Sharon's Dilemma

Part 1 - FLASHBACKS

Christopher Skelton is a good man. That's what WPC Sharon Granger had reasoned to why she accepted the invitation to go for dinner and a movie the first time Chris raised enough courage to ask her out on a date. In her eyes he was a bit too weedy looking and lacked a few connections upstairs. Conversations were stilted, not that they talked much, Ray used to make a snide comment every time Chris finally built up the courage to approach her. Their typical conversations usually consisted of:

"Hey Shaz... errr, the weather's been a bit awful today, hasn't it?"

"Yeah, it is a bit"

At that point, usually Ray would make a snide comment or the Guv would call Chris away, and Chris would follow like him like a lost puppy. All negatives aside, Shaz knew that Chris was loyal and kindhearted. That was why when Chris had, so very eloquently, asked her "Uhh, Shazzer. Do you, you know, want to see a movie or something. A date, like and dinner and and..." Shaz hestitated for a few moments, then looked in to Chris' pleading puppy dog eyes; took pity on him and answered in the affirmative. She knew it wasn't a good idea to get involved with a superior officer. Yet, after getting to know Chris, Sharon had found him to be funny and sweet and after a few pointers, quite adequate in the bedroom.

Sharon didn't mind taking care of Chris. Between his own inclinations and Ray's encouragement, left to his own devices, Chris managed to get drunk every night, only eat bacon butties, curries and chips and live in a flat reminiscent of a fresher's dormitory room. However, it meant that due to Sharon's refusal to visit his flat whilst it smelt like a changing room filled with men whom have just finished a marathon run, the sight of Chris wearing her mother's old frilly green apron, kneeling over and scrubbing the floor clean was an image that would always bring a smile to her face.

Once her personal life had been sorted out, the day Alexandra Drake was carried in to CID was the day Sharon's identity in her professional life changed. Shaz admired her superior officer. Although she was loud, occasionally annoying and crass and sometimes borderline certifiable, she brought a change in the environment in CID and even the rest of Fenchurch East that Shaz longed for. Shaz could aim higher now the glass ceiling had been weakened; she felt she could go far in her career as a policewoman. Alex gave Shaz that confidence. Shaz was very grateful to her ma'am for that. And it didn't hurt that she was able and very willing to give DCI Hunt an earful and sometime a chinful when he was being an insufferable git.

Two years after Alex's dramatic entrance, her head full of plans for her wedding, Sharon felt like the bubble that kept her feet from touching the floor was burst when she found out Chris had been corrupt. His integrity and her trust in him had been compromised. Sharon had been in love with the idea that Chris was a excellent policeman. An upstanding member of society. White as white could be. Maybe a little dull in terms of intellect, but a trustworthy and kind character.

It was soon after her perfect life had been dealt such a demoralizing shock that the unspeakable occurred, in that picturesque park where, swathed in white tulle, it all changed for Sharon. Her mentor was severely hurt and might never wake up. Her Guv soon disappeared. Ray was left to pick up the pieces of their team's morale and Sharon's relationship with Chris was cracking, strained perhaps beyond repair.

After the whirlwind of the few days after the shooting, Sharon and Chris had agreed to postpone the wedding. "Until things settle down" Chris had said. Sharon readily agreed; she was still determined to get married to Chris.

However, it was whilst she was still engaged to Chris, on a chilly morning a few weeks after the Operation Rose fiasco, Sharon pulled the sheet over her naked chest as she raised herself up from her reclining position. She heard quiet snoring of the figure lying next to her. Sharon had never considered having an affair with anyone before, but there she was, in the aftermath of a night of naked pleasure with a man who wasn't her betrothed.