Chapter 6

'Santana, say something.' Rachel pleaded, all three girls now back in Santana's bedroom but the Latina hadn't said anything since the earlier revelation. Santana looked up at the diva, the amount of fear showing through in her eyes almost unbearable. 'Santana?' Rachel said again, placing one hand on her shoulder. Santana was sitting on the end of her bed, Rachel looming above her and Quinn staring out of her window and into the forest.

'He..' She croaked, Quinn turning back into the room at the sound of her voice. 'He came here, to kill me.' Both other girls looked at her silently, not sure what to say really. 'Because, my dad turned off his daughter's life support machine.' Santana was now staring at a far patch of wall, swallowing harshly as she tried to make everything sink in.

'Santana….' Quinn stepped over to them and at next to her, one hand on her knee as Rachel's still lingered on her un-bruised shoulder.

'And the best part?' Santana smiled, breaking eye contact with the wall to look at her blonde friend. 'We just let his fucking ghost back into our dimension.' She laughed, lying down and falling onto the soft material beneath her. Rachel and Quinn shared a look of worry, Rachel eventually clearing her throat and trying to reason with Santana.

'Do you think that's actually what happened Santana?' She asked, sitting on the other side of the Latina.

'Well what else could it be Berry?' Santana said bluntly, not moving from her position but throwing her hands up to her head. 'Ow, shit.' She winced, forgetting about the second fall she took on her shoulder.

'You okay?' Quinn asked, Santana sitting up with a look of pain across her face.

'Fine.' She flexed her shoulder. 'Just a bit sore.'

'Okay, back to the whole ghost issue.' Rachel pressed on. 'Is it not plausible that your mind has been playing tricks on you?' Santana went to protest but Rachel continued. 'I just mean that knowing the woods were haunted, doing that stupid Ouija board, and now this revelation about Mr Walker, that you now think a ghost has come back from the grave or wherever, to seek revenge on your family?' Santana thought for a moment, standing up and shaking her head furiously.

'No, no Rachel, that's not what this is.' She put her hand on her forehead and closed her eyes. 'My Dad or Granddad or both of them, killed a man. They killed him because he came here to kill me.'

'That's not the part I'm disputing Santana. That is probably entirely true, all I'm saying is that maybe ghosts and Ouija boards aren't real, they don't work.'

'So explain to us Rachel.' Quinn interjected. 'How did a beam of white light shoot out of that board? How did we get thrown on our asses by nothing? How did Santana get another massive bruise on her shoulder in the woods earlier?'

'Alright, alright, I get your point. Several key factors cannot be explained.'

'Exactly, so until you figure out what else it might be, we are preparing for a ghost.' Santana said, sighing as she set herself down in her swivel chair.

'What do you mean preparing?' Quinn asked. 'How do we do that?'

'Well.' Santana sat forward. 'My Grandma always said there were ways to banish ghosts and spirits. I think it's time I tried to find one.' She smiled weakly, something else popping into her head. 'And Brittany doesn't need to know about this, any of it.'

'San, she's your girlfriend. You don't want to keep this from her.' Rachel said.

'Yeah I do, I don't want Brit anywhere near this. I wont risk her getting hurt.' Santana looked up at both of them, eyes filled with pleading.

'Okay San, it's your call. We wont say anything you don't want us to.' Quinn smiled gently.

'Thanks.' Santana whispered.

'So what do we do now?' Rachel asked, seeing the darkness settling over the outside world.

'Well, I'm going to stay up until my dad gets in, talk to him and get his side of the story. You guys are welcome to stay, or go. We have school tomorrow remember.' Santana said, both girls nodding slightly as they remembered.

'It is getting late, I think I better go before my dads get worried.' Rachel said, standing up and moving towards the door.

'Okay, thanks for coming over Rachel.'

'Sure Santana, Quinn do you want a lift home?'

'Is that okay?' Quinn asked, Rachel nodded. 'We'll see you at school tomorrow then San, okay?'

'Yeah, see you guys.' Santana said quietly, immediately turning around and turning on her laptop.

'Santana I need you to promise that you wont do anything stupid.' Quinn said as she and Rachel stood in the doorway.

'Please Q, what could I do?' Santana replied without looking at them, opening her web browser and starting a search.

'Don't go back into the woods.' Quinn said, Santana swallowing again before she promised not to. 'Good, see you tomorrow.'

'And we'll try and do some research of our own.' Rachel informed her.

'Thanks guys.' Santana waved them out over her shoulder, focusing on her computer screen. Now all she had to do was keep herself busy until she heard her dad come in downstairs.

Staying awake was easier said than done, Santana looking up everything she could to do with ghosts and how to get rid of them to avoid having her eyes close on her. She was exhausted. Fear being one of her main reasons at trying to stay awake but she also really wanted to talk to her dad. She needed to understand. Needed to know if this ghost was being irrational or if there was something more to this story. She heard the front door slam, her head jerking up from it's position flat on the keyboard of her laptop. She didn't know when she set her head down but she was very close to dreamland at that moment. Rubbing her eyes and yawning before she got up, Santana moved over to her bed. She grabbed her hoodie, which was screwed up on her duvet, and pulled it on sluggishly. It was suddenly very cold. She didn't remember it being this cold when earlier. Yawning once more before she made her way out of her room and down the stairs, everything in darkness. She heard her father moving around in the kitchen, and turning the corner she could see a faint light coming from the refrigerator being opened and closed. 'Dad?' She called, walking towards the door of the kitchen. 'Dad?' She repeated, pushing the door open and walking into the now dark kitchen.

'Oh, hi honey.' She heard through the darkness, flipping on the light as she passed it.

'Wow, you look awful.' Santana noticed, sitting around the island as her father took the seat opposite with a glass of milk in his hand.

'That's because I have just performed a very difficult surgery, at night, as well as my regular shift.' He smiled.

'Did they live?' Santana asked, Mr Lopez smiling.

'Yeah, he did.' Santana smiled as well, but she knew he would want to sleep so she decided to cut right to it. 'Dad I need to talk to you about Nathan Walker.'

'Who?' Javier asked, running his finger around the rim of his glass.

'Cut the crap dad.' Santana said gently, Mr Lopez looking up and settling his hand on the table. 'Mum told me.'

'She did huh?' Her father looked at her.

'Yeah, Rachel and Quinn know too.'

'Okay.' Javier sighed. 'What do you want to know?' Santana looked up suspiciously.

'So, you're just going to tell me now?'

'You already know, not much point in holding back with the details.' He laughed sadly. 'I never thought Nathan would react the way he did.'

'But he did.' Santana said, watching her father's fingers tapping lightly on the kitchen surface.

'Yes, he did.'

'Was she dead anyway dad?' Santana looked up. 'Before you switched her off, was she already dead?'

'Her body was there but her mind had gone.'

'That's not what I asked.' Santana changed the question. 'Was there any chance of her coming back? Or was she dead?'

'She was dead Santana. Nothing I could have done would have brought her back.'

'Okay then.' Santana cleared her throat. 'What happened that night?' Mr Lopez ran a hand over his hair and face, trying to wipe some of the sleep from his eyes as he remembered.

'He broke in, smashed the window in the living room with a rock from the front yard.' Mr Lopez laughed. 'He was drunk out of his mind when we got down there.'

'What did he say to you?' Santana asked nervously, pretty sure that she was not going to like her father's answer.

'He told me I was going to hell. That I had no right to do what I did, to take his daughter away from him. He was swinging a baseball bat in his hands when we stepped into the living room.'

'What was he going to do with it?' Santana asked, tears threatening to make an appearance.

'I think you know what he was going to do Santana.' She simply nodded, breaking eye contact with him and coughing.

'Yeah, what happened then?'

'Your Grandfather and I tried to calm him down and make him leave.'

'But he wouldn't listen.' Santana finished for him.

'No he didn't. He kept trying to get to the stairs, yelling about which room my baby girl was sleeping in.' Santana shifted awkwardly in her seat. 'We couldn't let him past so we did what we needed to. He started getting violent, using force to try and push us away. I landed the final blow, I think. Do you remember the statue we had on the hall table?'

'Vaguely, wasn't it a woman in a long dress or something like that?'

'Yeah, that's it.' Mr Lopez smiled. 'I hit him with it.'

'And then you buried him in the woods so no one could find him.' Santana stated.

'Santana, I know what you're thinking….'

'Yeah?' She looked at him, her eyes filling with something resembling anger. 'I'm wondering why you didn't call the police? You know, as soon as you heard someone downstairs. Or how about after he…' She stood up. 'You could have called the cops then.'

'Don't you think we thought about that?'

'I don't know, did you?' Santana laughed. 'The best you could come up with was burying him in the damn woods!'

'Santana, it all happened really fast, we didn't know what to do really. All I know is that a Dr who is also a murderer, would not bode well in the hospital.'

'Dad, it was self defence.'

'Even so, I would have lost my job and we would have had to have made lots of changes. I did what I thought was best and it saved your life Santana!'

'Okay, yeah I know that.' Her voice softened, walking towards the door, calming down. 'Get some sleep dad. And thanks for talking to me.'