Yup. Another chapter. Sorry it took so long. Real life is getting in the way.

Santana didn't stay sitting outside that choir room for long after that. There was just something weird about that girl, and besides, she had bigger fish to fry and she wasn't gonna catch them sitting on her ass in a hallway. As soon as she heard the first drifting notes of some Broadway ballad, she was on her feet and walking through the empty hallway with her hands shoved into her back pockets. God, fuck, she needed to get away from here. This place was already stifling. She rolled her shoulders as if to rid them of the weight of suffocation and left the building at a trudge, head bobbing slightly to the song playing through her headphones. There were only a few people loitering outside the school, but she didn't want anything to do with them. So she headed away, didn't even realize her feet were carrying her to the football field until she was stepping beneath the bleachers, staring out at it as if she might spot the Cheerios practicing from here. But of course, they didn't have practice right now. Otherwise Quinn and Blondie would be out here instead of in some lame choir.

A familiar smell tickled Santana's nose and she glanced over, eyes landing on a boy down at the far end of her small space. He was watching her, a cocky smile on his lips as he rolled a joint back and forth between his fingers. He was hot, she guessed, but his hair was styled in a Mohawk and she really hated those. Santana might have rolled her eyes and dismissed him except that she hadn't smoked in a while and maybe a couple of puffs would relax her enough that she wouldn't be completely bored for a little while. As quickly as the thought came, though, she dismissed it. If she went back to the Fabrays high, she'd get her ass booted out in a matter of hours. She couldn't risk that. Still, a contact high wouldn't be her fault… right?

"What's up, my hot little Latina mama?" he crooned and she did roll her eyes then, taking the words as an invitation to approach. The smell was a comfort, familiar in a way this stupid town and the fucking school weren't. The scent alone made her feel more relaxed around the strange guy, though she wasn't stupid enough to completely let her guard down. Isolated location, big, muscley guy with a douchebag haircut? Didn't add up right. Santana didn't trust men right off out of principle, and she certainly never approached one without an ulterior motive. Not that Santana couldn't stick up for herself, because she could, but she wasn't stupid either and she knew when she'd be outmatched.

She would never end up like her mama.

"Does that actually work with the chicks around here?" she snarked in return, edging closer with her eyes flicking between the joint and the boy's eyes. He was already high, which was to her advantage. Meant less of an effort if she needed to kick him in the balls and make a break for it. But Mohawk Douchebag shrugged and his expression didn't change. His eyebrows wiggled suggestively, but everything about him was so cheesy that she couldn't help but smirk at him. What a loser. Lima Loser. God, this town was probably full of them.

"You're the first one I've gotten to say it to. Not a huge Spanish population around here. So you tell me."

"I'm not Spanish." Dark eyes rolled. God, what a moron. "I'm Hispanic. And no. Sorry to be the one to tell you, but you have zero game."

He patted a hand to his chest dramatically, his smirk growing. "Babe, you wound me." A laugh escaped him and then he was motioning her over, holding out the joint in a manner that seemed completely friendly. "What's your name, mama? You want a smoke?"

Santana eyed the joint, completely tempted but not quite willing to bend. So she shook her head and Douchebag shrugged, stubbing it out against the metal pole of the bleachers. "Santana," she said at last, though she suspected everyone in the school already knew about the Fabray charity case. The thought was only confirmed when he nodded and looked completely unsurprised, his hand reaching into his pocket for the wallet he had there. The remainder of the joint was tucked away for later and Santana took note, just in case she decided to bum it later. And by bum, she meant steal. Not like he would report her. It was pretty much impossible to report someone for stealing a joint. Silence fell between them and Santana grew more and more irritated, eyes narrowing. "And do you have a name or am I supposed to call you Moron if I ever talk to you- which, by the way, seems pretty doubtful right now."

Mohawk Douchebag grinned and repocketed his wallet. "Puck," he replied. "Name's Puck. And by the looks of you, I'm real happy we met. But I've gotta get gone. Fuck if I wanna stick around here. Place sucks." Santana nodded in agreement and started to wonder if maybe this guy wasn't so bad after all. "Later." He sent her a wave and she nodded in return, watched him leave with suspicious eyes before relaxing in the isolation of her own company once more. She was familiar with being by herself, so whatever. No big.

Over the next few weeks, it became routine. While Quinn was off singing in glee club, Santana went and stood with Puck while he smoked. He tried to convince her to fuck him a couple of times, but her continued denial had them falling into a surprisingly friendly-ish relationship. She learned that he was on the football team and that he had a sister, a mother, and a deadbeat dad. He had a pool cleaning business and he was a known ladies' man around Lima. So he said, anyway. In turn, she told him… well, next to nothing. "I don't want to talk about it" was usually as far as he got on any topic. And over those three weeks or so, she hardly saw more than a glance or two of Brittany.

And yet.

And yet she continued to flit around the edges, an almost unreal girl that always smiled or waved or simply looked whenever Santana spotted her. It was unnerving, to say the least. Santana didn't trust people like that. People who were just… nice? There was always a reason, always a mask. No one was nice to you for nothing.

And yet.

And yet she couldn't find a motive, no matter how hard she tried. Brittany gained nothing with those small waves or sweet smiles. And when she stared the way she sometimes did, there seemed to be nothing in her blue, blue eyes but interest and… something she couldn't read, but it wasn't bad. It didn't help that when she asked Puck about her, he only shrugged and said, "She's hot. Not the brightest bulb, but real fiiine." Then there was a smirk, followed by, "Not a bad lay, either." For some reason, that didn't sit well with Santana.

Still, she didn't say a word to the Cheerio in all that time. She didn't want to because she didn't understand her. Not like she understood Puck. Not like she understood Quinn. Brittany managed to do something that no one had since Santana had been eight years old. She scared her. Which like, weird, because they'd had a total of one conversation and this shouldn't have even been an issue. She was just some fucking girl. One who was, by all accounts, stupid and slutty. The exact type of girl Santana had always hated. And yet, and yet, and yet… She'd done a good job avoiding her for the most part. The few classes they shared she sat far away, hardly sparing the blonde a look. At lunch she sat with Puck and the football losers, flirting shamelessly as she tried to pick which boy toy she would use and abuse. After school she went immediately to the bleachers, thus avoiding another awkward conversation outside the choir room.

All of it for nothing because one day three weeks after arriving in Lima, Santana walked into the Fabray household and found Brittany S. Pierce sitting on the living room couch as if she'd been waiting for her there all along.