CH 1
Alex Vause was only human. She didn't always do the right thing, but that didn't mean she didn't know right from wrong. She knew it was wrong to work for an international drug cartel. She knew it wasn't very nice to lie to her ex-lover Piper Chapman about giving up her name as a suspect to officials. But Alex was snide and street smart. She wasn't all that into feelings, with most people. She was good at what she did, before she got arrested for it. And she was good at loving Piper, too, except only when the two were alone. Her high-level drug operations usually took precedence over giving Piper attention, in the pre-prison days. Alex was actually the first one to say I love you. "You have to say it back," she said to Piper. "I love you too." Except there was the time when Alex's girlfriend at the time came home to find Piper in her bed. "It's complicated," Alex assured Piper. But Piper was hurt then like the many other times she had been. Alex loved Piper, but Alex loved her risky heroin-importer life just as much. Like she said before, "heroin was the best girlfriend she ever had." The drug was reliable, always there - unlike Alex to Piper.
After that one shaky visit with Piper at prison, Alex had decided she needed to skip town. Except right before she was ready to leave her shady Queens apartment, her probation officer saw her with a gun. One stupid mistake, and Alex was heading back to doing laundry with Pennsatucky and wearing an orange jumpsuit.
Alex assumed she'd be sent to the same prison. Probation violations typically landed criminals right to the closest jailhouse. When she first saw her probation officer at her apartment door, gun in her hand, she knew she was fucked. "Shit," she whispered in defeat. On her trip to prison after her hearing, sitting in the backseat of a cop car, her mind flooded with thoughts. On one hand she was definitely worried about how things would go with her inmates. How things would go with Piper. But on top of all the anxiety was a cloud of hopelessness and exhaustion powerful enough to balance Alex's anxiety about whatever was to come. Prison is supposed to be the lowest you can get, she thought. So who really cares. It'll work out some way.
Orientation brought Alex some familiar faces. Lorna Morello, with her bright red lips and mascaraed eyes, drove Alex and some other newbies to the cell house. But Alex wasn't a newbie. She knew how this went. "Vause. Welcome back," Morello said, the bumpy road jumbling her speech a little. "Hi Morello. Hey, have those starter kits?" "Hold your horses. I'll give you all brushes and toothpaste when we arrive." Alex wasn't getting any special treatment from anyone. She realized fully now, that she'd have to start new with each inmate she would care to speak to - she had left, fucked up with Piper, and now she practically was new.
Alex had gotten through the day with minimal hassle, excluding the small altercation with Jesus-lover Pennsatucky who raged that Alex was a "slit licking, good-for-nothing rich bitch." Alex was especially thankful that she hadn't ran into Piper yet. She was in a dorm with Big Boo, whom she didn't mind - it could be a lot worse. Alex laid in bed at 8:00. She knew she wouldn't be getting much rest but had nothing better to do, and knew tomorrow she would have to face a hell of a lot of interaction.