Everyone is excited. They're happy to have a free tour of a real penitentiary.

I cant' move my legs. Fuck, I can't feel my legs.

Everyone else is moving. I'm not.

"Come on Alex, we have to go" Piper tells me, a few feet in front of me. But I don't move, I can't. So she turns around and looks at me. I think I can pinpoint the exact moment in which she understands the situation.

She's on my side immediately. We're the last two of the group. Behind us, there's a guard, closing the line, impatient.

Piper's hand finds her old usual spot on the lower part of my back, and she pushes me, forcing me to take the first step towards what I now see as the gates of hell.

I'm not fucking ready.

She keeps pushing me. Hard. I let her drag me. Step after step. I try not to look, not to observe, to keep my eyes unfocused, but it's impossible. The fear is making me see everything, smell everything, hear everything.

Step after step. The alleys. The beds. The neon lights. The door that leads to the chapel. The sound of my heart. Beating too much. It's not healthy. It's covering everything else. I'm dying. I'm dying again. I'm dying in this fucking place like I was supposed to. If it wasn't for Piper's hand I would be still in the visitation room. But she keeps pushing me.

It's even worse when we go outside.

I can't breathe.

I know the path. I've walked it a thousand times.

Last time I did, it brought me to…

Fuck it's still there. Why didn't they fucking destroyed it? Tear it off? Erased from the face of the earth?

The greenhouse is looking at me. Still pulsing with black sticky death. Soaked with my blood.

The queue has come to a stop. Why aren't they moving? They're too slow. I have to go away. The air, I can't breathe. I have to…

"Hi baby girl, long time no see" I can still hear Adyin voice in my head. Stronger than anything. I still see him inside the greenhouse.

"You don't have to do this" my voice. Tiny. Whiny.

"Yeah. I do"

I see the shovel. Leaning against the wall. I see the shovel over my head. I think I'm about to…

"Don't look. Alex!" I can't tear my eyes from that fucking greenhouse. I'm falling. "Alex! Look at me!" for a second I follow Piper's voice, louder than all the other voices in my head. I look at her face. I see an anchor. A lighthouse. A buoy in this sea of darkness I'm drowning into.

She pushes me again. Harder this time. The line is moving again. I don't turn around anymore. She's pushing so hard I almost trip.

Before I even realize it, we're outside. The gate is behind us, the net is behind us, our past is still fucking behind us. And I'm still alive.

She keeps pushing me until we reach the car. Her hand leaves my back and she goes towards the car to open it. I collapse. I put my hands on my leg and I bend forward. Trying to catch my breath. Trying to let the panic pour out of me. Trying to feel part of this world again. I'm alive. I'm alive. He didn't kill me. I'm still here. I'm alive.

All the visitors are slowly leaving the parking lot. I just stand motionless until everyone is gone and our car is the only one left.

Piper isn't doing anything. She's not pressuring me. She's giving me the time that I need and I'm glad for it even if I think that even all the time in the world could give me back my sanity. Time heals, but I'm forever broken.

When I feel like I'm not spinning around anymore, I stand straight and I stretch a little bit my back. Breathing as deeply as I can.

I still see the world a little blurred, but I feel I am able to control myself and my body. The grip of panic loosens up.

The last time I had a panic attack I was at the camp, this summer. It doesn't take a genius to know what part of my life is the messed up one. I've started to see someone who's helping me. I'm going into the right direction, even if this trip could probably be labeled under 'things I've done too early', as Tom exactly predicted. But I had no choice.

I walk towards the car. Towards the passenger seat. Piper is already on the driver seat, checking her phone. She raises her eyes once she hears me approach.

I really don't want to talk. So I just look at her. No bullshit, no walls this time. She knows exactly what I think and feel, I'm sure.

"Let's go home" she says. I don't know if it's a question or an affirmation. But I just nod. I let my body fall into the seat, I close the door, I put the safety belt on and the car starts.

Silence is golden. This silence between us is the greatest thing that has ever happened between us. I'm so tense and tired that even a "How are you?" from Piper would bring me over the edge. And I have no intention of having a nervous breakdown in front of someone who doesn't even want to talk to me. I look outside the car window, trying to calm myself, but I can't. My mind keeps going there.

I wasn't supposed to talk about what happened after the attack. Only Nicky knew about it. Nicky and Fig. I didn't want Piper to know it. To know that I've overdosed. That I've been almost attacked again. I didn't want her to know it because it wouldn't change a thing. It wouldn't help me getting over everything and it wouldn't help her. At least not yet. I know she's blaming herself for everything. And everything now is in the past. Why did I have to bring it out again? It was not her fault.

I'm fighting the tears since I was talking to Red. In the rare occasions when my eyes move in Piper's direction, I can see her as tight as a violin string. Her hands are crashing the steering wheel. Her knuckles are white. Her eyes are fixed on the road. She's not ok, and I'm not ok. We both know it and we both can't do anything about it. She puts on the same random compilation. Maybe the music will help.

But it doesn't.

I check the watch every few minutes, but the time seems to have slowed down. I need to go home, I need to be alone.

And I need to call my therapist as soon as I put a foot on the ground.

I'm doing everything wrong. I'm not breathing as he taught me, I'm not getting out of the vortex of anxiety, instead I'm letting myself fall deeper inside.

They were just four fucking wood walls and a stupid roof. Why did I let it affect me so much? A fucking greenhouse. Like millions of other greenhouses in the world.

No.

It was the context.

The talk in the car.

The prison.

Piper.

Red.

Having to say out loud all the things that went wrong in my life.

The reasons why I've wasted my life.

I feel like I've crossed the point of no return.

I can still taste the blood in my mouth. I can hear the sound of the shovel, hitting my face, breaking the cheekbone.

God, I feel the panic rise again.

Oh God. God help.

I can't ask her to stop the car.

I squeeze my fists as hard as possible. I look outside. We're in the middle of a wood of some kind.

I'm trying to resist, but I feel my eyes getting wetter and wetter.

I bite my lips.

This goes on for I don't know how long. Until all hell breaks loose.

Literally.

The song that the radio is playing is 'Hell breaks loose' by Death Maiden.

My dad's band.

I realize it after the first guitar riff, and I gasp.

I cover my mouth with my hand but it's already too late.

This has nothing to do with my dad. It's just…too much.

Tears are running down my cheeks. I turn my head towards the window, trying to hide from her, trying to repress everything, but she knows.

Of course she does.

She has turned off the radio as soon as she has recognized the song.

I feel so pathetic. I just hope she'll keep ignoring me.

Instead, she pulls over. She drives into a dirt road and she turns off the engine.

It's a dead road, there's nothing around us.

I'm still trying really hard to keep myself together. I can't block the tears anymore, but I can block the desperation that I desperately want to let out. I'm like a volcano, with the lava slowly pouring out of me for everyone to see, but I know that I'm about to explode and destroy everything around me.

I think Piper wants to abandon me here and leave.

I wouldn't be too opposed to the idea.

I turn my head to look at her. She's still looking straight ahead and her hands are still on the steering wheel.

She looks… pissed?

"I- I'm sorry" I manage to say between the sobs.

She doesn't turn immediately. Her breaths look uneven, like she's fighting the urge to do something.

"I'm sorry" I repeat, trying to dry my eyes, preparing myself to leave this car.

I can see a little better now. And when she turns around, her eyes are full of tears.

It's like the time stops just for a second.

The second it takes her to unlock the safety belt and engulf me in a hug so tight that I don't have the space to think anymore.

I squeeze her back, as hard as I can. As hard as the safety belt and the horrible position I'm in allow me to.

And I finally let myself go.

Without thinking. Without any filter.

I feel at home. I feel safe.

I let out everything.

"I'm sorry" I say again with my head buried in her hair. Crying for everything that went wrong in my life. In our lives. And I'm crying also for the relief I feel. All that tension…

Tom told me that it is good to cry now and then, that crying is an healthy way to acknowledge and process traumas and pains. I didn't shed a tear since I left the camp and now I'm like a flooded river.

And with Piper holding me. If this is not an ironic twist of fate, I don't know how to call it.

'I'm sorry' I keep repeating.

I don't know what I'm sorry for exactly, but I know what she means when she says the same words back at me. I feel her guilt.

"It was not your fault" I tell her. And suddenly I realize that I'm able to speak and that I can breathe.

She keeps saying she's sorry. Like a mantra.

One of my hand is in her hair, the other is on her back. There's no space between us.

I think she's crying too.

I'm afraid she's going to loosen the grip on me, but it doesn't happen.

A shiver runs through my body the second she puts one of her hand on my nape.

I want more.

So I risk it.

I take off one hand and I try to unlock my safety belt. When I succeed, I separate our bodies for the minimum amount of time required for putting the safety belt where it belongs and go back into her arms.

I know this is dangerous. This is the part where she can easily back off.

But she doesn't.

She doesn't look at me, but when I push my body on her again, her arms just find their original place around me.

I don't know why she's doing it. If it's for me, or for her. I think for both.

But I know that she's not faking it. This is her. This is Piper. Finally my Piper, again.

I think I've never cried so much in my life.

My glasses are fogged, I take them off and I throw them in the backseat.

I let her comfort me for I don't know how long.

I don't know if it's wrong, I don't care… I let her hands draw circular motions on my back, on my neck…

"Thank you…"

I whisper to her neck. I repeat it until I'm sure she feels the honesty in my words.

I can breathe again. It's like a mountain of dirt has left my lungs. The greenhouse doesn't seem that scary anymore, I can see small sparkles of light, of hope. I can see a future that's not entirely made of pain, suffering and dangers. The grey blanket of panic around my heart has finally started to drop, and the relief is immediate.

And there's Piper.

And the power she has on me.

This is not her comforting some crying child. This is her, sharing a connection with me, and I swear to god, I want her life to be good. I want her to be happy. I don't wish anything else for her. Just what's best for her.

What we had was too much. I've started to remember it back at the camp and I do remember it now. I do feel it. This is a recurring subject between me and Tom. I cannot let all the love we shared go wasted, rotten somewhere. Nothing good can come out of the bad thoughts I had about her until now.

"It was not your fault…" And I really mean it. In this moment, in my heart, I feel free. And I know without a doubt that it was not her fault. Not the things she's blaming herself for. We hurt each other in all the possible existing ways. We both did it. I did it too. Now I think I know what Red meant when she told me that we can hurt each other only so much.

She gasps at my words. I feel her back shaking.

Now it's my turn to comfort her. And I really feel like I want to do it. To release her of the tension she has built inside for years, in the same way she's helping me releasing mine.

It's probably not the right thing to do, facing everything like this, and not the right moment too, I'm way too shaken, and it's way too early, but… "You overdosed…I wasn't there…" Are her first words to me. And probably the principal thing she's accusing herself of.

I don't think that telling her that she was my first thought when I took the first pill and the last one before passing out is the right thing to say.

"Piper…don't…." I repeat. But by the way she's sobbing I don't think she's believing me.

So I take her face in my hands and I make sure she's looking at me this time.

"Piper… I did it. I messed up"

I wait until her eyes are on mine and until I'm sure she has understood it. Her face is tired and exhausted and I think it mirrors mine.

"But if only I…" she starts.

"It's impossible to say what would have happened… Maybe I wouldn't be here…" I interrupt her. I don't want her to say anything more.

"I'm sorry Alex…for…not been there… for betraying…you" She's looking at me right now and this time I'm the one who feels the need to look somewhere else. Because I know what I'm about to say and I don't know if I have the strength to say it in her face. But I can't move.

"I know. It's ok"

The relief in her face is so evident and so beautiful that I really don't know why it took me so long to do it, since I'm feeling way better too. And I realize I'm smiling.

It's like the wall is finally falling and we're able to communicate again. I don't know what it is. If the fact that I've seen Litchfield again, that I'm here with Piper or that I've just had a panic attack and I'm crying without pause, but I feel this urge to put everything behind me. Honestly coming to terms with everything. Good things and bad things. She's here. She knows what I went through and I know that she's really sorry. And she really cared about me. She understands me. Maybe the only person in the world who could. It has always been like this. I'm tired. I'm deadly tired of pressing and pushing all the negative thoughts in the back of my mind. I want to let everything go. I want to let the past go, once and for all. I don't know if I'm just caught up in the whirlpool of emotions that I'm feeling right now or if this something that I would have done anyway, but, in this moment, I don't care.

"Why didn't we speak like this at the camp?" She says, laughing, while she dries her tears with the back of her hand.

"Well, it would have saved us some awkward moments for sure" I say, laughing with her.

"You were kind of a psycho there…" I add with a smile.

"I was not!" she replies faking being offended. I look at her with my eyebrow raised. "Really?" she asks and we both end up laughing.

"Well…let's just say that you were kind of…intense. And, as you can see, I don't handle 'intense' very well"

"Not that you were that sane anyway… no offence" she says jokingly.

"None taken…when you're right, you're right…" I reply.

We break our hug, so we can talk better. I must say, I'm still a little confused about everything. About the difference between the Piper who was trying to avoid me at all costs a few hours ago and this new-old Piper.

She isn't saying anything, so I take it as my chance to say what's on my mind.

"I was serious when I said that I think we should talk…I really want to… come clear…to get past all of this... but I cannot do it if you're… not willing to…" talk? Forgive me? Acknowledge me? I don't even know how I want to end this question.

Piper takes one of her deep breaths.

"I really don't know what to say. You're just… you're just… late. Your… openness, it…doesn't make any sense now. It confuses me. Why are you doing it? Why now? I tried in every way to talk to you back at the camp, even humiliating myself, and the moment I decide to give y- to give it up, for good, you want to talk. You left Alex. You left and you didn't try to reach me. For months. And now you wanna talk. Is it because you're working with Martha? I… I don't know what to think. It looks like a power game to me… a way to get back at me…"

"No. No, it's not like that" I interrupt her because… I can see her confusion.

"What is it then?" she asks the most difficult thing. But I need her to understand. I need her to know.

"I- before this summer, before the camp, I managed to… block everything. I thought I was over it, for good. I thought I had everything under control… and then… well… everything happened. And- and you kept pushing and digging and…" I take a pause to breath. It still is difficult for me.

I continue.

"I- When I realized that- when- you know…things started to happen... I started to panic. I couldn't think clearly. I tried to gain control but I did it in the wrong ways…" by trying to fuck you, I should add. But I don't. I guess she knows what I'm talking about.

"I wasn't ready to confront…everything that happened. There were too many things happening all at once… and then… I saw you with Rosa, making the pancakes, then Martha came…"

Her face changes the moment I say her girlfriend's name. Like I've slapped her in the face.

"They were for you" she says after a few seconds. A little coldly.

"I know"

She looks surprised by my words.

"That's why I left. I- you were…we both were clearly … confused… It was the right thing to do…"

"No. The right thing to do was talking about it…" she says with decision.

"I don't think so. We both weren't lucid"

"How could you know it if you didn't talk to me?" she is pressing me.

"You were making me pancakes, Piper, for God's sake… with your fiancé sleeping in the next cabin!" Our tones are getting louder, but we're not fighting even if I regret my words the second they're out.

"You should leave my moral dilemmas to me" she answers dryly, slightly closing herself off. It's not what I wanted.

"I didn't mean it like that. I- I spent the night looking at you instead of going to the cabin with my own girlfriend … it wasn't just you…" I confess.

By her face I realize that this is something she's not willing to discuss with me. And I totally agree with that. There's nothing to talk about.

"You decided for the both of us. You didn't leave me a choice and you left without even thinking about giving me an explanation" she replies, ignoring my confession and focusing on my departure.

"I knew that we would have seen each other in New York eventually" I try to justify my actions. I still think that I did the right thing. I wasn't ready to face her immediately. We both weren't.

"I still think it was a really egoistic thing to do. A text message. A call. Nothing. You left me wondering why the hell you disappeared…"

"I thought it was pretty clear" I reply. How could it be difficult to understand? We were living the same things.

She snorts.

"Clear? I even thought that it was all a premeditated plan to ruin my life…"

Oh god. Is she referring to the lake?

"Come on Piper! Nothing was premeditated… I could never…"

"You could never what? Kiss me just to prove me that you can do it with no emotions as you did in the meadow?" she's pushing and pushing. This is how we are. This is how we work together and how we squeeze out everything that's inside of us in a way that I've never experienced with anyone except for her.

"Come on! What I said was a pile of bullshit. We both knew it… we already talked about it" I insist.

"And I have to believe you based on what? I don't know you anymore… "

"You know I'm not like that…"

She almost laughs at my face.

"You know what? I thought…Well, I thought a lot of things. I even thought that you left because you felt like I…I don't know…that I took advantage of the fact that you were drunk…"

Fuck. What?

"What?" I can't believe it.

I think she's blushing. I can't believe she had those thoughts. It's… impossible, come on!

"Yeah. And those are just some of the things that I've thought… until I've decided that I had enough. Enough confusion, enough time wasted thinking about possibilities and about people that didn't even bother to send me a fucking text. And for what? You cannot draw blood from a stone…" The words hit me a little bit, but I don't let them take control of the direction of the discussion.

"And that's why you decided to play the Quiet Game with me?" I ask rhetorically.

She just flashes me a sarcastic smile. She's right. A sarcastic question requires a sarcastic answer.

"Listen, I get it. Maybe I should have said something after a few weeks, I was… confused and kind of angry at you… but… do you really think that it would have made a difference?".

She doesn't say anything, again. She just looks at me. But I know she's thinking I'm slightly right. I don't want to say it out loud. I still want to preserve the both of us. And, also, there's the risk that everything is and was only in my head. Even if…

"And you were probably pissed at me…" I add with a smile.

"Understatement of the year" she jokes, even if she's not smiling. Good.

"And about…the lake… well… you never took advantage of me or stuff like that… I thought it was pretty clear…"

"And again, what is clear for you isn't automatically clear for the rest of the world. But it was just a thought in a sea of other thoughts…."

"And then you decided to…"

"Yes. I decided to say a big FUCK IT. Can you blame me?" I laugh a little bit.

"Honestly? Not so much" I concede her this. And it's honest, even though I don't really like it.

"Good, because I'm tired of being the poor girl who's treated like shit but she's always there when the others need her… it was also my fault. I let you treat me like that. So the FUCK IT was also for me, not only for you of for whoever decides to cross my path and be a dick"

I smile at her words. When she's passionate about something she lights up and she engulfs everything that surrounds her. She has basically just told me that I'm a dick, but she has done it in a typical Chapman way…

"I know it sounds absurd, but I do agree with you…." I reply. Always with a smile.

"See? This is not helping. This. This version of you is the thing that confuses me the most, Alex. You're giving me everything that I asked you for this summer. You're treating me like a human being, you agree with me, you want to talk, you tell me that it was not my fault. Why? Why do this now after you run away and didn't try to reach me? Why do it only when I started to give you the silent treatment? I'm waiting for the other shoe to drop"

"I told you… I thought it was the best thing to do for the both of us…"

"Stop it. You've explained very well why you left and that was not what I asked. We both know that, if it wasn't for Nicky, we would have never seen each other again and you would have never tried to contact me. Am I correct?"

I cannot know what I would have done if Nicky wasn't in New York of it I wasn't working with Martha. It was never an option.

"I don't know…probably, yeah…" I admit. "But I knew that that was not the case…. It's just speculation…"

"Don't beat around the bush Alex. What do you want from me?" She asked directly in her slow sing-songy voice that reminds me of my primary school English teacher. There's no going back now. It's now or never.

"Closure" I say. And I really want to roll my eyes at myself because I know how ridiculous everything sounds, but her incredulous shocked face is enough for me to keep a straight one.

"I'm seeing a shrink. It's been a couple of months now. As it turns out, you were right. I didn't really come to terms with everything that happened, at Litchfield and even after that… in Max and in Chicago. I- now I'm aware of it…"

Her face is still the same. A mask of disbelief and shock. I can't blame her.

I wasn't planning this. Any of this. I've talked about it with my shrink, Tom. A lot. We both agreed that it still wasn't the right time for me to talk to Piper about these things. Because I wasn't ready and, well, because she wasn't talking to me. The plan was to focus on me, on my work and on the little things that I could enhance. Step by step. Even going to see Red was premature, according to Tom. And, judging by the way I've reacted to everything, I guess he was right after all.

The one I'm taking right now is not a step. It's a fucking jump into the unknown.

I keep talking, because I don't think she's planning to say something.

"I know how strange this may sound to you…"

"No, I don't think you have a fucking idea…" she intervenes. I smile.

"You're probably right. But that's how it is. I'm tired Piper. I'm so fucking tired of the nightmares, I'm tired of blaming myself and everyone else for what happened to me, I want to move on…"

"And what does it have to do with me?"

That's it. That's the thing I shouldn't tell her. Big breath.

"What you told me, back at the camp. I couldn't stop thinking about it… I thought I was ok with you blaming yourself, I thought I didn't care for your guilt…but it's not true…"

"It makes no sense…" she says.

"It does. I think that, in order to accept what happened to me I need to make peace with the past…including you. I don't want you to blame yourself for things that you're not responsible for. I don't want another human being to suffer only because of my …wounded pride. If I keep allowing that, I will never be really free. You are you, Piper"

Piper rolls her eyes. I think she's trying to avoid the formation of new tears. After all, I'm telling her exactly what she wanted to hear all this time, but it looks like she doesn't want it.

"Then why didn't you tell me this sooner?" She asks.

How can she be so naïve?

"Because of the things we did at the camp, for fuck's sake! Do I have to draw you a picture?"

"There's no need to be crude, Alex"

I still can't understand if my words have some meaning to her or not.

"Piper…really, how could I have come to you and talk after… everything we did?"

She rolls her eyes again, without giving me an answer. But she looks at me like…

"What?" I ask.

"I think we can agree to disagree" she says.

"All right then. Let's disagree on this… can we at least talk about why you left when I was talking to Red?"

She lower her gaze. Clearly distressed.

"It was too much…" she says with a soft voice.

"They told me they would have killed everyone who was involved with me…" This time I'm the one who's fighting her tears.

"I know, Red told me… " So that's what Red told her. I guessed right.

"That's it. That's all that happened, now you know everything. I was so scared… for you…for everyone else…" this time some tears actually fall from my eyes.

"If you had told me…If I knew about what happened after…I would never…" she's crying too.

"Nothing would have changed…"

"You do not know that"

"Yes, I do. I was too angry at you…"

"And now you're not…" she says matter of factly.

"No, it's been too exhausting" I confess. And I really mean it. "What happened, happened. I'm here and I'm still alive. I need to let it go and for some reason I need you to ... I don't know… don't feel like it's your fault…that's it…"

She looks at me, straight in the eyes. Probably to understand if she can trust me or not.

She nods and lies her forehead on my shoulder. I put my arms around her. We are linked but in a less desperate way. It's like a soft hug now.

"I've missed this…" I whisper on her hair after what feels like a lifetime, surprising even myself for the fact that I've just said those words out loud and that I really mean them.

"What? Pain and panic?" I can hear the smile on her voice and I can't help but laugh a little bit.

"No, this…" I reply.

"This?" she asks caressing me the scalp with her fingertips. I lean on her touch, I feel like a cat.

"Yeah". The Thing. Our Thing. A connection that, now I know, can never be broken and never will. It's part of who I am. Of my story. I'm done running away from it. I can't change the past. I'm done.

She suddenly stops her movement.

"It doesn't change the fact that we can't…I can't…"

"I know" I reply before she has the time to finish the sentence. It would be awkward to say out loud what we're both thinking while we're hugging each other. We cannot commit the same mistake again. We always end up disappointing ourselves.

"Alex, I mean it. I- it's been a mess. I can't switch from pretending you're Martha to talking to you like you're Alex. Every time I do it, it's like I'm… cheating all over again"

Cheating. She's the one who used the word we were trying so hard to avoid. It was hanging in the air like a sword of Damocles.

I break the hug to look at her again.

"This has nothing to do with our current situation. Well, I mean, not entirely. What I really want is a clean start. I want to leave my past behind and finally move on. I cannot force you to do or believe in anything. It's just…I wanted you to know everything…"

I didn't even realize that my hand was on her cheek.

"Ok" she says after a while, before shifting in her seat and moving so my hand has to go back to its original place on my leg.

"Piper, I mean it…"

"I understand, Alex. And, of course, this is… this is something that… I've waited a long time to hear, but…"

I know what she's not saying.

"I'm not asking you to be my friend. I just wanted you to know what happened and what I feel about it. That's it. It has nothing to do with your silent treatment. You can keep ignoring me for as long as you like…"

This makes her smile.

"Really?" she says.

"Well, it would be nice to reduce a little bit the awkwardness, but no pressure…" I reply, smiling too.

"I can't promise you that…" there's always a smile in her face now.

"Then I'll make sure that my phone is always fully charged when you're around" I joke.

"Smart girl" she says while putting on the safety belt once again. It looks like confession time is over. I put on mine too.

It's incredible how good I feel right now.

She starts the car.

"Are you feeling better?" Piper asks.

"Like I've been under a train, but definitely better…" I'm feeling drained. Empty. Tired. But good.

"Good, because I don't need another thing of yours to feel guilty about…" I turn my head, shocked.

"Was that a joke, Miss Piper Chapman?" I say with the biggest grin on earth.

"Maybe…" she replies with a grin.

And those are the last words that I remember before lying my head on the car window and closing my eyes.

A/N: As it turns out, it is very difficult to write when you're sick, confused and with a fever. Yes, I got sick on Christmas day. That's why it took me a couple of days to finish the chapter. I'd like to read it again, but in a few hours I'm leaving for a big trip and I need to sleep, and since I've promised you a chapter soon…I'm going to give you the chapter now as it is.

To the guest who didn't but the "troubled" Alex. Yes, I shared your concern. But I wanted her "desperate" enough for this to happen. I hope it was not too OOC.

To all of you. Thank you, again. Really! It's so nice and useful to read what you think and how you think this story is going to develop. I hope I won't interrupt other family meetings with this! LOL & Cheers!