AN: Ooops, it's already October. I'm honestly not super happy with how this chapter turned out but if I waited till I was, it might be another 6 months before it gets posted.
"I got something for him," Brittany says when they're chilling on the bench one Saturday. She pulls out a small black and white stuffed cat and puts it in front of Charlie, who immediately paws at it and starts trying to tug its ear with his mouth. "I figured he might get lonely since I haven't really seen any other cats in this neighbourhoods."
Santana laughs. "You spoil him."
"Well duh, I'm like his fun aunt, it's totally my job."
"Wait, if you're his fun aunt, what does that make me? The disciplinarian?"
"I mean, you are the one trying to get him back into shape," Brittany teases.
"Hey, that's under orders from his mother."
"I'm just kidding," she smiles. "I bet you're a total softie."
"Ok, now I think you're just swinging wildly to both extremes."
Brittany giggled. "How close are you to the goal?"
"A couple more pounds at least. Hopefully by his next vet appointment."
They sit for a little while longer and Santana can feel the words on the tip of her tongue. Do you want to go out sometime? But they can't seem to leave her mouth, so she settles for something else.
"How's it going with auditions?"
"Not bad, I guess. I got a callback the other day."
"Britt, that's awesome!"
"Yeah," she smiles. "I'm trying to be optimistic but I just don't wanna get my hopes up or anything," she shrugs. "What about you? How's work?"
"Ugh, I've got the world's most annoying client."
"Awww," the blonde commiserates. "Who is it?"
Santana rolls her eyes. "My boss' daughter. She wants a full scale production of promo materials. All for some ridiculous one-woman show that nobody's going to watch. I swear, I've never met a more insufferable person in my life."
"What's the name of the show?"
"Rachel! Not just, Rachel, which also would have been terrible and self-aggrandising, but Rachel! with an exclamation point. She even insisted the lettering has to all be in gold and that the dot on the exclamation point should be - wait for it - a gold star!"
"I'm sorry to hear that," Brittany says sincerely, though she smiles at Santana's exaggerated little huff. "I guess they're not casting any dancers, huh?"
"No," Santana shakes her head. "Trust me, even if they were, you do not want to work for this woman. It's one thing to be a control freak, but Rachel Berry feels the need to combine that with being the most annoying human being I've ever had the misfortune to meet."
"Well, I'm sure you'll do an awesome job anyway," she says kindly. "You're like the best advertiser in LA."
"Pffft, LA? Please, I'm the best advertiser on the West Coast," Santana winks and Brittany chuckles. "So, where'd you get the toy?"
"Just at the supermarket," she replied. "I um, found myself in the toy aisle the other day," she looks a little embarrassed. "Anyway, I'm gonna be gone for a couple days next week and I didn't want him to get lonely while you're at work."
"Where are you going?"
"Just up to San Diego for a couple days. It's my dad's birthday so I thought I'd drive up and see my family."
"Aww, well he'll miss you," Santana replies, though she's pretty sure that she's projecting her feelings all onto the cat.
Brittany claps at Charlie, which makes him drop his new toy and leap up onto the bench so that she can pet him as he purrs in delight.
"I'll miss him too," she says, though her eyes never leave Santana's.
Mercedes comes home from tour on a Tuesday, but they don't meet up till that Friday. Santana heads to the upscale bar downtown after work. When she walks in and spots there's a singing stage where patrons who are in that perfect state of inebriation can go up to sing, she immediately knows Kurt picked the venue.
Mercedes, Sam and Kurt are already sitting in the booth and she greets Mercedes with a big hug, genuinely pleased to see her friend.
"Where's my hug, Santana?" Sam teases and she responds by purposely ruffling up his hair. Kurt and Mercedes both laugh.
"So how was the tour?" she asks. "Tell me everything."
"Exhausting," Mercedes admits. "But it was a lot of fun, you know? I got to meet a bunch of fans and promote the album."
"My girl's a star," Sam grins proudly, with his arm around her.
"My producer's super optimistic on the sales-side," she says. "Plus there's a bunch of songs they're already coming to me with for the follow-up!"
"We're definitely drinking to that," Kurt says, calling over a waiter and ordering a round of Martinis to celebrate. His eyes linger on the waiter for a little too long when he goes to fulfil the order.
The four of them toast to Mercedes' success and catch up on everything that's been happening in their lives. It was crazy to think how long it had been since they all met and how far they'd come since meeting in college.
"Has anyone heard from Quinn?" Mercedes asked.
"Only when she calls to check up on her cat," Santana offers. "Other than some clear attachment issues, she seems fine."
"I'd love to go to London for six months," Kurt sighed, dreamily. "I guess the only problem would be the weather, it's so dreary."
"Like your love life?" Santana cracks. "Speaking of which, whatever happened to Gay Winklevoss?"
"Blaine and I are on a break," Kurt sighs.
"Again?"
"It was a whole thing, I don't want to ruin tonight by talking about it," he waves off. "And by the way Santana, I wouldn't start throwing stones, it's not like your love life is going anywhere."
"My love life is just fine, thanks."
"Is that why you still haven't asked out your neighbour?"
Santana gapes. "Who told you about that?"
Kurt points at Mercedes, who gestures to her boyfriend. Santana glares at Sam.
"What? We're in a relationship! I can't keep secrets from my girlfriend!"
Santana rolls her eyes.
"Well, now that we're on the subject," Kurt says with a coy smile. "Who is this mystery woman and why haven't you told us about her?"
"Don't you start with me, Lady Lips," Santana warns. When she feels all her friends eyes on her, waiting for her to elaborate, she sighs. "There's nothing to tell, she's my neighbor and we hang out sometimes."
The truth of the matter was that Santana had thought about asking Brittany out...kind of a lot. It just so happened that every time she tried to make the words leave her mouth, they always seemed to get stuck.
Maybe it was the fact that she genuinely enjoyed hanging out with Brittany and that she was too nervous about that possibly going away if Brittany said no. It would be too weird. And Charlie would probably still want to spend time with Brittany and Santana knew that she couldn't stop that. It would be too weird, like sharing custody of the cat, that in reality belonged to neither of them.
So there. Santana knew she might be being a bit of a chicken-shit about asking Brittany out, but she wasn't about to admit it to her friends.
Not to Kurt who was on his third (or maybe it was fourth) break with the Bowtie Baron and Sam who had spent the last month looking out windows and sighing longingly because he missed his girlfriend.
"She's totally into you," Sam offers.
"You met her for like five minutes, how would you know?" Santana shakes her head. "Besides, we're just friends."
"You mean like friends friends or I'm gonna catch you in the bathroom with your hand down her pants friends?" Mercedes raises her brow, referencing the unfortunate instance in freshman year she'd walked in on Santana and her "just a friend" from her socio class at a house party.
Santana rolled her eyes. "That happened one time."
"It certainly was not just one time," Mercedes retorted. "I have mental scars from the year we were roommates Santana."
Santana couldn't help smirking and tilted her head in acknowledgement.
"Ok, ok, we're done talking about this," she said. "I have a neighbour and she's my friend and that's it," she hit her hand on the table as if to establish it was a closed-case, no longer wishing to discuss it. She polished off her martini and signalled for the waiter to bring her another.
"How's work?" Mercedes asks her, granting her a reprieve from the Brittany talk.
Santana lets out a groan and reaches for her martini as the waiter sets it down. "Don't even start."
She proceeds to rant on about Rachel Berry, how the small woman seemed to love coming into the office unannounced and how she needed eight different versions of every marketing material they came up with and the fact that she insisted that while she'd been dubbed "The Next Streisand" (not that Santana had found any statements that supported such a claim), she wanted to stand on her own two feet.
"Did you know she signs off on contracts with a gold star at the end of her name?"
When another patron got on the stage to start singing his rendition of Carry on my Wayward Son, Kurt immediately started clapping.
"We have to go up," he grinned.
When the patron steps down, Kurt is all-too-keen to sing his rendition of Defying Gravity as Santana, Mercedes and Sam raise their glasses, clap and cheer him on.
"Wooo!"
"Go Kurt!"
"Something has changed within me
Something is not the same
I'm through with playing by
The rules of someone else's game"
The affinity for karaoke had started in junior year when Kurt introduced them to a little karaoke bar not far from campus. Having been part of his high-school acapella group, he'd drag his friends to come and sing with him. Everyone still laughed at the memory of Kurt's incredulous reaction to Sam rocking out to Red Solo Cup on the mic for the very first time.
When Kurt gets off the stage, he has a big smile by the time he gets back to the booth.
"I've missed that," he says, with a glimmer in his eyes. "One of you guys has to go next!" he grins. "Mercedes?"
"Nuh-uh, I'm off the clock. You gotta pay for this voice now," she teases, taking a sip of her drink as the others all laugh.
"Come on."
"Maybe later," she relents.
"Ok, Santana, you're next," Kurt turns to her.
"San-ta-na, San-ta-na," Sam starts chanting, setting the beat with his fist against the table.
"San-ta-na, San-ta-na," Mercedes and Kurt join in, so the chant gets louder.
"Alright, alright," Santana relents, getting up from her seat and causing her three friends to cheer. "Let me show you how it's done, peasants."
Brittany's been practicing for a few hours when Mike finds her. He let her borrow one of the empty rooms in the studio, where she has a camera set up. She's just finished when he walks in, as she takes the camera.
"How's it going, Britt?" he asks.
"Alright. Thanks again for letting me use the room."
"No worries, what's the job?"
"Dance scene in a movie. They want a solo concept piece."
"Sounds promising, I hope you get it," he says kindly.
"Thanks, me too."
Mike was one of the first people Brittany met after coming back to LA from touring. They met in a dance class and became fast friends. He was actually the one that told her his girlfriend was looking for a roommate, leading her to her current apartment. Mike was now the manager of a studio and he'd let Brittany use one of the rooms to practice in, since there were no classes scheduled in that room for the day.
"Last class done?" she asked him.
"Yep, I'm just closing up," he said. "What's up? I feel like you're here all the time but I keep missing you between classes."
"Just going to more auditions," she explained. "Something's bound to work out right? Plus, I'm getting a little tired of complex mathematical theories."
"Sorry, I wish I could match what Caltech is paying you," Mike says. He'd always offered her a teaching spot at the studio, but given how sought-after Brittany's brain was by STEM schools, he couldn't match what she was making against how often she'd have to come in and work.
"It's ok, I appreciate the thought."
"Anyway, Tina and I are gonna head out to this bar, you want to come with? Seems like you could use a break."
"Sure, I just need a minute to get changed."
"No problem, I have to close up. I'll meet you out front."
Tina's been itching to go to this bar for a few weeks ever since she heard about it from her coworker.
They're ordering drinks at the bar, as patrons go up and down the stage. Some of them drunk and tone-deaf, others actually genuinely talented singers.
"We should do a duet," Tina suggests to her boyfriend.
He laughs. "How about you sing and I'll dance next to you?" Mike turns to Brittany and asks her what's new.
"Not much," she shrugs. "Just auditions and stuff."
"You're not seeing anyone, right?" he asks. "Someone at the studio was asking about you."
Tina smacks his arm. "She's not interested."
"What? I'm just asking."
"Wait, why did you say I'm not interested?" Brittany takes a sip of her drink and turns to Tina. It was true, but she wanted to know why her roommate was so quick to answer.
"Because you're totally into that girl with the cat. The girl in 1820, right?"
"Oh, I totally forgot about that," Mike says, realizing his error. "I'll tell Jake, that you're not really interested."
"Wait what? Santana and I aren't seeing each other, we're just friends."
"You guys hang out all the time."
"So? We hang out all the time."
"Remember when they misdelivered her package? You could have just dropped it off at her doorstep but you waited to give it to her in person."
"Because it was the neighbourly thing to do," Brittany insisted. "What if someone had taken the package while it was on her doorstep, then what?"
"Just admit it, Britt, you have a crush on her."
"I-"
"Hey look, it's Santana."
"Very funny, Tina. I'm not six."
"No, really," Tina points. "It's Santana."
Brittany turns around to see Santana on stage, mic in hand. She suddenly remembers their conversation about Santana having tried her hand at singing.
"Well sometimes I go out by myself
And I look across the water
And I think of all the things, what you're doing
And in my head I paint a picture"
Brittany finds herself almost in a trance, watching the other woman sing. She had guessed Santana was good but...wow. Her eyes don't move from the brunette on stage, totally engrossed in that moment, so much so she doesn't even notice Tina turn to Mike and say:
"Told ya."
Santana can hear applause from the bar as she walks off stage and heads back to the booth. Her friends are still clapping and whooping, as she takes her seat.
"And that's how it's done," she says, proudly. Even though she doesn't try to do it professionally, she still enjoys singing and it still gives her that rush to perform every so often. "Trouty, you're next. Next round's on me," she volunteers, raising her hand, trying to spot the waiter.
"What should I sing?" Sam asks Mercedes. "Should I hit 'em up with the crowd-pleaser, Red Solo Cup?" he teases.
"No!" Kurt exclaims, causing his friends to laugh. "You have a nice voice, Sam, but I hate that song."
"It's a classic."
"It's ridiculous!"
Santana can't seem to get the waiter's attention, so she stands up to go find someone who can supply them with alcohol. She doesn't get more than a few steps away, when she comes face to face with a familiar pair of blue eyes.
"Brittany?"
"Oh my God, you were incredible!" Brittany gushes upon seeing her.
"You saw me sing?"
"Yes! You totally killed it!"
"Thanks, Britt," Santana smiles. "What are you doing here?"
"Oh, I'm here with Tina and her boyfriend, Mike," she gestures over to the bar. "You?"
"Yeah, I'm here with-"
"Santana!" she hears Mercedes call out.
"-Friends," she finishes off. "Look, we've got space here, if you're tired of sitting at the bar. Grab your friends, you can come to our booth."
"That sounds great," Brittany beams. "I'll just be a minute."
Santana places an order with a waiter before heading back to the booth.
"Who was that?" Mercedes asks.
"Brittany."
"Oooohhh," Sam teases. "That's the neighbour," he says, for Mercedes and Kurt's benefit.
"She's here?"
"Yeah, she's with some friends, I invited them to come over," Santana informs.
"Are you sure you're just friends?" Kurt teases her.
"Well maybe more, if you and I are just friends and I like her more than I like you," she shoots back.
Brittany comes over with her two friends. Santana recognizes the woman as Tina, Brittany's roommate. They've crossed paths a couple times in the laundry room and in the courtyard.
"Hey guys, I hope you don't mind, Santana invited us to join," Brittany greets. "Nice to see you again, Sam."
"Hey Brittany," he waves at her.
Introductions are made and the seven of them squeeze into the booth as another round of drinks arrive. Sam starts talking about work. He was a sports analyst for football games, but had mostly been relegated off the mic after his boss told him that he spent too much time doing impressions while giving commentary.
"I don't get it," he sulked. "Everyone loves my Connery impression,"
"Yeah, at the Christmas party, maybe not when giving football commentary," Kurt offers.
"It was totally called for."
"How?" Santana asked.
Sam pursed his lips and focussed as he got into his Connery zone. "Allen must have a license to kill, because he just killed any dream the Raiders have of playing in this year's Super Bowl."
Santana can feel her head pounding against her skull when she pries one eye open, before tugging up the covers to shield herself from the light. She lets out a groan as she tries to remember last night.
After everyone had taken a turn at the mic, they went dancing at a nearby club.
Brittany can dance.
Those last two rounds Sam and Mike paid for at the club were definitely a mistake.
All she can really hope for right now is that she didn't cry in front of Brittany last night. It's not her fault she's a weepy drunk.
Santana's phone buzzes from somewhere on the bed. She pats down the bed, till her hand comes into contact with the device and she turns on the screen to find a bunch of text messages from Mercedes, Kurt and Brittany. She moves the hair out of her face to read them.
[9:45 AM Brittany]: Hey, are you awake?
[9:55 AM Brittany]: Guess you're still sleeping. Left something on your doorstep.
[9:56 AM Brittany]: It'll help with your hangover :)
[10:13 AM Brittany]: I'm driving home today. Tell Charlie not to miss me too much ;)
Santana forces herself to sit up, still in her clothes from last night, she realizes and heads to her front door, where she's met with a six-pack of instant ramen, with a little note on the plastic.
It's good for hangovers.
Take care.
Brittany
She can't help but smile as she takes the food into her apartment and shoots Brittany a text.
[Santana]: Thanks for the noodles! Drive safe!
[Brittany]: No problem! Hope your head doesn't hurt too much.
[Santana]: What time are you leaving for San Diego?
[Brittany]: I'm at a pit stop. I'll be at my parent's in like 30 mins
It's only then that Santana looks at the time on her phone and realizes it's already past noon.
It's very much a slow day. Santana takes an aspirin to help with her headache, before boiling water so she can eat instant ramen for the first time since she was in college, if for no other reason than to test Brittany's hangover cure.
She hears Charlie meow as he makes his way back in through the kitty door and look up at her. Santana pours some cat food into his bowl, to which he looks down at the contents in disappointment before proceeding to look back up at her as if to say "no really, where's my lunch?"
"Sorry, Brittany's not here. You'll have to make do with," she looks at the label on the can. "Raw Instinct Cat Food for Weight Control," she frowns. "Who the hell chose this name?"
He meows at her.
"Brittany's not here to feed you second lunch, so this is all you're getting."
With his tail in the air, Charlie walks off, out of the kitchen and through his kitty door out of the apartment.
Santana sighs and shakes her head, "He's so spoiled."
Thirty minutes later, he returns, barely acknowledging Santana and makes his way over to his bowl of food. It seems like everything is fine and he even sits next to her on the couch while the TV plays, as if trying to make peace without saying anything.
She rubs his head in a silent acceptance.
It's only later when she goes to do her laundry that she spots on her doorstep, a present - a bleeding pile of feathers - that Charlie has left her.
"Gross."
Santana returns from getting her mail, when she witnesses Tina holding a massive white box and struggling to open her front door.
She offers to hold the box, so Tina can stop fumbling with her keys. The other woman thanks her and manages to open the door, before taking back the box.
"What's in it, anyway?" Santana asks.
"It's a birthday cake for Brittany."
"When's her birthday?"
"Today. She went to go spend it with her family."
Santana furrows her brow. "She told me it was her dad's birthday."
"They have the same birthday," Tina replies. "It's kind of a cute story."
"Oh. She never said."
"She doesn't like to, she thinks it's weird," Tina shrugged. "Like if you tell people it's your birthday, it's like you're looking for attention. We lived together over a year before I found out."
"Right."
"We're gonna have a small thing for her when she gets back," Tina says. "It'll just be me and Mike and maybe a couple friends but you should come by if you're free."
"Sure, I'll be there."
She bids Tina goodbye and heads back to her apartment where she texts Brittany.
[Santana]: Happy bday! Hope you're having fun with your family!
[Brittany]: Thanks, I am! Tina told you?
[Santana]: yep
The next message she gets is a picture of a fat tabby cat wearing a party hat. She surmises that it can only be the infamous Lord Tubbington and though he doesn't look too pleased, it's cute all the same and Santana sends back a laughing face emoji.
Santana clicks onto the next page of Amazon, having decided that giving Brittany an American Express gift card for her birthday was too weird, somehow managing to be both overstepping and also impersonal.
But it's not like she has any better ideas and she wasn't about to google 'what to get for your neighbour-who-you-have-a-crush-on's birthday?'
Well...not at work at least.
She barely notices the footsteps coming towards her office, when she hears Marley's voice.
"Miss Berry, she really doesn't like people coming in without an appointment-"
"Good afternoon, Santana," she hears the door swing open and comes face to face with Rachel Berry, holding a clearfile in her hand with a large, shining gold star on it.
"I tried to stop her," Marley says apologetically.
"It's fine," Santana addresses her assistant, who moves out of the office "Rachel," she turns to her client. "What do I owe this...unexpected visit?"
"Well, I was in the neighbourhood and I thought I would drop by with some of my headshots," the small woman says, removing a series of 8 by 10 glossies from her folder.
"Headshots?"
She nods. "For the press releases. I thought it would be nice to have some of my headshots when the articles talk about the show."
"Right," Santana sighs. "You know you could have sent these in an email, right?"
"Yes, but I thought it would be better if I could explain some of the options in person," she presented Santana with the first picture. It was a picture of Rachel against a white backdrop, a wind machine had obviously been involved.
"Now, this one I think, has a very Hollywood vibe to it, something I would send in if I was going to be cast in an action movie for example," she then pulled out a second picture. This was in black and white, with Rachel staring into the camera and her fist under her chin. "This one I think is very old Broadway, but a classic, very Barbra. Now this would be a good choice if we're going to highlight my body of work on Broadway. This one…"
It took Santana every ounce of strength to bite back every snarky comment on the tip of her tongue because Rachel (in addition to being her boss' daughter) was the client, after all and clients got what they wanted, even if they were insufferable about it. However, she wasn't able to hold back rolling her eyes, when Rachel presented a fourth set of headshots (where she looked about 18), with a soapy story attached about how they were the first ones she had taken in New York.
At some point, Rachel must have noticed that Santana was tuning her out and managed a glimpse at her laptop screen, currently on a page reading "Popular Gifts."
"I don't think that Shelby would appreciate you tending to personal matters at work," she chastises.
"For your information, Berry, you're not the only account I have to service, this is research," Santana easily shoots back the lie.
"Oh, well I apologize then," Rachel replies. "Honestly I think if you were going to give a gift, there is no gift greater than music. The performance of a lifetime, tickets to Rachel! Coming soon!" she waved her arms dramatically.
"Right," Santana drawled out. "Listen, why don't you just leave your headshots here and our copywriter will just get in contact with you about which one to use in the articles."
Rachel seemed to find this agreeable. She nodded. "I would like input on the content. Earliest is best, maybe around the first draft?"
"Sure, we'll be in touch."
Rachel made her long awaited exit from the office and Santana shook her head. "Poor McCarthy," she muttered to herself.
Madison McCarthy was the copywriter assigned to this project. She was a good kid and eager to excel, which almost made Santana sorry that she was going to be stuck dealing with Rachel Berry.
Whatever, at least she knew one thing. There wasn't any gift she could get Brittany that would be worse than tickets to see Rachel!
Santana's day had been busy, packed with meetings, but it had passed relatively quickly with good progress on all her projects, not to mention a lack of sudden, unscheduled interferences by Rachel Berry. She'd been nursing a headache since lunch and had decided to head home early.
She crashed onto her couch, closed her eyes and allowed the tiredness to take over her body.
Santana's not sure how long it's been when she wakes up to the sound of gagging. She opens her eyes and sits up on the couch, looking around, when she finds Charlie by the TV, pawing at his face and gagging.
At first she suspects it's another hairball, but when he starts rubbing his face against the floor and the noises don't stop, she looks in alarm, realizing it's more serious.
She's more alarmed when she looks past the coffee table and finds an open white box on the floor with a missing piece of metal.
It's not a hairball. He's choking.
"Shit!"
It occurs to her momentarily to google what to do, but she also has no idea how long he's been like this and by the time she finishes her search it could be too late. Without another word, Santana scoops him up (thankfully, he's lost enough weight that she can carry him without too much of a strain), grabs her purse and flies out the door.
She barrels through the courtyard, paying barely any attention to her surroundings when she bumps into another person.
"Sorry," she barely mutters, in her haste.
"Santana?"
It's Brittany and she quickly notices the panic in her neighbour's face, and that her grip is rather tight on the cat.
"Is everything ok?"
"He's...I think he's choking on something, I-I need to get him to the vet," she stammers out.
"I'll drive you," Brittany quickly offers and Santana agrees.
The two of them sit in the waiting room at the vet's office. Charlie was inside with the vet. Santana's head rests in her hands and Brittany gently rubs her back in an effort to comfort her.
If Santana wasn't so freaked out about how Charlie was doing, she might be more distracted by how nice it felt.
"I'm sure he'll be okay, Santana."
"God, I hope so, Britt. I don't know what I'd do if-" she sniffs and realizes for the first time that she's started crying. Quickly, Santana wipes the moisture from her eyes with the back of her hand. "I just really hope everything will be alright."
Dr Stevens comes out and Santana bolts up.
"Is he ok?"
"Charlie's going to be fine," the vet says reassuringly. "We gave him something to pass the charm. He's resting now. You can see him in a little bit and you'll be able to take him back home tonight."
"Thank you!" Santana lets out a huge sigh of relief.
As the vet leaves, Santana sits back down, now feeling like a tremendous weight has been lifted off her chest, knowing that the furry bastard was going to be fine.
Brittany pats her hand kindly. "Told you it would be ok," she smiles.
"Yeah, you did," Santana lets out a small smile, though she sniffs and has to wipe her eyes again. She's not sure if it's tears of relief or holdovers from tears of worrying. "Thanks for getting us here so fast. I'm sure you ran a couple reds."
"Don't worry about it."
Santana lets out a few audible inhales and exhales, finally feeling like she can breathe now that Charlie's going to be fine.
A nurse emerges, holding a zip-lock plastic bag with the little metal charm in it and hands it to Santana, before returning to the room.
"What is that, anyway?" Brittany asks.
Santana briefly flirts with the idea of lying about it, but after the emotional rollercoaster of the last few hours, she doesn't have the energy and decides to just come clean.
"It's a charm," she explains. "I….I actually got it for you as a birthday present," Santana can feel her face getting hot. "I just remembered that sometimes you wear a charm bracelet and...and...Anyway, it was dumb and you definitely don't want this now after it's been through the inside of a cat," she shakes her head and lets out a small disbelieving laugh.
Brittany manages to get a look at the item in charge of all the eventfulness of the evening and recognizes the shape of the piece of silver. It's a cat, sleeker than Charlie (or Lord Tubbington for that matter), that's positioned to look like it's walking.
"It's ok, Santana. It was really thoughtful of you to get me anything, you didn't have to."
Santana shrugs and then nods her head, as she wrings her hands, seemingly not knowing what to do.
The blonde chews on her lower lip for a few moments, watching Santana carefully, before she says her next words.
"I know what you can get me for my birthday though."
Santana's forehead creases in confusion. "Yeah? What?"
"A date."
The brunette's confusion deepens. "What?"
"Go on a date with me," Brittany asks softly.
"Wait, you...you want to go on a date with me?"
"I do. I've liked you for a while," Brittany admits, with a chuckle "I actually couldn't shut up about you while I was in San Diego. My family kept teasing me for it."
Santana lets out another disbelieving laugh. "Really?"
"Yeah, my sister especially. She kept telling me to just 'woman up and ask you out already' so she could stop hearing about it. "
That statement makes Santana chuckle and her heart beat faster at the same time.
"I mean she's eighteen so she thinks she knows everything," Brittany shrugs. "Look, I really didn't plan to ask you here, but… I don't know. How can I help myself when you're this sweet?"
"You're still the only person who thinks that."
"What do you say?"
"I'd love to," Santana says with a smile and it makes Brittany grin.
"Awesome."