FIC: Say Good-Bye to This Heart Of Mine - Glee, Rachel/Santana (3/4)
TITLE: Say Good-Bye to This Heart Of Mine (3/4)
AUTHOR: Misty Flores
Email: mistiec_flores@yahoo.com
GENRE: Rachel/Santana, mentions of Brittany/Santana; Rachel/Finn, Santana/Puck - Glee
RATING: Mature
WORD COUNT: Around 14500
SUMMARY: It's her and Rachel Berry against the fucking world.
NOTES: AU/Future!Fic. This is gilligankane's fault. And I also blame reading 'The Zombie Survival Guide' recently.
WARNINGS: Character Death. And as much as it seems like it, this isn't really a zombie fic. But it's dark. Hopefully you'll trust me enough to read it.
QuickLinks: Part I | Part II | Part III | Part IV>
PART III
She's been alone with Rachel so long she doesn't know how to be with anybody else.
Santana Lopez used to be the queen of McKinley High. She was the Head Bitch In Charge, and when she walked down the hallways, the masses parted for her like she was fucking royalty.
Now, the very sight of strangers is enough to terrify her.
The base itself is less than a thousand people, including the soldiers. Finn told them that.
Standing at the heavily fortified entrance, looking at the militia members and their guns and the people walking around like nothing fucking happened, it feels like a mob.
As she stands stock still, willing herself not to panic and run, a slim hand slips into hers. Rachel grips her hard, tangling digits. She glances over, and discovers Rachel's eyes wide, emotions playing over her expressive face like a movie on a screen.
Instinctively, Santana squeezes and brings her in, until Rachel's pressed in slightly behind her. Rachel clutches her like a she's a life jacket.
"Guys? It's okay." Finn smiles at them both, and spreads his arms wide. "Welcome home."
It doesn't fucking feel like home.
--
They pull her and Rachel apart for 'debriefing'. A military officer questions Santana like she's a POW, and when it's over, grimly tells her she can't have her guns in here.
"Too many people got too used to their guns," he says quietly. "This isn't the wild west. But I'm impressed. You've got a fighting instinct. We could use people like you, if you want to join up. Then you get to keep your gun."
Her skin is crawling. She feels naked. Like her arm is cut off.
It's exactly how she felt two years ago when she lost Brittany.
And now there's fucking people EVERYWHERE and when he assigns her her bedroom and lets her go, she searches every face for Rachel Berry.
Finn finds her first, and Santana feels so much like a trapped wild animal that she's almost relieved to see him.
"Where's Rachel."
"Don't worry." He smiles wide, handsome and sweet. "She's fine. They're assigning her a room and debriefing her, just like you. You'll see her soon enough."
Santana rubs absently at her scarred forearm. It's a nervous tick. Finn sees it.
"I still can't believe it. It's … a miracle." Santana stops rubbing. Finn looks so genuinely HAPPY to see her.
"It's not a miracle," she tells him flatly. "Rachel and I survived because there wasn't another option."
Finn stares at her. He breaks out into a wide smile. "They told me you might be joining up. Makes sense. You're still a bad ass, aren't you?"
Santana stares at him, wills him to go away by the force of her glare. Finn just stays.
--
After the first decent shower she's had in weeks Santana, dressed in clean clothes, heads to her assigned room; twin bunk beds in a dormitory that used to house college kids.
When Santana twists the knob and pushes open the door, she finally sees Rachel, sitting awkwardly on the bottom bunk.
Their eyes meet, and Santana is flooded with such a sense of relief that it nearly brings her to her knees.
Her hand tightens hard around the doorknob. She doesn't trust herself to walk.
Rachel launches to her feet, takes a couple steps toward her, and then suddenly stops.
Santana can only stare stupidly, waiting for the dizziness to pass and her strength to return.
She has the ridiculous urge to run into Rachel's arms like some movie cliché and never, in two years, has she had that feeling.
Because Rachel's never been more than two feet away.
It's a terrifying realization.
"Hi," she manages, and lowers her gaze, focuses on coming inside and closing the door behind her. "Are you okay?"
"As well as can be expected, I guess. At my debriefing they told me that they could use teachers."
Teacher. Of course. Santana feels the unmistakable urge to smile and squelches it.
"What about you?" Rachel prompts.
"What do you think?" she asks. Rachel just stares at her, and Santana says with a 'duh' in her voice, "Military."
"They're not going to make you shave your head, right?" Rachel sounds so damn mortified at just the thought.
"No." Santana stares at the beds. She glances at Rachel, at Rachel's things neatly piled near the bottom bunk. "I thought you were going to stay with Finn."
Rachel looks momentarily shocked. Her eyes flit down to the floor, then back up. "I'm… I…"
"What?"
Rachel's chin comes up. Her lip juts out. "I'm not."
It's a fair answer. Rachel doesn't elaborate.
Santana can feel her gaze burning on her. With a certainty that she doesn't feel, she flings herself up on the top and turns toward to the wall.
"I'm exhausted," she says, and shuts her eyes.
Rachel doesn’t respond. The light clicks off. She isn't aware she's holding her breath until she feels the bunk move and hears Rachel settle onto her bed.
Curling into herself, she opens her eyes.
--
Sleep doesn't come. For the past two years, she's lived her life like a damned Siamese twin, and it's a habit she doesn't know how to break.
She's in a fucking military compound and she doesn't feel safe because there's no gun under her pillow and there's no girl beside her.
It's some PTSD bullshit and it's turned her into a damned Rachel Berry junkie, and it's pathetic.
Underneath her, she hears a dramatic, overbearing sigh, and suddenly out of the darkness, Rachel speaks. "This is ridiculous."
Santana pushes up, watches through the shadowed room as the skimpy wooden frame of the bed creaks, and the brunette head of Rachel Berry peeks up at her.
The sight causes her breath to quicken, her heart rate to spike.
"What are you doing?" she rasps, intending to sound acidic and failing miserably.
Rachel doesn't stop. She pulls herself onto Santana's bed and crawls over her. For a tense second, she simply stares. Then, she matter-of-factly lets herself drop into the crook of Santana's side, curling up against her.
The sensation feels so much like home Santana is struck dumb. She tries to speak. Tries to tell Rachel Berry to get the hell out of her bed. That their codependence is ridiculous and bordering on plain crazy. That they both need therapy and they shouldn't be feeling this.
It all gets stuck in her throat and what comes out instead is a relieved, confused bleat of a sigh that only makes Rachel snuggle in closer.
She smells like cheap shampoo and soap.
"I've forgotten how to sleep without you," Rachel says suddenly.
Santana should argue.
Instead, she just feels like she's got her arm back. And suddenly her eyes close and she's so damn sleepy, she drifts off without realizing it.
--
She's brought to awareness by the sensation of touch. Her eyes open, eyelids flutter in drowsy appreciation at the feel of Rachel's fingers smoothing along her cheek. In their sleep, they've curled into each other. Her arm slings possessively over Rachel's hip, and Rachel's dark eyes just stare, as if she's trying to memorize every feature.
"They say it's natural," Rachel whispers. "The two of us have been through so much trauma together, we're going to feel this intense bond."
She keeps touching. Weighted by sleepiness, Santana lets it happen. Her eyes close in appreciation.
"Sure," Santana mumbles, and thumbs the curve of Rachel's hip, lazily tracing circles in the fabric.
Rachel's thumb slides across her nose, and lands gently on her lip. Santana's eyes open. Inches away, Rachel's half buried in her pillow, but the look in her eyes is unmistakable.
Ever so slightly, Santana puckers her lips; presses a kiss to the pad of Rachel's thumb.
Rachel doesn't pull away.
When Santana's fingers spread against her hip, pull slightly, Rachel's body comes willingly.
When her mouth meets Santana's, the kiss is almost chaste. There is a delicate press of lips that deepens only slightly when Rachel's takes her lower lip between hers and sucks lightly.
Santana feels it between her legs. Her body suddenly aches, and she sighs, inviting Rachel in.
Hands press against her cheek, tilting her head back as Rachel's pushes forward, tongue sweeping across her teeth, until Santana is flat on her back and Rachel's rolled herself on top of her.
Her shirt rides up, and she smiles against Rachel's lips when the other woman brushes against the bared skin.
Rachel's answering smile is fleeting, but expansive, and it disappears just as quickly when her fingers smooth up and find the small mound of Santana's breast.
Santana's brow arches cockily. Rachel grins, accepts the challenge.
Feather light kisses press against her mouth, her jaw, down her neck, as Rachel's fingers lift the shirt. She mouths Santana's bare stomach, and Santana stretches against the ministrations, hiking in her breath when Rachel's lips bump against her nipple, before she engulfs it completely.
"Fuck," she groans, and instinctively grabs for Rachel's head, tangling her fingers into Rachel's thick locks and arching underneath her. She hears Rachel chuckle, and answers in a hiss when Rachel's fingers reach down without warning to press into her damp underwear.
The sudden bang on the door is so unexpected she doesn't understand what's happened at first.
Rachel's head lifts.
"Rachel?" The banging continues. "Santana? Are you up?"
Their eyes meet in sudden realization. "Finn," Rachel breathes, and scrambles off the bed, nearly tripping down the frame as she straightens herself.
Dazed, Santana can only watch dumbly, as Rachel gives her a wild look. "Just a minute, Finn!"
She rushes for the door. Santana's brow furrows.
Rachel opens the door, and her voice is so oddly pitched, Santana knows she's wearing an idiotic expression to match. "Hi!"
"Hey!" Finn grins at her, and through the crook of the door, lowers himself in to press a kiss to Rachel's cheek. Santana feels something cold flush through her. She pushes up, rolls down her shirt as Finn smiles at her. "Morning, San!"
Her mouth quirks in response.
"I wanted to take you guys to breakfast." His smile is wide and radiant for Rachel. "How'd you guys sleep?"
"Fine!" Rachel glances at her, all wide-eyes and panic. "Umm… could you give us a minute? Let us get dressed?"
"Huh? Oh yeah, sure." Finn smiles, and keeps smiling even as Rachel places a hand on his chest and shoves him out the door. "I'll wait out here!"
Rachel slams the door shut.
She whirls and leans against it, looking spent and worried and fucking agonized.
Santana feels like a damn idiot.
"This is stupid," she finds herself saying, throwing off the covers and vaulting off the bed.
"What do you mean?"
"What do you think I mean?" she asks. "Do you think it's fucking natural that you can't sleep by yourself? Do you think Finn will understand it?" Rachel can only stare at her, looking lost and unsure. Santana feels something like dread fill her. "Are you ever planning on telling him?"
Rachel's mouth opens, ready to speak, before she seems to lose steam, and closes it again. "It's complicated," she manages weakly. "You know that."
She wants not to feel absolutely devastated. She wants the ache in her heart to go away. She wants to be anything than what she is, disappointed and idiotic and feeling like she's been fucking dumped.
Sucking in her breath, she turns away from Rachel and says in the most even tone she can muster, "No, it's not."
"San-"
"If you want to be with Finn, he needs to be enough for you."
Because that's always been Rachel's problem. She wants everything too much.
Santana hates that she can identify with it.
"Santana." Rachel's tone is soft, hurt. "That's not fair."
The statement is too much. She turns on Rachel, grips her pants and nearly flings them at her. "Fair? What's fucking fair? That Brittany loved me and wanted to be with me and because I wanted to be fucking popular I never told her I loved her? That she died before we could even be together? Do you think it's fair to Finn that he finds the love of his life and she's fucking the girl that took his virginity instead? That all our friends and family are DEAD? What's fucking FAIR, Rachel?"
The rant exhausts her. She's breathing hard and wounded and Rachel only stares at her, with her big beautiful brown eyes, speechless for once in a lifetime.
Santana licks her lips, sucks in her breath, and lowers her voice. "Seriously, Rachel. We don't need each other anymore. You're lucky. You got a second chance with Finn. If you want it, then you need to take it. Don’t make the same mistake I did and think you've got time. You don't." She looks at her jeans, thumbs at the seam, and makes a decision. "I'm getting another room."
She jerks on her pants and shoulders her way past Rachel.
When Finn calls out to her, she ignores him.
--
It's not like it was before.
Santana thrives on control. She and Rachel spent months in quarantine and then a year on the run and they answered to no one but themselves.
Logically, it's natural to feel like this. To feel insecure and unsure and anti social. To bury herself in military drills and the comfortable weight of a rifle.
Santana's no stranger to feeling alone in a crowded room.
She sees Rachel on the base. Most often she sees her with Finn, or whenever she goes by the education building.
Rachel always meets her eyes. Always offers a wave and a smile. Santana nods back, but she doesn't talk to her.
She still feels like her arm is missing, but after a month, she's learned to sleep through the nights.
--
She's in the cafeteria, thumbing her way through a Kindle (Alice in Wonderland), when a shadow obscures the light and a flier falls in her lap.
"So I come back from a two month scouting mission and I see this. A USO Concert hosted by Rachel Berry? Now I know I've gone crazy."
Santana jerks her head up. Noah Puckerman, looking like some Jarhead with his muscle tee and shorn head, smiles down at her.
She's too shocked to say much of anything. His grin is kind and cocky and everything Puck used to be.
"Who was the idiot who gave you a fucking gun, Santana?"
Relief and shock and joy courses through her in such quick succession she's dizzy. She lets both the Kindle and the flier fall to the floor as she launches into his arms.
When he laughs and hugs her back, she's so grateful and happy that she sticks her tongue down his throat.
--
They fuck in his room.
That's exactly what it is. That's all it is.
They fuck in the frenzied, furious way that is all bites and groans and quick, hard orgasms.
It's what Santana knows, and when it's over, she falls against his naked body, sweaty and spent, and cries.
He holds her, whispers gently in her ear, and it occurs to Santana how much she missed him.
Later, she lies nude on his bed as he sorts through his pack and settles on the bed cross-legged, handing her a shoddy printout that's worn and wrinkled.
It's a page torn out from their sophomore yearbook. A picture of the Glee Club. The original twelve Gleeks.
Santana's eyes moisten and she sighs, gently tracing Brittany's sunny features. Her eyes flit to Rachel, who looks ridiculous with her perfect smile and rigid posture.
"And then there were four." When she glances up, Puck's smile is bittersweet. "Yours if you want it. I feel like a fucking fag carrying it around."
She rolls her eyes, and blinks away her sudden tears. "Thanks." She folds it back up carefully, and places it on the dresser. "I can't believe I'm actually glad to see you."
"Yeah, you too," he drawls sarcastically. "Check it out though, I'm a fucking bad ass now. Killing people and shit? Those Crazies got nothing on the PuckerMan." Santana's amused despite herself, laughing when he flexes for her.
"You're such an asshole."
He waggles his eyebrows. Santana smacks his arm. "I gotta admit though, you deserve a fucking medal of honor." When she glances at him questioningly, he elaborates. "Harboring Rachel Berry for a fucking year? Dude, if it was her, me and a gun?"
"Says the guy who actively tried to get in her pants for two years."
"Do you remember the skirts she used to wear?"
Santana does. Her smile falters, before she presses her lips together and sighs. "It's just one of those fucked up things, you know? We kinda got knocked into things together. There were so many people trying to kill us… I kinda forgot how annoying she was. Two years of that, you get used to her."
She stops talking when she realizes Puck is staring at her.
"What?" she asks, suddenly self-conscious.
"Dude," he begins, signs of exasperation in his tone. "Tell me you did not tap that."
Santana arches a brow. Puck guffaws.
"No shit?" he whispers, and smacks the mattress. "Holy fuck, no shit!?"
"Jealous?"
"Fuck, yeah!" Puck grins, looking like an idiot as his flaccid cock jiggles as he stands up, holding up his hand for a high-five. "Don't leave me hanging. Come on, we're so doing shots!"
It's classic Puck, and so achingly familiar, Santana kisses him instead.
--
She stumbles back to her room, a little drunk and battling a headache, feeling more like herself than she has in two fucking years, when she sees an apparition that looks like Rachel Berry sulking around her door.
She pauses, blinks, and glares, and when Rachel doesn't disappear, barks out, "What do you want?"
Rachel jumps, flushing slightly when Santana approaches her. Her expression changes as Santana comes closer. "Are you drunk?"
Santana blinks. Rachel is back to wearing those little skirts, and her slurred mind recalls Puck and his comment. She finds herself smirking.
"Yeah," she said, tone acidic. "I'm drunk. What do you want, Rachel?" She fumbles for her key card. Rachel grabs it from her hand inserts it into the lock. "Thank you."
"Maybe I should wait until you're sober."
"Maybe you should just tell me right now." Santana stumbles into her room. Rachel follows behind her.
"You were with someone."
"I was with Puck," she says, and feels stupidly happy that Rachel looks shocked.
"Noah?"
"PUCK!" she says again, shoving a finger in her chest. Rachel glances down, and Santana flicks her nose. "Made you look."
"Noah's back?"
Santana falls into the bottom bunk, drowsy and exhausted. "Noah's back," she responds dryly. "We caught up."
When she doesn't hear a word from Rachel, she lifts her head. Her old buddy is still standing in the middle of the room, staring at her like it's a contest.
"So you…"
Santana grimaces and pushes herself up to her elbows. "Yes," she says, and tries valiantly not to slur. "We…" It's too much effort. Her head falls back.
"Santana, do you really think that's a good idea?"
"It's a fantastic idea. I forgot how awesome it is just to fuck someone. You know? No strings attached. No feelings. Just fucking. Nothing like with you and me. Can you get my boots off?"
When Rachel just stares at her, Santana blinks at her and wiggles her foot pointedly.
Rachel finally comes forward, jerking to life to settle on the bed and tug at her laces. "Santana, as you may have noticed by the flyers I've posted, I've decided it would be extremely beneficial for the moral of this compound to have a concert. Since there's four of us that used to be in Glee, I think it would be extremely therapeutic if we worked on a few numbers together." It comes off like a well rehearsed pitch, but Rachel says it in a high squeak and the words run together. Santana comes out of it cross-eyed.
"What the what?"
Rachel tugs off a boot. "You smell like him."
"Of course I smell like him. I fucked him." Rachel's speech finally registers. "And that's the stupidest idea I've ever heard. I'm not fucking singing with you." The other boot gets tugged off with so much force she winces. "Ouch! Bitch, that hurt!"
"Sleeping with Puck is the stupidest idea I've ever heard. Santana, he's a walking STD!"
"At least he knows what to do with his winkie! Finn couldn't thrust his way out of a paper bag!"
"I have no idea what that means."
"Point taken. I mean made. I mean I'm right and Finn's stupid." She wriggles her toes and blinks at Rachel. Rachel's hair is glossy and her lips are plump, and her cheeks burn, making her expression brilliant. "When did you get so fucking hot?"
She says it angrily. Rachel just smiles, this weird smirk that's almost sad. She leans into Santana, and it's then that Santana realizes that she's touching her; the first time in a month.
With a ragged gasp, she focuses on Rachel's hand on her thigh, warming her skin even through her pants.
"You're stupid."
Santana blinks, thrown out of her reverie when she realizes Rachel's just insulted her. "Huh?"
"You're also right." Rachel swallows hard. "I want everything too much."
Suddenly Rachel's bent over, pressing her lips against hers, hard.
Santana freezes, and then sinks into the kiss, opens her mouth and groans when just as quickly, Rachel pulls away.
"And it's not fair," she hears Rachel whisper.
Before she can quite register what's happened, Rachel is off the bed and out of her room.
--
END PART III | Part IV
AUTHOR: Misty Flores
Email: mistiec_flores@yahoo.com
GENRE: Rachel/Santana, mentions of Brittany/Santana; Rachel/Finn, Santana/Puck - Glee
RATING: Mature
WORD COUNT: Around 14500
SUMMARY: It's her and Rachel Berry against the fucking world.
NOTES: AU/Future!Fic. This is gilligankane's fault. And I also blame reading 'The Zombie Survival Guide' recently.
WARNINGS: Character Death. And as much as it seems like it, this isn't really a zombie fic. But it's dark. Hopefully you'll trust me enough to read it.
QuickLinks: Part I | Part II | Part III | Part IV>
PART III
She's been alone with Rachel so long she doesn't know how to be with anybody else.
Santana Lopez used to be the queen of McKinley High. She was the Head Bitch In Charge, and when she walked down the hallways, the masses parted for her like she was fucking royalty.
Now, the very sight of strangers is enough to terrify her.
The base itself is less than a thousand people, including the soldiers. Finn told them that.
Standing at the heavily fortified entrance, looking at the militia members and their guns and the people walking around like nothing fucking happened, it feels like a mob.
As she stands stock still, willing herself not to panic and run, a slim hand slips into hers. Rachel grips her hard, tangling digits. She glances over, and discovers Rachel's eyes wide, emotions playing over her expressive face like a movie on a screen.
Instinctively, Santana squeezes and brings her in, until Rachel's pressed in slightly behind her. Rachel clutches her like a she's a life jacket.
"Guys? It's okay." Finn smiles at them both, and spreads his arms wide. "Welcome home."
It doesn't fucking feel like home.
--
They pull her and Rachel apart for 'debriefing'. A military officer questions Santana like she's a POW, and when it's over, grimly tells her she can't have her guns in here.
"Too many people got too used to their guns," he says quietly. "This isn't the wild west. But I'm impressed. You've got a fighting instinct. We could use people like you, if you want to join up. Then you get to keep your gun."
Her skin is crawling. She feels naked. Like her arm is cut off.
It's exactly how she felt two years ago when she lost Brittany.
And now there's fucking people EVERYWHERE and when he assigns her her bedroom and lets her go, she searches every face for Rachel Berry.
Finn finds her first, and Santana feels so much like a trapped wild animal that she's almost relieved to see him.
"Where's Rachel."
"Don't worry." He smiles wide, handsome and sweet. "She's fine. They're assigning her a room and debriefing her, just like you. You'll see her soon enough."
Santana rubs absently at her scarred forearm. It's a nervous tick. Finn sees it.
"I still can't believe it. It's … a miracle." Santana stops rubbing. Finn looks so genuinely HAPPY to see her.
"It's not a miracle," she tells him flatly. "Rachel and I survived because there wasn't another option."
Finn stares at her. He breaks out into a wide smile. "They told me you might be joining up. Makes sense. You're still a bad ass, aren't you?"
Santana stares at him, wills him to go away by the force of her glare. Finn just stays.
--
After the first decent shower she's had in weeks Santana, dressed in clean clothes, heads to her assigned room; twin bunk beds in a dormitory that used to house college kids.
When Santana twists the knob and pushes open the door, she finally sees Rachel, sitting awkwardly on the bottom bunk.
Their eyes meet, and Santana is flooded with such a sense of relief that it nearly brings her to her knees.
Her hand tightens hard around the doorknob. She doesn't trust herself to walk.
Rachel launches to her feet, takes a couple steps toward her, and then suddenly stops.
Santana can only stare stupidly, waiting for the dizziness to pass and her strength to return.
She has the ridiculous urge to run into Rachel's arms like some movie cliché and never, in two years, has she had that feeling.
Because Rachel's never been more than two feet away.
It's a terrifying realization.
"Hi," she manages, and lowers her gaze, focuses on coming inside and closing the door behind her. "Are you okay?"
"As well as can be expected, I guess. At my debriefing they told me that they could use teachers."
Teacher. Of course. Santana feels the unmistakable urge to smile and squelches it.
"What about you?" Rachel prompts.
"What do you think?" she asks. Rachel just stares at her, and Santana says with a 'duh' in her voice, "Military."
"They're not going to make you shave your head, right?" Rachel sounds so damn mortified at just the thought.
"No." Santana stares at the beds. She glances at Rachel, at Rachel's things neatly piled near the bottom bunk. "I thought you were going to stay with Finn."
Rachel looks momentarily shocked. Her eyes flit down to the floor, then back up. "I'm… I…"
"What?"
Rachel's chin comes up. Her lip juts out. "I'm not."
It's a fair answer. Rachel doesn't elaborate.
Santana can feel her gaze burning on her. With a certainty that she doesn't feel, she flings herself up on the top and turns toward to the wall.
"I'm exhausted," she says, and shuts her eyes.
Rachel doesn’t respond. The light clicks off. She isn't aware she's holding her breath until she feels the bunk move and hears Rachel settle onto her bed.
Curling into herself, she opens her eyes.
--
Sleep doesn't come. For the past two years, she's lived her life like a damned Siamese twin, and it's a habit she doesn't know how to break.
She's in a fucking military compound and she doesn't feel safe because there's no gun under her pillow and there's no girl beside her.
It's some PTSD bullshit and it's turned her into a damned Rachel Berry junkie, and it's pathetic.
Underneath her, she hears a dramatic, overbearing sigh, and suddenly out of the darkness, Rachel speaks. "This is ridiculous."
Santana pushes up, watches through the shadowed room as the skimpy wooden frame of the bed creaks, and the brunette head of Rachel Berry peeks up at her.
The sight causes her breath to quicken, her heart rate to spike.
"What are you doing?" she rasps, intending to sound acidic and failing miserably.
Rachel doesn't stop. She pulls herself onto Santana's bed and crawls over her. For a tense second, she simply stares. Then, she matter-of-factly lets herself drop into the crook of Santana's side, curling up against her.
The sensation feels so much like home Santana is struck dumb. She tries to speak. Tries to tell Rachel Berry to get the hell out of her bed. That their codependence is ridiculous and bordering on plain crazy. That they both need therapy and they shouldn't be feeling this.
It all gets stuck in her throat and what comes out instead is a relieved, confused bleat of a sigh that only makes Rachel snuggle in closer.
She smells like cheap shampoo and soap.
"I've forgotten how to sleep without you," Rachel says suddenly.
Santana should argue.
Instead, she just feels like she's got her arm back. And suddenly her eyes close and she's so damn sleepy, she drifts off without realizing it.
--
She's brought to awareness by the sensation of touch. Her eyes open, eyelids flutter in drowsy appreciation at the feel of Rachel's fingers smoothing along her cheek. In their sleep, they've curled into each other. Her arm slings possessively over Rachel's hip, and Rachel's dark eyes just stare, as if she's trying to memorize every feature.
"They say it's natural," Rachel whispers. "The two of us have been through so much trauma together, we're going to feel this intense bond."
She keeps touching. Weighted by sleepiness, Santana lets it happen. Her eyes close in appreciation.
"Sure," Santana mumbles, and thumbs the curve of Rachel's hip, lazily tracing circles in the fabric.
Rachel's thumb slides across her nose, and lands gently on her lip. Santana's eyes open. Inches away, Rachel's half buried in her pillow, but the look in her eyes is unmistakable.
Ever so slightly, Santana puckers her lips; presses a kiss to the pad of Rachel's thumb.
Rachel doesn't pull away.
When Santana's fingers spread against her hip, pull slightly, Rachel's body comes willingly.
When her mouth meets Santana's, the kiss is almost chaste. There is a delicate press of lips that deepens only slightly when Rachel's takes her lower lip between hers and sucks lightly.
Santana feels it between her legs. Her body suddenly aches, and she sighs, inviting Rachel in.
Hands press against her cheek, tilting her head back as Rachel's pushes forward, tongue sweeping across her teeth, until Santana is flat on her back and Rachel's rolled herself on top of her.
Her shirt rides up, and she smiles against Rachel's lips when the other woman brushes against the bared skin.
Rachel's answering smile is fleeting, but expansive, and it disappears just as quickly when her fingers smooth up and find the small mound of Santana's breast.
Santana's brow arches cockily. Rachel grins, accepts the challenge.
Feather light kisses press against her mouth, her jaw, down her neck, as Rachel's fingers lift the shirt. She mouths Santana's bare stomach, and Santana stretches against the ministrations, hiking in her breath when Rachel's lips bump against her nipple, before she engulfs it completely.
"Fuck," she groans, and instinctively grabs for Rachel's head, tangling her fingers into Rachel's thick locks and arching underneath her. She hears Rachel chuckle, and answers in a hiss when Rachel's fingers reach down without warning to press into her damp underwear.
The sudden bang on the door is so unexpected she doesn't understand what's happened at first.
Rachel's head lifts.
"Rachel?" The banging continues. "Santana? Are you up?"
Their eyes meet in sudden realization. "Finn," Rachel breathes, and scrambles off the bed, nearly tripping down the frame as she straightens herself.
Dazed, Santana can only watch dumbly, as Rachel gives her a wild look. "Just a minute, Finn!"
She rushes for the door. Santana's brow furrows.
Rachel opens the door, and her voice is so oddly pitched, Santana knows she's wearing an idiotic expression to match. "Hi!"
"Hey!" Finn grins at her, and through the crook of the door, lowers himself in to press a kiss to Rachel's cheek. Santana feels something cold flush through her. She pushes up, rolls down her shirt as Finn smiles at her. "Morning, San!"
Her mouth quirks in response.
"I wanted to take you guys to breakfast." His smile is wide and radiant for Rachel. "How'd you guys sleep?"
"Fine!" Rachel glances at her, all wide-eyes and panic. "Umm… could you give us a minute? Let us get dressed?"
"Huh? Oh yeah, sure." Finn smiles, and keeps smiling even as Rachel places a hand on his chest and shoves him out the door. "I'll wait out here!"
Rachel slams the door shut.
She whirls and leans against it, looking spent and worried and fucking agonized.
Santana feels like a damn idiot.
"This is stupid," she finds herself saying, throwing off the covers and vaulting off the bed.
"What do you mean?"
"What do you think I mean?" she asks. "Do you think it's fucking natural that you can't sleep by yourself? Do you think Finn will understand it?" Rachel can only stare at her, looking lost and unsure. Santana feels something like dread fill her. "Are you ever planning on telling him?"
Rachel's mouth opens, ready to speak, before she seems to lose steam, and closes it again. "It's complicated," she manages weakly. "You know that."
She wants not to feel absolutely devastated. She wants the ache in her heart to go away. She wants to be anything than what she is, disappointed and idiotic and feeling like she's been fucking dumped.
Sucking in her breath, she turns away from Rachel and says in the most even tone she can muster, "No, it's not."
"San-"
"If you want to be with Finn, he needs to be enough for you."
Because that's always been Rachel's problem. She wants everything too much.
Santana hates that she can identify with it.
"Santana." Rachel's tone is soft, hurt. "That's not fair."
The statement is too much. She turns on Rachel, grips her pants and nearly flings them at her. "Fair? What's fucking fair? That Brittany loved me and wanted to be with me and because I wanted to be fucking popular I never told her I loved her? That she died before we could even be together? Do you think it's fair to Finn that he finds the love of his life and she's fucking the girl that took his virginity instead? That all our friends and family are DEAD? What's fucking FAIR, Rachel?"
The rant exhausts her. She's breathing hard and wounded and Rachel only stares at her, with her big beautiful brown eyes, speechless for once in a lifetime.
Santana licks her lips, sucks in her breath, and lowers her voice. "Seriously, Rachel. We don't need each other anymore. You're lucky. You got a second chance with Finn. If you want it, then you need to take it. Don’t make the same mistake I did and think you've got time. You don't." She looks at her jeans, thumbs at the seam, and makes a decision. "I'm getting another room."
She jerks on her pants and shoulders her way past Rachel.
When Finn calls out to her, she ignores him.
--
It's not like it was before.
Santana thrives on control. She and Rachel spent months in quarantine and then a year on the run and they answered to no one but themselves.
Logically, it's natural to feel like this. To feel insecure and unsure and anti social. To bury herself in military drills and the comfortable weight of a rifle.
Santana's no stranger to feeling alone in a crowded room.
She sees Rachel on the base. Most often she sees her with Finn, or whenever she goes by the education building.
Rachel always meets her eyes. Always offers a wave and a smile. Santana nods back, but she doesn't talk to her.
She still feels like her arm is missing, but after a month, she's learned to sleep through the nights.
--
She's in the cafeteria, thumbing her way through a Kindle (Alice in Wonderland), when a shadow obscures the light and a flier falls in her lap.
"So I come back from a two month scouting mission and I see this. A USO Concert hosted by Rachel Berry? Now I know I've gone crazy."
Santana jerks her head up. Noah Puckerman, looking like some Jarhead with his muscle tee and shorn head, smiles down at her.
She's too shocked to say much of anything. His grin is kind and cocky and everything Puck used to be.
"Who was the idiot who gave you a fucking gun, Santana?"
Relief and shock and joy courses through her in such quick succession she's dizzy. She lets both the Kindle and the flier fall to the floor as she launches into his arms.
When he laughs and hugs her back, she's so grateful and happy that she sticks her tongue down his throat.
--
They fuck in his room.
That's exactly what it is. That's all it is.
They fuck in the frenzied, furious way that is all bites and groans and quick, hard orgasms.
It's what Santana knows, and when it's over, she falls against his naked body, sweaty and spent, and cries.
He holds her, whispers gently in her ear, and it occurs to Santana how much she missed him.
Later, she lies nude on his bed as he sorts through his pack and settles on the bed cross-legged, handing her a shoddy printout that's worn and wrinkled.
It's a page torn out from their sophomore yearbook. A picture of the Glee Club. The original twelve Gleeks.
Santana's eyes moisten and she sighs, gently tracing Brittany's sunny features. Her eyes flit to Rachel, who looks ridiculous with her perfect smile and rigid posture.
"And then there were four." When she glances up, Puck's smile is bittersweet. "Yours if you want it. I feel like a fucking fag carrying it around."
She rolls her eyes, and blinks away her sudden tears. "Thanks." She folds it back up carefully, and places it on the dresser. "I can't believe I'm actually glad to see you."
"Yeah, you too," he drawls sarcastically. "Check it out though, I'm a fucking bad ass now. Killing people and shit? Those Crazies got nothing on the PuckerMan." Santana's amused despite herself, laughing when he flexes for her.
"You're such an asshole."
He waggles his eyebrows. Santana smacks his arm. "I gotta admit though, you deserve a fucking medal of honor." When she glances at him questioningly, he elaborates. "Harboring Rachel Berry for a fucking year? Dude, if it was her, me and a gun?"
"Says the guy who actively tried to get in her pants for two years."
"Do you remember the skirts she used to wear?"
Santana does. Her smile falters, before she presses her lips together and sighs. "It's just one of those fucked up things, you know? We kinda got knocked into things together. There were so many people trying to kill us… I kinda forgot how annoying she was. Two years of that, you get used to her."
She stops talking when she realizes Puck is staring at her.
"What?" she asks, suddenly self-conscious.
"Dude," he begins, signs of exasperation in his tone. "Tell me you did not tap that."
Santana arches a brow. Puck guffaws.
"No shit?" he whispers, and smacks the mattress. "Holy fuck, no shit!?"
"Jealous?"
"Fuck, yeah!" Puck grins, looking like an idiot as his flaccid cock jiggles as he stands up, holding up his hand for a high-five. "Don't leave me hanging. Come on, we're so doing shots!"
It's classic Puck, and so achingly familiar, Santana kisses him instead.
--
She stumbles back to her room, a little drunk and battling a headache, feeling more like herself than she has in two fucking years, when she sees an apparition that looks like Rachel Berry sulking around her door.
She pauses, blinks, and glares, and when Rachel doesn't disappear, barks out, "What do you want?"
Rachel jumps, flushing slightly when Santana approaches her. Her expression changes as Santana comes closer. "Are you drunk?"
Santana blinks. Rachel is back to wearing those little skirts, and her slurred mind recalls Puck and his comment. She finds herself smirking.
"Yeah," she said, tone acidic. "I'm drunk. What do you want, Rachel?" She fumbles for her key card. Rachel grabs it from her hand inserts it into the lock. "Thank you."
"Maybe I should wait until you're sober."
"Maybe you should just tell me right now." Santana stumbles into her room. Rachel follows behind her.
"You were with someone."
"I was with Puck," she says, and feels stupidly happy that Rachel looks shocked.
"Noah?"
"PUCK!" she says again, shoving a finger in her chest. Rachel glances down, and Santana flicks her nose. "Made you look."
"Noah's back?"
Santana falls into the bottom bunk, drowsy and exhausted. "Noah's back," she responds dryly. "We caught up."
When she doesn't hear a word from Rachel, she lifts her head. Her old buddy is still standing in the middle of the room, staring at her like it's a contest.
"So you…"
Santana grimaces and pushes herself up to her elbows. "Yes," she says, and tries valiantly not to slur. "We…" It's too much effort. Her head falls back.
"Santana, do you really think that's a good idea?"
"It's a fantastic idea. I forgot how awesome it is just to fuck someone. You know? No strings attached. No feelings. Just fucking. Nothing like with you and me. Can you get my boots off?"
When Rachel just stares at her, Santana blinks at her and wiggles her foot pointedly.
Rachel finally comes forward, jerking to life to settle on the bed and tug at her laces. "Santana, as you may have noticed by the flyers I've posted, I've decided it would be extremely beneficial for the moral of this compound to have a concert. Since there's four of us that used to be in Glee, I think it would be extremely therapeutic if we worked on a few numbers together." It comes off like a well rehearsed pitch, but Rachel says it in a high squeak and the words run together. Santana comes out of it cross-eyed.
"What the what?"
Rachel tugs off a boot. "You smell like him."
"Of course I smell like him. I fucked him." Rachel's speech finally registers. "And that's the stupidest idea I've ever heard. I'm not fucking singing with you." The other boot gets tugged off with so much force she winces. "Ouch! Bitch, that hurt!"
"Sleeping with Puck is the stupidest idea I've ever heard. Santana, he's a walking STD!"
"At least he knows what to do with his winkie! Finn couldn't thrust his way out of a paper bag!"
"I have no idea what that means."
"Point taken. I mean made. I mean I'm right and Finn's stupid." She wriggles her toes and blinks at Rachel. Rachel's hair is glossy and her lips are plump, and her cheeks burn, making her expression brilliant. "When did you get so fucking hot?"
She says it angrily. Rachel just smiles, this weird smirk that's almost sad. She leans into Santana, and it's then that Santana realizes that she's touching her; the first time in a month.
With a ragged gasp, she focuses on Rachel's hand on her thigh, warming her skin even through her pants.
"You're stupid."
Santana blinks, thrown out of her reverie when she realizes Rachel's just insulted her. "Huh?"
"You're also right." Rachel swallows hard. "I want everything too much."
Suddenly Rachel's bent over, pressing her lips against hers, hard.
Santana freezes, and then sinks into the kiss, opens her mouth and groans when just as quickly, Rachel pulls away.
"And it's not fair," she hears Rachel whisper.
Before she can quite register what's happened, Rachel is off the bed and out of her room.
--
END PART III | Part IV