"You live here?" Santana questioned, frowning as she looked at the tiny apartment. It was tiny bachelor apartment, that had no furniture except for a bed and a small coffee table, which held a beaten-up laptop. It was dark, with the only light fixture being in the even tinier kitchen. She crinkled her nose slightly as Charlie moved around the room, clearing a pathway.
"I do," Charlie answers simply not bothering to look up as she heads into an even tinier bathroom and opens the medicine cabinet and grabs the bottles and begins to pop the tops.
"Why?" Santana asked glancing around the tiny apartment, the only place to sit was on Charlie's bed and she shuffles over and takes a seat at the edge trying to balance carefully.
"Because it's quiet, it's small—it reminds me of the shitty little cabin I spent the rest of my adolescence and early adulthood in, till my grandfather died," Charlie shrugs. "Could be because it's all I can afford right now, I don't know." Charlie places each of the pill bottles on her small coffee tables and with practice begins to pull out two of the pills at a time, placing them on the table in order. "Why are you here?"
Santana scowled, she wasn't the same girl that Charlie had simply abandoned. She wasn't as insecure as she was back then. "I don't actually know, I mean it's been six years, but you fell off the face of the earth. I was fucking curious. I probably shouldn't have come."
"Probably," Charlie agrees as she stands up and heads to the small miniature fridge and opening it and grabbing two bottles of water and heading back offering one to Santana.
Taking it, Santana flicked her eyes towards the pills on the coffee table as Charlie began to adjust them once again. "Are you okay? I mean are you sick or something, those are a lot of pills." When Charlie doesn't answer her, and begins to pop the pills into her mouth and take a gulp of water after each she grimaces. "I mean Karofsky—the gorilla—bear or whatever he is, said you couldn't shift anymore."
Charlie finishes for a moment, "He's incorrect, I can shift, it's just unstable. It's why I have to take these to keep my wolf drugged up, so there isn't another incident." Charlie shrugs her shoulders slightly. "It's difficult and expensive, I burn through most drugs quickly so it's why I have to take this cocktail, and deal with all the side effects. But it allows me to hold a steady job, more or less. It's not glamorous but I get to survive, my parents made me come down after my grandfather died, they were afraid that I was going to turn into a hermit or something."
Santana takes it in and reaches for one of the pill bottles, reading the label. "Ketamine? You're taking horse tranquilizers like candy?"
Charlie shrugs, "It works. Most of the time."
"Most of the time?"
"When I start getting emotionally worked up—I begin to burn through the drugs quicker. Being around you—" Charlie inhales deeply and closes her eyes, "Not exactly helpful." She could feel her wolf rousing, trying to shake off the drugs, it was manageable at least for right now. She had doubled the dose for this very reason. Her wolf craved Santana and it hurt far more than she was willing to admit.
Santana crosses her arms slightly, "That's not fair, you're not being fair about this whole thing. You never gave me a chance. You never gave us a chance. You couldn't even say goodbye—"
"You said no, and you have every right to. You're human, hell even if you were a wolf—you can always say no. I'm more than my base desires, I am human. I understand what no means." Charlie explains. "We couldn't just be friends. It wouldn't have been pretty if I had seen you with other people. My wolf is possessive, and those emotions were already starting to bleed into my human side. I couldn't be near you; my father was right. You were young, you were human and you simply didn't understand. I didn't understand. I learned." Charlie shrugged and moved back so she could lean against the wall.
"You could have sat down and explained to me—" Santana frowns trying to find the right words to say.
"You were a sixteen-year-old girl who was in love for the first time. If I had told you if it didn't work out that I would need to go to Alaska. A sixteen-year-old girl who has slight abandonment issues—" Charlie trailed off and closed her eyes and inhaled deeply. "You would have forced yourself to stay with me."
"I'm studying to be a vet Charlie, I'm one of the few humans who has been allowed to study about Therianthropes— I know all about mating, I read everything that I could get my hands on. I understand—"
"You don't. Reading about it, is different from living it—experiencing it. It's like describing a sunset to someone who is blind. I can't explain it, books can't explain it because it's something so deeply personal, so deeply fulfilling, to know that you have a partner? That there is someone who loves you unconditionally?" Charlie exhales slowly. She was getting worked up again. It was a good thing it took time for her medication to set in. "Why are you here Santana?"
She had demanded to come, to follow Charlie and she didn't quite know why. What she did know was that she was furious, she was hurt and she was tired, "You're right I can't experience it, I can't experience shifting, I don't know what it's like to have a mate. But what I do know and you can't explain to me is why even after all this time I still feel comfortable around you. I should hate you. But I don't, and I've been with other people. I've had one night stands but nothing felt right, being with you is the only thing that felt right and I have no idea why. You're a coward, you're an asshole and you abandoned me."
"I left to keep you safe," Charlie snaps back, her skin was beginning to itch. "I needed to get myself under control, and I can't even manage that. I'm another fight away from being labelled feral and that means someone will eventually have to put me down. I was a danger Santana, I am a danger to you, and right now you need to go."
"So, you can run away back to Alaska?" Santana accuses shaking her head. "Look, your father did help me get into the specialized veterinary school and for that I'm eternally grateful, but your wolf was never a danger to me—"
"Do you really think I would have been okay to see you with other people? To smell them on you? To watch them knowing that you had been with them, my wolf—I wouldn't be able to stand it Santana. I couldn't be your friend, I'm a wolf we are possessive in nature, but I am human and I know that I can't possess you. Do you know how—painful not being in balance is? I am constantly in conflict with myself, you have no idea what it's like. Do you have any idea how tiring it is?"
Santana was about to say something when Charlie's eyes flashed, even though the room was dark, she could see the transformation beginning to take place. The last time she had watched anyone shift it hadn't been this prolonged, Brittany said it didn't really hurt. But Charlie was shaking. "I'm not afraid of you," Santana says finally. "I mean sure you're a wolf, but I was never in any danger from you, or your wolf. So maybe it's time you stop fighting yourself and just let it go."
"I can't," Charlie insists trying to calm her beating heart. But it was too much, and she looks at Santana. "Please leave."
"Fuzzbutt isn't going to hurt me—"
"I can't promise that, I haven't been in control of my wolf for years Santana. We are not one, we haven't been one in a long time—I don't want to trap you with me. I don't want to hurt you so please." Her voice cracks breaking into a rougher sound as she shudders once, her muscles and bones were starting to snap into place.
But Santana merely shakes her head, she wasn't going anywhere. She would be lying if she said that she wasn't worried but she had already made up her mind that she wasn't going to leave no matter the consequences. "I trust you."
Charlie moves as if to get up, but the action has an unintended effect of dropping her to her knees as her body convulses once more. She had hoped that she could get herself to the bathroom to lock herself in, if Santana was going to be unreasonable, but she had left it far too late. Her wolf was coming and there was nothing she could do about it.
Santana swallowed, she was being stupid, she knew it but she'd seen Charlie as a wolf before, she'd also seen Charlie transform and knowing what she knew now? Which really wasn't that much, in the grand scheme of things. She knew she could handle herself as long as she made no sudden moves or loud noises. She bit her lip as Charlie's clothes tore as the fur began to grow, had she always been that furry? If anything, it seemed her coat was longer. She really was a bundle of fuzz now as her tail appeared. The sound of bones breaking and her tendons reshaping Charlie's body filled the room filled with her grunts of pain. It lasted what felt like an eternity instead of the twenty minutes that it took but finally Charlie's wolf appeared, looking positively haggard. Even from where she sat she could see the chunks of fur missing. She doesn't say anything instead staying perfectly still watching Charlie for a moment who seems to stare at her. "Hey Fuzzbutt," Santana says softly. "Remember me?" She slowly extends her hand out for Charlie to sniff.
This was going well but she immediately cringes when Fuzzbutt lunges at her, she should have taken Charlie's advice and run for the hills instead of doing whatever this was. She opens her eyes, when Charlie's tail smacks her in the face causing her to sneeze. "Jerk," Santana mumbles rubbing her nose as she turns to look at Fuzzbutt reaching once again to run her fingers through Charlie's thick fur. "I missed you," she whispers as Fuzzbutt flops onto the bed and curls up after a second. She turns to get a better look at Charlie and reaches to scratch behind Charlie's ears only for Charlie to snap at her and let out a weak growl.
It's enough to cause Santana to pause for a moment before looking at the pill bottles on the table, Charlie had taken a large dose of ketamine, it was quite possible her wolf was completely out of it, as they battled for dominance. "I told you I'm not leaving you, I still need to have words with your other half." Santana informs Fuzzbutt who snorts at this before rolling over ignoring her.
Santana smiles at this, and Charlie had been worried.
