a different dress. For Santana, being instructed to buy seven dresses at three quarters of the price upon hire was hardly a chore. The perverse fact that they were all skin tight and all stopped below her bountiful ass could be overlooked.

She followed Becca out onto the floor. The dense atmosphere of liquored conversation and collective body heat barraged her senses, almost creating a dreamy haze of the space that was made up of sectioned off alcoves of wobbly rustic tables. Handing off the bottle of Oregon and instructions to another server, Santana sauntered over to the moony-eyed young couple that occupied table 14. Check, please, and here's the card. Right. She knew that look, the one where they wanted the check settled urgently so they could scamper on off to most likely his place where they will go at it on a bed of rosepetals listening to Bruno Mars.

God, she hated this holiday.

The evening carried on for another two hours of polished off bottles of red, shared bruschettas, giggly hair flipping, a few ass grabs, albeit a surprisingly low number for the usual average, before she had shooed out all but her last two tables. The dining rooms were hushed and the candles flickered happily on the last of their wax. She was at the home stretch, and the final hour was always the most gratifying coast to freedom.

Becca and Santana held down the fort, both sitting at the bar sipping on some concoction the bartender mixed together. It hardly mattered what it was at this point. She was already 3 drinks to the… breeze or whatever the saying was.

She pushed herself off the plush stool to do a round, offer water refills, plates to be cleared, the like. Satisfied with her service, her patrons dismissed her and she had all but rounded the divider between the bar and the tables when she saw a blonde, not dressed in leopard, occupying her seat. An irrepressible grin tugged at her lips.

She strolled over and sat down next to the new customer, tilting her head to get her attention. Quinn spun in her seat and smiled at her, an unreadable one.

"What can I get you?" Santana purported, coming off as some sort of sultry drug dealer. Quinn barked a laugh at the affected voice Santana put on.

"Is that how you talk to all of the people that come in here? Now I know where you get your stupid generous tips," Quinn said, lifting the high ball glass that was once Santana's to her lips for a sip. Santana eyed her stolen drink, and decided to let her have it. She lounged against the bar, exuding a certain ownership of her sexuality that airbrushed magazine covers attempt to emulate.

"Hey, know your market. But seriously, what are you doing here. You never come to harass me at my job, you said it's a vapid trend sponge with cuisine on par with Carabba's," Santana stated. Quinn leaned back a few degrees with her drink sliding past her lips, and gazed up at the tin ceiling. The golden hues of the rich lighting in the dining rooms danced across the aluminum tiles. Santana watched them cast her features in a soft glow. She looked young, which was a strange thought. She was young but Santana couldn't recall the last time Quinn actually looked it. The blonde in question sighed into an absent minded shrug, before returning to Santana's eyeline.

"Well, nobody should be alone on Valentine's Day."

At that, Santana was without a retort, so she slipped her cocktail out of Quinn's hand and took a sip. She felt the inklings of a genuine blush on the back of her neck but suppressed it immediately. Sincerity was not a trait they often used upon one another. Amongst all of the discarded clothes and skin on skin, it was easy to forget they were friends at the root of it all. They told people they were anyway. High school was always fond of labels, but nobody ever outlined what it meant to be the names they branded each other with.

"By nobody you mean you," Santana quipped. Although, the bite was hardly there.

Quinn merely smiled knowingly, and grabbed her drink back.

"I'll have the bolognese," she announced.

"I'll see if the kitchen is still open."

Santana finished up her hour flitting from the two tables to the bar, twirling a forkful of Quinn's meal into her mouth each time she passed. A single straggler remained at table 7 as the witching hour rolled in, sipping his cognac introspectively. Santana had long lost interest in scaring him out, and was helping Quinn sop the sauce off her plate with some bread. Becca caved as she watched Santana chase the remaining bits of tomato around the dish, trying to knock Quinn's bread piece away so she could have it all to herself. She told Santana to take her fuck buddy home, that she would handle 7.

Santana braved the gale force winds pushing her backwards towards the Hudson as they trudged down 10th street, across the island to Quinn's apartment off 1st Avenue. She made use of Quinn as a body shield as best as she could, and Quinn let her because she knew it wouldn't make a difference either way. The city had succumbed completely to the February chill. It was everywhere; icing over steps, pipes, seeping through the cracks in the walls, snatching at every mug of coffee or cup of soup, nipping at every inch of exposed skin and riding on the back of every burst of wind. Nowhere was safe, the suns warmth was merely a myth of lore, buried in the past under a snowdrift.

The stuffy heat of the apartment was welcomed with sighs of relief and bags dropping unceremoniously on the floor. Santana darted for the bathroom, a quirk that never failed her whenever she entered someone's home. Quinn busied herself around the studio while she waited. She brought a few mugs from her little table next to her bed, a queen sized bed that engulfed most of the main area, into the little kitchen alcove in the corner. It was small, but it was all she needed, and it hers. She pulled a lighter from one of the few drawers in the kitchen and began darting about quietly.

When Santana emerged, releasing an over dramatic sigh, she had to adjust her eyes to the darkened apartment. Small flames scattered their sleepy gleam around the room, and she almost didn't notice Quinn who leaned over one on the windowsill as she set it alight. Santana took a few hesitant steps into the main room and paused as Quinn took note of her presence.

"Um, Quinn? Something you want to share with the class?" Santana inquired. Her gaze on the approaching blonde was uneasy and her hands spun the ring on her right hand around her finger.

Quinn set the lighter down on the white sill and assumed the usual position before Santana, tugging at the collar of her peacoat and looking up at her through hooded eyes.

"I want a real Valentine's Day. I've never had one," she stated just above her breath. "I bought roses for my kitchen." She nodded in the direction of the small vase of red flowers, just as she said. Santana's stomach tied itself into a most unpleasant knot of pity and remorse, as a good deal of her past relationships weren't helped by Santana's involvement in her life. That quickly gave way to a panic at what Quinn was now insinuating.

Quinn had been undoing the buttons of the coat as Santana stood stiff. She broke from her piercing stare into Quinn's clouded eyes to watch the navy wool slide off her own shoulders onto the floor with a muffled thump. Quinn grazed her fingertips down the polyester print, a golden blur in the dim light, and placed them at the hemline, conveniently below her ass.

"Quinn," she protested, as her best friend's lips assailed her neck. She felt her body react to the sensual contact but she felt strange, like she had been duped into something she certainly didn't sign up for.

"Relax," Quinn mumbled into her skin. When her words and affections could not ease the tension in her friend's muscles, she looked her squarely in the eye. "It's not like that, okay? It's just… I can't have a Valentine's Day by myself."

Santana scoffed, "So, why wrangle me into this? You can have any Tom, Dick, or Harry from Pace to Syracuse." Quinn's explanation, while a bit scalding, at least allowed her to resume the status quo. Nothing made Santana more at ease than knowing where she stood. With anyone.

It was then that Quinn's neutral facade melted into a smirk, her eyes alight with something terribly sinful.

"Because," she drawled, her vowels falling all over the place. "Tonight, I want someone who can do things to me so that the sounds coming out of my mouth are so loud, that they shatter that vase over there into a million pieces."

If ever there was an image to accompany the definition of lust in the dictionary, Santana's face at that utterance would be it. Her entire body was revved up like a Mustang, and Quinn the hot asphalt road gleaming in the afternoon sun before her. Quinn wasn't even touching her, and if she did, there wouldn't be another coherent word out of her little pink maddening mouth.

"And I know the only person who can guarantee that…"

The dramatic pause as Quinn's features came into focus, a hairs breadth of open air left between them, almost drew a whine from Santana's constricted throat.

"...is you."

Santana chuckled and said with finality and blown out pupils, "However you want it, Susie Q."

At the faintest contact of Quinn's somehow still glossed lips grazing her own, Santana released the brakes. She seized the moment, charged with Quinn's fantastical expectations, and floored it. Everything rushed past her in her effort to get Quinn naked and on her back on the bed. Fabric and various objects collided but here was nothing but ringing in her ears as Quinn's body became a symphony of sensations underneath her.

She groaned as their bare skin melded together and raked her nails down the sides of Quinn. There was no further discussion, no explanation. Just the weight of Santana's upper body atop Quinn's, undulating up against her like waves crashing against the shore, as tan fingers did their work. It's not like they would have done anything different tonight had it been an ordinary day. Although, Santana usually had quite a few qualms when it came to playing along with Quinn's jerry-rigged attempts at happiness. She didn't have time for her deluded bullshit, no matter how guilty she felt for their sham of a friendship in the past.

But this was the only way to have sex with Quinn at the moment, and sex was one thing, but great sex was hard to come by. How could she resist Quinn, so heated and willing, legs that parted themselves pretty much. If Quinn wanted to dress up their fornication with roses and a pretty pink bow for one night, Santana might as well just suck it up and give in this once.

She did have to admit, the candles were a nice touch.