I_soprano_5x13

The air in North Caldwell was thick with the humidity of late June and the stench of betrayal. Tony Soprano sat on his patio, the glowing tip of his Cohiba the only light in the encroaching gloom. He wasn't thinking about the orange juice with "some pulp" or the ducks that had long since flown south. He was thinking about his mother and his uncle.

The realization had hit him like a panic attack, but without the sweet release of passing out. Livia and Junior had conspired to have him clipped. His own blood had turned the Vesuvius dinner into a potential wake.

Livia’s eyes fluttered, a tiny, wicked glint appearing behind the fogged plastic. She didn't deny it. She just looked at him with that look—the one that said the world was a giant bowl of nothing and he was the biggest nothing of all. I_soprano_5x13

Tony left the room and walked straight into the path of the FBI. The feds were moving in, a swarm of windbreakers and warrants. They weren't there for Livia; they were there for the wreckage Tony had left behind in his wake.

Tony looked at his family—Carmela, Meadow, AJ—huddled together in a booth. He realized then that the ducks weren't coming back. He had built a cage around his family, and the bars were made of his own sins. He raised a glass, the wine dark as blood. To the family, he said, his voice cracking. The air in North Caldwell was thick with

He leaned in close, his shadow swallowing her bed. He didn't yell. He didn't shake her. He just whispered into the plastic of her oxygen mask. I know, Ma. I know it was you.

The following story is a reimagining of "I Dream of Jeannie Cusamano," the Season 1 finale of The Sopranos . He was thinking about his mother and his uncle

Outside, the sirens were getting louder, but for one last night, the walls held.