Brittany met the band the next morning in the lobby of her hotel. They were already waiting, huddled together on couches next to the oversized coffee table that dominated one side of the room. Tina and Sam had their heads together, deep in discussion while Santana watched Portland pass by the windows.
"Good morning," Brittany said, her voice bright despite the early hour. Yesterday's music still rippled beneath her skin, clean and fine. Morning-induced zombiedom didn't stand a chance. "Let me grab a cup and then we'll talk."
The coffee shop right in the hotel's lobby was rather convenient, and the cute barista slinging lattes behind the counter cracked flirty jokes and got a laugh out of Brittany and a good sized tip for the trouble. Brittany felt Santana's eyes scouring the exchange like it was the most interesting coffee order ever.
Brittany settled herself down onto the couch in the space next to Santana, and it was like sitting next to a high-voltage powerline. She tried to ignore the buzzing in her fingertips as she focused on the matter at hand. "Do we need to wait for Brad?"
Santana shook her head. "He had someplace to be, and he never says anything anyway, so..."
"Sounds like he hasn't changed much."
"Have you known him long?"
"Long enough for me to owe him a favor or two." Brittany grinned at the memory of a drunken night in jail after a gig got rowdy, and Brad's just-in-time bailout before she ended up someone's prison bitch. He may have broken his own record for most eyerolls per hour that night.
Sam and Tina emerged from their guitar talk reverie and the four of them made small talk about Portland and the Pearl District and hotels that wished they were art galleries until Tina shifted in her seat and leaned forward like she was sharing a secret. "Which room did you get?"
"One with a giant painting of a cat on the wall." Brittany put on her best stage whisper. "I've named him Lord Tubbington."
That one earned snickers from Tina and Sam — and a smirk from Santana.
"So you do have a sense of humor." And Brittany knew she was playing with fire, but she had to test, had to see if they could work together, if there was more to Santana than a bad reputation and a hell of a way with a song. Two years of relentless work had put her in a place where she could be picky about the gigs she chose and she wasn't about to be stuck on tour for several weeks with someone who couldn't take a joke.
Santana's response was a nonchalant shrug.
"She's on her best behavior," Sam said, sensing the turn in the conversation.
"I'd like to see you when you're not on your best behavior."
Santana turned and looked at her. Are you sure?
Tina cleared her throat and Brittany looked away in time to see Sam nod toward the entrance.
"And that would be Puck," Santana said.
Puck had the build of a linebacker, sported an ironic mohawk, and was dressed like the spring fashion issue of Esquire. Brittany guessed he was the band's manager.
"You must be Brittany," he said with an extended hand and a salesman's smile. "I'm Noah Puckerman, but my friends call me Puck." Santana rolled her eyes.
At least he'd chosen a handshake instead of the traditional fake industry hug. Brittany shook his hand, and they sat down and launched right into the logistics: the number of dates, the venues, the accommodations, and the travel. It seemed simple enough on the surface, but this was the band's first major market tour and it was being promoted by Will Schuester. The guy had a reputation for cutting every corner. But the red flags weren't enough to drown out the music thrumming within her — that and Santana's eyes saying Are you sure? — and she named them a price that was less than her usual but would still require them to stretch a little.
"I think we can make that work," Puck said. "What do you think, Santana?"
Santana's eyes met hers. "I want that."
That or you?
Puck rubbed his hands together briskly. "Great. We'll get you hooked up with the paperwork tonight. And you'll need to get the tour book from Quinn."
Brittany's eyebrows quirked. "Quinn Fabray?"
"Yeah. You know her?"
"Know of her." Interesting. Quinn Fabray was probably enough of a perfectionist to pull off a tour consisting of road virgins and an unproven crew thrown together by a slimy promoter. Schuester wouldn't have hired someone like her to manage a tour this small unless he was confident he had a hot prospect in his hands. At any rate, it was a moot point now; she'd given her commitment and it was time to do the work — and hope they'd hold up their end of the deal.
Puck stood up. "Well that's settled. If we were on anything other than Santana's ridiculously early schedule, I'd propose we grab some drinks to celebrate."
Santana shrugged. "It's easier to kick people out of bed if I don't have to look at them in the daylight."
Brittany had to admit she had a point.
Quinn turned out to be even more efficient than Brittany hoped, and within an hour she had the ink drying on a signed contract, and another hour after that a bike messenger delivered her a copy of the tour book, her hotel reservations for the upcoming week, and a post-it note with the words Finally, someone whose nose I don't have to wipe. Welcome aboard. -Quinn written in strong, neat handwriting.
The tour book revealed that the first show would be tomorrow night, Friday, at a venue called Mississippi Studios. They'd rehearse in the morning, then have soundcheck later in the afternoon.
A year of traveling, of never sleeping in her own bed for more than a week at a time, and here she was in yet another hotel room, signed up for another two month stint.
Maybe it was time for her to admit that she liked it.
Brittany smiled and pulled her practice drum pads out of her suitcase, queued up the playlist on her macbook called "Santana," and dug in for a long day of drumming under Lord Tubbington's watchful gaze.
Brittany pulled her truck into the alley behind the venue at three o'clock the next day, taking advantage of the luxury known as designated band parking. She wasn't expected at soundcheck for another hour, but she had gear to check and people to meet and it never hurt to be early.
The load-in entrance behind the venue already buzzed with activity. The box truck containing the band's gear was parked next to the doors, and the local crew was busy unloading amps and flight cases and carrying them inside. Brittany grabbed her drumstick bag and cymbal case out of her truck, dodged a hauler who had his hands full with two large guitar cases, and worked her way inside.
Mississippi Studios was about the size of a shoebox, and it had been a long time since Brittany had played in a venue that put the audience so close they might as well be on stage. It was cozy, and intimate, and the perfect place to kick off a tour that would live or die by the buzz it could generate. Even if it meant that she had to squeeze her drum kit into an area the size of a doormat.
The cramped backstage area was crowded with people busy doing their jobs, and in the center of the swarm stood a woman directing traffic like the tour manager she probably was.
Quinn turned out to be a cute blonde with a rather intense disposition. She had an iPhone grafted to one hand and the other hand in constant motion, getting things done, pointing other things out for the crew to handle, solving the hundreds of little disasters that inevitably preceded a gig. As soon as she spotted Brittany, she walked over and extended her hand. "I'm Quinn Fabray. And you're early."
Brittany shook Quinn's hand and grinned. "Last I checked my name was Brittany."
Quinn stared at her for a moment and then rolled her eyes. "Oh God, not another one. Sam's already bad enough." Then the phone in her hand rang and she looked at the screen, frowned, and said, "Sorry, I have to take this," before sweeping back into the fray.
Brittany took that as her cue to check her own gear. The haulers had set the PA and backline equipment in one row and everything else in another row of almost identical black flight cases — except for Brittany's drum cases, which had pink gaffer's tape wrapped around their lids for easy identification. She knelt beside one and popped open its latches and started taking inventory.
"Pink tape, huh? Nice."
Brittany looked up, and the voice belonged to a young man wearing thick horn-rimmed glasses and a baseball cap turned to the side, his arms braced in a pair of crutches.
"I'm Artie," he said. "Sound guy. And this is my homeboy Rory."
Rory looked about twelve and wore a Seattlesque uniform of a green flannel shirt, dark skinny jeans, and black Converses, and when he opened his mouth to say, "Hello, I'm your monitor guy," a surprisingly heavy Irish brogue tumbled out.
Brittany introduced herself, and Artie said, "Hey, you got a list of your inputs?"
"Sure do." Brittany reached around and pulled a piece of paper out of a side pocket of her stick bag and handed it over.
Artie scanned the list and nodded. "Awesome. We'll get you hooked up and ready to go."
Brittany got back to work, and once she was satisfied that all of her gear had arrived intact, she un-cased her drumkit piece by piece and started building it back up again.
"Shouldn't you be in the dressing room?" Quinn was back, and beside her stood a young woman who glowered at Brittany with a look that was trying very hard to be disinterested. "Mack can take care of your setup."
Mack, who was apparently the backline tech, looked Brittany up and down and grunted before picking up Brittany's snare stand and the hi-hat and heading for the stage.
Quinn shrugged. "She's like that with everyone."
"Where'd you find this crew?"
"Schuester hired them. Artie and Mack I'm not sure where, but they seem competent. Rory's so new the ink's still drying on his diploma, so get ready to hold his hand."
The back door flew open and Santana and the rest of the band arrived backstage. Sam and Tina bounded in with huge smiles and spoke too fast and too loud, their nervous excitement bouncing off Brad's usual stoicism. And Santana... Santana wore the glow of anticipation, and she moved with easy confidence, all loose and graceful in the hips, and Brittany found herself staring until her eyes met Santana's and she knew she'd been caught.
Quinn saved her by herding them all into the green room to get settled. The catering spread was in place and a stack of clean towels sat on the countertop next to a basket full of odds and ends: packs of tissues and chewing gum and mints and nail clippers, everything provided in pursuit of the perfect show.
Quinn handed her an empty aluminum bottle. "Hang on to that, you're going to need it. There's filtered water in the fridge."
Brittany took the bottle and looked at it in confusion. "What?"
"This venue doesn't allow bottled water. Bad for the environment and all that."
Santana rolled her eyes. "Well, that's Portlandia for you."
Brittany snickered in commiseration. "Sounds like something Seattle would do."
"Seattle. Always gotta be copying the best."
"Oh, whatever. We gave you Starbucks."
"And Nirvana, wouldn't want to forget that one." Santana's voice was snarky with sarcasm, and she sounded like a true Portlander, someone who loved and hated the city, sometimes in the same moment. Brittany didn't know what it meant to put down roots, to identify with a place so much that she'd rise to defend it. She'd hit the road almost immediately after graduating from high school, and once she left the close-minded little town she'd grew up in she never looked back.
The moment was interrupted by Quinn reminding them about soundcheck, and fifteen minutes later they were crammed on stage and adjusting their gear. The quarters were so close that they'd stuck with basic wedge monitors across the front of the stage instead of their in-ear systems. No need to make things complicated.
Artie's voice floated up through the monitors. "Let's run through each of you in turn." If Brittany squinted hard she could see him sitting at the mixing console at the back of the hall.
When her turn came, Brittany couldn't resist playing a classic rimshot, if only to see what kind of reaction it would get out of Santana, and she was rewarded with a headshake and a grin.
"OK, your inputs checked out. Why don't you start playing something from mid-set?"
Santana picked a song and they started to play and Brittany knew that it sounded absolutely terrible, but that was the point of soundcheck. It was Artie's job to make them sound good in a space of shifting acoustics, a job made even trickier because they'd never really know how the hall sounded until it was packed with warm bodies.
Santana held herself back, singing with just enough effort to get the point across, and her voice was trapped within the echoes of the empty space.
They played right into another song until Artie gave them a thumbs up. "A'ight. You've got time for one more."
The band glanced at each other, but no one made any suggestions until Brittany finally said, "Let's run through the opener so Artie can start with his levels already set."
They did, and Brittany could hear Artie making adjustments until the end, until his satisfied grin signaled that he was happy with his settings and that they could clear the stage.
Brittany walked off stage past Sam, who was frowning at the neck of his guitar and picking at a loose string. "Damn, that's my last spare."
That got Brittany's attention. "What did you say?"
"When I replace this one, I won't have a spare left."
"Write down what you use and give it to Quinn so she can send the runner out to buy more. It's already past four so they'll have to hurry. And have them buy a bunch so you'll have extra."
Sam grinned. "Anti-Murphy's law, huh?"
"You got it." She'd learned that the hard way as a rookie, at a gig where she broke her last spare stick at soundcheck, which of course led to breaking another stick five minutes into the main event. She played the rest of the show using the butt end of a soft mallet and the determination to never let that happen again.
Another mistake she'd been determined never to let happen again was falling for another musician, but when she looked away from Sam and saw Santana's eyes on her, submerged with a strange kind of longing, she realized just how hard keeping that promise to herself was going to be.
The place was packed by 8:15, and the space hummed with the unmatched energy of a hometown crowd. The floor was full of people, and some stood along the walls while others peered down upon the stage from the balcony up above.
Then it was showtime, and Quinn gave them the signal and they walked out on stage to raucous applause.
Santana stepped up to the mic, said, "Hello everyone. Thanks for coming out tonight. I'm Santana Lopez," and they launched into the opener with the intensity of a drag race in the streets. Santana was fearless, and she sang like singing should be illegal, like a robbery, but one where you wanted her to come in and take what she wanted, rummaging around inside and turning up places and things you'd forgotten you had.
And Brittany had a front row seat and no escape route, just as vulnerable as the crowd, and she wasn't immune — couldn't be immune — to the music that surrounded her.
They powered through the first three songs until the crowd was up and dancing and the people on the balcony were pounding out the beat against the railings. Brittany and the rest of the band kept the beat going as they transitioned between songs, giving Santana a chance to breathe and grab a drink of water. But instead of reaching for the bottle sitting next to her mic stand, Santana sauntered back next to the drums and stole a drink from Brittany's.
Brittany raised an eyebrow, more out of surprise than anything else, and Santana gave her a look that said, So? You weren't drinking it.
Flirting. Right in the middle of a show. It was utterly ballsy, and completely terrifying, and she felt like Santana had stolen every damn dish in her house along with all the electronics.
Somehow, she kept it together through the remainder of the set, until Santana was saying, "We love you, Portland. Thank you all," and the crowd howled for an encore, and another one, until the house had to raise the lights and put on a Kenny G album to clear them from the floor.
Santana was making it awfully hard for Brittany to keep time.