Promises
A/N: This is my first official Glee fanfic. It will revolve around the relationship between Quinn and Santana, from when they met, and probably up to Season Two. It depends on how this will develop in my brain.
It's a slightly AU fic so, I'm using my poetic license to forget that "Lucy Caboosey" and the whole incident with Beth ever happened. If I need to modify anything else, I'll let you know.
WARNING: Mentions of drug use and alcoholism.
May, 2000.
You remember the first time ever you saw her face. You were sitting on top of the tallest slide of the playground, just staring at the world below you. You had always cherished power and control, even if you were only five years old at the time. Everything was going well until a big and dumb looking boy climbed onto your little sanctuary and started pressuring you, saying you had to move because he wanted to slide down. You refused and told him to back off, that you had gotten there first. Then he started making fun of you because he thought you were afraid of heights. He called you a "tiny, little baby". That made you really angry. You hated when people made gibes about your size. You knew that you were small for your age, but not as small as the loud Rachel Berry from your class. But you were also very skinny, which made you look smaller. Most of these things made the teachers and the kids think that you couldn't do stuff, like swing from the monkey bars, or carry one of the wooden chairs for story-telling time. They were wrong, very wrong. You were strong, very strong. You could push open the rusty door to your apartment all by yourself. You could help your Mami carry all of those grocery bags filled with clinking bottles, the same ones that smelled funny and made her act weird. You could drag your Mami up onto the couch when she fell asleep on the floor, after smelling too much of that pixie-dust that looked like salt. Even if your Mami wasn't fat, helping her up was quite hard, and you felt very proud after accomplishing it. You knew that the other kids couldn't do that. They were weak, you were strong. You could do as many things as the taller kids, maybe even more.
You told the bigger boy to shut up and go back down, you weren't going to move. This was your slide, at least for the moment. He kept pushing you, whining about how he couldn't go back down because there was somebody else climbing up. You don't know if it was the way he was bugging you, or the fact that you had been happily lounging on the top of the slide, that when you thought about sliding down just to get away from the annoying kid, the ground seemed to be a million feet further away. It looked like a city for ants, and the metal sheet of the plaything seemed to go on for miles, as steep as a scary waterfall. Your throat tightened and your tummy started doing flip-flops, your knuckles white as you held onto the railing with all your might. You weren't going to tell the guy that you were scared, even if it was a little bit. But he was trying to squeeze past you onto the narrow platform. The only way you could get away from him was if you slid down first, but the floor of the playground was too far away.
His babbling was making your head hurt, so you tuned him out, just like you did when your Mami invited one of those strange men for sleepovers and they made a lot of noise. Satisfied, you saw his lips move and his constipated face shift, but you couldn't hear anything. You could finally think. You curled up into a ball and motioned for him to step over you so he could get to the edge of the slide. He did so and you helped him by nudging his back hard with your foot so he could go down faster.
You sat down again and stared at the playground. You really wanted to go to the jungle gym, but you could now properly admit to yourself that you were very scared of sliding down. Bad thoughts started creeping into your brain. About how you were going to be stuck on the slide forever. How you would never see your Mami again or your Abuela. How you would never be able to read Harry Potter or eat gummy bears. Tears started clouding your eyes and you sniffled. Before you could do anything else, you felt a warm hand on your back, and you turned around.
Your watery, brown eyes connected with the most beautiful golden ones you had ever seen. They had green, and brown, and yellow, and another green, and more gold. You had never seen someone as pretty as her - not even the one time you got a brand-new Barbie for your birthday. Her skin looked so smooth that you wanted to touch it, to see if it was as soft. Her hair looked like it had been made out of sunshine, it glowed.
Your little heart started beating very fast as you realized that she was the most perfect thing you had ever laid your eyes upon. Her face was serious, a look of concern etched across it. She whispered, "Please, don't cry." You had almost forgotten why you were crying and you had actually forgotten that you hated when people saw you cry; it made you feel uneasy. The sunshine-haired girl started talking again. "I saw that Finn was being mean to you. Ignore him; he's just a dumb giant. He doesn't even know how to tie his shoes without his Mommy's help." You chuckled, he was really dumb. You had known how to tie your shoelaces since you were four. "I'm Quinn," the girl said, "I know it sounds like Finn, but he is not even my friend." You really liked this girl; you wanted her to be your friend, your first friend. "You're pretty. He is ugly," you stated quickly. "I'm Santana. And I'm not crying anymore," you added proudly. Quinn smiled, a smile that could've reduced those toothpaste ad models into puddles of goo. "I like your name, Santana. And you are pretty, too. Even when you cry, but I don't like seeing my friends sad. It also makes me sad." "Friends"? Had she called you her friend? You wondered if she could hear your heart thumping wildly against your chest. A warm sensation travelled from the tip of your toes to the top of your head. "No, no, no! Don't be sad, Quinn. See? I'm happy," you beamed back at her. Quinn giggled and sat down next to you. "I see. B-but, why were you crying?" she asked gently. You replied right away, knowing that she was going to be able to help you, because that's what friends do. "I-I-I was scared of sliding down, it's too big." She squeezed your hand, "The first time I did it, I was scared, too. But my sister showed me a trick, and now I love sliding! Do you want me to show you?" You nodded excitedly. You were hungry and you had been at the park for hours, ever since your mom had dropped you off in the morning and gone to work. You wanted to get home and read the next chapter of the Prisoner of Azkaban. "Okay! Sit down behind me, put your legs next to mine, and wrap your arms around my tummy. Got it?" You clung to her tightly and felt the familiar sensation of fear coming back as she scooted towards the edge of the slide. Her hands covered yours over her midsection and you whispered in her ear, "Quinn, please don't let go." Quinn held onto you tighter and whispered back, "I won't, Santana. I will take care of you and protect you." Your eyes went wide when you realized what she had just said, a nice, fuzzy feeling filling your chest. "You promise?" you asked hopefully. "I promise," she answered fiercely.
In that moment, neither of you realized the meaning and the significance of those words. It wasn't until later that you grasped the fact that it was the first promise anyone had ever made to you. And it wasn't until even later that you realized that the promise, those simple words, meant the world to you.
A/N: I hope you liked it, I'm really proud of the outcome.
I look forward for some feedback!
Special thanks to my best friend, Vashti. She beta'ed this, and put up with my crazy. She always does and she made this possible.