Brittany S. Pierce never remembered how to tie her shoes. Not after kindergarten, not after third grade, and not even after seventh. Her mother would constantly try and help her daughter, telling and re-telling the tale of the two bunny ears, but Brittany never quite understood it enough.
"Mom, doesn't the bunny get sad that his ears are all in knots?"
"No, sweetie, that's the way he likes them"
"But…" Brittany would always protest, "How does he hear? He likes being deaf? Does that mean he can't hear me sing to him? Or any songs at all!?" Brittany would always get upset at this point. She would cry and cry over how the bunny would never be able to hear and get even more sad that there was one bunny for each shoe. "They live right next door to each other but they can't even say hi!" She would sob.
Eventually, Mrs. Pierce just got her Velcro shoes.
"Britt!" Santana gasped, her arm snapping out to catch a pale elbow. She heard Brittany's breath catch in her throat.
"Whoa, San, you saved me…thanks!"
Santana nodded and looked down, ready to kick the stupid thing Brittany tripped over down the hall. Instead, she was met with bright blue and green laces, trailing and bunching around Brittany's feet as the blonde walked into art class ahead of her. "Britt!" Santana hissed, sliding into her seat next to Brittany's. "Since when do you wear lace-up shoes?"
Brittany was currently ignoring the teacher's opening words of instruction and running her fingers along all of the differently colored jars of paint in front of her. "Since I like them better than my stupid Velcro ones…" She shrugged. "Those are for little kids."
Santana looked underneath their table to the incredibly troublesome hazard that Brittany had chosen to wear to school today. She remembered way back in kindergarten when Brittany had first learned to fail at tying her own shoes, while Santana excelled. In fact, Santana excelled so much that she began tying all of the other children's shoes into knots for them…when they weren't looking. "Does your mom know you wore those today?"
Brittany nodded. "She's the one that tied them for me this morning. I bought them with the money I won from the writing competition."
Santana smiled despite her concern.
"Velcro is so 1989, San."
Santana just studied her friend carefully.
"Britt, how about at recess I'll teach you how to tie them, okay?"
"Not gonna work," Brittany mumbled, sticking her paintbrush into electric yellow paint and boldly smearing it across her paper. "Never works."
Santana huffed. She refused to let Brittany enter high school next year without knowing how to tie her shoes. They would, after all, be required to have gym class and Santana wanted to make sure Brittany didn't get laughed at. She would personally punch anyone who dared to do so anyway. "All Lima Heights…" She mumbled.
"What did you decide?" Brittany suddenly asked.
Santana looked at her blankly.
"For our project…?" Brittany asked, gesturing to the teacher and all the kids who now looked busy.
Santana guessed she had been too preoccupied by Brittany's shoes to actually listen. "Um…"
"We have to paint something that represents our greatest fear."
Santana's hand automatically reached for the black paint. "Oh…okay."
"Mine is sunburn." Brittany stated, continuing to glob yellow all over her paper. She turned to Santana. "Yours is spiders right?"
Santana stared at the black paint jar in her hand and smiled. "Well, yea, that's one of them."
"You weren't gonna do spiders?" Brittany asked, her messy yellow paint brush now paused, sitting still between her fingers. "I thought it was spiders," Brittany pouted. She was sure that she knew everything there was to know about Santana and was surprised and upset that she had not got it right.
"I hate spiders, Britt." Santana shivered in her seat. "But I hate darkness more."
"Oh!" Brittany's eyes lit up. She remembered now. "I remember." She went back to her yellow paint.
Santana began to delicately smudge some black at the very center of her paper, letting it seep and crawl out to the edges. It got bigger and bigger, making Santana feel a little bit uneasy. Her paint engulfed the whiteness of the paper just like actual darkness did.
Brittany's face scrunched up for a moment. With cautious movements she leaned over to Santana and whispered, "But San, I thought you weren't scared of the dark anymore because I got you that night light for Christmas in fifth grade…" Brittany made extra sure to whisper 'night light'. She knew how insecure Santana was about other people knowing that she slept with one.
Grateful for Brittany's secrecy, Santana replied in an equally hushed tone, "It broke last week, Britt."
Brittany frowned. "I have ten dollars left over from the writing competition…after buying these shoes." Brittany told Santana. "After school, wanna ask Rex to take us to the mall to get you a new one?"
Rex was Brittany's older brother and her only sibling. Standing at six foot four and already a junior in high school, Rex was Brittany's idol. It seemed to Santana that Rex could do no wrong in Brittany's eyes. Santana grew up thinking that Rex's name was actually Rex, when it really wasn't. His actual name was Pete but when Brittany was four, she had an intense infatuation with dinosaurs. Seeing as how Pete was already the tallest and coolest person Brittany knew, she began calling him Rex, short for , her favorite dinosaur. The nickname had eventually stuck and her brother hadn't minded. In fact, Santana was pretty sure that Pete genuinely liked it.
"He's going there to meet his girlfriend again anyway." Brittany told her.
Santana really could use another night light. She hated to admit it but the darkness petrified her. When she was in fifth grade, and her father decided that she was too old for night lights, she had almost had a panic attack. That first night she had called Brittany and insisted that Brittany stay on the phone with her until she fell asleep. "You won't tell anyone?" Santana whispered.
Brittany frowned at her and shook her head. "I would never tell anyone." Brittany said.
"Okay." Santana finally agreed, going back to her paper. She stared at the blackness for awhile.
"Done." Brittany announced not long after.
Santana looked over and witnessed the mess of hues that Brittany had created. There were spirals of orange, gashes of intense neon yellow, and somehow Brittany had managed to acquire gold glitter. "That the sun?" Santana asked, actually enjoying the assault on her senses that the image brought.
The blonde happily nodded.
"It's awesome, B." Santana admitted. "It's like I'm actually being blinded." She laughed.
Brittany grinned and recalled when her fear of the sun started. It was when they were ten years old and they had been invited to Quinn Fabray's beach-themed birthday party. Santana and Brittany had played on the beach for hours and hours, sneakily dodging any grownup that tried to interrupt their games with the application of sunblock. At the end of the day, both Brittany and Santana had returned to their awaiting mothers bright red and in more pain than they had ever thought possible from playing at the beach. The two of them spent the next few days in bed, slathered in aloe very. Only able to talk on the phone, Brittany had been miserable without Santana and when they would talk, sometimes Santana would cry over the phone because of how bad her burn hurt. Brittany, since that day, had been extra careful and afraid of the sun. She would always be afraid of anything that caused her or her best friend pain and made them have to spend time away from each other.
"How do you like mine?"
Brittany studied the darkness of Santana's painting. Hidden amongst the blackness there were deep purples and strikes of eerie blue. "Creepy." Brittany said.
Santana nodded. "Isn't it?"
"Hey," Brittany suddenly exclaimed, pointing back and forth between their paintings, "We're opposites." She observed, grinning widely.
Santana realized how right she was. "I'll give you my shade." Santana told her, tapping the back of Brittany's hand with her paintbrush, leaving a swirl of grey-black on her pale skin.
Brittany smiled and dipped her index finger carefully in the brightest mixture of yellow paint that she could find. Reaching over, she pressed her finger to Santana's painting, leaving an almost-glowing fingerprint against the shadowy background. "And I'll light up your dark."
They had no idea how right they were.
