Forgive me for this one. Once again, a one shot for my crazy feelings.
Oh, Happy New Years bitches! ;)
Such a Mournful Sound
You know those mornings where you thought you woke up, got ready, and were ready to leave for school and then you actually wake up and realize it was all a dream and now you're running stupid late and barely have time to get ready?
That was the type of morning Santana Lopez had.
She doesn't even remember getting to school. She just knows she's there now, Cheerio skirt twirling around her thighs as she walks through the front doors of McKinley High School.
No one even acknowledges her presence as she walks the halls, but that's nothing new. Ever since she came out a few months ago, everyone has showed little attention to her. She's still top dog on the Cheerios and she's still one of the best singer's in Glee club, so the fact that the peons in school aren't even noticing her doesn't bother her much anymore. She's grown up a lot in the last year and her popularity has become secondary to more important things.
Like Brittany. And Glee Club. And College applications. And then there's Brittany. And being on the Cheerios. And, of course, Brittany. That pretty sums up her priorities in no particular order. As she continues down the hall, thoughts of her favorite blonde rush through her mind and she can't fight the goofy grin that takes over her features.
People probably think I've gone crazy…
She thinks as she looks around, but once again, no one is paying attention, and it makes her feel a little better that no one saw it. She gets to her locker and pulls out her phone to check the time, wanting to wait for Britt but not wanting to be late to class. When she sees the time she curses under her breath; how did it get so late so fast? She glances around and notices the halls are empty and panics, knowing she's going to be super late for Calculus and since that teacher already despises her, she knows she should hurry.
She grabs at her lock and starts spinning the dial, putting in her combination and pulling hard, only to be met with nothing. The lock doesn't open and she continues to tug at it, huffing at the effort it's taking, but the lock wouldn't budge.
She looks at her phone again and decides that she doesn't need her books and begins to make her way to class. She knows she'll see Britt later and figures if she can get through Calculus, the rest of her day has got to get better.
When she walks into Calc, her teacher doesn't even look up from her desk, so Santana takes this as a sign that Mr. Walker is already pissed off at her, so she quietly takes her seat in the back of the class and pulls a pen from her ponytail. When she looks down, she sees that everyone has a test on their desk and she starts to panic.
How could I have forgotten about a test? She screams in her head as she leans over the guy in front of her to see what chapter they're on. Chapter 14? How are we already on 14?
She's so freaked out that she decides to fake sick and just run from the room. She couldn't believe she had blanked out over the last couple weeks. She was normally such a good student and she knew she could try and sweet talk Mr. Walker to let her re-take it when she was 'feeling better'. So instead, she wonders the halls of McKinley, ducking into the Cheerio's locker room to hide until 4th period when she had History with Britt.
She had tried to send her a text earlier, but she had no signal on her phone, which was crazy because her iPhone is her lifeline and it had to work! She wonders if her mom randomly forgot to pay her phone bill, but the possibility of that happening was zero to none, so instead she figured that Coach Sylvester probably installed some type of signal killer in the locker room to keep them all off their phones. She bitched about it constantly, so Santana wouldn't be surprised if that was the case.
Finally the bell rang for 4th period and she dashed for her class, excited to see her girlfriend after what felt like weeks apart. She wasn't sure why she felt so excited to see her, but it's Britt, so she knew she didn't need a reason. Just like how they don't need a reason to kiss or hug or hold hands; they just could. And it wasn't to amuse or entertain boys anymore, it was real, and once again, her face was plastered with a huge grin.
When people started filing into the room, she couldn't help but crane her neck to see Britt. When the blonde finally walked in, the smile fell from Santana's face. Brittany was not in her Cheerio's uniform and was looking a little worse for wear.
Her hair was in a messy bun, strands of blonde hair falling out all over the place; tucked behind her ear or hanging in her eyes. She didn't have any make up on, even though San knows she doesn't need it, but it's very unlike Britt to not at least have on some eyeliner. She watches as the blonde sits down next to her and sees how red her blue eyes are. There are bags under her eyes where it looks like she hasn't slept in days and she can't remember B looking like this the other night when she saw her.
Before San can even greet her girlfriend, Britt puts her head down on the table and lets out a sigh. Santana decides to not push and knows she'll find out later what's wrong with her girl. Instead, she just reaches for Britt's pinky and latches on, hoping the small gesture will offer a little bit of comfort until they can be alone.
Brittany raises her head and glances to her left, but her eyes don't seem to focus on her, but San can see a glint in the blonde's eyes before Britt turns around and puts her back down. Santana had tried to give her a smile, but she seemed to have missed it.
The brunette was nervous that Brittany would get in trouble for having her head down, so she put hers down too, just so the teacher would have to yell at both of them if it came down to that. But instead of closing her eyes, Santana kept hers open with her head laid down facing Britt so she could watch over her. If something was wrong, which it definitely was, Santana wanted to be there at a moments notice if need be.
Santana's eyes shot open when she realized she must have fallen asleep in class, but when she looked around, the room was completely empty. She couldn't believe that no one had woke her up when the bell had rang… especially Britt. She glanced at her phone and noticed that the final bell must have been what woke her up because it was the end of the school day and she had literally slept through it.
She sprinted from the classroom to see that the halls were almost vacant of students and if she was being honesty, she was super pissed off that this was happening. She couldn't believe that Britt could be so mad at her over something that she would just let her sleep in class and not wake her up when it was over.
I mean, who does that?
Santana was on a mission now. She was going to track down Britt and figure out what the hell was going on. They had Glee after this, so she figured she would talk to her then, but first she had to stop by her locker and get her Calc book. She knew she needed to study like a mad woman so she could re-take the test she had skipped earlier.
She's almost to her locker when she seems her best friend and girlfriend. Quinn has her arm around Britt's waist and their walking toward the front doors of the school. She couldn't understand, one, why they were leaving when they still had glee club practice, and two, why Brittany would leave without even saying bye to her. They've been in fights before, but never had they gone a whole day without speaking to one another and they would definitely not leave without at least a goodbye.
"Brittany!" She couldn't help but yell the girl's name in a more than frustrated tone, but she kind of felt like Britt deserved it. What she wasn't expecting was what happened next.
Brittany stopped dead in her tracks and Quinn practically fell over from the force of it. She watched as Britt slowly turned her head and stared back down the hallway at her. Their eyes seemed to meet, but there was no recognition, no acknowledgement in the eye contact before Britt slowly turned back around and continued walking out the front doors, leaving a very confused and even more pissed off Latina in her wake.
What in the fuck is going on? She thinks as she watches the front doors to the school swing shut.
She stands there for a good few minutes just staring off into space before deciding that she needed to get her stuff, get to glee club practice, and head home. As she tries to open her locker, she gets even more agitated that it won't open. It's like the world was conspiring against her today and it took all of her strength to not punch the red locker in front of her.
She gives her lock one last tug before saying fuck it and heads down the hall toward the choir room. This day has been too weird for her and she knows that singing her heart out, even though she sounds so much like Rachel Berry right now, will help her feel better.
Her house is pitch dark, cold, and empty when she gets there. Her parents were obviously still at work and the maid must have just left because her room is spotless when she flops down on her bed.
Glee had been cancelled for the week, according to the sign on the door; only adding to her already miserable day. She had tried to use her cell to call Britt, but the thing still wasn't working and was now slung onto her desk across the room.
"Seriously, could this day get any worse?" she said out loud to the empty room, hoping the black walls would give her some sort of response. She laid there for what seemed like hours before she decided that she'd had enough. Britt hadn't tried to call or text her all evening, so instead of waiting for that to happen, she decided she was going to just march on over there and get some answers.
She put on a jacket and headed out the door, ready to make the drive over there until she decided that she wanted to walk instead. It wasn't that far away and she wanted some time to think before getting there. She didn't want to attack the blonde with a verbal assault because having B shut down wasn't what she needed, but she also knew that Britt couldn't ignore her forever.
It was almost 10 o'clock by the time San arrived at the blonde's door, and instead of knocking, she just let herself in like she always did. Britt's family was probably already in bed at this point, so she crept silently through the house until she got to Britt's room. She put her ear against the door and could hear the faint sound of music, but it was too quiet to make out what song was playing.
She was going to knock, but knowing it would probably just scare Brittany more, she just opened the door and walked in. Brittany was sitting on the edge of her bed with her back to the door so she didn't see Santana come in and the music stopped her from hearing the door being opened and closed again.
She stood there for a little, just taking in the state of the blonde's room. Granted, Brittany wasn't the cleanest person in the world, but never in the long time that Santana had known her, had her room been in this state of total disarray. Clothes were piled up everywhere, drawers and closest doors were open, and an untouched turkey sandwich sat on a clean spot on her desk. The entire state of the place screamed 'I don't give a shit' and if she were being honest, Santana was now more worried about the state of her girlfriend, not just their relationship.
"Britt?" Santana said quietly as she walked toward the bed, but she didn't receive a response so she stopped moving, wanting to wait and approach the blonde on her own terms.
It wasn't a moment later that she heard Brittany's voice for the first time in what felt like weeks.
"I miss you so much…" Brittany said, her voice cracking and her shoulders shaking under the weight of the words. Santana's heart broke the moment she heard them. She could see that Brittany was crying by the way her body was shaking and she immediately went to kneel in front of her girlfriend.
"Brittany, I'm right here baby." Santana said, placing her hands on the blonde's thighs and rubbing them gently. "Hey, look at me." The brunette tried to get her attention, but she was being so stubborn and just continued to stare at something in her hands.
Santana looked down and noticed it was a picture of them from the summer. Both girls were in their swimsuits and had been lying out by Quinn's pool for the whole day and finally decided to get in. They had been waist deep in the water when Q had yelled at them and taken the picture. It was one of those moments where they had been 'caught', as they liked to put it. They had their hands intertwined under the water and had been staring at each other, having one of their silent conversations. Both had tender smiles on their faces and only broke eye contact when Quinn yelled for them, and she had snapped the picture before their smiles faded or their hands could untangle. It was one of their favorites and Santana couldn't help but smile a small smile every time she saw it.
"Why'd you have to go San?" Brittany asked, which brought Santana back to the moment.
"Go? Britt, you're starting to scare me." She said, her voice shaking almost as hard as the girl's in front of her.
It was then, when she glanced around, that she noticed the other things scattered on Brittany's bed. There were pictures of them together, from all different periods in their friendship and relationship; from Nationals for Cheerios and Glee, to summer vacations, and Christmas breaks. It was almost like a timeline of them was laid out and as she continued down the line of photographs, from second grade to senior year, she was forced to stop on the last piece of paper at the edge of the bed.
It was then that she realized she was screaming.
"No, no, no, no, NO!"
The next thing she knew, she was up against the wall, sliding down it slowly while her hands began to shake at her sides. She looked up from her fetal position on the floor to see that Brittany was still sitting on the edge of the bed, completely unfazed by her hysterical yelling. She sprung up from the floor and immediately grasped at B's hands.
"Britt! Baby! Please, please look at me!"
She was shaking harder now, unable to control herself as she looked down and noticed that her hands weren't actually holding Brittany's. It was more like she was holding a force field that was around Brittany's hands. She noticed that it wasn't as warm or as soft as her girlfriend was, but it almost felt like touching. She reached for the blonde's face, her arms, thighs, anything, but each time there was a barrier between them that seemed to stop her from making contact.
She reeled back like she had been burned and couldn't help but let out another shriek of agony.
"Please B! Please hear me!"
But the blonde didn't respond, she just kept rubbing her finger back and forth across the picture as tear stains began to form on her cheeks.
It was then that she realized why everything seemed so weird today.
Missing the Calc test and being two chapters behind where they were.
Brittany ignoring her all day.
Glee Club practice being cancelled.
It was all because of one thing…
And the last piece of paper at the end of Brittany's makeshift timeline explained it all.
It was a newspaper cut out from a week prior.
A picture of Santana as the main focus.
Her obituary.