They say when the mighty fall, they fall hard. But, often times it’s the fall from your lowest point that hurts more than the fall from your highest.
Bianca Bishop returned to Dalton Hall in the morning only to find her sister, Layla, pacing the floors.
Layla: Where have you been? I’ve been calling you all night!
Bianca: I – I don’t know.
Layla: What do you mean you don’t know?
Bianca: I had a blackout. One minute I was having lunch with Archie at the Bistro and the next I was waking up on a park bench. I lost 19 hours.
Layla: Have you ever lost time like that before?
Bianca: Yes…when I was you. Layla: When you were sick? But, you’re not sick anymore. You integrated. Can that come undone?
Bianca: It’s not supposed to. I realized my trigger was feeling powerless and, while I’ve been feeling pretty damn powerless lately, I haven’t experienced any symptoms of dissociating again. But, if I have – They’re going to lock me up for good. If I snap into another personality this easily, I have no business walking around in free society. What if I hurt someone or --
Layla: Calm down. You don’t know that you had another Layla episode. We need to just take all of this one step at a time. I love you, Bianca. I’m your sister and I’m going to help you figure this out.
Bianca: You don’t know how much you mean to me.
Just then, there came a knock at the door. Bianca answered, only to find a stranger on the other side.
Caroline: Bianca Bishop?
Bianca: Yes?
Caroline: I am Detective Caroline Hartford with the Sunset Valley Police. I need to ask you a few questions.
Bianca: Concerning?
Caroline: The murder of Alison Roberts.
Downstairs, Rebecca was perplexed to walk into the kitchen and find Sam brushing his teeth.
Rebecca: There are a hundred bathrooms on this campus and you do this in our kitchen sink?
Sam: The boys’ bathroom sinks on the first floor are clogged and the second --
Rebecca: And, you didn’t want to risk running into me on the second?
Sam: Are things awkward now?
Rebecca: Because of the kiss?
Sam: I just don’t want you to feel like I’m pressuring you or…
Rebecca: I kissed you because I wanted to. I’m not ready for anything serious yet, Sam, because my heart is still healing from Noel. But, when I am ready to move on, I want it to be with you.
Sam: Good because I’m pretty sure if I have to avoid you in the name of giving you space, I’m going to lose my mind and my ice cream.
Rebecca: Ice cream?
Sam: You know the rum raisin ice cream I always ask for in the grocery order?
Rebecca: Yeah. You and Bianca are the only ones in Dalton House who eat that stuff.
Sam: Well, I think she must have eaten it all. There was an entire pint in there yesterday afternoon with my name on it. I came in from my run, took a shower and went to eat it and it was all gone.
Rebecca: My poor Sam.
Sam: It’s like she doesn’t know how many extra laps I did to justify having that pint of ice cream. And, I can’t complain to her because she’s evil and I’m pretty sure she could kill me with a single look.
Rebecca: Don’t worry. I’ll protect you.
Rebecca and Sam were oblivious to the spying eyes of her baby sister – and to the plan cooking in her pretty little head.
Denise: You always get everything Rebecca, but not Sam. He belongs with me. My first plan might have failed, but my next one won’t. Enjoy it while it lasts, Rebecca.
Later that morning, Bianca, Layla and their parents met in the dining hall with Detective Hartford. And, though all of them were still reeling from the news of Alison’s murder, Ted and Beth were doubly shocked when Rachel came waddling in.
Beth: She’s pregnant?
Ted: I had no idea.
Beth: Is it yours?
Bianca: Don’t freak out.
Ted: You knew?
Bianca: …Kind of.
Rachel: Long story short, yes, I’m pregnant, no, I wasn’t going to tell you and can we please postpone the yelling until after we get this mess straightened out for Bianca?
Caroline: I’m aware of your history with the deceased.
Bianca: She stole my boyfriend, so I hooked up with his ex-junkie best friend and then she blew him up in a cabin, except he wasn’t blown up, he had amnesia and thought he was in love with her. But, I didn’t know this because I had a split personality and was hooking up with this Lucas guy at the time. Fortunately, I resurfaced, but Jasper hit me with a car and I went into a coma, but his love brought me out of it and we reunited and I got integrated, but it turns out
the guy my other personality hooked up with was actually his brother and my therapist was his presumed-dead mother and Lucas showed up here and kissed me, trying to remind me my other personality loved him and Jasper saw that and thought I was choosing Lucas, which I so wasn’t, and he had sex with Alison, got her pregnant, lied to me for months and here we are. Caroline: Okay. That gives context to the video.
Bianca: Video?
Caroline: There’s a viral video online of you accosting Alison and wishing her baby never existed.
Bianca: I didn’t kill her. I might have wanted to, but I could never hurt her or her baby.
Caroline: Where were you last night?
Bianca: I was –
Layla: Home. Here. With me, all night.
Caroline: Really? Then, can you tell me why you made seventeen calls to your sister’s phone if she was with you all night? We subpoenaed phone records on both of you when the video surfaced.
Rachel: Woosh.
Layla: Are you okay?
Rachel: Mm-hmm.
Layla: Are you sure? Because, you’re making labor face.
Rachel: I’m fine, dear. Let’s just focus on your sister.
Bianca: I don’t know where I was. I – I had a blackout.
Beth: Oh, no. How much time did you lose?
Bianca: 19 hours.
Ted: Was it…
Bianca: I don’t know.
Caroline: We found a hair on Alison’s body. A long, black hair. Would you be willing to submit a DNA sample?
Ted: As her attorney and her father, I’ll have to request you get a warrant for that.
Caroline: Shouldn’t be a problem.
Rachel: Are we done here?
Caroline: For now. I’ll be in touch. Bianca, it goes without saying, but don’t leave Sunset Valley.
Outside, Beth and Ted met up.
Ted: Beth, I swear, I had no idea –
Beth: I believe you.
Ted: What does this mean for us? I know it took us a lot to get past my infidelity, that one stupid lapse in judgment, but –
Beth: But, we did get over it. And, when I married you, I married you for good and bad. I love your girls. Bianca and Layla might as well be my own. And, this new baby, I will love him or her, too, because they’re a part of you.
Ted: Do you know how much I love you?
Beth: Almost as much as I love you.
Rachel: Is it a bad time to mention my water just broke?
When the Bishops went to the hospital, Beth found Jasper in the waiting area.
Beth: Honey, I’ve been trying to call you.
Jasper: I left my phone at home.
Beth: I heard about Alison.
Jasper: They’re doing an autopsy on her. I know I should go, but I wanted to be here when the medical examiner finished.
Caroline Hartford joined them and Jasper stood up, eager to hear about her discoveries.
Jasper: Did you find him? Did you find the son of a bitch who killed Alison and Laura?
Caroline: I just spoke with the medical examiner. The autopsy is finished. Alison hemorrhaged and died from the blood loss. But, the baby –
Jasper: I don’t know if I can hear this.
Caroline: You need to. Alison had already given birth. That was the cause of the hemorrhage.
Jasper: What are you saying?
Caroline: I’m saying your daughter was delivered. And, judging from the amount of Pitocin in Alison’s blood –
Jasper: Pitocin? What is that?
Beth: It’s a drug they use to induce labor.
Jasper: Someone took Laura on purpose?
Caroline: It appears that way. And, forensic evidence has led us to a suspect.
Jasper: Who?
Caroline: Your ex-girlfriend, Bianca Bishop.
When Caroline was gone, Jasper turned to Beth.
Jasper: Bianca did this?
Beth: No, Jasper. I don’t believe she could do something like this.
Jasper: But, forensics –
Beth: Aren’t everything. They have a hair they believe belongs to Bianca, they’re probably going to be able to subpoena a DNA sample based on that confrontation she and Alison had at the bistro yesterday. I’m not saying the case isn’t solidifying, it is, especially since Bianca suffered a blackout –
Jasper: How much time did she lose?
Beth: 19 hours.
Jasper: She could have done this.
Beth: Do you honestly believe that?
Jasper: I don’t know what to think. All I know is that I want my baby…
Beth took her adopted son into her arms. She tried to comfort him as best she could, knowing there was little she could do to ease his pain.
Upstairs, in the maternity wing, Ted, Layla and Bianca visited with a glowing, if exhausted, Rachel.
Ted: You’re a beautiful little surprise. What’s her name?
Rachel: I told the girls they could decide.
Layla: We named her Roxanne. Roxie, for short. Like that dog we had when we were little.
Rachel: You named my daughter after a dog?
Layla: Roxie is a beautiful name for baby and Doberman alike.
Ted: Bianca, are you okay? You’re not saying much.
Bianca: I need to go find Jasper. I need to see him –
Ted: That’s not a good idea.
Bianca: I know. But, my life is a succession of bad ideas. What’s one more?
They stumbled upon each other in the stairwell. He was going up, she was going down. They met in the middle.
Bianca: Jasper—
Jasper: Is it true?
Bianca: No.
Jasper: How do you know? You lost time.
Bianca: Because, as angry and upset as I am about what you did with Alison, I couldn’t hurt her or your baby.
Jasper: Someone loaded her up with drugs to induce labor and took the baby.
Bianca: She’s alive?
Jasper: Maybe. I hope. I pray she is.
Bianca: I hope so, too. Those things I said at the bistro, I saw the video online and I cannot believe I would say something so awful.
Jasper: But, you did.
Bianca: If I could take it back –
Jasper: YOU CAN’T! You can’t bat those big green eyes and make all of this better! You said you wished my daughter never existed and now she doesn’t! I’ve lost everything! I’ve lost Laura, I’ve lost you…I have nothing left to live for.
Bianca: You haven’t lost me. Jasper, I love you --
Jasper: And you’re the main suspect in the disappearance of my daughter. If you’re responsible for this, Bianca – I’ll never be able to forgive you.
Bianca: Jasper, please…
Jasper: Just go.
Bianca: Jasper –
Jasper: LEAVE!
Bianca ran from the stairwell, not wanting to leave but not wanting to cause him anymore pain.
Jasper sunk down on the stairwell floor, sobbing for the daughter he’d lost and for the love of his life, who might as well have been a million miles away.
Later that night, Jasper took a taxi back to his home. He went to the place in the living room where Alison had died, where Laura had been born and taken away, and he let himself go. He helped himself to a bottle of Vodka and every pill he’d been able to acquire from his old friends. He slipped needles into his veins and the medicine burned away the pain and took him to an old, familiar place where there was nothing to hurt him.
A place he might never come back from again.
