This story might be a little familiar to some of you. It is a re-work of the first story I wrote for this site, in case anyone was wondering what happened to that one. I consider it a prequel for the 3-part story "You're There For Me" that I have been working on lately. This story begins at the start of Season 3. Lines in italics were lines spoken on the actual show.

Nicky Nichols' heart was hammering in her chest the way it always does when you know you are about to do something risky. Like jumping into shark infested waters, if Heroin was a shark. A hungry shark ready and waiting to strike. Nicky couldn't believe that she had found herself in this position, and knowing what the ramifications of her actions would be if she turned around now did not stop her from pursuing. What had started as a method of enacting revenge, had now ignited the most alluring and terrible parts of herself. It was frightening and exciting. It was surreal how deep she already jumped in.

"It's a bad fucking plan", Nicky argued, glancing behind her shoulder at her accomplice, Big Boo, as she led the way down to the laundry room. She rested a hand lightly onto the toolbelt strapped around her waist. Her other hand brushed itself up the light fabric of the blue paper suit that she was wearing and found itself tangled in the mass of wild curls on her head. As if life wasn't complicated enough these days, the plague, in the form of bed bugs, had come to Litchfield.

"It's a great fucking plan," Boo replied lightly. "Drugs in tool belt, tool belt to Luschek, Luschek to the streets, money! Don't overthink it."

Nicky moistened her lips and pondered, as an image of a certain red haired inmate sprung to her mind. She didn't want to think about Red right now, or about what her reaction would have been if she had heard what Boo had just said. Nicky liked to think that she would have been horrified, that she would have automatically switched into the protective mothering mode she had assumed before, whenever she had suspected Nicky was threatened. Nicky suddenly had to resist the urge to turn on her heel and run back the way she had come, but a glance at the inquisitive look on Boo's face propelled her on.

"Yeah, I'm missing the part where you contribute" Nicky told her grumpily.

"I am the fairy godmother who watches over you to make sure the plan doesn't go up your cute little nose." Boo told her lightly. Nicky sighed as she knelt down on the floor.

"Great", Nicky joked weakly, doing her best to act like everything was okay. "I finally get a mother who gives a sh*t about me and it's Bibbity Bobbity Big Boo!" The words were out before she could process them, an expression of how unattended and forgotten she had been feeling lately. For Red had called herself Nicky's mother for over two years now. And Nicky felt a flicker of guilt, but quickly dismissed it in place of the anger that was rising up inside of her.

It was all well to label Red her mother. It was nice to hope that Red would show up to handle the mess that Nicky had gotten herself into, but she couldn't stop irrationally thinking about how it was Red's fault that she had gotten herself in this situation in the first place. It was love for her that had prompted this foolhardy plan for revenge. And Nicky couldn't help but think how she wouldn't have gotten this far at all, had Red been watching after her better like she had always sworn Nicky she would. But Red had been fighting her own demons for weeks.

All Nicky had wanted was to do something powerful to express her fury that anybody would dare cross the woman she loved beyond all others. Upon hearing the news that Red was in medical after being brutally slocked by Vee Parker, Nicky had known that she needed to do something to hurt the evil assaulter where it would hurt her the most. She hadn't been thinking about how she was endangering herself in the process, handling substances that Red would have been furious to know Nicky had let herself anywhere near. Nicky hadn't been thinking about herself it all.

"And what I'll do to you, if you use again, will hurt a lot more than this", Red had threatened on their first night together, as she had held Nicky up during the very worst pains of withdrawal. That Nicky hadn't used, but was only hoarding, would not be an acceptable excuse to the older woman. And rightly so, Nicky lamented as she felt her veins twitch in her bare arms. Any exposure was dangerous.

She pretended to look shocked at discovering the empty confines of the vent, and glanced up at Boo through her big brown eyes. Uh Boo," she said, trying her best to sound surprised, "we got a problem". Nicky motioned into the vent, "somebody stole our candy".

"Oh, f**k!" Boo moaned.

XXXXX

Nicky wished that that could be the end of it. The Heroin was gone, stolen-at least that's what Boo believed. Nicky wished that that was the case. She'd have done anything to go back and change what she already done, but it was like she couldn't help herself. She just kept getting herself in deeper and deeper, taunting a hunger that she knew could not be satisfied. Giving in to it would kill her.

As soon as she left Boo, Nicky shuffled back to the dormitory. She turned into her cube, needing just a little alone time to think, but was greeted by the sight of Norma sitting before a group of her enchanted followers. "Jesus, Norma," Nicky groaned, "can you do this somewhere else?" She turned on her heel and walked into the cubicle next door, which was vacant for the time being.

She threw herself onto the bed, temporarily forgetting that all the mattresses were being burned because of the bed bugs. How anyone would be able to sleep that night remained to be seen. "Ah, f**k!" Nicky cried, as her body made contact with the hard metal frame.

"What are you doing?" a thick Russian accent demanded, and Nicky looked up to see Red standing at the entrance to the cube. Dressed in a blue paper suit that matched Nicky's, Red's hair was wet from the shower and slicked back, making the bruising all around her eye and the gash on her cheek more apparent. The marks were obvious on her pale skin.

"Hey," Nicky replied gruffly. She sat up and pulled her knees into her chest, while Red walked over to her locker to put away her shower bag.

"Anything wrong?" Red asked with a frown. She shook out her towel and hung it to dry.

"Wouldn't you like to know," Nicky muttered, picking at the fabric of her paper suit. She was contemplating whether she really felt like blurting out everything that was wrong and how she had messed up and needed help in the worst of ways. Red would be angry, there was no escaping that, but she had always said that Nicky could come to her if she was struggling. However, at the same time, Nicky felt defensive. Giving Red a once over, she could see that, save for a couple of bruises on her face, she had more or less returned to her own self. And yet, Red hadn't sought out Nicky once since her return from medical.

Mother's Day had come and went. Nicky knew that Red had received a lengthy visit from her husband and three sons, but she hadn't been alloted anything more than a passing glance from the woman she had grown so close to. Resentful of Red's neglect, Nicky was bothered at how much her feelings and worries about Red's condition had been so disregarded. Red hadn't allowed Nicky to be there for her, and that made it much harder for her to ask for Red's help now.

"Uhhhh," Red groaned, as she sat down on the hard metal frame next to Nicky. Cursing under her breath in Russian, she smacked a hand over her thigh and then scratched at her ankle. "According to Chapman you can't actually feel the bugs biting," she said through gritted teeth. "That's just one of the things she comes up with in that pointy blonde head of hers."

"Yet, either way, we're all being a bug buffet", Nicky muttered, as she played with the blue material of her paper suit. Turning to look at the old woman, she nodded at the remnants of her injuries. "Well you don't you look at bad as you might have. And it seems you got out of medical with all your brain cells intact."

"I'll live," Red muttered dryly. She touched the scar on her cheek with a light finger. "It's more interesting now, or at least that's what I told Dmitri."

"Must be nice to have such a great visit from your husband and kids," Nicky muttered. Ignoring the way Red pursed her lips at the remark, Nicky glared reproachfully at her. "It must be wonderful to know there are people in this world who actually care about you."

"What do you really want, Nicky?" Red stared her down. "I still am getting headaches, and I'm in no mood for guessing games."

"Maybe I just wanted to check on you," Nicky snapped. "Because unlike you, maybe I was still under the impression that we cared about one another. And maybe I wanted to see for myself that you were okay, since you haven't said more than two f**king words to me since you got back. But you don't give a sh*t anymore, do you?".

"Nicky, I have not been avoiding you," Red looked astonished. "I've only been back for a few days. It was Mother's Day, I'm still not at my best-I've been dealing with a lot personally."

"Keep telling yourself that," Nicky muttered. "Don't you remember Mother's Day last year?" Both of their eyes met as they recalled how they had celebrated the holiday the year before. Red's sons, Maxim and Vasily, came to see her, while their older brother Yuri stayed behind to help their father run the store. Visits from her family always lifted Red's spirits, but they never made her forget what had also come to matter to her on the inside.

"You, little girl, you're why I have a reason to get up every morning and make the best of another day in this hell hole," Red had said last year, when she had gone in search of Nicky after visitation and found her sitting in the grass near the fence in the yard. It had been exactly what Nicky had needed to hear then, and what she still was yearning to hear in the present. She was her prison mother, and Nicky was her prison daughter-but they both knew that they meant even more to one another than that. Or at least they had.

"I'm getting divorced," Red announced bluntly. "I'm meeting with a lawyer tomorrow to start the process."

"Why?" asked Nicky.

"Huh," Red scoffed. "Over thirty-five years of marriage and all that it got me was a bed in prison and a partner who was always lying behind my back."

Nicky sighed and closed her eyes for a moment. She wanted to be understanding to Red's plight, but all she could think about was that her predicament was so much more crucial than Red's marital affairs. She hadn't lived with her husband in over fifteen years. He was almost like a non-entity.

"What did he lie about?" Nicky asked, trying to disguise the exasperation in her tone.

"About my store," Red said bitterly. "The market, everything I worked for and sacrificed to keep going. It's all gone. Worthless mushroom of a man."

"Well, I'm sure he tried his best," Nicky replied flatly. "Bad economy and all…"

"Whose side are you on?" Red asked angrily.

"Yours, it's just," Nicky sighed. "Come on, Red! You haven't lived with him for over a decade, so I don't see how anything he does with the store or himself could be life changing. Some of us have real problems!"She stared determinedly back at the pant leg of her paper suit and began picking at it again. She was sorry for her outburst only slightly. She needed Red to pry and ask what she needed. She needed help.

Ignoring Nicky's rudeness, Red studied the angry, and slightly flushed, girl in front of her. She looked at Nicky more closely than she had in months. She seemed twitchy and irritable, and suddenly Red was filled with a concern that hadn't been there before. "Okay," Red said after a long pause, "and what sort of life changing, real problem are you dealing with?"

Nicky chuckled, as she succeeded in finally ripping a hole in her pant leg. She was debating whether to go for shock value or play aloof for a bit. But she knew no matter how she answered, she was going to tell Red the truth. She had been prolonging the inevitable, reluctant to confess something that would go against Red's toughest rule-no drugs.

Nicky eyed her warily. "Don't hurt me," she warned her, a hand held up in surrender. "Because I am about to make you very angry." She sighed and continued to stare Red dead in the eye. "I have a large stash of heroin hidden here in the prison, and I need to get rid of it."

Red's eyes widened in alarm. She raised a hand impulsively and then brought it to her mouth, biting down on her finger as she resisted the impulse to strike the girl in front of her. "What the f**k do you mean?" Red hissed, moving her hand back to her lap.

"Exactly like I said," Nicky replied calmly. "I want it gone."

"Where did you get it?" Red demanded.

"From Vee," Nicky replied. "Boo and I stole it as revenge. I was just trying to get her back for you."

"Bullsh*t", Red snapped, "You weren't doing this for me because you know damn well that this is the last thing I would ever want you involved with!" She shook her head in fury and then said coldly, "I warned you before, what I'd do to you if you ever used again."

"Yeah, but I didn't f**king use it", Nicky said, "I want to get rid of it. I gotta get it to Luschek and then he is going to smuggle it out of the prison for me."

"For what? Money? Do you know how many things could go wrong?" Red hissed in a deadly whisper.

"That's why I'm here," Nicky admitted. "I need your help. The plan will work. Luschek won't say anything."

"Then why haven't you done it already?" Red asked coldly.

"Because I hid it from Boo, okay? I wasn't ready to let go." Nicky confessed, she tangled her hands in her hair and let out a shuddery breath. "I don't know, man, I'm an addict!"

"Well, where is it now?" Red demanded to know.

"Hidden up in the lights, in the laundry room," Nicky whispered.

"That's all I need to know," Red said stiffly. She got to her feet and gave Nicky a piercing stare. "Stay here and wait, do NOT follow me." With a final frosty look, Red walked out of the cubicle and down the hall out of the dorm. Nicky watched her go with an odd sensation of relief riddled with anxiety. She hadn't known that you could feel both at once. She leaned back against the wall and took a deep breath. Waiting was hell.