Going back to read some reviews of this fic gave me a smile, so thank you for those. The lovely ones warm my heart.

X

Santana had always known.

When it came to Brittany there was never any doubt.

When she was younger she never believed in 'the one'. It had just seemed like nonsense to her, the idea that people were meant for each other. That everyone's lives were already written out in the stars, that love didn't come from within but from some other place, some grand cosmic place. Fate or kismet or the universe or whatever people called it, growing up she always thought it was bullshit.

She still thought it was bullshit.

But she had believed it once briefly, but only for her and only for Brittany.

When they were together everything in Santana's bones told her she was meant for Brittany and Brittany was meant for her. Perfect opposites who were somehow perfectly in sync.

In high school she never understood why so many supposed 'badass' people would walk away from or cheat or hurt their girlfriends or boyfriends just because they could, just because they felt like they could get away with it, because in their minds being a badass apparently meant acting like a bitch ass punk. She didn't get that, because if you were a real badass then you would never run from anything. At least that's what she thought.

Most adults and teachers in her life had always regarded her as difficult, as complicated, as trouble, as obnoxious, and she may have been some of those things some of the time but one thing she had never been was afraid of love. Badasses weren't afraid of anything and as far as she was concerned she, Santana Lopez, was the most badass of them all.

And so when she first laid eyes on Brittany on their first day of school Freshman year there was no going back. It was then she knew she was going to be a badass at love. Unlike others she wasn't going to waste it or run away from it. What was the fun in that? Where was the bravery in that?

When she saw Brittany smile for the first time she felt something warm inside of her heart bloom. Brittany was funny and adorable and crazy and brilliant. She had adventure in her eyes and all Santana knew is that she wanted to be a part of whatever adventure that was.

Sensing a uniqueness about Brittany and what she could bring to their group Quinn and Mercedes had quickly decided to induct the new girl into the B-faces. Brittany had taken to them just as easily, leaping with joy at the idea of sleepovers at Quinn's and shopping trips with Mercedes but she had a very natural gravitation to Santana when the four of them hung out. There had been plenty of nights when Mercedes and Quinn would nod off or wander away until it was just her and Brittany on a bedroom floor, laughing and talking in hushed tones as if they were speaking their very own special language that no one else could understand.

Later when Santana was the first of them to get her own car and was thusly promoted to be everyone's defacto ride she always made sure to drop Quinn and Mercedes off first so that she and Brittany could have that little extra bit of time. Even if all it meant was singing a Kesha or a Gaga song together before they arrived in front of the Pierce home a few minutes later. She savored every private moment, no matter how short or how trivial.

Santana took her time because when she did her make her move she wanted Brittany to know that she meant every emotion behind her words. She didn't want a fling, she didn't want to just fool around, what she wanted from that very first moment was to be all in.

Of course what she hadn't counted on was Brittany deciding that instead of waiting on Santana, she was going to make the first move herself. One day when they were sitting in Santana's bedroom she had just point blank asked her ''so are we ever gonna make out or what?''.

Santana hadn't expected that but it made sense, because as innocent as Brittany could be sometimes she wasn't this shy, dainty fragile thing. No, Brittany kept her on her toes. She challenged her at every turn. Of course she wasn't just going to wait for Santana, she was going to make her own move.

Her plan was to be a badass at love but it seemed Brittany was an even bigger badass at it.

And that evening when Mercedes and Quinn walked into Santana's bedroom ready for a B-faces girls night in and found Brittany straddling and kissing a perfectly willing and perfectly happy Santana on the mattress, no one batted an eye, no one scratched their head. There was a second of 'oh, okay, this makes sense' and that was it. Mercedes just shoved them over so she could sit on the bed and steal a pillow and Quinn just snorted something about Santana being on the bottom before she began debating on what movie they should all watch.

From that day forward she and Brittany became a them. And they did it all, school dances and meeting each other's parents and ridiculous little squabbles over nothing of importance that never lasted for more than a couple of hours. They made sense in the most nonsensical way. Santana was all growly and hard edges and Brittany was all bubblegum and unicorns and together they created this perfect balance with each other. They fit. They were teenagers but what they had was anything but high school, atleast that's how Santana felt.

With Quinn and Mercedes along for the ride they survived high school. And as tough as it was for the B-faces to part ways as they all began to embark on their own journeys Santana felt a peace with it. She knew whatever Mercedes and Quinn did, they would kick the world in the nads and own it. And she was sure she and Brittany were on the right track too when they decided to make their break after graduation.

They went to L.A. and got a shitty apartment along some shitty jobs and began the process of figuring out who they were and who they wanted to be. But in all of that talking and all of that figuring out there was one thing Santana had never questioned. When it came to Brittany she was always all in. Still. And forever.

They were navigating the world together for the first time as young adults on their own and yeah it was scary, but it was the wonderful kind, the kind that made her believe that with Brittany anything was possible. Because Brittany made everything possible.

And so she bought a ring.

Only a few days after they settled in, she bought a ring.

Unlike when she first met Brittany she didn't want to wait. She had tried to, that had been the plan at first, to wait a few months, to find the perfect moment, to plan, but in the end she only lasted a couple of weeks.

She had come home one evening and found Brittany had ordered chinese take out and had arranged a very romantic looking picnic for them on the floor, which was pretty easy to do because they hadn't any furniture. They ate by candlelight and read each other's fortunes and laughed as they later tumbled their way to the king sized mattress. There was no frame, no boxspring, just the bed on the floor. In dim light their bodies moved in slow degrees against each other until they were both breathless, slick and dizzy from release. Afterwards when they were curled into each other under the sheets Brittany let one of her hands wander over to Santana's face where she pressed the pad of her thumb against her full lips and gently stroked them for several minutes. Marvelling at them, so very quietly captivated. And it was in that moment as Brittany got lost in her that Santana found herself so lost in Brittany.

She realized she didn't need to wait for a perfect moment, because every moment with Brittany was already going to be perfect. They were perfect. Perfect opposites who were somehow perfectly in sync.

She pulled away and stark naked Santana had padded to retrieve something from the far side of the room. She returned to slip back under the sheets where a curious Brittany was sitting up and waiting. It felt like all the air was sucked out of the room when she held out the tiny black box and popped the lid open.

Brittany didn't say anything, she tried to but she stumbled over her words at each start. Nothing came out right. Her eyes blinked rapidly, alarmed.

When it was clear after several moments she had no answer Santana shattered.

And that was that.

''Because I asked you to marry me, that's why!'' Santana rushed to speak. Her heart clenched inside of her chest at the cold truth. ''I asked you to marry me and you didn't say yes...and you didn't say no...you didn't say anything, Brittany.''

And there it was.

The thing they had been dancing around and avoiding for so long, for years. The thing that had always been there at the tip of their tongues but never uttered, at least never fully and never ever sober.

One of them had finally said it out loud.

Santana's outburst however was promptly followed by a suffocating kind of silence between them as they looked into each other's eyes there on the sidewalk outside of the club which was now somehow conveniently deserted except for the two of them.

When it became to much to look into those perfect blue eyes Santana took a breath and started swiftly walking down the sidewalk.

''What are you doing?'' Brittany asked.

''I'm not entirely sure, but I'm not having this conversation here.'' Santana looked up and down the street and raised her hand for a cab but the few that passed didn't stop. And neither did Brittany who was never more than a few steps behind her.

''Why?''

''Because. You can't just push me to talk about my feelings like this. It's not fair.''

''And avoiding your feelings as well as mine somehow is?''

Santana didn't want to hear it though and after giving up on her search for a taxi she continued on down the street and made her way for the subway to get back to the hotel on the other side of town. Even though she tried to make it clear she really didn't want Brittany tagging along with her, the blonde wasn't going to allow either of them to walk away from a very long overdue conversation. That was how they eventually ended up on a subway train. They were the only two people in the compartment in the dead of night.

They stood and watched each other as the train gently jerked their bodies around.

''I didn't know,'' Brittany said finally, finding her voice and looking Santana head on.

''You didn't know what?''

''I was eighteen. And I didn't know what to say when someone kneels in front of me and offers me everything. Maybe that's a really pathetic answer and maybe it makes no sense but that night...I just didn't know what to say. It was like I forgot how to talk because I couldn't believe-''

''What?'' Santana asked quietly as she looked down at her own shoes. ''That I was stupid enough to buy a ring?''

''No. That you loved me enough to give me one. I didn't know what to say because looking at you...looking at me...I lost my breath. It was like I didn't know how to make words anymore because…''

''Because what?''

Brittany paused and closed her eyes. She looked overwhelmed and about a million other different things.

''Brittany if you want to have this conversation here then you're gonna have to give me something. Like I can't keep guessing or wondering. Just...just tell me. You forgot how to make words because - what?''

''Because I had the world's most perfect woman kneeling in front of me with a ring, Santana. I didn't know what to say and I didn't know how to say it because you gave me this perfect moment that most people only ever see in movies or read in books and all I could think was how am I this lucky. Millions of people in the world and I found the most perfect one and here she is...this perfect one offering me everything.''

Santana swallowed. ''...so why couldn't you say all that then? Why'd you just sit there and look at me speechless?''

''We had just graduated high school and there we were in L.A. and everything was so new and different and we were just barely starting to figure life out. We were just barely figuring out how to be adults. I mean I had just learned how to work a washing machine that very same week. I was eighteen and I didn't know how to get the words out when someone offers me something like that. Also, I had just had like three orgasms that night so speech was already going to be a struggle.''

Even in a conversation like this Santana took pride in herself and her stamina in the sack. ''Thank you.''

''You're welcome.''

''But not the point, Brittany.''

''Then what is the point, Santana?''

''The point is I don't think you get how scary it was for me,'' Santana countered. ''I came home to my girlfriend who I'd been with for years and we have dinner and we make love and afterwards I'm naked in every sense of the word and I pull out a ring and...and all I get is silence.''

''I'm sorry I hurt you, Santana, but you hurt me too.''

''I hurt you?''

Brittany laughed at the absurdity. ''You pulled out a ring and okay, I lost my speech for what thirty seconds and when I do finally talk I stumble over my words, you-you just freak out and close the box and walk out of the room. So you know what at eighteen I didn't know how to react to a ring, but at eighteen you didn't know how to react to my non-reaction either. San, I tried to talk to you for days after that night but each time I tried to bring it up you said it didn't matter, that it was stupid and that you were over it. Things got weird. You shut down on me and then you broke up with me out of nowhere.''

''Not out of where,'' Santana said and motioned with her hand between herself and Brittany. ''And for your information when you're sitting there holding out a ring to someone - thirty seconds feels like a fucking lifetime, Britt.''

''And so you punish me by leaving me? What kind of overreaction is that?''

''I wasn't punishing you. I was never angry with you. Breaking up was never about that.''

''Then what was it about?''

''I was just trying to save face alright? I couldn't handle being with you thinking that each time you looked at me all you would ever see is some sad pathetic fool.''

''I never thought you were a fool.''

''Well I felt like one...I still feel like one. Every single day. And every single day that I see you I force myself to pretend that night never happened. That I never bought the ring, that I never showed it to you, that I never gave you the chance to reject me.''

''Who said I rejected you?''

''Look Brittany I gave you a choice and you couldn't choose. In that moment you couldn't choose...and that was answer enough for me. Because when it comes to you I've always known. I never had any doubt or hesitation...you did though and maybe that meant something. And guess what? That's okay because you didn't owe me anything and right now I don't owe you anything so I don't know why all of a sudden you're pushing all of this to the surface when we were doing just fine how we were.''

''You call all of this just fine?'' Brittany lifted her hands and motioned around the grimey train compartment.

Their night had been a messy, confusing nightmare so far. They had been running around the hotel and the city, they had encounters with literal rats and a couple of friendly neighborhood strippers.

Santana laughed weakly. ''I mean tonight? Drunk shenanigans? Wedding dress fiasco? No. But overall, me and you? Yeah.''

''Have you ever asked yourself why we do half the things we do?''

''Because they're fun?''

''Or because for whatever reason we've decided that if we can't be happy together we'll just be miserable together and we trick ourselves into believing that it's fun. The going out, the drinking, the occasional drug use, being those two unreliable, irresponsible bachelorettes - it's not fun anymore. And really, was it ever? And you want to know why all of this is coming out now, tonight? You're right, it's the wedding. Weddings do that. They make you think about what is and what could have been. Or at least it's made me think about all of those what ifs. If that night went different...or if we did different things after...what would our life look like.''

''Please don't do this.'' Santana looked so frightened. ''Brittany. Please.''

Brittany stepped closer towards her, her getting softer and more emotional as she went on. ''We were kids and we both reacted to those things in really messed up ways. It's no one's fault, it's just how it went down and we can't change it. Maybe if we were smart enough we would've found a way to talk this out years ago but we're here now. And here now I'm tired of being miserable together. Aren't you?''

Santana had no answer.

''Do you remember earlier tonight when we were doing coke in the bathroom at the restaurant?'' Brittany pressed on regardless of the silence she received. ''I asked you if Mercedes was happy, if Quinn was happy and if we were happy...I'm not happy, Santana. Not when we're pretending that being friends, that being B-faces is all me and you are. We're more than that, we've always been more than that.''

Santana blinked back tears and shook her head. She knew what she wanted and she knew what Brittany wanted, but the risk of ever going there again with each other, it was just too much. It was still just too scary.

''Do you know how many girls I've been with just trying to get over you?'' she asked Brittany. ''I can't even count. Everybody thinks that's who I am and I think a part of me even wishes that's who I really was.''

''It's not...I know,'' Brittany said, encouraging her to go on. ''I've always known.''

''The only reason I started screwing around like that after we broke up, it was just about pretending, Britt. If I could pretend that's what I wanted, if I could pretend to be over our thing then I thought maybe you wouldn't feel sorry for me...or sad for me… Cause you know before all of this you were all I ever wanted. I used to think you were the one for me. And you know what the funny thing about all of this is? I never even believed in any of that 'the one' shit before you.''

''I do though,'' Brittany said with ease. ''I totally believe in all of that shit. I believe in 'the one' and I believe in fate and I believe in happy endings and I believe I was meant for you. I might have tried to convince myself that I didn't anymore, but I don't think I ever stopped wanting you. If what we had was just high school I don't think we would have stuck around each other like this. We would've just forgot about each other and drifted off to do our own things, but we didn't.''

''Because we're friends.''

''No, because something in you brings out something in me and something in me brings out something in you. There are better parts of us. And those parts, they're only for each other.''

X

Meanwhile back at the strip club Quinn and Elliot were walking out with the trash bag in hand. Brittany and Santana were long gone from the scene and in any other situation she would probably make an attempt to find them and figure out where they were or what was going on inside each of their heads but time was of the essence and they were running out of hours.

If the two of them had issues to sort of together she was going to leave them to it because it was now up to her to save the wedding and save the dress. She and Elliot were just about to slide into a cab when her phone began chirping.

Her screen lit up with life as the name Mercedes flashed onto the screen.

She took a deep breath and answered. ''Hey, what's going on, is everything okay,'' Quinn began urgently.

''Hey,'' Mercedes said. ''I know it's late and but I just couldn't sleep and I was wondering if you could come over to my room for a few minutes. I just want to have a talk, one on one.''

''I….uh….'' Quinn looked at the street and at Elliot who was waiting for her call on what to do and where to go.

''I'm kinda having a moment here and I need my maid of honor right now Q.''

And like that Quinn knew what she had to do. ''Okay, I'm on my way, just give me twenty minutes and I'll be there.''

They ended the call and Quinn pushed the wedding dress filled trash bag into Elliot's hands and then proceeded to push Elliot into the backseat of the taxi.

''What's going on, what are we doing? I thought you were coming with me,'' he said, hugging the bag to his front like a teddy bear.

''Change of plans. Listen the deal is still on okay? You go to your place, you get out your gear and you fix this dress, alright? If you can do that in three hours I'll pay you whatever the hell you want,'' she vowed as she shut the door behind him and put her hands on top of the hood. ''When you're done you take it back to the hotel alright? The same one we had the bachelorette party at. You got it?''

''I think so,'' he said with a nod.

Quinn handed him a wad of cash to pay the driver and saw him off. She barely waited a second before hailing her own cab and hauling her ass back to the hotel. As soon as she stepped inside the building there was a sense of dread that washed over her, and it only grew and became more intense as she made her way through the lobby, the corridors and finally to stand in front of Mercedes' hotel room door.

It was there standing in front of that door that she decided to call Santana. The last thing Santana had said she was going to do was reveal everything to Mercedes and Quinn wasn't sure if Santana had since returned to the hotel and made good on that. Unfortunately Santana's phone went straight to voicemail. 'Hey you've reached Santana, eat a dick' said the recorded message before the beep. Which kind of figured as she suddenly remembered she had actually broken Santana's phone. It had been left in the middle of the strip club floor after their slap fight.

With no clue what she was walking into Quinn lifted her hand and knocked on the door. A few moments later a very somber, serious looking Mercedes answered the door.

''I think we need to talk,'' Mercedes said in greeting.