"No..seriously. What are you doing here?" Santana asked again, standing in the middle of the lobby. She refused to sit down at this moment.
Cassie rolled her eyes as she turned more towards Santana. "It's a vet, why do you think I am here?"
"Waiting on Shelby since she is a bitch you know." Santana responded casually as she walked over to wall, left of Cassie, to sit down in a chair.
"You better watch yourself Lopez, that is my wife you are talking about." Cassie sneered.
"Yeah well, your wife likes to treat her daughter, which is my fiancee like shit. I just calls it likes I sees it." Santana shrugged her shoulders and turned her head to look around the waiting room. She wondered if Shelby really was here.
"You know your fiancee knows how to read, write and pick up a telephone just as well as Shelby does. She could have just as easily called and their whole relationship could have been saved." Cassie wasn't going to sit here and let all the blame be put on Shelby.
Santana whipped her head around, shooting daggers from her eyes at Cassie. She leaned forward in her chair speaking in a low heated whisper. "Don't you dare put the blame for this on Rachel. That woman was still struggling with everything that had happened to her during that time. She needed her mother who happened to be too busy for her once London came calling. There were days that Rachel called five or six times a day, only for Shelby to brush her off saying she would call back and never did. Rachel asked about visiting and Shelby brushed her off again saying that she was too busy and she wouldn't have time to visit because of her work schedule. For any type of relationship to work there has to be effort on both ends and Shelby wasn't doing her part. A person can only be let down so many times before they finally decide they have had enough disappointment. So no, you don't get to place blame where it definitely doesn't belong."
Cassie leaned back in her chair a little stunned. She had no idea that it had been that bad and that Shelby had been brushing Rachel off like that. Why didn't she know this? She could have done something to help prevent this all from happening in the first place. Cassie was under the impression that once Shelby had left, they had just let the distance become too much. "I had no idea." Cassie whispered more to herself than Santana.
Mrs. July. The veterinarian stood next to the sign in desk, with a kitten carrier in his hand. He smiled when Cassie stood up. She paused for a moment and looked down at Santana who was sitting there brooding. She reached into her purse to pull out a piece of paper and write her number on it. "I know you don't care for me and frankly I can't stand you that much either, but...it wouldn't hurt to get together and maybe try and help Shelby and Rachel. If you're up for it that is."
Santana looked at the piece of paper as if it was a bomb that was about to go off. She knew she should really stay out of this, but apparently a lot of wires had been crossed over the years and maybe it wouldn't hurt to try and help uncross some of them. "Yeah, I will uh call you sometime. I am only going to do this for Rachel though." Santana said as she reached out to take the number.
"I'm only doing this for Shelby." Cassie said as she turned around to speak to the vet and pick up her kitten so that she could go and pick up Shelby from the sushi place down the block and then head home.
Santana sat there for a moment thinking about what had just happened as she watched Cassie walk out of the door. She could have sworn there was about to be a fight, except the way that Cassie had acted told Santana that someone hadn't shared the whole story. Rachel at the time hadn't been that willing to share the whole story either, it was by accident that Santana had seen all the calls on Rachel's phone that had went unanswered or only lasted two or three minutes.
Ms. Lopez. Santana smiled at the vet as she got up to walk Dax and Dahlia into the office. Maybe she and Cassie could work something out to help Rachel and Shelby or maybe this would all go horribly wrong. Only time would tell.
"Are you guys ready to go get some lunch?" Sam asked as he leaned back in his large leather chair and rubbed his stomach.
"I think I will head to the cafeteria and grab something there." Rachel responded as she gathered her things to head in that direction.
"Just remember no dairy, you have to sing again in a little while." Sam shouted at Rachel's back. Rachel chose to ignore that statement, she was well aware just what dairy could do to her voice. It wasn't like it was a huge issue considering she hardly every had dairy anyway. Rachel paused momentarily in the hallway to make sure that Jasper hadn't followed her, after being stuck in a studio with him for roughly four hours, she didn't want to see his face right now.
Everything had been fine while they were working, Sam never left her alone with him. She assumed that Puck had filled him in on a need to know basis. It was still a bit of a struggle to pretend that everything was fine. Rachel had to control her urges to jump every time Jasper spoke or got too close to her, she needed to reign that in so that it wouldn't become obvious. She couldn't say it enough that she hoped that all of this would be over soon before anyone got hurt.
As Rachel got closer to the cafeteria she pulled out her phone to see that she had a couple of text messages from Santana. She was maybe going to be late tonight depending on how long the dogs vet appointments took and she was asking if Rachel wanted to just meat her in St. Lawrence. Shit, Rachel though to herself, she had completely spaced about that too. Awh, but on the bright side they could take the dogs to the park and have a picnic. It felt like they hadn't done anything like that in a while now. There was a text from Leroy letting Rachel know that when she was ready he would book their tickets to Ohio. That trip may not be happening for a while considering how far they were behind on Jasper's music, everything else was still on schedule. The music video for Joe's song would start filming soon also. She didn't know all of the details yet, but the production crew could only say good things about the direction the video was going.
Looking up from her phone and around the cafeteria, Rachel noticed that there seemed to be a few more people in there today. Usually it was just her and maybe four or five others, but today there were some men and women that she had never seen before. It was possible they were part of the security detail that Puck had hired, he wanted ears and eyes all over the place. Rachel sighed, she knew he was going to do this, but did he really have to hire this many? Hopefully Puck had spun a good story for when someone asked.
Once Rachel had grabbed a salad and a water, she sat down at her normal table towards the back of the cafeteria. She wasn't trying to avoid anyone, she just chose to eat by herself so that she could eat quicker and get back to work. Today the universe had other plans as two women sat down with her.
Rachel almost got strangled on her water as she realized who was sitting in front of her. "Kitty? Bree? What are you two doing here?"
The two shared a look before Bree shrugged her shoulders and responded. "We're moonlighting as security for a while around here."
"You mean Sue just let you leave working for her to come here?" Rachel asked as she wiped her chin with a napkin.
Kitty scoffed as she opened her chicken sandwich. "Of course not. Puck had to pay a pretty penny, but he wanted the best and he got us. Plus, we're only doing this once or twice a week, Sue would never let us leave the force permanently."
"Yeah, I think she would kill us herself before she let us leave." Bree said thoughtfully. Good thing she loved being an officer, she didn't want to die at the hands of Sue Sylvester.
"Do you know exactly why you are here?" Rachel was worried that everyone was going to know about Jasper now and that was a huge deal.
"All we know is that there was an "incident" and Puck doesn't want to cut any corners when it comes to his employees." Bree studied Rachel closely for a moment. "Do you know exactly why we are here?"
"No, of course not. I was just curious because I had seen the extra security around." That was good, just play it cool and no one will ever suspect a thing. Bree studied Rachel again for a moment before she went back to eating her lunch and making small talk with Kitty and Rachel. They had to get back to their rounds soon and they were sure that Rachel had to get back to the studio.
Cassie sat waiting for Shelby to climb into the car, she swears the woman must have bought the store out with the amount of sushi she was carrying. Cassie really wanted to ask about what all Santana had said, but she didn't want to upset Shelby. In order for them to get anywhere however, she needed to know the truth and why Shelby had drowned herself in work instead of taking the time to keep a relationship with her daughter.
Shelby smiled and leaned over to kiss Cassie on the cheek after setting the bags of food in the back floor board. "What did the vet say about Simba?" Shelby asked as she buckled her seatbelt and turned to look at the little orange kitten sleeping in his carrier.
"He said he was great and that his blood work came back good. He has a follow up appointment in a few weeks. I really like the vet, he didn't talk to me like I was stupid, he explained every question I asked even if they seemed silly."
"That's good, I am glad we could find someone who is truly good at what they do." Shelby sat back in her seat as Cassie backed out of her parking space.
"I ran into someone while I was there." Cassie said nonchalantly.
"Who?" Shelby asked curiously. They honestly didn't know very many people around St. Lawrence, people knew of them and who they were but that was really the extent of it.
"Santana Lopez...Shelby why didn't you tell me about the times that Rachel reached out to you and you just brushed her off? You never told me what really happened, you just let me believe that you and Rachel fell out of touch because of the distance. So what do I do? I mention that part to Santana and then she proceeds to tell me how Rachel tried day after to day to call and visit you, but you just didn't have the time. I could have helped you make time Shelby, so what's the real reason behind all of this?" Cassie was furious, furious at herself for not pushing the issue harder when it was happening and furious at Shelby for not asking for help and keeping her in the dark.
Shelby's face paled, she hadn't expected Cassie to say that she had ran into Santana and of all things they could have talked about, she and Rachel were the main subjects. Dammit, Shelby thought to herself, she really had some major explaining to do.
I know this chapter had a lot of Shelby and Cassie in it, but that's just how this chapter fell. The amount I write for each chapter is what I am comfortable reading and it allows me to work at a decent pace so that I can update every three days like I do. Once I get Shelby and Cassie more established, they will fade out. There's a lot going on in this story and I want to make sure that everything stays in order.
Thank you for hanging in there with me and thank you for all the views, reviews, favorites and follows.