All Alone

Chapter Seventeen

DISCLAIMER: I'm not a doctor or nurse so the medical stuff might be wrong. Forgive me please!

Brittany blinked repeatedly as her eyes fluttered open.

She looked around confusedly. All she saw was white, she seemed to be sitting in a very uncomfortable chair, and there was drool crusted on her chin. She was practically crushing a styrofoam cup in her hand.

Where am I?

Then she glanced directly in front of her to see a hospital bed with a sleeping girl in it with an IV tube in her arm and a heart monitor and some other machines and one of those tubey-things that went to your nose.

Everything came crashing back.

The blonde stood quickly and rushed to the Latina's side.

She remembered riding in the ambulance with Santana and waiting in the waiting room for hours. She also remembered calling her own mother and then speaking on the phone with Santana's. The last thing she remembered she was in Santana's hospital room in this chair, staring at her.

Brittany gently shook her and whispered, "Santana..."

"That won't work."

The cheerleader whipped around to see a thirty-something brown haired man in lab coat carrying some kind of file. Obviously the doctor.

He smiled warmly. "Hi, Brittany, I'm Dr. Denman. I want to talk to you about a few things."

"Okay..." Brittany replied nervously.

She sat and the man sat across from her.

"First things first I wanna say that you did the right thing by calling 9-1-1 immediately. She might not be here right now if you hadn't."

Brittany shuddered at the thought.

"Second, Santana's mother won't be able to make it here until this afternoon so thank you for staying with her. Even if she's not awake it does help." Dr. Denman said in a calm voice.

"When will she wake up?"

The man smiled sadly. "That's the third thing. I'm afraid Santana has gone into a coma."

The dancer gasped. "How long will she be like that?"

"It's indefinite."

Brittany's whole body sagged. "Why would she do this?"

Dr. Denman sighed. "When you've been through what Santana's been through and you don't get help immediately, it's easy for this to happen."

"I was gonna get her help." Brittany's lip trembled and a tear slipped down her cheek. She made no attempt to wipe it away. "Yesterday. I was gonna go to the guidance counselor but then she didn't show up to school so I went to find her. It's all my fault. I should've done something sooner."

"Brittany..." The doctor's voice was gentle. "I don't want you to blame yourself, okay? You did everything right. Your actions are admirable."

The blonde shook her head in disbelief. "I feel so bad for her."

"Me too. A lot has happened to her."

Brittany furrowed her brow. "How do you know?" She asked suspiciously.

"Before she moved here Santana lived in a bad town. This was the closest hospital. My colleague, Dr. Tera did the rape kit."

"Oh."

"Listen, Brittany, this is gonna be hard. I need to make sure you know that before you commit to help with this and stick by her."

"Of course I'll stick by her!" The cheerio cried indignantly. "No matter what! She needs me..."

Dr. Denman smiled. "That she does. She's lucky to have a friend like you, Brittany."

Brittany smiled slightly and wiped her tears away.

"I need to do a couple of standard tests. You're welcome to stay but you should probably get something to eat."

The blonde stood and thanked the doctor before heading down to the cafeteria.

She got a salad and picked at, taking a few small bites. She just didn't have an appetite. All she could think about was Santana lying limp in that bed with all those tunes going into her and all those machines beeping next to her.

She dropped her white plastic fork with a clack and put her head in her hands. This was the most awful thing she had ever experienced. She had so many questions to ask that no one could answer.

How could Santana do this?

Was it really that bad?

Why hadn't she seen this coming?

Could she have prevented it?

The Latina was self-destructive. She knew that. But she never imagined it was to this point.

Brittany threw her plate away and made her way down the hall back to Santana's room.

The sounds of coughs and beeps and nurses and doctors rushing around were all she could hear. It wasn't the most pleasant thing.

The blonde reached Santana's room and entered cautiously "How's she doing?"

Dr. Denman looked up with a furrowed brow. "Well pumping her stomach last night helped a lot." (AN: Can they even pump an unconscious person's stomach?)

Brittany cringed.

"There's still traces of the drugs she overdosed on in her system but it's so little it hardly matters at this point. I'm not really sure why she's not waking up. I think when she passed out she may have fallen and hit her head on her headboard or wall and there might be damage there that's causing the coma." He stood and crossed the room to stand in front of the teenager. "She'll be fine."

Brittany sighed and was about to say something back when a cold voice cut in.

"Where the hell is my fool of a daughter?!"

AN: hope this wasn't so sad! And yes, mama Lopez is coming in. And you will hate her. She's not gonna be a nice lady like in the show. Hope you liked it! Comment, vote and share please! Love you all!

- G. Schreiber