A Lesson in Chemistry

As Brittany sits uncomfortably outside of her professor's office, she drums her fingers off of any available surface present in an attempt to calm her nerves. It's a few minutes before her 2 o'clock appointment, which was specifically set by her professor. Brittany didn't ask for this meeting, therefore she has absolutely no idea what it is that her Sociology instructor could want to talk to her about.

But that's not the only reason why Brittany is extremely nervous.

You see… Brittany's professor wasn't just some average, frumpy looking middle-aged woman that devoted her life to her students during the day and spent her nights cuddled up on her couch with her cat, watching Murder She Wrote.

Nope.

Brittany's professor was none other than Miss Santana Lopez, a fiery 28 year old Latina that was the very definition of sexy. Standing at 5'5'' with raven hair, mocha-colored eyes, and a killer body, Professor Lopez was by far the hottest teacher at Ohio State University. Oh, and if that wasn't enough… did I mention that she was Brittany's Sexuality and Society teacher?

As Brittany's anxiety continues to build up, the sudden sound of the door in front of her opening snaps her out of her panic-like state.

"Miss Pierce… come on in," Santana casually states as she quickly pops her head out of the door. Once Brittany finds enough strength to stand up, she enters her professor's office. "Have a seat," she says, motioning to couch that sat across from Santana's desk.

As Brittany obliges, she takes a minute to look around. This being the first time she's ever been in Santana's office, she immediately notices that the set up isn't as rigid as most of her other professors. Actually, the room doesn't really read as an office at all, except for the desk and computer that's present. It has a more urban/contemporary look that feels more inviting than your standard metal and wildly uncomfortable furniture.

While Santana takes a seat behind her desk, Brittany looks down and picks at her nails. "Miss Pierce, do you have any idea why I asked you to meet me here today?"

"No ma'am," Brittany responds as she quickly looks up to make eye contact with Santana, only to place her head back down and continue messing with her nails.

"I asked for this meeting because I'm concerned about your grades," Santana states, effectively halting Brittany's movements.

"What's wrong with my grades?" Brittany inquires, still avoiding eye contact with her teacher.

"Well… it's not so much your grades on your homework or on tests," Santana continues. "Your attendance in class has steadily decreased and whenever you are there and I give a pop quiz, you've been doing exponentially worse than usual. What's going on Brittany? Y'know you can talk to me."

Brittany remains silent as she thinks about the best way to respond. Should she make something halfway believable up or finally just tell her professor the truth.

"You have always been an active student in my class since the beginning of the semester, but lately, you've been kind of off," Santana says. "I've talked to some of your other professors and they all say what a delight you are to have in their classes, so I guess I'm just wondering why you haven't been you're usual upbeat self when you are in my class?"

As Brittany still sits there without a word leaving her lips, Santana feels herself getting a slightly irritated by the lack of response. It's not often that Santana goes out of her way to help someone else, but in this case, she made a special exception for Brittany. Feeling as if she's not getting through to the younger woman, Santana stands up from her chair, walks around to the front of her desk, and leans against it.

"Look… I know that you could easily make A's in all of your classes without showing up, but in my class… it's physically impossible," Santana starts again. "If you remember from your syllabus, attendance counts for 10% of your grade while participation counts for 15%. If you don't show up for class, then it's kinda hard to get any points for participation."

Brittany can't bring herself to look at Santana. It upsets her to know that she has let Santana down. She never thought in a million years that the Latina would even notice if she didn't show up for class, but apparently she did. Brittany knows that if she doesn't stop messing around, her grade in Professor Lopez's class will suffer and quite possibly cause her to lose something that she's worked so hard on since her collegiate career began.

"I'm not trying to pry here, but if there's something going on in your personal life… there are people that can help," Santana continues. When Brittany shakes her head "no", she continues. "Okay… did something happen in class then, like with one of the other students?"

Brittany's jaw clenches, trying to hold back the emotions that are building up. Upon seeing this, Santana thinks she might be on to something.

"Is that it… something happened in class?" Santana questions. "Did one of the guys say or do something to you? If they did, then let m—"

"It's you, okay!" Brittany yells in response, effectively frightening her instructor and cutting her off. "I'm sorry… I didn't mean to yell."

"Me? What did I do Brittany?" Santana asks, feeling very confused at this point. "Whatever it is, I'm sorry."

Feeling as if now the cat's out of the bag, Brittany finally decides to be honest and tell Santana the real reason why she's been avoiding her class like the plague.

"You didn't do anything wrong, Professor Lopez…" Brittany begins. "It's me… I'm the problem."

"I don't understand."

"I stopped coming to class cuz…" Brittany starts to say, but pauses. She takes a deep breath and then tries again. "I stopped coming to class because it was beginning to get extremely difficult… being in the same room with you," she finishes, finally looking into Santana's eyes.

Santana opens her mouth to respond, but realizes that she's not exactly sure what to say. Luckily for her, Brittany has more to get off her chest.

"When I first signed up for your class, I was super excited because I've heard what an amazing teacher you are; not to mention… you're pretty easy on the eyes," Brittany blurts out that last part inadvertently. As Santana bashfully ducks her head down, she continues. "The first day I walked into your class, you literally took my breath away. In high school, I had a hard enough time paying attention in class so I wasn't really sure how I was gonna make it through yours. But as soon as you opened your mouth, I knew I could listen to your voice forever."

As a tiny smile tugs at the corners of Santana's lips, she opts to stop the blonde sitting in front of her. "Brittany…"

"Just let me finish embarrassing myself since it's too late now," Brittany pleads. Once she receives a slight head nod from Santana, she picks up where she left off. "Coming to your class and getting to see you 3 times a week became my new favorite thing. I love how passionate you are about the material you're presenting. I love how passionate you are about teaching. But then…"

"But then what?" Santana inquires, almost getting lost in Brittany's words.

"A lot of the guys in class are egotistical jerks…" Brittany picks back up. "All they do all day is sit in their seats, ignore your lectures, and objectify you. All of them are just so arrogant and think that it's just a matter of time before they get into your pants," she states, anger building up. "And the girls aren't much better, calling you names and implying that you're easy. It just got to be too much, listening to all of those assholes disrespecting you like that. I just couldn't do it anymore…"

Santana silently smirks to herself, still trying to remain professional. However, she was delighted to know that Brittany thought so highly of her to the extent that being surrounded by stupid college kids gawking and talking shit about their professor made her this angry.

"It just kills me cuz none of them really see you for the intelligent and incredibly beautiful woman that you are," Brittany continues. "The girls are just jealous and all the guys see is a hot piece of ass that they want to fuck… excuse my language. I see you though… not that you're remotely interested in me; even if you were, we couldn't do anything about it for obvious reasons. It just bothers me to hear them talk about you like that."

As Brittany concludes her rant, Santana feels her heart melting. Never in her life had she felt so smitten with someone, let alone one of her students. Sure, the girls talking shit about her doesn't really surprise her. Also, she's used to guys calling her hot and/or sexy and trying to get her in the sack, but hearing Brittany call her beautiful was refreshing… like music to her ears.

Santana would be lying to herself if she said that she hadn't developed a strong liking to the blonde. In fact, like Brittany, Santana often looked forward to her class that Brittany was in, knowing that the atmosphere would be filled with positive energy exuding from the blonde. She knows that as a teacher, she's not supposed to have favorites. Honestly though… Santana just couldn't help it.

"I'm not a violent person, but even I have limitations," Brittany says, breaking Santana away from her inner thoughts. "I stopped coming to class because if I heard one more person make some shitty remark about you… I might've snapped."

"Well… that definitely explains why you've been M.I.A. for a while," Santana finally responds after hearing Brittany's endearing explanation. "But what about all of the pop quizzes? Even before you stopped coming to class, you never did as well on them as your exams or homework."

"Oh, uh…" Brittany says, starting to fumble over her words. As her cheeks start turning a slight shade of pink, debates on whether she should further humiliate herself in front of her favorite professor. As Santana looks back at her, waiting for an answer, Brittany finally gives in. "Sometimes when you give quizzes in class, I lose focus with you standing only a few feet away from me. Looking at you is very distracting for me and often makes me forget about the quiz completely until you ask for us to turn them in," Brittany states, finishing her ramblings as she looks away from her professor.

Santana is at a complete loss for words. To her, Brittany is possibly the sweetest and most honest person she's ever met. If she wasn't a student – her student, that is –, Santana would've probably lost all of her self-control and had her way with Brittany right there in her office.

"Okay… now that I've made a complete fool of myself, I'm gonna leave and wait for my roommate to come home and kick the chair out from under me," Brittany says as she quickly gets up and makes a B-line towards the door.

Before she can make her exit, a soft grasp around her wrist stops her in her tracks. As she looks down, she sees a caramel-colored hand wrapped around her milky-colored wrist. As Brittany's breath hitches in her throat at the sudden contact, Santana removes her hand and whispers a quick "sorry".

"Brittany… I greatly appreciate you sticking up for me," Santana starts to say. "However, you have to come back to class if you want any chance of passing with an A. Finals are in a couple of weeks and I would hate for you miss out on graduating with honors because of some assholes in my class."

Brittany lightly chuckles to herself, hearing Santana repeat her words from minutes ago. Although she knew that nothing would ever happen between her and Santana – and that her reasoning for skipping class was a bit irrational to begin with –, finally getting all of this off of her chest has been a relief. Now maybe she can get back to focusing on graduation and forgetting about her crush on her professor.

"I'll start coming back to class," Brittany responds softly, "and I'm sorry if anything I said before made you feel uncomfortable."

"You didn't… if anything, I'm beyond flattered by your kind words," Santana honestly states, causing Brittany's face to heat up.

"Oh, okay… t-that's good to k-know," Brittany stutters out, getting lost in the sexy rasp of Santana's voice and their current close quarters.

Before she loses all of her senses, Brittany she places her hand on the doorknob and throws a quick "see you Monday" before exiting her professor's office. Santana smiles contently as she watches Brittany leave, armed with brand new insights on her favorite student.

Author's Note:

So, what did you guys think? I've been very intrigued by the whole teacher/student aspect in some of the Brittana stories I've been reading lately so I thought I'd give it a shot. This was originally intended to be a one-shot, but it got pretty lengthy so I decided to break it up into 3 parts. Hope you enjoyed it. The next part should be up shortly. I promise that after I'm done with this little story, I will finally work on You and Me.

-K

Disclaimer: I own NOTHING!