Fic: The wrong way round's the right way up when she calls, for ZIPPADEDOODAH
Title: The wrong way round's the right way up when she calls
Pairing: Quinn/Brittany
Rating: PG-13
Length: 2000
Summary: For the prompt: With Santana no longer an option, Lord Tubbington sets out to find a new mate for Brittany. Brittany thinks he's sneaking away to buy cigars again and Quinn just wants to know why she keeps finding dead rodents on her doorstep every morning.
Lord Tubbington was by far the smartest kitten in his litter, which is how he knows that when Santana leaves cigars under Brittany’s pillow they're for him, and when she leaves notes that end with ‘love you forever,’ they're for Brittany.
It's also how he knows that when Santana leaves for good, it's for herself.
Brittany tells him to be nice to her, because they can't make her stay. Together he and Brittany can do whatever they like, so Lord Tubbington knows they could make her stay, if they tried. But he also knows Santana well enough to know what Brittany isn’t saying: that they shouldn’t make her stay with them, not when living in Lima would make her so unhappy.
It isn’t anyone’s fault that Brittany’s mom got sick, or that her dad can't look after her little sister and work to pay their bills. It isn’t anyone’s fault that the city had been all Santana ever wanted, until Brittany. It isn’t anyone’s fault that when faced with the choice between her future or Brittany, Santana chose for herself. It isn’t anyone’s fault that when people leave this town, they never came back, and if they do, they’ve grown too big to fit inside its borders. It isn’t anyone’s fault, but that doesn’t stop Brittany from being angry with everyone. Everyone except Lord Tubbington.
So when Santana hugs him for the first and last time, he doesn't say anything to Brittany about how Santana says she’ll be back soon, because he knows as well as Brittany does that though she might come back soon, she's never going to stay, not ever again.
**
Even though Brittany knows who won’t be there, hope makes every walk to her front door a struggle.
“Hi,” Quinn says. It’s probably rude to be disappointed by Quinn’s face; Brittany’s pretty sure it’s insulting to baby angels or something, but it’s only been a week and all Brittany can do is wave at her through her disappointment.
Quinn looks like she doesn’t want to be there, but she holds up a movie they haven’t watched together since they were fourteen. “Can I come in?”
“Are you just here because you feel sorry for me?”
Quinn bites her lip, then shakes out her hair and looks her up and down pointedly. “Britt, everyone knows what Santana leaving means to you. Of course I do. But we’re friends, aren’t we?”
Brittany tugs at the bottom of her sweater. “I don’t know, we did some pretty mean things to each other.”
Quinn waves the movie in her hand. “Look, we're both stuck here together, and we’ve been friends for a long time. Can we forgive each other? That’s what the movie’s about.”
“I thought it was about sex. And cities.”
Quinn rolls her eyes and gives her a look, and Brittany smiles, just a little, because yeah, Quinn was always the only other person that didn’t let her get away with saying stupid things she didn’t mean.
Lord Tubbington wraps himself around Quinn’s legs, and Quinn squats down to hug him. “Hey, gorgeous kitty, I missed you.” Brittany is pretty sure Quinn likes animals more than she likes people, and she definitely likes her cat more than she likes her, but she takes the DVD from Quinn and goes to put it on.
Quinn’s right. If they’re both stuck to this town, they may as well be stuck together.
**
Now, Lord Tubbington loves Brittany. He does. But he is a proud cat, a manly cat, and after two months of Brittany not having anyone but him to cuddle up to?
He needs her to get out more. He wants to get his loving on with the sex kitten down the street, and he is aching for a cigar. He’d even go for a cigarette at this point. Brittany’s cuddle schedule is totally messing with his life, and he needs her to get a mate - one of her own species.
Puck has visited her, but he spends most of his time eating and playing games, and although Brittany speaks to him, she doesn’t seem at all interested in anything she has to say. Santana is gone, but Quinn....
Quinn has been coming around more and more, lately. She seems like she could do with a Brittany hug, and she gives really good scratches: just the right amount of pressure, and never too demeaning.
But really, it's when he sees them hug each other like they hug him that Lord Tubbington is decided: even if they need a push, he is going to get Brittany a new mate, and they are going to know how to cuddle.
**
Walking to the door isn’t as hard when Brittany knows it’s Quinn on the other side. Quinn’s still holding up a movie, but at this point it’s mostly pretence. They talk over most of the plot, and though Quinn had always rolled her eyes whenever Brittany said one of her more outlandish statements (the ones she thought, privately, always made more sense than anything they’d ever been taught in school, like 'i comes before c except after e', except i comes before c and e in 'ice', so how did that even work), now she kind of just listens. It's probably sad that it makes her tear up, but like, sometimes you just need to be heard properly.
And Quinn had always been super bottled up before. She used to purse her lips and you could see that she was about to explode from the inside, and sometimes she used to sit and stare at somewhere that wasn’t where she was. But Brittany's found this awesome trick where she can touch her hand to Quinn’s shoulder (she tried her cheek once, just for full scientific testing), and Quinn’s face just shifts and all of it melts into like, words, about how she's feeling. It's kind of the best thing Brittany has ever learnt on her own.
Except for maybe that one thing she can do with her fingers, but like, Quinn probably wouldn’t appreciate that.
**
Santana isn’t coming home.
It isn’t like she isn’t expecting it - Santana's a city girl now, and everyone's heard the songs about city girls and country girls and of course it isn’t going to work now that Santana's a city girl - it's just.
Santana isn’t coming home.
**
Lord Tubbington has a plan. A scheme, if you will. Sitting on Brittany’s lap, he stretches across to bat at Quinn’s leg until she moves close enough to stroke along his ears. He ignores Brittany’s sideways glance, purring as Quinn’s patting gets more absent. Her fingers catch on the edge of Brittany’s shorts, and Brittany jumps, enough for him to glare back at her. Quinn’s cheeks go pink, and she mumbles an apology, but her hand doesn’t stop moving across his back, and this time it seems like it's more to keep Brittany close than him.
“I know what you’re doing,” Brittany tells him later, eyes slitted into a glare, even as she plays with his paws. It’s always mostly adorable when she tries to be firm with him. “But it won’t work. Quinn doesn’t like girls, okay? So stop it.”
But the phone calls from Santana are coming more sporadically now, and the last time Brittany had put the phone down she’d cried until Quinn put her arms around her. And it's hard not to notice that any mention of her own feelings for Quinn are conspicuously lacking.
Stage one complete. Now, to stage two.
**
“Where’s Lord Tubbington?” Quinn asks, and the fact that it’s the first thing she says when she walks through the door makes Brittany grin, even though she is a little worried about him.
“I’m not sure,” she says, grabbing Quinn’s hand as she hears her dad’s footsteps and his voice asking if that’s Quinn. She drags her, laughing, up the stairs. Her dad has started this weird thing, ever since he heard what happened with Quinn’s dad in their sophomore year, where he keeps trying to ask Quinn about what her plans are, and if she's taking any supplements because she's looking a bit pale today. Quinn gets totally flustered, and it’s kind of adorable to watch her stammer, but they’re going through old seasons of Beauty and the Geek and they’re up to the makeover episode, so.
“He’s been going off on his own a lot lately,” Brittany says, when they’re on her bed and watching one of the geek’s chests being waxed.
“He has?” Quinn says, and she doesn’t just know what Brittany’s talking about, she’s also worried, and, bother, this is all that damn cat’s fault.
Oh, they should totally watch that movie after they’re done with season.
“It's okay, he's probably just buying cigars again,” she says, and she has to try not to look at Quinn, because the worry on her face is kind of making her fall in love with her, just a little bit.
**
When Quinn comes over the next day with a sheaf of printed research about how cats like to seclude themselves when they’re sick, and how he’s probably dying and they need to find him and take him to the vet like, right now, Brittany has a hard time feeling worried because of just how much she wants to kiss her.
**
When Quinn calls her and asks her to come over, her voice sounds super weird. Usually they avoid her house, because Brittany is pretty sure Quinn’s mom’s face is a halloween mask, so the whole thing is weird enough to make her run over there.
(She hasn’t run in such a long time; it feels like oxygen is finally back in her lungs.)
“Hey, what’s...” There’s like, ten dead rats on Quinn’s front porch. “Did your mom fire your cleaner, or is she just not very good at her job?”
“The good news is that Lord Tubbington is fine,” Quinn says, opening the door wider. Her awful cat is sitting at Quinn’s feet, looking particularly pleased with himself. “The bad news is that he seems to be giving me, uhm... presents.”
Brittany sighs, steeling herself before going to scoop her naughty cat up into her arms. She can’t help but nuzzle her nose into his fur, because he had worried her. But if she’d known it was all about this...
“I told you, Mr Tubbington -- don’t turn your nose up at me, you’ve been way rude -- I told you. This isn’t going to work. He’s thinks I’m lonely,” she says to Quinn, and Quinn takes a half step forward, to stroke along Lord Tubbington’s back. Her hand stays clasped to Brittany’s elbow, and Brittany sighs. “The only way he’s going to stop is if you tell him. He won’t listen to me. He’s trying to court you. For me.”
“C-court me?” Quinn splutters, and Brittany looks pointedly at Lord Tubbington, bouncing him in her arms.
“See, I told you. She’s not interested in girls the way we are, okay? So you need to get this silly idea out of your head, and stop meddling.”
Lord Tubbington looks at Quinn, and Quinn looks back at him before shifting her gaze to Brittany. The hand on her elbow tightens.
“Look, Brittany, I mean, I’ve never really... but... when I was one of the Skanks...” Quinn says, and Brittany drops her cat.
Lord Tubbington yowls, but Brittany's eyes are fixed on Quinn, and there’s a sort of bravado on her face that fades into a sheepish sort of hope after a few seconds. "I like you," Quinn says quietly, shrugging helplessly as Brittany blinks at her, then steps in closer, her arms fitting around Quinn carefully.
“Yeah?” she whispers, and Quinn’s neck is warm with the blush that’s swept all over her face.
“May as well be stuck together,” Quinn says, but this time, it sounds less like a last resort, and more like a promise.
**
(Quinn gives good hugs, and she makes his Brittany smile. Lord Tubbington is content.)
Pairing: Quinn/Brittany
Rating: PG-13
Length: 2000
Summary: For the prompt: With Santana no longer an option, Lord Tubbington sets out to find a new mate for Brittany. Brittany thinks he's sneaking away to buy cigars again and Quinn just wants to know why she keeps finding dead rodents on her doorstep every morning.
Lord Tubbington was by far the smartest kitten in his litter, which is how he knows that when Santana leaves cigars under Brittany’s pillow they're for him, and when she leaves notes that end with ‘love you forever,’ they're for Brittany.
It's also how he knows that when Santana leaves for good, it's for herself.
Brittany tells him to be nice to her, because they can't make her stay. Together he and Brittany can do whatever they like, so Lord Tubbington knows they could make her stay, if they tried. But he also knows Santana well enough to know what Brittany isn’t saying: that they shouldn’t make her stay with them, not when living in Lima would make her so unhappy.
It isn’t anyone’s fault that Brittany’s mom got sick, or that her dad can't look after her little sister and work to pay their bills. It isn’t anyone’s fault that the city had been all Santana ever wanted, until Brittany. It isn’t anyone’s fault that when faced with the choice between her future or Brittany, Santana chose for herself. It isn’t anyone’s fault that when people leave this town, they never came back, and if they do, they’ve grown too big to fit inside its borders. It isn’t anyone’s fault, but that doesn’t stop Brittany from being angry with everyone. Everyone except Lord Tubbington.
So when Santana hugs him for the first and last time, he doesn't say anything to Brittany about how Santana says she’ll be back soon, because he knows as well as Brittany does that though she might come back soon, she's never going to stay, not ever again.
**
Even though Brittany knows who won’t be there, hope makes every walk to her front door a struggle.
“Hi,” Quinn says. It’s probably rude to be disappointed by Quinn’s face; Brittany’s pretty sure it’s insulting to baby angels or something, but it’s only been a week and all Brittany can do is wave at her through her disappointment.
Quinn looks like she doesn’t want to be there, but she holds up a movie they haven’t watched together since they were fourteen. “Can I come in?”
“Are you just here because you feel sorry for me?”
Quinn bites her lip, then shakes out her hair and looks her up and down pointedly. “Britt, everyone knows what Santana leaving means to you. Of course I do. But we’re friends, aren’t we?”
Brittany tugs at the bottom of her sweater. “I don’t know, we did some pretty mean things to each other.”
Quinn waves the movie in her hand. “Look, we're both stuck here together, and we’ve been friends for a long time. Can we forgive each other? That’s what the movie’s about.”
“I thought it was about sex. And cities.”
Quinn rolls her eyes and gives her a look, and Brittany smiles, just a little, because yeah, Quinn was always the only other person that didn’t let her get away with saying stupid things she didn’t mean.
Lord Tubbington wraps himself around Quinn’s legs, and Quinn squats down to hug him. “Hey, gorgeous kitty, I missed you.” Brittany is pretty sure Quinn likes animals more than she likes people, and she definitely likes her cat more than she likes her, but she takes the DVD from Quinn and goes to put it on.
Quinn’s right. If they’re both stuck to this town, they may as well be stuck together.
**
Now, Lord Tubbington loves Brittany. He does. But he is a proud cat, a manly cat, and after two months of Brittany not having anyone but him to cuddle up to?
He needs her to get out more. He wants to get his loving on with the sex kitten down the street, and he is aching for a cigar. He’d even go for a cigarette at this point. Brittany’s cuddle schedule is totally messing with his life, and he needs her to get a mate - one of her own species.
Puck has visited her, but he spends most of his time eating and playing games, and although Brittany speaks to him, she doesn’t seem at all interested in anything she has to say. Santana is gone, but Quinn....
Quinn has been coming around more and more, lately. She seems like she could do with a Brittany hug, and she gives really good scratches: just the right amount of pressure, and never too demeaning.
But really, it's when he sees them hug each other like they hug him that Lord Tubbington is decided: even if they need a push, he is going to get Brittany a new mate, and they are going to know how to cuddle.
**
Walking to the door isn’t as hard when Brittany knows it’s Quinn on the other side. Quinn’s still holding up a movie, but at this point it’s mostly pretence. They talk over most of the plot, and though Quinn had always rolled her eyes whenever Brittany said one of her more outlandish statements (the ones she thought, privately, always made more sense than anything they’d ever been taught in school, like 'i comes before c except after e', except i comes before c and e in 'ice', so how did that even work), now she kind of just listens. It's probably sad that it makes her tear up, but like, sometimes you just need to be heard properly.
And Quinn had always been super bottled up before. She used to purse her lips and you could see that she was about to explode from the inside, and sometimes she used to sit and stare at somewhere that wasn’t where she was. But Brittany's found this awesome trick where she can touch her hand to Quinn’s shoulder (she tried her cheek once, just for full scientific testing), and Quinn’s face just shifts and all of it melts into like, words, about how she's feeling. It's kind of the best thing Brittany has ever learnt on her own.
Except for maybe that one thing she can do with her fingers, but like, Quinn probably wouldn’t appreciate that.
**
Santana isn’t coming home.
It isn’t like she isn’t expecting it - Santana's a city girl now, and everyone's heard the songs about city girls and country girls and of course it isn’t going to work now that Santana's a city girl - it's just.
Santana isn’t coming home.
**
Lord Tubbington has a plan. A scheme, if you will. Sitting on Brittany’s lap, he stretches across to bat at Quinn’s leg until she moves close enough to stroke along his ears. He ignores Brittany’s sideways glance, purring as Quinn’s patting gets more absent. Her fingers catch on the edge of Brittany’s shorts, and Brittany jumps, enough for him to glare back at her. Quinn’s cheeks go pink, and she mumbles an apology, but her hand doesn’t stop moving across his back, and this time it seems like it's more to keep Brittany close than him.
“I know what you’re doing,” Brittany tells him later, eyes slitted into a glare, even as she plays with his paws. It’s always mostly adorable when she tries to be firm with him. “But it won’t work. Quinn doesn’t like girls, okay? So stop it.”
But the phone calls from Santana are coming more sporadically now, and the last time Brittany had put the phone down she’d cried until Quinn put her arms around her. And it's hard not to notice that any mention of her own feelings for Quinn are conspicuously lacking.
Stage one complete. Now, to stage two.
**
“Where’s Lord Tubbington?” Quinn asks, and the fact that it’s the first thing she says when she walks through the door makes Brittany grin, even though she is a little worried about him.
“I’m not sure,” she says, grabbing Quinn’s hand as she hears her dad’s footsteps and his voice asking if that’s Quinn. She drags her, laughing, up the stairs. Her dad has started this weird thing, ever since he heard what happened with Quinn’s dad in their sophomore year, where he keeps trying to ask Quinn about what her plans are, and if she's taking any supplements because she's looking a bit pale today. Quinn gets totally flustered, and it’s kind of adorable to watch her stammer, but they’re going through old seasons of Beauty and the Geek and they’re up to the makeover episode, so.
“He’s been going off on his own a lot lately,” Brittany says, when they’re on her bed and watching one of the geek’s chests being waxed.
“He has?” Quinn says, and she doesn’t just know what Brittany’s talking about, she’s also worried, and, bother, this is all that damn cat’s fault.
Oh, they should totally watch that movie after they’re done with season.
“It's okay, he's probably just buying cigars again,” she says, and she has to try not to look at Quinn, because the worry on her face is kind of making her fall in love with her, just a little bit.
**
When Quinn comes over the next day with a sheaf of printed research about how cats like to seclude themselves when they’re sick, and how he’s probably dying and they need to find him and take him to the vet like, right now, Brittany has a hard time feeling worried because of just how much she wants to kiss her.
**
When Quinn calls her and asks her to come over, her voice sounds super weird. Usually they avoid her house, because Brittany is pretty sure Quinn’s mom’s face is a halloween mask, so the whole thing is weird enough to make her run over there.
(She hasn’t run in such a long time; it feels like oxygen is finally back in her lungs.)
“Hey, what’s...” There’s like, ten dead rats on Quinn’s front porch. “Did your mom fire your cleaner, or is she just not very good at her job?”
“The good news is that Lord Tubbington is fine,” Quinn says, opening the door wider. Her awful cat is sitting at Quinn’s feet, looking particularly pleased with himself. “The bad news is that he seems to be giving me, uhm... presents.”
Brittany sighs, steeling herself before going to scoop her naughty cat up into her arms. She can’t help but nuzzle her nose into his fur, because he had worried her. But if she’d known it was all about this...
“I told you, Mr Tubbington -- don’t turn your nose up at me, you’ve been way rude -- I told you. This isn’t going to work. He’s thinks I’m lonely,” she says to Quinn, and Quinn takes a half step forward, to stroke along Lord Tubbington’s back. Her hand stays clasped to Brittany’s elbow, and Brittany sighs. “The only way he’s going to stop is if you tell him. He won’t listen to me. He’s trying to court you. For me.”
“C-court me?” Quinn splutters, and Brittany looks pointedly at Lord Tubbington, bouncing him in her arms.
“See, I told you. She’s not interested in girls the way we are, okay? So you need to get this silly idea out of your head, and stop meddling.”
Lord Tubbington looks at Quinn, and Quinn looks back at him before shifting her gaze to Brittany. The hand on her elbow tightens.
“Look, Brittany, I mean, I’ve never really... but... when I was one of the Skanks...” Quinn says, and Brittany drops her cat.
Lord Tubbington yowls, but Brittany's eyes are fixed on Quinn, and there’s a sort of bravado on her face that fades into a sheepish sort of hope after a few seconds. "I like you," Quinn says quietly, shrugging helplessly as Brittany blinks at her, then steps in closer, her arms fitting around Quinn carefully.
“Yeah?” she whispers, and Quinn’s neck is warm with the blush that’s swept all over her face.
“May as well be stuck together,” Quinn says, but this time, it sounds less like a last resort, and more like a promise.
**
(Quinn gives good hugs, and she makes his Brittany smile. Lord Tubbington is content.)