Santana swallowed the weird lump in her throat as she stared at the door to Charlie's apartment. Charlie had buzzed her in, so it wasn't as if she was trespassing, but her palms were sweaty, and she had spent an inordinate amount of time looking at her reflection in the elevator to make sure that she still looked good. She wasn't dressed for a simple night in with pizza and beer, she had put on her little black dress and was wearing heels, she hadn't wanted to be late so going home to change had been out of the question. Still she was uncharacteristically nervous, probably due to the fact that Charlie had made it clear that she was only going to get one shot to impress her. She wasn't sure if her soulmate had been serious, or was just trying to tell her to bring her A game, but if they were attempting to start over with a clean slate, then she needed to make a good impression.
Which meant knocking on the door. She just needed to knock on the door but she was practically frozen in fear, she had never really made a good impression on her mate, and she really didn't want to fuck this up. She could be charming, she could charm and seduce anyone. But she couldn't just pretend that there wasn't any history between her and Charlie, they had history and their relationship had never been good. She wasn't even sure what would set her soulmate off.
The door swings open and Charlie raises a brow at her, before spotting the six pack of her favorite shitty beer, and another pack of a beer she'd never heard of. "I was just about to make the milkshakes, I thought about it and shitty pizza with wings and breadsticks pairs better with a milkshake than questionable beer," Charlie turns to head back into her apartment leaving the door open for Santana. "What flavor do you want?"
Santana swallowed, "Chocolate?" She asked unsure if it was a trick question as she followed Charlie into the apartment. She spots a bunch of candy out on the counter and she raises a brow at the oreo tower. "I didn't realize you had such a sweet tooth."
"I didn't realize you were so boring," Charlie retorts. "Chocolate?"
"Well how was I supposed to know that you mugged Willy Wonka?" Santana snaps back placing the beer on the island and trying not to smile when Charlie rolled her eyes.
"Well now that you know—"
"Still chocolate, dark chocolate," Santana clarifies, smiling just a bit.
Charlie narrowed her eyes at Santana, she wasn't sure what she had expected. "I bet you take your coffee black too."
"I do, I don't have a sweet tooth. I've never had a sweet tooth," Santana explains.
Charlie paused for a moment, before shrugging her shoulders. "That actually makes sense."
Santana tilts her head, "Does it?"
"Yeah, monsters don't like candy," Charlie says, keeping her face neutral as she studies Santana, who flinches at her tone. Immediately she feels that pit in her stomach.
Santana swallows, was that how Charlie viewed her? As some sort of monster to be vanquished. "I just don't—you know what I'll just take what you're having."
"I was kidding—well not really but we're here to get over me thinking of you as some sort of monster." Charlie says taking her unopened bottle of Baileys and dumping half of it in the blender. She opens a cupboard and grabs some bakers chocolate and tosses it in a pot so she could melt it.
"Is alcohol poisoning something that I should also be worried about? That's a lot of alcohol."
"Bailey's is like barely alcohol."
Santana grabbed the bottle, and checked it over. "This says 17% Charlie. What the fuck do you consider alcohol? If you don't think that this is barely alcohol."
"Everyone knows that 40% and above is alcohol Santana, how are you this old and you don't know the basics?" Charlie argues as she opens her freezer and grabs the vanilla and chocolate ice cream. She immediately adds some chocolate ice cream to the blender and then adds the melted dark chocolate before turning it on.
"I'm not an alcoholic?" Santana points out, she barely drank at all. Sure she liked a good beer or a glass of wine every now and again but drinking alone had always felt sad to her.
"Either am I. I like cheap beer sometimes and adult milkshakes like twice a year. It takes half a year to burn off all the calories," Charlie grumbled over the blender.
Santana watches quietly as Charlie finishes blending and motions at the candy and the whipped cream so Santana can decorate her very tall glass. She grabs a twizzler and bites off both ends of it and slides it into the drink and uses a generous helping of whipped cream before looking at Charlie who is staring at her. "What?"
"You're not dressed for a night where we watch crappy horror movies and get progressively drunk. You do look really nice though." Charlie's quiet for a moment. "I should have a hoodie and some sweats you can wear, or a t-shirt somewhere. Hold on—if the pizza guy comes just buzz him in, the tip money is in the glass bowl beside the door." Charlie says taking off to her room so she can find Santana something comfortable to wear.
Santana blinks at where Charlie had just been and takes a deep breath before taking a sip of her milkshake, her eyes widen at how surprisingly good it is, it's not overly sweet the bitterness of the dark chocolate offsetting it, but it's creamy and delicious and she knew if she wasn't careful she might actually get drunk on this and that was the last thing that she wanted. She was not a respectable drunk, no she needed to be in full control of herself. So instead of drinking the rest of her milkshake, she decides to take a look at Charlie's apartment, which is sparsely decorated.
She can't tell anything about her soulmate, there weren't any figurines or posters, or paintings. Spartan was the word that described Charlie's taste, and she's not sure what that said about her soulmate. She had hoped for something, anything to talk about with Charlie, but she was drawing a blank.
"Alright I got you some sweats and an old soccer jersey, don't worry they're clean. I gave them the sniff test," Charlie said holding up the clothes for Santana.
Santana turns and flushes, even though she hadn't been snooping. "Thanks—bathroom?"
Charlie pointed down the hallway, "It's open for you," Charlie said quietly, studying Santana. It wasn't as if she had dated a ton of people, but even with her limited experience she could feel the tension between them. She's tempted to call Santana out on it, but she hesitates, she had been the one that had made this a high pressure situation and seeing Santana stumbling proved that she wasn't this horrible person that she had built up in her head. "My parents want to invite you to brunch," she blurts out as Santana reaches for the clothes.
Santana blinked and grabbed the clothes, "Your parents want to invite me to brunch?"
"If the night goes well, my dad wants to thank you and argue with you about his weight and his diet. I have no clue what my mom wants other than for us to mate, so she can start talking about grandchildren." Charlie continues wincing at her word salad, but she needed Santana to know that there would definitely be more of this.
"Do you want me to go to brunch with your parents?" Santana asked, Charlie's parents wanting something didn't matter if Charlie didn't want this relationship to continue.
Charlie swallowed and looked away, "Well despite your horrendous taste in both pizza and milkshakes—this date hasn't been the worst I've ever been on. I'm not opposed to going to brunch with my family with you. You can wear that dress again, I think, is that a brunch dress?"
"No, I have something else for that," Santana said smiling and relaxing, well this wasn't the disaster she had worried about. She just needed to show Charlie a bit more of herself.