Also, this fic was written especially for @demigod-shenanigans because they mentioned one tiny thing in a comment which gave me brain worms, and then proceeded to let me roll around on the ground and cry at them in their Tumblr DMs. (´。• ᵕ •。`) ♡
Self-focused learning and meditation was little more than solitary confinement, even if the administration wouldn’t, or perhaps couldn’t, use those words. Somewhere along the line, someone had figured out that the easiest way to get through to troubled kids was to break them down, and the easiest way to do that was isolation. So, if there was anyone who was causing problems, they would just grab that student up by their scruff and take them away. They had a whole wing dedicated to making sure that the undesirable kids were able to have their own dorm, to eat by themselves, and even receive the best distraction-free one-on-one learning Wilderness School had to offer. They got to study and live completely alone other than their watchful supervisor for as long as it was deemed necessary. Sometimes it was a day, sometimes it was a week. All of them were miserable.
This particular sentence had been three days. Seventy-two hours all alone. Definitely not the longest it could be, but more than enough to make a point. Piper shuddered just thinking about it, an aching, lonely hollowness clawing at her chest.
***
Piper and Leo reunite after three days apart.