So next chapter for my loyal readers! Sorry it took a while but I am currently living the most amazing summer ever! My friend invited me out to her cattle station (have you seen the movie Australia? And they're just at that house in the middle of nowhere? This is what it's like, the nearest town is five hours away and all you can see for miles is gum trees and red dirt!) and we have been having the most incredible time. However there is no internet or phone reception out there so I can't work on this at all! I am writing this on my quick break back at home (needed to buy supplies) before heading back out there tomorrow which is why it is a little bit shorter. Hope you still like it though!
The four walked over to the empty chairs in the waiting room where they were met by the curious glances of the other teenagers, none of whom had the courage to say anything upon glance of their defeated faces except for Puck.
"Where the hell are they taking her?" He exclaimed angrily as he watched an orderly wheel a sleeping Santana away, several nurses and doctors following to monitor the girl's vitals.
Mr Schue drew in a deep breath before replying in a sombre tone, "They're moving her to the intensive care unit."
"What! Why?" This time it was Quinn who jumped in, the worry painted on her face identical to those on her peers.
"The test results from earlier show that she has a pretty bad infection and the doctors are worried about it because of how low her blood pressure is getting." A heavy silence settled over the group as they digested the news, all of them concerned for the safety of their friend.
After several minutes of heavy silence had passed Rachel let out a sigh and settled further down in the chair, running a frustrated hand through her hair as she tried to wrap her mind around how much had happened since she first woke up. It had only been a matter of hours since her fathers had been planning a health check to prevent something like this from happening and here she was living it instead. Oh right her fathers, she had nearly forgotten about them. They were probably wondering where the hell she was by now, school would have finished at least an hour ago.
"I'm just going outside, I have to make a quick phone call." She said quietly, holding up her cell phone as proof. Mr Schue gave her a slight nod in acknowledgement, everyone else too caught up in their own thoughts to even notice her leaving.
Stepping out into the brisk air Rachel dialled a familiar number into her phone, holding it up to her ear as she waited for a response from the other end.
"Hello?"
"Daddy?" Rachel half whispered, half sobbed when the familiar voice came over the line.
"Yes it's me. Where are you Rachel? School finished over an hour ago?" Leroy's tone was not angry or harsh, simply curious to the whereabouts of his daughter.
"I'm at the hospital. Santana..."
"Oh you convinced Santana to go see a doctor? That's wonderful, how did it go?" Leroy interrupted Rachel when he heard Santana's name, he would have to admit that the girl had not left his thoughts for most of the day.
"No Daddy...Santana...She...She's really sick and the doctors are worried and now she's in the ICU and I don't know what to do!" Rachel sobbed, feeling herself beginning to ramble on as she succumbed to the emotional pressure.
"Shh baby calm down. Why don't you start at the beginning?"
Rachel took a deep breath to collect herself before starting the tale. "We were in Glee club and Santana collided with Kurt and then she threw up and just kinda fell on the floor. She felt really hot so Mr Schue drove us over to the hospital and the doctors did some tests...I'm pretty sure they said something about an infection, but her blood pressure was really low and she lost consciousness so now she's in the ICU. Can you just...?" She trailed off, squeezing her eyes close and shaking her head slightly in disbelief at the tale.
"You want me to come down there?" Leroy filled in the blanks of the question, the lines on his forehead deepening in worry for both his daughter and her friend.
"Can you?" Rachel whispered, not trusting herself to not break down again.
"Of course sweetie. Your Dad finishes work in half an hour, we will be there right after that. Are you going to be okay until then?"
"Yeah I'll be fine. Anyway I should really get back to everyone, you know just in case there's any more news about Santana." Rachel let out a sad smile even though she knew her father could not see it.
"Okay then, I'll see you soon. Good-bye."
"Bye." Rachel responded before snapping her phone shut and walking back through the hospital, entering one of the elevators. She went to push the button for the third floor but saw that it was already lit up, assumingly by the young woman next to her. The pair travelled in silence until they reached the desired floor, Rachel walking over to the Glee club and the woman going over to the desk.
"Woah. I never knew Santana had a sister! They look so much alike." Sam exclaimed, his eyes following the woman from the elevator. It was only then that Rachel saw the uncanny resemblance the woman had to Santana, from the tanned skin to the dark expressive eyes, although hers looked slightly bloodshot.
"That's not her sister. She doesn't have a sister." Brittany said, finally looking up from her mother's embrace to face the group.
"Are you serious? That chick looks like she could be Santana's twin!" Artie piped up from his wheelchair, looking at Brittany in disbelief which earned him a dirty look from the girl. The other glee clubbers had also erupted in similar outbursts of disbelief.
"Hold up, you didn't let her finish." Puck called out over their voices, silencing the chatter.
"She doesn't have a sister. That's her mom." Brittany finished as she eyed the woman in distaste, a similar look appearing on the face of the older Pierce.
"Oh wow, she's really young." Tina said softly, looking at the woman and trying to imagine her with a teenage daughter. A five year old maybe, but not a seventeen year old. It was hard to imagine that she was Santana's mother, it just didn't seem right. All of the club's heads turned in unison when the woman turned and approached them, trying to make it appear as if they hadn't been staring.
"I'm Louisa Lopez. The nurse said you were all here for Santana?" Her voice was blunt and her mouth was twisted into a scowl that everyone could easily recognise from her daughter.
"Yeah. We're all friends of Santana's. From Glee." Puck replied, his voice guarded as he maintained eye contact with Louisa.
"Glee? Well how do you know Santana?" She asked, a small laugh of disbelief escaping her lips as her eyebrows raised.
"Santana's a member of the Glee club. She has been for several years now, she is a very talented singer." Will stepped in to the conversation, his dislike for the woman after their meeting a few nights ago increasing tenfold.
"Huh figures, the girl never did know how to shut up." Louisa mused causing several members to shoot her nasty glances. She ignored them to answer her phone that had started ringing.
"Hi baby!...Oh just stuck at the hospital, Santana's gone and got herself sick...No, no don't bother coming she's probably just being her typical whiny self. Besides I need you to be at home ready and waiting for what I'm going to do to you tonight...Yeah you might need to go buy some more condoms...Alright, bye honey." The faces of several of the teens screwed up in disgust during the conversation, it was not really a topic they wanted to hear about from their friend's mom.
"Didn't any one ever tell you that cell phones aren't allowed in hospitals?" Brittany snapped, her normally bright blue eyes filled with hatred.
Louisa ignored her and turned back to address the group. "Well I guess if you're all here there really is no need for me to hang around. Tell Santana I'll see her at home whenever she gets out." With that the woman left leaving the New Directions to stare in disbelief.
"Fucking bitch." Puck muttered darkly, shooting daggers with his eyes at the woman's retreating back. Will didn't have the heart to reprimand him about language, every part of his being agreeing with the boy's statement.
Rachel could not believe that the woman she had just met was Santana's mother, surely even a bad parent would care when their child was in the ICU. And how on Earth were they going to tell Santana that the reason her own mother wasn't there was because she left to go have sex? But, she thought bitterly, judging by the looks on the faces of those who had known her the longest this wasn't exactly a rare occurrence. She was shaken from her thoughts when Santana's doctor walked into the waiting room, a frown etched across his forehead.
"Natalie Pierce?" He asked as he glanced down at the papers in his hand. The woman in question stood up, gently lowering Brittany back into the seat.
"Yes?" She questioned calmly, but the fear was evident in her eyes.
"We request your permission to perform emergency surgery on Miss Santana Lopez." The colour drained from Natalie's face as the words sunk in.
"O-Of course. But why, what happened?" She asked shakily.
"We now have reason to believe that Santana has developed what is known as abdominal sepsis. This means that the infection in her abdominal cavity has started to spread to the bloodstream. Her blood pressure is still very low which leads us to believe that she is at a high risk of entering septic shock, where the blood pressure drops dramatically preventing blood delivery to the major organs which causes them to shut down. If she develops septic shock the fatality rate is high even when treated, with twenty five to fifty percent of patients dying. Without treatment death is almost inevitable. The surgery will allow us to open up the abdomen to drain and remove the infected material and then flush out the abdominal cavity with antibacterial cleansers, hopefully preventing her from entering septic shock."
"Just do whatever you have to do to keep her alive. I'll sign whatever you need." Mrs Pierce said, her voice wavering slightly as the tears in her eyes threatened to well over. Rachel watched in sympathy, the pain both of the Pierce's were going through would be so much worse than hers, after all it was only in the last few days that Rachel would consider herself friends with the Latina. The attention turned to Sam when he stood up with a deep sigh, pinching the bridge of his nose.
"I'm sorry guys, I'm going to have to go. It's nearly seven and I promised by parents I'd be home for dinner...Ring me when she gets out of surgery?" The remaining teens murmured their agreement, with Tina, Mike and Mercedes saying they should leave as well. It was only then that Rachel realised Artie, Finn and Kurt had already left leaving just her, Puck, Quinn and Brittany as the only teenagers. She joined the others in the sombre goodbye's before sitting back down
"Rachel?" A voice questioned from the direction of the elevators causing the girl to whip around to see who it belonged to. She felt her body sag in relief when she saw the worried face of her two fathers, allowing herself to be swept up in their embrace once they were close enough.
"How is she?"" Hiram asked, allowing his eyes to scan across the waiting room before turning back to Rachel.
"She's in surgery at the moment, the doctor said they have to drain the infection otherwise she might die."
"Oh my god." Leroy breathed out, rubbing a hand across his forehead. "The poor girl."
"Not to interrupt the family moment or whatever but how exactly do your parents know Santana? Last time I checked you guys weren't exactly friends." Puck asked.
"She slept over at our house last night, we were trying to help her." Rachel responded, gesturing to her parents.
"Help her with what?" Puck demanded curiously. Rachel froze, how was she supposed to answer that? Santana would probably kill her if she told everyone about her little problem. But maybe it would be easier to help her if more people knew? No it would definitely be easier and these were her closest friends right?
"Her eating disorder." Rachel said with a sigh. As soon as the words left her lips Brittany started sobbing louder.
"Oh crap, not again. I thought she had finished with all of that. I mean I suspected but..." Quinn sighed heavily as she trailed off.
Puck kicked a chair in frustration before bursting out, "Why can't she just get that she looks fine! I thought after last time that this would be over damn it!"
"Wait what do you mean after last time?" Rachel asked cautiously.
"She went through a thing in freshman year where she was convinced that she wasn't pretty enough, that she didn't fit in. It didn't help that at that point she was the only one in the Cheerios that didn't have blonde hair and pale skin, Sue's not exactly the best for one's ego either. I caught her throwing up in the bathroom after lunch one day and the truth just came out. She continued for about another month before she stopped. She never told us what got her to stop, but it was about the same time we joined Glee and since then she's seemed fine. How did you find out?" Quinn explained the story, causing a few tears to fall from Rachel's eyes.
"I noticed she wasn't eating and I caught her throwing up at Puck's party when I knew she hadn't been drinking. Then I sang that song and she cried to me about it in the bathroom. The panic attack she had last night when we tried to get her to eat kind of confirmed everything." Rachel replied.
Will sat listening to the conversation of the teens around him. How could he have been so clueless about Santana this whole time? He had taught Santana during both of those times, in Spanish and then in Glee. She had even slept at his house and thrown up her food. But she didn't throw it up on purpose he frowned as he recalled the night.
"She seems genuinely scared of eating though. From what I've seen she doesn't force the food back up, her fear actually makes her physically ill." Rachel added on, not knowing she was voicing her teacher's thoughts.
The conversation about Santana was brought to a halt when the doctor came into the waiting room, his scrubs stained with what Rachel guessed to be Santana's blood.
"The surgery was a success." He said with a small smile, allowing looks of relief to cross their faces. "We did have to remove part of her small intestine, but that should not affect her. Worst case scenario is that she will have to take daily vitamins to ensure she is still getting enough nutrients. We're going to keep her in intensive care for a few more days to finish off a strong dose of antibiotics and to ensure that she recovers well after the surgery, but her blood pressure is slowly coming back up so we have every reason to believe she will make a full recovery. You can go in and see her if you want, she should be coming round from the anaesthetic soon but be aware she will likely be very groggy and disoriented. And just be careful of her abdomen, she's going to find it a bit sore and uncomfortable for a few days."
The doctor walked away and Rachel sighed in relief. "She's going to be okay."
So a bit shorter, hopefully worth it though. And no cliffhanger, unless you were hoping to see Santana! But now I have a question for you which I really want to know the answer to – How did you find this fic? Were you searching for Santana? Or Rachel? Or did you just randomly stumble across it? Did someone tell you about it? Please answer, I really want to know haha! Anyway TTFN!
