Chapter Six:

And when light returns to our hearts,

We'll share a look and know our past.

The rest of Christmas went off without a hitch. Santana received a small apology from Quinn along with a guilty "Merry Christmas" phone call in the afternoon of Christmas day. She had told the blonde on the phone not to worry about it and queried about what had changed her from stubborn to grovelling.

Quinn had not replied but just asked when Santana was leaving back to New York and what her plans were for New Year's.

Rachel had taken over with her plans for this particular celebration, so it was on the day before New Year 's Eve Santana found herself inviting Quinn to a get together that involved both Rachel's dads and her own dysfunctional family. She needed Quinn to keep her sane, but it seemed the blonde wasn't sure whether she was going to come or not.

Santana was not surprised, after what had happened in the previous few months she was not sure Quinn even wanted to hear her speak about Rachel anymore. But it had been Rachel whom had pushed her to ask Quinn to come.

She tried to cover for the blonde, telling her that Quinn was always asked to go to some sort of church mass with her parents on New Year's Eve. Rachel though, was having none of it, stealing her phone (which seemed was becoming a habit of sorts) and texting Quinn herself.

The blonde had replied with a nonchalant "we'll see" and Santana finally got Rachel to drop it.

Being in the middle of her two best friends while one of them was seriously in love with the other and said object of affection was clueless, felt like being in a fucking Shakespeare play with all the angst of a teen drama film. Santana enjoyed immersing herself in their troubles though, just so she could forget about Brittany.

It was the first New Year's since they were seven years old she was going to be spending without the other blonde half of her heart. She wasn't looking forward to that part, but she was sure what with Rachel running around like a mad woman and her mother following with Hiram and Leroy, she was going to have enough to deal with.

Still, she would have liked some blonde around, it was a pity Quinn couldn't face her demons, not that Santana was being hypocritical by calling her a coward…right?

The laughter rang out over the music playing on the stereo, a mix tape of classic rock her father had borrowed from Leroy when he learnt that they had pretty much the same music taste.

Santana's mother fell about laughing as Rachel tried to prize Julian from Hiram's back and the older man laughed, tickling Anthon underneath the arms. Sara, Santana's little sister just watched from the sofa, quietly.

Santana had always been distant from her brothers, but Sara was different. She was the second oldest at fifteen and Anthon and Julian were non-identical twins of nine.

As she moved towards the kitchen she tapped her little sister on the shoulder and nodded her head towards the other room, Sara stood, avoiding her father's tipsy attempt at a hug and followed her older sister into the kitchen.

Santana poured herself a Jack Daniels, slipping a drop into a new glass and topping them both up with cola. She held out the glass to Sara and the younger girl took it, matching her mischievous wink as they toasted.

"So, what's up chica?" Santana asked, leaning against the counter as Sara jumped up to sit on it beside her.

"Nada, mom's a pain in the neck, dad's hardly ever around, Ant and Jules are killing me…same old same old. I wanna hear about New York!" she replied, moaning before trailing off excitedly and Santana chuckled.

"It's just New York baby girl. Nothing special. My apartment is tiny and cold, my only friend there is Rachel and we're top of our law class, I guess that's good news."

Santana trailed off, thinking about Rachel's college choices for what could have been the millionth time since she walked into her law class. It was true; she and Rachel had been acing their law class since the start of the term.

Rachel was putting her all into it, spending most of her time with or without Santana studying everything relevant and some irrelevant to the subjects she was taking at NYU. The girl was clever, Santana would give her that, but there was something huge missing from Rachel's work and her demeanour when she studied.

Back at McKinley, when Rachel Berry did something you could tell, it was done properly with effort and above all passion. Rachel had no passion for the subjects she was studying, she put effort and work in but she never seemed to have any passion for what she was doing.

"You look thinky." Sara moaned and Santana came back to the present, shaking her head clear and taking a sip of her drink.

Sara reached across and ran her fingers over Santana's forehead.

"What are you doing?" Santana asked as she regarded the girl's concentration face, tongue between teeth, and a small scowl about her eyes. Santana recognised it; she had caught herself doing it many a time during late night study sessions.

"When you go all thinky-looking it's like you've borrowed Granma's forehead for the day." Sara replied as Santana let the skin on her forehead be ploughed and pulled.

"Well, it's what being old does to you." The older Lopez shrugged and Sara pulled back, surveying her.

"San..." She began thoughtfully as she regarded Santana's bittersweet smile. "Do you want to talk about it?"

Santana sighed and shook her head, smiling at her little sister fondly as she tucked a spare strand of the trademark Lopez black hair behind Sara's tanned ear.

"Brittany would want you to talk about it." Sara mumbled and Santana ceased her actions, moving her hands to steady them around her glass. She took an extra-long pull at the drink, blinking slowly.

"Pull up a pew bigger-me." Sara gestured for the space next to her on the counter and offered her a hand. Santana took the hand, kissed the back of it and in one movement, leapt up to sit on the counter, a leg folded beneath her.

"I know she would." Santana addressed the earlier statement. "But it's all because of her."

Sara wove her arm through Santana's and around her back, pulling herself closer so she could rest her head in the crook of Santana's neck.

"Well, you don't have to talk about it. I get it, you love her. Simple like chemistry."

Santana frowned down at the dark hair on her shoulder.

"Chemistry is a really, really hard subject Sair."

The younger Lopez pulled away and grinned, nodding.

"Yeah, one of the hardest, but you can't stop chemistry from happening, maybe on the odd occasion you can stop a reaction, but there's always some sort of chemistry going on somewhere."

Santana thought about the analogy for a moment.

She and Brittany were two chemicals that had come together. They had formed a bond very early in their lives and so had never really lived without each other. But people didn't understand their bond, they didn't understand how it had happened and so they poked and prodded, looking for a reaction. After a while, the bond changed and was influenced by the people trying to instil a reaction in their relationship.

Santana realized who she was in that respect. She was the scientist, poking and prodding at the relationship, scared of the unknown and trying to find a familiar reaction or happening that could be pinned as normal.

"You're fucking clever, you know that?"

Sara grinned up at her, white teeth straight and shining just like Santana's.

"You tell me that all the time. It must be true."

Santana pulled her younger doppelgänger into a hug and felt Sara relax into her embrace.

"I miss you San."

It came out as the tiniest admission, Sara being a typical Lopez and not really working with feelings, only logic.

"I miss you too baby girl." Santana replied into the familiar black hair, soothing it at the nape of her sister's neck where she used to stroke when she was a toddler.

Sara pulled away and drank some of her drink, leaning back against the cupboards.

"What about you? You looked kinda thinky in there just now." Santana used her famous finger quotes and Sara scrunched up her nose.

"I was thinky. Thinky about stuff. You know how it is. Mom's always on my back about helping with the twins and dad's never around to help her like I said."

Santana narrowed her eyes.

"That's shit stuff S. But, that's not what's got you so thinky."

Sara's face fell as though she were remembering something and Santana's affinity for her sister hit her square in the chest.

"Seriously, what's wrong?" she rested a hand on her shoulder and leant forward to look into Sara's eyes. They were wet with tears as she tried to hide them with the back of her hands, the dark brown echo of Santana's eyes showing signs of shame at her emotions.

"Sara…"

"I think…I think I'm like you."

Santana blinked.

"Well, you are. We're sister's that supposed to be like that. Same hair, same skin, same parents, same blood…"

"No I mean…I think I'm gay."

"Then it's possible we have the same taste in women, tell me who she is." Santana leant forward, her hands cupping Sara's as the girl looked away, hiding her tears.

"Charlie." Was all Sara managed and Santana nodded.

Charlie Greer was the sister of a play mate Anthon and Julian had when they were in kindergarten. She was the same age as Sara but went to a different school.

Charlie had dark auburn hair and sparkling green eyes, pale skin and was a little shorter than Sara (whom, despite inheriting most of her mother's features, managed to grow tall like her father, now just a head smaller than Santana herself). She was thin, athletic with a wicked sense of humour and an appetite for adventure. However exciting she was though, Santana knew that Charlie's sensitive side was what appealed to Sara. The girl used to help look after Anthon and Julian during their younger years and so showed how wonderfully mature she could be in emotion while being plain and simple for kids.

She reminded Santana of a certain blonde she knew.

"Good choice."

Sara let out a spluttering laugh.

"It wasn't a choice."

Santana nodded slowly.

"Have you talked about it with mami or papa?"

Sara shrugged.

"I tried…they just told me I was trying to copy you!" Sara replied, sighing and fiddling with Santana's fingers. "I thought, you would be the best person to talk to and you've been away…but now you're back."

Santana grimaced.

"Sara, baby girl. I may be your sister and we share a lot, but I don't how to give good advice. I'll listen and I'll help you if this is the way you want to live your life, but I'm not a good role model at all. I opened that closet door and tripped over every piece of fucking dirty washing I could find and nearly fell back in a few times."

Sara sighed and halted the attention she was administering on her sister's hands.

"So…is there no one I can talk to?"

Santana thought for a second.

"Of course. There are so many. I'd say Brittany but that's a bit well…."

"You're going thinky again."

"Sorry. Perhaps not Brittany, not Mami or Papa. There's always Quinn, I mean she's pretty good at advice..."

"Has Quinn told Rachel she's in love with her yet?"

"No." Santana replied thoughtlessly.

"Then I'm not taking advice from her." Sara shrugged.

"Wait, how did you know?"

Sara smirked.

"Does the phrase: repressed lesbian, judgmental bitch, awesome gaydar. Sound familiar bigger-me?"

Santana resisted the urge to ruffle her sisters' hair before carrying on.

"There's Rachel but she's undetermined, she claims to know a lot but she hasn't got any first-hand experience in coming out. Only her dads know what that's like."

Sara looked up.

"Then why don't I talk to them?"

Santana thought for a second.

"It's certainly a possibility. You want me to ask or do you wanna do it yourself?"

Sara bit her lip in thought and Santana watched her deliberation.

"I'll ask, but not right now. Sometime soon but, I need time to get used to this whole confusion thing…you know?"

Santana smiled and ran her fingers through the ends of Sara's black locks.

"Oh trust me, I know."


When it had got to ten o clock Rachel had accepted that Quinn was not coming.

When it had got to ten thirty Rachel had changed her mind.

Eleven o clock rolled past and Rachel decided she was stupid for thinking Quinn would actually come.

By half eleven she was setting a glass aside for the blonde just in case she decided to turn up for midnight.

Midnight passed without much drama, Santana kissing Rachel stiffly but gratefully on the cheek, the brunette returning the gesture with a hug and a peck on the temple.

If you had asked Rachel exactly a year ago that in three hundred and sixty five days she was going to be spending New Year's eve with Santana Lopez, laughing with her as a best friend as midnight came to pass, her dad's spending time with her family, eating food together, she would have laughed in your face.

And yet, it was one of the happiest New Year's celebrations Rachel had ever experienced.

There was a nagging feeling though, and as more often than not, blonde hair and hazel eyes were at the forefront of her mind.

She wondered whether Quinn had gone out with some colleagues from the diner, perhaps she'd tried to go back to her parent's, house…Either way Rachel prayed she wasn't sitting alone in her downtown bedsit listening to people spend New Year's together while she sat alone.

So one o clock came and went as Santana showed her sensitive side by tucking her brothers in to bed, her mother and father talking to Rachel's dads about something parental as Rachel sat watching the stars on the front porch with Sara.

They didn't talk; Rachel found that Sara was very much like Santana, especially when it came to the way they kept their emotions under stony poker-faces.

It was quarter to two when Sara decided enough was enough and she was going to bed. Laying a small Santana-like hand upon the brunette's shoulder she twitched her lips in a small smile and left Rachel upon the porch, staring at the sky.

As she sat she heard the sound of laboured footsteps upon gravel. Turning slightly she saw the bright orange end of a cigarette move about in the darkness behind a streetlamp. The footsteps continued and sure enough somebody moved in to the light.

Swaying slightly with three quarters of a bottle of scotch in her hand, Quinn Fabray took a long suck on the cigarette and subsequently threw it away over a car and into the road as she exhaled the smoke.

"Quinn!" Rachel tried hard not to sound too excited, but excited enough to show that she cared and that Quinn had actually been missed. Quinn choked on the smoke she was exhaling in fright, spluttering for air as Rachel waited for her to regain her composure.

"Fucking…Rachel….Shit…" came the reply as the blonde stumbled up the grass.

"Quinn Fabray!" Rachel frowned. "Are you drunk?"

As the blonde came to a stop on the porch she leant against the rail.

"Rachel." She shook her head, breathing fast after her choking session and repeating her name. "Santana invited me, but I didn't know whether I should come or not, whether I could. And I was, drinking to get up the courage but then I kept talking myself out of it, I meant to be here before midnight but then I got lost cause some jocks letting off fireworks in the park nearly hit me with them while I was taking a shortcut…"

Rachel thought about how endearing Quinn's babbling was. Not annoying and incessant like her own, but scatter-brained and rather cutely strung together with stutters and forlorn apologetic facial expressions.

The brunette did think that Quinn was going to pass out if she didn't stop, so she relieved the blonde of her explanation by holding up a hand.

"Quinn, come and sit down." She patted the cushions of the wicker sofa that she was sat on.

The other girl looked guilty still, but made her way haphazardly to the chair, tripping and collapsing half onto Rachel. Only slightly rolling her eyes, the brunette helped Quinn right herself.

She noticed with surprise, in a small part of her brain, at how comfortable Rachel was with Quinn half sprawled over her; as though it was familiar or something she was used to. It wasn't. The most times Rachel and Quinn had ever had body contact was when Quinn was trying to hurt Rachel, or when Rachel laid her hand over Quinn's in the diner a few days before.

"Sorry." Quinn mumbled and Rachel chuckled.

"It wasn't Santana's idea to invite you, you know." She replied after a few seconds silence.

"Wasn't it? Who's idea then?"

Rachel rolled her eyes.

"Who else could it be?"

Quinn shrugged, playing with the cap on the bottle.

"Sara, maybe Mr Lopez…"

"Me, you idiot." Rachel interjected with a disparaging smirk.

Quinn turned to look at Rachel, staring at her in what Rachel took to be a calculating gaze.

"Why?" she asked in a small voice, her vulnerability showing on her thin exhausted face.

Rachel bit her lip, thinking about it for a second.

"Because I wanted you to be here. Santana for one, misses you like crazy, she doesn't know it, but when she falls asleep sometimes at my apartment all she talks about in her sleep is you, Brittany and Sara. Occasionally my name comes up, but not as much as yours."

Quinn looked thoughtful at this and Rachel continued.

"Also because I wanted things to change. I figured if Santana and I could put aside our differences then so could we. There were moments in high school when I believe we were able to tolerate and perhaps even enjoy each other's presence, however limited that time we spent together was. I think we could get along Quinn, if I wasn't so annoying and you weren't so sensitive to my being annoying."

Quinn's lips twitched into a sad smile.

"You tell me you want to try being friends, after you offer me a space to live with you?"

Rachel chuckled and Quinn joined in.

"It is a little backwards isn't it." Rachel admitted and Quinn sighed in what she interpreted to be the beginning of some sort of confession or admission.

"I've been thinking about it." The blonde continued to play with the cap on the bottle of scotch, avoiding Rachel's eyes.

"Since my mom and dad kicked me out again, apart from Mike no one's been there for me. I was terrible to you Rachel, I was the worst person I could be towards you, and yet here you are, the knight in shining armour caring for me like I actually matter. I appreciate it, I really do, I don't deserve it and I know you know that too. I think you're a really good person."

Rachel waited as Quinn swallowed.

"I think that's why you offered first, you're a very emotionally in touch person. You always do what is right for your feelings; that is second only to your need for being a good person. A good person would see someone in a…difficult position and offer them help. At the diner you were being a good person, here and right now you're doing what's right for your feelings."

Rachel nodded, wondering vaguely if years of rambling had rubbed off Quinn's own speech patterns.

"Yes, but when I saw you outside Mandy's that first day back I felt it. I don't quite know what it was but I knew I wouldn't let that be the last I saw of you. The good Samaritan in me marries quite healthily to my emotional being and when I came to convince you to move to New York it was not just the intention of being a good person, but I actually felt as though life could give you so much more than it was at that moment." She explained.

Quinn smiled and took in a deep breath.

"New York, New York." She sang lightly and Rachel revelled in the sound, closing her eyes as Quinn continued to hum, broken only by the sound of the bottle shaking and a hefty swallow.

"Like I said I've been thinking about it." Quinn added and Rachel opened her eyes again, Quinn looking straight back at her.

"What's your conclusion?"

Quinn bit her lip.

"I'd like to take you up on it." She replied quietly and Rachel beamed, though she wasn't quite sure why.

"Fantastic, I'll let Santana know." She replied and they both looked out at the dark street, thinking about what they had just initiated. Rachel felt the chair move as Quinn put the bottle of scotch beside her leg on the floor.

"Rachel…"

She turned and was taken aback by the burning look in Quinn's eyes. It was the first time since high school Rachel had seen that look and before it had been anger but now it looked like passion, like need, like the real type of burning. Quinn was facing her, arm on the back of the chair, gazing intently at her with a look on her eyes of fear and inexplicable need.

Without a word the blonde's fingers moved to Rachel's, both of them not moving but watching with steady gazes as they linked together in Rachel's lap.

She swallowed.

She didn't understand why she was letting Quinn do this in the first place, let alone why on earth she felt it in the pit of her abdomen, on the back of her neck and knees, between her legs. She felt that incredible warmth spread about her body as she looked back up at Quinn.

Never dropping her gaze, Quinn moved forward, her other hand moving from the back of the sofa to rest lightly on the skin between Rachel's neck and shoulder. Rachel felt the soft fingertips on her hot skin; the goose bumps were not just left by the chill of Quinn's fingers but moreover just by their touch.

Quinn moved further forward, her face a few inches from Rachel's, gauging the brunette's reaction. All Rachel could do was stay still, not in horror but in pleasant and confusing shock. She was not attempting to stop Quinn, she knew what was coming. She had no idea how it was happening or whether Quinn really knew what she was doing.

Their breath mixed in the cool air just in front of them as Quinn moved closer. Rachel closed her eyes as both of them revelled in the closeness.

Instinctively Rachel leaned forward a millimetre, the scent and taste of Quinn's scotch, cigarette and sweet breath an intoxicating mix. Rachel had never condoned smoking and on anybody else it was horrible, but Quinn wore the scent well, sweet but not as tarry as others.

There are moments in life, where you become so close to something that the small stimuli on your skin feel as though you are actually in physical contact with it. This was that moment.

Amongst the soft breathing battering at her lips, Rachel could almost taste Quinn's lips, if she moved a bit closer it would have been possible, but something halted inside of her.

She felt it in Quinn too, they both stopped dead, the hands Quinn had lain on Rachel stiffening as her shoulders followed.

Rachel opened her eyes to see Quinn's still closed as she tilted her head away from facing Rachel but more to her own lap. A laugh that sounded more like a sob, racked through Quinn's body as she pulled away shaking her head.

"I'm so fucking drunk." She admitted to herself and Rachel tried to recover, filing away this experience to analyse later.

Shaking her stupor off she took the bottle from beside Quinn's leg.

"Where did you get this anyway?" she wrinkled her nose as she sniffed.

Another bitter laugh split the night air.

"When my dad kicked me out of his house, I stole the only thing that was more precious than god to him. I have like, three bottles of whisky and a few small flasks of his bourbon too. Oh, and I stole a bottle of mom's favourite wine."

Rachel let her eyebrows touch her hairline.

"Why?"

"I don't know. Out of spite, revenge. Part of me just wanted to go crazy like they said I was, so I thought about it, and this is what I came up with." She shrugged. "It's always a plus to go home to a full liquor cabinet after a long day."

Rachel pursed her lips together and moved the bottle to the small porch table beside her, folding her arms.

"Quinn…" she asked tentatively and the blonde looked up at her with wary eyes.

"Rachel?"

"Why…" she began but she faltered, thinking deeply how to word her query. "Why is it…that your parents threw you out? I mean, why they think you're crazy…you. You don't have to answer I just, was curious is all."

The silence wasn't awkward, but it reeked of thoughtful tension. Quinn looked at the watch on her hand and brushed her hands against her jeans.

"I think you already know Rach." Quinn whispered as her hot breath turned into steam before the moonlight.

Rachel quivered at the shortened version of her name; she was accustomed to Santana using it, but never Quinn. It had been a shock to hear the blonde say her full name in the first place. Her eyes narrowed in a stare of deep thought at the decking of the porch.

"I should probably go in and see S. I haven't seen her properly since…"

Rachel nodded and Quinn stood, offering her a small lopsided smile that seemed to knock the breath out of Rachel, before entering through the half open door of Santana's house.

It was then that Rachel was sure she knew the reasons for Quinn's becoming homeless.

She laughed a little hysterically to herself as she tried to remember ever knowing anyone who hadn't turned out to be at least a little bit gay. She sighed when she couldn't think of anyone, not even herself, and smiled to herself as she looked up once again at the stars.