Chapter Fourteen

"How can ya be with someone and not let them see just how crazy and fucked up you are, huh?" Annalisa continued her mockful comments. All the while never faltering her eyes from Lorna's face or releasing the smirk her lips had formed. Each time she spoke she moved where the tip of the knife had rested on Lorna's cheek.

Emo Morello. The taunting name echoed through her mind. It rhymed but that didn't negate the clear fact of how false said name was. Lorna wasn't an emo. Never would she be. And she was damned certain she wouldn't ever allow Nicky to find out about her rather small cutting obsession. Nicky didn't need to see that side of her. Nicky worried too much about her now, she didn't need more reason to do so. Lorna refused to give any more worry or stress to her beloved Nicky.

However, as she was forced to return Annalisa's unnerving stare from having her cheeks in the other's rough grip, Lorna concluded she likely wouldn't have a choice in the predicament. Annalisa was determined to follow through with the threat and all Lorna had the ability to do was swallow down her saliva and dig her shoes frustratingly into the cement of the floor beneath them.

Witnessing the apprehension etched through the scrunched up lines creased onto Lorna's forehead, the blonde inmate sneered coolly at her. The thrill of instilling fear and anxiety in another human being was almost as good as the high she used to receive from snorting cocaine or shooting her veins up with heroin. She sucked in a long breath and finally took the knife off of the shorter woman's face. Instead she fumbled with it for a moment before forcing it into one of Lorna's hands.

"I ain't gonna do shit to your little girlfriend. I want you to fucking cut yourself in fronta her," she demanded, her mouth pressed uncomfortably upon the rim of Lorna's ear.

The best punishment was forcing her victim to inflict herself with the injury in front of someone she loved. Annalisa smirked wider at the mere visual flashing through her mind. It was just cruel enough she determined. And if Lorna failed to deliver she knew she could go to the COs and convince them Lorna was in the midst of a mental episode which would certainly lead her to being sent to Florida.

Nerves steadily increased the second Lorna's hand came in contact with that godforsaken knife. The knife that if she were alone would bring her relief and release but now the only thing it brought her was shame and guilt. Her brown eyes peered down at the object, she swallowed uncomfortably and sucked down on her bottom lip. "No, I-I'm not gonna make her see that. It's the middle a the night, anyway, she's asleep and I ain't gonna wake her up so she can be forced to watch me do that. Just, just fuckin' shiv me so we can move on and never talk to each other again," Lorna cried out in exasperation from the entire debacle. She longed to go back and not be in this closet at that particular time. If she had been more careful she knew this wouldn't be going on right now.

The butter knife she had been made to hold was the only fault for this occurrence. It was the whole fault. She snatched that knife from the kitchen, hid away in this same closet, and used that knife to slice into her skin with. Annalisa walked in on her and now was using that as leverage to force her into agreeing to some sick, twisted, plot of allowing Nicky to walk in on her doing that very same thing to herself. Lorna gulped. It was one thing for Annalisa to see her cutting herself but for Nicky—Lorna violently shook her head at just the damn thought of it. She couldn't fucking do that to Nicky. How much fucking pain and trauma such a sight would cause to her, Lorna couldn't even imagine. She didn't want to be the reason for that. Not when she had already been the reason for so much of Nicky's hurt. She couldn't add this to that long fucking list.

Annalisa wasn't at all shocked by Lorna's less than willing response. But she didn't need Lorna to willingly agree to her demands. One way or another Lorna was going to comply and she was certainly going to make sure Lorna knew that. She took Lorna's hand that she had previously forced the knife into and pressed the tip of into the palm of said hand. Eyes stared heatedly into Lorna's. "You don't have a fucking choice, Morello. You're going to cut yourself and I'm gonna make Nicky come here and watch you cut yourself. And if you fucking refuse I will tell the COs I saw you harming yourself and then you'll have to spend the resta your sentence in Florida. You don't want that do ya?"

The sensation of the sharp edge of the knife pressing into her skin caused a slight yelp out of Lorna. It didn't feel as numb inducing as it did when she stuck the knife in her skin herself. Her chest puffed out while a deep breath entered inside of her now trembling mouth. She squeezed her eyes shut for a second, trying to locate the strength she knew she would need to go through this shit show. Her chest ached for what this was going to do to Nicky. Her sweet, precious, Nicky who shouldn't have to be forced to witness what Annalisa wanted her to witness. This was the absolute worst torture scenario Lorna could imagine. Annalisa was sick—sick in the head, even sicker in the head than she knew herself to be. Only someone with a sick mind could come up with a scenario such as the one that was about to go down in this closet.

Making Lorna's fingers curl around the knife by a menacing movement of her own hand, Annalisa let go of her altogether and gradually walked towards the door. She turned to give a cold glare towards Lorna. "Ya better do as I said and start cuttin' yourself. Unless you want to go to Florida where you'll be permanently separated from precious, precious Nichols." The corners of her mouth once again curved up forming a smirk upon her face. She watched as Lorna fidgeted uncomfortably where she stood. Satisfied, she deemed now a good time to go and get Nicky.


Left to her lonesome—despite it knowingly only being a temporary predicament—Lorna relaxed and slid down onto the hard floor. Her back pressed up against the wall behind it and her eyes peered down at the knife her fingers had forcibly been curled around. She traced her thumb from the thicker end all the way down to the sharper end. It wasn't the cutting part she feared or stressed over—she had no reservations about sticking herself with a sharp object—what she did have a problem with was doing it in front of Nicky. She knew Nicky's seeing a sight like that would do nothing more than cause her even more unneeded, undeserved, anguish. Nicky's pain and agony left a sharper pain than any cut the stupid butter knife would leave in her skin.

Tears had long formed at the base of her eyelids the longer Lorna sat there and pondered over what was about to happen. She felt sick with herself for getting into this mess to begin with. The whole thing was her fault. She chose to come in this same closet with that same damn butter knife which led to Annalisa's walking in on her and catching her in the act of self-mutilation. Lorna easily provided Annalisa with the leverage she needed to create this entire sequence of events that was ready to play out. It wasn't Annalisa's fault but her own for being the selfish bitch Lorna knew herself to be.

The more worked up she got the more she wanted to take that knife and stab her own skin with it. She was infuriated at herself. Beyond infuriated. She wished she wasn't such a meek piece of shit. A selfish meek piece of shit who was about to traumatize the hell out of the one damn human who gave a single fuck about her. How would she ever make this up to Nicky? How would she and Nicky ever be able to mend their relationship if she kept causing unrelenting pain to Nicky?

Lorna's tears intensified. They rushed out of her eyes, streaming along her cheeks and blurring her vision tremendously. She would never be good enough for Nicky. She would never be able to take back what Nicky was about to witness and that fact alone was enough for her to finally stick the knife through the bicep of one of her arms. Punished was what she needed to be for every fucking pain she inflicted onto Nicky regardless of if the pain had been intentionally or unintentionally inflicted.

Her desire for self-induced punishment overpowered every other thought swirling through her mind. Which, she realized, was a good thing if she wanted to keep herself out of Florida. But quickly after that realization dawned on her the guilt grew and caused her to stick the knife even sharper into the same spot she had already stuck it in. Tears continued pouring out and she felt an involuntary sob come tremoring out of her windpipe. She wanted to hide herself before Annalisa came back with Nicky. She couldn't willingly allow Nicky to witness this. She didn't want Nicky fucking witnessing this shit. It wasn't right. It wasn't okay. It would certainly make Nicky need therapy for the rest of her life. She would make Nicky need therapy because of how selfish she was to hurt herself in Nicky's presence despite the choice not technically being of her own accord.

Yet, no matter how much she loathed the image of Nicky's being forced in this closet to watch her self-harming behavior it wasn't enough to stop Lorna from giving in and doing exactly that. The want to refrain was there but the rampant thoughts incessantly intensified the rage Lorna had with herself leading her right back to cutting her arm even more. A vicious cycle was what she created. She didn't choose to participate in this but now that she was forced in it, and was momentarily left to her lonesome with her overactive mind, she couldn't cease from taking the knife over and over into the flesh of her arm.

Time slowed down. Lorna thought hours had gone by at this point. She wondered if maybe Annalisa had forgotten about her or maybe a CO finally was doing their job and stopped the blonde to question her on what the fuck she was doing roaming the prison in the middle of the night. However, her ponderous and hopeful thoughts were soon proved to be wrong.

The door very slowly squeaked open, Lorna squeezed her eyes tightly shut and tried to stop the sob she felt threatening to escape from doing so but the sob was stronger than she and came out even louder than all the others before. Her hand shook badly as it held the knife tip inside of her skin. She couldn't cut it again not now when Nicky was likely about to be pushed inside by fucking Annalisa.

But then what happened next happened so fast Lorna felt completely out of control. Annalisa dragged Nicky in the room, who Lorna heard a vastly audible gasp come out of, and the unsteadiness of her hand—from the incessant shaking of it—caused the knife to unintentionally slip deep into her skin almost into a vein. The slip of the knife and where exactly it cut into Lorna's arm rapidly led to a heaping gush of blood come pouring out of its open flesh.

"Nicky," Lorna's voice cracked, her eyes puffy and soaked with tears. She looked frantically, shamefully, up at the woman she loved and felt her chest tighten at the agony displaying itself on Nicky's face. "I—I'm so sorry…I'm so sorry, Nicky."

Swiftly the shock faded away and in its place adrenaline took over. Nicky acted on autopilot, pushing harshly past Annalisa and over to Lorna. She crouched down on the ground beside her, ripped a piece of cotton off of the sleeve of her shirt, and then—once she had rapidly yanked the butter knife out of Lorna's arm and threw it as far away as possible—she used the ripped up cotton piece to cover over the gaping cut in Lorna's arm, applying pressure as best she could to stop the bleeding.

Nicky wrapped her other free arm securely around Lorna's back pulling her to lean right into her shoulder. She chewed down on the side of her mouth, uneased at the mere fact Lorna had been the one to cause so much blood to come gushing out of her own arm. It was a hard visualization to process. Hard to comprehend that Lorna would do something so harmful to herself. Sure, in the back of her mind, she had wondered if Lorna might have been into self-harming behaviors—but to actually witness it was a whole other story. Surreal had been the sensation seeing the incident take place left her with.

Anger was quick to follow, however, when her head turned and eyes locked with Annalisa's venom filled ones. Teeth gritted fiercely together the longer her eyes lingered onto the blonde's. The blonde who fucking took the time to set this evil, sick, manipulative plot up. Before words could even form to say to Annalisa the sound of a horrific whimper interjected her and she immediately returned all of her focus onto Lorna. Eyes widened tremendously when she noticed how much blood was soaking up onto the piece of cotton she had pressed onto Lorna's arm. She held it tighter against the wound but it was proving to be too much blood for one person to handle.

Tears mixed in with the anger as she realized how deep Lorna must have cut herself. From watching it occur outside of the closet—while being shoved in there by Annalisa—Nicky saw how the second Lorna laid eyes on her she became terrified which inadvertently caused her hand with the knife to shake leading to a considerably deeper cut than Lorna likely had intended to make. Nicky fastened her arm even fiercer around Lorna's back bringer her as close as she could possibly have her. Her face leaned forward until her lip naturally pressed onto the top of Lorna's head.

Only a moment passed before Nicky swiftly raised her head and turned it to glare heatedly over at the conniving Annalisa still hovering in the open doorway. "Go fuckin' get a damn CO now, ya evil little rat. Because of you Lorna's arm is gushing out so much damn blood I can't fucking keep up with it," her voice bitterly demanded.

The mention of COs caused a strong wave of apprehension to come over Lorna. Her head shook fervently and she used her good hand to frantically grab at Nicky's shirt to gain her attention. Once she had succeeded, and Nicky's face was back in front of her own, Lorna peered up at her with the utmost panic seeping through her brown eyes. "I don't want," she had to pause from how out of breath she was due to the excessive blood loss, "I don't want the COs involved, Nicky. Please. They-they'll send me to-to Florida for, for this."

"I know, doll, but-but you're bleeding a shit ton. I don't want you to fucking die so we gotta get a CO," Nicky gently, albeit resistively, informed the younger woman. Her voice tremored slightly from the crying she hadn't realized she'd been doing until she heard the cracking as she spoke.

The vibration of Lorna's legs against her own told Nicky all she needed to know about just how truly terrified Lorna was of the COs finding out about this incident. She swallowed thickly, pressing her mouth softly onto the rim of Lorna's ear so that what she said next was only heard by Lorna. "I won't let ya get sent to Florida, okay? I'll tell the COs Annalisa did this to you. And, in a way, she fucking did do this to you so she deserves to get in trouble for it. Just calm down, please, you can't use the little energy ya have right now on worrying about Florida. Ya gotta focus on breathing, baby."

A loose strand of hair fell into Nicky's line of view which she soothingly tucked behind Lorna's ear with her thumb. She shifted her head up, glancing back at the doorway just in time to see the blonde snake scurrying out of it. Relief poured through her. If she had to be in that woman's presence for a second longer Nicky didn't think she'd have been able to refrain anymore from going over and beating her senseless. Now she didn't have to worry about that happening—she could put every ounce of her focus on Lorna and making sure Lorna was properly tended to.

Her head turned in Lorna's direction again and this time she leaned forward until their foreheads naturally pressed together. Lips brushed comfortingly atop two vastly trembling ones. "It's gonna be okay, sweetheart. Everything's gonna be just fine, I promise. I won't let ya get separated from me again. I can't let that happen. But ya also need a hospital so your arm can be taken care of by someone medically fit to. You, erm, you really cut yourself good here, kid. It's definitely gonna need stitched up," she started off strong but by the end her voice nearly shook as much as she witnessed Lorna's lips shake.

Nicky still had a hard time processing this entire ordeal. Regardless of the fact this particular incident she was forced to walk in on was an enforced one, the mere image of Lorna's sitting on the floor of the custodial closet with a butter knife in her hand sticking it through the flesh of her own arm was a hard one to swallow. It brought up a plethora of emotions—a plethora of worries that this wasn't the only time Lorna had hidden herself away in a closet to do something like this.

Despite the fears whirling through her mind Nicky didn't voice them aloud. It was clear to her Lorna was in no condition to be answering the round of questioning she had been desiring to ask at this point in time. She reluctantly concluded she'd have to save the numerous queries she had for another day when Lorna wasn't bleeding to her possible demise. A sigh came out. Now all that mattered was taking care of Lorna and keeping as much pressure on her wound as possible until further help arrived.

"I love you so fucking much, doll," Nicky brokenly murmured, lips touching softly against the still trembling ones beneath them. Teeth bit into her own bottom lip afterwards as she took a thorough observation of Lorna's face. Tears flooded her eyes, effortlessly streaming down along her cheeks. She used a thumb to caress lovingly along the length of one of Lorna's pale cheeks. "After you get some medical attention for this cut and come back, we're gonna have to talk about this. Okay? I have so many questions, babe, but I'll save them for a better time. I just—I want you to be okay," she whispered even though the only ones in the room were the pair of them.


By the time a CO entered inside of the closet—to Nicky it felt like an entire lifetime had passed—only fifteen minutes had come and gone. The bleeding hadn't ceased at all in that time, much to her dismay, but she was rather grateful for help to finally arrive. Even more so was she grateful when she looked over and saw the CO to be officer McCullough. At least, out of all the COs in max, McCullough was one of the nicer ones. One who seemed to actually have a caring bone in her body. One Nicky trusted would take her word when she disclosed what happened with Lorna and wouldn't throw Lorna in the psych block after she came back from the ER.

"What's going on in here, inmates?" The tall blonde officer questioned rather loudly. Eyes peering intently between Lorna and Nicky. Though a sternness inflected through her voice, a slight concern inflected through her eyes.

Nicky remained with her hand pressing the cotton fabric against Lorna's wounded arm, however, she twisted her head around to return the CO's stare. Much to her distaste right behind officer McCullough stood Annalisa who was watching the pair of them with that god-awful smirk of hers in place. Anger seized through her veins at the sight. "Oh, didn't Damiva tell ya? She fuckin' dragged Lorna in here and cut her arm with a butter knife. I was walking past on my way to the bathroom and heard a cry, walked right in on it. I've been sittin' here with Lorna tryna stop the bleeding but it keeps fucking comin' out. She needs a hospital," the fury wasn't hard to miss, it shone through her voice without any effort on her part.

The false accusation instantly caused Annalisa to shoot a daggering stare in Nicky's direction.

If Annalisa thought the menacing look she was giving would somehow cause a reaction out of Nicky it did no such thing. The last thing on Nicky's mind was what Annalisa felt after hearing her be blamed for the cut on Lorna's arm. Which, despite Annalisa's not physically doing it, she was the one at fault for it occurring even at all. Nicky hadn't been completely aware of the backstory but she knew for a fact the only reason Lorna cut herself was because Annalisa had to have threatened her to do so. Annalisa was the evilest of evil. She wouldn't be shocked one bit if that had been exactly what happened. Annalisa used Lorna's vulnerability for her own deviant pleasure.

"That's bullshit, Nichols. Morello fuckin' did that to herself because she's an emo little pussy bitch," the blonde inmate icily retorted while hitting her hands violently against the wooden frame of the door. Like hell she was going to go down for nonsense both she and Nichols knew wasn't even in the slightest bit true. Her head shook infuriatedly, eyes moving off of Nichols and darkly onto Morello. Little bitch, the words roared through her head the longer she stared at the brunette woman.

Red was the only thing Nicky had seen after listening to the demonic insults spew from Annalisa's devilish mouth. The urge to grab her by the neck right then and there was strong—oh how she yearned to take Annalisa by her throat and strangle the life out of her for saying such cruel words about a person as sweet as her Lorna. Despite the intense desire to bring revenge onto the blonde inmate Nicky refrained and instead settled on just giving an infuriated glare her way.

"Damiva, I'd watch what comes outta your mouth if I were you," Officer McCullough shot her a serious look. She got out her telecommunication device and used it to enlist an extra CO to come detain inmate Damiva with. When she finished, and had received confirmation a CO was on their way, she placed the device back in its spot and returned her focus onto the three women.

Eyes landed on Annalisa first, arms folding up across her chest as she stood looking her heatedly over. "I have an officer coming for you. You'll be put in isolation until further notice. And there's no sense in arguing that'll just add to how long you stay there," she calmly informed the blatantly enraged inmate.

McCullough's stare then shifted onto both Nichols and Morello. Her hardened face slightly softened with compassion when she noticed the cut running along Morello's arm. She raised a hand, gesturing it towards the pair of them as a means to wordlessly tell the women to get up and walk over to her. The two quietly complied; McCullough watched how Morello appeared to barely be able to walk without leaning her entire body weight onto Nichols. That showed her just how deep and bad the cut was.

Once the two were standing only a foot away, McCullough replaced Nicky's hold on Lorna with her own. "You can go back to your bunk, Nichols," she told her, but gave a sympathetic glance her way. It wasn't hard for anyone to see—including the COs—how close Nichols and Morello were with one another. Though, at one point, she got on the pair's case during their reunion a few months ago over what she deemed too lengthy PDA, deep down she wholeheartedly admired the closeness they shared and couldn't imagine how traumatizing it had to have been for Nichols to walk in on the incident she did.

Slowly—and with a heaping amount of resistance—Nicky neared the open doorway of the closet. However, before completely disappearing out of it Nicky turned to face Officer McCullough and Lorna. Apprehension shined from her eyes as they peered between the hurt brunette and the officer who now was in charge of getting her the proper medical attention she needed. "You're gonna make sure Lorna gets taken care of right? And she'll be back here when she's okay, yeah? Like to this cell block with me?" The questions frantically shook their way out of her faintly quivering lips. She hadn't even realized the quivering of her lips until she voiced her worries aloud.

"Yes, I promise I'll get her the help she needs and after the hospital releases her Morello will come right back to cell block D with you. Don't worry too much, go on back to your bunk and get some rest Nichols. Morello should be back before the morning is over," the female office gently assured and watched with sympathy as Nicky disdainfully exited out of the closet.

Not long after Officer Copeland showed up and cuffed Annalisa's hands behind her back taking her out of there and in leu of the segregation unit.

McCullough carefully held onto Lorna's arm with the cotton Nicky had given to her to continue the applying of pressure onto the wound and slowly began leading her out of the closet down towards the exit out of the unit altogether.


Due to the lack of funds within the prison the only way for Lorna to be transported to any sort of emergency medical facility was by a prison-driven vehicle. And, if she hadn't felt the amount of lethargy as she currently did from the immense blood loss, Lorna would have laughed at the irony of being taken to the hospital via the same prison van she used to drive back in Litchfield. But now all she could do was lean her head against the headrest in back of it and close her eyes in agony each time the van drove over a pothole.

Sat in the back beside Lorna to keep a hand gripped onto the open wound with that ripped up piece of cotton being the only means to cease the blood from gushing all over the place, McCullough felt her lungs fill up with a glut of air as she had her head turned towards the petite inmate. The words of Damiva came echoing through her mind the longer her blue eyes watched over Morello. She had slightly peeked a small glance at the cut before taking over the pressure applying earlier and easily was able to come to the conclusion that the cut was more likely a self-inflicted one than a wound inflicted by an outside source.

Self-inflicted injuries were a subject McCullough was all too familiar with. And because of the familiarity that made it easier for her to observe when an injury on someone else's body had either been self-induced or caused by another person separate from themselves.

So, to conclude that Morello had been the reason for such a horrific laceration on her, McCullough couldn't resist the empathy which had naturally etched itself upon her face as she sat there beside her. The desire to say something was strong but she chose to bite her tongue instead. She didn't want to risk the other officer hearing—she didn't feel the need to cause any issues for Morello when it was clear she already was dealing with enough of those.


The emergency department was eerily quiet. Lorna had been quickly taken back to a room once they arrived at the hospital but was left alone on the gurney in there after a nurse hooked her up to an IV. The only company she had was Officer McCullough who just stood uneasily on the other side of the bed with her spine pressing into the wall and her hand still covering the cut with that blood-soaked cotton material. Not the way Lorna imagined her night would go. The whole night felt more like a nightmare than real life.

It was fucked up what happened. It was so fucked up and surreal Lorna couldn't fully wrap her mind around everything that occurred. She swallowed thickly and looked down at the white blanket that covered over her legs. Eyes became mesmerized by the thread that ran through it. Instinctively she brought her hand down, laying it on the thick fabric, and traced her thumb repetitively along each thread line she could make out.

"I know that cut on your arm is self-inflicted, Morello."

Lorna immediately froze mid-stroke. The pupils in her eyes grew so big her irises were hardly visible.