She'd just woken up from a nap. Disoriented, she took a look around her. Judging from the light coming in through the window, it was probably early afternoon. She had no clue how long she'd been asleep; probably only an hour, tops. Searching her memory for indicators, she remembered talking to Santana but she wasn't quite sure whether that had really happened only a little while ago or not. Time was the most peculiar thing since she'd woken up from the long sleep, as she called it. It was a stream; not tangible, ever-flowing.
It took her a moment before she could feel her body. It was a real light bulb moment: Her bladder was uncomfortably tense. She really needed to go to the bathroom. Looking around for the nurse call button, she was stumped. It was nowhere to be found. Where had she last seen it? Nothing – it was like looking at a blank page, trying to read words that never were there in the first place.
Brittany knew she had no time to waste. It was really, really urgent. Still hesitating, she crossed her legs tightly, as if that would keep it in indefinitely. Panic started to grasp at her, pulling her under; her thoughts became even more jumbled than they were before. A solution, quickly, something that would solve this issue before she couldn't stop it; already feeling how she'd not manage it much longer.
She felt sweat starting to collect beneath her armpits as the deep fear of loosing control over her bladder sent shivers through her. She needed to get up and go, she decided. It was only just a few steps away, anyway.
Hoisting herself up the bed rail, she managed to pull herself up into a sitting position with barely any issues at all. She could do this. Getting herself out of bed proved to be a challenge but she succeeded. With her legs planted firmly onto the ground, she took a step forward. Then another. And another.
Brittany bit her lip. She could feel her legs starting to tremble and when she frantically searched for something to hold onto, she could only see her wheelchair a few inches away from her. Arms stretched to the max, she tried to reach for it.
It was as if she was suspended in mid-air; everything slowed down to the point where the fraction of a second felt like an eternity stretched wide. She wondered if this was what floating around in space might feel like. It was a nice feeling, not being bound by the constraints of time and space. Maybe she could become an astronaut one day and do this for a living? Suddenly, eternity snapped; time found its flow again and caught up.
As a yell of pain reached her own ears, Brittany became aware of the linoleum flooring invading her field of vision. Tears spilled from her eyes as she felt a searing pain in her right wrist. Her whole body jarred from the fall, she had to focus on not passing out as little currents of sharp electricity stabbed into her arm.
"Brittany? Oh my god, what happened?" she heard a voice from far away calling out. It was getting more and more difficult to stay in the moment and not let herself be swept away by the darkness wanting to claim her. A pained groan escaped her. She was dizzy, and she had to keep very still to not further upset her balance. The room around her was spinning already.
She felt a pair of strong arms around her shoulders as somebody helped her navigate her body into a sitting position on the floor. When she looked up, she saw that it was Santana kneeling close to her, her arms still at her shoulders as if to keep her steady.
Then, Santana's face appeared in front of hers. "Britt? Are you alright?"
Once the first wave of pain had washed over her and retreated again,replacing the sharp sting and leaving more of a dull ache in its place, she could think again. A worried look was etched onto the Latina's face, she noticed. She looked quite tense, a vertical line appearing between her brows, burrowed deeply into her skin. Brittany realised something else, too. The pressure in her pelvis had vanished and the ground they were sitting on – kneeling on, in Santana's case – was wet.
Embarrassment surged through her like flames in a bonfire; a beacon of shame, heating up her cheeks. Pressing her lips together, she just silently shook her head.
"Come on, let's get you back up onto the bed." Santana's voice was level and so calm that it was unnerving. How could she pretend that everything was fine?
"No," she said, her reluctance obvious. Her head was lowered, and she was keeping her stare fixed at the damp spot adorning her sweatpants, now sporting a darker hue of grey than this morning. She couldn't look the other girl in the eyes, burning with shame as she was.
"The chair, then? Alright. I'll just-" she said, interrupting herself, already pulling her up as if she weighed nothing. With a little puff, she lowered her into the wheelchair sitting nearby. It really had been so close...
The space she'd just been occupying was marked by a distinct puddle of yellowish liquid; the amber shade a stark contrast against the white of the linoleum, making it stand out even more. She couldn't tear her eyes away from it. It made her want to cry from the deep humiliation coursing through her.
She felt Santana's hands pulling at her face, trying to make her look at her as she kneeled in front of her. "Let's get you into some fresh clothes, okay?"
When Brittany finally unglued her gaze from the floor, she locked eyes with her. Brown pools of sympathy were zooming in on her, and she felt herself snap.
Trying her best to pry those warm hands off her, as well as she could with her aching wrist and pounding head, she yelled, "Stop! I'm not a little kid anymore. I can do it my-self! I don't need you. Stop treating me like a freakin' kid!"
Agitated as she was, she was stumbling and tripping all over her words but that did nothing to take away from the forceful anger behind them.
"I'm not, I mean-" Santana started, baffled, clearly surprised at the blonde's outburst. "I just want to help, Britt."
"I don't want your help!"
Santana tried to take her hand, but Brittany snatched it away brusquely before she could make contact to her skin. Apparently understanding that comforting gestures wouldn't be well-received, Santana held up her hands in surrender. "Look, I get it. You're in pain right now, and it sucks. But I'm just here to help, alright?" she asked in a soothing tone which just set Brittany off even more.
"No! I' mad at you! Get angry with me! Yell at me! Just.. just treat me like a normal person! Please, please, I'm a normal person. Please," she implored, desperation tinging her voice.
Lowering her own voice to a whisper, Santana tried again to comfort her friend, "Of course you are. But everyone needs some help sometimes, so let me help you. I can bring you some clothes and get the nurse."
Shaking her head frantically, making the world spin on its axis, Brittany felt more than heard the next words coming out of her own mouth, "Go away, Santana! Just go! I don't want you here. Go away!"
"Hey, calm down and listen to me, Brittany. How bad is the pain? We need to get you checked out after the fall, in case you hurt yourself or something, okay? So let me help you and we can get all of this fixed," the dark-haired girl insisted.
"Fuck you, Santana! Just get the fuck out, right now!"
Brittany was yelling so loudly she didn't realize her own volume until her ears started feeling tight and fluttery, distorting the sound of her own voice. Instinctively, her hands clutched at the shells of her ears as if to protect them from the barrage of sound she was inflicting upon herself.
She saw a flash of shock and hurt pass over Santana's face; saw the way the girl pressed her lips together and glanced away. A hint of guilt blossomed in her chest but it was as if she couldn't control the absolute force with which her emotions were crashing over her, compelling her to act like this. As if someone had taken over her volition and she was merely a puppet; a pawn in a game of hurt. A rigged game, really, for there was nothing to be won – for anyone.
Heaving a sigh, Santana stood and, with one last look to Brittany, mumbled, "See you later, Britts." Then, she turned on her heel and left the room.
Her absence felt like all the energy had been sucked out of the room, leaving Brittany battling an inner emptiness more cutting than ever. She looked after her for what might have been hours, secretly hoping, but it was in vain. Santana had left, for real, she realised.
Only then did Brittany allow herself to cry, openly; unashamedly. She sobbed with such fierceness that she didn't even recognize the sounds coming out of her; instead they felt foreign, her gasps merely resembling broken inspirations.
That's how a nurse found her a couple of minutes later. Santana had asked her to, before going home, she said. Brittany wasn't sure if she would ever resurface from the avalanche of guilt burying her deeply within her own shame.
After the nurse had helped her clean herself up and change into clothes that weren't soiled, she was wheeled into the radiology unit. As she sat in her wheelchair, waiting for her turn to get her wrist x-rayed and assessed for damage, she couldn't stop thinking about the pain on Santana's face.
The pain which she had caused, and no one else. It was a hurt that the other girl definitely didn't deserve – actually, quite the contrary. When thinking about about her, she couldn't help but be reminded of everything Santana stood for: loyalty; a fierce need to protect and an unending belief in her. While Brittany herself had long since stopped thinking she could do anything at all, there was Santana; thinking that she could do everything she set her mind to – and probably even more.
Intoxicating and inexplicably addictive, there was not a moment in time where Brittany hadn't loved Santana. Or, if there was, she certainly couldn't remember it. In her mind, Santana was just... everything. Incredible beauty that was so much more than just skin deep – it was a beauty that seeped into every nook and cranny of her very being. Santana had what one would call a beautiful soul, Brittany thought. And for reasons she would probably never manage to fully comprehend, she'd chosen to share herself with her.
Memories, lost but found again, swirled through her head. Mostly just flashes of moments that she managed to grapple from her broken brain long enough to catch a glimpse of black hair, the fleeting impression of a soft smile. Directed at her; always only at her.
The touch of lips ghosting over her own, uniting them in a kiss that spoke of things neither of them were strong enough to whisper into existence. Breathing to the sound of their unvoiced feelings; their tastes mingling as they opened themselves up to one another.
Flashes of Santana's hitched gasps, bittersweet a sound; words tumbling over her full lips in complete and unabashed surrender. Utterances, perhaps reserved only for her ears, but not the right ones; not the ones telling her how deeply she felt inside. Instead, whole worlds lay hidden beneath the words she used. Brittany would hold her and watch her choke on the ones she could not bring herself to say, kissing Santana until she could breathe again.
The deep ache in her chest momentarily distracting her from the dull pain in her wrist, she was startled when she suddenly felt the room start moving again. Stuttering, start and stop, and suddenly everything around her was spinning again. Automatically, her arms shot out to try and keep herself from falling over until she realized that she was still sitting safely wedged between the wheels. Cradling her head in her hands, she tried to keep herself together.
"It's our turn now," the nurse said from behind her, already wheeling her towards the direction of the examination room. She already felt the memories trickling away – like sand in an hourglass, every second taking with it grain after grain, her thoughts dwindled with every passing moment until all she felt was a buzzing emptiness take over her senses.
The brand-new compression wrap encasing her right wrist was making her incarcerated skin itch. It was difficult to resist the irritating urge to start scratching but there was nothing to be done about that. She'd just have to tolerate this uneasy feeling – it wasn't the first uncomfortable sensation she'd had in the past few weeks anyway. Far from it, to be honest – this was nothing, compared to the rest of what her life had become.
The pain? It didn't even bother her that much anymore. She'd grown accustomed to being and feeling physical pain.
At least, she had been super lucky, according to the nice radiologist who had taken the time to explain her x-rays to her. If she was honest, she'd pretty much started zoning out when he started using terms like "proximal" and "distal" even though she actually did get that the longish white parts he called "radius" and "ulna" were supposed to be her arm bones. Keeping track of the man's explanations he lectured her about while pointing at some hazy contrasts of blueish and white structures on the radiograph proved to be impossible, though.
It was all just a jumbled mess of technical terms, one sounding more incomprehensible than the other, which made her feel stupid beyond belief because she'd forget more than half of what he said a second after he did. It was as if the words didn't even register in her brain; getting instead repelled as soon as they reached her ears.
According to the doctor, she had not broken any bones nor dislocated anything, although he suspected that her ligaments might have sustained some sort of damage which she needed to be careful about. Basically, she had a badly sprained wrist that was currently on its way to growing double its size with all the swelling. To allow the ligaments to rest and heal, she had been prescribed a splint for the next two to three weeks and strict immobilisation for the time being.
It was only when she'd gotten back to her hospital room that she became aware that "full immobilisation" probably meant a huge setback for her the rest of her recovery. How was she supposed to work on regaining some of the functions she'd lost when she couldn't even move her dominant hand? And how had she not thought about that before when she had actually had the chance to ask the doctor about it?
It most likely didn't help that the whole time, her head been throbbing from the fall and the stress of her altercation with Santana. The worst part about that was that she only kind of remembered what she'd said to her best friend. She just knew it hadn't been pretty. She could still hear her own yelling like a distant echo resounding in her ears.
What if Santana finally had enough? What if she never came back? The thoughts were worrying her but she tried not to let herself wallow in self-pity too much. Brittany knew that it would do her no good, keeping herself thinking about all the bad things. She wanted to think of nice things, too. She found herself staring at the charts on her walls again.
There was a new addition to the collection of charts: You fell and sprained your wrist. You need to move it as little as possible so it can heal properly.
It was a hastily handwritten note, although the person who wrote it had been careful to make the litters big and easily legible. As if she could forget about that; she almost wanted to chuckle when she saw it. She was sure the pounding and swelling would make sure to hammer it into her brain. Stupid cards, she thought.
Until an idea hit her, and a genuine smile started to form on her face. She allowed herself to get excited over her plan, and she kept repeating it over and over in her head, hoping to hold onto it until she could do something about it.
I'm sorry.
I'm sorry.
I'm sorry.
Finally, she was right on track: the next time a nurse came to check on her, she asked him to write a few things down for her. He looked at her with an unreadable expression before he nodded and pulled out a piece of paper, pen at the ready.
She poured her heart out, not caring what the man might think of her. The only thing on her mind was getting the right words out, quickly, before they faded. The nurse never commented, not on the content and not on the difficulty she had, struggling with every word before getting it out, and just scribbled down what she wanted instead.
Wordlessly, he handed her the note. She thanked him and clutched the paper close to her chest when he left after deciding she was okay for the time being. Once she heard the door close behind him, she peeked at his handwriting, and hope bloomed in her heart.
It read:
I'm sorry. I can't express how grateful I am to have you. Thanks for being there for me. You hold my hand when everything else is spinning and out of control and there's nothing I can do but hold onto you. I'm sorry for getting mad. I can't remember why or how but I know I don't want to lose you. I'm sorry for hurting you.
Note to self: Tell Santana if she comes back to visit.
You had a fight.
She is probably mad and sad. Apologise.
You were really, really mean to her. Not cool.
Don't do it again.
Perhaps, she would remember. Most likely, though, these words of regret and apology would get lost somewhere deep inside her, far away from where they belonged: spoken out loud, to Santana, acknowledging her feelings.
Just in case, she wanted to be prepared and not forget about this. Just in case that Santana, hoping against all hope, decided to come back to her at least one more time.
Two days later, according to the calendar on the wall which she kept checking, over and over again, she was still waiting.
