The talk fest with Quinn has been nerve wracking and awesome at the same time. After our initial conversation, we've been pretty good about easing into this whole thing, somehow managing to avoid jumping into super deep conversations about our feelings and instead choosing to catch up on silly little things or reminiscing about funny stuff from high school.

We intentionally kept our kiss last night short and chaste before returning to talking and enjoying the best pizza on earth once it arrived. By the time Porcelain and Berry the Hobbit returned, Quinn and I had demolished a large pizza and were giggling at our similarly pained expressions as a result of our full stomachs.

We've escaped to Central Park today, claiming a bench for ourselves and sitting down to people watch. It's a warmer day than most have been lately, and I smile when Quinn lies on the bench and puts her head on my lap.

"So can I ask you something?"

I roll my eyes.

"You don't have to ask if you can ask, Q. Just ask your question."

Quinn scowls at my snarky response before responding.

"Fine. How did your song make it to Keith Urban? And when did you start writing country music?"

I laugh, because it is weird that I have a songwriting credit for a country song.

"Well, my original version wasn't exactly country. It was a bit slower, more wistful. I was actually pretty devastated when I wrote it. But I played it during one of my graveyard shifts at the diner and some dude from Nashville just so happened to be visiting New York and grabbing some 3 AM pie at the diner. He liked it and asked me if I was willing to work with some other songwriters to give it a country vibe. And the rest, as they say, is history."

Q is studying me silently. I can tell she's debating whether or not to make a comment that's on the tip of her tongue.

"Out with it Fabray, we're never going to get anywhere if you're afraid to say what's on your mind."

Quinn shakes her head at me and sighs.

"God, you're annoying sometimes."

"Don't get flustered because I'm the only one who calls you out. You have a thought. Share it."

I shrug my shoulders and give her a "no big deal" expression. Quinn huffs a little, not wanting to acquiesce to my insistence. I know she will though, so I wait expectantly.

"Why were you so upset when you wrote the song?"

Her tone is annoyed because she is being forced to ask her question, but her eyes are sincere and curious. She actually looks kind of concerned.

It's my turn to hesitate, because I've painted myself into a corner now.

Telling Quinn how I feel about her was a lot easier on a phone 3,000 miles away. Talking about that night with her face to face brings up a lot of feelings I spent a good amount of time boxing away. I'm torn between wanting to pour out every single little thing to her and not wanting to open Pandora's Box o' Feelings.

But of course, I just called her out on not being forthright enough, so it would be exceptionally dickish if I didn't share my thoughts.

We've crossed back over into serious talk now, so I muster all of the courage I can find.

"I mean…I was in love with...someone else. And you. All at once. I felt like a terrible person. Cheating wasn't something I considered a big deal, up until that point. Then it felt like every time I thought of you…like that…I was cheating on...her. Plus, I was afraid that somehow one of you would find out about my crazy feelings and I would lose you both. It's not like people were exactly clamoring to be my friend. So, yeah. I was near tears when I wrote those lyrics."

Quinn is quiet, her eyes looking up at me pensively.

"I'm sorry you were in such turmoil. I wish I had known, although I'm not sure I would have handled it very well back then. Honestly, part of why I insisted on separating myself from the Unholy Trinity during my time as a Skank was because I didn't really know what to think about my feelings for you. I was so messed up in general though, it was just another layer of crazy in a whole big mess of craziness."

I try not to laugh at the memory of Quinn sauntering down the hallway with pink hair and a nose ring. I fail miserably and Quinn tilts her head to see me better.

"What's so funny?"

"I was just remembering the first time I saw you in full Skank mode. I won't pretend you weren't hot as hell, but that get up was ridiculous."

"Whatever. At least I didn't date Karofsky of all people," Quinn deflects with a snicker.

"Oh PLEASE! We weren't really "dating," I did that whole thing to get Kurt back to McKinley."

"Horse shit, Santana, you did that to win Prom Queen."

"Yeah, that worked out real well," I intone sarcastically.

"You should have won. You looked stunning that night," Quinn replies lightly, as if testing the water with her words.

I look down at her and narrow my eyes a little, cocking my head to the side.

"You know, I don't know why, but compliments from you run straight through me. I get the tingles whenever you say something nice to me. Probably because you're usually such a mean bitch," I tease.

Quinn laughs at my comment, considering I am by far the bigger bitch of the two of us, and I smile at her.

We're quiet for a bit before Quinn speaks up.

"I'm glad that nose ring didn't leave a scar, it's bad enough I still have the stupid tattoo."

I snort at her unexpected comment and she laughs at me.

"Was it weird taking out the tongue piercing? I saw the metal in your mouth once and, as I'm sure you can imagine, almost died."

Quinn bites her lip and looks up at me with a guilty/pleased/devious expression.

"What?" I ask, suddenly wary.

"I still have it."

"What?! No fucking way."

"It's clear glass."

"That's impossible, I would have felt that…"

"No, San, look, the retainer is clear and it has a flat top."

Quinn sticks her tongue out and pushes the bottom of her tongue piercing against her teeth so that it pushes up enough to be seen.

I'm utterly speechless.

"I was actually kind of worried you'd notice it during one of our more passionate kisses at Mr. Schue's wedding," she says with a little laugh.

"You were worried? Are you insane? I would have lost my ever loving mind. This is like…did I just arrive on Fantasy Island? I'm pretty sure I dreamed about hooking up with you and that tongue ring more than a few times."

Q is wearing a smirk that could turn just about any girl gay and I can't help myself any longer.

I lean down and kiss her, quickly slipping my tongue in her mouth before she even sees me coming. I slide my tongue along hers until I feel the glass stud I still can't believe exists. A deep hum comes from my throat as I run my tongue against it.

Quinn leans up into the kiss and wraps a hand around my neck, holding me in place as she takes the kiss over, pushing my tongue back with her own. I'm hopelessly turned on when she swirls her delicious tongue around in my mouth and then sucks my top lip between hers before releasing it with a pop.

"Wow," she breathes against my lips.

"Yeah," I whisper back before she releases her grip on my neck.

We share a long moment of eye contact.

"Thank God for public places," I say, my meaning clear as day to the girl with darkened eyes lying on my lap.

She laughs a little.

"Yeah if we're gonna take this slow, we should probably not do that again."

"Agreed."

We walk hand in hand back to the loft to collect my roommates for our little group celebration. When we reach the door, Quinn turns her head and places a soft kiss on my cheek. We share a smile, and then I release her hand and slide the door open.

"Yo! Loud and Louder, we're back! Are you guys ready to go?"

Two impossibly happy faces pop out of their respective personal areas and give me face-splitting grins.

I'm immediately put off by their expressions and I give Quinn an annoyed eye roll that makes her laugh in response.

Just when I'm about to go full bitch mode, curtains are yanked back in tandem and my roommates emerge, dressed to the nines.

Rachel immediately addresses Quinn as if I'm not standing right next to her.

"Okay so normally, since we're celebrating her, we'd let Santana pick where we're going tonight. However, Kurt and I made an executive decision to preemptively veto her choice and have selected Callbacks as our destination for tonight."

"Absolutely not," I respond without hesitation. "I thought we were doing a fairly mild night out, anyway."

"But Santanaaaaa. This is a big deal, we should do something big," Kurt whines at me.

"But we're going to need time to actually get ready, and we're both pretty hungry since we skipped lunch."

"What's Callbacks?" Quinn asks.

"It's this lame bar where the kids who pay to be educated theater nerds hang out and sing songs. It's basically like the choir room but with poorly made drinks and mediocre food."

"Oh stop, it's not that bad," Kurt chides.

"I like the sound of it. Let's do this," Q interjects.

I glare at her with a meaningful warning look, but just get a smile in return.

"Fine. But you all owe me for hijacking my celebratory night," I huff out before walking to my room to start getting ready.

When we've arrived, Hummelberry immediately head off to sign up to sing and I lead Quinn to a table.

"You're a traitor, Quinn Fabray."

"Will it help if I tell you I have a good reason?"

"It would have to be a damn good reason," I say, my face skeptical.

Quinn raises her eyebrow at my sullen doubtfulness. She leans forward and speaks lowly.

"Look down."

I scrunch my face in confusion and glance down before looking back up at her and raising my hands in a "what?" gesture.

Q smirks and slowly drags her line of sight down from my eyes to my chest and bites her lip before bringing her eyes back up to mine.

"You're bad," I say, shaking my head at her with a grin.

"You love it," she responds cockily, then shrugs, "I just figured I'd take the opportunity to enjoy the view I knew you'd so kindly provide."

"What happened to my cleavage being 'too distracting'?"

"I won't be trying to focus on an important conversation between us tonight, being distracted isn't such a concern."

I nod my head slowly and then tip my head in a sign of respect.

"I gotta give it to you, you're good, Fabray. But I still think you're going to have trouble keeping your ogling of the twins here from being noticed by Thing 1 and Thing 2. I've even caught Kurt giving them the once over, so I'd imagine they're pretty hard to ignore," I tell her with a wicked little smile.

Kurt and Rachel are making their way to the table finally.

Quinn leans forward once again and looks me dead in the eye.

"Who says I plan on hiding my ogling?"

She leans back and lets her eyes drop to my tits for a second before returning her gaze to mine.

My mouth drops open at her bold statement and bolder actions just as Kurtchel place a whole bunch of shots in front of us on the table.

"Okay! We're going to kick this night off right! Everyone grab a shot and let's toast to start this shit up!"

Quinn looks at Rachel with a shocked expression and I laugh.

"Welcome to the New York Directions, Quinn. These two are 95% less lame than you probably remember them being. 100% of the credit for this transformation is mine," I announce as Kurt and Rach grin proudly, then roll their eyes when I take credit for their reduced lameness.

We all hold up shots and Rachel raises her voice once again, attracting the attention of several tables around us.

"Here is to Santana Lopez. Successful songwriter, soon to be superstar, mean ass bitch, and the best friend I never thought I'd make. We're so damn proud of you! Wooooo!"

I shake my head at the unexpectedly awesome toast and fight the lump I feel in my throat. It's way too early to start feeling emotional, especially since alcohol always brings all of my carefully contained feels to the surface anyway.

We touch our shots together and then drop them to the table before throwing them back as the tables around us raise their glasses and bottles and cheer.

Kurt swipes another shot off the table and gestures to us to do the same. I give him a warning look; he does NOT want to see the outcome when he feeds me and Quinn shots without feeding us actual food. Between her anger and my tears, it'll be a certified shitshow.

"No, no, don't worry, this'll be the last shot for a bit and we've already ordered some food. Rachel and I just couldn't agree on who gets to say a toast for you."

I roll my eyes and hold up yet another shot. Kurt kindly keeps his voice low enough for just the four of us.

"Here's to our dear friend Satan," he says with a wink in my direction, "who is up next to SING HER HIT SONG "COP CAR," WHICH CAN BE HEARD ON THE RADIO SUNG BY KEITH URBAN!"

Kurt's sudden shouting shocks me and it takes me a moment to realize what he actually just said.

"What?! No, I'm not singing it. Kurt. Kurt. Listen to me, Kurt. I'm not singing."

It seems like everyone in the entire bar is cheering and I can barely raise my voice loud enough to be heard by the soon-to-be-dead gay man standing right next to me.

He pretends like he can't hear me and gestures toward the small stage. I glance at Quinn and she smiles at me calmly.

Oh God. I can't sing this in front of her.

I shake my head and look at her again. Q nods her head towards the stage and mouths "you got this."

Shit.

I get up, feeling uncharacteristically heavy and nervous as I start walking to more cheering around me. I've sung in front of much larger groups than this, with choreography no less.

I try to get a grip over my anxiety as I head to the stage. I walk to one of the guys sitting behind an instrument and ask in his ear if he has a left handed guitar. I realize I'm really hoping he doesn't when he nods and gets up to grab one from a room off to the side.

While I'm waiting I pull a stool up and adjust the microphone stand. I sit down and carefully cross my legs. This dress could easily show a lot more than great cleavage if I'm not careful.

The bar has quieted considerably.

I pull the mic closer and take a deep breath.

"Hi everyone. I'm just waiting on a guitar and then I'm going to sing you guys a song I wrote almost three years ago called "Cop Car." Some of you might have heard it already, as my soon-to-be dead roommate pointed out ever so loudly."

I hear laughter from the crowd as Kurt sheepishly waves and I relax a bit. I glance over and don't see the guy yet so I keep talking.

"How many aspiring songwriters do we have here tonight?"

There are a few cheers and a whole shit ton of hands go up.

"Wow, awesome. Don't give up on it."

Someone yells out something from the crowd.

"What was that?"

They yell again and I just barely make it out.

"Oh you want advice? Um, well shit." (laughter) "Honestly I just got extremely lucky with having my song being heard by the right person, but I think the key is really the song itself. You've got to write stories and feelings that really move you in order to reach other people. I think my song got picked up because the feelings it describes are real."

I shrug and glance over to see the guy finally emerge with the requested guitar. I take it and strum a few bars to make sure it's tuned

"Alright guys, I hope you enjoy this. As I'm sure you can tell I'm not exactly a country artist, so my version is a little different."

I take a deep breath and begin playing softly for a few bars, then close my eyes and start singing a memory.

Flashes of a night I won't ever forget play out in my mind as I sing.

A curious gaze on my face as we drive.

Hazel-green eyes reflecting the flash of blue lights.

A devious smirk pulling at the edges of a perfect mouth.

Big, beautiful eyes peeking up at me from under thick lashes.

A gentle kiss on my cheek at the end of the night.

I open my eyes and scan the crowd as I sing. I see a lot of people singing along and a few lighters and cell phones waving back and forth. My lips pull into a slight smile as I finish the chorus and head into the last verse.

My gaze falls upon the inspiration for the song. Quinn looks like she's barely breathing, her eyes fixed on mine intensely. I keep my eyes on her as I finish the song.

Side by side

And locked in tight

They were taking their time

But we didn't mind

We talked

And we laughed

We sat real close

By the time they let us go

I was already gone

I was already gone, baby

I fell in love in the back of a cop car

For someone as unusually confident as I am, I'm still surprised by the thunderous applause that follows the final note. I smile and nod in lieu of a bow before saying "thank you" into the mic and carefully climbing down from the stool so as not to flash anyone.

I hand the guitar off and start walking back to the table occupied by my friends. I smile and acknowledge a few people who give me compliments as I'm walking by.

I see Quinn walking toward me and give her a wide grin. She looks serious and focused as she makes a beeline in my direction and I give her a curious look.

My question is answered barely a second later when she pulls me against her body and kisses me passionately. I recover from my surprise quickly and loop my arms around her, moving my mouth against hers with equal fervor.

I'm distantly aware of renewed cheering until we pull apart and Quinn looks directly in my eyes. Suddenly I hear nothing, see nothing, know nothing except that the girl in front of me is the most beautiful thing I've ever seen and that I'm absolutely still in love with her.