My love of tinkering was passed down to me by my father. He has always been the person I look up to most in the world, and because of it, I found myself naturally gravitating towards engineering as I grew up.
I can still remember sneaking into our basement to watch Dad fix broken electronics or fiddle with his own homemade gadgets, knowing it was only a matter of time before I got caught. Luckily, my snooping never seemed to bother him. Instead, he would just wave me over and help me crawl onto his lap so I could watch as he explained to me how the devices worked.
It has never been a surprise to anyone that I am a total daddy's girl, but no one could ever guess just how much the relationship between my father and I would help shape my entire future.
In that respect, some would maybe blame him for the struggles I eventually faced as a result of the engineering knowledge he had shared with me, but I have never believed that to be true. In fact, he didn't even know about the true nature of my little project until years after the damage was already done... but that's a story for another time.
You know those mornings when you don't want to get out of bed but you know you have to?
Yeah, this was definitely one of them.
Every third Saturday of the month, I was scheduled to be the on-duty veterinarian at the clinic. Thankfully, it was never an all-day affair. We were only open from eight to noon, which was better than nothing, I suppose.
Now, don't get me wrong. I love my job, despite not exactly being thrilled to work on the weekend. The real reason my body was trying to anchor itself to the mattress was because it was the day of the blind date I had no interest in attending. In fact, my severe disinterest in the date was reason enough for me to keep hitting the snooze button until the last possible second.
As the alarm rang out one last time, I slammed my hand down on the off switch and flung off the covers. Rolling myself out of bed, I wiped the sleep out of my eyes and released a soundless yawn as I stretched my arms out high above my head, thinking about what I would give for a cup of coffee and how it was a shame I decided to give it up years ago.
Quietly padding over to my closet, I eased open the door to grab a set of work clothes before moving past a sleeping Layla on my way to the bathroom. After changing, I continued through my morning routine until I was finally ready to head out.
Just as I was about to walk out the front door, I remember that there was one last thing I had to do and retrieved my phone out of my purse to make a call. Hearing an airy 'hello' come over the line a couple seconds later, I greeted the voice with a simple, "Morning, Mother Dearest. What are you up to?"
"Nothing much. Just fixing your dad and I a pot of coffee." The woman must have heard the quiet sigh I heaved at the mentioning of my ex-favorite beverage because she instantly asked, "Oh no, I said the 'c' word, didn't I? Sorry, Honey."
"It's okay. I'll get over it. Anyways, the real reason I was calling was to make sure it was still alright to drop Layla off on my way to work. I'm going to be out for most of the day, and I have a lame blind date tonight that Quinn is forcing me to go on so-"
"DATE?!" my mother practically screamed into the receiver out of shock. I guess that got her attention.
"Yeah, but it's not really a bid deal. I'm just doing it to shut Quinn up. She'd been on my back about this for months."
The woman let out an exaggerated groan, "Brittany, I really wish you would let yourself live a little. There's no telling when or where you will meet Santana, and I just hate seeing you wait around for someone without really knowing when they will walk into your life."
"Actually, she already has," I corrected as an off-handed remark.
"WHAT?" she shrieked before blurting out, "Why the heck are you going on this date, then? It doesn't really make sense that you've done all this waiting just to agree to a date with someone else."
"Wow, aren't you easily swayed. Just two seconds ago, you were encouraging me to go on this ridiculous thing."
"Which was before I knew you had met Santana. If I would have known that, I would have never pushed the issue."
"Gee, thanks, Mom," I shot back with an eye-roll. This woman, I swear. "Let's just focus on what I was originally trying to ask, okay?"
"Oh, yeah, of course. We'll be around."
"Awesome. Lay and I be over there in five," I informed as I made my way to the foot of the stairs.
"Alright, see you then," she said before hanging up the phone.
Letting out a loud whistle, I yelled, "Come on, Layla! Let's go to Grandma and Paw-Paw's!" Not even a second later, the Golden retriever came bolting past me and over to the front door. Chuckling quietly to myself, I walked over to where she was excitedly prancing in place as she tried her best to patiently wait to leave. "Alright, Crazy, let's go," I said, swinging the front door open for her to dash through.
At least one of us was excited for today.
Work turned out to be an absolute disaster.
The clients just kept coming in one after another after another. I ended up being double-booked with three emergencies, which are the type of events found in my worst nightmares. It also didn't help that almost all of the cases were super complicated. Regardless of the hellish conditions, however, we still managed to get out of there by one-thirty, so I guess that's one positive thing I could say about the situation.
I couldn't help but feel a little disappointed, however, once I realized that leaving work meant I had nothing left to distract me from my date.
Getting ready was simple. All it took was a quick shower, a bit of make-up, and a couple minutes to pick out something to wear, and I was ready to go.
By the time I left the house, I had worked up quite an appetite. Thankfully enough, we were meeting at my favorite restaurant in town. One thing I can definitely say about my date was that they definitely had excellent taste in food.
Pulling up in the Breadstix parking lot, I stepped out of my car and headed for the entrance. Once I was inside, I glanced around briefly and froze as I noticed a familiar face sitting at the bar. Before I even knew what was happening, my body involuntarily made a beeline over to where she was sitting and greeted, "Hello, Ms. Lopez."
The brunette jolted slightly as she snapped her eyes up to meet mine. It was fairly obvious that I had caught her completely by surprise.
"Oh, hey, Dr. Pierce. How are you this evening?" Santana asked once she managed to regain her composure.
"I'm pretty good. How about yourself?"
"Same. Are you here with someone?" she questioned, glancing around behind me as if she expected to see me with someone else.
"No, I'm actually supposed to be meeting someone here. To be honest, I'm kind of on a blind date, but the thing is that I don't even know who they are. The friend who set us up told me she wanted us to go into this thing entirely blind, but what she didn't think about was the fact that knowing their name might actually come in handy when trying to locate the person. That's typical Quinn for you, though," I explained with a shrug.
The woman gave me a puzzled look for a moment before asking, "Quinn as in Quinn Fabray?"
"Um, yeah, you know her?"
Giving her head a slight nod, she confirmed, "Yep, and it looks like you just found your date."
'Great, this is what I get for not caring about this date. Now, she's here, and I once again look like crap. Fan-freaking-tastic,' I thought to myself as I entered full-on panic mode.
Then, something clicked in my head.
'Wait a minute. NO. Absolutely not. I refuse to accept that Quinn, of all people, is the one who helped get us together. There has to be some kind of mistake or something. Please, oh, please let this just be some kind of misunderstanding,' I pled to myself before cautiously asking, "Um, are you sure we're talking about the same Quinn Fabray?"
"I mean, I'm sure there aren't that many Quinns living in Lima, let alone ones sharing a last name like Fabray, but the one I'm talking about is blonde and about yea big," the brunette teased with a smirk as she lifted her hand a little above her head to show the estimated height of the woman she had in mind.
"Hazel eyes?"
"Yep, sure enough."
"Oh, okay. I guess we do have the same Quinn, then," I sighed as I unconsciously let my shoulders slump down in defeat. I knew full-well that Quinn was never going to let this go, especially after all the hell I had given her in trying to avoid this date.
'This day just keeps getting better and better...'
"Why do I get the impression that you didn't want our Quinns to be the same person? Are we breaking some kind of work protocol or something since I'm technically one of your clients?" Santana suddenly inquired, effectively snapping me out of my thoughts.
"No, it's not that at all," I quickly amended. "It's just that I had never expected that you would be the one I'd be going on this blind date with."
Santana's expression instantly shifted to one of offense, responding, "I'm not exactly sure whether or not I should feel insulted right now."
"No, not at all. I'm just surprised is all. I swear," I sputtered out in an attempt to fix our misunderstanding.
"Yeah, we'll see about that, Miss Vet," she replied but followed it up with a quick wink to show she was just kidding.
'Great. I can already tell this girl is going to be the death of me.'
"A-anyways, how about we go grab a table before I manage to dig myself even further into this hole I'm in."
"Sounds perfect. Lead the way," the woman said as she motioned for me to go first.
After we got back to the front area, I walked up to the hostess and requested a table for two. The girl quickly glanced through the current list of open tables and announced, "Alright, ladies. Right this way," and started leading us towards the back of the restaurant.
Once she had placed the menus and silverware down on the table that would be ours, I moved to pull one of the chairs out for Santana but didn't see one of the waiters passing between our table and the one beside us and accidentally ended up bumping into him, almost making him drop the entire tray of food he was carrying in the process.
"Oh my gosh, I am so sorry. I honestly didn't see you there," I fervently apologized as I placed my hands on the sides of his shoulders to help steady him. "Are you okay?"
"Oh, yeah. Don't worry about it. Happens all the time," the man ensured with a polite grin before carefully returning to the previous task at hand. His words did nothing to alleviate the embarrassment I was feeling, though, as I spun back around to face the brunette. Our eyes only met for a brief moment before my gaze found purchase on the ground, but I pulled her chair back ever so slightly once more to show that I had intended it to be for her.
Once she was seated, I darted over to my seat across the table with my eyes still glued to the floor and sat down. Taking the menu into my hands, I opened it to give off the impression that I was looking through the food selection when I was really just trying to hide the deep blush I knew was painted across my face. After a few minutes of awkwardly staring at the menu, I decided to finally break the silence and said, "I'm really sorry about that, Santana. I swear I'm not usually that clumsy."
"It's alright. I've already forgotten about it," she replied, but I knew she was just trying to be nice. Regardless, she continued, "So since we're on a date and all, is it okay if I ask for your first name, or would you rather me just call you Dr. Pierce the whole time?"
"Oh yeah! Sorry, of course! My name is Brittany, like the spaniel."
Her eyebrows instantly scrunched up in confusion, "Like the what?"
"You know, a Brittany spaniel? It's a breed of dog," I informed shyly.
"Nope, I didn't know that, but okay, Brittany-Like-the-Spaniel," she laughed with a wide grin. "So, how do you know Quinn?"
"We went to high school together. She and I didn't really become close friends, though, until college while we were working on our undergrads," I answered, despite still feeling as if I were walking on eggshells. It felt like one more wrong move could throw the entire date for me, which I definitely did not want to happen.
"Ah, so you went to OSU?" she continued, effectively snapping me out of my thoughts.
"Yeah, and then we both decided moved to California, but she went to Berkeley while I went to U.C. Davis."
"Ah, I see. So if you went to California, why in the heck would you come back to Ohio?"
"Couldn't you ask Quinn the same thing?" I joked quietly with a timid smile as I struggled to gain more confidence. Thankfully, it managed to get a small chuckle out of the woman, which I found encouraging.
"True, but for now, I'm just asking you."
"Ah, well, I just had an overwhelming feeling that this is where I was supposed to be," I mentioned without thinking, but it didn't take me long to realize how awkward of an answer that was. Thankfully, the waitress cut in before Santana had a chance to ask for some sort of clarification.
"Hello, ladies. Are you ready to order?"
Looking over to Santana, I saw the unspoken question in her eyes and gave a little nod to show her I knew what I wanted.
"Yes, I'll have the chicken fettuccini alfredo," Santana informed while handing her the menu before they both glanced my way.
"I'll just have spaghetti, please." As soon as the waitress had walked away, I looked across the table and unintentionally blurted out, "I always get the spaghetti. It sort of became my thing after I started practicing pushing the meatballs around the plate with my nose like on Lady and the Tramp. It's my favorite movie ever, so yeah." I left my voice trailing off at the end as I realized how strange it must sound for an adult's favorite movie to be one that was originally meant for little kids.
"Uh, you know, it's, uh-It's just kind of a timeless classic for me and, uh, stuff," I tried to explain as I reached out towards the untouched tableware so my shaky hands could have something to keep them busy. What I wasn't expecting, however, was for the cutlery slip through my fingers and go cluttering to the floor before I even had time to process what was happening. Gritting my teeth, I clutched the clothed napkin in my fists and forced back the tears that were starting to prick my eyes.
'Wow, this is just the icing on the cake... Now, I've even managed screw up our first date. Just terrific.'
Releasing a quiet sigh, I threw the clothed napkin down on top of the table as a sign of surrender. "Look, I'm really sorry all this. I promise I'm not doing it on purpose, but I'd still totally understand if you'd want to get the food to-go and leave. I'll pay for everything, of course. I mean, it's the least I could do after ruining your nigh-"
"Brittany, what are you talking about?" Santana interrupted as she looked me square in the eyes with a softened expression. "You aren't ruining anything. Trust me. I actually find your quirkiness, and even your mild case of clumsiness, to be quite endearing, so don't worry about it. Just relax and be you, okay?"
"A-alright," I responded, thought I was caught completely off-guard by the fact that she was willing to stick around. In my opinion, I had literally given her every reason to go running for the hills, but I guess maybe not. "So, uh, what do, uh-what do you do for a living?" I asked in hopes to get as much attention off of me as possible while still trying to salvage what was left of the date.
She gave me a wide smile with a look of understanding and answered, "I'm a lawyer at my mother's firm, Lucas and Lopez. Originally, I thought I wanted to be a singer, but I quickly realized I preferred it more as a hobby and switched majors."
"What about now? Do you like what you do?"
The woman's lips split into a wide grin, "You have no idea. Ever since I became a political science major, I have lived and breathed law. I don't know why, but I love it."
"That's awesome. I'm glad you were able to find a career that makes you happy. So, I know this is kind of changing gears a bit, but I assume you aren't from Lima, seeing as how we didn't go to school together."
"Nope, I grew up in Cleveland. My dad used to work at a hospital there, but then he got a job offer at Lima Memorial while I was away at college. I decided that wanted to stay close to them after I graduated, which is how I eventually ended up here," she replied with a shrug before adding, "Alright, my turn again. So, you already know about Del, but I'm curious to know if you happen to have any pets of your own."
"Yep, I sure do. I have a two-year-old Golden Retriever named Layla and a cat named Lord Tubbington, but he still lives with my parents. No matter how hard I have tried to convince him to move in with me, he still refuses. I personally think it's because of the cute little calico that hangs out around their house, but who knows? He's a pretty secretive feline." That was enough to earn a giggle from the woman sitting across from me, which worked wonders in helping me calm down after the whole silverware debacle.
Thankfully, the rest of dinner was full of laughter and various stories ranging from our childhood adventures to present endeavors. Time was flying now that we were starting to get comfortable with one another, and before we knew it, our waitress was bringing us the check. As soon as the check presenter was on the table, I reached out to grab it only to have my hand slapped away.
"What the heck?" I asked as I shifted my gaze up to see Santana looking at me with a smug grin.
"I'm paying."
"What? No way! I told you that I was going to pay to make up for our awkward start."
"Yeah, and I told you not to worry about it, so don't," she retorted as she slipped her debit card into the holder and handed it back to the waitress. Once she had returned with the receipt, Santana quickly added her tip to the merchant copy and signed her name at the bottom. Placing the pen down on the table, she gathered her things and nodded her head in the direction of the door to suggest we head out. I quickly stood to meet her and lead the woman to the door so I could hold it open for her.
"I still wish you would have let me pay for dinner," I mumbled quietly as the brunette stepped past me into the brisk evening air, causing her to look back at me as she rolled her eyes with a small smile.
"Don't worry. I'll let you pick up the tab next time."
That instantly brought my footsteps to an abrupt stop.
"Next time?" I questioned in disbelief, despite knowing that we would technically have to go on a second date if we ever had any hopes of getting married.
Realizing that I was no longer following her, she turned around and replied, "Yeah, unless you don't want to."
"I want to," I answered a little too quickly, but thankfully that only made her smile more.
"Good, so that means you wouldn't mind if I asked for you number right?"
I just stood there, staring blankly at her for a moment before saying the first thing that popped into my head.
"What the what?"
'Yep, pretty sure my brain just short-circuited from an emotional overload. I can't even form coherent sentences right now.'
"Your phone number? I was wondering if I could maybe have it. You know, so we could plan our next date and stuff," she explained, and for the first time that night, she actually looked a little bashful, which was more than enough to kick my brain back into gear.
"No, not at all. I'd really like that, actually," I agreed, moving forward once more to walk over to where she was standing so she could hand me her cellphone.
"Well, that's my car over there," she informed once my number had been successful saved into her contacts, motioning toward a red sports car that was sitting a few parking spaces away. "Good night, Brittany," she bid with a slight nod of her head.
"G-good night, Santana," I stuttered out as I watched her slowly turn around and make her way over to the car, throwing me one last look with a beaming smile before opening the driver side door and sliding in. Seeing no further reason to remain standing in the Breadstix parking lot any longer, I spun around and started towards my own vehicle. I hadn't even made it halfway when I felt my phone vibrate inside my purse and immediately noticed a text from a phone number I didn't recognize.
Unknown Number: It was nice getting to know you tonight, Brittany. Hopefully we can do it again soon. Have a safe trip home.
I stared down at the screen for a moment in disbelief. How in the world did I manage to get a second date after the train wreck I caused at the beginning of the evening? I just assumed sum it up to fate smiling down on me since there was no better explanation for Santana to brush it all off so easily. Sure, she said that it was no big deal and how I shouldn't worry about it, but that is easier said than done. Regardless, it all seems to have somehow worked out in my favor, which I couldn't be happier about.
With a huge grin, I quickly typed out a quick response and sent it before I had a chance to overthink the message.
To Santana: I had a great time getting to know you, too! Oh, and I hope you have a safe trip, as well! Good night!
A little too enthusiastic? Yeah, probably, but what can I say? I had scored a second date with the girl of my dreams, and I felt like I was on top of the world. Now, I just had to get cracking on planning the most perfect date for her so she wouldn't come to regret it.
Author's Note:
Oops! I completely forgot to write this when I first posted the chapter, but I would just like to say that I hope you all enjoyed it. I have a few things planned for the next few chapters that I'm really excited to get started on, so hopefully there will be another chapter posted soon!
Anyways, thank you so very much for reading, and I hope to see you all next time!