A/N I'm not sure how happy I am with this chapter, I got a little stuck on it. But the show must go on...
P.S I've had a lot of requests to continue with the one-shot of I Cherish You, Too. I'm thinking on it, so hopefully I can deliver :)
Out of Kindness
Chapter Six
"Here we go, Britts. Huevos, Santana Lopez style," the Latina said as she placed a plate down in front of Brittany, holding two forks in her hand and sitting in the seat next to her.
"Oh my God, the memories!" Brittany exclaimed excitedly. "Do you know how many times I've tried to make this and failed, miserably." She took the first mouthful and hummed in blissful appreciation. "I swear you make the best cheesy omelette ever."
"It's only good when you share it, because that way you can make it bigger and put loads of cheese in it without throwing off the ratio." Santana said, picking up her fork and digging into the shared plate.
"Maybe it's just better when I get to share it with you."
Santana stopped chewing mid-mouthful, glancing over at her friend, but Brittany continued talking, saving her from trying to think of a response.
"What do you have to do today?"
"I don't know. I still have a few more days until I have to meet with my new boss, so I might get some editing done today. Maybe I'll start looking for a place..."
"A place for what?" Brittany asked.
"For me to live, Britt."
"I don't get it; aren't you living here?"
"No, Britt, I'm just staying here. It was all arranged as a temporary thing, until I find my own place." Santana said, taking another mouthful and looking over at Brittany.
"I don't want you to live somewhere else though. I just got you back, you can't leave," Brittany said with a perfectly heartbreaking pout. "Just stay here, pleeeaasse. C'mon, San, Charlie's always working anyway and I get bored and lonely. Besides, this is my house and I want you in it!"
"Okay, okay," Santana said through a chuckle, holding her palm up to Brittany's face in an attempt to stop the persuasive rambling. "I'll stay, but we have to talk to Charlie about it, it's only fair...and, what happened this morning, Britt...we can't keep doing that okay. It isn't fair to him, he doesn't deserve that."
"Do what? I don't know what you're talking about...Wait," Brittany shuffled closer to the brunette and started trailing light kisses from the juncture of Santana's neck all the way to her ear where she whispered directly into it, "are you referring to our sweet, sweet lady kisses?"
Santana's eyes fluttered closed at the action and she inadvertently cocked her head the side to allow Brittany greater access.
"Britt..." It came out as more of a moan than a protest, but she eventually regained her composure. "Stop, Brittany. It's not right, I can't do that to him. We aren't just two seemingly straight teenagers making out for kicks because we don't know any better. What would you do if you came home and found Charlie and I sucking face? Aside from the fact that I'm one hundred and fifty percent gay and the thought of it makes me want to dry-heave, it's really no different."
Santana was looking straight into Brittany's sapphire eyes as she spoke with a gentle yet firm tone.
"You're right, San. I'm sorry..." Brittany spoke sadly, averting her eyes.
"Britt, look at me," Santana brought her palm up to Brittany's cheek in an attempt to lock her gaze with the blonde once more. "It's not that I don't want to kiss you, God knows I want to. Having you back in my life has me feeling kind of...really confused about a lot of things. It's like, whatever I felt for you when we were teenagers is coming back at full force and whether I was too young to recognise it, or just not mature enough to handle it, I don't know. But now I'm older, and you're here and I'm just...so confused. But then, there's Charlie...and Brittany, he's been too good to me. I can't do this to him behind his back. Do you understand?"
"Yeah," She nodded her head slightly, with tears glimmering in her eyes. "I'm sorry I put you in that position, I wasn't thinking about the consequences. But, just so you know, everything you just said is everything I'm feeling too."
"So what does it mean?"
"I can't answer that, Santana. I guess we'll find out in our own time."
"Yeah, I guess so...but we'll only be confusing ourselves more if we start being all affectionate with each other. And there's Charlie..."
"You said that." Brittany was smirking playfully at Santana.
"Yeah," she breathed out in response.
"So...you and Charlie. Just how close were the two of you, back in the day?"
"Not anywhere near as close as he would have had you believe." Santana gave Brittany a pointed look. "We became really good friends at the end of freshman year, around the time that I came out."
"But you slept with him? Wasn't that before you came out?" Brittany asked, tilting her head to the side.
"Yeah, Britts, it was before. Like I said yesterday, I slept with a lot of guys back then. It's definitely not something I'm proud of, but the past is just that, I can't change it. I just kind of grew to learn that sex was expected of me, however wrong that sounds, it's just what I believed for a big part of my adolescence."
Brittany stayed silent, prompting with her eyes for Santana to continue.
"Charlie was actually one of the last guys I ever had sex with. He came into my life at a time when...all I really needed was a friend. I couldn't have asked for a truer friend at the time, Britt. He's actually the first person I came out to, and I guess you could say, he really helped me find myself. I owe a lot to Charlie."
"How so?"
"He just...was a really good friend to me, that's all," Santana said as she stood to clear the empty plate from the table and taking it over to the sink. "I'm going to go shower my stinking self, 'kay Britty?"
Santana glanced in the blonde's direction, offering a brief smile before making her way to the bathroom. Brittany just watched her leave with a bemused look on her face, recognising Santana's escape route all too well.
XxXx
"Miss Lopez...Santana, can you hear me?"
Santana could hear the muffled voice, trying to hone in on it but it felt as though she were trying to decipher voices from the next room with her ear pressed against the wall. She felt a slight pressure on her face as one of her eyelids was pried open by foreign fingertips, the smell of latex gloves invading her nostrils. She tried to squint against the bright flash of light that suddenly penetrated her pupil but, in an instant the fingertips released their hold. The same intrusion was thrust upon the other eye before finding the comfort of darkness once more, even though the muffled voices continued to speak around her.
"Patient is responsive, keep her on twenty minute observations for the rest of the night and the doctor on duty can look her over in the morning."Santana tried to focus on her unfamiliar surroundings but found herself being pulled away into a dreamless state of unconsciousness.
She awoke with a sluggish start; her eyelids were heavy and begging not to be opened and, when she did, her head pounded. She tried to sit up a little and noticed a tube coming out of her right arm, attached by a needle sticking into the back of her hand and leading to a clear bag attached to what looked like a coat stand on wheels. Santana ran her hands along the stiff white sheets among which she was laying and looked around at the sterile room she occupied, confusion masking her face.
"What the f-" She tried to whisper to herself but found the pain of trying to talk excruciating through her dry, raspy throat.
"Oh, you're awake." A young woman entered the room, pulling out a chart that was attached to the end of the bed. She walked over to Santana and applied a blood pressure monitor to her arm and proceeded to jot down notes on the chart.
"How do you feel?" The woman asked.
Santana opened her mouth to try and speak but, once again, found it too painful. The woman must have noticed the way Santana winced and placed her hand on her neck.
"Your throat may be a little sore for a couple of days. They had to pump your stomach, which can irritate the oesophagus quite a bit. Your probably feeling quite disorientated, I bet," She gave the Latina a sympathetic smile. "I'll page Dr. Ross and have her come speak with you." The woman turned to leave Santana on her own once again.
All Santana could do was nod in confusion, still trying desperately hard to decipher her reality. Pump stomach? Fleeting and fragmented images began to dance around in her mind, like she was sporting a lotto wheel in her brain that spun them around incessantly. All she had to do was grasp one of them that would act as a clue as to what the hell was going on, but all she received were many tiny flashes of incongruent memories.
"Good morning, Santana." She looked up to see who she would only presume was Dr. Ross; complete with long, white coat and stethoscope. "How are you feeling?"
Santana could only shake her head from side to side, her mouth hanging slightly agape as she pointed lazily towards her throat.
"Ahh, yes it's common for the throat to feel sensitive after having your stomach pumped. Do you remember why you're here, Santana?"
Once again, she shook her head whilst laying back on her pillow and looking up at the doctor like a scared little girl going for her first check-up.
"You're a very lucky young woman, Santana. You overdosed on a bottle of Aspirin that you chased with a bottle of Hennessey. Your boyfriend found you and called an ambulance just in time and the doctors in the Emergency Room were able to pump most of the contents from your stomach. Do you remember any of this? Do you remember taking the pills?"
Santana tilted her head and looked at the doctor with a somewhat vague expression. The images that had been racing through her mind where beginning to click into place and form a cohesive chain. She was beginning to remember. In her mind she saw herself toying with the pill bottle, rolling it between her hands as she played with another pill on her tongue and stared at her sunken reflection in the mirror.
She nodded at the doctor, tears welling a little in her eyes.
"Were you attempting to end your life?"
She nodded once more, casting her eyes down. Dr. Ross sat on the edge of the hospital bed that Santana occupied, placing a gentle hand on her knee.
"You also have some lacerations on both arms, some are superficial, but a few of them needed to be stitched. Did you do those to yourself, Santana?"
And again she nodded, sullenly.
"I'm sure you'll understand that, when a patient comes in who's attempted suicide, it's mandatory that they be seen by a psychologist to undergo an assessment. You're extremely lucky to be alive, Miss Lopez. If you're boyfriend hadn't have walked in when he did, you wouldn't be here."
The woman stood from her sitting position on the bed, giving the young Latina a gentle pat on the leg before leaving the room.
Santana's mind was still swimming in confusion and lacking clarity. She remembered taking the pills and swallowing them amongst mouthfuls of Hennessey. She recalled staring at her reflection, wondering which side of the glass she was on and feeling so dead on the inside. Her sole purpose had been to end her the misery that plagued her; should she be happy she was saved? Should she feel as lucky as the doctor said she was? Maybe she didn't want to die, but she sure as hell didn't know how to live anymore.
She found herself drifting in and out of consciousness for an amount of time she had no desire to record. Pulled awake by nurses coming in and out every now and then to perform observations, lulled back to sleep by the bustling sounds of the hospital ward. Gradually, each time she woke, her head began to feel lighter and less clouded and with that feeling came a fresh sense of clarity and understanding; she'd attempted suicide, and because she'd been unsuccessful, she now had to deal with the consequences.
Santana was lost in her own thoughts and confusion when an unexpected guest entered her room.
"Hey," he said, "its good see you awake."
"Charlie?" Santana asked, perplexity lacing her voice. "What are you doing here?" She spoke in a volume barely above a whisper because her throat was still a little sore.
"Well, obviously I'm here to see you. I bought you these, because I know you like them, but I'm not sure if you're allowed to eat them yet or not? I thought about getting flowers but I remember you saying once how cliché they are..." He was holding up a bag of Peanut M&Ms as he paced over to her bedside. He raked his eyes over the figure in the bed taking in her pallid form.
"How do you feel?" Charlie asked.
"Probably almost as bad as I look. Thank you, for the M&Ms. I'm still on liquids but I'll be loving them in a couple of days...umm..." She glanced down at the hands resting in her lap, thumbs rubbing soothing circles over her palms. "How did you even know that I'm in here? Does everybody know?"
Charlie's jaw slackened a little and his eyebrows knitted together.
"No, Santana, nobody knows what happened. I thought the doctors might have told you already; I'm the one who found you and called the ambulance."
"Oh...I'm sorry...that you had to see that..."
"Santana." Charlie sat down beside her on the bed, taking hold of her hands. "Listen, don't be sorry, because I'm not. I could never be sorry for saving your life, do you understand?" He looked directly into her dark, sunken eyes as he spoke."Look...I know you're life mustn't mean much to right now and I'm guessing you're really confused and maybe even a little angry with me for not letting you die. But, all of those feelings will fade in time, I promise. And when you get to the other side of it you'll find a life worth living. Until then, will you please just think of the people who are going to be devastated if you were to end your life."
"Yeah? Like who?" Jutting her chin out as she asked the question, she narrowed her eyes, hiding herself within them.
"Like me, for one..." He raised his eyebrows in a pleading expression.
"You told them you're my boyfriend. Why?" Santana asked as she curled her lip in a slight snarl and Charlie seemed to be taken back by tone of her voice and the question itself.
"Because I thought-"
"What, that we were dating? We had sex, Charlie...sex isn't dating." She delivered the line with blunt force that went straight to his heart.
"I'm pretty sure I've been in love with you since the first time I met you," he said as he lowered his eyes, lacking confidence in his words. "I wish you could see you like I see you. If you let me, I'll love you enough for the both of us until you learn to love yourself."
A silence broke upon them, both of them quietly deliberating what should come next.
"Charlie...I'm...I think..." Santana's eyes shifted uncomfortably as she fought the demons inside herself to try and voice what she had to say. "I'm gay, Charlie. I'm a lesbian." She looked up to read the expression on the man's face but found it indecipherable.
"Oh," Charlie's mouth formed an 'O' shape, his head tilted to the side. "Is that why you did this?"
"Part of the reason, yeah, I guess so."
"San..." he lifted his hand to stroke her cheek lightly with his thumb. "You're perfect, you hear me? To be honest, I'm upset that I'll never get to be with you...but that doesn't mean I'll stop loving you. So you're a lesbian, that's fine...but will you let me take care of you...as your friend? Until you can see as well as I can how perfect you really are?"
Santana put her arms up to embrace him, as tears she thought had long since run dry suddenly forged a path down her cheeks.
"Thank-you," She whispered, brokenly into his ear. "You know, you're the first guy who's ever wanted to just be my friend. Thank- you for that."