22. Speeding Cars

The glass door slammed against the wall, shaking the top pane. A tall man wearing an old grease-stained grey t-shirt and ripped jeans came striding through the door. His face was puffy and red, his eyes bloodshot and sunken. He pulled on the tips of his black mohawk with his fingertips. A well-hidden nervous tick...until now.

He saw a nurse in light blue scrubs come toward him.

'Where is she?' he yelled.

The nurse stopped in front of him. 'I'm sorry? Who are you looking for sir?'

'Quinn...' he shifted impatiently. 'Quinn, where's Quinn?'

The nurse looked at him for a second in confusion. A light of recognition sparked. 'Quinn Fabray? Pale skin, blonde hair, hazel eyes...?'

He nodded quickly. 'Where is she?'

She gestured to the waiting room. 'Please wait in the waiting area, she's been taken into surgery...'

'S-Surgery?' he spluttered interrupting her.

'Yes sir, the doctors are with her now. I'm afraid I don't have any further information with you at this point, but I will keep you informed.'

'I-Is she gonna be okay?' he stuttered.

She looked down at the shiny grey floor then back up to meet his worried eyes. 'I'm afraid I can't say at this point.'

His fist clenched. The dull ache deep within his chest intensified, making it difficult for him to breath. 'Please...' he barely whispered through his dry throat. 'Please, just take care of her...'

Beep. Beep. Beep.

'10 blade.'

Beep. Beep.

'Suction.'

Beep.

'She's bleeding out, I can hardly see a thing. Hang another bag.'

Beep.

'Clamp.'

Beep.

'Get more suction in here!'

Beep. Beep. Beep.

'Somebody page Armstrong quickly.'

An intern scuttled off to find a phone.

Beep. Beep-beep. Beep-beep beep-beep.

'Reynolds, press against that laceration, I'm gonna try to suction around the wound so we can see what we're doing in here...'

Beep. Beep-Beep-Beep-Beep-Beep.

Eyes fall on the small black screen.

Beep.

A thin red continuous line appears.

'She's crashing. Charge the paddles to 200.'

'Clear!'

A small brunette breezed through the white double doors. She looked around frantically until her wide worried eyes fell on Puck. He stared at her through the glass for a second, as if trying to recognise her.

He jumped to his heavy feet, hurrying over to her.

'Noah!' Rachel breathed a sigh of relief. 'How is she?'

She clung tightly to his bare forearms as he wrapped his large hands around her elbows supporting her weak weight. 'I don't know Rach...'

Her brow crinkled. 'What d'you mean you don't know? W-where is she?'

'Last I heard, she was in surgery, and that was about an hour ago...'

Her breath hitched and her body twitched as if she'd been winded. Tears sprang to her eyes, clouding her vision. She turned in his arms.

'I have to go...' she muttered shaking her head 'I have to see her. I have to see her...'

She went to walk but Puck held her back. Her small elbow collided with his abdomen but he held her shoulders under his palms. 'They're taking care of her Rach...just let them do it.'

'I have to know what's happening!' she whined.

'They'll tell us when there's something to tell.'

She collapsed back into his arms, burying her face into his chest, trying to breathe in his comforting warmth. 'I need to know she's gonna be okay Noah...'

He wrapped his arms fully around her, embracing her. He gently rested his jaw on the top of her head, gently rocking her. 'Me too Rach...' he sighed heavily. 'Me too.' He closely watched the door the nurse had disappeared through.

'Hang another unit, she's losing it too fast.'

B-Beep. Beep.

'Pressure's dropping.'

'We don't want her crashing again. Push two of epi.'

A tall red headed doctor peered into her chest cavity. 'What even happened?'

The older surgeon with black rimmed glasses opposite her shook his head as he directed the suction tube into Quinn's open chest. 'Some jackass in a hit and run on a crossing. Apparently he was drunk. She was talking on her cellphone - totally didn't see him coming.'

Beep. B-Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep.

'Pressure's evening out. 115 over 75 and rising.'

The older surgeon eyed the electronic screen skeptically with a nod. 'We don't want it higher until she stabilises.'

Her fingertips toyed with the crumpled end of the tissue balled up in her small fist. '...And I stopped her. Before I had a chance to really talk to her about it, she'd disappeared out the door. She j-she just...left...just like that...and I let her Noah. I let her go...and now look what happened!' she choked out a sob and he rocked her in his lap.

He brushed her dark dishevelled bangs away from her forehead, planting a light kiss. 'Shh...' he soothed. 'It's not your fault Rach...'

'I let her go Noah...I should never have let her go...' she kept repeating to herself.

He kept rubbing his left palm up and down her back as he cradled her on his lap, with his right hand supporting underneath her bent knees. He rested his chin on top of her head again.

'You still love her. Don't you...'

After a pause registering the weight behind his realisation, she lifted her head, brown bloodshot eyes meeting. 'Noah...'

He smiled softly at her. 'It's okay Rachel, we're not in college anymore and I know it'll never happen again for us.'

She smiled gently, giving in. 'I don't want to feel sucked back in. I was moving on...or at least trying...and then she just,'

'Appeared.' they spoke in unison. Puck smiled softly.

'Like she has some sort of radar for me. Like she knows when to swoop in. And now I can't just go back. I can't just go back to a time when she wasn't around, when I didn't have to think about her. When I didn't have to watch those stupid dog food commercials and hear her snorts of laughter at it. When I didn't have to call up my dads to ask them about my reviews instead of sitting on her old ugly ass couch and hearing her voice read them to me. I could finally live without that disgusting jar of Marmite plaguing my cupboard.' she said with a shiver and Puck gave a light laugh. 'And now she's back. Now I can't walk past NYU. I have to turn off the radio if Michael Jackson comes on. I had to delete Hall and Oates off my iPod. Delete it, Noah. I couldn't just delete the one song, or it would mess up the whole collection. Now I have no Hall and Oates!' she threw her hands up in exasperation.

Puck sniggered. 'And somehow you're living without them...'

Her fingertips smoothed over the white lettering on his stained t-shirt. 'She has to survive Noah...she's just got to.'

He smoothed his hand over her hunched back again. 'I know, Ray...I know...'

Puck raised his eyes to see a tired looking surgeon in scrubs walking towards them. If they were anywhere else, he would probably try to hit on her. She pulled off her polka dot scrub cap to reveal shiny red hair. Okay, he would definitely hit on her. But not here, he's not that much of a jackass.

He gently shifted Rachel's legs off him and turned her body. He helped her to stand as she also noticed the surgeon.

The surgeon smiled at them. 'Am I right in assuming you're friends with Lucy Quinn Fabray...?'

Rachel nodded quickly. Puck rested a hand on her shoulder and spoke for them both. 'Yeah that's us.'

'I'm Dr. Armstrong, but you can just call me Emilie. I'm a cardiothoracic surgeon, and I assisted in Lucy's surgery...'

'Please, just call her Quinn. That's what she prefers.' Puck interrupted.

The surgeon gave a small nod, correcting herself. 'The impact of the car broke three of her right ribs, which punctured her lung. Some suspected internal haemorrhaging was what forced us to take Quinn into surgery, and it was complicated further by some lacerations that we found due to the impact.'

Puck felt small hands clutch desperately at the dark grey cotton of his t-shirt when those fatal words were uttered.

'Quinn crashed, and we lost her for a few minutes...' Dr Armstrong spoke gently. Puck took a visibly sharp intake of breath. '...But we were able to stabilise her once we could control the bleeding.'

Wide, dark eyes fluttered up to the doctor. 'She's alive?' Rachel squealed in visible relief.

The doctor smiled with a nod. 'Yes, Ms. Fabray is alive. She is stable, but she is still unconscious - her body has undergone considerable trauma over the past few hours. We're going to keep her under observation for a few days, just to track her progress.'

Puck smiled a little easier. 'Can we see her...?'

Dr Armstrong nodded. 'Yes, you can see her.' she began to lead them over to the intensive care ward, where the blonde was situated. 'Just to warn you, she is still using a tube ventilator.'

'I thought you said she was stable?'

'She is, it's just a precaution for post-op cardio patients. For the first hour or two, even after they're stabilised we keep patients like Quinn on a ventilator, just to give her that extra support - so her lungs won't have a chance to decrease from the normal capacity.'

They both nodded as if they had a clue what the surgeon was talking about. Quinn was alive and stable and that's all they needed to know.

She led them to the door of Quinn's room. 'I'll leave you three alone for a while, but a nurse will be coming to check on her in a little while.'

They both nodded in gratitude. 'Thank you so much doctor.' they spoke in unison again and immediately looked at each other. They really needed to stop doing that. Dr Armstrong gave them an amused smile and then retreated, leaving Puck to enter the small white and sky blue room first.

The heart monitor and the ventilator took it in turns to beep and gush, sometimes even colliding with each other. Puck stepped carefully around the bed, as if he thought his footsteps might wake her.

He winced at the sight of the bruises around her nose, eyes and left temple. Her bottom lip was split and there was still some left-over dried blood under her perfectly little nose. She looked as if she'd been in some sort of fight. Her arms rested by her sides, above the scratchy looking pale yellow and white blankets. Her knuckles were grazed, speckled with deep red dried blood. He didn't want Rachel to see Quinn like this. To ruin the image of her that she held so dear to her. That's why he volunteered to go in first. But the small gasp made it obvious that she could see her now.

He turned his head to see her horrified expression, hand raised to her lips, fresh tears threatening to coat the now old lines marked on her little cheeks.

'Rach...' he whispered, not quite sure what to say to make any of it better.

She simply ignored his attempt. She crept over to the right side of the bed and stroked her fingertips over Quinn's pale right forearm. Puck moved round to that side of the bed, to support her. Rachel let out a shallow quiet moan as more tears fell. He eased his hands over her shoulders, and kissed the side of dark brown hair, his senses being invaded by coconut scented shampoo.

'Quinny...' she murmured. Her small thumb brushed the ridges of rough knuckles. 'I'm so sorry Jelly...' she whispered weakly, just watching that still face as the ventilator continued to wheeze and gush, and the heart monitor continued to steadily beep.