There are five stages you have to go through when someone dies. Five states of mind.

1 Denial

"This can't be happening…" she muttered, her eyes glistening with unshed tears. "She's got years left ahead! She's got…her whole life…"

"I'm afraid she didn't, Miss Lopez. We did all we could, it just wasn't-"

"Enough. She'll take up, right?" she turned to Quinn here, her eyes begging, pleading, that she tells her the right thing.

Quinn didn't answer.

"No, this is a joke, a scam, a mistake! She can't be dead! She isn't dead!"

2 Anger

Screaming was the only relief she could find. That and throwing things, like lamps and CDs and papers and plates.

Smash – the china against the wall.

Crack – an indent in the plaster.

Ping – broken glass on the floor.

With every object she projected she cursed someone else in her head.

Puck, for introducing her to the hobby.

Her parents, for encouraging it.

The doctors, for not trying hard enough.

God, for taking her away.

Herself, for never saying goodbye.

Finally, when she settled and her breath had slowed, as she stood in the middle of all the broken glass and china, she decided that if it was anyone's fault, it was Brittany's.

She shouldn't have let herself die.

3 Bargaining

Over the next few days she made a lot of promises.

She promised to stop swearing, if He would give her back.

She promised to go vegetarian, if He would give her back.

She promised to go back to the church, if He would give her back.

She promised to become straight again, break up with her, if it meant she'd live again.

She prayed every night in hopes of maybe one prayer coming true, maybe one reaching Divine Hearing.

She even added she wanted nothing like that Stephen King bullshit. She wanted her Brittany back and not a mindless zombie or demon-possessed body.

Eventually she realized that even if He could hear her and could give Brittany back, he was either too busy, didn't care or just didn't want to.

4 Depression

Then kicked in that mind-numbing, chest-crushing, soul-aching darkness that clouded her mind and blinded her eyes.

She refused to leave her house, wandering around like a ghost instead with her hair down and her body wrapped in some sort of tunic from her mother's closet. She wandered around for days, growing surprisingly thin and pale. She couldn't cry anymore, her eyes were way too tired; she didn't eat or sleep, only dozed occasionally. The rest of her time she spent wandering. And reading.

Oh, the books she found! Her brother's collection of old Stephen Kings, her father's classics, and her mother's collection of Edgar Allan Poe. She read through them all, and days inside turned to weeks, merged together until one hour was indiscernible from another…

It wasn't until weeks until she stopped praying, after she was finally getting ready to return to her normal life, try to socialize again, that she found her father's collection of Italian novels…

Santana Lopez never arrived to the final stage, 'Acceptance'. It was a stage she need not live, for the discovery of a trilogy of Italian books gave her new hope.

For years she translated word for word, read and analyzed, memorized and understood. For eight years it was all she did.

And finally she bought a ticket to Las Vegas.