My Escape (Quinntana)

Chapter 33

"Yeah. That sounds reasonable." He took off his glasses and wiped them with his shirt. "Well, uh, I'd better go clean myself up." Santana smirked. 

"Go do that," she agreed. As she watched him wheel away, she looked up to glance at Quinn. "That was... strange." Quinn nodded in agreement. "What's up with people apologizing to me all of a sudden? There was Valeria, now Artie." Quinn started to wheel her towards first period, but Santana put up her hand. "Wait, wait. Can we make a quick detour?" Quinn tilted her head slightly. 

"Where to?" She asked.

"Sue's office."

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"So let me get this straight. Or not so straight, in your case." Santana and Quinn both blushed at the remark, but they stayed quiet. "You want me to get Figgins to momentarily stop all classes and force everyone into the auditorium so you can give some speech?" Sue clasped her hands together. "And you won't even tell me what the speech is about?"

Santana nodded. "Yeah, pretty much." Sue raised an eyebrow.

"Well... I guess I could make that happen." She narrowed her eyes. "Wait. You're not going to bring in the Glee club to sing some cheesy song about friendship, right?" Santana shook her head.

"Nope. Promise." Sue thought for a bit longer, then sighed.

"Fine. You and Q get the gym for 15 minutes. That's all." Sue stood up. "I'd better go find some way to blackmail Figgins to get him to agree to this." Quinn and Santana shared a confused glance at the comment, but once again said nothing. "What are you doing? Get out of my office." The words were sharp, but there was a hint of humor in her voice. She winked at Santana. "I'm glad you're doing better, Sandbags," she said. 

"Thanks," Santana replied. Not wanting to push their luck, she and Quinn hurried out of the room- well, Quinn hurried both of them out of the room. Finally, Quinn crouched down a bit and looked at Santana. 

"Okay. Now are you going to tell me what you're up to?" Santana smiled. 

"Well, you're going to know in about..." she checked the time on her phone. "6 minutes. Come on, wheel me to the auditorium." Sighing, the blonde started to do so.

"God, you're impossible," she muttered. Santana laughed.

"Oh, you love it," she teased. The two girls continued the rest of the way in a comfortable silence.

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Next thing she knew, Quinn was standing backstage in the auditorium with Santana. She could hear students conversing loudly outside- they were probably trying to figure out why they were there. Santana still wasn't telling Quinn anything, and she had given up on trying to figure it out. 

They heard loud footsteps make their way onstage, and everyone grew quiet. "Hello, McKinley idiots," they heard Sue say. "You're probably wondering why you're here. Honestly, I don't even know why you're here. But you're here now, so shut up and listen." She met Santana's gaze. "Okay, now welcome my favorite lesbians to the stage: Quinn Fabray and Santana Lopez." Sue exited into the wings, and Quinn found herself wheeling Santana centerstage.

Quinn grabbed the microphone and handed it to Santana, who couldn't reach it in the wheelchair. "Hi," Santana began. "You all already know me. I went from head bitch- no offence Quinn- to a member of the Glee club, to quite possibly the most harassed person in this godforsaken school." She looked around the audience, trying to make eye contact with every person. "And all of you? You're all assholes." That caught everyone off guard, and there was some angered whispering. Quinn saw Sue raise her eyebrows.

"Okay okay, that's a bit harsh." She paused. "You're all assholes to an extent. Yeah, that's better. But still assholes." Santana took a deep breath. "Many of you went out of your way to make me feel like crap, to make me feel worthless- and my girlfriend too, even though she didn't do anything. Neither of us did anything."

"Maybe some of you are thinking, "but I didn't do anything! I didn't threaten you on social media, or shove you in the hallways, or anything like that!" Yeah, okay, sure. But you still didn't do anything." She tilted her head slightly, thinking. "Wait, actually, the Glee club was pretty cool. They weren't assholes, but the rest of you were." 

"I'm not telling you all to just be nice. That's kind of exactly what I'm saying, but whatever. I'm telling you all to be a little less mean. Here's an example: Instead of slushying 10 people in the hallways, try slushying 9 people. See? Improvement."

Quinn thought she would wrap it up, but she seemed to remember something else. "Oh! One more thing. A lot of you, how do I put this... are kind of homophobic." She raised her hands defensively. "Maybe not on purpose, but you are." She sat back in her wheelchair and twined her fingers together. 

"Let me give you all some hard numbers. Let's assume that there are 700 students in this school. That's around the average amount of students in an Ohio high school- at least that's what Google told me. Google also told me that the percentage of LGBTQ people in Ohio is around 4.3 percent- and that's probably no where near the actual amount. According to my math, that means that there's around 30 LGBTQ people in this school, if not many more."

"What I'm trying to say is that... don't hate on people who are different just because you want to be a jerk. Some of you are probably just lashing out, because you're scared to face your own truths. I get that. But don't take it out on others." She cleared her throat, and Quinn had a feeling that she was about to finish.

"So yeah. I'm Santana Lopez, a lesbian who has been through hell and back. That's who I am, and I hope you all find out who you are soon. Then maybe, just maybe, we can throw away this dumb school hierarchy." With that, she looked up at Quinn. Understanding, the blonde wheeled her offstage. There was no applause or anything, but that was to be expected. Santana was fine with silence. Sue walked back onstage, and smacked the microphone with her hand.

"Well then. That was pretty fun, wasn't it?" She winked at the girls. "Now, get out of here and go to class, and don't forget what you've all heard today."

The students filed out of the auditorium. Sue met Santana and Quinn, and nodded curtly. "I'm proud of you, S. That was pretty good." 

Santana smiled. "Thanks Coach."

AN: So it's been a while. I'm really sorry. I've been going through a rough patch recently. But now, I'm back and ready to write. Thanks for being patient!