Chapter Text
Trinity thought that she had lived long enough to know when to trust people, and when to not. She thought that she had experienced enough heartbreak in one lifetime to know when to expect when more heartbreak and treachery was coming. She thought she knew that raising her expectations, of having any expectations whatsoever, would only lead to being let down and ruined once more.
She thought she knew better, and so perhaps that was what hurt the most.
Letting someone in, trusting them with something as delicate as her skin and her scars, only for them to push her away and shut her down when she needed them the most was one of the worst heartbreaks of all.
Six months had passed since that day that Yolanda Garcia had broken off their… situationship. Six months had passed since Santos had hoped that they could become something more, and Garcia had taken that and shattered it into itty bitty pieces right on the hospital floor of Pittsburgh Trauma Medical Center.
Santos could still hear her voice and see that moment, replay it in her mind like a movie or a broken record player, that same moment, again and again.
Each time she saw Garcia afterward, that moment was all she could see, which was, as one could imagine, incredibly distracting in the workplace.
It was noticeable to all of their coworkers that something had happened. If it wasn’t that the two avoided each other like the plague, it was in the moments where they were unable to avoid each other. When Santos would snap at Garcia, or Garcia would ignore Santos and speak over her, or ask for other medical advice, when Santos had already given her opinion.
Whenever the two worked together, the tension was thick enough to be cut with a knife.
And then, of course, there was Baran Al-Hashimi. Fuck Baran Al-Hashimi. Fuck Yolanda Garcia. Fuck it all.
At first, in the days after Garcia’s rejection, there had been radio silence. Santos didn’t speak to Garcia, she didn’t see the woman at work, and she certainly did not see Garcia out of work, despite how badly she ached for Garcia to reach out, to say anything.
Santos considered herself to be strong-willed and independent but fuck her for wanting comfort for once in her damn life. Fuck her, because if Garcia had reached out, she probably would have let her in as though nothing had ever happened at all.
Santos hated how she wanted to be held, hated how she missed the soft moments that they’d had. She hated that she didn’t miss the sex, but missed the way that Garcia would sometimes brush a piece of Trinity’s hair off of her forehead, or how the girl would sometimes press a kiss against her lips after they’d had sex. She missed having ramen with Garcia, missed curling her body into the other woman’s and pressing her head against Garcia’s strong chest, letting her heartbeat and her warm arms lull her to sleep.
At least Whitaker had known better than to talk to her about Garcia, given that he’d seen the immediate aftereffect of Garcia’s rejection. Many nights had been spent in their house, with Trinity lodged into the corner of a couch with a blanket and a small bag of crackers and Whitaker on the floor, turned towards her, with that stupid look of sympathy on his face. She wanted to say that she hated him, but she was and had been secretly glad for his companionship, for the way he listened, nonjudgmentally. For his advice, no matter how stupid it usually was. For not letting her be alone, despite him having every reason and then some to leave her alone.
Despite Whitaker’s best attempts to avoid the topic of Garcia, Trinity still became privy to the rumors.
The fucking rumors.
Santos never would have known what the entire hospital seemed party to, but she’d caught Javadi and McKay gossiping in passing and hadn’t been able to get their words out of her head since.
Garcia and Al-Hashimi had gone home together after a shift.
She wanted, oh so badly, to write it off as a friendship.
But Santos knew better, especially when, in the following weeks- no, months, she began to pay more attention to the two women at work.
She paid attention to the glimmer in Al-Hashimi’s eyes which seemed to always be there, but which seemed to absolutely shine whenever Garcia was in the room. The small, shared smiles between the women whenever they agreed on the treatment of a patient.
The touches, which always seemed to linger just a moment longer than which was absolutely necessary.
To any other person, it wouldn’t have been noticeable. Both women were being, for the most part, completely professional in the workplace, but Trinity knew better– knew better, because it had once been her who had shared those touches, those smiles, those car rides.
It hurt more than she wanted to admit, especially when, a few months later, she caught the two having a moment in a supply closet like this was fucking Grey’s Anatomy or something.
She’d opened the door to grab something– but the moment that she did, the moment that she began to process who was in front of her, her mind completely deviated from the mission at hand in order to figure out what the hell she’d walked into.
Garcia, pressed against a set of metal shelving– her shoulder blades digging into the material in a way that Santos knew was likely painful, but Garcia seemed to be leaning into the pain. The woman’s head was tipped back in a way which was oh-so-familiar to Garcia, but which was equally as unfamiliar. Her scrubs were disheveled, pants pulled down to her ankles and legs separated for another leg– Baran’s leg. Her eyes were closed and her lips were parted, and the hairs on Trinity’s arms rose as she tuned into the small, wanting gasps which continued to escape Garcia’s lips, even as Al-Hashimi noticed that Trinity was standing there.
Al-Hashimi, whose beloved jacket had been discarded behind her, leaving her in her black scrubs. Al-Hashimi, who always seemed to be such a rule follower, whose leg was now between Garcia’s, with her thigh flexed and pressed high into the apex of Garcia’s thighs. Al-Hashimi, whose hand was digging into Garcia’s hip bone, seemingly had been guiding her to grind down against her leg– Al-Hashimi, whose other hand was wrapped around Garcia’s throat like it was a necklace.
The second Al-Hashimi seemed to register that Trinity was there, Trinity was gone.
She heard one of the women– Baran, probably. She doubted that Garcia had had enough time to recover and realize what had happened.
Baran was calling out for her, telling- ordering her, really, to stop. She didn’t, of course. What a fucking fool she was, to have ever had feelings for this woman who, seemingly the next day, if not at the same time, was seeing and having feelings for someone else. What a fucking fool she was, to have hoped that Baran and Yolanda were just friends. What a fool she was, but not fool enough to turn around and face Baran.
Not with the way her face was burning, or the way her heart was pounding, or the way that her stomach seemed to have turned upside down and her underwear seemed to be soaked.
Fuck Baran Al-Hashimi. Fuck Yolanda Garcia. Fuck it all.
She didn’t answer Garcia’s texts that night, or her calls.
She didn’t answer her calls the next day, either.
She couldn’t avoid them at work, but that didn’t matter. She’d accumulated enough sick leave and time off to be able to escape for a couple of days, and so she did. She spent a lot of time in her home, in the comfort of her four walls, with some ramen and nobody but herself.
She tried not to think about Garcia.
She tried not to think about Baran.
She tried not to think about what she’d seen in the supply closet– about Baran’s pink lips, about how her tongue had stuck out to wet her lips, about her baby-brown doe eyes, about her hands, how her surgeon’s hands had been so delicately wrapped around Garcia’s throat. She tried not to think about Garcia, about how she knew how Garcia must have felt, having had Garcia in a similar position, about Garcia’s noises– the way she’d gasped, and moaned, and writhed against Baran’s body. She tried not to think about how it made her feel, how she missed Garcia.
She tried not to think about how she would have fit into the situation, if she were wrapped around Baran’s back, chest pressed into her spine, telling her where to touch Garcia, where Garcia liked it most. Or whether she was pressed between the two women, with Baran’s hand wrapped around her throat like it had been wrapped around Garcia’s-
It was safe to say that Trinity was struggling.
On the third day of “ignoring” and “not thinking” about Garcia and Al-Hashimi, there came a knock at her door.
In hindsight, she should have predicted who it would have been. Neither woman seemed like the type to let things rest, stubborn and headstrong in their own right just as Trinity was.
However, when Trinity opened her door, the last thing she expected was to see Yolanda Garcia and Baran Al-Hashimi at her doorstep.
“We’ve gotta talk.” Garcia, as usual, wasted no time.
“Why the fuck are you at my house? No, I don’t want to talk-”
“Well, that’s too damn bad. We’re talking.”
Fuck Baran Al-Hashimi. Fuck Yolanda Garcia. Fuck it all.
And with that, Trinity simply stepped back, unsure and, admittedly, a little bit… excited, maybe nervous, a little hurt… she wasn’t sure. Still, she stepped back, unable to deny the women any further as the two stepped into her home.
As Trinity shut the door, she swallowed harshly and tried to keep herself from panicking as she followed the women into the confines of her own house.