A few weeks passed, and Brittany settled into school. Her Cheerios uniform and her friends – Quinn and Santana - gave her a kind of power. She was popular and happy at school. But, Louise was worse each day. In Cheerios practice, she would roll her eyes nastily whenever Brittany got praise for pulling off a hard move. She would whisper to the other girls on the team about Brittany, most of them ignored her, but Brittany was sure that Louise was making some of the team dislike her.

Brittany wasn't in many classes with Louise, but they did take History together. Brittany mostly kept her head down in lessons, because all of the work went in one ear, out the other. Mrs Hagberg had noticed her quietness and picked on her.

"Brittany, who led the SS in Nazi Germany?" She asked.

Mrs Hagberg could have been speaking Chinese for all the sense that sentence made to Brittany. She felt humiliated and embarrassed, she hated it when teachers picked her out, and humiliated her in front of all her friends

"Erm… Mozart?" She suggested, taking a guess on a German-sounding name.

A laugh rang round the classroom; Brittany's cheeks flushed pink.

Louise's voice rose above the laughter, "God! She is so stupid!"

Brittany's eyes blurred. Stupid. That was her one weakness. She couldn't bear being called, 'stupid'. She tried to be strong, but somebody calling her 'stupid' always made her break down in tears.

"Leave Brittany alone!"

Brittany looked around to see Santana standing up, her eyes flickering with rage. She glared intently at Louise.

"Listen here you little sneaky bitch, I've had enough of you and all your crap. I find it revolting to look at you, you repulse me. And maybe that's why you don't have a boyfriend because no one would ever touch your non-existent boobs. And everyone should know how stupid you are because this is a freshman class." Santana gave Louise a belittling look. The whole class stood stunned. Miss Doosenbury spoke first,

"Santana, you better step outside the classroom. And I'll speak to both of you you after the lesson is finished."

Santana turned to the class and gave a final speech,

"If any of you have a problem with my girl Britt, you can take it out with me." Brittany felt a wave of gratitude towards Santana. This was the nicest thing anyone had ever done for her; whatever anyone had said about Santana being 'mean' wasn't true, Brittany knew this for sure.

Brittany sat through the rest of the class her eye glued to the door, in case Santana came into view through the small window. But Santana must've been standing to the side. Brittany badly wanted to talk to Santana, thank her, and tell her that she would've done the same.

The bell rang loudly to signal the end of the day, and the end of class.

"Class dismissed," Mrs Hagberg then turned to the dopey quarter-back Finn Hudson, "please send Santana in to see me."

So Brittany had to wait outside after class to talk to Santana, but Louise came out first.

"Fight your own fights next time," Louise raised her hands as a sort of surrender and stormed off. Brittany used to consider Louise as a friend, then as a bully, and now she couldn't care less about her.

A little while later Santana came out the classroom, clearly cross and bothered, she saw Brittany sitting on the floor waiting patiently,

"You waited for me?" Santana said in surprise.

"Yeah, I wanted to talk to you," Brittany said as she hoisted herself onto her feet.

"Look if it's about the yelling, I can't help it, I have rage. It's like my good judgement is being bitch-slapped by my crazy other side. You can't…

"I actually wanted to thank for doing the yelling. It means a lot that I've got a friend who is willing to get in trouble to stop somebody being mean to me."

"Don't thank me; Louise is a bitch, she was asking for it: Gossiping about you, putting you down, and calling you stupid." Brittany felt her eyes water as Santana spoke.

"Britt, don't cry," Santana went to put her arm around Brittany "you're not in the least bit stupid, you smart, funny, and witty. You can just be mean back to anyone who hurts you…"

"I'm not like you though," Brittany explained, "I can't think of things to say back like you can."

"Then I'll teach you; that's what best friends do… We are best friends right?"

"Best friends," Brittany agreed.

"I got your back." Santana said, holding up her pinkie finger, Brittany linked it with hers and they walked off. Best Friends.

AN: thanks for all the reviews; it's good to know you all like the story. This chapter is a bit shorter so I'm going to post chapter 4 tomorrow to make up for it. Keep reading.