I had the urge to write a quick little story about Lorna and Nicky. I love seeing them together and thought I'd write a little one-shot about the two. Don't know if anyone will read this as hardly anyone's reading my other story about them. Although since this isn't a crossover maybe people will be interested in it. I guess we'll just have to see. Thanks, please leave a review to let me know what you think!
Overcoming The Mind
Fantasizing has been a part of Lorna Morello's life since she started her first day of Kindergarten. When she came home from school that day - with no friends to tell her parents about - she made up a story to make herself feel better. In high school, she told everyone how rich her family was - which definitely couldn't be further from the truth, but she would do anything to get other students to be her friend. Currently, she's telling everyone how in love she is with her beloved Christopher and how they're planning the wedding for as soon as she gets out of prison. And at this point, all the other inmates are getting fed up with her constant wedding talk.
Prison is one of the last places that Lorna could have ever imagined herself to be. Sure she knew buying expensive items online and then asking for a refund - while she sat holding them in her hands - wasn't the smartest decision, but she never thought it would get her into trouble with the police. Although it might also be due to the fact that she created a fantasy with the one man that she loves more than anything, and she wholeheartedly believes this to be real - so much that she always knew exactly where Christopher was at. She knew his number, his address, his real fiancee's name, where he worked, where he bought his coffee. She met him during one of her trips to the post-office, in the midst of her online shopping scams, and he asked her out for a coffee. From that day on she knew the two of them were meant to be, even when he refused her a second date.
Lorna spends most of her time - when she's not busy cleaning the bathrooms or hallways - watching television, usually with her best friend Nicky Nichols, in the rec-room or strolling along the garden that Red created outside. She's only half-way through her prison sentence - which is thirty-four months, just a couple months shy of three years - and time only seems to go by slower and slower each day.
"Morello," a voice calls out. Lorna takes her eyes away from the screen to look at whoever had called out her name. Suzanne Warren - better known as 'Crazy Eyes' - is standing in the doorway of the rec-room, peering at her with her wide black eyes, "Someone's on the phone for you. I was just in Caputo's office and he told me for you to come down there. I don't know who it is but it sounds to me like it might be that fiance of yours - oh what's his name? Christopher?"
A weary smile appears on the short woman's face as she gets up and starts walking to his office. She hasn't seen or heard from Christopher since the day of her trial. Butterflies fill her stomach at the thought of getting to hear his voice again. She wonders what he'll say - maybe things between him and Angela aren't working out, not as if she thought they would. Christopher is too good for that woman, Lorna thinks.
When she finally walks into Mr. Caputo's office, he absent-mindedly hands her the phone before going back to working on his laptop. Lorna takes a deep breath, bringing the phone to her ear. "Hello?" She greets in her perky Brooklynn accent. She anxiously waits to hear who it is, desperately praying it's Christopher. She needs to hear his voice, it's been too long.
"Look Lorna, I know you fucking broke into my house a few weeks ago!" It's definitely Christopher on the other end. He seems to be very angry which makes the butterflies in Lorna's stomach turn into fear and nausea. "What the fuck is wrong with you?! You're absolutely the most demented, psychotic, fucked-up bitch that I have ever met! You are delusional and I wish you'd be locked up in there for the rest of your miserable life. Unfortunately you won't be, so let me make one thing clear - When you do get out of prison if I ever see you near me, my family, or my wife, I will kill you! I will kill you with my bare fucking hands, Lorna! I mean it - I will fucking strangle you until you're lying on the floor fucking dead." The line goes dead and she shakily hangs it up. She runs out of there as fast as she can, tears running down her face while her body trembles.
Nicky Nichols - who's in the midst of a sex contest with Boo - is in one of the shower stalls with a fresh new inmate, Soso or something odd like that. This is probably one of the most annoying inmates she ever met - all she does is talk, all through her orgasms. She rolls her eyes, just wanting this to be over. Then suddenly a faint cry is heard, and the redhead knows it's certainly not Soso - she's too busy flapping her lips about something she can care less about.
The cry gets louder and Nicky instantly recognizes it. She immediately stops what she's doing - taking her hand out of Soso and redressing herself - then quickly walks to where she hears the woman's cries. Her heart breaks when she sees Lorna curled up in one of the stalls, trembling with sobs. "Hey, what's the matter, kid?" She looks at her, her big brown eyes soft with worry as she crouch down beside her and pulls her in for a hug.
Lorna can't even bring herself to look at the taller woman - one of her closest friends in there and she's lied to her; she's lied to everyone. It's not like she meant to lie to them; it's just that living in her fantasies is what helps her cope when times are tough. That's been her coping mechanism since she was a young child. And now it feels like the fantasy she has worked hard to keep hidden is being torn from right under her.
"Please talk to me, kid," Nicky's raspy voice worriedly begs as she holds her tight. She lifts her chin so that they're looking directly into each other's eyes. "Is this about Christopher and his idiot fiancee again?!" For the past month that's all Lorna has talked about, and if it were any other person, Nicky would be annoyed and probably tell them to shut hell up already. Most of what the brunette did would annoy her, if it was anyone else. She had a soft-spot for her, ever since she walked into the prison a year-and-a-half ago.
Brown eyes - that usually held positivity and a somewhat annoying cheerfulness - looked up at Nicky with a darkness that she had never seen before. Tears are coming out by the truck-load, her bright-red lipstick has long been wiped away, and she just looks like a complete mess. "Christopher called me," she whispers, her voice strained from how raw and dry her throat feels. Hearing the words he said really hit her hard into reality and that did not feel good.
Nicky's face shows a bout of confusion - for as long as Lorna has been behind bars, never once did this 'Christopher' come to visit her. So to hear that the woman received a call from him made her realize he's actually a real person. "What did he say to you? Did he call just to rub it in your face that he's got a new lover?! That filthy son of a bitch!" She balls her hands into fists, outraged how awful men could be.
If only that's what he had called about, Lorna thinks to herself. She bows her head down, ashamed of the woman she's become. She can't bare to live in this reality - a reality where all she does is hurt the people she loves and can't even face it without making up another lie. "I - I have a problem," her hands shake as she keeps her head down. "I-I've do-done really bad things, Nicky." It hurts deeply to realize that she can't keep living in the fantasy she created. But she doesn't know how to cope in the real world without it. She doesn't know how to deal with truly being alone in the world.
Nicky immediately wraps her arms around her, pulling her as close as she can. She kisses the top of her head, and gently looks into her eyes, "I'm pretty sure everyone in here has a problem and has done terrible things. That's why it's called prison, kid. I mean all you did was scam some online stores, that's nothing compared to what some of the other women have done! Don't beat yourself up over it. Now tell me what Christopher said to make you so upset!" She runs her hand comfortingly through the other's wavy brown hair.
"T-that's - That's not all I've done," Lorna sobs out, her heart ripping inside of her. She doesn't want to end her fantasy, but she knows eventually it will all come out anyway - if not by her, by someone else. "I-I lied to you, and everyone in here. Christo-Christopher and I w-were never going to get married. I-I m-made it all up," she can hardly breathe, it hurts too much to even speak. She hates that she has to face reality - that's never been something she's good at. "We-we only went one date, and I instantly fell in love with him. I-I couldn't see a life without him - but-but he told me he wasn't interested in pursuing a relationship. He told me that - that he met another woman, Angela, and he liked her better. 'She's normal', he said to me, 'You're pretty and all, Lorna - but Angela's a goddess, she works out and eats healthy, she actually chews her food instead of just inhaling it! She's fit; you're kinda thick, and you're too chipper for me. It just wouldn't work, Lorna.' And-And I didn't take rejection well, s-so I-I st-started to stalk him. I loved him, I really loved him! I wanted us to be together, he was everything I dreamt of in a man!"
Nicky stares at her, her eyes wide - she never expected to hear that. She sighed, pulling her closer and stroking her back softly. It made much more sense as to why her sentence was so long for an online-shopping scam, because that's not what it was even for. She had a sense that there wasn't something quite right with Lorna's head, but this was just a complete shock. It didn't anger her to know that her best friend lied to her, it angered her that no one in her family saw the signs of an obvious mental condition that seemed to consumer her. And what angered her even more was hearing what Christopher told Lorna, when breaking it off with her. "Christopher's an asshole, a complete fucking asshole for saying that to you! From the picture you showed me of Angela, she's not even close to how beautiful you are! Maybe he oughta get his eyes checked. What the fuck's he mean you're kind of thick?! You look pretty damn thin to me, kid. Men are such fucking dicks - literally and metaphorically." She looks compassionately into the smaller woman's eyes, brushing her cheek softly with her knuckles, "You're too good for a guy like him anyway, kid. Way too good! You mind tellin' me what he said to you now?"
Lorna slowly looks up at her, watery eyes, and surprised. "You-you don't hate me? You-you're not mad that I lied?" She wearily asks, still not buying it. If she were Nicky, she would hate herself for what she's done - she hates herself as her own self. Any other person would probably drop her as friend immediately, she's mentally insane. That's what her family tells her, the judge told her, Christopher constantly tells her, and the COs tell her. She should be locked up in psych, is exactly what the judge told her during her hearing.
The redhead feels her heart ache at that question. Ever since she met Lorna, something in her changed. She became much less rambunctious and hard-headed, especially around the petite, italian, woman. "Kid, I could never hate you. I mean it's really messed up that you would make a story like this up and actually believe in it, but that isn't going to make me want to stop being your friend. I'm mad at Christopher for how fucking rude he was when he broke off a relationship with you, and I am mad that your family didn't do anything for you knowing that something's wrong with your mind, but I'm not mad at you. You can't really lie when you actually think it's the truth, right? Now tell me what he said to you over the phone! So I can have more reason to hate him." Nicky keeps her voice soft, trying to calm the other down. She strokes her hair gently while peering into her eyes.
"He-he told me that when I get out if I ever come near him or his family or Angela, he'll kill me. He'll strangle me until I'm lying on the floor dead - fucking dead, is what he said. He said that I'm demented, psychotic, and I should spend the rest of my miserable life in prison - he's right, I should. I'm too fucked up to be allowed in the real world, I can't function." Fresh tears start pouring out of her eyes as she squirms her way out of Nicky's arms and starts dry-heaving. It feels as if the world is closing in around her - it's too hard to breathe.
Nicky shakes her head, fuming at the thought of someone wanting to actually kill Lorna. She grits her teeth, and hits her hand roughly against the wall - secretly wishing it was Christopher's face that she hit. How could anyone want to kill Lorna? Sure she wasn't exactly stable in the head, but she was the kindest person in the world. She would never intentionally hurt anyone. Nicky groans angrily, then quickly scoops the smaller woman back into her arms and kisses her head. "Christopher isn't touching a hair on your head, Lorna. I'll fucking find him and kill him. You're not demented or psychotic - you're a sweet, beautiful, and somewhat crazy woman. But you are not fucking demented! Not even close, kid. The fuck kind of person is he?! Does he enjoy hurting you? Does he fucking enjoy making such a sweet person like you cry?! He's the fucking demented one here, not you. God I swear if I ever meet this sleazy Christopher, I will beat him until he can't move. You should be happy you never dated him, kid, he's an asshole. That's all he'll ever be. And you don't deserve someone like that. You deserve to be loved by someone who actually wants to love you. Someone who will protect and take care of you the way that you should be," she speaks firmly, but looks softly into her eyes.
Lorna shakes her head, sobs quieting into sniffles. She looks up at Nicky, pain clearly in her eyes. "Who would ever want to love some fucked up person like me? Who in their right mind would want to have to deal with me?"
Hearing that only makes Nicky hold her tighter, she runs a hand lovingly through Lorna's hair. It breaks her heart to know that her beautiful best friend thinks that no one would ever want to love her. Maybe Christopher wouldn't but someone else will - someone better. She cups her face, stroking her cheeks lightly, and presses a warm kiss to her lips, "I would want to love someone like you, Lorna. You're a beautiful, sweet woman with such a big heart. Quit saying you're fucked up, because you're not! You're not anywhere near fucked up, kid. You just need a little help." She brushes a hand through Lorna's hair, kissing her cheek. "I want to be with you, Lorna, I want to love and take care of you - protect you from all the fucking idiots in the world. We both have problems, and yours don't bother me. They only make me want to love you more, and take care of you more. I may not be a man like Christopher - although I'd hardly consider him a man for how much pain he's caused you - but I sure as can love you more than he could. And I can promise you that I will never hurt you, kid. You're special to me - very special, baby. I will always be here for you," Nicky speaks gently, while pressing another soft kiss to Lorna's lips.