‘Oh, God, this must be a nightmare!’ she thought desperately. Little did she know the worst part was yet to come.

There was a gentle knock on the door.

"Angel?" Alex cried from outside. "Are you awake?…"

Angelica did not answer and tried not to make a sound.

"Angel, your mom’s here to take you home…" Alex said, still from outside the door.

Angelica’s heart sank.

"Oh, no…" she groaned, burrying her throbbing head in her hands, "This IS a nightmare…"

"I’m up, just give me two minutes…" Angelica said as loudly as she could without contributing to the pain in her head.

"Okay, baby, take your time." Alex responded.

Angelica rolled her eyes. She heard Alex retreat. Then, she wondered which one of her moms had come to pick her up; she prayed for momma T, for she was sure, Bette would give her a dressing-down she would remember forever.

She dressed as quickly as she could, yet, when she started gathering her things together, the door was opened and her mother Bette walked in.

"Mom…" Angelica started. Bette, however, just stood there, hands on her hips, observing her clearly hungover daughter critically.

"I don’t wanna hear a single word." Bette interrupted her in a cool voice.

Angelica stopped talking, hung her head low and waited for her mother to start yelling.

"Are you ready?" Bette continued, "We should get going…"

Angelica stared at her in surprise. No reproaches? No scene? No yelling, even?

She quickly gathered the rest of her things and then followed her mother out of the room, quietly thanking her momma T for obviously having told Bette to take it easy on her.

Angelica wanted to walk towards the front door, when she noticed Bette taking a different direction.

"Mom, the exit is over here…" Angelica said hesitantly.

"Oh, I know," Bette said, still in her cool voice, "I just wanted to have a quick word with Alex."

"With…Alex?" Angelica asked, confused.

"Yes." Bette said simply, walking towards the living room.

Just then, Angelica’s memory seemed to come back to her: with horror, she could see pictures appear in front of her inner eye, pictures showing her gulping down one glass of vodka after the other, pictures of a crowd of people cheering her on loudly, and then pictures of a beautiful girl, sitting on a bench outside in the garden, leaning very closely toward her and-