IV.

August

Though it isn't night, storm clouds cast the yard dark, and rain stains the concrete around the swimming pool in slate. Santana presses fingertips to the glass door and feels it cooler than the air inside the kitchen. Still, she doesn't go for clothes warmer than the sweats she already wears, and Brittany doesn't go either. Brittany's breath blooms and unblooms a fog flower on the lips of her own dim and backlit reflection on the door.

"We might get wet," Santana worries.

Brittany shrugs, placid. "Then we get wet," she says, reaching for the door handle and sliding the door open.

The girls traipse onto the back deck on cautious stocking feet. Through the eaves of the house protect them and the wood underfoot from the raindrops, it's still difficult not to feel as if they've stepped into someplace wild—and especially not when a shock of thunder whipcracks, violent, directly above the buckeye tree beside Santana's bedroom window, just a few strides away from where they stand.

Brittany slides the door shut quickly behind them so as not to let a draft inside Santana's house, and Santana shrieks the instant the door sinks closed into place, startled by a gust of wind that rips across the surface of the swimming pool like claws.

"Shh," Brittany warns, not angry but cautious. She glances up at the house, to rooms that she and Santana cannot see, to Santana's parents, one in the study, the other in the master bedroom when last she and Santana checked.

Santana's parents wouldn't mind Santana and Brittany storm-watching, but they might mind other things, eventually.

Brittany tiptoes to one of the deck chairs tucked snug beneath the eaves and settles herself down into it, her legs forming into a graceful, folded pretzel beneath her weight. Santana follows suit, taking over one of the pool chaises, curling into it like a cat, her feet tucked safely under her legs.

The clouds move like galloping in the stratosphere, and the rain beats down the grass and dots the fence in teardrops.

For a long while, the girls sit still, in awe of Midwestern summer. When another whipcrack snaps just above the house, Santana jolts, and Brittany extends a hand to her. Santana sets her own hand into Brittany's without looking away from the storm, and Brittany's palm envelopes her palm with human heat.

When wind peels another sheet of water from the pool, Santana shudders, maybe because the wind chills her, maybe because the storm is so awesome that it makes her feel small. For a second, it is easy to believe that all her problems, which usually seem so vast and insurmountable, are actually trifling.

Maybe Santana's shudder is what prompts Brittany to move, but, whatever the case, Santana glimpses Brittany shifting at her side from the corner of her eye and feels Brittany's palm adjust against her own. Suddenly Brittany is out of the deck chair, joining Santana on the chaise. The chaise sits against a corner of the deck, pushed against a corner of the house. Santana scoots back against the house to allow Brittany room at her side.

Brittany moves like a cat, all liquid determination. She climbs onto the chaise and crouches but then continues forward. It takes Santana another second to realize what Brittany is doing.

Her eyes say it, even under the shadow of the eaves.

I'm going to kiss you now.

Brittany's hand fits under Santana's chin, her thumb against Santana's cheek. She lifts Santana's face to hers, and Santana's body stills, waits, Santana's eyes fluttering closed, breath holing up within her breast. At first, Santana's lips remain just slightly parted like rose petals in an early bloom, but then Brittany's mouth seals over Santana's, and Santana locks to Brittany. Their noses nudge each other's faces, and all they can hear is rain applauding upon hard earth and the sounds of each other's lips sussurating together.

Santana feels Brittany—a strength in her, a heat, more of that wildness from before.

The kiss starts at Santana's lips and spreads out through her everywhere, lifting something deep inside her. Brittany kisses her hard like the rain.

But then Brittany goes to deepen the kiss, making another gasping lean forward, and suddenly Santana startles, remembering her parents upstairs in their rooms, wondering if either one of them has a window open to hear the rain, if they could hear other things.

Santana and Brittany usually don't kiss while they're home.

A little whimper escapes Santana's lips, and she pulls back, frightened.

"Okay, um—," she says, her lips still half upon Brittany's lips, Brittany's hand still guiding her face.

Brittany still leans forward, still seeks another kiss, a half-second behind the times. The moment doesn't break for her until thunder clatters like cymbals above the eaves. Only then does she recede, closing her mouth, backing away. She stares at Santana with cloudy eyes, and Santana glances—like Brittany did before—up at the house, to the unseen rooms, to the unseen people.

"What if they hear us?" Santana peeps, the ghost of the kiss still on her mouth, and her heart suddenly in her throat for more reasons than just a few.

Brittany shrugs, placid. "Not if we're quiet. Not over the rain," she says.

But she doesn't press. A pause.

Her hand still lingers at Santana's face, her thumb cradling Santana's jaw. She glances at Santana's mouth.

Her eyes say it, even under the shadow of the eaves.

I want to kiss you again.

But.

"It's your choice," Brittany says. "If you don't want to, we don't have to."

Her hand moves from Santana's face back to her own lap, and her shoulders relax, her body standing down, curling away, making room for Santana to decide.

A whole summer has passed, and Santana still has no idea about so many things. She feels certain that Brittany loves her just like she loves Brittany, but she doesn't know what that means—if there are words for what they are to each other, if there will ever be words. She still feels so cowardly, unready in some ways but more than ready in others. She still can't imagine what her parents will say when they finally know, if they ever do.

Santana licks her lips, and rain pops against the surface of the swimming pool, creating a symphony of little splashes. Thunder sounds past the house.

"Britt," Santana says.

She tries to say it with her eyes.

I choose, I choose, I choose.

It happens in reverse from the first time. Santana reaches to lift Brittany's chin. She moves forward like the thunder, like the rolling of the clouds. And suddenly she's in Brittany's lap, curled over her, warming both of them by her heat. Her face is so close to Brittany's, and the rain behind them intensifies, and the wind, and they kiss.

Santana seals her mouth over Brittany's, their faces pressed together. She takes in Brittany's last exhalation and kisses her deep and slow, vaguely aware as the pulse at Brittany's neck picks up just under her hand. She opens her mouth again, and Brittany follows her lead. She slips her tongue past Brittany's lips, Brittany's teeth, and for a moment she forgets the storm.

Santana kisses Brittany and knows exactly where she is.