After successfully navigating past the bar without having anyone ask too many questions, and passing the nauseating wine off to Wes’s aggravating partner, she found Dov and Traci ringside. Traci had just started asking her about Holly when the fight began.

What the..? Nick? No, that wasn’t right. Nick was the trainer not the fighter. She looked across the ring to see Oliver’s head snap around and his eyebrows shoot up in concern as the fight was announced. Where was that stupid rookie? How could he do this to them? To Oliver? Maybe the universe was trying to tell her tonight that you just couldn’t trust anybody.

She needed a real drink, and she needed it now! As if reading her mind, Traci reached into the pocket of her coat and pulled out a flask. She drank deeply before handing it to Gail and cheering Nick on.

Thank God!

As Gail lowered it from her lips, the inscription on the flask flashed in the light, making her freeze, the impact of it hitting her hard before she handed it back.

“Jerry Barber, Groom.”, was all it read.

And there it was. Someone had truly wanted Traci. And Gail had fucked that up too. She had to get out of here! She was toxic. She ruined everything she touched. And to think, for one moment she had allowed someone to give her the false hope that she could be different, be better. But for now, she realized, even as she plastered a smile on her face and pretended to be having a good time, she had to get the fuck out of here!

Nick was going down, and going down hard! She and Traci and Dov were all yelling at him to fight, when she saw him look across the room. The look of defeat on his face was clear even before his opponent landed the final blow. Andy and Sam. Of course they had to show up now. Just one more reason for her to dislike the traitorous little bitch. And that was her cue to go.

Once again Gail found herself on the roof of her building, sitting on the ledge behind the stairs, feet dangling over the five story drop, bottle of tequila held loosely between her legs. It had been a while since she had been here, drinking and hiding and thinking. Nine weeks if she let herself think about it. Nine weeks since Ford had changed everything. Nine weeks since she had so desperately kissed Holly in the interrogation room and allowed herself to love, and to hope.

She took a deep pull on her bottle and let the liquor burn all the way down to the hollow pit in her stomach. She closed her eyes and let her head fall back against the wood of the shed behind her.

Fuck.

Cold bit into her fingers and nose as it began to snow again. Her ears were numb and her feet were turning into painful blocks of ice in spite of the thick wool socks she wore. She kicked her legs, enjoying the way her heels made a painful thud against the brick. Tears burned in her eyes as tequila burned the back of her throat. They left hot, silent trails down her cold, red cheeks. Her chest felt like someone had crushed all of her ribs under a red hot iron weight.

What did it matter if she had been just another notch in Holly’s lesbian bedpost? Another straight girl turned. Fun. Right?

How could she have let herself fall so fast, so deep? Well that was over now. Never again. She needed to close that door, walk away and never look back. Yup. That’s just what she would do.

Get yourself together Gail!

She sucked in a ragged breath, wiped her runny eyes and nose on the sleeve of Holly’s hoodie she had stolen weeks ago, and threw the empty bottle she was holding into the dumpster below. It landed with a satisfying crash of glass shattering against metal. She pulled the hood up over her head breathing in the comforting scent of Holly’s hair.

Yup. Time to go.