Deep breath. She is Santana Lopez. She will be fine.
The red suitcases bounced slightly as Santana dragged their wheels over the gravel driveway of her house, she didn't bother being careful as she put everything into the trunk and backseat of Brittany's silver car. Her grandmother was in the house, ignoring her departure. Santana saw her mother's sadness for her as she waved goodbye, her father merely looked pensive—then again, Santiago Lopez always looked pensive. Santana wondered if it would be worse to see her grandmother leave for Puerto Rico and never come back, instead of having her disregard her so completely. If that were the case, her grandmother wouldn't see her because she couldn't...
No matter now. Dwelling on things wasn't something Santana did, not now. Especially not now, she had to put on a brave face for her parents, she had to show them she was going to be alright—because she was going to be alright, she was only moving across town, and she was going to be with Brittany. And perhaps she'd visit, if only to ease her parents. She glances up at the window in the second floor with the heavy lace curtains… Or perhaps she wouldn't visit, seeing as the reason she was leaving was because she couldn't handle the disappointment that pierced her whenever her grandmother walked in the room.
She was doing this for her, mostly. Not for herself. Santana knew her presence made the woman uncomfortable, and she still loved her dearly. In a way, she understood why she was being ignored this way, things like this were unfathomable for a woman like her Abuela. She had known as a young child that the older woman's religion supposedly said a thing like being homosexual wasn't acceptable—and so when Santana found herself, she lost her Abuela.
Deep breath. She is Santana Lopez. She will be fine.
A lot happens in a week, Santana was sure it had been longer until she realized that Brittany's Cat Calendar was just now changing from January's fluffy white to February's calico. The idea of missing her own house had yet to cross her mind—or perhaps she'd been ignoring it until now. Santana had to admit to herself that a part of her still expected to 'go back home' at some point. It still felt like she was in stranger's house…because, well, she really was.
Brittany's parents were like the couples from Romantic Comedies would be a few years after the movie ended. They bantered, then smirked, then kissed briefly at every opportunity that came. Santana was currently keeping a mental tally of how many times they repeated the process this morning; six times, unless she had missed one in the time it took to make herself a mug of coffee in their strange, modern coffee maker. They seemed to like her well enough, grinning at her whenever one of them caught her examining them; she'd always grin back, it was hard not to. Santana felt creepy, studying the pair like this…but it was just so strange. They were the kind of family Santana thought only existed in fiction; with their kindness and their First World Problems and their office attire. She wondered if this is how those adopted inner-city children feel like—She'd shake the thought from her head soon after it arrived.
The twinge of sympathy behind the kindness of Mr. and Mrs. Pierce put Santana off, she felt like a charity case. Brittany's lips on her cheek made her start, turning quickly to her smiling face as she muttered her greeting. This was when Santana was unclear about things, Brittany's parents had made neither comment nor complaint about her staying in their daughter's room—and bed; and then again, they hadn't addressed what they thought Santana was to their daughter. And she hadn't yet managed to ask Brittany about it, finding the concept of it slightly daunting. These moments, when they were all in the room, caused her to tense, to take in the fact that she was mooching from people too kind to say no to her (or too unwilling to say no to their daughter.)
Deep breath. She is Santana Lopez. She will be fine.
And she won't overstay her welcome here, a job is not something difficult to find, right? She thought she could pay rent, at least, for the time she was here. Because she wasn't a charity case, no matter how much pity the parents of her girlfriend were trying to conceal. A beep from a Blackberry announced her cue to leave. With a wave and a thank-you (manners were becoming routine for her now) she and Brittany left for school.
Now, getting to school from Lima Heights Adjacent was what one could call a commute. After the rather loud alarm of "Ya estas tarde! Apúrate!" along with the fight of "You're not walking out with my earrings, you'll lose them! And don't wear those shoes you're not a whore!" and of course, the begging and pleading for the car that day (a fight she usually won, except on days where the Boss was driving her mother "fucking insane") It was a wonder Santana made it out of the house looking like she did.
The whistles from the local chiquillos was not something that bothered her anymore, it was impossible to get them to shut up. And it wasn't like Santana minded much now, it gave a nice little ego boost before school. If she had the car for the day, she'd make it to school by around the middle of Second Period. If not, the bus stop was on the other side of the tracks, on days her phone would manage to have service in her house, Brittany would pick her up.
But now it was like she had been put into a completely different life, a strange niche entirely alien from her own upbringing. Where you actually had an alarm clock that was on the right time and you woke up when the sky was still pink and yellow. And everyone was quiet in the morning, barely raising their voice to call upstairs to announce breakfast. She felt so out of place, this wasn't her, and as much as she'd love to pretend, she couldn't. Don't get her wrong, she wasn't ashamed, quite the opposite, she never failed to remind everyone of who she is. What she is. It's the... It's the lack of firmness, she thought; it was too Nice, too… cookie-cutter for her. They were lovely people, surely; but far from her type of people.
It was strange how people seemed to forget the past, or pretend it didn't exist. Conversely, it was strange how people never seemed to let the most trivial things go. It's also strange that so many people could look at her like they did, like they knew exactly who she was, but didn't know her at all, and on top of that felt entitled to do so. But that was school: labels and bullshit and endurance of the idiocy surrounding her. Whatever. She didn't care. She didn't care about the looks, she'd glare them down in the way her mother taught her how. It didn't matter what these unimportant people thought of her, or the things they were whispering since ages before she had come out (or rather, forced out..on local television). But fuck—it got tedious, and fuck if she wasn't about to Ends the next person who looked at her that way. Snix was emerging and she closed her eyes as she finally settled in her seat in the choir room.
Deep breath. She is Santana Lopez. She will be fine.
School bells were a sound she could definitely get used to never hearing again. The whiny pitch got into her head and she could find the note on a piano by now. Brittany was already leaning against the silver car by the time Santana had made it to the Student Parking Lot. A smile put the blonde's questioning face back to its cheery default; it never failed to be enough for her whenever she thought Santana wasn't alright. This was why it was easy to be with Brittany, she didn't pry.
The day was nothing out of the ordinary, except for the nagging image in the back of her mind. The image of a face she should hate more than she did. The face belonged to one Sebastian Smythe, the warbler who nearly blinded Blaine. The warbler she had dueled with—and got quite close to beating her. The Warbler who fiercely refused to leave her mind. She didn't know what it was, his voice was stuck in her head…his face, inches from hers, smirking down at her like he knew something she would never know. It hadn't left her alone since the duel... Smooth Criminal was the only song her iPod had played since then, she couldn't listen to anything else—every time she tried to, it didn't help. And during these past days she kept wondering why that was… So far, she hadn't the slightest clue.
She shook it off for what seemed like the hundredth time today, and smiled again at Brittany. The tugging image of the Prep-school Prat in the back of her mind still present as she sat in the passenger's seat... She just didn't know... that's what bothered her, made her want to hail a cab to Dalton again for a rematch. She was itching to hear the sound of their voices in harmony again, battling and powerful and full of passion—for the music, of course. The thought if the music was what was making her heart go faster. Making her cheeks feel suddenly very hot—
Deep breath. She is Santana Lopez. She will be fine.
The monotony of this new life was making Santana grow incredibly uneasy. She was used to the sudden yelling in the middle of the night, the constant fighting and the loud music blasting when you clean the house. This new life was so quiet. Everyone kept to themselves. The only interactions were during meals. And the conversation was too…strained. Or maybe she was too used to arguments occurring at the dinner table to find any of the discussions here stimulating. But no matter, she'd laugh when Brittany's father tried to be funny, and grinned at Brittany's mother across the table whenever the woman tried to be clever. This was another time of the day when Santana couldn't sit still. So to counteract this she kept her mouth full of the poorly-seasoned food, trying to stay as silent as she possibly could; occasionally resting her left hand on Brittany's thigh.
Her thoughts kept her up when everyone else was asleep, always. No matter how exhausted she was after sex with her girlfriend, not matter how much time she spent trying to find a good position for sleep—nothing helped. What also didn't help was that same image of that same Warbler, making her re-play the incident of their duel, thinking of what she could've said to wipe that amused half-grin off his face. She wondered if he thought he had won—which he didn't… She also wondered why the fuck these things were rotating in her mind, it had been ages since it happened/
It was better than thinking about her family, she supposed. Her rebellious nature had been a problem in the past couple of years, she'd admit to that without flinching—it's what all kids went through isn't it? And her Abuela had been patient, she had helped her through Puck, and Sam, and Finn sort of, and all of the other guys… But now, when she needed her support the most, when she had found the person she thought she will spend her life with, she turns her back. That's the most painful heartbreak she'd ever encountered, and it seemed that no one knew how to help her.
But she was stronger than to wallow for very long, thinking instead of the way Sebastian's eyes flashed with uncertainty when she announced that Blaine just might lose an eye, she smirked when she thought of how that split second of guilt was there because she put it there. A soft sigh came from Brittany's side of the bed, her back was to Santana—and she realized that she had just been grinning about a boy while sharing her bed with her girlfriend. The fact that they were merely memories of her putting him in his place didn't ease the uneasy feeling she was experiencing, considering that this problem was following her everywhere else. Santana wraps her arms around Brittany's small waist from behind, burying her head in the girl's soft blonde hair. And sleep does eventually come and take mercy on her—her dreams, however, aren't so forgiving.
Deep breath. She is Santana Lopez. She will be fine.