Chapter 9: Not So Strangers Anymore

Two days pass and I don't hear anything from or see Santana. But, it's Friday night again, and I'm hoping, like the last few weeks, she will show up at the bar again tonight. But, maybe with less alcohol involved. It's not my place, but I think that Santana drinks too much, but like I said, it's not my place. I am the bartender and it is my job to serve the drinks not advise people on their drinking habits.

It's crazy busy tonight. I don't know why but the dining room is packed and so is the bar. Someone said that there is a basketball tournament in town this weekend so that might have something to do with it. People coming in from out of town to watch their kids play basketball. It makes sense but it also means that it will be a busy weekend for us. The more the merrier, I say. It's good for business, after all.

I've been running around the bar the whole time. I have been here over two hours already. I'm wiping down the bar after a couple just got up and left. Someone pulls out one of the barstools that was previously occupied. Out of the corner of my eye I see the person sit down but I'm too busy to look to see what the person looks like.

After I wipe off the counter, I start stacking the glasses that just got done in the dishwasher. We have been washing glasses constantly tonight.

A 'hey stranger' gets me to look up from what I am doing. "Oh, Santana, I didn't see you sitting there."

"Yeah, well, you look pretty busy."

"Yeah, it's crazy tonight. You want something to drink?"

"Yeah, um Captain and Coke. Please." Santana folds her hands and sets him on the bar top, to wait patiently.

"Okay." First, I throw some ice into a glass and then grab the bottle of Captain Morgan and pour some into the glass and then add the Coke. "There ya go."

"Thanks." Santana gives my a grateful smile.

"So, you're a little later than usual." Not that I have been keeping track of what days and times she shows up. Because I totally have.

I go to stack the rest of the glass. "I had dinner with the 'rents. My mom's been on my ass about being more responsible and being a grown up and not going out all the time. So, I figured, I'd make an appearance at home, have dinner with my mom and dad, and then go out."

"Hmm. Right." Someone waves me down from a few seats over. "I'll be back." I mumble and go over to the guy that waved me down. "What can I get ya?"

"Four Buds, please." He says.

"Okay." I turn around and open the cooler on the back wall of the bar and pull four bottles of beer out and turn back to hand them to him.

"Thanks." He pays me and walks off into the crowd.

"Can I get a refill?" A clearly drunk woman shakes her glass in my face. Rude.

"Sure. What did you have?"

"I don remember." The woman's words slur together. "Maybe Vodka Cr'nberry."

"Okay." I'll go with that. I don't have time to figure out what the woman ordered originally. If she says Vodka Cranberry, then Vodka Cranberry it is. I refill the woman's drink and hand it back to her and she hands me a five and walks away.

The whole night has been like this. The bar is standing room only. People just keep coming up to me and asking for a drink or a refill. I haven't even had a chance to have a conversation with anybody. Even the regulars left once it started to fill up when they couldn't talk to each other without yelling.

When I finally make it back over to Santana, at the end of the bar, I see that her drink is almost gone. Either, I've been gone way longer than I thought or she downed that drink really fast. I did have to fill four more drinks before I made my way back so…

"Almost done?" I ask and I think I scared her because I see her flinch the second before she turns away from the college basketball game on tv to me.

"Yeah, can I have another?"

I nod and mix her another drink. I swap out the two glasses and glance up at the game she is watching. "Good game?"

"Yeah, actually, it's really close. There have been like eight different lead changes and five ties." She says without looking away from the tv.

It must really be a good game then. I don't know that much about basketball other then one team runs down the court and scores and then the other team gets the ball and runs down the court and scores. I'm sure there's more to it than that but I sure as hell don't know what.

"You like basketball then?" I can only assume with the way her eyes are glued to the tv.

Santana shrugs. "Yeah, I guess." She looks down to the bar and picks up her drink and her attention goes back to the game, immediately, as she takes a drink. "It's March Madness, how can you not it like?"

I don't know. That's a good question. I don't really like it. But, I suppose that I don't know enough about March Madness to even be able to like it, so I guess I'm not the best person to be asking.

"I don't know. I don't really know anything about basketball. You might want to ask someone else."

She turns her head. It's like it's slow motion. Her eyes narrow as she searches my face. Probably to see if I'm lying or not. She leans forward slightly and just stares. "Are you serious?"

"Yeah." I say uneasily.

"Then I am going to have to school you on basketball because that is just not acceptable." She says and I think she is serious. She is back to watching the game.

"Uh- okay. While I have a second I have one question for you."

"Okay. Shoot." She says not turning away from the tv.

"Um, what did- what did-"

Santana turns to me and raises an eyebrow. "Sp-sp-sp-spit it out."

I roll my eyes. "Yeah. Yeah. Make fun of me."

She just shrugs.

"Okay. What did you- tell that guy?"

Santana pulls that cute confused scrunchy face. "What guy? When?"

I wring my hands together. What is this? Nerves? I'm not sure. I just want to find out what she told that guy. "The other day, Wednesday, when you were leaving."

"Oh." She nods. "Yeah." She smirks and takes a gulp of her drink. "I just told him that he better stop hitting on my girlfriend or I would kick his ass."

"What?" I gasp. She didn't actually say that, did she?

"Yeah. It's nothing." She shrugs. "I was just messin' with the fucker."

"You're kidding right?"

Santana turns back to the game on tv. "No. Serious as a heart attack. That's actually what I said to that guy. He deserved it, after looking at you like a piece of meat." She takes another drink of her Captain and Coke.

I'm speechless. I can't believe it. Really. I don't know what to say.

There is another person flagging me down and I have to go. I walk away from the amazing dark-haired Latina over to an older gentlemen. I stand in front of him.

He eyes me curiously. "Can I get three more?" He says.

I look down to the glasses on the bar top, in front of him, and back up to meet his eyes. "Uh-"

"Three Gin and Tonic's."

"Right." I grab up the glasses and start on the drinks. I realize now that I made this man's drinks earlier in the night. And for him to have to tell me what it was that he wanted again is kind of embarrassing. I am usually on top of that sort of thing. I know drinks and I know people and what they ordered.

But, right now, I am off. Obviously. I blame Santana and what she said. I shouldn't have asked her what she told that guy but my curiosity got the better of me. I had to know. I didn't know that what she said would leave me in such a weird state.

I mix his drinks and hand them back to him. "There ya go. Enjoy." I smile my best, politest smile. I want to say I'm sorry for my weirdness but I think that would make it more weird. I gotta get me shit together and be professional.

The hours pass quickly and I get Santana a few more drinks, maybe three, but most of my night is spent serving other customers. Which is fine, I guess, but I just want to talk to her. Just to have a conversation about nothing in particular.

I do have a ton of questions that I want to ask her. Now that we are friends, I want to know everything about her. But, that won't be happening tonight.

It's not until after midnight when it starts to quiet down.

"Hey, Ms. Bartender. You gonna give me a ride home tonight?" She's drunk. I know. First of all, because she only ever calls me Ms. Bartender when she is drunk. Second, it's the way she says it. It's light and easy and like she isn't thinking about how it might sound. She has lost that self-control to filter everything that she is saying or doing.

"You want me to drive you to your house?" I ask in confusion. I'm not entirely sure what she means. I did drive her home the last time she came in and got drunk.

"Or to your house." She suggests wryly.

"Are you sure?" I ask cuz I'm not really sure myself. "I mean you can stay over if you want but I can totally bring you home or call you a cab."

"No cab. No home." She shakes her head. She really doesn't like to go home after a night of drinking. I'm guessing from what she told me the night that I dropped her off that it has something to do with her mom.

I sigh. "Okay. You can come over after work." It's not that I don't want Santana to come over. Cuz I totally do. But, it's just that I feel like I am the excuse that she uses for not going home and I don't want to be anyone's excuse for anything.


"Ready to go?" I tap Santana on the shoulder. She has her head resting on the top of the bar. I know she's not asleep because her eyes are open and she has been watching me as I cleaned up for the night. I even checked twice to see if she was asleep or not. But, she assured me that she was just resting her head.

Santana picks her head up off the bar and stands up. "Yep." She takes a wobbly step towards me as I round the end of the bar.

"Whoa." I say and put my hand on her shoulder to steady her. "You okay there?"

"All good in the hood." She giggles.

I scrunch my nose up. "That's terrible."

"No, it's not. I'm ready for my ride."

"Sorry to disappoint but we are walking." I nod towards the door and start walking.

Santana walks next to me. She stumbles into one of the table and I stop. She looks over at me. "What?"

An idea pops into my head as she stands there with one hand on the table holding herself up. "Here." I motion to my back. "Hop on." She looks at me with that cute confused scrunched up face. "You're gonna get your ride after all."

"Sweet."

I turn around and she clumsily jumps on my back. Good thing she is small and doesn't weigh a lot because if she did we both would probably be on the ground right now. With her front pressed into my back she wraps her legs around my waist and her arms around my neck. Her hands hanging clasped together in front of my chest. I put my hands under the backs of her thighs to hold her up. "Ready?"

"Yeah." She breathes into my left ear and it sends a shiver through my whole body. I grab on to her legs tighter just so I don't drop her.

I make it out the front door and down the steps okay. That was probably the hardest part actually. Walking down the sidewalk with her on my back is actually pretty easy. Easier than I thought it was going to be, actually.

But, then we get to my building and I need to unlock the door. That's a problem. The keys are in my front pants pocket and I really don't want to have to put Santana down and fish out the keys and open the door. "I have to unlock the door but the keys are in my pocket. I'm gonna put you down, okay?"

"No." Her arms and legs tighten around me. Another shiver runs through my body.

I chuckle somewhat nervously. "Okay, but how am I going to open the door?"

"I'll do it. What pocket your keys in?" She slurs.

I'm not sure how this is doing to work or what she thinks she is going to do, but I am interested to see. "Front right of my jeans."

"Mkay." I see her fingers unlatch and her left arm wraps around my neck to hold on, the other hand glides over my stomach, and I suck in a sharp breath. I feel her finger searching around for the top of my pocket.

"Santana." I don't know if I can handle her hands on me like this.

"Almost." She breathes.

Her fingers plunge into my pocket. They curl and then they pull out. Another shiver. She dangles the keys in front of my face. "Ta da. Just like magic."

"Not quite, but good work. Now hold on." I readjust my grip.

I grab the keys out of her hand and it goes to wrap around my neck with the other one. I smash the key into the lock and turn it and push the door open with one hand. The other still holding her up.

I manage to shuffle into the building and kick the door shut behind me. Both my hands holding her up again. I look up at the steps. This might be a little more difficult.

Climbing the stairs is actually easier than going down the three at the bar. I can lean into them and not worry about falling.

"This is fun." She giggles in my ear. I nod because it is fun, but I need to keep my concentration. It would be, not as fun, if we fell down the stairs. We reach my apartment door and I pull my hand from behind me to unlock the door. It swings open and I step inside and, again, kick it shut.

I quickly walk over to the couch, avoiding stepping on Lord Tubbington, in the process. I manage to spin around in front of it and then fall onto the couch squishing Santana between my body and the back of the couch.

Both of us are laughing. I pull my hands out from under her and grab her forearms from where they still hug around my neck. I pull down until she lets go and my hands slide to her wrists. "Santana." I say through my laugh.

"What?" She asks through hers.

"I don't know." It takes a few minutes, but I eventually stop laughing. Releasing her wrists, I stand up. "You want something to drink? Water?"

"Sure." She says and reaches down and takes off her shoes.

I go in the kitchen and get two glasses of water and bring them back. "Here ya go." She is up off the couch and looking through my rack of DVD's.

"Thanks, Ms. Bartender." She takes the glass from me, but doesn't drink it. She seems too busy looking over all of the DVD's that I have.

"You wanna watch a movie?" I ask. She shrugs and I lean over her shoulder to see the movie she is pointing at. It's fairly dark in here. Neither one of us bothered to turn any lights on so the only light is the light coming through the window from the street lamp outside. "That's a good one." I reach around her and pull the movie off the rack and turn and put it in the DVD player.

"Come on." I go back over to the couch and sit down. She follows and sits down on the opposite end. I shake my head at that. She was just clinging to my body not even five minutes ago but now she has to sit as far away from me as possible.

I pull the blanket off the back of the couch and scoot over towards her. "What are you doing?" She asks as the movie starts to play.

I throw the blanket out in front of us when I get to her side. "I'm sharing my blanket with you." The blanket floats down over our bodies. She doesn't say anything.

The movie plays on and on. About halfway through the movie I feel her head rest against my shoulder. It makes me smile. She's probably exhausted. I know I would be. But after work I can never go to sleep right away. I have to wait at least an hour after I get home to go to bed. I don't sleep otherwise. The adrenaline or whatever it is has to wear off before I can sleep.

I wait a few minutes before I'm about to ask her if she wants to go to sleep. I twist my neck to look down at her face. Her eyes are closed and her lips are parted slightly, her jaw slack. She's asleep already.

I shut the DVD off and gently push her off my shoulder so I can stand up. Once I'm up, I bend over and pick her up and carry her like a bride over the threshold. She grumbles intelligibly but doesn't wake up. I carry her into the bedroom and set her down on the bed. I pull back the sheets and cover her up. She rolls onto her side and curls into a ball, like she did last time.

After a go to the bathroom and change into my pajamas, I get back into my room and climb into bed. I lay on my side and stare at the girl that lays across from me. She is beautiful even in her sleep, especially in her sleep. She looks at peace like the world can't touch her or bother her.

Something flutters inside me and I sigh. The last thing I do before I fall asleep is lean forward and kiss Santana on the forehead.


My eyes flutter open and the first thing I see are big brown eyes staring back at me. I smile. "You stayed." I say and my voice is still deep and full of sleep.

She nods. "I stayed." She smiles.

"Do you want some breakfast?" I can actually do today what I didn't get the chance to do a week ago. I rearrange my question. "Do you want me to make you some breakfast?"

She purses her lips together then nods her head. She averts her eyes and ducks her chin to her chest. I can see the blush that heats her cheeks. "Hey." I reach out and tuck my index finger under her chin and lift until her eyes are back on mine. "It's okay." I tell her and smile reassuringly. She nods again. "Okay, I'll meet you in the kitchen in five minutes." She nods and I sit up and get out of bed.

After I stop at the bathroom, I go to the kitchen and pull out the waffle maker. I hope she likes waffles.

She comes into the kitchen looking a little fresher than before when we were laying in bed. Not that she didn't look alright this morning when she woke up, or when I woke up, I guess. She looked great. I don't think I've ever seen her and not thought she looked great.

"I hope you like waffles."

"I love them actually." She pulls out a chair at the table and sits down. I go back to making the waffles. I can see her out of the corner of my eyes. She is just sitting there playing nervously with her fingers. She's nervous and it's cute.

I make the waffles and sit down with Santana to eat. We share breakfast in relative silence. Every now and then I will look up and smile at her and she will duck her head and stare at her plate.

"I have to be at work at noon." I mention and look over to get her reaction.

She looks up from her plate. "Okay." She looks around the room. I don't know what she is looking for, if anything.

"You can stay until I have to go." I say it thinking that maybe that's what she was trying to figure out. If she should leave as soon as she is done eating or wait until I have to go.

"Okay."

"You don't have much to say this morning." I comment. Santana has been super quiet. Like, I don't think she has said more than a dozen words since we woke up.

"Thank you." It's timid and shy but those are sort of the same thing.

I cock my head to the side. "What for?"

She shrugs. "This." Santana points down to her almost empty plate. "Breakfast. And for letting me stay last night."

"We're friends, right?"

She breaks eye contact and looks down at her plate again. "Right."

"Just so you know, you can stay over whenever you want. Except, if I'm not here cuz then how would you get in." Santana laughs at that. She looks up and that smile is back. "I'm gonna go take a shower and you can do whatever, watch tv or play with Lord Tubbington, wherever he is."

"Okay." She nods. I get up and put my plate in the sink and go take my shower.

I get out and Santana is looking at the pictures on my wall. There are some of my family and friends. Some with my friends from when I was in high school. Some with me in them and some without. It's basically the most important people in my life.

"We should take a picture together soon." I suggest. Santana flinches when she hears my voice. "Sorry, didn't mean to scare you."

"It's okay."

"So, I've had a great time but I have to get to work now. But, we can walk over together."

"That sounds good."

I motion for her to go first. She leads as we walk to the door. I shut and lock the door as soon as we are out. She waits for me at the top of the stairs. I send her a smile and she smiles back and we descend the stairs side by side.

When we make it outside it's a nice spring morning. Well, its almost afternoon, but whatever. The walk over to the bar is short. Too short for my liking. I don't really want her to go but I know that she has to.

"Well, that was short." I hope she can't here the disappointment in my voice.

"Yeah, but it must be pretty cool to live so close to work. You don't need to worry about traffic or being late because of some unforeseen problem on your way into work."

"It is a privilege, of the life, that I live." I chuckle awkwardly. "So, here we are." I hike my thumb over my shoulder at the building.

"Yes. I should get going too."

I nod. "Right. So, I'll see you soon."

"Yeah, and uh- thanks again." She stumbles over her words.

"Please, don't thank me. Seriously. Stop. I don't want to hear another thank you come out of that pretty little mouth of yours. Now, come here you goof." I hold my arms out and step forward wrapping them around her body.

I hear her let out a sigh as she brings her arms up and puts them around my waist. I squeeze her tight before I let go. "Now get out of here, your gonna make me late for work."

She smiles and shakes her head at me. "See ya, Britt." She waves as she walks over to the parking lot where her car still is. I wave back and my heart flutter a little in my chest at the way she shortened my name. Yes, she is not the first person to call me Britt. My parents do, and Sugar does, and some of my close friends do, but it means so much more coming from her.


Another chapter in the books. I hope it was a good one. I'm loving all the reviews and comments and the follows and favorites this story is getting. Thank you.