#but my prof is Amazing and brought cheese trays and veggies and crackers

[echoes-of-realities]

69 brittana?

69. “Quit flirting.” // “I didn’t mean to—”

[A continuation of this.]

It’s almost two in the morning when Santana’s phone starts ringing, casting the entire bedroom in too bright, too harsh light. Santana groans in displeasure at the annoyingly loud sound and buries her face further into the gentle rise and fall of Brittany’s chest, warm and soothing. Her phone eventually stops ringing and she sighs as the blissful darkness and silence of the middle of the night reappears. Brittany shifts under her a little and tightens the arm that’s draped around Santana’s shoulders and down her back, her fingertips just grazing Santana’s hip. Santana shifts around a little too, scooting up the bed just a couple inches so she can bury her face into Brittany’s neck, quickly kissing the soft skin and letting her lips linger there as she drifts off to sleep to the sound of Brittany’s gentle breathing above her.

She’s almost fully back asleep, can feel the release of consciousness just creeping at the edges of her mind, when Brittany’s phone starts ringing on the other bedside table.

“Fuck off,” Santana mutters darkly into Brittany’s neck, but it comes out as more of a whine than anything.

Brittany’s groggy as she shifts and stretches to reach blindly for her phone, clumsily palming at Santana’s hip to pacify the displeased grunt she makes at being dislodged from her wife’s side. “I’s prob’ly imporan��,” Brittany mumbles, her words all slurred together and raspy with sleep.

Brittany finally manages to grab onto her phone’s charging cord and, in a practiced move, gives it a sharp jerk to send the phone flying onto the bed. She grabs it from there and settles back into Santana, fumbling with the touchscreen to answer the phone. “It’s Chris,” Brittany mumbles before raising it to her ear and trying to stifle her yawn with a “Hello.”

Santana’s sleepy for all of five seconds before she’s wide awake and pushing herself up on her elbow to watch as Brittany’s face slowly fades from sleepy to wide awake and excited in the little bit of light escaping her phone screen where it’s pressed against her face; Santana can only hear one half of the conversation, but based on the way Brittany’s body comes awake and starts to wiggle against hers, Santana knows exactly what’s going on. She doesn’t wait for Brittany to say her goodbyes, she just presses a sloppy kiss on Brittany’s shoulder and scrambles out of bed and towards the bathroom. She’s halfway through brushing her teeth when Brittany makes it there too; she places a soft kiss to Santana’s cheek before reaching for her own toothbrush. They brush their teeth in synch and, no matter how many times she thinks of it, the fact that they can press their hips together and not knock elbows while brushing their teeth never fails to make something in Santana’s chest flutter.

They shower together, still just a little sleepy as they wash each other’s hair; they don’t speak while they shower, but they exchange soft, languid kisses as they pass shampoo bottles and face wash and the loofa back and forth. Brittany passes Santana a towel before grabbing her own, and it earns her a quick kiss to the underside of her jaw as Santana passes her. Brittany quickly dries off and heads for the bedroom to get dressed while Santana fights with her thick, sopping hair. Brittany wanders back in after a couple minutes and eases the brush from Santana’s hand before gently teasing the tangles out fo her. She kisses the top of Santana’s head and reaches for her moisturizer as Santana heads to the bedroom to get dressed herself.

They skip making coffee into travel mugs because Brittany says Chris promised them some, and they are almost out the door when Brittany stops them. “Wait, we forgot the present for the little turtle.”

Santana laughs and releases her wife’s hand as she hurries back to their bedroom. Brittany’s been calling Mercedes’ and Chris’ unborn child the little turtle since they first found out about the pregnancy, and despite the parents-to-be fondly rolling their eyes, they both found so it adorable and had painted swirls of swimming turtles around the walls of what will be their child’s room. Brittany reappears a couple moments later with a small gift bag in one hand, sliding her other one into Santana’s again. This time Santana makes it as far as opening the front door before Brittany’s tugging on her hand again. “Wait,” she repeats, “we forgot something else.” Santana glances up at Brittany in question, but gets her answer as soon as Brittany’s lips brush over hers, gentle and chaste, once, twice, three times. “Official good morning kiss,” she explains as she pulls back, bright and adoring, and Santana’s stomach still flips over despite all the years.

She giggles and bounces up to kiss Brittany one more time, mumbling her “Good morning” against soft, soft lips before they finally make it out the door. They splurge and take a cab to the hospital because it’s the middle of the night and they’re both a little antsy to get to the hospital and meet their godchild, even if they know they’ll be waiting for a very long time.

Both Mercedes’ and Chris’ parents don’t live in the state, and since it’s still ten days before her due date, neither set of parents had flown in yet; it means that Brittany and Santana are their closest family, and it makes both of them giddy in a way that makes it hard not to bounce around. Santana elects to sit in the middle of the backseat to cuddle with Brittany and speculate about their godchild; Brittany wants to teach them dance and help them with math when it gets too hard, and Santana quietly admits she’s always wanted to teach the meaning of music and how important it is to be true to yourself. Santana’s quiet for a beat before she looks up at Brittany with a shy smile. “I learned that from you,” she whispers, and Brittany kisses her softer and more adoring than anyone ever has before; Santana sighs into Brittany’s mouth because Brittany’s always kissed her softer and more adoring than anyone else ever has.

The spend the rest of the ride in comfortable silence, cuddling and watching the city lights flicker by. They’re at the hospital before three in the morning, and Chris is in the waiting room when they walk in the front doors with a large coffee in each hand. He smiles wide and bright as he engulfs them both in a hug, almost sloshing hot coffee onto the floor. “I’m going to be a daddy soon,” he breathes, and Santana and Brittany both giggle at his enthusiasm.

Chris leads them to see Mercedes briefly, all the while explaining how far along Mercedes is and how long she probably has to go and how over-the-moon excited he is. They meet one the nurses in the room and chat with Mercedes for a couple minutes, but slip out with a wave to Chris as she works through a sudden contraction. Mercedes looks exhausted and, as Chris leans down to gently tuck Mercedes’ hair back behind her ears, Brittany and Santana exchange a sappy glance and tangle their fingers together. The nurse leads them to a small, empty family room and they sit in the loan big chair in the corner, Brittany first and Santana settled on her lap, her legs thrown over one side of the armrests and one arm around Brittany’s shoulders, Brittany’s free hand teasing at Santana’s hip.

They spend the next couple hours sipping their coffees and setting them on the floor so they can play with each other’s hands and dozing off against each other’s shoulders and chatting about what dumb coworker did what and nothing and everything all at once. (Santana’s is the first to admit that she’s always loved it about them, that they can be anywhere doing anything and just be them. She loves how she was lucky enough to marry her best friend, the one person who’s been with her almost right from the start, because there’s so many things she can’t even imagine sharing with anyone else but Brittany, the little blonde girl with the pigtails who took her hand that second week of kindergarten and never let go.)

Brittany angles her phone towards Santana and Santana blinks and tries to refocus on the conversation she was just partaking in. “See,” Brittany explains, “it’s actually really cute once you overlook the whole mess of it all.”

“You’re cute,” Santana says automatically but earnestly as she studies the picture and desperately tries to remember why they are talking about renovating gardens in the first place.

“I’m exhausted and look it,” Brittany corrects.

Santana shakes her head quickly and stops playing with the fingers of Brittany’s left hand long enough to bring it up to her lips and sprinkle gentle kisses across her knuckles, paying special attention to the two rings that sit snug against Brittany’s ring finger. “Even running on two hours of sleep and caffeine,” Santana whispers earnestly, “You still look as beautiful as you did on our wedding day,

“Quit flirting,” Brittany chides, but the way her lips twitch and her cheeks pink means she’s fighting a smile.

“I didn’t mean to—” Santana protests (even though she definitely meant to, because even after being married for almost a decade, bringing out that pretty pink blush of Brittany’s is still one of her favourite things in the entire world), but Chris appearing in the family room doorway with a bundle of blankets takes the words right from her mouth.

“Hey,” Chris whispers, looking up at Santana and Brittany with tears in his eyes and the entire world in his smile. Brittany and Santana exchange a quick glance as they stand, and it’s all Santana needs to confirm that Brittany’s just as teary as she is. “Come meet your new goddaughter,” he says, his voice wavering and watery and it throws Santana back in time to two years ago when he stood at the end of the aisle and promised to love Brittany and Santana’s oldest and dearest friend. “Sweetheart,” he whispers to the bundle of blankets, and Santana can already see Chris’ eyes and Mercedes’ lips, the jut of Chris’ chin and the start of Mercedes’ curls, “meet your aunties.”