Just an idea I wanted to work on. Tom Waits was playing in the background throughout this. ( Come On Up to the House and Take it With Me).
Thank you Wanderingbrowneyes, for reading through most of this!

Let me know what you guys think.


The light wind is cool and welcoming against my cheek as I walk towards the train station. Nice to see you old friend, I think, leaning into it. With every caress I remember our multiple previous rendezvous when I would go out running. I've missed you.

As I get on the train and take a seat that faces the window looking out at the world, I can't help but smile at the stranger sitting in front of me. Her expression barely changes and she turns away and I feel taken aback by the fact that I'm taken aback. All around me, people sit, with bored faces, tired faces. Not everyone has been locked up in prison for the past seven months. They don't appreciate this night like you do.

There's a lot I've learned about freedom lately. Freedom is relative; arbitrary even. It depends just as much on the physical walls people lock you up in as the mental ones you build up around yourself.

I am happy for Cal, he looked content tonight… A kind of contentment that comes from being true to yourself and I want that. All those people, looking at me with pity, with the "you'll put this behind you" looks, what they don't understand is that this is who I am. Their expectations for me to be someone I'm not, well that's just a whole different kind of imprisonment. Expectations and freedom don't go hand in hand. When you're always supposed to be doing this or saying that how the fuck can you ever feel free enough to be who you really are?

So I had to get out of there. I had to leave. The train stops, I get off and out on the platform, I look down on the wrinkled piece of paper in my hand. Eleven blocks from where I am. My heart thuds loudly in my chest as I start walking, anticipation and a certain kind of fear seeping in my blood. Freedom is scary. At least with restrictions, a small part of me argues, there is some semblance of control, safety… boundaries. When those boundaries are crossed, when that control dissipates, there's nothing stopping you from free falling, is there?

The look on Cal's face hits me again, and my stride gains strength. It's the right thing to do. No, I shake my head. Fuck the right thing, it's the only thing that I want to do. It won't be pretty, and it won't be comfortable.

Happiness and freedom have nothing to do with each other. Happiness is a small bubble that can burst at any moment. Look too hard at someone, or think too much about something and pop! There goes happiness with its tail between its legs, out the back door like a fucking coward. No. To be really free, you need passion.

I check the piece of paper again against the smoky black number painted on the building door. Yep, it's the right building. I climb the 2 steps leading to the door, take off my heels, walk up the three flights of stairs and there I am, standing in front of the door.

So passion. When you find that one person you never have to pretend for, you don't try to hide any emotion, you don't try to be someone you're not… you're not suddenly cured of all your fucked-upness. This person just doesn't give a crap, they take you in, all of you in, and just let you be. You find that perfect balance of passion and freedom they call love. A certain independence within that codependence.

I'm looking for that tonight. For someone to look at me, and just take me in for exactly who I am. The good, the bad and all the in-betweens. I take a deep breath and rap on the door thrice.


I don't rush to answer the door these days, and I wouldn't have bothered this time either, except I was already up, refilling my unknown number of glass of wine. Glass in hand, I figure I'll just take a peek. I tread lightly on my feet, which is a little hard to do seeing as I'm more than a little tipsy, and just as I'm about to get a look, there comes the knock again. I scowl at the door. Someone's annoyingly insistent tonight.

"Alex?" My name floats through the door and I realize I've just said that out loud. Hard to keep track of things like that when you've been alone too long. But wait… that voice.

My hand flies to the million locks that won't be any good if the situation calls for them, and turn the knob without another thought. The door opens and I'm face to face with a certain blonde that has no business being here, really. I've surely gone out of my fucking mind. I have. I'm hallucinating a breathtakingly beautiful Piper, standing in the shithole of a hallway outside my shithole of an apartment in a black dress with sexy stockinged legs and smoky eyes, with her shoes dangling off of her fingers.

Her eyes flicker behind me to the inside of the apartment and then back at me. "Do you have company? I mean I'd offer to come another time but, y'know…" she trails off, her lips turning up into a ghost of a smile and a laugh slips out of my lips.

"Are you real?"

Her expression changes to something that sends shivers all over my body. She moves forward, as if in slow motion, over the threshold and right up close to me, so close that I can feel the warmth of her body and the booze on her breath. Or maybe it's mine. One hand, one solid, very life-like hand comes up to cup my cheek and, the other rests against the small of my back, the heels of her shoes digging in my skin and she presses her lips firmly against mine. Before I can register it, let alone react to it, she pulls back, "real enough for you?"

I nod dumbly, the feel of her lips seared onto mine, and close the door behind her as she moves past me, dropping her shoes next to the wall that she caresses with her fingers, taking in the place. She walks into the kitchen and eyeballs the bottle of wine. I get out a glass and start to pour, keeping my hand light.

"Say when."

"When," she says when the glass is nearly brimming with the golden liquid. "Thanks." She takes it and moves on towards what barely passes as my living room these days. After a furtive glance at the couch I remain standing by the entrance.

"So, wait, how are you…?"

She looks over her shoulder at me. "Furlough. My grandmother died." She says without any inflection, her voice flat. But I know how close they were and that there must be plenty brewing beneath the stoicism.

"Celeste?" Piper hums in assent, glancing over my meager book collection. "Shit, Pipes. I'm sorry."

She lifts her shoulders in a shrug but before they can fall back down, she squares them, tilts her head and says, "The famous Alex catch phrase." Ah, the passive aggressive Piper. How I've missed her.

Piper ambles over to the window and peers outside, around the sheet.

"How're you dealing with it?" I ask, studying her. She doesn't answer me, but instead continues to look out the window. Piper feels a little different; there's something about the way she holds herself, that has nothing to do with the wine in her hand that is so alluring- well more alluring than Piper always has been to me. Her hold on me is mystifying and frustrating and intoxicating. But tonight, she seems open, in spite of her stubbornness, fearless and vulnerable all at the same time.

"Do you wanna talk about it?"

She takes a healthy mouthful of the wine and saunters over to me, her movements slightly exaggerated. "How is it that you have wine glasses but no curtains?"

She places her glass behind me on the waist-high shelf and effectively traps me against it with other hand ghosting over my hip. My eyes take in hers, as they journey to my lips, making her intentions very clear.

Intoxicating.

She runs her hand over my cheek, through my hair. "Soft. Like your resolve when you were offered a plea deal."

I try very hard not to roll my eyes. "Piper…" before I can continue, she brushes her lips against mine, the softest of kisses, as if testing the waters, as if it were our first time. She leans back and regards me, with unadulterated desire on her face.

"Alex."

"We shouldn't… I mean-" I'm trying, really, to act the responsible adult here, but when she looks at me like that, I know this isn't just the alcohol talking, she needs me.

"We shouldn't, I can't, this isn't right, I haven't showered today…" she smirks at me, though it doesn't quite reach her eyes. "Got any more?"

My hands trail over her arms around me, up to her shoulders, her neck. I push back hair from her face, lightly threading my fingers through the blonde locks at the nape of her neck and meet her halfway as she crashes her lips onto mine. It's not a pretty kiss; it is sloppy and wild, our teeth knock painfully, tongues battling for dominance, my glasses colliding against the bridge of my nose and we steal the breath out of the other. I feel Piper everywhere; I'm overwhelmed as my senses come alive; Piper's everywhere. One of her hands grips my ass, pulling me closer to her, a sigh escaping her as our bodies come flush against each other's. Her scent pervades my entire being and I try to inhale as deeply as I possibly can while already being short of breath.

I reach down to grab her by the back of her thighs and lift her up, her legs hooking up behind me as my eyes become level with her neck and her chest. Turning around, I back her up against the wall and it registers somewhere in my lust filled stupor that I may have slammed her too hard as she lets out a groan.

"Sorry, sorry…" I manage to get out as I messily make my way down her buttery skin, throwing in kisses and licks and nips at whatever skin is exposed to me. There's a slit in the dress at the centre of her chest that I bury my nose in but it's not enough for me.

Flat surface, flat surface, flat surface! As if reading my mind, Piper pushes off the wall and I stumble backward, balancing Piper's weight against mine as she captures my lips in another kiss. Coffee table! No, couch. Blindly retreating, I settle down with a loud thump on the couch, Piper ending up straddling me. She continues pushing into me, her hands somehow underneath my shirt, as she lays soft bites onto my ear lobe.

"Dress. Off." She commands, sending a jolt straight to my centre and I hasten to comply.

I try to pull the dress off her shoulders but it's too tight. My fingers still clawing at her stockings, I'm still trying to figure out the workings of her fucking dress, when I feel her back shudder rhythmically and at first I think she's laughing at me for being so slow. I lean away from her, fully intent on justifying myself and blaming her impossible outfit when I see she's crying.

"Pipes. Talk to me." I hold her face in my hands, wiping away her tears with my thumbs but they just don't run out. She can't talk, her eyes tell me, and I nod and pull her to me, expecting resistance, but she yields and I close my arms around her.


I don't know if it's the way she's looking at me, or the way her hands feel against my skin- warm and consoling- or that I knew coming here would finally allow me to lose control, or a combination of all these and more reasons that I find myself breaking down. She pulls me to her, the slightest tug, and I'm sobbing into her soft cotton shirt. She holds me, her strong, sure hands kneading my back, her cheek resting against my hot forehead, murmuring words of comfort. I can't even hear them, let alone make sense of them, but her voice vibrates against my ears, the low, husky tone, and that is all I need.

When was the last time I gave into my feelings like this? With Larry? No. I was always in control; there was always a part of me he couldn't reach because I never gave it to him. I think back to my childhood, trying to remember moments of vulnerability but other than grandma and cal, nothing comes to mind. Even then, the ways of our parents were so well ingrained in us; all we could do was to glance fleetingly at what we were feeling before turning a stony face away. Feelings were to be swept under the carpet, emotions weren't dealt with, they were hidden, away with the rest of our ugliness. And where did that leave us? With hollow caricatures, instead of humans to call a family.

It's ironic really, that I find this openness with a drug smuggling lesbian, an ex convict who personally went and landed me in prison. My sobs die down as I pull back to look at her. Her cheek has turned red where it touched me, her glasses a little lopsided, the shoulder of her shirt stained dark with my tears and snot.

"Sorry about that."

"S'okay." Her eyes convey nothing but concern and love and I can feel them pulling me in. she has always had this effect on me. I used to think it'll lessen with time, as the exciting phase of our relationship wound down but it never did. Here it is, strong as ever. "Do you wanna talk now?"

"Yes." She nods and I extricate myself from her embrace, trying and failing to create a safe distance between us as her hand crawls over to cover mine. She's looking at me with those stupid persistent green eyes, so I close mine so I can keep my head and not be willing to forgive and forget the whole thing. I fill my lungs in deep and what comes out is, "So, in your letter, you claimed you tried to ask if I could get the same deal you got but, what you fail to explain is why after you coach me in exactly what to say in my testimony, you suddenly do an about-face and say the exact opposite thing."

When Alex doesn't respond, I open my eyes to look at her and she's wearing an amused expression. "Did you rehearse that?" I just stare at her, willing her to be serious.

She looks away, sighs before turning back to me. "Look Piper, I was facing more time than you. My lawyer told me that my testimony would put Kubra away. For sure. And that I could walk, that same day. So I told the truth." Her eyes narrow. "I thought you were going to tell the truth!"

So that's how we were playing it? "And I thought you were going to lie!" this woman exasperates me like no one else.

Her hand pulls away from mine as she gestures to the heavens, "Jesus. We're like a fucking O. Henry story." Great. She pulls out a literary reference at the drop of a hat. Why doesn't she just slay me? As soon as she says it, my face betrays me and twitches into a smile that she mirrors.

Our hands meet again, and I'm surprised to see it's mine that reaches for hers this time.

"You have every right to be angry." Her thumb maps the contours of my knuckles.

"I don't know if I'm angry." And I'm not. Not when she's here in front of me, not when her hand on mine alone can make me feel so many feelings. "I'm confused…by you."

She snorts. "I'm confused by me too. I'm pretty much the master of handling things completely wrong."

"Yeah well that's an understatement." I can't help keep the bitterness out of my voice.

Alex's expression contorts and she opens up, letting her smugness fall away like a heavy curtain. "I'm a fuck up. I know I've said this to you many times but I am sorry, Pipes." Her eyes vacillate between mine, as if beseeching me to believe her. "For all of it."

I don't say anything because if I open my mouth my resolve is going to break. No physical distance I create between us matters. Not because she's charmed her way out of this, or because she's got a hold on me, but because I believe her. And I forgive her. It's as simple as that. But she continues, breaking me further.

"I know my track record is shit but I really do love you." Her voice falters a little as her eyes get moist, but there's no doubt in my mind that she means what she says. She says this upfront, with no hiding behind words, like before. She says this, without expecting a reply. Or perhaps, without needing one.

As one last ditch attempt I try to distance myself and blurt out, "Yeah well I hate you." Even though there's no conviction behind the words, I still curse myself as I wait for the hurt to show on her face but it never comes. She just smiles at me, her reply as quick and sure as a reflex.

"No you don't."


We lie in bed, talking late into the night. This is what it would feel like, I find myself thinking during a lull in our conversation, if it weren't for all the fucking drugs. We would come home after a long day of work, and after dinner we would stretch out, fill each other in, fall asleep holding hands.

We switch positions all through the night, trying to get closer and closer still; trying to absorb as much of the other as possible. Piper is currently nuzzling into my neck. It's slightly ticklish, but I haven't been held like this in a very long time so I just enjoy her warmth.

"I missed your smell so much," she murmurs and when I pull back to look at her in amusement, her expression tells me she didn't mean to say that out loud.

"Shut up," she says in response to my ever growing smirk. I clamp my mouth shut and kiss her forehead, feeling her smile against my skin.

The sun is beginning to show as the sky lightens, signaling the near end of Piper's visit. I'm propped up on an elbow in my bed that suddenly feels too big for me and watch Piper pull together the discarded items of clothing strewn across the room. Clad in her bra and lacy underwear, she's pulling on the stockings, one leg at a time and my eyes are following her hands as they cover up the flesh, hiding it from my view.

"What're you thinking?" I've been staring at her for a good ten minutes now, trying to memorize the way the muscles on her back ripple with movement; the way her eyes become small crescents and her nose crunches when she smiles; the way her hands move when she talks, signifying her proper and lady-like upbringing- something she just can't get rid of. And it's not enough, it'll never be enough.

I try to come up with a flip comeback but it seems stupid, given all that has happened tonight. I shake my head. "It's too soon. I don't want you to leave."

Her dress is up her torso, but hangs off of her shoulders, yet to be pulled up. Piper comes and sits next to me. Her eyes are clearer now, no indication she'd been crying before, as they gaze at me. Her fingers caress my lower jaw, trailing down to my throat. "I don't want me to leave either." Her face darkens, "back to Litchfield for me." The prison with its drab walls and the taupe uniforms and the shitty food is all too fresh in my mind to understand what Piper's thinking.

Pulling the sheets around me, I sit up and grasp her hand in between mine. "Eight more months, Pipes. Time will fly."

"Eight months," she repeats, coming back to me. "Who knows what new ways we'll find to fuck each other over by then." I chuckle as I pull her in for a kiss. "You'll come visit, right? I'll put you on my visitation list. And…" she hesitates, "wait for me, okay? I'll get out and then we'll…" she trails off, and her words open up a whole world of possibilities for us. And fears for me. Where will I be in eight months? "… We'll figure it out. Al?"

How I would love to promise the world to her. To guarantee that I will be there for her, without a doubt, that I will keep her safe. She sees it on my face before I can try and hide it. "Y-yeah. We'll figure it out."

"What aren't you telling me?"

"Nothing." I swing my legs so that she's sandwiched between them and I hug her around the centre, bringing her close into me. I kiss her bare shoulder. "You'll come out, I'll pick you up myself. We'll go hit every bookstore in the vicinity and get all the books we can get and head to the beach and read to our fucking hearts' content. You'll get tired though, and you'll tell me I'm a lazy coot. Not in those words exactly, but some passive aggressive shit only you can get away with."

I feel happy with myself as I feel a laugh rumble through her and her hand encircles my arm around my barbwire tattoo. The only one that got in, I think to myself. Placing my lips softly under her ear, I inhale that distinct Piper smell and I know what she meant before. I missed it too.

"Alex. Tell me." She turns around, her eyes boring into mine.

"He walked. Kubra," I say curtly.

"What?"

"There was a mistrial." I shake my head, brow furrowing at the memory of the courtroom and the judge's decision. "Some dumb fuck mishandled the evidence. He's out."


I have to go, it's time. We stand in her doorway, and I try to remember Alex as I see her, standing in her doorway with last night's shirt and pants hastily covering her body. She smiles for me, puts on a brave face. But inside I know she's breaking apart, and scared, and all I want to do is go back inside with her and fight whatever comes, together.

"Remember what I said about being your prison wife, Pipes. I don't wanna hear from Nichols that you've gone and set up camp with someone else," her trademark smirk is back.

"I love you." I lean in to kiss her.

"Look at that, she says it first for the first time. I love you too." She kisses me back and just like that I'm walking down the three flights of stairs and down the two steps out of her building.

Freedom is scary, I think, as I look around, trying to see if I can spot any suspicious looking cars or people hovering about. Of course, I don't see anything. I turn to look at the building, wondering if I'll see Alex looking down at me, but then I pray that she'll have the sense to stay away.

I have to go back to my walls, walls that have actually been keeping me safe, walls that I suddenly wish I shared with Alex, so they would keep her safe too.