Hey everyone, not sure if anyone will actually be interested in reading any of this or not but I thought I'd post anyway seeing as how I'd written it! I hate when watching the show where it jumps from one scene to another and you wish you'd seen the bit in between… that normally ends up in me writing the bit in between in the way I think it should have went! The first one here is between Maria getting to Carla's flat and the police coming out. If anyone has any suggestions of any other missing scenes then I'll definitely have a go!

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"You know what we have to do, Carla. The sooner the better."

Carla shook her head. Police. No, she couldn't.

"There's no point, Maria. They won't listen to me. I didn't listen to you."

Carla put her head down, not wanting to look Maria in the eye. She'd been right about Frank all along, if only she'd listened to her.

"Do you want him to do this to another woman? Cause he will, you know he will."

The thought came into Carla's head. Maria was right again. Frank wanted power, control. If he didn't get that, if someone else dared to defy him then he would lash out again. Then came the doubt. It was her, it had been her fault. He had done this to her because she had been so cruel and heartless, she had finished with him on the eve of their wedding because she loved someone else. This was her punishment.

"Police please. I need to report a rape."

Carla winced at the word. That's what had happened to her. She'd been raped. She was a figure, a number, another statistic. She felt like she was in a movie or a tv show but then the pain was too real for that. Her whole body was throbbing and her head was a jumble of emotions.

She listened to Maria give the police her address and felt in a bit of a daze. This couldn't be real. How had this happened? She knew that breaking up with Frank was never going to be easy but never had she imagined this. How could she have been so stupid? Maria was sat right in front of her. Living, breathing evidence of what Frank was and yet she'd ignored it, stubborn as always.

"Carla?"

Maria said her name once more, hoping to catch her attention. The police would be here soon but until then, Carla was her responsibility. She couldn't quite believe this had happened but then again, of course she could. She'd known Frank was bad news ever since that terrible night at his home which sometimes still gave her nightmares. Looking at the broken and bruised woman in front of her made her realise just how lucky she'd actually been.

"Let's sit up here, they'll be here soon."

Carla groaned slightly as Maria took her hand and tried to help her up. Pain radiated throughout her body.

"I don't think…" she put her head down sheepishly, embarrassed. "I don't think I can get up, Maria, I…."

That's when it hit Maria. This was where it had happened. Carla hadn't moved here from the bedroom or from the couch, she'd been here all along. Frank had raped her right here, on the floor. She did her best to suppress the urge to be sick.

"Come on, I'll help you. Put your weight on me."

Very slowly and difficultly they made it onto the couch. Carla was shaking but hoped that Maria wouldn't notice. She did.

"What happened, Carla? Last I knew you were getting married."

Maria did her best to hide any judgement from her voice but failed maybe a little. She couldn't pretend that it didn't hurt her when Carla got engaged to the man who had tried to force himself on her but looking at her now, she could see that she'd paid the most awful price for her betrayal and no one deserved that.

Carla's mind was running at 100 miler per hour. The wedding. So much needed to be sorted. People had to be told it was off, things had to be cancelled. What would she tell everyone? What would they say? How had she been so stupid?

"Talk to me, Carla."

Maria put her hand on top of Carla's and flinched herself slightly when she felt her jump. She couldn't let her retreat inside herself.

"I called it off. Told him I couldn't marry him."

She shuddered as she thought of their earlier conversation. She hadn't seen it coming. Sure, she'd expected him to be angry and upset but never had it entered her head that he would do this to her.

"Why?"

Maria spoke hopefully, hoping that perhaps Carla had come to her senses and realised that she'd been telling the truth about Frank all along. Perhaps that's why she had called off the wedding. Better late than never.

"I just… couldn't go through with it. I was doing it for the wrong reasons. I didn't love him."

No point going into detail about the Peter situation. God, Peter, she thought. She hadn't split up with Frank so that she could have him, she knew that was never going to happen but now this was all such a mess and Peter was caught up in the middle of it. Frank thought they were having an affair. She didn't have the energy to think about that right now.

"And so that's why he did it? Because you broke up with him?"

Maria immediately regretted the question when she saw the look on Carla's face. She hadn't meant it the way it had come out, of course it wasn't Carla's fault. She was just trying to understand what had gone on, how everything had turned so bad so quickly.

"He was angry, he… I tried to get him to leave, I told him to go but he, he wouldn't, I… I should have tried harder."

Carla's gaze flew over to the door and she seemed transfixed by that one spot on the floor. Maria looked over with her and squeezed her hand tighter as she started to get a picture in her mind of what had happened. Images of Frank and Carla flashed into her mind and then came the images she knew so well, Frank, in his house, on the couch, on top of her. Thank God she had gotten away. She shook her head slightly, trying to shake away those memories. Carla was her priority now.

"Don't blame yourself, Carla. This is him, this is all him. Surely I'm proof of that if nothing else?"

Carla looked at Maria, she was small, skinny, tiny even… and yet she'd been able to fight Frank off. How had she not been able to do the same? She had frozen up, it was like she had been trapped inside her own body that was refusing to do as she begged it. How had she let it happen?

"You got away, Maria. You're proof of that… but I… I let him do this to me. I lay there and I let him do it. This is my fault, this is all my fault."

She began to cry, her body shaking with her tears as flashes of what had happened came relentlessly into her mind. She could still feel his breath on her face, her neck, so close she could hardly breathe herself. She could still feel his hands pulling apart her clothes and her legs…

Suddenly she jolted up away from Maria, off the couch and towards the bathroom, ignoring the pain she felt as she took every step.

"I need to have a shower, I can't sit here any longer, Maria, I can't, I can feel him all over me, I can't do it, I need to have a shower…"

Maria jumped up just as quickly and grabbed Carla as delicately as she could, all too aware that she couldn't let her shower, they had to preserve the evidence that would no doubt still be on her body.

"Carla, just try to calm down, ok? I know it's hard and I know you feel horrible but we have to do this right or else he'll get away with it, you don't want that, do you? Come on, let's sit back down. It won't be much longer."

She knew Maria was right, somewhere deep inside her she knew that Maria was right. Frank had done this to her, it wasn't her fault that she couldn't stop him. She had to make him pay. She had to do this properly. Could she though? Could she sit here in these clothes, in this flat, waiting for the police to come? And that would be the easy bit. Then there would be examinations and questions and disbelief. How had it all come to this?

Through her thoughts Maria guided Carla gently back down to the sofa. Inside she was breaking but she knew she had to remain strong for her friend. They'd had their ups and downs but when it came to it, they were family. Maybe not by blood or even by marriage anymore but Frank was the one who had last ripped their friendship apart and she sure as hell was not going to let him do it again.

Carla jumped as the buzzer sounded. This was it. She had to stay strong, she had to do this.