Thank you all so much for the support on this story and all of that jazz. A few people have said some things have been a little confusing flashback wise so I'll take a second to explain a little bit. This story is from Santana's point of view and she's reflecting on her past with Brittany, while trying to decide how she wants to proceed with her life knowing that she remembers everything while Brittany remembers nothing. The flashbacks are all just memories, which is why they aren't in chronological order of when they happened. They're all linked but aren't presented at the same time so it's like I've chopped them into scenes, if that makes sense? Anyhow if you have any questions about it just ask. This AN is too long so onto the story :]!

Sometimes, most of the time, life is stupid. Everything is so stupid and we're all just drowning in this huge puddle of stupidity. And I'm not just drowning because I can't swim, I'm drowning because all the idiots around me can't swim either. It's fine though, the idiots can keep stacking up so I can walk up them like stairs. Not that we ever know where we're walking to. It's so hard to find who you are and where you are supposed to go because the idiots are piled up so high. One person wants you to go this way, but you want to go somewhere else while another person says you should go the other way, and it's stupid. There are supposedly all these paths to success and happiness, but I don't see them. I must be on the wrong one or something... did I mention that it's stupid?

"Come on San, it won't be cold I promise," Brittany says while trying to drag me into this lake. A lake. A dirty, germ infested, animal shat in, lake. This is disgusting. Even if I could swim I would not be stepping foot in it.

"This water is not chlorinated, which means this chica does not wants to get her swim on in it."

Brittany is pouting and I think it's supposed to be cute but I'm not letting it get to me. I should have gone to work, where we have no nasty lakes.

"I think you're scared. Santana is scared! Scared scared scared, just like a rooster," Brittany exclaims!

I'm not scared. It's just disgusting. I should have suggested coffee or breakfast, at least that way we'd get to stay dry.

"Please, Santana Lopez eats fear for breakfast. And it's chickens, not roosters."

Brittany smirks and I immediately know it means she's got an idea and I'm screwed.

"Good, then you can come swimming with me," she says while tip toeing into the water as she tosses her shirt behind her.

I raise an eyebrow as she not only removes her shorts, but her bra too. I'm pretty sure I roll my eyes all the way down to the water as I too remove my clothes. Two can play that game.

Drowning is boring. You thrash around for a while until you realize you're just screwed anyway and then it's a waiting game. You're either going to die, or someone is going to come save you. I was drowning all my life and then this crazy blonde girl rushed in and pulled me from the water. Normally that would be cool and make for a good Bay Watch episode, but trust me, it wasn't cool.

Everyone always talks about love and how amazing it is. They write movies about how it saves people and makes life rainbows and sunshine. The guy is a tortured soul and this goody-good bombshell saves him from himself and it's beautiful and disgusting, the end. But they don't teach you what happens when it's not a boy and a girl.

I was drowning, and my lifeguard wasn't who I wanted it to be. I was dragged from one body of water to an entirely new one where I was left to start drowning all over again.

I built my life on appearances. Everything was about being accepted and about being better than everyone else. Except with Brittany, I learned quickly that to feel accepted you have to become someone you later will hate, and to be yourself you have to be rejected.

She's splashing me and I'm splashing her and it's almost like nothing matters anymore except who can splash the highest. Anyway, it was all that mattered until now as Brittany tries to coax me deeper into the lake.

"I skipped out on breakfast we should go eat, yeah? Lunch on me?"

Brittany just shakes her head and curls her finger in a 'come hither' motion as she swims further into the distance where the water begins to get deeper and deeper. I keep my ground, I'm not abouts to drown in the middle of some mucky lake with some crazy stranger. No way. Not happening.

She swims back to where I'm standing comfortably in the water that just barely covers my tits. Being almost a head taller than me means that she she stands I have a clear view of her rack and I make a mental note to thank my parents for never giving me swimming lessons. I may be straight, or something, but I can appreciate a good rack, right? No big deal, it's just boobs anyway.

No one has a personality anymore, everyone is just trying so hard to be exactly the same. It's like seeing everything in the world as black and white; nothing is different. You just keep waiting for someone or something to come and color it all up, make everything appear more appealing.

Brittany though... now she has a personality. I was trying to think of words to describe it, it being her personality, but there aren't any. It's evident in her smile and in the way she laughs. It's easy to see, even at first glance, that she isn't like everyone else. She's somewhat awkward but at the same time very well composed. She's confident without being cocky. She's quiet and prefers to speak in tones rather than in words. I wish there was a single word to describe her. If there was, I'd finally be able to rest my mind for a moment because I find that I spend so much time trying to figure her out. More time now then when she was around. Especially more time now that she doesn't remember.

She colored me. With crayon. She didn't go for the permanent markers because I don't think she knew how to deal with anything concrete. She colored my life from the beginning. Strangers have never clicked so well until we met each other. Life had never been so full of rainbows and ducks until she came along. But it was colored with crayon, and eventually crayon fades. I wanted to trace everything in with a sharpie because from the first awkward conversation I had with her on her couch, I knew I wanted her to become a permanent fixture in my life. She made me believe she did too. She colored me with crayons but she disguised them as sharpies tricking me into a mindset of permanence.

"Come back with me, to my house," Brittany said as she and I pulled our clothes back on. It was slightly uncomfortable considering we were both still dripping wet. She didn't seem to mind so I ignored it the best I could so she wouldn't notice. I think I nodded though I can't be sure because I'm watching her lips move while I ignore the sound that's coming out of them. They're animated in a way that puts me into some kind of trance and I'm only drawn away when she grabs my hand and starts dragging me away.

"I'm taking this awkward silence as a yes and you have no choice in the matter."

I stay quiet while we walk. Mostly because I'm not sure what to say. Words don't always work for me. They come out all wrong and never sound as nicely as they do when other people say them. So I just don't.

"You don't talk much. It's okay though, it doesn't bother me. I can just pretend you're a mime," Brittany says as we reach what I believe is her apartment building. I make a 'I'm stuck in a box' motion and she laughs. I laugh because she does. I laugh because hers is contagious.

"I'm not sure my life is much to talk about. I mostly work and sleep. I don't have much of an in between."

She shakes her head.

"Well then I'll be your in between. It'll be great. We're soulmates."

I raise my eyebrows at the use of what I thought was a very intimate term.

"Soulmates?"

She nods.

"We're perfect for each other, San. My life is moving super fast so I can experience everything before I have nothing. Life is too short not to have an in between. I can speed you up, and you can slow me down a little. But not too much, I don't want to become boring."

I knew from the word soulmates things were going to be intense. Because that word made me realize what had been happening to me that day. It made me realize that I was falling for her. For a girl. For a strange girl that no one else would ever quite understand. For someone that was completely and utterly the opposite of everything I was. For someone that would finally hurt me instead of the other way around.

I've always been a bitch, but it's because I've been angry. I've always been angry because I never knew how to deal with my feelings. I never knew how to deal with my feelings because I was taught they were wrong. It was easier to date and dump countless boys than putting myself out into a world of flannel to be ridicule. I was angry because I couldn't be myself.

Brittany called me her soulmate that day.

I saw her today. She was on the train a few seats in front of me. She was listening to music and bobbing her head. She was lip synching the lyrics and people were starring but she didn't care. She was the same Brittany I used to know. I think that's what hurt the most about it... about seeing her again.

When I found out about the doctor and the mind erasing I thought it was a joke. I heard about it from a friend of Brittany's named Artie. He was a doctor and they had met way back in high school. He wasn't around very much but when he was I didn't like it. He was always around when there was bad news. Mainly for Brittany but it somehow always affected me as well.

He called me and told me she had gotten me erased. It sounded outrageous. I had spoken to her the day before and though things hadn't been exactly good, they hadn't been completely bad either. We fought a lot but it was never enough to mess anything up. We never meant the things we said during fights and the next day we'd always pretend the didn't happen.

He told me that she remembered everything from the day before we met. He told me that everything after that was just a blur for her now.

And then he told me he found a note asking him to ask me to stay away from her.

"You kissed him."

She had her arms crossed tightly at her chest. It was a sign that she was angry. All the while I'm holding my head in my hands, a sign that she once again is being delusional.

"When he was here I told him I was seeing someone else," she rolls her eyes, "I told him I was happy to see him, but not the way he wanted to see me. Why are you freaking out?"

She shifted uncomfortably and rolled her eyes again. "You kissed him."

"It was a goodbye kiss, Brittany. Him and I dated on and off for five years, it wasn't exactly an easy thing to do."

Another eye roll.

"Because you love him?"

I shake my head and sigh because she doesn't get it. She never gets it.

"Because I love you, okay? It was hard because I love you and that's hard. Loving you is hard. Being with him was easy because he had a dick and I had boobs and it just was easy. Telling him to go back to Ohio was me getting rid of anyone that isn't you. I kissed him because it was the last time I was ever going to willingly see him, because the only person I want to see is you."

She shakes her head and makes her way to the door.

"If loving me is so hard, then you can just forget about me."

As she opens the door I shout at her, "Oh because it's that easy right? You can walk into someones life and then walk right out and just forget about them? You can fall in love and just leave all fine and dandy. That's how life works right?"

She looks back before walking out completely. With sad eyes she says, "It can be that easy, just watch."

I never liked Artie. I could never get over the wheelchair and the 'poor me' complex he had. But he told me something. Something which made me think he wasn't all too bad. He told me that I should try again... he told me that Brittany and I were soulmates.