They text back and forth the next couple of days and it quickly turns into a regular thing.
Santana won't admit it but this cat-guardian thing has no upsides until it presented her the perfect opportunity to text the hot blonde in her complex. She asks questions like what the best cat food to buy is or why Charlie kept coughing up hairballs. Brittany's super helpful and insightful.
For instance, she knows everything about cat diseases. Santana had no idea cats could even get AIDS.
Whenever she's at home when Charlie is visiting Brittany, she tags along. Brittany has taken to feeding him cat treats (she left her fondue pot back home, so cheese is off the table) instead, although there is the occasional helping of tuna casserole when her roommate, Tina tries cooking again and they sit on the bench and just chat. When Charlie finishes eating, they'll play with him with one of those fishing-rod cat toys or watch him go nuts trying to chase the red dot across the floor.
"Whoa, someone got lucky today," Santana comments, noticing that Charlie isn't eating cat treats.
"Yeah, they're tuna patties," Brittany informs her. "Tina keeps buying stuff in bulk from Costco so the cans have taken up most of the kitchen. We keep on having to cook with it otherwise we won't have space for anything else."
Santana chuckles at this.
"I think it still qualifies under Atkins. Besides," Brittany comments. "I was at campus most of last week, so I felt bad I didn't get to feed or play with him."
"You're a student?"
"Not really. I'm a choreographer, well trying to be," she says, with a little sigh. "But I do some research stuff at Caltech a couple times a week for extra money."
"What do you research?"
"Applied mathematics and quantum mechanics."
"Oh. I have no idea what that is."
Brittany laughs. "It's not that interesting, I'd much rather be dancing but dancers and choreographers are kind of a dime-a-dozen in LA, so it's hard to do it full time."
"It'll happen," Santana says, reassuringly.
Brittany quirks her brow. "How do you know?"
"Because I've never seen you dance and somehow I can already tell that you're good."
Brittany looks bashful. "You're sweet."
Santana's chuckles and looks down at Charlie eating his food to avoid blushing. "I don't think anyone's ever called me that before, but thanks."
"You know, I don't think we've ever talked about work."
Santana tries to think back to their previous conversations and much to her surprise, she realizes that Brittany is right. Work never seems to come up in their conversations, which is weird given that it's where she spends most of her time. They talked about cat stuff, obviously, but they talked a lot more about their friends and about their lives.
Brittany's from San Diego, where her family all still live with her overweight, chain-smoking cat, Lord Tubbington (who certainly lives up to the name, she's seen pictures). Her roommate, Tina has taken it upon herself to learn how to cook for her boyfriend, Mike, who never asked her to and has a habit of trying to maximise her Costco membership, meaning that their kitchen is often filled with a select number of items in bulk.
They'd talked about how Quinn was totally an overbearing cat-mom and how she and Santana had known each other since high school. They talked about how Santana's friend Mercedes just started a month-long tour to promote her new album, leaving her boyfriend a total pining mess.
"Nobody wants to see those giant guppy lips trembling about how much he misses her," Santana had quipped.
"I work at a marketing firm. We do a lot of ad campaigns and PR, that sort of stuff."
"Sounds exciting."
"It can be, but it definitely takes its toll."
"Have I seen anything you've worked on?"
Santana paused. "Do you know Bubble Bites, the fish food?"
"That was you?" Brittany asks, eyes widening a bit. "I love those commercials. Where the little goldfish with the big lips kisses the bowl cause he's so happy with the food? It's adorable."
"Yeah, the giant fish lips were inspired by my friend Sam. I totally thought he should get royalties for it."
Brittany laughs and it makes Santana want to spend the whole day on the bench with her.
Sam shows up at her doorstep at ten in the morning on a Saturday, dressed in workout gear and jogging up and down on the spot when he rings the doorbell.
"Do you want to go for a run?" is the first thing he says when she opens the door.
"I really don't."
"C'mon, Santana, please," he pleads. "I need to keep my brain occupied while I'm running. We can catch up."
"God, you are such a sap. You miss Mercedes so much that you can't go on a run without thinking about her?"
"It's not that," he mutters, trying to save face. "C'mon, please, just come with me. I'll buy you coffee afterwards. I'll even go slow so you can keep pace," he teases.
"Oh please, Trouty Mouth, I would totally leave you in dust," Santana rolls her eyes.
Sam grins. "So you'll come?"
"Fine," she huffs, turning around to go get changed.
Santana's out of breath by the time they finish their run, starting to regret trying to sprint ahead of Sam every time they turned a corner. They talked a bit, but she was pretty invested in proving her point that she'd totally leave him in dust.
At least having to keep up with someone else could distract him from his girlfriend woes.
As promised, he bought her coffee from the cafe near her apartment as the two of them walked back through the courtyard of the complex.
"Hey Santana!"
Santana stopped in her tracks and turned around to find Brittany, carrying a box and coming towards her.
"Hi, Britt," she smiles.
"I believe this is yours, they misdelivered it to my apartment," Brittany says, holding out the box.
"Oh, thanks," Santana replies, quickly thrusting her cup of coffee at Sam to hold and taking the box from Brittany.
"No problem," Brittany says, distracted, trying not to stare directly at Santana's abs, since the sports bra, she's wearing makes them very evident. "Just trying to be a good neighbour. Did you just get back from a run?"
"Yeah. Gotta stay in shape and everything," she says.
"I mean you totally look like you do."
Santana finds her mouth slightly agape once again, not sure how to respond to that comment, so she just laughs a little nervously.
"Looks like you're feeling better, then."
Santana had come down with a cold last week. After a full day of trying to sniffle her way through meetings and waiting to blow her nose when the door to her office was shut, Shelby told her not to come in till she was feeling better. When Brittany found out, she showed up a couple hours later with chicken soup from the deli and a copy of The Parent Trap.
Santana would have swooned if she wasn't on the verge of falling back asleep from all that cold medicine. Mucusin was actually very effective, though it was also super strong.
"Much better," Santana nods. "Thank you again for the soup and the movie. I still need to return your DVD."
Brittany waves it off. "Don't worry about it. I was totally right though, wasn't I? Parent Trap is the perfect sick day movie."
"You were definitely right about that," Santana smiles. She hears Sam clear his throat and it suddenly occurs to her that it's not just her and Brittany standing out in the courtyard, "This is Sam by the way. He just ate my dust," she smirks. "This is my neighbour, Brittany."
"Nice to meet you," he nods. "I'd shake your hand, but," he gestures at the two coffee cups he's holding.
"Wait you're Sam...you're the Bubble Bites guy!" she exclaims, as if finally putting two and two together.
"The Bubble Bites...Santana!" he turns to his friend. "I really wish you'd stop telling people I was the inspiration for that," Sam chastises, though he laughs.
"I'm just keepin' it real," she shrugs, with a smirk. "I did fight to try to get you royalties on that, but the Bubble Bites Corporation refused."
Brittany laughs. "Anyway, I actually have to get going, I have an audition in a bit, but I just wanted to make sure your package got to you safely."
"Well, thank you for that. And good luck with the audition, I'm sure you'll kill it."
"Thanks, I'll see you around," she smiles. "It was nice to meet you, Sam." Brittany then turns around and walks back to her apartment, leaving Santana to watch as she walks away.
Her attention is finally diverted when Sam nudges her in the side and she sees the big guppy grin on his face.
"What?"
"Why didn't you tell me about Brittany?"
"Tell you what? I have lots of neighbours."
"Yeah, but you said that you weren't seeing anyone."
"We're not seeing each other, I mean, we hang out sometimes but that's really only so she can play with my cat."
Sam looks like he's about to burst out laughing.
"Not that! My actual cat! Well, Quinn's cat, Charlie. The four legged animal. Ugh. You're impossible," she mutters before turning around and storming off towards her apartment as Sam finally bursts out laughing.
"So, he's shedding now," Santana informs Brittany, one afternoon they're back on the bench.
"Really?"
"Yeah, it feels like I have carpeting in my living room now."
Brittany scratches the back of Charlie's ear. "Oh no. Have you given him a bath? Sometimes it helps."
Santana groaned. "No, not for a while. The first time I tried to do it he acted as if I was trying to kill him. My entire bathroom floor ended up soaked, the little drama queen," she glared at him, moving to his eye level, though Charlie didn't seem the least bit bothered
"Bathing cats is never fun, trust me," Brittany giggles. "One time in high school I was trying to wrangle Lord Tubbington into the bath and well, I ended up in the bath too. Soaked my clothes and everything."
"Ok, I'm starting to think I got off easy with the wet floor," Santana laughed.
"I mean, it could've been worse," she smiled with a little shrug. "You could try brushing his fur too, it'll collect the fur before it falls out. That way, it won't end up all over your floor and your furniture."
"Brushing? So that's like an everyday thing?"
"A couple times a week should be fine."
Charlie is distracted when a bird flies low and quickly leaps off the bench in an attempt to chase it, causing the bird to panic and quickly flap its wings in an attempt to leave, as the cat makes a swipe at it.
A couple of months ago, Charlie could have taken down that bird in one swipe. Despite his recent weight loss, he was still a little slow and the pigeon lived to flap away.
"I'm just glad I'm not going to have to clean up that mess," Santana comments.
"Oh yeah, he'd definitely present it to you as a gift on your doorstep."
"Gross."
"Aww, it just means he loves you," Brittany teases.
Santana has a grin on her face when Brittany sends her another cat meme. The blonde has a kind of quirky sense of humour, but her meme game is certainly on point. They've been texting back and forth for a little while and Santana giggles, immediately replying with three laughing face emojis.
Sam notices immediately.
"Who are you texting?"
"Hmm? Nobody," she answers quickly. She's at his apartment, trying to help him pick out an outfit for when he picks Mercedes up at the airport and whisks her off to their date. He hasn't seen her in a month and it's incredibly obvious.
"It's that Brittany, chick right?" he asks, with a teasing grin. "She seems cool, you should ask her out."
"Ok, mind ya business, Trouty Mouth," Santana retorts, defensively. "Why don't you go back to focussing on picking out your clothes like you're a teenage girl on her first date."
"You're supposed to be helping me! Hey, what if I picked her up in a suit and a sign with her name on it? I could get one of those chauffeur's hats."
"Yeah, because there's nothing that gets a woman hotter than the idea of coming home to her chauffeur."
"Ok fine, help me pick something out then," he sighs, dragging another batch of shirts out of his closet and onto his bed.
Santana thumbs through a few of them and pulls out some options.
"She's not even going to be back till next week. Why are you doing this now?"
"I don't remember if I washed some of these after the last time I wore them," he admitted. "It's been a while."
Santana scrunched up her nose.
"Besides, I needed your opinion and it's impossible to pin you down with your schedule these days."
"Where are you taking her anyway?"
"That new place near Kurt's apartment. He said it's really good, also y'know, classy but not super high-profile in case she doesn't wanna get recognized and have to take selfies all evening."
Santana looks at the shirts she pulled out and hands him a wine-red button down. "You have black jeans somewhere right? Wear them with this."
Sam thanks her and heads into his en-suite to try on his outfit. Santana can hear zippers being pulled up and down and fabric hitting the bathroom floor.
"So are you gonna ask her out?" he calls out from the bathroom.
"What?"
"Brittany," he clarifies, emerging in his new outfit, still doing up the buttons on his shirt. "She seems cool. Why don't ask her out?"
"She's- I mean," Santana tries to shrug and make it look like she doesn't care. "I mean she's cool but I don't even know if she's gay."
"She totally is."
"How would you know?"
"I have awesome gaydar."
Santana snorts at that. "You? You think you have awesome gaydar?"
"Yes," he answers in complete sincerity.
"Not that I like to be reminded of this but we dated ," Santana reminds him. "And it was only for like two weeks in high school but still."
"Yeah, but you weren't out then."
"You would've known though, if your gaydar was so good."
"Well, I knew Kurt was gay."
Santana snorts again. "That's because Lady Hummel came out of the womb tap-dancing in a rainbow onesie and singing showtunes. Next."
He thinks again. "Well, I was your wingman that time at Eclectic. Remember, you went home with that brunette? I knew she was gay."
"Uh, only because she kept sending me drinks and grinding up on me on the dance floor. Face it Trouty, your gaydar doesn't work."
Sam pursed his lips. "I still think Brittany's gay. She was kinda checking you out after we went running."
"She was?"
Sam nods.
"Well...who wouldn't check me out?" Santana waves it off and hopes she doesn't stammer. "Have you seen my abs? They're fantastic."
Turns out brushing the cat regularly really does help with the shedding.
She just didn't expect it to turn into an every-other-day sort of thing. She thought maybe once a week, but it was practically a daily thing at this point, only missing days when Santana was super swamped at the office.
Fortunately, Charlie actually liked being groomed, so this wasn't like a bath situation. He'd purr in contentment as she collected the hair with the brush, preventing her from having to collect it from the floor in the coming days.
She'd never admit it, but it was almost kind of relaxing, like one of those mindless things you can do so that you don't have to think of anything.
"Good boy," she tells him, petting his head as she finishes brushing him and Charlie responds by climbing back to his spot on the couch. She just lets him sit on the furniture or wherever now. It's not like she can stop him when she's at work most of the day anyway.
Her phone rings and she looks at the screen to see that it's Quinn requesting for a FaceTime. Santana turns to the cat.
"Your mom is calling."
He looks up at her and meows, before turning his attention elsewhere.
"Yeah, but if I don't pick up now, she'll just bother me about you later." Santana hits the accept button on her phone. "Hey, Q. Everything's fine here, Charlie's still in one piece."
"How's it going with the weight loss?"
"It's, you know...going," Santana shrugged, squinting at the cat. "He's doing better. Here," she turns the phone around so that Quinn can see Charlie sitting on the couch.
"Hi Charlie," Santana heard Quinn gush in what she now dubbed her 'mama' voice. "How are you doing? Is Santana taking care of you?"
Santana rolled her eyes, as she watched the cat look up at his human on the screen, blink once and then go back to cleaning himself.
"He actually looks like he's lost a little weight," Quinn comments.
"Well I should hope so. Do you know how many types of diet cat food I had to buy? You were certainly no help."
"Well excuse me, my cat never gained five pounds in a month when he was with me ," she retorted. "So which one helped?"
"Huh?"
"Which brand worked in the end?"
"Oh," Santana flipped the phone back around so Quinn was facing her. "Well, it just turned out that one of the neighbours was feeding him sometimes, so it was just that."
Quinn frowned. "Are there kids in your complex?"
"I don't think so, why?"
"I figured it would've been some kid feeding him."
"No, it's um...it's not a kid."
"So who was it?"
"Just, you know," Santana shrugged. "A person."
"Do you know them?"
"Who?"
"The neighbour, Santana."
"No. Well not before. Now I do."
Quinn furrowed her brow. "Are you ok?"
"Yeah"
"You're acting weird."
"No I'm not."
"Yes, you are."
"Yeah? Well you FaceTime your cat once a week. You are weird."
Santana's work week has been completely insane. Her firm has been tasked to put together a bunch of press releases for a book launch. It was a total rush job, but despite everything, Santana was proud of the work that she and her team has done.
She was also ready to not think about work anymore, which is why she decided to head home at 5pm on a Friday night.
She crossed the courtyard from the parking lot when she spotted a familiar figure sitting at the bench, playing with Charlie.
"Hey Brittany" she greeted.
"Oh, hi Santana," the blonde looked up. She gave a polite smile, but Santana could sense something was off.
"Everything ok?"
Brittany sighed. "Not really. Remember the audition I went on a couple weeks ago?"
"Yeah."
"I didn't get it."
"Oh, Britt, I'm so sorry," she said, apologetically, taking a seat on the bench. "Are you ok?"
"I guess. It was for this choreography gig for the little theatre production, they're putting on a show that's supposed to run for a couple of months. I thought my pitch was really good and they seemed to like it but the director called earlier and said they're going in another direction."
Brittany pouted, as she stared at the ground. Charlie hooped up on the bench again and nuzzled against her side, so she could pet him.
"I've kinda just been hanging out with him for a while," she admits. "Tina's still at work and I've just been bummed since I found out. Didn't really want to be alone."
Seeing Brittany sad felt like watching somebody repeatedly kick a puppy and there was no way that Santana could stand by and not do something.
"Do you want to come over?" she asked. "I was gonna order a pizza and just chill out, you're welcome to join me. You can talk about it if you want or we could just watch Netflix or...whatever terrible stuff they play."
"I'd hate to crash your Friday night."
"Please, you wouldn't be," she then looks down at the cat. "Don't worry, I won't get in between the two of you if you're worried about that."
The comment made Brittany's lip come up in a small smile and she let out a giggle. Santana felt a surge of pride in being able to do that
"That sounds really nice."
They eat pizza on Santana's couch while Charlie is curled up on his giant pillow of a cat bed. Some B-movie in playing, but a commercial break interrupts the terrible story unfolding.
"Did you work on that one?" Brittany asks, taking a bite out of her slice of pizza when a sports drink commercial comes on.
"No, that's not me," Santana replied. She frowns a little as she tries to recall. "I think we made a pitch for that account, but we lost out in the end."
"I know that feeling."
"Oh, sorry, Britt."
"No, it's ok. Please don't apologize," Brittany waves it off. "I'm just feeling sorry for myself."
"Do you want to talk about it?"
Brittany pauses, trying to gather her thoughts. "It's just that I feel like I've been trying to make this work forever and nothing's really happened," she shrugged, dejectedly. "Maybe it's time to call it quits."
"How long has it been?"
"Almost four years. You know I had a scholarship to MIT?"
"You never told me that."
"Yeah. Full ride too, as a math major. I spent all of high school with people thinking that I was stupid, so when I got the offer, I jumped at the chance to go somewhere where everybody knew I was smart," she looked up from the floor and back and Santana. "Turns out I hated it. I mean, I was good at it, but I didn't want to spend all my time thinking about Euler bricks and the Reimann hypothesis. I finally dropped out after my second year and moved down here to be a dancer."
Santana didn't say anything, waiting for Brittany to continue.
"I actually got picked up for a couple of minor acts. I toured for over a year. I don't think I was ever at home for more than a couple of weeks at a time."
"What made you give it up?"
Brittany sighed. "It got to me after a while, all the travelling and stuff. Like it was fun and exciting when it was happening but I missed the feeling of being able to come home at the end of every day, you know? Like even if it was just to a roommate or a cat or just to a place that I could honestly say was home."
Santana nodded. "Yeah, I could see that."
"Plus it made having any kind of relationship impossible. I mean, having a boyfriend or a girlfriend you just never get to see is so…" she trailed off. "Anyway, that's why I stopped going on tour. I moved back here and tried to land a steady gig in choreo, but that hasn't exactly been going well," Brittany shook her head, disappointed. "Doing the research gig at Caltech was supposed to be a short-term thing, just to tide me over until I had something steady, but it feels like that's the only thing that's steady right now."
"I'm sorry, Britt."
"They approached me again a couple of days ago about doing it full time, maybe work on getting a masters or something even though I never technically finished my bachelors. Some kind of abridged program…" she trailed off. "I said no, but maybe I should reconsider."
"Do you like working on the math stuff?"
"Not really, but I don't know how much longer I can keep this up. It just...it doesn't make sense to give up something that's working out for something that's not." she sighed. "Right? These schools all want my math-brain, they keep saying my mind is like 'once in a generation' or whatever, nobody seems to want me as a dancer."
Santana paused, trying to collect her own thoughts, trying to think of the right thing to say. "Britt-"
"Did you ever try to pursue something you didn't love?" she asked.
"Well, I tried to date boys for a while," Santana said, hoping that it would make Brittany smile even just a little bit. "But, I'm definitely done with that." She felt a little better when the blonde let out a chuckle, before looking back at her.
"Were you always going to be in advertising?"
Santana let out a laugh. "God no. I was so lost in college, you have no idea. I was pre-law for a while, convinced myself I wanted it, then realized that I actually didn't. I took a gap year, thought I could make something of myself as a singer and did the whole waitressing-while-trying-to-land-gigs thing."
"You're a singer?"
"Hardly. I mean, I liked it, but I decided it was something I just wanted to do for fun, not as a career."
"I bet you're good though," Brittany smiled, her tone now playful and less sad. "I can totally tell by your voice."
"I'm...alright," Santana said, fighting a small grin and trying to play it cool.
"Can I hear you sing?"
"Now?" Brittany nodded. "You can't put me on the spot like that!" Santana said, suddenly feeling nervous and fighting off the heat that was creeping up the back of her neck.
"Pleeease," she pleaded.
"I-I haven't even seen you dance," Santana retorted. "Totally not fair."
"So? I'll show you mine if you show me yours," Brittany teased.
"Ok first, wanky," Santana smirked. "And second, you dance professionally, I can't just perform on the spot like that."
"Ok fine, not now, but...sometime?" Brittany asked, hopefully.
"Sure," she conceded. "Sometime."
"Score," Brittany smiled. "I'm gonna hold you to that."
"I expect nothing less."
"So, what happened after your gap year?"
"Well, I figured out I didn't want to sing professionally, so I figured that I should go back to college, but I still didn't want to be a lawyer, I had no idea what I wanted. I almost just dropped out completely and went back to Ohio because I didn't want to feel like I was wasting any more money," she paused. "One day I was applying to a bunch of internships, literally, any internship, just throwing everything at the wall and seeing what would stick and lo and behold, I got a call for an interview from this little marketing firm. I went to the interview and the rest is history."
"So you weren't always in love with advertising?"
Santana shook her head. "No, but when I started working there I started really enjoying the work and after I graduated they offered me a full time job. I mean, it gets stressful and there are definitely days you want to strangle your clients, but all things considered, I love my job. And honestly, loving my job...now, I can't imagine having to go in every day to do something I didn't like."
Brittany fell quiet, as she reflected on Santana's words.
"What do you love doing Britt?"
"Dancing," she said, without missing a beat.
"Look, I didn't think I was ever going to figure out what I wanted to do, but I did. If you love dancing, you should stick with it. It's gonna work out for you, Britt, but you shouldn't give up before it does. "
She watched closely as Brittany chewed her lower lip, processing everything that she'd just said. Santana suddenly became aware of how close they were and quickly averted her eyes, as to not stare at Brittany's lips for too long. Looking at Brittany's lips made her want to lean in and…
Now wasn't the time. Not when Brittany was feeling so down and confused about her career. Besides, she didn't even know if Brittany felt the same way. She'd just confirmed that she was interested in women, but that didn't mean she was interested in Santana. She was a total sweetheart, but it was just who she was, Santana couldn't read too hard into that. Maybe Brittany just wanted to be friends. Sam said that she'd totally checked her out the other day, but really who wouldn't? Her abs were phenomenal.
"Okay," she heard Brittany finally say.
"What?"
"Ok, I won't give up until it works out," she said with a small smile on her face.
"Yeah?" Santana asks. "Promise?"
Brittany extends her pinky finger. "Promise."
Santana chuckles and links Brittany's pinky with her own, as if to seal the deal.
The rest of the night feels lighter. They talk about friends and work and make fun of the movie that's playing. They finish off the pizza and play with Charlie when he eventually makes his way over, deciding he wants to be showered with affection from Brittany.
Eventually, Brittany figures that it's late and that she should head home. Santana walks her across the courtyard to her own front door. She tells herself it's the neighbourly thing to do.
"Thanks for cheering me up tonight," Brittany tells her. "I really needed it."
"I'm just glad I could help."
Brittany wraps her arms around her and pulls her in for a tight hug.
"You really are very sweet," Brittany says once they pull away.
"I'm pretty sure you're still the only person who thinks that."
The blonde laughs. "Goodnight, Santana."
"Goodnight, Britt."
AN: Promised myself I would get this out by the end of the month.
Feedback is appreciated if you can.