Disclaimer: I don't own Glee, its characters or any intellectual property.
I've done several fan fiction stories before, but this is my first Glee fic. I wanted to explore the Santana in New York sans Brittany storyline that has been presented. This fic is canon up until 4x13 Diva.
There are many choice words to describe Santana Lopez. She's heard any number of them hurled at her throughout the course of her life. The words are expressed with different tones and inflections. They all have specific, intended purposes, and thus strike various chords within her. No matter what she's been called, they all elicit a reaction.
Some terms she's been called are kinder than others. These are the words used by loved ones. Her parents have always used cherished colloquialisms with her. They are words spoken in Spanish whose English translations never quite capture their affection. Other things she has been called were whispered softly, intimately into her ear. Those phrases of love used to strike her as empty, just meaningless verbal fluff to encourage sexual promiscuity. However, she's found that when a certain blue-eyed girl spoke using those same sentiments… they felt different. They registered somewhere deeper inside her, somehow filling her heart with warmth. Those words always sped up her pulse and weakened her knees. Those were her favorite things to be called. Honey, sweetie, baby…
There are some are terms she's just getting used to labeling herself with. These words feel alien in her mouth as she says them—terms whose connotation denote a particular lifestyle choice or a specific sexual orientation. They're things that she's said about other people, usually when she was fiercely trying deflect questions about her own sexuality. Coming out was difficult for Santana and she has only semi-recently admitted the words' application to her own life. They're words that used to carry secrets and guilt—but now describe pride and community. Gay, lesbian, dyke…
Other words that Santana has been called are harsh, cruel syllables meant to shame. Those words cut deep when she hears them, burrowing down inside her like a splinter. Those descriptors are usually referencing her attitude or her habit of unfiltered brutal honesty, or even a commentary on her lack of self worth. Those hurt when they're directed towards her, but they build up her fortitude. She will never apologize for who she is, she tells herself whenever she tries to remove that splinter from her heart. Bitch, slut, worthless…
There will always be vernacular to utilize when trying to verbalize the complexity and depth of her life.
However, despite whatever series of letters one might attribute to explain her, Santana is not what one might deem an optimist. She isn't a self-described pessimist either, though some might attest that this is false. She doesn't see things in terms of "glass half full" or even "glass half empty"—as much as it may seem like she places life events and situations into these two categories. She doesn't believe in dichotomies: one or the other, white or black, this or that. Santana considers herself to be a realist.
Santana knows that life hands everyone choices. She knows that the choices made alter the outcomes and directions of her life. She knows that she's made some bad decisions, ones that never seem to escape her.
Even on nights like tonight, where everything seems perfect and preordained to be just exactly as they are, Santana knows that there is something that will always be missing. Even as she recoils from the boisterous cacophony of sound erupting from her roommates' mouths, she knows that this exact scene could be improved subtly, if only she'd made different choices in her life.
Thankfully, it becomes hard to dwell on the missing pieces of her life when her roommates never let their refurbished once-factory-now-a-loft-slash-studio space in Bushwick fall into silence (except when they're asleep). Every waking moment is an opportunity to sing, dance, and speak in soliloquies. While it becomes hard to have small moments to reflect with these two around, there's not much about them that Santana would change. If you'd asked her roughly a year before where she assumed she'd be at the present moment, she would have given you a much different answer. She might have said in college, or in Los Angeles recording an album, or maybe even she would have guessed New York. She never would have been able to predict the circumstances that got her here. She also would never have been able to guess that the one consistent part of each of her "year from now" scenarios wouldn't turn out to be so constant after all.
As Santana gazes at the dramatic hand gestures and shudders at the extremely grating vocal ranges that her roommates are employing in this most recent conversation, she can't help but to recede back into her own mind. If she lets her mind stray enough, she tends to fantasize about the missing parts of her life, adding to the scene before her different elements, as one might Photoshop something into a picture. She still sees Rachel, squawking about Julie Andrews' missing out on portraying the iconic Eliza Doolittle in the film adaptation of My Fair Lady to Audrey Hepburn. She still hears Kurt shriek in agreement before launching into the first few lines of "I Could Have Danced All Night" in his feminine troubadour falsetto. She still sees the wine in their cheap glasses sitting on the coffee table, blissfully undisturbed as Rachel joins in, sauntering around the room. She sees the shimmering lights of a much bigger world waiting right outside their windows, so near but still so far away. She still hears the rumble of life happening all around her, as she's perched, so close, on the precipice of that big break that will give her life direction. These things are all still there as she dreams, wide-awake.
The part that she always inserts into this dreamlike scene unfolding before her is something simple. It is a pressure behind her neck, an arm wrapped around her shoulders as she leans her head back against it. It is warmth emanating from a body as it sits closely coiled next to her. It is a scent, a lingering tenderness from slight skin contact, and a presence absent from her that makes her ache deep down into her bones. In this dream, she can turn her head and know that her eyes will find a pair gazing back into hers, a sharp blue that seep into hers. They're blue like a cloudless sky when happy, dark like choppy waters when lustful, pale like a robin's egg when sad. They're wide eyes, expressive, and somehow depthless. They see further into her soul than anything else ever has. They belong to the only person who Santana thinks has ever really known her. They belong to the only person who she desperately wishes was still there.
Santana drops her head, unable to maintain the charade that she's actively listening to her roommates' Broadway discussion. She cannot think of anything besides the lack of pressure behind her neck, the absence of warmth next to her, and the missing blue eyes. She thinks back to how she suffers for the decisions that she's made, but being the proud Latina that she is, always tries not to dwell on them—until she can't anymore.