A/N: I meant to have this up a little earlier in the week (and, to those I spoke to privately and told to expect an update…I meant to have it up earlier tonight too). My apologies. I do want to warn that this update will contain some Finn POV.

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Whatever we deny or embrace
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The rest of Christmas is fairly uneventful. They open presents after brunch, most of which are for Bella from Judy, though basically everyone gets presents. She's very grateful for her family's wealth at this point, because she has no idea how Rachel is managing to work and attend school at the same time; sure, she gets time to relax with friends, but the vast majority of her time is spent on schoolwork. She actually has access to three trust accounts, two set up by each set of grandparents, and the one she had relinquished from her father. Much of the money is meant to go toward school—one fund can only be accessed specifically for school-related costs—but some of it is spending money, and though she generally tries to be frugal, especially hesitant to show her school friends that she comes from money, she's glad to spend on Christmas.

She and her mother spend Christmas night eating leftovers from brunch and watching It's a Wonderful Life. Her mother cries, but Quinn finds herself distracted. She remembers the time at God Squad when she'd confided in the others that, despite how horribly some things in her life had gone, she hadn't considered ending it. And then how Kurt had came in to say to her that she could never understand Karofsky's pain.

That hurt. Almost as badly as all the absolute shit she had been put through. But there was nothing she could say. Kurt was hurting, too, and she'd forced her mouth shut, before she said anything she'd regret.

She knew depression. She knew what it was like to hate herself. When she'd told Zizes she'd changed herself because she loved herself, it wasn't entirely true. She loved herself in the abstract, in the same sort of way she'd loved her family for most of her life—not because they were particularly good to her, but because she knew she had to. She also hated herself, hated the way she'd looked, hated the way she'd treated people, hated the way she ached inside, ached for someone to love her, ached for her daughter.

She couldn't articulate very well why she never considered suicide. There were times when it crossed her mind that it would be such a relief to not have to think about these things anymore, to not have to feel things anymore, but something inside her had always risen up and steeled her spine and pushed those thoughts away. She didn't think it came from her religious upbringing—she can't remember anyone ever specifically discussing suicide at church—and though she was pretty sure she was an exceptionally strong-willed person, it was not entirely that. It was partially guilt; she always imagined what it would be like for people who cared about her—even people like Santana who were so damn good at hiding that they cared that she sometimes forgot—and for her family to have to take care of her corpse, and her belongings. It was guilt and empathy that made her stay, almost as much as a pure, instinctual drive to live that never let her see suicide as a real option.

And Beth. The desire to be there, in case Beth ever needed anything from her, was as life-affirming as any instinct.

After the accident, though, there'd been a day in which she spent her lunch in the choir room, unable to take the way people stared, when Kurt approached, rubbing his wrist and staring at his shiny boots. It was hard for him to avoid her eyes when she was basically at the level of his waist, but he managed.

"I'm so sorry," he told her.

She wasn't much in the mood for pity, so she half-glared at him, "What for?" she'd asked icily.

Kurt took a deep breath and actually met her eye, stating, "For what I said, about how you may have been through difficult things but everyone always loved you. For dismissing your pain." He shot his eyes away, "I was wrong. I see you now," and he'd waved his hand in an all-encompassing way at her that for some reason made her hackles rise slightly, "and see how optimistic you are, and I realized it's because you have people who love you, friends and family, in your corner. Sophomore year, you were abandoned by people who claimed to love you. When I thought about it, I realized you were basically living a gay kid's worst nightmare—you were kicked out of your home for something you didn't have a whole lot of control over. And even your friends were so embarrassed by you that they didn't stand by you." He shook his head, "I'm sorry for judging you so harshly."

Quinn had closed her eyes, and thought what do you possibly have to lose and, for the first time, tried to find a way to tell someone. "I…don't know what it's like to be gay like you and Karofsky, but…I know something similar," she told him, quietly and painfully. Her heart sped up as her courage peaked, and her stomach twisted in anticipation of his support.

He didn't seem to react properly at all, just smiled a little and said, "I should have known that. I should have remembered how miserable you were…how miserable you've been for, god, years now. That's just…god, Quinn, sometimes I don't know how you're still here, in front of me."

She hadn't known what to say, since what she tried to say seemed to have fallen on deaf ears, so she'd just thanked Kurt, and accepted the hug he offered, and forgave him for being unintentionally really dismissive of her pain and her feelings. She didn't think they were ever going to be the best of friends or anything, but an understanding had settled between them, and mutual respect followed.

Inside, however, the courage she'd built crumbled as soon as she realized he didn't understand what she had been trying to tell him. She felt inexplicably hurt and betrayed that he didn't understand—foolish, she knew, on a cerebral level, but still there, still painful, and her courage lay shattered at her feet for months since. If she couldn't even come out properly to the walking gaydar…

But now, on Christmas, she again feels the weight of the thing she's been wanting to say for so Goddamn long, and one glance at her mother fills her with ice water, with frigid slushie. Absolutely not.

When she wakes up the next day, she needs to get out of the house, so she texts Puck at 9:30, hoping he's actually awake and not at work.

Q: I need Lauren Zizes's address.

Puck: um wtf

Q: Hey, remember that time you knocked me up? You owe me, dumbass. Zizes's address. No questions asked.

Puck: jesus q ok i'll find it for u

Fifteen minutes later, she has it, and when her mother comes home from work around 4:30, she asks to borrow the car, promising she'll be home for dinner.

On the way there, she takes deep breaths, and refuses to think about anything except the road, and her speed, and the other drivers. She still trembles sometimes when she drives, but she's learning to attack problems head on, and forcing herself to face her fear of car accidents has been a goal since the summer. And besides, focusing on her fear of driving is a good way to get everything else out of her head.

Zizes actually lives fairly close to Puck, a few blocks away, and her street resembles Puck's—the kind of houses that show signs of belonging to the lower-middle class, with cracked sidewalks, sagging gutters, old-fashioned architecture, and evergreen shrubs in desperate need of trimming. They're not worn-down to the point of being dangerous, just a bit depressingly uncared for in a way that indicates the overwork and exhaustion the inhabitants must experience. Several are lit up with some hanging Christmas lights, or inflatable snowmen in the yard, which helps the image somewhat.

Zizes's house is pretty similar, with both a loose board and blue icicle lights characterizing the front porch and a few muddy patches from recent cold, not-quite-freezing winter rain in the dead lawn. There's a car in the driveway, so Quinn knocks optimistically.

When Lauren Zizes answers, her eyebrow rises and one side of her mouth twitches up. "Fabray. This is a surprise."

"Hey," Quinn says quietly. They stare at each other for a moment, before Quinn takes a breath and rushes on, "I need to tell you something, and it's something I haven't told anyone else, but I'm choosing to tell you because you're the only person who ever really intimidated me. You almost beat me at my own game in high school, and you even apologized for the way you dragged Lucy into the spotlight. Still, I'm doing this because you still scare me a little, and I need to do this in a way that will make it easier when I tell others…"

"You're rambling," Zizes notes emotionlessly, but her smirk shows she's interested.

"I'm gay," Quinn blurts, and her vision immediately blurs and it's…she's not even sure that's what she wanted to say—she'd thought she was going to tell Zizes "I'm not straight" or "I like girls"—and…it's one the first times she's ever fully allowed herself to think the words. Until this point, she's been forcibly correcting herself in her head, changing it into a spectrum over the years of, I'm naturally curious or A few girls might be exceptions or I'm bicurious or Some girls are attractive or I may not be entirely straight or I'm bi or Some girls make me feel more than guys or for a short-lived time, I'm straight but not narrow, and for the past several months, all she's allowed herself to think is I have feelings for a girl or I like girls. She's never quite allowed herself to think this exclusively about her feelings, even though she's admitted her attraction to girls and dismissed her attraction to guys—to the point that over the summer she could tell Brittany with assuredness that she was not bisexual—she's just never let herself fully connect the two. She's avoided the label. Which is unsurprisingly easy, considering her repressive upbringing. She's thought the word gay, but in contexts like you and your stupid gay fantasies, and she recognizes now the way this let her do what so many religions did, and separate her actions from her identity. But now, it's out, and she fully recognizes its truth. I'm gay.

She thinks she must've slipped out of her conscious mind for a bit, because the next thing she knows, she's sitting at a small plastic table in Zizes's kitchen with a mug of hot chocolate in front of her, Zizes across from her with her own mug, her expression bored, but Quinn can see a glimmer of sympathetic attention in the eyes magnified by her glasses. Quinn wipes at her cheeks with her palms, childlike and pathetic, takes a deep, shaky breath and stares into her mug.

"When did you know?" Zizes asks, seeming to sense that Quinn's no longer spacing out. Quinn opens her mouth, but nothing comes out. Zizes frowns slightly, and amends, "I mean, I'm not prying, it's not like I'm that interested in this revelation, Fabray, because it really doesn't affect me at all. I just know it's probably good for you to talk about it."

Quinn shakes her head, "No, I know, I appreciate it, but…I don't think I'm ready to talk about that. It's…a little too personal."

Zizes nods, keeping her disinterested mask. "So no one else knows?"

"No," Quinn whispers.

Zizes snorts, "Not even Lopez and Brittany? Seriously?"

"I know," Quinn emits a humorless laugh, "I mean, if I tell them, they'll scrutinize everything they can remember about me, and I'm not ready for that."

"You think I won't do that?"

"Well, like you said, this doesn't really interest you."

"Of course not, but come on. Former head cheerleader who fits the Prom Queen title in every stereotypical way possible even if she never actually won because of technicalities and pranks just comes out to me, sure I'm gonna think back to everything you've ever done, even if it's not of much personal appeal." Her eyes gleam, "Of course, I'm not going to tell you my thoughts, because it's your time to talk. So talk."

Quinn doesn't know what to say, so she just says, "I don't know how to tell my mother, either. I don't know how to tell anybody. But I just…I have a measure of respect for you, and I think you have some for me, so I'd appreciate it if you didn't tell anybody."

Zizes snorts, "Who would I tell?"

Quinn blinks, "I don't know, I'm sure you're still in touch with some people? Wait, where did you end up, anyway?"

She shrugs, "Indiana University. Undeclared, before you ask. And I mean, I dunno, I don't talk to the Glee club much. Most of them kinda wrote me off after I left Senior year, which I get. I talk to Artie some; we stayed in touch in A/V club."

"Oh, God," Quinn says abruptly, "Do you still talk to Jacob ben Israel? Please don't tell him!"

Zizes smirks and rolls her eyes, "Yeah, we're in touch, but come on. He has better things to think about now than your sexuality. Besides which, I wouldn't tell him anyway. And otherwise? I don't think I still talk to anyone you know."

"But I saw you at Puck's party over the summer."

Lauren's smirk turns a little forced, "Yeah, well. Puckerman had his moments. I wish sometimes we'd stayed friends at least, but whatever. Can't change the past, right?"

And that, Quinn thinks, is something she definitely gets, and somehow, just proves to her that she made the right choice in confiding in Zizes.

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My blood's so mad feels like coagulatin'
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He's really grateful for the fact that he's allowed to be home for Christmas. He's actually getting close to the end of his program at the Ordnance Mechanical Maintenance School, which is really neat. He learned a bunch of stuff working for Burt, but he's learning even more now, and he enjoys most of all working on the wheeled military vehicles, because he figures that will be the most useful for when he decides he wants to be a civilian again and work on cars.

Working on machinery always did make him happy. He remembers early in Senior year, before things with Rachel got completely messy and he wasn't thinking about the future, when he was sure he could be happy just staying there working in the Hummel shop. She and everyone else had encouraged him to look beyond that, to try to dream bigger, and the pressure had just frustrated him and, he thinks now, caused his relationship with Rachel to implode.

He remembers when the realization that he could be happy doing this snuck up on him again. He had been on the phone with Burt, after talking to his mother for awhile, and was describing all the cool stuff he was learning about maintaining and repairing military equipment, and Burt had said that it sounded like a crazier version of the apprenticeship he had gone through, and Finn had said that he heard he can earn certification to work on cars through the army and he's thinking of doing that. And that's when he knew. He feels strangely at home in the army, to the point that he wants to keep going with it for awhile, but he sometimes thinks of the way it broke his father. He wants to do it long enough to bring honor back to his father's name, and get out before it can possibly break him, too, but then, he realizes almost painfully, he would be fine just settling down somewhere and working on cars for the rest of his life.

It had scared him, because he was still trying to win Rachel back. He had so many regrets about the way that had turned out, the way he'd desperately tried to tie them together with a ring instead of trusting in their love. But, even then, he supposes he'd realized underneath it all that they were doomed, that even their love wasn't going to keep them together when they needed so desperately to be apart to chase their dreams.

Of course, it had taken Finn a long time to find his dream, but he's sure he's living it now. And Kurt is right. He can't sacrifice it for her, and she can't sacrifice hers for him. It doesn't make it any easier to stop loving her; it's almost a habit at this point, like a flower pointing at the sun, it feels natural to pour love back at someone who had been investing so much in him, even if he was never entirely sure what the love he was feeling was really like. He spent so much of that relationship doubting it, that when he thinks he finally did start to feel it, he questioned it, and it scared him, and he tried to preserve it by marrying her. Even now, he can't be entirely sure if he loves her or what he wishes she could be.

But again, it doesn't make it any easier to let go. Nor is it any easier to know that they're in the same town at the same time and he can't see her. He won't. Both for her, and for his own heart.

He makes it home on Christmas Eve, and Carole picks him up at the airport. He'd missed his mom so much; he barely feels like he had been home for Thanksgiving, and he hugs Burt when he gets home. He missed them both.

And Kurt…yeah, they hug, but he thinks he can tell that Kurt's still a little peeved at him. He hadn't really realized until after they'd talked on the phone that he had stopped writing to Kurt once he started writing to Rachel, and it really took that phone conversation for him to see how much he misses Kurt. But he's also embarrassed now, because of the things Kurt said that were true.

He never meant to hurt anybody. He had lashed out at Santana in a way that he now regrets, and because he had realized it was wrong, that's why he had worked so hard to make it okay, by singing songs, and trying for her forgiveness. And he figured once he got that, he was in the clear, which was why he was so surprised that Kurt was still mad about that. He just hates it when people are mad at him. He never meant to hurt Rachel, either, it had just gotten so messy, and he certainly never meant to hurt Kurt.

Because of how awkward he feels about Kurt, family time is slightly weird, so once Christmas Day is over, he just kind of wants to give Kurt some distance. Kurt seems to feel the same way, and calls Blaine Christmas night in order to make plans to get out of the house himself. Finn sometimes is thankful that Burt and Carole had agreed to move to a bigger house, because he knows he wouldn't be comfortable sharing a room with Kurt, especially not since he has a boyfriend. He doesn't think that's homophobic, but sometimes he thinks about what it must be like for Kurt and Blaine to make out and he just feels weird. He doesn't like to think about it, but it doesn't change the fact that he loves his brother and wants him to be happy. That's what counts, right? But it's good, too, because the new house isn't far at all from Burt and Kurt's old house, so it's easy to get to the auto shop, and the new house has a guest room, which had been really useful when Sam had come to live with them—no one had to share a bedroom. And Burt was renting the old house to one of his most-trusted employees, which was a good source of income and the guy would probably be the one managing the business while Burt did his thing in DC, so it all worked out.

And Finn wishes Sam was there to sorta be a buffer between him and Kurt, but Sam's seeing his own family for the holiday. Which is good. Burt tells him Sam should be back a couple days after Christmas, so Finn will get to see him, but he wishes he were there now.

He doesn't have too many people he feels like can see one on one. Except…he borrows Burt's phone to text Puck the morning after Christmas.

Puck says he can come by in the afternoon, and Finn spends the time until then looking at his friends' pictures on Facebook. He hadn't taken his computer with him to AIT, because being without it for BCT made him realize how easily distracted he can get and he thought it might be better not to have it with him in AIT. He doesn't even have his phone, because he'd agreed to cut his cell phone service while he was away, both to save money and to minimize distractions; his mother thought it would be good for him to write letters. Of course, he's allowed to use pay phones at the base, even more frequently now that he's in AIT and has more free time. But now, as he scrolls through Facebook, he realizes how much he's missed. Mercedes is in an open relationship? Brittany is Senior class president again?

He turns on his Xbox and tries to play a little bit of CoD, but he's just not sure it holds the same appeal that it used to, now that he knows more about how to use real guns. Still, he plays through a few missions for awhile just to zone out until four, when he heads over to Puck's.

He smiles as he approaches the door. Puck has lived in the same house for as long as he's known him. They met as kids, when Puck got held back in first grade, mostly due to behavior problems. Finn much later put together the pieces and realized that Puck had been acting out because of things with his family; it was around that time, when his sister was still tiny, that his father had walked out, never to fully return again. Puck stopped behaving in school and stopped trying.

Meeting Finn had probably actually been a great thing for him. Finn was a kid who wanted to do what was right, and when he and Puck bonded by playing Power Rangers at recess, they became instant friends. Still, it wasn't all smooth sailing. Puck would suggest they do something bad or mean, and sometimes Finn would say no, that's wrong. About half the time, Puck would shrug and give in, but the other half, Finn would find himself involved in some scheme that he didn't particularly feel good about, and they'd both get in trouble.

Finn's mother had been pretty uncertain about Finn's new best friend. Back then, Puck had worn his tangled hair long, almost shoulder-length, which for kids that age was almost as badass a statement as the mohawk later was—Puck was tough because he had long hair and he didn't care who saw it (Finn had never realized it was because his mother couldn't afford to get him a decent haircut, and Puck had been too angry at her for too long to let her cut it herself, but Carole had). But Puck had known how to be charming even then, and Carole grew to love him, even if he continued to get Finn in trouble throughout their childhood. She couldn't know, however, how often Finn would stop Puck from doing bad things if he were there.

He can't help but think of all they'd been through in childhood as he knocks, and just seeing Puck when he answers the door, with his shaved head, loose jeans and Browns hoodie, he breaks into a wide grin and almost moves to hug him, but Puck's hollow eyes stop him, "Hey, dude! What's up?" Finn asks. It almost feels like he hadn't even seen Puck at Mr. Schue's wedding, he was so distracted.

Puck folds him arms and flicks his gaze up and down Finn's form. Obviously, he'd stopped wearing his uniform once he'd gotten home, and had pulled on some old clothes—pants that he now needed a belt to hold up, a shirt that felt tight on his arms. He then meets Finn's eyes again and says, "What do you want?"

Finn falters, and eyes Puck as if he's crazy. "I'm here to see you, man. It's been forever. I'd love to hang out and catch up. You know."

"Are you fucking kidding me?" Puck deadpans.

Finn stares harder, "What do you mean?"

"I get it now," Puck glares. "Guess I'm only your best friend when you haven't got anybody else. Now that Sam's in Kentucky and you don't have Rachel to chase, you come crawling back to me because I'm the only one left who's in your corner."

"That's not true," Finn tries to protest.

"Oh, it is. Maybe Kurt is, too, but I'm sure he'd rather spend time with him boyfriend right now, yeah?" Puck shakes his head, "You haven't earned my best friendship."

"But, dude, we're bros for life. We agreed that. I mean, when we took that trip this summer, I thought we agreed that we'd never let anything get between us again."

Puck snorted, "Yeah, well, you broke that when you decided to put Rachel through the shitter again. Tried not to take sides, but I couldn't take seeing her that messed up about you again, and after what we talked about this summer? I thought you knew you needed to leave her alone! I thought you'd started growing up, man, but you're still as self-centered as ever."

Finn sputters, then scowls, "How can you say that?!"

At this point, Puck finally slams his front door and steps full out onto the stoop. Finn barely registers his bare feet, and reigns in the urge to tell him he should get shoes. He's pissed, what the fuck does he care if Puck gets frostbite, when he's being such an asshole?

"I say that shit because you've treated me like dirt!" Puck shouts in his face, and his expression is twisted with rage, "After all we did, after we spent like more than a month together, seeing the whole damn country, after I offered to take you with me so we could bond, would it have fucking killed you to write me a Goddamn letter? Once?! I didn't hear a fucking thing from you while you were at boot camp, bro, so for God's sake, what did you want me to do? I wrote you off!"

Finn flaps his mouth a bit uselessly, then snarls, "You have no idea what it was like for me there! It was hard and I was always exhausted. I'm sorry I didn't have the time to write you a goddamn love letter!"

"Oh, fuck you, because I know you wrote fucking billions to Rachel, and you wrote to your parents and Kurt, which, fine, I get you want to keep in contact with your family, but for fuck's sake, Rachel didn't want to hear from you! I would've written you back every time, just to show you I was there to support you, because I'm supposed to be your best friend, but you didn't give a fuck about me!"

"And why should I?!" Finn screams back, his temper finally snapping, "What are you even doing with your life?! What would you have to tell me? How many underaged girls you got drunk? Jesus, Puck, all I've seen or heard about you doing since graduation is go get alcohol and get people drunk! If you keep this up, you are gonna be just like your dad in a few years, if you don't die from alcohol poisoning first!"

Puck's fist rises, but he stops himself, and he growls, "Don't you dare compare me to him! I'm just trying to make people happy, Goddamnit! I just want people to have a good time!"

"And the only way you can think of to do that is to get illegal alcohol?"

"You fucking hypocrite, you got as drunk as me this summer before you left. What, now that you're a soldier you're all high and fucking mighty? Fuck you! I'm here exactly where you left me and I'll probably always be here in motherfucking Lima, so you just go do your soldier thing and let me live the way I fucking want. If I want to give people alcohol, I'll do it. If I want to get drunk, I'll do it!"

"I'm just worried about you," Finn suddenly pleads, his voice losing some of its edge, "You had all these plans to go to California, and now you're just here, doing, I don't even know what, and you're better than this, Puck."

Puck snorts, some of his anger draining as well, "The fuck I am. Look, California will still be there in a couple years. I just have to stay here to help my mom out for a little longer…" he trails off.

"I get it," Finn says quietly. It had taken him a long time to realize that Puck's family had money problems. "But just…be careful, man. You can have a good life, and I'll always have your back. And I'm sorry. That I didn't write." He doesn't even have a good excuse. For whatever reason, it just hadn't occurred to him to write to Puck. It just felt so…girly.

"Whatever," Puck growls lightly, "You know I didn't mean it when I said I wrote you off. I'll always have your back."

"Okay," Finn says quietly.

"Okay," Puck echoes.

They stare at one another for a few minutes before Puck finally says, "Look, I need some time. Maybe we can hang out before you leave, but…not right now. Okay?"

"Yeah," Finn whispers, "That's cool. Um. See you later then."

"Later," Puck nods, and watches as Finn walks back to his truck.

Puck takes a deep breath and walks back into his house, thanking God that his sister is at a friend's house and his mother is at work, so no one really heard their argument. His heart had been in his throat when Finn had gotten there, and then suddenly he'd been furious that Finn was just going to pretend that he hadn't been ignoring him for like five fucking months.

He meant what he said, about always having Finn's back. The guy had been there for him through most of his life, and despite their problems in high school, they'd pretty much always managed to be okay with each other. But even so, he just feels like something may have broken permanently this time. They may always be bros, in some way, but Puck's pretty sure they're no longer best friends.

But he's also pretty sure this is also something they can come back from. They always do. They may always have to work at their friendship, but he's pretty sure they'll always want to.

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I'll pretend I'm blind in one eye and I'll hide it in you
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Watching Rachel, Quinn and Kurt leave for Lima had been painful. Of course. She'd felt helpless, foolish, embarrassed, angry, frustrated and sad. A cluster of emotions that basically added up to Santana despised the fact that her job basically told her she couldn't go home for Christmas.

She supposes the only plus is that she has most of Christmas Day itself off, fat lot of good that does her, though. She is to go into work early in the evening on Christmas Eve so that hopefully they can finish restocking the store before 2am, and then she doesn't work again until her normal shift, at 10pm, on the day after Christmas. The store is actually closed on Christmas Day, which also happens to mean no deliveries that evening, so that's something. People lucky enough to have family close by might be able to spend the holiday with them.

So far, Santana just plans to Skype with her parents on Christmas morning. They'd sent her Christmas presents by mail; the large parcel is in her room already, waiting for her Skype call. She'd managed to send her parents' presents by mail as well. Luckily, she'd ordered them online after finding out she wouldn't be coming home, so they were just sent there to begin with (she'd needed the time to earn the money to buy them). The same with her friends' gifts; she feels awkward being thanked for presents, so she even sent her roommates' presents to their addresses in Lima.

She goes to bed around 8:30 after seeing off her friends, and she's exhausted, because she's almost never up this late…or early…or whatever the fuck.

At around 3:30, she wakes up because she hears her phone ringing. She usually leaves her phone on the lowest volume setting on her short bookshelf that doubles as her bedside table, and with the fan running, she never wakes up to texts, but the rhythmic vibration of a phone call often does wake her, even if she can't hear her ringtone over the white noise of the fan.

She gropes for the phone and answers it somewhat blearily, without even bothering to check the display. "Yeah?"

"Oh no, I woke you up, I'm sorry."

Her face relaxes instantly and she slowly stretches back out onto her pillows, "Hey, baby."

"Hey, San," Brittany says, "I thought you'd be up by now."

"It's okay. Best way to wake up ever."

"I think I can make it better," Brittany purrs.

Santana half-groans and half-laughs, "Much as I love morning sex, I'm just not sure if I'm up for it right now," she admits a little begrudgingly.

"Oh. I didn't mean that, though now that you say it, I so should have thought of that, but I guess it's okay that I didn't." Santana smiles and burrows a bit more into her blankets. "But what I meant was, I talked to my parents, and I'm coming up to see you."

Santana blinks, startled, "Wait, what? Holy shit. When?"

"It's like their Christmas present to you and me. I need to be here for Christmas morning, but I can fly out that afternoon and get there that night."

"Oh my god," Santana whispers, squeezing her eyes shut, "You have no idea, Britts. You have no idea how good it feels to hear that."

"Yeah. That's what I thought, too," Brittany agrees with a chuckle.

It's easier to get through her weekend of work; even the freezer doesn't feel so cold. After she and Helen finish restocking the grocery section, they're in the seasonal section, where they're instructed to get everything on the shelves no matter what, and are then given eight pallets full of mostly Christmas ornaments and stockings. The whole section is a huge damn mess by the time they're finished, but at least everything is on the shelves.

The early shift on Monday is a pain. Santana sets an alarm, just to make sure she doesn't sleep past 4, and basically wakes up and doesn't dawdle. She goes with eggs for breakfast, hoping the protein will help combat her annoyance and exhaustion—she's not used to waking up to an alarm, and it seems to have caught her at a bad part of her sleep. They're open until midnight, so that last-minute shoppers can come in and get anything they need, and she's sure she'll be badgered by annoying assholes all night.

She's right. Panicked white women stop her and demand in pretend Spanish that she find them a video game, disgruntled men get furious when she tells them she doesn't know where something is, kids lose track of their parents and cry. Santana grinds her teeth as she struggles to stay focused on the groceries and then bullshit Christmas things she's supposed to be restocking. Helen is there, too, but stuck over in electronics, so Santana is by herself.

She's snapping at some middle-aged suburban mom (which is like, what the fuck is she doing at this store?) who is claiming (in slow, drawn-out sentences where every verb ends with an "o") that she knows for a fact that have some particular toy Santana has never heard of, (the most polite response she can muster, and it takes all of her willpower to say it, is "I speak English fine, thank you, but I have no idea what you're talking about. Ask someone else.") when Angela seems to appear out of nowhere.

"You can find that over there, ma'am," a brightly smiling Angela tells the fuming white woman, pointing out the right aisle. Santana can't help but stare, taking in the messy blonde bun, warm brown eyes, and she lets her gaze linger on that rainbow charm around her neck.

When she snaps her eyes back to Angela's face, she's rolling her eyes, "God, customers are a nightmare this time of year." And it's great, because they're supposed to call customers "guests" which just seems like bullshit to Santana, because why in the world would anyone invite such rude assholes over?

"Yeah," Santana chuckles, and watches the girl through her eyelashes. It's weird, because she thinks the girl might actually be a little shorter than her, which, although she doesn't like to admit it, is not that common. "Thanks for the rescue."

"No problem," Angela grins, and Santana watches as her eyes flick up and down. Santana feels a bit…vulnerable. She's long stopped wearing more makeup than just concealer to work—there's really no reason to look all that pretty here—and after a couple hours of work, there's almost no way to keep her hair from frizzing, so she knows she must look a little sloppy and therefore much gayer than normal (what, she's not a self-hating homosexual, it's just a stereotype, everyone knows it), but judging by Angela's smile, she doesn't seem to mind.

"You're Santana, right?"

Santana glances down and then rolls her eyes, fishing out her name badge that she forgot to pin on; usually no one overnight bothers with them, "Was that a hint?" she asks as she puts it on.

Angela laughs, "Nah. Just, I've heard some things about you. Mostly from Helen."

"Ah," Santana nods, "I've heard a bit about you, too."

"I heard you're available."

"Uhm," Santana stutters slightly, and jesus this isn't fair. This isn't like Helen, where the possibility just kind of snuck up on her after getting to know the girl for a couple months, where it had been a potentially dangerous intellectual, emotional attraction, this is like…damn it. It's very much immediate and surface and physical. Maybe she does have a type, and it's blonde, blunt and benign…

Angela seems to take her faltering for affirmation and smirks, but then another employee, some Middle Eastern guy Santana doesn't know, is calling her name and waving her over. Angela rolls her eyes again and walks briskly over to him.

Santana lets out her breath and goes back to shoving stockings on the overstuffed hooks on the wall. And tells herself it's fine, Brittany won't mind, Brittany wants her to do this.

Shit.

Additional A/N: Chapter titles from Pat Benatar, "We Belong," Barry McGuire, "Eve of Destruction" and Purity Ring, "Shuck."