Accidentally In Love
Rating: PG
Coupling: Pezberry, Pezberry, Pezberry! Sorta.
Summary: 5 times Santana thought she fell in love with Rachel. And the one time she did.
1
December 18, 2004
Sundays had always been Santana's favorite day of the week. It was the one day of the week her father was guaranteed to not be working in the hospital, and her mother's law firm didn't need in her office. So, her family always woke up early in the morning and drove to her grandmother's house by 8am for breakfast before heading to St. Rose Parish for mass at 11:00.
Today, her abuelita had taught her her very special migas recipe. She'd had to promise three times not to divulge the secret ingredients to her best friend Brittany, because migas were her favorite, too.
Sunday mornings also meant Sunday evenings, where the Lopez family took their daughter to what was her favorite restaurant ever: the Red Lobster, where they brought all the cheddar bay biscuits you could ever eat. She'd been known to eat four whole biscuits along with all her popcorn shrimp. A mighty feat, if she said so herself.
Unfortunately, dinner had been disturbed by a commotion a couple tables over, by an interracial pair of gentlemen in suits, arguing with the manager of the restaurant. Through the wild gestures, Santana could see a little girl about her age wearing the cutest weiner dog sweater, nervously chewing on a biscuit. She didn't seem to be enjoying the delicious, cheesy goodness. It must have been the screaming.
'People like them,' the manager said. Were they too tall? One of the men looked African-American, but there was another couple in a booth by the corner that had the same skin color. The other man wore glasses and had kind of a big nose like her pediatrician Dr. Epstein, and everyone loved him.
Santana had managed to glean the words 'tenth birthday' from the conversation, along with 'homersexual' - she'd have to ask her papi what that meant, later on. No girl should ever have to deal with getting thrown out of a restaurant like that, especially not on the big 1-0. She waved to the girl, mouthing a hello in order to keep from attracting the adults' attention to themselves. After a moment's hesitation the little brunette waved back, shyly lifting her sweater to reveal a Rachel Berry's 10th Birthday t-shirt underneath.
Rachel, she guessed that was her name, lowered her sweater back down and used a sleeve to wipe at the tears spilling down her cheeks. Santana couldn't but feel an intense ache in the pit of her stomach, as the girl kept trying to blink away her tears. Eventually, the two men guided Rachel towards the door. She concluded that they must have been her daddies. Awesome. Despite her sadness for the girl, she felt a smidgen of jealousy at the thought of having not just one, but two dads to take care of her.
She quickly got up from the table, catching her Sunday's Best on an errant splinter on the back of her chair. Pulling off the Daddy's Girl necklace her father had bought for her at Claire's. It was only her 3rd most favorite possession.
It was only a moment before she blocked the path to the door. Fortunately, the two tall men stopped before trampling over her. It would have been too much bother to see the reactions of Rachel's fathers, so Santana kept her eyes on Rachel. She chewed on her lower lip for a moment, then thrust the little plastic necklace into Rachel's hands. "You look like you need this."
Rachel looked at the little hispanic girl in the torn dress and smiled, though she still looked so sad to her. The little songbird sniffed before responding shyly, "Thank you..."
"Santana Lopez," she filled in, as the question of her name hung in the air. Then, it had been nothing but the two young girls staring at one another. Santana's gaze broke first as her head tilted towards the ground, staring at her feet.
"I'm gonna hug you now."
Santana perked up at the soft warning, then quickly found herself in the full body embrace of the very special Rachel Berry. It passed quickly enough, and soon, Santana watched as Rachel was scooped up by her darker-skinned father, and carried to the Berry's SUV.
She hoped they'd see each other again.
Auhtor's Note: As the summary alludes, I'm planning to come up with 6 kinda-sorta-almost related Pezberry ficlets. It should prove easier on my brain than a continuing story... *cough* Chapter 2 to come out as soon as my imagination will allow!