Finally. The last school bell of the day rang, and seventh period was over. Which was good, because Brittany Pierce almost had to give an oral report on the cultural changes in Honduras. She didn't know what any of that was, so she was relieved when the tone saved her.

She made her way out of her world history classroom and to her locker to put away the few textbooks she actually carried. The rest she had sold online because they were heavy, and she wasn't using them anyways. Her geometry textbook and foods with flair manual were the only two she kept, because she couldn't sell the manual and Santana Lopez had written an adorable message inside the hard-front cover of the geometry one.

She sighed contently. Santana. Things between the two of them were actually good for once in a long time, although the Latina had gotten mad and Brittany the previous day about something that was in the school's newspaper. But it didn't seem to be that big of a deal, because that same night she still invited the blonde over for a few hours of sweet lady kisses. Which was totally fine with Brittany. Angry sex with Santana was kind of hot.

She placed her books - as well as her favorite notebook with the cartoon elephant family on the cover, which she carried around all the time but never really wrote in – in her locker and began rummaging through the top shelf, searching for her journalist notebook, seeing as she had a newspaper meeting in five minutes.

Where is this thing? She thought to herself, not being able to believe that after two days she had already lost it. She definitely remembers specifically placing on the top shelf, right as Jacob ben Israel was saying something about wanting to touch her boobs...

"What's going on with you and Santana?" She heard come suddenly out of nowhere, and she snapped out of her search to find that nowhere was actually somewhere, and that somewhere was no one other than Artie Abrams, her boyfriend.

She almost wanted to smile at him, to give him a greeting and to apologize for not catching the light-up wheels coming towards her from up the hallway. But then she registered his question, and her smile faltered.

"Nothing," she said simply, her eyes darting around. Artie gave her a look and shook his head.

"It doesn't sound like nothing." He said quite honestly. "It sounds like something which is most always more than nothing."

Brittany tried too hard to ingest all of those words that came quickly out of Artie's mouth, but failed. Too many words too quickly almost always gave her a migraine.

"Calm down, Artie," she said after a little chuckle, tossing something aimlessly into her locker.

Artie's eyes narrowed at her and he didn't stop himself from asking her the question he really didn't want to ask her.

"Are you cheating on me with her?" His voice seemed somewhat hurt, like he already knew the answer.

"No, of course not," She replied. He was being ridiculous. "I mean, I can't. She's a girl." She unhooked her thumb from around the strap of her backpack and shut her locker, notebook still unfound, but that was the last thing on the blonde's mind right now.

"Fooling around isn't cheating," she continued innocently. "It's just friends talking with their tongues super close."

"Who told you that?"

"Santana-"

"Don't you see that she's manipulating you?" He continued to ask her, and she shook her head, continuing to reply with the same answer.

"That's not cheating, either. She told me that."

"Don't you see what's going on here?" He seemed to be getting flustered now at his girlfriend's numbness. No answer came from her, and he sighed.

"You're the hottest girl in this school, and I wear saddle shoes on legs that don't work. This...shouldn't be happening. Not because I'm in a wheelchair, but because I'm obsessed with Angry Birds and my mom cuts my hair."

"I like your haircut." She interjected.

"It's hard enough for me to believe that this is real." He went on, ignoring her cute compliment with as much as an eye roll. "If I know that you spend even a little time sharing yourself with someone else, that's just one other person in your life that can provide you with things that I'm supposed to provide? It's just…too much for me to take. And Santana knows that. She's taking advantage of it to break us up."

"No," She said somewhat loudly, getting defensive now. "Everybody thinks she's a bad person, but she's not."

Artie scoffed as he very well felt tears beginning to form. "God, Brittany, why are you so stupid?"

Brittany's face went blank, and she felt herself go cold. Artie, too, seemed to have realized the massiveness of what he just said and he stared somewhat apologetically up at her. And with the blink of Brittany's blue eyes, tears formed and were halfway down her cheeks when she even regained her breath and was able to speak again.

"You were the only person in the school who never called me that!" She cried, and quickly tore away from his presence to go as far away from him and everyone else as possible, and to go there alone. Artie took a few rolls forward, but stopped himself when he realized that any further communication to her right now would make her hate him even more. So he watched her disappear around a corner, walking fast, her head hung low.

Artie wheeled away, his head hung in sadness, too.

Brittany, after ducking behind the corner and eventually running until her tears blocked her vision, somehow made it into Santana's arms. She rested her head on the girl's shoulder, and Santana immediately began comforting her best friend, who was actually – in Santana's eyes – more than a best friend. Santana loved her, and although her jaw was set in anger when she saw Brittany running down the hall and crying, she softened her voice and gentled her touch and hushed Brittany and told her everything was going to be okay.

After a good, solid minute of silent rocking back and forth, Brittany pulled away from Santana, her chest heaving as she tried to catch her breath.

"What happened, B?" Santana asked softly, her hands staying firmly but graciously staying put on the blonde's hips.

"A-A-Artie," she stuttered out after a few seconds of sniffling. "He…he…he…"

Santana nodded, seeming to understand Brittany in the fullest without her even having to say it. She pulled her back into another hug. "He broke up with you?"

Brittany shook her head on Santana's shoulder, the Latina not even minding that the girl's tears were leaving a small wet spot on the sleeve of her shirt, with a slight added blackness from her lightly running mascara.

"No, worse…he called me stupid."

Santana's brown eyes popped out of shock, and her jaw set even more as the anger inside of her got even stronger towards the boy. She knew how sensitive Brittany was about being called stupid. She never even said the word when she was around Brittany because she knew how worked up about it she got. To Brittany, stupid was worse than any swear word in any language. And to hear it from someone she loved made it hurt even more.

"What a dick," Santana muttered under her breath as she ran her fingers mildly through the blonde's hair.

"Why would he say that, San?" Brittany inquired. Santana gave a small shrug as part of her answer.

"I don't know, Britt. I'm sure he didn't mean it." As much as she hated even talking about Artie, she figured there was some good reason that he called Brittany the S-word.

"But he did, though," Brittany continued, muffled by Santana's shoulder.

"Well what were you guys talking about that made him say it?"

Brittany seemed to go quiet for a moment before answering quietly, "You."

Santana felt her heart thump. "M-me?"

Brittany nodded into Santana's shoulder once more and Santana gently pulled her upright.

"What about me?"

Brittany wiped her finger underneath her eye to remove the visible tears that were trailing down her face. Santana quickly joined in and brought her thumb to her cheek on the other side to wipe the moisture away.

"He kept saying you were a bad person, and I defended you, because you're my best friend and I love you, and then he got really angry and upset at the same time and called me…you know."

Santana felt her cheeks flush pink while her heart basically made itself out to Brittany.

"Hey, you know what?" Santana said softly, lifting the blonde's chin up and looking into those blue, blue eyes of hers.

Brittany sniffled again. "What?"

"They have blizzards at the Dairy Queen up the street, and I hear they have one already made with your name on it." She gave Brittany a small smile.

"Really? They have a flavor called 'Brittany'?"

Santana giggled and shook her head, drawing an invisible line with the tip of her fingers down Brittany's arm that stopped at her knuckles. She then slowly locked their fingers together quite fittingly.

"No…but they should, because those blizzards are sweet, just like you." She drawled out the last of her sentence and enunciated it by gently poking the tip of the blonde's nose. Brittany smiled at Santana and obediently followed her when she began to pull the both of them towards the front doors of the school.

"But wait, I have a newspaper meeting today." Brittany remembered once they were both already halfway to the Latina's car.

"You can skip it, just this once." Santana reassured her, and Brittany smiled even bigger, happily accepting that answer.

Brittany sat on Santana's bed, her legs folded underneath her, as she scooped up the rest of her M&M Blizzard into her mouth. Santana stood in front of her dresser, putting a CD into her radio.

"What CD is that?" Brittany asked, her mouth half full of ice cream.

"Rumors," Santana replied, hitting play andturning away from her dresser to Brittany cutely eating her frozen treat.

"…No, I don't wanna talk about any rumors, I just wanna know what CD it is…"

Santana laughed and sashayed over to her bed and took a seat across from Brittany.

"No, that's the name of the CD. It's by Fleetwood Mac."

Brittany nodded slowly. "Oh." She took another bite, and then held the red plastic spoon in her hand as she tipped the paper cup back and drank the rest of her blizzard. Once the contents were emptied, she put the spoon back in the cup and tossed the whole thing in the trashcan beside the brunette's bed.

"You've got a little ice cream on your face…"

Brittany licked her lips, hoping she was able to wipe all of the ice cream from her face, but she still left a spot. Santana bounced closer to her and used her index finger to wipe the ice cream from the blonde's chin. She then took the tip of her finger in her mouth, eliminating the dairy from her finger. Brittany smiled at her.

"Thanks," she said cutely, rubbing at her chin. "And thanks for the ice cream."

"No problem, B."

Brittany yawned slightly then stretched back onto Santana's bed, her head lying against the many pillows. Her eyes closed sleepily, and she gave a somewhat-content sigh.

"I know that look," Santana said, spreading herself out on the bed right next to Brittany. "Either you're tired or you're thinking."

Brittany opened an eye to peer sidelong at Santana. She grinned.

"See? I know you." She said, giving ticklish pokes into the blonde's stomach and sides. Brittany giggled. "Which is it?"

"Hmmm. Both, I guess. Mostly thinking."

Santana propped her head up on her elbow. She brushed a few pieces of hair away from Brittany's face.

"About what?"

Brittany's eyes closed again and she lay there silently. Santana had almost thought the girl was asleep, until she heard her voice.

"About why Artie called me that."

Santana nodded and picked at a loose thread that was hanging from her bedspread.

"Well, do you wanna know what I think?"

Brittany swallowed somewhat nervously, but nodded anyway.

"I think he's just jealous."

"Of course he's jealous, San, that was, like, the whole point of why he got mad."

"No, I don't think he's jealous about just that." She said. "I think he's jealous because me and you have something that he and you will never have."

"What's that?" Brittany asked, just like Santana was hoping she would. She smirked.

"Sex. Memories. Stuff in common." She replied sweetly, before adding, "Sex."

Brittany opened her eyes again and gave Santana a look, but couldn't help but laugh.

"Thanks for helping me feel better, San," Brittany said, giving Santana a quick peck on the cheek.

Santana's cheek burned in the most wonderful way possible where Brittany's lips had just been. "No problem. Anything for you, B."

Brittany's eyes closed once more, and Santana allowed her eyes to close as well. They both laid there in satisfied silence, happy just to be in one another's company.

"Hey San?"

"Yeah?"

"Do you remember the time when you called me stupid?"

Santana felt a pang inside of her body. Her eyes opened, but Brittany wasn't even looking at her. She swallowed the lump in her throat, to her own dismay actually recalling exactly the time when she had let the word slip about Brittany.

"Uhh…no," She lied.

"Oh." Brittany said, seeming to relieve the brunette. "Well I do."

The Latina felt her heart practically punching her chest on the inside. "What? I never did that."

"Yes, you did. It was the beginning of our freshman year," Brittany recalled aloud. "Right when you learned that I had just started dating Puck."

For Santana, everything was good. She was a freshman in high school, which meant a fresh-new start at a brand new school where no one had even heard the name Santana Lopez before. She had made it on the Cheerios, she was dating a super-cute junior varsity football player, and her friendship with Brittany was stronger than ever. Everything was aces.

The first weekend of school, Santana had been invited to a party by her boyfriend Daniel, and of course she had to invite Brittany, figuring there would be something to keep the blonde interested for three hours, since she herself intended on going to at least third base with Daniel.

After not much convincing and a quick wardrobe change from their red and white Cheerios uniforms to two party-hot outfits, they were heading over to the far side of Lima to Dave Karofsky's house.

This was the best party Santana had ever been to, although up until then, the only parties she had ever been to had been birthday parties and parties for random holidays. At this party, there was real alcohol, and no adults, which meant nothing was off-limits. Not even what she planned to do later when she and Daniel were alone…

"Hey San!" Brittany said loudly, tapping her best friend on the shoulder. Santana detached from Daniel's lips and turned around slowly.

"What?"

"I won Jenga again! That's five in a row!"

Santana groaned. "Britt, you don't need to come over here every time you win…I get it."

"Oh. Right, sorry. Why don't you come play?"

Santana nodded to Daniel. "I'm sorta busy here with Danny."

"He can come too! There's no size limit!"

"Brittany, maybe later. Right now just…leave me alone." She said and turned back to Daniel, leaving a somewhat hurt Brittany standing in front of her.

"Well fine! Have fun getting harpies!"

"That's herpes, Britt!" Santana yelled after Brittany as she stormed off.

Two hours later, a tired Santana came stumbling out of one of the bedrooms on the third floor. Her lip hurt, probably because Daniel had hit her there in an angry fit. He followed her out of the room, glared at her as he quickly passed, and then called to her from the top of the staircase at the end of the hall, "Don't bother calling me, bitch." And then took off down the stairs.

Santana on the other hand took her time down the stairs, wanting to enjoy as much of the last of her first high school party ever, since she was by now more than ready to just get the hell out of there.

She treaded into the room with the pool table, where a bunch of older guys and Brittany had been playing a version of Jenga that somehow involved alcohol. She scanned the room for her friend, but no sign of the blonde. She walked up to the nearest guy and tapped him on the shoulder.

"Have you seen Brittany?" She yelled to him over the blaring music and drunken whooping coming from the guys surrounding the green felt-top pool table.

"Who?"

She sighed. "My friend. She was in here like, all night. Blonde. Tall. Wearing a dark purple, skin-tight dress."

"Oh! Her!"

"Yeah."

"Yeah man, she left with Puck."

Santana's jaw dropped. "Puckerman?"

The guy nodded. "That's what I said."

She sighed and made her way to the front door. Her jacket was missing, which meant so was her phone, so no chance of being able to contact Brittany tonight. She left the house and took the bus back to Lima Heights Adjacent.

The following Monday, Santana strolled right up to Brittany flirting with Puck at his locker, excusing her before pulling the blonde away from him by her elbow.

"Santana! What's wrong with you?"

"What's wrong with me?" she repeated with frustration clear in her voice. "What's wrong with me?"

"Yeah! What the hell!"

"Well, here, let me give you a recap of my fun-filled weekend and you see if you can tell me what's wrong with me."

Brittany shrugged. "I'll try-"

"Well first, I get damn near close to being raped by Danny in Karofsky's little brother's bedroom on Saturday night. I get punched in the face, then I get dumped. Then I go to take us home, and you're freaking missing. Then I have to hear from some dude who I swear was like, 27 and therefore definitely not in high school that you left with Puck?"

"It seems like you worry too much," Brittany said.

"Oh, wait, it gets better. I go to leave by myself when I find out that my $200 Juicy Couture jacket is missing because they wanted to go tee-peeing but ran out of toilet paper, so I'm then without my jacket and my phone, so I can't call you to make sure that you're not getting like, raped or abducted or made to eat dark meat. Then I have to walk three blocks to the bus stop in the rain and take the creepiest and shadiest bus all the way back to my house, where I realize that I don't have my key, because I was supposed to go back to your house with you, but I can't freaking call you 'cause I don't have my freaking phone. So then I had to go bunk with Mercedes Jones for the night who could not stop wheezing the whole entire night, so I got no sleep, and plus I think her cat farted on me."

Brittany sucked her lip and nodded. "Wow. You got a problem."

"Yeah, tell me about it."

"Well, I mean, I don't think I could tell you about it as well as you told me about it, but I think your problem is that you don't have any other friends in your neighborhood to bunk with."

Santana threw her arms up in the air. "Oh, my God, Brittany! That is the least of my problems!"

"Then what's your problem?" Brittany blinked.

"You!"

Brittany stared at Santana. "Me?"

"Yup! Because if you hadn't left with that dumbass over there then I could've saved myself a lot of trouble!" Santana said, referring to Puck who was holding Brittany's pink magnetic mirror from her locker in front of his face, checking himself out.

"He's not dumb! He's sweet!" Brittany defended. "He said he wants us to start dating."

"Yeah. Yeah, he would say that. But the thing is, he doesn't. He's just saying that so he could have sex with you then just drop you off at any place and time he wants. Trust me, B. I've known Puck since preschool. He did it to his toys back then. Now it's with girls. Just trust me on this."

"No! You're just jealous of me and him because your loser of a boyfriend dumped you for a varsity cheerleader!"

"Brittany! Trust me!" She said firmly, grabbing onto the girl's wrists. "Trust me, he's no good."

"Neither was Daniel, but I never tried to break you two up!" Brittany retorted with some physical struggle to break free from Santana.

"And you were right! And now, I'm right, so you gotta trust me!"

"I don't gotta do anything!" Brittany snatched her wrists from the brunette's grasp and stared angrily at her.

"He loves me and I love him and we're gonna get married and have little blonde, Mohawk babies and there's nothing you can do about it."

Santana shook her head at Brittany, astounded by how naïve she was."Brittany, why are you so stupid?"

Brittany's breathing got really quick really fast, and her eyes immediately began tearing up.

"W-what?" She stammered out, not believing that her only true friend actually just said that.

"Brittany, you are such an idiot if you think that one of the hottest guys in this school suddenly wants to be with you and it's for real. That's just about the dumbest thing I've ever heard."

"Yeah well, I thought you were my friend, but it turns out, you're just a jerk!" She said quickly and turned on her heel to run away and into Puck's arms, who was already flirting with another Cheerio.

The next weekend, Santana showed up at Brittany's house, the blonde's mom letting her into the backyard where Brittany was on the trampoline doing a Cheerios routine. She approached her slowly.

"Hey," she said softly, her right hand grabbing the back of her left elbow across her chest. Brittany stopped bouncing and stared down at Santana, who seemed like she was three feet tall.

"Hey."

"Are you still mad at me? 'Cause you haven't been talking to me in the pyramid lately," The brunette said. Brittany bit her lip.

"Yes," she said, flopping down onto the black surface of the trampoline. "You said I was stupid, San."

She sighed. "Yeah, I know, and I'm really sorry." She said. "I know I usually just say that so you can get your way but this time, I really mean it."

"That really hurt me, Santana." The blonde continued.

"I know it did, B, and I'm sorry." She replied. "It hurt me, too, 'cause you started crying right afterwards, and I don't like seeing you cry. I hate it."

Brittany fumbled around with her fingers, giving her some sort of distraction from Santana. But after a while, she had to look.

"You were right, San." She confessed in a whisper. "You were right."

"About what?"

Brittany sniffled. "Puck. He didn't really want me. He used me as a stepping-stone to get with Jessica Martin."

"Oh." Santana said, mentally counting this one as a victory. "I'm sorry."

"Me too. I should've listened to you."

"And I should've been less of a…a…"

"A jerk-face?" Brittany suggested, and Santana shrugged.

"Well, I was gonna say bitch, but yeah, jerk-face works too."

Brittany nodded slowly and Santana seemed to do the same.

"So are we best friends again?" Santana asked, and Brittany thought for a moment before giving her a strong nod.

"Yeah. I need your help with my Spanish homework again, anyway." She said with a smile. Santana smiled back.

"So can you teach me that routine? I kinda missed it 'cause I was distracted by the cute soccer players doing laps."

Brittany nodded, and Santana quickly kicked her shoes off and hopped onto the trampoline with her best friend.

"Man, what a bitch I was," Santana said after Brittany was done telling the story. "Am I like that now?"

Brittany shook her head, but decided not to lie to Santana. "Well, yeah. But not to me."

"You know I would never do anything like that to hurt you, right?" Santana asked, rolling back onto her side to face Brittany. She shrugged.

"Oh, come on, B." She begged. "That was then. This is now. I love you."

A huge grin spread across Brittany's face, and her eyes opened. "I love you too, San."

Santana couldn't hold back a smile either, and suddenly, she found that to be the only thing she knew how to say. So she just repeated it, because it felt so damn good.

"I love you."

Brittany giggled and rolled over on her side, too, so they were lying face-to-face now. But she had underestimated how close Santana had been to her, and so their lips were just centimeters apart. Brittany leaned slowly in, before stopping just in front of the brunette's lips.

"I like this song," she whispered, making Santana swoon. But she stopped and listened.

"You do?" She asked, and Brittany nodded, practically teasing her now with how close to kissing they were.

"It can be our song," Brittany suggested happily. Santana nodded in return.

"It's called 'Songbirds'," She said. "And the lyrics are perfect for our relationship."

Brittany liked the way that sounded, so she finally gave in to Santana and pressed together their lips. Kissing Santana was always wonderful, and this definitely was no exception. It wasn't their first time making lip-to-lip contact with one another, either, but it was their first time as girlfriends, if that's the technical term for what they are now.

Santana pulled away but lingered over the last few, soft pecks from Brittany.

"You're great," Santana said huskily.

"You're better," Brittany said back, receiving a kiss on the nose from the Latina. Santana stopped to listen to the song, which was almost over, except for the last few lines. Quietly and sweetly, she sung them to Brittany.

"And I love you, I love you, I love you like never before."