Chapter 3
My eyes fly open feeling my chin hit my chest in one of those 'falling asleep in class' moves. A little confused as to why I'm fully clothed sitting upright and alone in my bed I glance toward the clock. 10:45pm. Oh thats right I went temporarily insane and chose Berry over Brits. I look toward my bathroom to see the door still shut tight. Grumbling out loud at the realization Berry's been hiding in there for a good 20 minutes I skip the formaility of knocking. Hey this is my house after all. I jump up grabbing the key above the doorway and barge in causing the half naked girl to shriek in terror as her back slams into the wall. Okay, so not the best desicion I've made this evening.
"Uhm its been over twenty minutes and you're still not dressed? Did I interupt some...uh 'private solo times?'" I ask air quotes and all hoping to shift the fear out of her eyes. She lets out a huff in annoyance and suddenly my eyes focus on her bruised body. Standing in front of me in only tight black boyshorts I feel my jaw practically unhinge in horror and hit the floor. "Aye Dios mio ...does it hurt?" Wow. Since when did Brits speak spanish? And when did she sneak in? Wait hold up...that ridiculous question came out of my fat mouth. Smooth criminal? As if.
"Don't look at me." Shes sniffles but I can't help myself. My eyes wander slowly taking in the damages. Her entire left sholder down the arm and neck too are painted this ugly mix of black and purple with the faintest hints of yellow suggesting it's been a few days since the damage was done. Suddenly I strike "scarf" off my list of future insults for Berry as I see the hand print...a mother fucking HANDPRINT around her throat. I take a few tentitive steps closer afraid even getting near her will hurt her somehow. To my surprise her eyes lock with mine and she doesn't try to run. I can see the internal debate swimming in her eyes. "I won't hurt you" I whisper. My eyes go back down to where they left off zeroing in on bruised ribs. I close in on her now so close I can feel her shaky breath as I reach out to ghost my fingertips as feather light as possible over the angry bruises coloring her ribcage. She sucks in a pained breath and my eyes dart up to lock with hers. My other hand reaches to cup her chin afraid she'll look away. "I'm not going to hurt you. Do you know if any of these are broken?" She shakes her head no. "No they're not broken or, no you do not know."
"I..." her voice cracks and my heart feels as if it did too. Clearing her throat with determination she starts again. "No they're not broken, Santana. Mostly bruised with two fractured on the left side. I had to go to the doctor to reset my shoulder. They insisted they examine the rest of the… damage."
"You're going to need to fill me in on the rest of the damage later. Do you need anything for the pain? I have pills, I can get you ice packs or heating packs...what can I do?"
"I could actually use a tylenol."
I let out a bark of laughter. "Tylenol is for allergy headaches Berry I'll get you the good stuff that will actually take some of the pain away."
"I don't want to pass out or get delirious." I bite down hard on my lip before I mutter something along the lines of 'or I can take the pain away Santana style make you both delirious and pass out and you'll love every minute of it'.
"Don't trust me Berrry?" I can't help but smirk.
She rolls her eyes at me. Good to see a small flicker of the old diva back. "I just don't like losing control like that." Oh honey, you'd love it this time. Seriously I may be worse than Puckerman.
"I said the good stuff...not the great stuff." I turn to go raid my stash and possibly stick my head in the freezer when she grabs my arm.
"Santana wait...I uh..." She starts to stutter as I turn back around to face her.
I see her looking down helplessly at the clothes on the floor and realization hits me like a ton of bricks. "Oh my God why didn't you come out and get me?"
Again she shrugs. "I was embarrassed."
I grip her chin again as her gaze goes everywhere but my face. "Hey look at me. I'm only gonna say this once so do me a favor listen up." I let my eyes rake up and down her body trying to pretend the bruises aren't there. "Me gusta, mama. Rough translation? You're fucking hot, midget. You are no Ru-Paul after all and these hands?" I reach and take one in between both of mine…"I've never seen ones this cute on a man. And look at those tits? Amazing...for being your God given ones of course." She quickly moves to cross her arms over her chest as if suddenly remembering she's topless. "Uh uh" I gently uncross her arms and place them back at her sides. "Don't hide them. Just because I've morphed into Mrs Brady tonight doesn't mean I'd say this shit if I didn't mean it. You have nothing to be embarrassed of except for the fact that you cover all this up with your ridiculous toddler outfits."
"Well if everyone stopped hurling slushies all over me on a daily basis I could wear my real clothes. But quite frankly that stuff stains and I got tired of having to throw out all my good clothes." I feel my eyebrows shoot up to my hair line.
" That's pretty genius." She gives me a self satisfied smirk. "One day I want to see what you call your 'real clothes' but for now let's get you into mine and get this show on the road."
I'm not gonna lie I don't remember a time ever in my life where I was putting clothes ON a girl and not ripping them off, but tonight seems like a lot of firsts for me. I tried my hardest not to cringe hearing the whimpers as she struggled to move her arms and legs up and down as I redressed her.
After giving her some pain medication we find ourselves standing in my room staring at each other. Suddenly it's awkward as hell. Walking back out to my bed room it suddenly feels really freaking awkward. "This is weird" she states the obvious. "I don't know what to do."
"This is weird for you? You're like the queen of vomiting emotions all over us everyday. Imagine how this feels for me? I don'tdo emotions and I don't usually do this shit either, that's B's thing...with her bone crushing hugs and all."
"Where am I supposed to sleep?"
"There's a guest bedroom next door or it's cool if you pass out here my beds huge. Just stay on your side dwarf" Insult rolling of my tongue unapologetically. She's stalling, and quite frankly I'm not in the mood to go through another whirlwind of emotions before she tells me what the hell happened to her. I am way outta my element here. And then she fires off this direct hit.
"Is that where you stole Finns virginity?"
Suddenly everything goes red. I take a few steps toward her closing the gap. I imagine I look similar to a raging bull...smoke coming out of my nostrils and all cause that's about accurate as to how I feel. "The fuck did you just say, hobbit?"
"I'm just saying that it would be a bit weird to share a bed with the woman who stole my boyfriend virginity." She says way to confident for my liking.
Oh no she didn't. Seriously how am I supposed to focus on being a nice person right now when she's firing this shit at me?
"First of all I didn't have to steal a damn thing he begged me for it. Second, he wasn't your boyfriend when we did it and he isn't now. Third, if you keep this up I will dump you off in the real lima heights, ya got me? Oh and for the record he paid for a hotel room."
I try to take some calming breaths. This was not what was supposed to be going down. Here I am selflessly giving up some sweet sex with Brits to take care of this ungrateful troll and she's firing cheap shots? I think it's time to reach into Snix bag of dirty little tricks before she takes over and I end up doing Berry more harm than good. She wants to come at me instead of dealing with this shit? Let's see her dodge this ball.
"Karofsky" I hiss, face so close to her we're practically Eskimo kissing. Her body goes rigid. Hey, I told you it was a dirty trick, but it works like a charm.
"Wh..what?"
"David Karofsky." I say arching and eyebrow and reaching for my phone. "Ah ha. There he is let me just give him a ring and have him pop on by."
Ah ha, gotcha. I muse to myself upon seeing her plump little lip start to tremble.
"No" she lets out in the most heart wrenching sob and collapses to the floor. She's pulled her knees up to her chest, head resting on top and is rocking back and forth. I don't know how long I'm standing there like an idiot before I toss my phone on my bed and quickly scramble down to the floor to take her in my arms, only to have the little monster start fighting me trying to shove me off. She might have an unusual amount of strength for her size but so do I and I have a few inches on her. I hold her tighter pinning her arms and violent little fists between our chests. "Shhh. You're safe Rachel I'd never do that to you." I whisper in her ear.
"Then why would you say such a thing." She shrieks loud enough to leave my ears ringing. I pull back to look her in the eyes, "because you've got to let this out, honey. Come on." I stand up holding out my hand for her to take and to my complete surprise she grabs it without a fight or nasty word. I let go of her hand to climb onto my bed and lean back against the headboard. She's still crying but holding back the sobs I can see desperate to break free. "Come here baby girl. You're safe here." She crawls up onto my bed and over to me settling down in my arms. I kiss the top of her head holding her tight with one arm while the other is running gently through her hair. She sighs as she squirms a little to get comfortable. "Are you in pain is this okay?" I ask seeing the bruises on her arm that just tightened across my waist.
"I'm okay. This feels nice. I don't know how to start this." She confesses quietly.
"Talk when you're ready we're in no hurry. Just relax and let whatever you're feeling out." That's all it takes it seems to finally push her over the edge. I'm a little taken aback at the effect it's having on me. She feel so small in my arms, it's the first time I see Rachel Berry as breakable. And that's exactly what she is, broken and although I can feel my heart breaking a long with her I have to consciously fights the rage bubbling up from deep within me.
Despite my horrendous attitude at times in Glee club I do love music which is why after a few moments pass with Rachel shaking violently in my arms from releasing all this pain, I start to sing softly. Maybe because she's wearing my Janis shirt that this song comes to my head but listening to the lyrics as I start to sing them I can't help but think it's kind of the perfect song for the broken body in my arms.
Oh and I know how you feel,
I know you feel that you're through.
Oh sit there, count, Ah, count your little fingers,
my unhappy oh little girl, little girl blue, yeah.
I notice her small body still what feels like hours later but I'm sure hasn't been even close to that. Her body lets out a tremor every few breaths, the aftershocks of expelling such built up emotion, until only silence fills the room. My hand stills from playing with her hair as I reach down to tilt her chin up from where it's been buried under mine. "Hey there."
"Hi" she sniffles as I brush the tears from her face. "I think…I'm ready now." She whispers, the fear evident in her voice.
"Okay"
She lets out a sigh burying her head back in my chest and squeezing me tighter. "Just one more minute," she mutters into my chest.
I tighten my grip around her. "Take all the time you need honey, but you know it's never going to be easy to talk about. It's not going to feel any better a few minutes from now or a few days this is just something you're going to have to fight through, but you're not alone."
"I'm scared."
My heartbeat picks up speed in my chest, "of what?"
"He said he'd kill me if I ever told" her breath hitches again and I can feel her crying a little against me.
"Shhh it's okay baby girl. I told you, no one can touch you now, not even that son of a bitch. Besides, Auntie Snix is going to take care of him."
"No please, please promise me San. He'll kill me."
"Not if I kill him first, baby girl"
She sits up now pulling herself free of my embrace. She brings her knees back up to her chest and starts shaking her head. "No no no."
"Hey hey." I say softly shifting up to my knees next to her rubbing her back gently so I don't hurt her. "Shhh deep breaths, it's okay." She's starting to scare me with this mental patient rocking back and forth shit she's done twice already.
"No, it's not! It's never going to be okay again, Santana..Snix..whoever the fuck you are! If you go after him he'll come back for me. You can't protect me around the clock, please don't!"
Is she insane? I attack people if I don't like their outfits for God's sake and I'm supposed to 'control myself' around some meathead to if nothing else clearly beat the shit out of a girl! There is seriously no way I can promise not to kill this bastard. "Rach…I, shit…can we iron out those details later? I don't want to lie to you whatever he did seems pretty fucking awful. You're a strong girl, you can take alotta shit from alotta people, mostly me, and I've never seen you like this. Not to mention the fact you look like you've been playing the role of 'bait dog' in a pit bull fight."
She scoots a little to sit Indian style facing me. Taking both of my hands in hers she asks if I'm sure I really want to hear what happened to her. I assure her I most certainly do and kindly remind her I've said as much at least ten times tonight. She gets a faraway look on her face and her hands hold onto mine for dear life as she begins her story.