Chapter 37

She caught me at the bottom, my body crashing into hers in the grass and making her wince.

"Sorry," I apologized.

"Right, right, your arms suck," she mumbled, pulling me up. She gave me a funny smile and brushed the dirt off of my sleeves, her gaze meeting my chest. My HAPPY shirt. "Are you happy again today?" she asked.

"No."

Santana's eyes fell. "Oh." She peered up at the open window above us. A shadow was closing in on Dave's bedroom door. "Let's go," she hissed, wrapping her fingers around my hand and squeezing hard.

We raced down the street together, our heavy breaths synchronized, like we were twins. The streetlights blurred beside my head. The lights bled out and then in. I had to squint. I had to keep my eyes on Santana's boots instead.

She threw an arm up in front of my abdomen, stopping us both. "Let's go this way," she spoke. She nodded her head towards a side street.

We walked in silence, her shoulder grazing mine and her fingers dancing at the slim space between our thighs. I peered down at her. I could still hear her ragged breathing, coming out from between her lips. Her dark eyes were glowing. Funny how they only really glowed in the darkness, like maybe that was where she belonged.

"How did you find me?" I asked.

"Oh, I'm like Batman," she answered quickly. "I just look up into the sky and see that you're in trouble."

"Really?"

She looked at me, a weird expression on her face that looked like it wanted to go one way but then another. She pressed her lips together in a tight smile. "No, not really," she answered.

I pressed at my purple G-Shock. Its face became illuminated, forming a blue circle at my wrist.

"What time is it?" Santana asked.

"8:30," I told her.

"It's not that late."

"No, not yet."

"So you've fucked her, huh?" Santana asked suddenly. But it was like she already knew the answer 'cuz her face went all shadowy and stony. "Quinn?"

I could feel the words in my mouth, a whole bunch of them, a whole bunch of them sitting on my tongue and joining up and spelling out the entire story. If I opened my mouth they'd spill out. I bit at my lip. I could already picture them sliding down my shirt like barf. I didn't wanna have to feel sick again.

I didn't say anything. I only gazed at Santana as she stared back.

"Well," she started. "She was right about one thing. You're not like her."

"I'm not like anyone," I whispered.

"Yeah, thank God," Santana said. "I hate these people."

"It's better to be like THEM though."

"Why?" Santana asked sharply. She walked towards someone's bushes and tore off a chunk of green. "Fuck them." She rolled the mass of leaves around in her palm, squeezing harder and harder until they stained her skin. "Why does she treat you like that?" she asked, dropping the wilted piece of bush in the street. "Why do you let her treat you like that?"

"I don't know." I shrugged. "We're friends. We've known each other since elementary school."

"Do you like her?" Santana kept her eyes on the ground. Her question hung like an icicle in the air. "I mean, in a gay way?"

"Do you like her, do you like her, do you like her?"

"I don't know."

She sighed into the collar of her leather jacket, kicking an errant pebble into the darkness straight ahead of us.

"Sometimes I feel like an alien," I whispered.

"What?"

"Sometimes I feel like an alien," I repeated. "Like I'm just watching everyone else live their lives without me." The fist came back, full of fingers and punching at my throat. "Even though I'm there, it's like I'm not there at all." Punch, punch, punch. "I just wanna feel like THEM. I just wanna be like THEM. People think I'm stupid, but it's just 'cuz I'm trying to fit into their puzzle and I don't." The tears came up, clouding my eyes. I sniffed and wiped them away with the side of my hand.

"If you're an alien, can I come live on your planet?" Santana asked.

I looked up at her and laughed through my sobs.

"Seriously, it's gotta be better than this one."

As soon as her words hit my ear I couldn't stop crying. I bent my head into my neck, letting the tears slip into my HAPPY shirt. Santana's boots made a scratching noise on the gravel. She put her arms out in silence and pulled me into the warmth of her chest, suffocating me with her leather-coated arms. She held me in the middle of the street and, even though there were houses all around us, if felt like we were on the moon or on my planet. Like we were the only two people there. Like we never had to come back down to Earth.

"Hey," Santana breathed into my hair. "I know I'm gonna lose like a hundred coolness points for turning all woobie right now, but whatever." Her voice dipped. "Somebody's gonna love you for real someday, Brit. I don't mean like those idiot football players you slept with or your loserific friend, Quinn, using you to get off and all. I mean a person who doesn't care about shit like that. And they're gonna love you for you, and make you feel like you belong somewhere, and you'll forget all of this lame high school bullshit. For real."

"Really?" I asked, pulling away from her.

I wanted it to be real. I wanted her to say "yes," even if she was only lying.

She gave me a sad smile, her fingers drawn to my lashes and dragging my tears away. "Yeah, really," she finally answered. "I promise."

Her fingers were so soft, a million times softer than Quinn's had ever been, even softer than Mucho Bucho when he was a baby. They were softer than anything. She touched my hair, pushing a piece of my bangs off of my forehead and tucking it behind my ear. She stared straight at me as if I were the only person in her world too.

I wished, with all of my heart, that it was true.

"Come on," Santana said. "I'll take you home."