DJ Snowflake and Scrooge
December 6
10:11 am
Santana stared at the hands of the clock on the nightstand with disdain.
She had never been accused of being a morning person. In fact, it was well-known that Santana should never be approached before her coffee and certainly not before nine am. Somehow this morning was much worse. She had spent the entire night tossing and turning in bed and despite the softness of the mattress and the seemingly endless supply of pillows, she couldn't find a comfortable position.
Not only had she spent the night in a perpetual state of motion, but she had very consciously aware the dozens of Rachel Berrys staring down at her from the portraits on the walls.
When she had turned the radio on to try to take her mind off the portraits of Rachel, she had been bombarded by the never-ending Christmas song playlist. Needless to say, her night had been awful and she wasn't looking forward doing or accomplishing anything for the rest of the day.
She checked her cell phone – no messages, no texts, no anything. With nothing to stop her from officially waking up, Santana got out of bed and started for the shower.
A knock at the door stopped her from entering the bathroom.
Santana questioned. "Yes?"
"Just checking up on you. Can I come in? I didn't see you come down for breakfast and I wanted to know if you needed anything."
Kurt. Right.
"Yeah sure. You can come in." Kurt poked his head through the door with a dazzling smile and a tray in his hand. Clearly he had slept in a room without a hundred Rachel Berrys because he seemed as cheerful as he did yesterday.
Kurt placed the tray of breakfast foods on the nightstand next to her bed. "Well I brought you some breakfast just in case you were hungry. And I wanted to know if I could get you anything else."
"No. I'm fine. Thanks." Santana shook her head, but she eyed the steaming cup of coffee on the tray.
"Well I know you're probably eager to start digging through all the Rachel Berry stuff we have." Kurt smiled. "And there's a lot."
"I can see that." Santana humored his excitement and glanced around the room. The Berry portraits, the signed autographed picture in the gold trimmed frame on the mantle, the Rachel Berry: The Berry Best Christmas album strategically placed next to the record player, and of course the small gold plaque on the base of the bed frame that read: The Rachel Barbra Berry Suite.
"Oh." Kurt laughed into the back of his hand trying to stifle some of his amusement. "This is just the suite collection. We have so – so – much more."
"You have more?" Santana couldn't hold the disbelief back in her voice.
The excitement in Kurt's eyes frightened her more than his answer. He kept nodding his head and Santana could almost hear him counting off a list in his head.
"How much more could you possibly fucking have?" Santana muttered under her voice and immediately went for the coffee on the tray.
Now for a list of municipalities that will still be open through the Christmas holiday: snow removal, waste collection, and the water authority. The sheriff's department might be open. Please call ahead to schedule an emergency.
Sue pressed her lips to the mic and ran her finger meticulously through every line as if striking her nail through the words on the paper would produce the same effect in real life. Her eyes were too focused on her list to realize she had an observer. Brittany pressed her nose against the glass and sighed.
"You know, I'm not paying you for any extra time you spend at the studio, right?" Holly half-jokingly asked her.
"I know." Brittany's words fogged the glass before they faded like her dreams to once again be on the morning show.
"Then stop looking like a sad puppy in my studio. You've got a fabulous pout, but it's not good enough to overturn the town's ordinance against Miss Sunshine in the morning." Holly good-naturedly teased. It had been over a year since Brittany had introduced herself on the morning show. She had been so excited and awake in the morning that a few of Midtown's citizens took action to get her taken off the air – immediately.
The loudest of the complaints had come directly from Sue Slyverster – the same Sue now running the morning show.
"How do I get back in here, Holls?"
Holly shrugged. There was no easy answer. "Well you definitely can't freeze and purposely hang up on our only caller of the night."
"Sorry bout that." Brittany hung her head. "It's just who doesn't want to hear Christmas music on a Christmas show?"
"No worries, babe, it happens to everyone." Holly wrapped an arm around Brittany's shoulders with a friendly embrace of commiseration and pulled her in. "Just be yourself, girl. Get some more sponsors. Be so exciting that people will demand to hear you all the time instead of just late at night."
"I can do that." Brittany looked back in on Sue. She repeated it again until the words once more fogged over the glass. "I can do that."
11:23am
Ring.
Ring.
Santana puffed out a sigh of exasperation and looked around. She sat in the center of The Rachel Barbra Berry Master Suite surrounded by smiling facsimiles of the famous singer's face. In every single image, Berry had the same smile and her head tilted in the exact same way. For the past hour hours, Santana had already learned to not make direct eye contact with any of the pictures or album art covers. Their eyes followed her around the room and Santana feared she could be in serious danger of possession by the late singer.
How did her life come to this?
She picked up one of the three original Rachel Berry Christmas albums, this one from 1953. Each of them had been signed by the singer and kept in pristine condition. She began to realize how much actual merchandise had been made with Berry's likeness and name on it.
Ring.
Ring.
A knock at the door pulled her away from any more thoughts.
"Santana?" Like the eight or so times before, Kurt popped his head into the doorway.
"Yeah. Come in. I was just –" Santana noticed he was holding yet another box. It would be the ninth time he had come with a Berry box. "-going through the last box you brought in."
"Oh great! Well this is stuff from her stay in 1962. I thought maybe you'd be interested in looking through it. I'm pretty sure she signed the guest book and left her number for my great-great grandfather."
"Grrrreeat." She elongated the word with an overtly insincere smile. Kurt looked back at her unsure if she was really excited or just mocking his use of the word great. But it was hard to tell as Santana glanced down at the boxes she still had to sort through.
Ring.
Ring.
Kurt placed the box down with care next to the sofa and glanced to Santana's nightstand.
"Your phone's ringing."
Confused, Santana pulled her cell phone from her pocket. "No. It's right here."
Kurt shook his head. "No, your room phone."
"That thing?" Santana turned to the strange object on the night stand. "You mean that's a phone? I thought it was a prop and it just rang on a timer or something to give the room an effect."
"Oh it works!" Kurt rushed over to pick up the receiver and held it out for her to take.
"Hello?"
"Santana!"
"Mercedes?"
"Yes, it's me! I've been trying to call you for the last two hours, but your cell kept bouncing me to voicemail and every time Burt patched me through to your room, you never picked up."
"I never got your call." Santana checked her cellphone, but there were no missed calls. "I don't think I get service here."
"Well whatever. I just wanted to know how it was going."
Santana made eyes with Kurt, unsure if he could hear Mercedes or not. She flashed him a big smile and spoke through her gritted teeth. "Great. It's going great. There's so much stuff here."
Mercedes paused. She had known Santana for far too long to recognize the sound of her friend's distress.
"That good, huh?"
Kurt was still smiling at her. "Yup."
"You wanna get a coffee?"
"Yes. Please."
"Do you think you can find your way back to town? I work at the town hall. You can't miss it."
"Are you going to give me more bullshit directions?"
Mercedes barked in laughter. "I'll see you tomorrow then?"
Santana handed the receiver back to Kurt who hooked it into place. "So I'm going to meet Mercedes in town for a bit, but when I come back, I'll sort right through these boxes."
"Great! Have fun! Do you need directions to get back into town?"
Santana hesitated for a second, but obstinately answer. "No, I'll be fine."
Santana only got lost twice on the way into town, but she had refused to call Mercedes even once for directions. The town was busy and full of people walking up and down Main Street with bags in their hands. There were posters for Breakfast with Santa, the Annual Tree Lighting, and an album release all over the shop windows. After a few minutes, she located parking and walked down the sidewalk determined to make it to the town hall without having to give a dollar to a local charity or receive a flyer.
As she approached the town hall building, she noticed there were no lights or anything to indicate that it was even open. She yanked on the handles of the town hall door. It was locked.
"What the fuck?" Santana pressed her nose to the glass to see if Mercedes was waiting for her, but everything was dark. She knocked on the glass. "Mercedes?"
"Santana!" Mercedes called from around the building.
"Why's everything locked?"
"They're out to lunch. Come on. I need to get my purse and then we can go."
Santana tucked her arms into her body and hurried to the side entrance. "It's freezing."
Santana followed Mercedes into the side entrance to the building, but instead of walking into something like a state or federal government building, the town hall was more like a very old building that had some renovation work done and name plaques attached to each room to make them seem more like an office space. Plaques and portraits with former town hall members and staff hung on the walls. Mercedes's heels clicked against the polished wood floors accompanied by the sound of Santana's heeled boots. Yet the only other noise Santana could hear was the muffled broadcast of the radio from one of the offices. Mercedes led her down the hallway.
"So does everyone here take lunch at the same time?"
"They are all getting a bite to eat at the diner down the block."
"And you're not?"
"I wanted to check up on you." Mercedes tried not to let Santana know she was smiling. "What you're doing for Kurt and Burt is really nice and I appreciate that you're going to at least look into some of the history at their place."
"It's whatever. I just wish they wouldn't blast the radio through every room and ask if I need more hot chocolate every thirty minutes."
"They're excited."
"I noticed."
"You know…it wouldn't kill you to try and enjoy at least some of the Hummel's excitement or even enjoy Christmas in general, Santana."
"All that garland? I could be allergic."
"You seem to have a long list of allergies around the holidays." Mercedes didn't pursue her comment about the holidays. Instead she focused back to the reason she had brought Santana into town. "How's it going?"
"Honestly? I have no idea. They have so much stuff. Kurt was still bringing me boxes of things touched by the Great Rachel Berry when you called. I don't even know where to start."
Mercedes pursed her lips together and nodded. It wasn't the answer she was hoping for, but it was the one she expected. "Hopefully, you can turn something up. Alright, let me grab my purse and then we can head to the coffee shop." Mercedes unlocked another door leading to a staircase.
"Where do you work? The dungeons?" Santana grasped onto the handrail going down the stairs to the basement level of the town hall.
"No, my office is back upstairs at the other end of the hallway. I left my purse down here because I was checking on some property records."
"Thrilling. I always knew you'd have a life of excitement in local government."
"Says the girl who spends all of her time in archives."
"I don't technically spend all that time in the archives, Mercedes."
"Spin it anyway you want, girl."
Santana smirked, but had nothing to say. Mercedes accepted Santana's silence as defeat before she opened the doors to the basement. It was filled with rows and rows of stacked boxes on old metal shelves. There were a few desks plastered with current paperwork and a station for card catalogs.
"What is this?" Santana asked with curiosity.
"Town records." Mercedes feigned disinterest, but she waited until Santana walked toward one of the unlidded boxes before she walked over to a desk to grab her purse.
"This box has census records from 1903."
"Does it?" Mercedes shrugged, but she turned around with a smile on her face.
"Are these indexed somewhere?"
"I don't think so. No budget to do that. I think we use the good old filing system of memory. The one woman who works down here knows where everything is."
"Seriously?" Santana closed the lid on the box and looked around the basement with new eyes. "You guys have no idea what's down here?"
"Is that a problem?"
"Do you have internet?"
"Yeah, we have computers in the offices upstairs and we even have wifi, although I don't think it makes it down here."
"It's just there could be something on the Hummel's place here."
"If it would help, you could come down here any time you want. I'd even let you use my computer." Mercedes offered.
"What?"
"Here. You can have my spare key. We don't really have security. I'll just make sure the rest of the staff knows you're here working for me." Mercedes passed Santana a key ring.
"You're really pushing it right now. With the directions, bed and breakfast and the key to the town records with access to your computer. I'm not dumb. I know what you're doing." Santana took the key, but not without a skeptical eye. "You planned this didn't you?"
"And what am I doing?" Mercedes lifted an eyebrow and dared Santana to say something – anything that wouldn't sound like Mercedes was just being a good friend. After a moment's pause, Mercedes shouldered her purse and started for the door. Her satisfied smirk only grew larger as she walked past her best friend and dismissively waved her hand in the air. "I just wanted coffee."