Hey Guys. Sorry for the long wait. I just started University, well and had a lot on my hands. Well actually I just finished this at Uni :D Hope you enjoy the update and as always thanks for all of you who took the time to review or put this on alert or even favorite :)
Disclaimer: As always, don't own anything Glee related.
Everything had been better than Brittany expected. She knew that the Latina could never be really mad at her for these things happening to her but she was afraid that she would push her away. Somehow start to think she was disgusting. Sometimes when she closed her eyes she could still feel his fingers on her skin and it made her feel disgusted and ashamed of herself all over again. She had dreamt of the incident. it wasn't really a nightmare. She wasn't the one being attacked or rather she was but she was on the outside watching everything. Like everyone around her must have seen things unfold and like them she was unable to do anything to stop it.
What she came to realize was that she would never be able to take this back. She only knew one thing for sure. that she could start to heal further, not to forget things but to come to terms with them and it relived her to think this was possible.
She was immersed in her thoughts but was out of them when she felt the familiar sensation of a warm slightly smaller body beside her. Arms wrapped tightly around her waist to keep her safe and grounded.
Before she even knew it her heart swell with love. It seemed as it was the indisputable answer to her confession yesterday and for the first time in months Brittany could say she felt her love for Santana, her happiness starting to swell. it was still not the same. She was not the same but she ravished in the feel of it. She soaked up everything she could as if she was trying to keep some of it for worse times. She tried to store it away some part it could never vanish, some part she could access to bathe in it when her darker moments made her feel as if nothing was there for her anymore.
As if she was the slut, the abomination he claimed he wanted to correct. She felt a shudder at these thoughts of him - Kyle - the one who took everything from her. And suddenly the arms that held her tight felt wrong, she didn't like the touch it reminded her to much of what happened. It was too intimate, to caring, to close. She couldn't handle it. She felt a again shame through every fiber of her being. She felt dirty again. As if her numbness which constantly allowed pain dulled the unbearable facts as well.
She was familiar with the pain of the loss, the pain of feeling dirty and like the biggest liar for not telling Santana about what happened with kyle but this intense feeling of shame and disgust with herself was new. She stood up untangled herself from Santana and rushed into the shower to wash herself, clean her of every touch, every thought and every sin she felt burning on her sin. In her soul.
Santana woke up to the sound of the shower. She felt around the bed and found the spot beside her empty. She got up and went over to the bathroom and knocked carefully on the door to warn the blonde of her presence. After some light knocks she switched to heavier ones but still she got no answer.
"Britt are you in there? Can I come in?" Santana tried to keep her voice calm and collected but she was freaking out inwardly. The only thing that remained to make a sound was the shower.
"If you don't answer me Britt I'll have to come in." Santana hoped that Brittany wouldn't want her to come in enough to say something. Santana kind of thought that Brittany didn't want her to see the blonde without clothes. Although in the six months taking care of her Santana had on more than one occasion seen Brittany naked it was while she couldn't help herself and never realized it. But this time, remembering the rape, she knew it wasn't the best idea.
"Okay B, I warned you I'm coming in." The Latina took a deep breath and entered the room. Which didn't enlighten her at all because the whole room was full of something like evaporated water fume. it looked like someone had dropped a smoke grenade in there. Santana immediately made her way over to where she new the window was and opened it to let the "smoke" escape. When she turned around she saw the "smoke" was coming from the shower. Again she hesitated.
"B, really please just tell me you#re alright. I don't want to invade you privacy or anything." Santana's voice was gentle but she couldn't suppress the worry lacing with it.
She put her ear against the shower wall and still there was only the shower heard. She prepared herself with another breath and opened the door to the shower and her heart broke all over again.
The blonde was sitting in the shower furiously scrubbing at every inch of her skin with a washcloth. The skins had already started to break at some places and blood was dripping down her smooth porcelain skin. The water must have been scorching because she looked like a lobster. it hurt Santana to see Brittany like this after the road to her recovery seemed to have been going rather well lately. She looked at the blondes face and saw that Brittany hadn't even realized she wasn't alone anymore. She was still scrubbing her body manically. Santana started to lower the water temperature which had really been hot enough to try to boil something. She then knelled down to be face to face with Brittany.
"okay b, we have to get you out of her and you have to stop hurting yourself with that washcloth." She slowly reached for the washcloth but Brittany didn't let go. She was still not looking at Santana and scrubbed perhaps even harder.
"come on Britt you#re hurting yourself this has to stop. You are clean already let me get you out of this shower. please." Santana had long ago swallowed her pride when it came to Brittany and was now more or less begging the blonde to listen and stop with the insane scrubbing.
This time Brittany did react. She looked at Santana with stormy gray eyes brimming with tears and croaked out "I have to get him off me." And then returned to just scrubbing and hurting. Physically and emotionally.
"It's okay Britt you don#t have to. You're clean in every sense of the word. What you had to endure was never your fault. Don't ever thing that. Never!" As she said this the Latina clawed the washcloth out of the blondes hand. She then proceeded to try to get the soap from the body. It must have stung real bad but Brittany didn't seem to react to this pain at all. She seemed so far away. But not like before. this was no returning to her catatonic stage. this was a new form of madness clawing at her frail soul. A new torment that tries to break her completely.
Suddenly Brittany lashed out and tried to scratch her face and shrieked "Don
't touch me!" at the Latina. Luckily Santana got away before the blonde got to her nose or eyes and got away with a scratch mark along her cheek. She was shocked to say the least.
"Britt it's me Santana snap out of it. i won#t hurt you." Santana was trying to approach the blonde again this time more careful of her sharp nails.
Santana was desperate. She needed to show the blue eyed blonde was safe. Brittany had to get out of her haze and come back to their safe apartment. So Santana lay it on the line. She made a rush to the blonde and before Brittany could react slapped her. Right across the face.
"Snap out of it Britt! You are safe. You are clean. Everything is going to be alright. I promise!" Santana shouted this at the blonde as if her voice was a hammer trying to nail it into the blondes mind.
Brittany stood still for a moment and seemed shocked. She then looked around. "San?" she seemed confused.
"Britt you are in the bathroom. Can I help you out?" she asked before touching the blonde without permission again.
"Just get me a towel and put some clothes out for me please?" Santana knew that the blonde didn't want her to see her naked form. She was ashamed. She saw this in the way she hugged herself tightly over her chest and clung to the newly picked up washcloth to cover her modesty.
Santana left the bathroom after she handed Brittany a towel and some antibacterial cream and body lotion to put on the almost boiled and split skin.
What Brittany now needed was patience and Santana was more than willing to give her all the patience she needed. Never would she allow for Brittany to crumble under the weight the incident put on her shoulder. It had long been decided that the Latina would be Brittany's rock. Be strong when she couldn't be, be patient when she lost it, lover when she herself couldn't.
Brittany sat hugging herself in the shower. She was in a frenzy when Santana found her. She didn't know at first how she even got in the shower and started to wash herself. But she then remembered how she remembered everything and how she just wanted to feel clean again. This time she just tried to block it out. She didn't want to freak Santana out even more but she still felt uncomfortable. All this time in her recovery she had cuddled and even kissed the Latina and it was just right but now that it lay all in the open she just didn't want to be touched. May be it was because it was now all out there? maybe because she herself felt so dirty again? She just didn't know.
She just hoped to keep the intimacy with Santana to a minimum. She pulled herself out of her thoughts and started drying herself off. Now for the first time she really saw and felt the pain from her skin. She winced while she carefully dried herself off and applied the lotion Santana had given to her as well as the antibacterial cream to cover her wounds. Putin her towel around her body she made her way out of the bathroom into their bedroom and saw Santana sitting on their bed but not looking at her. She must have felt that she didn't want to be looked at at least not when this exposed.
Santana always notices these things about her. to think there were people who thought she was a heartless bitch had never been more ridiculous to Brittany than now.
She quickly stepped to her drawer took some underwear, sweat pants and a nice hoodie and got dressed in the bathroom. When she strode into the bedroom again Santana was looking up her eyes questioning the blonde before her.
"Do you want to talk about it?" was all Santana asked. Brittany thought for a moment. She had told Santana everything already but she knew if she told Santana what triggered everything she would tell her time and time again that nothing was her fault and that she loved her despite this but what the brunette had to see was that she knew somewhere in her heart that Santana would stay by her side. What the blonde didn't know was if she could come to terms with this herself. Would she be able to ever feel clean again? free from the ghost of his touch? Could she ever see herself in the mirror again without feeling like she did something wrong as if there was a stamp on her forehead that screamed "dirty".
So Brittany just shook her head.
"I'm sorry San but I just need some time to think about everything it's just so much to process right now. know it might seem silly because one could guess I would have dealt with this by now but it's just so much more overwhelming now that I start to get a grip on my feelings." The blonde didn't want Santana to feel left out. She really wanted to be with her but just couldn't. Not now.
"I think I'm going to call Danny. I.. I thought about maybe living with him for a week or so." Brittany hadn't really thought about this but as the words left her mouth she knew it was the best thing to do.
"Why do you want to move in with him? I mean you can see him all day if you want to. i never said anything did i? I mean did I do something wrong? Is it because of the slap? I really am sorry abut that Britt I was just so fucking scared seeing you like this and I didn't know what to do." Santana was rambling right know fighting a long lost fight with tears that already streamed down her face.
Brittany's heart ached at the scene. She didn't want to hurt Santana or leave her but she had to be away for a bit. She needed a safe place. Because in their apartment in their bed there would be too much intimacy. Brittany couldn't handle that right now. And she knew that if she always with drew from the Latin's attempts to comfort her she would be hurt.
"San not this is not about you. This is about me. Please you said you would stick by my side. Do you trust me?" Brittany looked directly into Santana's brown eyes.
"With all I have." The answer was immediate.
"Then trust me to do this. I need some time to sort out myself and Danny has always been good to me and helped me. Perhaps I can stay at his place a bit to deal a bit more. I don't want to leave you don't ever think that. I love you so much that it hurts. But I have to do this for me. And for us. And I'm so sorry for hurting you earlier. But this is just another reason I need this break."
Santana's head hung down after she talked so she couldn't read the emotion on the brunette's face. She gave her a moment.
"San?" Slowly the Latina looked up. She was still crying but she had a lopsided grin on her face.
"Come home fast. I'll be waiting."
Brittany returned the grin. And with one last glance at her best-friend, girlfriend, her lover she turned around. She had to go. She had to get it together. For herself. For her. For them.
A/N: So another chapter. I know this may seem like this is a step back but I think it's the natural conclusion of it all. Love you guys regardless but if you have the time please review ;)