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Chapter Three
Piper was worried; she hadn't seen Alex all morning. After she didn't show up at breakfast, she'd checked the showers and her bunk but nothing.
"Listen," Nicky said, exasperated, "I've been following you around for fifteen minutes but if we don't get to the workshop we're both getting shots for being late. So if you're not coming, I'm leaving without you."
"It's just so weird," Piper said as she looked up and down the hallway. "Don't you think it's weird?"
"No, I don't. This is a prison – there are only so many places your girlfriend can be. She'll show up. Meanwhile we need to get our asses down to…"
"Yeah, yeah, okay," Piper said, finally giving in and fell in step next to Nicky she made her way outside.
There was a harsh chill in the air but that wasn't the reason for the sudden chill that crept down Piper's spine. She hugged her coat a bit tighter around her but the feeling of unease didn't abate. After the past few days of not being able to keep their hands off each other and having Alex around all the time, her sudden absence was strange to say the least.
"Hey!"
Piper turned to see Stella coming up behind them. She stopped and waited.
"Ah come on," Nicky complained. "You know what an ass Luschek can be."
"Hold on," Piper said to her and when Stella caught up, "Hey, have you seen Alex today?"
"Good morning to you too," she replied.
"She wasn't at breakfast and I checked her bunk but she wasn't there either," Piper continued.
"We'll file a missing persons report okay? How does that sound? But for now, let's move the fuck on already."
Nicky didn't wait for a response and started off in the direction of the workshop. Piper reluctantly followed with Stella walking next to her.
"Speaking of Vause," Stella started, "Who do I talk to about getting a bunk transfer?"
"What? Why?"
"Look, no offence but that girl has trouble written all over her. I just want to keep as far away from that as possible. Do my time and get the hell out of here, you know?"
"What are you talking about?" Piper asked, seriously perplexed. It didn't sound like they were talking about the same Alex.
"Well, she got into that brawl with another inmate before she could even wear in her orange kit and now this…"
Piper stopped and touched Stella's arm in a sign to do the same. She had her full attention now.
"And now what? What happened?"
At first Stella didn't say anything and let the moment stew with Piper a bit. Then:
"Last night I got to the bunk and she was pretending to be asleep. I told you I'm good at people and I knew right away it was an act. Her breathing was unsteady and it kinda sounded like she was crying."
She paused for effect and it worked because Piper was visibly becoming more and more agitated.
"Go on," she pressed her impatiently.
"Then this morning, you know she gets up at like the crack of dawn to shower and it usually doesn't bother me but this morning she was pretty noisy about it. Anyway, I saw her leave and her face was all busted up. Looks like a broken nose or something. Way worse than the first fight is my guess."
Piper swallowed hard and felt her stomach drop down to her boots. There were so many words swimming around in her head but she found it impossible to string them into a coherent phrase. What the hell was going on?
"Anyway," Stella said and started walking again, slowing her step for Piper to catch up. "I figure it must've been some kind of a revenge hit or something."
Piper felt a burning rage start up inside her. What Stella was saying made sense. Lolly was pretty beat the last time she clashed with Alex and of course she would wait for an opportunity to get her own back. That was how things worked in places like this, Piper thought. If you were perceived as weak, then that's what you'd be. Lolly obviously wanted to assert her dominance, being new and at risk of further estrangement and harassment. She was seething by the time they reached the workshop.
"It's too much drama for me," she heard Stella's voice break into her thoughts. "That's why I need a transfer. I don't want to get caught up in all of that."
Piper nodded stiffly, barely hearing what she was saying, not being able to organize her own thoughts.
"So?"
"So, what?" she asked.
"Who can I speak to about it?" Stella asked.
"Oh, I don't know. Go see your counselor, I guess," she said dismissively and went in to the workshop.
"Chapman, Carlin… shot!" was Luschek's simple greeting.
Nicky gave her an 'I told you so' look but Piper barely acknowledged it. Her mind was nowhere near work or shots. She needed to see Alex but surviving in prison was about navigating through intricate power plays without fucking up and that had to be her top priority right now.
"Man, I hate this show. Where's the remote?" Lolly asked to the room at large.
There were only a few other ladies in there with her, mostly new inmates that arrived with her from Chicago and they were all riveted by the whale wars on the tv. Lolly rose, pushing her chair back in irritation and started scanning the surrounding tables for the remote. She bent down to check under her own one and felt her head slam into the edge it as if she misjudged her distance.
Blood started trickling down her forehead from the neat cut the table had made there and Lolly realized that it was the hand clenched in her hair that was the culprit. She looked up into Piper's face and could just make out the rage-filled eyes before she felt the force from the hand shove her head back down. Thinking quickly, Lolly put her hands out to prevent her face from meeting the table but the skinny bitch was stronger than she thought and a screaming pain shot through her head as it met the hard, flat surface.
"You better watch your fucking back," Piper spat the words at Lolly before discarding her limp frame to the floor like a used tissue.
She crashed into some chairs on the way down and tumbled into a helpless pile, watching Piper turn to leave in utter bewilderment. Her brain racing to catch up with what had just happened. Bennet appeared at the door with the same bewildered look on his face as he tried to assess the situation but Piper simply brushed past him, her hands raised in a gesture of innocence and then she was gone.
Lolly looked around to the other inmates who had quickly moved out of Piper's way to avoid being caught up in the struggle.
"What the fuck, you guys?" She touched a hand to her bleeding head and when she saw her stained fingers she was even angrier.
"You're just going to stand there?" she screamed at Bennet, jumping up and getting right in his face.
"Hey, back off!" he said sternly, holding her back with one arm.
"Look at what that bitch just did to me! And you let her walk right by you!"
"Calm down."
"No, I won't calm down! What the fuck?"
"Inmate! Calm down!" Bennet raised his voice now. "You have to have that cut checked out. I'll deal with Chapman. Come on," he said, showing her to follow him.
For a second, Lolly just stood there livid, the veins at her temples bulging with rage. She soon realized though that as a guard, Bennet was forced to follow procedure. It wasn't like he was going to go chasing Chapman down, beating her to the ground. Fine, she thought, she'll jump through the hoops and she'll let them 'deal with Chapman'. What they won't be privy to however, is how she deals with Chapman. First the crazy bitch with the glasses jumps her and now this. Well, she wasn't about to let the remainder of her sentence become a free-for-all-Lolly-brawl. She was going to put an end to it and fast.
"I'm going to ask you one last time…"
"Mr. Healy, you can ask me one hundred more times. I didn't see their face," Alex said with a heavy sigh.
She had been in his office for close to an hour after being hauled there by one of the guards who spotted her face. The interrogation began after they patched her nose – broken – and taped her ribs – also broken. The simple act of breathing was painful, let alone sitting or standing or moving. Meanwhile Healy had been grilling her for details about how she got to looking the way she did and she felt like crying every time she had to buffer his questions with 'I don't knows' and 'I can't remembers'.
"She was small – her height, her frame… but strong," the tremble that started up in her voice made her stop there. God, she hated feeling this way – helpless and afraid.
"You're pretty tall. More than half the prison fits your description," Healy said. "Did you see anything else? Any tattoos or markings that will narrow this down?"
"I already told you…"
"I know what you told me," he said impatiently. "I also know that you people think you can handle these things on your own. Settle a beef or whatever you call it. What you don't realize is that the administration is here to help you, protect you. Having inmates calling martial law and doing whatever they goddamn want is not how things work around here."
Alex pursed her lips, making no sign that she was suddenly about to divulge the information Healy wanted. Even if she did know who did this to her, she wouldn't say anything. Not with Kubra's axe hanging over Piper's head.
"Okay, have it your way," Healy said, finally giving up. "But hear this – if you're involved in any altercation with another inmate, I'm going to see it as directly connected to this incident and your ass is going off to max. You get that? The person who did this to you is supposed to be the one who's punished but instead, she'll get off scott free while you rot for plotting your stupid revenge."
"I get it," Alex said, her composure now regained. "but you don't have to worry. I'm not plotting anything."
He locked his gaze with hers then, as if daring her to go against his warning. She held it firmly, not even flinching. Alex could deal with administration and their crazy power trips. That was one thing she didn't have a problem with. Her stubbornness always got her through. Healy eventually dropped his eyes to the forms on his desk and motioned at her with his hand to leave. Alex was out of her chair and out the door without looking back. Her relief at being let go was short-lived as she walked right into an anxiously waiting Piper outside his door.
Alex's first thought was that the wrong person would see them together and assume she was saying things she wasn't supposed to be saying. She nervously looked up and down the hall for any suspicious looking stragglers.
"Oh my god," Piper said, gingerly touching the bruises on Alex's face.
She jerked her head away instinctively and stepped back to increase the distance between them.
"It's no big deal," she said. "I have to go."
"What? Alex…" Piper said, going after her down the hall.
"Piper, don't," she said simply. Hoping it would be enough but knowing with Piper it most likely wasn't.
"So we're doing that again?" Piper asked, her concern for Alex quickly turning into frustration with her and when Alex didn't answer: "Okay, we're doing that again. That thing where you act like an ass and push me away when…"
"Chapman!" Bennet's voice carried down the hall and Alex turned to see Piper looking like a deer caught in headlights.
"Fuck," Piper said and slowed to a stop as Bennet made his way toward her.
Grateful for the pass to a quick getaway Alex sped up and disappeared around the corner. She wasn't sure how she was going to do this. Breaking things off with Piper never worked out. This time it had to stick though, she just had to think of a way to do it so that it would. But how? How was she going to make it so that Piper would want nothing to do with her? Permanently. Alex knew that it was going to be the hardest thing she ever had to do and it scared her. More than coming face to face with her mortal fate scared her. She felt a pang in her chest that had nothing to do with her injuries and everything to do with the understanding that it was the end of her life with Piper. It was over and she wouldn't even get the chance to say goodbye…