A/N: Thank you so much for the feedback! :~) People both wished for a flashback and a continuation, so I figured "Eh, why not both?" Keep those reviews coming! Since this story is AU, their meeting is also AU. Also, the business Alex is in is not the drug business! Just wanted to clear that up, I don't think we need that extra drama added to what's to come in later chapters. Kind of a crappy ending but I finished this chapter at 12:13 AM on the dot and could hardly keep my eyes open. Hopefully this is okay! Love you guys. :*
The walk to the rendezvous point was a short and silent one. Not a tense silence, not one that reflected Alex's mood after running into Piper's ex-fiancé who obviously still had some sort of hots for her. One that said "You know what? This is good. What we have is good." They were hesitant to let go of each other's hands, knowing that once they stepped into the old diner, they'd be pulled from each other's rotation and no doubt into Nicky's or Morello's or Polly's.
After taking a deep breath, their hands broke away from each other and the two walked into the overwhelming atmosphere.
Before Nicky could pull Alex into a conversation, the brunette greeted Red, who owned the diner and found no wrong in pulling two or three tables together towards the back so the group of women could gossip.
Idle conversation between the two began. The marriage, the apartment, how the pets were, whether Alex was planning to take Piper on another honeymoon or not. Alex and the rest of the group had some unspoken agreement that Red was some sort of surrogate mother to them. Though Alex was part of this agreement, she still had hermother so unlike most of the group, she wasn't about to give Red any maternal title.
Piper left Alex to chat with Red and joined the rather loud group towards the back of the restaurant.
"No, no, Godzilla could kick the Clover field monster's ass to where ever the fuck it came from and back." The claim was exaggerated with quick hand movements as the bushy haired female went on. "Because while Clover destroyed New York or whatever the fuck, Godzilla kicked Tokyo and New York's asses. Ma, back me up on this will you?" Her head snapped towards the woman leaning at the counter, obviously irritated at the sudden interruption.
"You're on your own. I don't know jack about either of them." The answer was simple, Red shook her head and nodded to the retreating Alex.
Nicky's eyebrows raised high when Alex arrived. "Vause A! I was just about to ask Vause B where you were!" She widened her grin which had suddenly turned into a teasing one. "Vause A, Vause B, this is Maritza. Maritza, Vause A and Vause B."
Alex received a warm smile as pressed a kiss to the top of Piper's head before sitting in the chair next to her. "I'm Alex, this is Piper." She held her hand out to the woman over the table. After shaking the Maritza's hand, she leaned back in her seat and scooted her chair closer to Piper's so she could drape an arm over the blonde's shoulder.
"So, I hear you two are married, yes?" After receiving a nod she smiled even wider than she already was. "How'd you two meet?" She slightly tilted her head as Nicky let out a loud sigh.
"I tell you, I'll never get tired of this fuckin' story. I can't afford to, I have to hear it every fuckin' week," Nicky said, words having a mock-bite to them.
"Well go help Ma in the kitchen then." It was Poussey's turn to sigh, it wasn't directed at the question, though. It was directed towards Nicky, who always had to find a way to be difficult.
"Well," Alex began.
"We're fucked." Piper slammed her head onto her crossed arms that rested on the table. She was replied with a soft pat on the back and the familiar sound of Polly ordering some more shots.
"I think it went very well," Polly muttered, downing a shot.
"Yeah, right. I made a fool of myself. I made myself look like a total fucking ditz. Remember when I dropped the soap on the ground then proceeded to slip on it and nearly break my ass?"
This was met with no argument, but instead the sound of a small empty glass hitting the table. Piper slowly rose, a frown set on her face. "I'm going to get so shitfaced you're going to have to drag me out in a body bag." She then proceeded to pull three shots toward her, one she tried to raise to her lips, but a pale hand interrupted the glasses path.
"Wow, you got the hard shit." Piper turned her head to the body that had slid into the booth beside her. "I like that in a woman." Excuse me? Her mouth fell open as the woman let out a loud laugh and rested her elbows on the table. "Let me guess… bad break up?"
After a few seconds of silence, Piper found her voice. "N…No. I have a lovely boyfriend, thank you." Piper rolled her eyes before finally getting a taste of her bitter shot. "Wow I was… not prepared for that," she hissed, setting the empty glass quickly. That earned a laugh from the woman next to her and Piper found herself narrowing her eyes at her. She quickly turned to Polly, but found she was laughing while a bushy-haired woman spoke to her. "Who the hell are you?"
"How rude of me, drinking your drink and you don't even know who I am! I'm Nicky's friend," she paused at Piper's expression, which had turn to confusion. "Nicky? Nicky Nichols?" This time, she was the one rolling her eyes. "She used to be Polly's coworker when they worked at B&N. Nicky was the one who got fired for tearing pages out of books and smoking weed in the back." She nodded as a look of understanding crossed Piper's face. "Anyways, we walked in, she saw Polly and got excited. I didn't want to be a third wheel, so I thought, eh, let's just talk to the cute blonde."
Finally, Piper smiled. "Oh, I think I met her once before. I was… drunk at the time, though. So it's a little foggy. I'm Piper, Polly's certified best friend." Suddenly, she wanted to slap herself at the dorky comment.
"I see…" Alex pushed her glasses back up her nose. "So, you have a lovely boyfriend. So why are you here?" She asked, an eyebrow raised.
"Do I have to have a reason to get shitfaced?" Piper asked, raising her eyebrow this time.
"I mean, doesn't really seem your type to even go to a place like this for no reason," the brunette replied with a smile.
"Really? What exactly is my type?" Piper asked, a little irritated.
"You're a college graduate," she looked Piper up and down, frowning at the fact that Piper's dress hid so damn much. "WASP?" Alex bit her lip, suppressing a laugh as Piper nodded. She looked down once more after noticing Piper's cheeks turning a rosy color. "Feel free to correct me… but you seem like the type to sit down with a little bit of white wine, red if you're feeling adventurous, and you like to read a good book with big words in them while waiting for your lovely boyfriend to get home from his lovely job that required him to work late."
Piper's mouth fell open, and a laugh erupted from next to her. "You're full of shit, you know that? WASPs love to have fun, I might come here every weekend and get absolutely smashed, and how high and mighty would you feel then?"
"Well, we don't have to worry about that because I know for a fact that you don't do that because I do that and I haven't seen you once before. Believe me, I would have remembered your face."
Piper shook her head before downing another shot. "Business deal gone wrong," she finally said. "Dropped the merchandise, slipped on the merchandise, nearly broke my ass." She shuddered inwardly at the memory of all of the faces, a mix of uncomfortableness and amusement.
"Aw, poor baby." The brunette stuck out her bottom lip, which earned a light hit from the woman next to her.
"Enough about me. Tell me, what do you do?" She asked with a fake glare.
"I work for an international drug cartel."
"Vause! Stop fuckin' with the poor thing! This is how you lose potential friends!" A loud voice came, Piper turned to look at the source of the voice. The bushy haired woman was now leaning over the table, swatting at Alex Vause. "Don't listen to her, she works a stupid fuckin' desk job that her stupid fuckin' aunt offered to her when she was eighteen. She's some kinda big shot now, ain't that right, A-lex."
Alex's felt her cheeks warm up as Nicky spoke. "Oh my God, shut the fuck up, Nicky," Alex hissed. "I can't have any fun anymore." She began standing up, following Nicky's movements.
"Well, kid, looks like I gotta jet." Alex smiled at Piper before reaching into her pocket. "Here's your phone, I put my number in there for you, in case you ever get bored."
"When the hell did you..?" Alex was walking away now, smiling widely.
"Goodbye, Piper Chapman!" She called out, turning around momentarily.
Piper raised on of her hands to wave back, eyebrows knitted together. "Wait..." She turned towards Polly. "Did I tell her my name?" She asked.
Polly offered a shrug before looking at the mess of a table, empty shot glasses decorating the wood. "Nicky probably told her," she said simply before standing up. "Let's move this back to my apartment, it smells like pot in here."
After another hour or so, Piper was laying in her shared bed, a curly haired man lightly snoring next to her. She couldn't get Alex out of her head. The way words rolled off of her tongue, it was like she'd practiced the conversation so many times in front of her mirror. She bit her bottom lip, thinking about the red lips.
Suddenly, her phone vibrated on her nightstand and she was fumbling to reach it.
New text from Alexxx: We should hang out again sometime (;
New text from Alexxx: Oops, I mean (:
Alex gently tapped the cover of her book, she couldn't focus on it anyways. She was too busy staring at the phone next to her. She could hear Nicky's snoring in the other room, she let a breath go she didn't know she had been holding when her phone vibrated. She quickly grabbed it and opened the message.
Pipes: we could tomorrow if you want?
She gently laughed to herself before quickly texting back.
Alexxx: That depends.
Pipes: on what?
Alexxx: /How/ lovely is your boyfriend?
Piper rolled her eyes at the text. She couldn't say she was surprised by the flirting, she shook her head before typing out another text.
Pipes: goodnight, alex.
Alexxx: Night, kid.
"So, let me guess, she won you over with some sort of shitty love song or something?" Maritza raised on of her eyebrows at the couple.
"No, actually. We were good friends for a while, she got engaged, and that really pissed me off," Alex took a sip of soda from the glass in front of her. "And then she got pissed because I was pissed. We didn't talk for a year then I texted her and we picked up like nothing ever happened."
"Are you forgetting the screaming?" Piper asked, turning towards Alex.
"Well, I remember some screaming but we're probably thinking of different scenarios." That earned a loud laugh from Nicky.
"That was fucking brilliant," Nicky said with a large grin.
"I was waiting for the perfect moment to use that one." Alex grinned back and stood up to high five Nicky over the table.
"It wasn't high-five good," said Piper with an eye roll yet with a smile all the same. "More of a… fist bump good, at most."
Alex pulled the younger woman closer to her to press a kiss on the top of her head. "Oh, it was fucking hilarious and you know it. Anyways, Piper's right. We actually yelled a lot each other. Then one thing led to another and well… you know. Her lovely boyfriend couldn't compare to me."
A soft buzz emitted from Alex's pocket and she quickly pulled her phone from her pocket. "It's my mom, I have to take this." She quickly walked towards the bathroom, letting out a soft greeting to her mother before the door closed behind her.
"She is such a mama's girl," Nicky commented before reaching across the table to grab the drink Alex had abandoned. Before she could let out any sort of snarky remark, Alex burst from the bathroom door and walked right passed their table, not looking towards their table.
"Alex? What's...? Ah, shit." Piper quickly muttered an apology to the table before half-jogging out of the building. "Alex, what the fuck was that?" She yelled as she caught up to the woman.
"That was my aunt, Mom's sick. She came down with something fierce, I don't know. But her body was overheating or something, Sandy panicked and took her to the ER, and turns out she might have some sort of infection, I...I don't know, I just want to go see her, I need to make sure she's alright." She sighed deeply before turning her head so she was looking at Piper. "You don't have to come."
"Yes I do, we're each other's rocks, remember? I don't want you to crumble away or something while I'm hanging out with our best friends." Piper took Alex's hand in her own noticing the older woman was shaking. She knew Alex's mom meant the world to her, so she couldn't give her shit for freaking out so soon. The walk back to their apartment, to their car, was silent. Unlike the walk there, the silence was uncomfortable, uncertain.
Alex nearly threw herself into the car before turning the car on. "Let me just…" She looked at her shaking hands. She would be fine, her mom was tough as nails, she'd gotten through abuse, assaults, even worse; a stupid fucking infection wasn't going to take her away.
"Hey," Piper muttered, taking both of Alex's hands in her own. She leaned forward, gently pressing a kiss to Alex's lips. "It's okay, we're okay, and she's okay." Alex nodded quickly at Piper's words.
"Yeah, everything will be a-okay."