I took a deep breath and looked into her eyes. I froze at all the emotions I saw there: hurt, confusion, fear and hope.

Hope. How good it felt to see some hope in her eyes.

I reached forward to take her hand in mine, but she quickly pulled away. It was then that I saw something else in her eyes-she was guarded. She was hopeful for the best, but still expecting the worst.

"Thank you for not running away."

She just stared at me. No change in her expression. Her silence told me I should continue. I couldn't look at her while I spoke for fear I would see her expressions change, yet again. I folded my hands in my lap and watched my fingers mindlessly fiddle with one another as I began to speak the words I had shifted around in my head a million times in the past 72 hours.

"For the past three days, I haven't been able to think about anyone but you. I haven't been able to sleep without dreaming of you. I haven't been able to breathe without feeling your breath on my neck."

I heard her let out the smallest, softest gasp, but I didn't shift my gaze from my hands as I continued.

"Whenever anyone else speaks to me, I imagine it's your voice I'm hearing. Except, when I'm in silence, the only things I can hear you say are the screaming demands for me to not hug you or touch you or, essentially, show that I even know you're around. And every time those words replay in my head," I paused, unsure if I should say the next words, but spoke anyways "every time those words replay in my head... my heart breaks all over again."

I looked up at Santana, unsure of what I was going to see or what I wanted to see. She wasn't looking at me. Her chin was resting on her chest, and I saw a single tear run down onto her thigh, just like I had seen it fall on her kitchen counter only a few mornings ago. Remembering what had happened when I tried to comfort her then, I just sat there, unsure if I should keep talking or not. After about ten seconds, Santana held up three fingers, and I knew she was letting me know I still had three minutes left to speak.

Much softer than before, and with a little less uncertainty, I leaned in closer to make sure she could hear everything I was saying.

"San..." I paused, remembering that she didn't want me to call her that. She didn't budge, so I just skimmed over it and kept on talking. "I am so sorry for the pain that I've caused you. I don't know exactly what I've done or what I can do differently, but I promise you that I am willing to do whatever it takes for you to be able to be around me again. I haven't felt whole without you. And I don't know what all these feelings mean quite yet, but the one thing I do know, is that I can't go another day without seeing you, without smelling you, talking to you... touching you..." my voice faded, almost surprised at the last words to escape my lips. I gasped for air as I realized I was crying as I plead for Santana's attention again.

Through tears I sputtered. "My time is up. Please think about what I've said," and I stood up and began to walk away when I felt her hand wrap around my wrist and pull me back. I turned around and looked down at where she still sat on the piano bench. She was looking up at me, staring into my eyes, as if she was searching for something. The fear and sadness on her face had vanished, and through the glossiness of her tears, I could see hope there again. I took the step back to the piano and sat down, her hand still gently wrapped around my wrist. I was still looking into her eyes, and became suddenly more aware of the tears rolling down my own face when her free hand reached up to wipe them away. I felt goose bumps rise all over my arms and down my spine at the comforting feeling of her hand on my cheek. She noticed the chill and started running her hands up and down the sides of my arms to warm me up and soothe me.

"Whoah, ladies! Am I interrupting something?" Puck chirped, with an egotistical grin as he strolled into the choir room.

"Damnit," Santana muttered under her breath. "No, ass. We were just talking."

"It looked like a little bit more than that to me, but whatever you say!" he said with a wink.

He walked off and I turned back towards Santana. Our eyes locked again and, as if choreographed, we both let out a small smile.

"Sorry, he can be such a dude sometimes," Santana said to me.

"It's ok." I looked away and felt her hand back on my arm, turning me to look back at her.

"You ok?"

I paused and glanced back at her. "Yeah, I... I just don't really know what to do now."

I stared at her, wanting her to respond to everything I had just said. She opened her mouth to speak when the bell rang, signaling we had a minute to get to our first period classes.

"Uh... I guess I better get to class. Coach will kill me if I get one more detention for being late." I got up and was almost in the doorway to the hall when I felt my phone vibrate in my pocket. I pulled it out and saw it was from Santana, who was still sitting across the choir room at the piano.

*U wanna skip? ;-)*

I turned around to see her watching me, smiling. I'd never seen this smile on her before. It was eager, but still hesitant. My heart leapt when I saw how happy she looked.

How could I say no to that face?

I just smiled back at her with a quick nod, and she jumped up from the piano and hurried towards me. She grabbed my wrist, just like she had before, and peeked her head out of the room and into the hallway. After a few random teachers went into their respective classrooms, Santana looked at me with a huge grin.

"Let's go!" She said it both quietly and excitedly. Never letting go of my hand, she pulled me out into the empty hall way, around the corner, and out a side door into one of the student parking lots. We went through a few rows until we reached Santana's SUV, and quickly hopped in. We sat for a minute, both a little out of breath from rushing and trying to stay quiet at the same time.

We looked over at each other, and Santana just busted out laughing. It made me laugh, too, and for a moment, it was as if we had both forgotten about the world in front of us. Eventually, we both settled down, and as Santana pulled out of the parking lot, I realized that I had no idea where we were going.

"The lake..." I said, softly. We had been driving for about half an hour, and Santana still hadn't told me where we were going.

"Is that okay?" She looked at me nervously.

"No, no, Santana. That's totally fine. Kinda perfect, actually." Santana's aunt has a lake house less than an hour from Lima, and we'd spent every summer night there since we met. When we weren't at cheerleading camp, of course. I had never told her, but it is one of my favorite places on earth. She glanced at me out of the corner of her eye, and I couldn't help but smile. She turned her eyes back to the road, but I could see she was hiding a smile of her own.

"Music?" she finally asked.

"Yeah, sounds good."

She reached over and turned her satellite radio onto some upbeat punk song that didn't seem to fit the mood. "Nuh uh," I said, practically to myself. I reached over and pressed the button., As the channel changed, we both froze.

"And next, a new one from Tennessee rocker, Will Hoge, this one's called 'Lover Tonight.'"

Santana almost ran off the road she tried to change the channel so quickly, but I stopped her. She looked at me with a mixture of fear and apprehension. "No, I want to hear it." She pulled her hand back to the wheel and we both faced the road ahead.

"It's okay, baby. I liked the song." I saw her smile, with a slight pang of guilt, as I called her baby. We rode the rest of the way in silence, and arrived at the lake before the song was over. Neither of us dared to move, as the last verse and chorus continued to roll over our ears.

"And how do we get back to where we started love?

And what do we do when everything is not enough

Oh and all of your cards are played

Maybe we should just walk away

But lover tonight, don't leave

Just one more kiss upon my cheek

Cause it's just miles and time

Between this heart of yours and mine

And lover tonight, don't go"

The song ended, and we both remained silent for an uncomfortable amount of time.

"What now?" I said as we avoided each other's glances.

"Wanna take a walk down to the pier?"

I smiled. "Yeah, definitely." I nodded, and though she didn't say anything, I could feel her exhale.

We got out of the car and headed towards the water line, turned left, and started walking around the side of the lake, each without saying a word. The walk to the pier was shorter if we had stayed on the road, yet we both instinctively knew the other would want to walk along the water. It was a walk we knew well, and had taken on endless summer mornings to watch the early fishermen and sailboats go out. It was something so comfortable and natural, and those mornings on the pier are probably a big reason why Santana and I had become such good friends. We spent hours upon hours looking out over the water, talking about any and every thing. And we had spent hours not talking at all, just sitting in each other's company in silence, absorbing our surroundings. Thinking of going there with Santana now, with all they needed to talk about, felt so appropriate. We walked along in silence for most of the way, but after what felt like an eternity, Santana spoke.

"I'm sorry I made you feel all of that. I sorry I yelled at you, Britt. You didn't deserve that. I'm the one that fucked up our friendship by trying to turn it into something more, and then you did nothing but try to show me that you care about me... and... I just completely shut you out. You didn't deserve that."

"It's ok, Santana. You were hurting, and feeling a lot of scary emotions, and you reacted, and I'm okay with that. I'm just not okay with us not being okay."

"I know."

It was if we felt again that there was nothing else to talk about. We had both apologized. We knew that our friendship would survive. Both of our arms were hanging loosely at our sides, the backs of our hands kept brushing against each other. I didn't want it to stop, and I could tell she didn't either, as I saw her steal away a smile at the extended contact of one of the encounters.

But I didn't feel satisfied. I decided to try and ask her some of the questions I had been mulling over.

"Can I ask you something?"

"Sure, I guess."

"Why haven't you said anything to me about having feelings before now?"

"I knew that's what you were going to ask. And the answer is simple: I was afraid that something like what happened the other night, would happen. Only..." She stopped talking and looked away.

"Only what?"

"Only, it was worse than I had imagined. I can't even try to describe the feeling in my stomach, and in my heart, that has been eating at me these past few days. It felt like I couldn't breathe... like I had no reason to."

A chill ran up my spine. I stepped forward, over, and into her path and turned around. I knew I had caught her off guard by the look on her face. We were standing inches from each other, simply staring. I felt my heart began that incessant racing, and I took each of her hands in mine, pulling her a little closer.

She's holding her breath. She's so nervous.

I smiled, trying to ease her fears.

"Santana... I felt the exact same way."

A/N: To hear the song, go to youtube and search "will hoge lover tonight." The first search result is the best, IMO.