Title: Hold Her Hand Too Tight
Part/Chapter: 2
Pairing: Faberry
Type: Romance, Angst
Rating: M
Summary: A false hope in their love is all they have, so she's hanging onto it until it becomes the truth.
Okay so I have decided that I'm going jump from moment to moment in different chapters in no particular order; just what I feel might fit right as the next moment. Some chapters may follow one after another chronologically and others may jump from 5 years ahead to 6 years before the present. So this will be a ride for all of us but I'm going to do the best that I can with it.
By plucking her petals,
you do not gather the beauty of the flower.
~Rabindrath Tagore
"UNO! WOO! What is that? Three games in a row guys," Rachel leans back on her knees admiring the final red card that stared back at her. Smiling wide she holds the card closer to her chest in an effort to save it from roaming eyes. "Looks like I'm a pro at this game." She looks around at the rest of the group settled at the glass coffee table in the middle of the living room that she and Quinn shared. Santana: four cards; Puck: six cards; and the love of her life: five
Santana eyed the smaller girl suspiciously. "Berry, I swear your short little dwarf self is cheating. And there is no way that this is your first time playing this game." She rests herself against the couch, laying her remaining cards on the table and picking up the can of Pepsi that was left abandoned throughout the round. "This is the most that I have ever been beaten in one night cause I'm the fucking master at this game. Right Q?" She tilted her head back, drinking the remnants of her soda.
The girl in question nodded her head, her ten cards clutched in her hands, long blonde hair resting on her shoulders. "Yup." Her eyes weren't focused on anything particular, just anything that would her mind busy.
Puck watched Rachel as her excitement slowly fizzled away. He wasn't as close to the girls as he used to be but he knew that Rachel was hurting, just as much as Quinn hurt. Rachel's hand reached out to hold Quinn's and she placed a kiss on her girlfriends the pale cheek. Santana picked up her cards again and broken the silence. "Come on Q, your turn to go. You better have some cards to put Berry back in her place.
Quinn smiled and shuffled through her cards until her thumbs landed on the one that she had in mind, "You better be ready S."
"Oh I am."
Quinn placed down four cards quickly, and Santana and Puck followed suit with their own, each card displaying a perfect "2" with a plus in the corners. Quinn smiled more as her two friends stood and did victory dances as Rachel drew 12 cards with a frown on her face. "You'll win next time baby." She kisses Rachel's head then stands up, crabbing the corner of the coffee table to keep her steady. "Now, I have to pee. And oh…," swiftly she smacks down her final card before leaving the table, heading for the bathroom in the hall, "UNO out. Don't beat her too bad guys."
Blocking out the sounds of excitement from the room beyond the wooden door, Quinn leaned down over the sink to splash water on her face. Her hair cascaded down, forming a wall between her and the rest of the world, before she lifted her head up barely, just to see her reflection in the mirror. The girl starring back at her was distressed and frail. Two hands caressed the cheeks on a face that she could barely recognize. It was drained of color, lacked the tactfully applied strokes of make-up it used to bear and tauntingly diminished the very definition beauty that she had worked so hard to achieve. Quinn hung her head low, tightly closing her eyes to stop her thoughts, and wiped her hands over her face. After drying her hands with the hand towel that was awkwardly placed between the shower and the mirror, Quinn reached for the hair brush on the sparkly brush holder that Rachel placed in the bathroom. The girl couldn't help but smile at the memory of her more than adorable girlfriend with glitter all over her face as she practically poured pounds of "Hollywood cerise" pink all over the dull brush holder. Running the brush felt incredible on her scalp as she let the memory replay in her mind, her lids closing again.
The brushing always helped. On days when the chemo was really bad and on nights where the only time she would move out of bed was to curl over the toilet and her let her insides out, it helped. It made her feel pretty among the hand of ugly cards that life had dealt her.
She ran the brush through her locks a last time while opening her eyes and hazel with a sprinkle of brown freckles landed on clumps of blonde hair that knotted on the brushes bristles. "I..." Cautiously, her fingers danced between the strands that grew from her head, the pads grazing spots where hair used to be. It was happening. She couldn't stop the tears from as her legs gave in and she fell to the tile floor.
It's real. This is happening to me. The bathroom's objects looked on at the girl curled in a ball in the middle of its floor; the tile posing no effort to comfort her as the object of her demise lay a few feet away. Muffling her cries, her arms locked around her as if it was the only thing keeping her together. She couldn't lose her hair. She couldn't be bald.
I can't have cancer.
Tears hit the floor, and all the strength in her broke. Maybe no one would check up on her. She hoped no one would.
