A whole day after my meeting with Quinn, thinking about what she said and all, I decided it's time to get back to school. I noticed how much I lost by not going to school. I missed my friends, I missed going out. After nearly two weeks of not being sick and staying in all the time, you get bored. Even though I was still kind of upset about things, I hadn't touched my skin in a harmful way ever since the day I met with Quinn. So I guess that was good. I didn't even find the blade yet either, which was probably only a good thing. When I forgave Quinn, I felt much better. It felt like I had officially let go of everything that was behind me and her and that I could finally focuse on the future - without her in it. I woke up the Monday after the weekend and for once in a very long time, I woke up without being angry about the fact that I woke up. I was going to school not looking like a mess. I didn't want to, everyone didn't have to know how I felt, they could think I was okay again if I only acted like I was. One thing left my shoulders, there was only all the other things to fight and win over. When I got to school on Monday, I went to all lessons without skipping or being late to any - to make up for my lost time. After math, I decided to look for Brittany during my long break. I wanted to tell her we were okay, so she wouldn't keep texting me, telling me she's sorry for something she hasn't done. All I would ask for her to explain was why she left my room when she found the blood stain on my pants. After ten minutes of looking and asking for her, I was told she was outside by one of the girls from the cheerleading team, I think her name was Christine. I went outside and even though it was nearly summer, the wind was cold. It hit my legs and arms, it made my body shiver. I looked around and there she was. Sitting right next to Quinn, discussing. When I started walking towards them, they first didn't notice me but when Quinn looked up, she saw me coming towards them. A smile showed upon her face.
"Hey" she said.
"Brittany, can I talk to you?" I ignored Quinn. She chuckled.
"Um..," Brittany looked up at me and stood up "sure"
"Alone?" I asked, looking at Quinn.
"I'll leave" she said and quickly walked over to one of the benches on the other side. I was surprised she didn't fight back.
"What's up?" Brittany said.
"I just wanted to tell you we're okay.. Sorry for ignoring you before" I looked up.
"I mean.. Did I do something? Was that why you ignored me? Was it because I left your place just like that.. I-" she kept babbling.
"Brittany, calm down" I cut her off and smiled. "It's not because you left, I'll ask you about that soon" I lightly laughed. She smiled back. "I ignored you because I had been texting with someone I thought was you everyday for a whole week.."
"What? Are you serious? Santana, I'm so sorry.. I had no idea, I swear" she raised her hand and placed it on my shoulder, her lips changed from a smile to a little pout.
"It's okay, it's not your fault" I said to save her the sympathy.
"Who was it? Did you find out?"
"I did. We've talked about it already"
"Who was it then?" she asked.
"It's not important" I didn't want to tell her it was Quinn. I didn't know Brittany that well and I didn't know how she would react.
"Was it Quinn?" she nearly whispered and lowered her head to my height.
"It doesn't matter, Brittany" I smiled, from that, I was almost sure she knew it was Quinn.
"Alright.." she half smiled back at me and removed her hand from my shoulder.
The sun from behind me was striking her eyes so she narrowed them but yet the clear blue colour was perfectly visible, even with her eyes small. It was distracting. It was hard to look at anything else but her eyes sometimes, not that I wanted to stare into them, it's just really hard not to.
"And now, explain to me why you left like that?"
"I don't feel like explaining" she looked behind me, I looked back and faced Quinn staring at us.
"Brittany, tell me," I demanded "I need to know, was it because of the blood stain?"
"Do you want the truth?"
"Of course" I furrowed my eyebrows.
"It was becuase of the blood" she admitted.
"But I told you it was fo-"
"Don't," she stopped me "I know exactly what it was, Santana. I wanted to believe it was food but then I found something.."
"What?"
"I went into the bathroom, I thought maybe I could calm down and not feel like I did and stay with you. But then it hit me, I started looking through your stuff"
"You did what?" I started to sound really aggressive.
"I guess I don't need to tell you more?" she said.
"You can't look trough other people's stuff like that" I started to raise my voice, but not too much.
"I wanted to protect you from yourself"
I looked down at the floor. What she said made me feel.. Happy, like she really cared about me. I felt like crying out of embarrassment. I didn't want anyone to know, I really didn't because it made me feel like a messed up freak.
"How did you even find it? I hid it really good" I said when I stopped feeling sorry for myself.
"My big sister used to have problems.. And she was as smart as you were with the hiding" Brittany stared right into my eyes for the first time today, my heart sunk to the floor when she told me about her sister. "I know this is weird because we're not really friends, I think, but I get really upset when people hurt themselves like that, I just hope you know I care, and I don't want you to keep doing it"
I looked at Brittany, I was staring. I didn't answer her. I just took one step closer to her, I smiled with all my heart. She smiled back and I opened my arms and hugged her. Her chest was being pressed against mine really hard, I didn't even notice until that moment that I hugged her very tightly. I pulled away and stepped back.
"We are friends, Brittany" I smiled at her.
"We are, aren't we?"
"Yeah" I laughed.
I walked out of the locker room when we finished P.E. I walked right behind Tina and we were talking like normal, as if we never got weird. I hadn't seen Rachel around in school so I was relieved and felt like I could hang out with Tina. Mercedes waited for us right outside the English classroom. We walked towards her and then the three of us made our way to Spanish class, me and Mercedes walked in and Tina went to her lesson.
"Hey, I'm glad you're back"
"Me too" I answered Mercedes as we sat down.
The rest of the lesson went on and we were quiet, we didn't want to get thrown out. The Spanish teacher had serious mood swings all the time. Quinn and Brittany sat in the back like always and we were two rows before them. I tried to avoid looking back at them, I failed once but they didn't catch me looking. I started playing with my pencil, repeatedly and lightly hitting it on the edge of the desk. I just wanted the lesson to end, I know I wasn't the only one. All around the classroom were people shaking their legs, playing with their phones and drawing instead of taking notes. I tried to focus but then instead of actually focusing on the teacher, I drifted away as always. It was just too boring. I also didn't have to listen to her and she knew that so I didn't get why she got angry when I didn't. Probably because it wasn't "fair".
"Class dismissed"
Everyone basically rose from their chairs and ran out of the classroom. So did me and Mercedes.
"Jeez, that woman seriously should work in a prison" Mercedes joked.
''She should be in prison" I corrected her and laughed as well.
Spanish was our last lesson so we started heading to the parking lots. When we got out, I took a look around to see if my mother was here yet and of course, she wasn't. So I walked with Mercedes to her car so she had company at least.
"Do you want a ride home?" she asked me when we reached the black volvo.
"No, it's okay. I promised my mom she could pick me up today"
"Oh, okay. I can wait with you until she gets here if you want to?" Mercedes offered.
"Don't, she'll be here any minute"
"You sure?"
"Yeah, you go and we'll see each other tomorrow" I assured her.
She nodded, smiled and walked into the car, I waved and walked to the usual spot my mom picks me up from. On the left side of the parking lot. I took really slow steps there just to make everything go slower then maybe time would go faster. I stood there with my arms crossed, facing the road and hoping she would be here soon. I was glad the weather was nice so I didn't have to stand outside in the cold. I mean, I could wait inside school but then I would have to check the window all the time and that would just be stressful. Around ten minutes passed and my mom still wasn't in the parking lot. Another ten minutes went by and after I had been standing there for twenty minutes my mom texted me saying she couldn't come get me because she was held up in work. And I was left there, without a ride home. Which meant I had to walk because I really didn't like taking the bus anywhere. I didn't even answer my moms text because I was so angry about it. She had me waiting for that long and she couldn't tell me earlier that I would have to find another way to get home. I would've gone with Mercedes if I had known. I picked up my bag from the floor, threw it on my back and started walking. People were still walking to their cars and stuff so school wasn't empty of course. It was just no one I knew, unfortunately.
"You're not walking home, are you?" I turned around in reaction to her voice and the fact that she stopped me by dragging my arm.
"I am" I said.
"I can drive you.. If you want?"
"It's okay" I started walking again.
She hurried and stood right in front of me to stop me from walking, I moved to the left and she blocked the way, I moved to the right and she did the same thing. So I stopped and looked at Quinn's face just to hear her lame speech so I could get home sometime today.
"Let me drive you" she said with a serious voice.
"I said it's okay, can you let me go?"
"Santana, I told you I was going to make it up to you" she started to look angry.
I looked at her face and she seemed to really follow her words and promises this time. And I was still determined on following mine, I didn't want anything to do with her. It was just really hard in my position. It really was.
"I don't want you to drive me home, please stop being such an ass licker"
"I'm just trying to be nice, Santana, I told you I was going to be better" she was so annoyed I could hear the frustration in her voice.
"And I told you we will never be friends" I said and pushed her aside and started walking. I heard her sigh behind me but I didn't look back.
"Santana" she held my arm again, right under the elbow.
"Will you stop?" I jerked myself of her grip.
"I don't want us to be enemies any longer"
"You've made that very clear, we're not enemies, Quinn," I said "we're just not friends"
"I hate this, I hate that I like you so much" she angrily mumbled, turned around and walked away to her car.
I watched her walk away for a long while until I started walking home again. Something inside me felt sorry for her after what she said, but I shook it off and covered the pity by remembering how she treated me before she "changed" towards me.
When I finally got home, no one was in. My dad was at work and so was my mom. This time instead of walking to my room, I went to the living room. I sat on the couch and turned the TV on. After I had been staring at the screen for a while, I got lost in my own thoughts again. It was hard for me to stop thinking about Quinn these days, about everything she told me. A part of me wanted to tell her I'll be her friend, only to save her all the trouble of trying to be super nice to me. Then again, another part hated her more and more for each second that pasted - not only for what she did to me but also because she was really hard for me to hate. And from my strong hate grew some kind of liking towards her. A liking I had been pushing away for a really long time, a feeling I didn't allow to even enter my soul and my mind. It was something I kept on the outside, something that kept knocking and begging me to let in. This liking though, it wasn't something that lightened my days and made them brighter, this liking could be compared to a dark cloud. Whenever I felt it approaching me, I got distracted, cold.. I got helplessly pushed down to the ground. Quinn was that dark cloud to me.