Orange Is The New Black
Okay, this is my first attempt at a multi-chapter fanfic as well as my first OITNB fanfic. I would appreciate any and all comments and feedback so I know what I'm doing right and where I need to improve… Thank you for reading! :)
Rated M for covering all bases for all possibilities.
*** I do not have any claim to any of the characters from Orange is the New Black, I am merely using them for storytelling purposes. ***
The long haired brunette woman entered the coffee shop, casting an unsure glance over her shoulder at the grey sky out the window. She walked up to the counter of the little book and coffee shop owned by her friend Red. The smell of coffee already taking over her senses, she searched through her leather jacket's pockets quickly before her hand found the money she'd been searching for. Now second in the queue the brunette observed the woman in front of her, fairly tall and blonde. She wore a loose white top and tight grey jeans with simple flat shoes. Those shoes stepped forward and took the woman so she was stood in front of the till ready to be served by the new till girl whose name badge read 'Lorna'. Once the woman had ordered she stepped aside to wait for her drink and Lorna preceded to take the brunettes order. Lorna called both orders to a fiery haired woman who the brunette knew and was good friends with.
"Hey Vause!" the flame haired woman called happily when she turned towards Lorna to hand her the drinks she had made on Lorna's instructions.
"Hey Nicky!" the brunette replied with a sly smile. Nicky only ever called her by her surname, if she was ever addressed by her first name there was something very wrong.
"Just couldn't stay away from me, eh?" Nicky joked playfully, dramatically raising a hand and placed it over her heart.
The brunette raised an eyebrow suggestively, a smirk played at the corner of her mouth. "You wish Nichols!" she replied as she took her drink from Lorna, noticing as she did the blonde had already taken hers and left.
"Oooh! The signature Vause look has joined the party! Well it's been nice to chat with ya kid but some of us have gotta work ya know?" Nicky teased.
"See ya Nicky!" the brunette laughed before turning towards the door to leave.
As the brunette reached the edge of the pavement directly in front of the shop, she felt her phone buzz in her pocket. She passed her drink from her right hand to her left so she could extract her phone and check the message on it. After reading the message she sighed and put her phone back in her pocket unanswered as it had killed the happy buzz she'd had just moments before. With another sigh she took a sip of her drink and pulled a face at the sweet taste, this was not what she'd ordered.
She turned to head back to Red's and take it up with Nicky, when a soft blonde mass collided with her. She felt hot liquid cover her shirt and the left side of her leather jacket, a quick thought went to how difficult it may be to get the possible stain out. As quickly as that thought came it left at the sight of the blonde woman who had just crashed into her over-balancing due to her surprise and falling towards the road. The brunette threw out a hand to catch the blonde's now free hand and tugged on her arm, causing the other woman to be pulled right up against her. Still with the blonde's hand in hers the brunette automatically put her other arm around the shorter woman's waist to combat their momentum and to stop her falling back towards the road.
A second later an older woman walked past them, not having witnessed their situation moments before, only seeing them wrapped in each other's arms. She stopped to speak to them.
"Oh, it's so lovely to see such love, girls. I know how people can be but it's still so beautiful to see how love prevails!"
The brunette recovered first and released her hold on the woman in her arms slightly but the blonde woman still clung to her tightly, still shocked.
"Err… thank you ma'am." The brunette replied politely.
The woman's smile got even bigger. "Aww, how did you two meet?"
Alex glanced at the woman in her arms, she seemed to have pulled herself together enough to understand the situation. The blonde smiled charmingly at the older woman and relaxed more into the brunette's arms so they look more like a couple, surprise registered momentarily on the face of the woman who was holding her, which the blonde noticed but smiled what she hoped was reassuringly at her, and she silently hoped the brunette would forgive her for playing along… She kept their bodies flush so that the woman would not see the fresh stains down their fronts.
"It's a funny story… Our drink orders from the little shop over there," The blonde gestured to the shop they now faced then returned her hand to her pretend lover's jacket, "got mixed up by mistake and on my way back to the shop I walked into her and managed to pretty much throw it all over her… So… Um yeah." The blonde flashed another dazzling smile which held a hint of embarrassment as she had just described exactly what had just happened.
"Oh girls! That's so romantic! Aww… Well have a good day loves!" The older woman said before she began shuffling off down the road.
The two women waited in their pretend embrace until the old woman had walked a fair distance before stepping apart. They both looked at each other with embarrassment before they both burst laughing.
The brunette put out a hand shyly.
"Would this be a bad time to say hi? I'm Alex by the way."
The blonde took her hand and shook it gently. "Hello, I'm Piper." They both smiled before Piper started talking, suddenly remembering everything that had happened minutes before. "Look I'm really sorry for throwing my – well thinking about it your coffee - over you… It had 'Alex' written on it so it must have been yours. And thank you for catching me, that could have been messy if you hadn't have been there… I'll buy you another coffee and pay to have your clothes cleaned as I really did a good job on covering them didn't I? I'm also sorry for panicking when the woman spoke to us, I didn't know what to do so I played along hoping you would forgive me later…" Piper trailed off when she realised she'd just been blabbering away with Alex staring at her with a smile she seemed to be trying to suppress.
"Wow kid, you really like to talk huh?" Alex chuckled at her.
"I'm a nervous talker…" Piper mumbled quietly, flicking her gaze away from Alex's face.
"I've made you nervous?" Alex asked with her signature smirk, raising an eyebrow playfully.
"No! That's not what I meant, I mean yes, wait no!" Piper struggled with her words, getting herself a little worked up trying to explain exactly what she'd meant.
"Relax kid, I'm messing with you." Alex laughed, her laugh sounded musical but it was low, it fitted the sound of her low voice and suited her personality.
"Oh. Oh right… okay, gottcha." Piper blushed a shade of red that rivalled the paint on Red's coffee and book shop and earned her another grin from Alex. Piper remembered she had a card in her phone case with her details on it. She retrieved it and handed it to Alex.
"Here. It's got my number on it so you can send me the bill on cleaning that jacket and so I can replace the coffee I threw at you…"
Alex got out her phone, wincing inside as she remembered the unanswered message that she would most certainly be berated for not answering and added the number on the card to her phone and sent a text to it so that Piper had her number. She then put the card away in her wallet.
"I've sent you a text so you'll have my number too. But you really don't have to worry, it was an accident and look at it this way: we wouldn't have met otherwise."
Piper smiled at Alex's words and replied, "But I want to though."
"Okay." Alex said with a smile giving in to Piper's silent plea to not reject her offer. At this moment the sky decided it had held out long enough and erupted into pouring rain, quickly drenching both women with cold rivers running down their faces.
"Shit!" Piper muttered under her breath, already beginning to shake with cold.
"What's wrong?" Alex asked, water dripping down her face. She adjusted her glasses in what seemed like a familiar habit.
"I walked here, with no stupid coat. My house is 20 minutes away. Fuck!" Piper started pacing in the rain and had a two fingers pressed to her temple.
"I know we've only just met but… my car is just down the road, I can give you a ride. If you'd like?"
There was something about the way she asked that made Piper not want to refuse her, but she felt awful for everything that had happened so far with the woman.
"That is lovely for you to offer Alex but… after everything I've done so far-" Piper started.
"Do you seriously expect me to leave you out in this weather, knowing full well that you are freezing, have no coat and it'll take you 20 minutes at least to get home? And you're already soaking. Please?" Alex was almost begging, something about that seemed like it was very uncharacteristic a thing for her to do.
"Um… okay, as long as you really don't mind?" Piper said, secretly elated to be able to get out the rain quickly but wanting to offer the woman before her a way out as she didn't want her to feel obliged to help her.
"Come on!" Alex replied and grabbed Piper's hand and dragged her in the direction of her car.
A few minutes later the pair were safely inside Alex's little silver car, blasting the heater in the hope of warming up quickly. Alex began rummaging around the back seat and produced a folded t-shirt and a small towel. She handed Piper both and cut off her objections.
"Piper, you are freezing, don't try to tell me you're not. Put the t-shirt over the top, it might help you get warm quicker. And you can dry your hair with the towel if you want, I won't move the car until you're ready so don't worry."
"Thank you Alex…" Piper said gratefully.
Just as Piper finished rubbing her hair down with the towel her phone started ringing, she looked at the caller I.D and sighed.
"You can answer it if you want I don't mind, and I'll keep quiet." Alex said with a friendly wink.
"Sorry," Piper mouthed at Alex before answering the call, "Hey Larry."
There was a little bit of shouting from the other end of the phone and Piper rolled her eyes.
"I got caught in the rain and a friend offered to give me a lift. I'll be home shortly, I'll speak to you then. Bye." Piper said brusquely before ending the call. She looked up at Alex who was staring out her window, trying not to listen to the conversation even though she could not escape it. "Sorry… It was my boyfriend Larry. He was angry because I hadn't answered when he called me earlier, and basically he's in a mood and I'm not there to cook his dinner." Piper felt she needed to give an explanation to the brunette but Alex shook her head and smiled with a knowing expression.
Alex went to start the car when her phone then started to ring, she knew who it would be and hung up on them. Immediately afterwards her phone lit up again and Piper gestured for her to answer it, smiling her assurance that she didn't mind either. Alex moved her glasses from her face onto the top of her head and sighed.
"Sylvie." Alex said by way of greeting.
Down the phone a voice shouted loud enough for Piper to hear without trying.
"Where the FUCK are you Alex? I've been trying to get hold of you for the last hour and you just couldn't be bothered to bloody reply could you? I bet you're off with some-" came the string of shouting before being interrupted.
"Enough Sylvie." Alex said with contained anger. "I went to get coffee and made a friend, said friend has no coat. It is raining. I'm driving her home and then I'll be on my way." After she finished talking Alex shut her eyes and put a thumb and finger on the bridge of her nose where her glasses usually sat. She knew her mistake.
"Her? So you are off with someone else? You're a lying, cheating bitch, Alex. You know that?"
"Sylvie." Alex said barely masking her anger this time. "Piper is just a friend, I couldn't let her walk home freezing and soaking. I am not the cheating type. The same cannot be said for you though can it?" There was a stunned silence in both the car and on the end of the phone at Alex's sudden outburst of rage. Already she was half regretting it as well as accidently saying Piper's name.
"I'm sure you'll keep Piper nice and warm won't you?" Sylvie hissed in reply.
"Whatever, Sylvie." Alex said simply, before hanging up and throwing her phone in the door pocket. She suddenly remembered that she's not alone in the car and looked up to see Piper looking straight ahead, unsure what to make of what had just happened.
"I'm sorry Piper… Sylvie is… Well she is as she is and I'm not sure why I put up with it. God knows she gives me plenty of reasons not to. She shouldn't have said that about you and I'm sorry. And I wish you hadn't heard me say what I did because it wasn't very nice either…" Alex put her head on the steering wheel and sighed for what seemed like the millionth time that day.
She started slightly when she felt a hand on her shoulder and heard Piper speak.
"It's okay, Alex. It's my fault she went off on one at you, so I'm the one who should be saying sorry. I'm sorry Alex."
"You shouldn't have to apologise for existing Piper." Alex said seriously. "Well we better get going before we receive calls from long lost relatives who've seen the missing people posters our respective people have placed in our absence!"
Alex's attempt at lightening the mood earned a heartfelt laugh from Piper and they began to relax into each other's company again. They drove in silence for a while before Alex turned the radio on, they listened and occasionally sang along with Piper pointing directions until they came to a stop outside Piper's apartment building.
"So here we are." Alex said, almost sadly.
"Here we are." Piper confirmed, with a similar sadness in her tone. "Will you text me when you get home? I know it sounds silly… but I worry about those kind of things and after all I've put you through today…" Piper trailed off again when she saw Alex looking at her and trying not to smile.
"Of course I will Pipes." Alex said softly, then her face showed her worry that she may have offended Piper with the accidental use of a new nickname.
Piper just smiled, relieved that her new friend would text her later. Pleased, partly because she would know she had gotten home safely, albeit possibly to a fuming girlfriend, but also because she wanted to keep talking to this woman.
"We'll have to arrange for that replacement coffee." Alex said with smile.
"We will. And you'll have to send me the bill for cleaning that jacket!" Piper agreed.
"We'll see about that…" Alex chuckled, Piper had a feeling that Alex would conveniently 'forget' to send that to her.
"Well I better go inside now before Larry calls again… Thank you for today and I'm sorry for the trouble…" Piper said sincerely.
"Thank you for today, I enjoyed it, coffee and all!" Alex replied with a wink.
Piper got out the car and jogged through the rain to the door of the apartment building and turned to see Alex's car still there, waiting for her to go in before she drove away. Piper waved in farewell and Alex pulled away.
Piper let herself into the apartment she shared with her boyfriend Larry and sank onto the comfy sofa, exhausted. She heard Larry come into the room and decided she would avoid the conversation that would probably ensue if she didn't make her excuses.
"Hey Larry, I'm going for a shower as I'm freezing cold and rather soaked…" Piper said, trailing off when Larry wasn't even concentrating on her but on the program he had just turned on. Piper left the room and locked herself in the bathroom while she showered.
After she got dressed in some comfy pyjamas, she checked her phone for messages. She had two she'd missed from her best friend Polly and she had one from an unsaved number. Piper ignored the two from Polly and read the one from that must have been from Alex.
From Alex:
Hey it's Alex, I'm home now. Thank you for a fun afternoon Pipes, I think I needed it. Well, have a good evening. :)
Piper smiled at the message and replied quickly, her fingers tumbling over the keys before pressing send.
From Piper:
Thanks for letting me know :) I had fun too. Have a good evening Al. :)