My Mate Amber
Okay, this is my response to the episode on Saturday (12/10/02), What Little Girls are Made Of. As you may be able to tell, I don't like the idea of Lara and Dillon romantically involved, as it's fairly obvious, IMO, that TPTB are going to do. :-/ Anyway, this was what I came up with!
Lara slowly made her way back to the main prison area, clasping the blue envelope from Anna in her hands. Was this what it was always going to be like at the end of visiting time? Her walking away, crying, leaving someone behind crying? She supposed she should feel loved, but it wasn't like that to her. However hard it was for her to admit it, she needed someone to be strong for her. She always tried to be the strong one, but right now she felt so alone and afraid. The old Lara was gone, and she needed someone to bring her back.
Why did he have to make sure she was constantly reminded during their conversation that she was in prison? Telling her he'd packed her stuff up and put it in storage. Visiting time was her chance for a contact with the outside world, not time to mope about and feel sorry for herself. She had plenty of time to do that the rest of the time. She'd asked him about his new girlfriend, trying to get him to talk about normal things, but he didn't seem to want to talk. Thanks so much, Dillon, she thought. It was just her, and it made her feel sick.
She entered her cell, and slowly sat down on the bed. She turned the envelope over in her hands, wondering whether to open it now. She wanted to open it and find a friendly letter that would make her laugh and feel a bit better. But she was worried that she would find a letter talking about being in prison, and how hard it must be, which would just prove to make her feel even worse. The latter was most likely, she decided. She got up slowly, and put it on the side with some of her other things. She'd open it another day. Time didn't really matter in here - it wasn't like she'd see Anna, and have to comment on something she said.
"Why'd you do it?" Lara jumped, looking around her quickly. "Up here." She looked up to the top bunk, where her roommate lay.
"They discharged you so soon?"
"They don't care about us, you'll soon learn that. Why'd they want to keep me in?" Lara sighed, knowing that Amber should have been properly observed for longer. "So, why'd you do it?"
"Do what?"
"Save me, you idiot. What else?"
"It's my job, it's what I do," she explained, sitting back down on the bed.
"Your job?" A laugh came from above her. "You're a prisoner love, you don't have a job."
"They can't stop me being a doctor, even if they stop me practising as one."
"I wanted to die." Lara gasped, as the face of her roommate appeared next to her: she was leaning over the edge of the bunk. "Scare you did I? Let me tell you something: you have to learn round here to do what people want. Otherwise people hate you. And I hate you. You took the last thing I had away from me, and that was death."
"At least you had a chance to choose," Lara whispered, really wishing she could just punch this woman right now.
"Yeah, that's the one thing I get to choose." She lifted herself back up onto the bunk, and lay there while continuing to talk. "But I don't get to choose the things that matter, and you don't either. I don't get to choose what my family thinks of me. I don't get to choose whether I'll still have someone waiting for me when I get out of here. And I know I won't. You won't either." She pointed towards the picture on the wall. "Mr. Handsome there won't be waiting for you. He'll find a replacement quick as you can say 'I love you.' Who wants to be associated with a criminal, after all?"
"He won't be waiting for me, but not for the reasons you think."
"What, he already left you?" She snorted, making Lara shudder. "Gone off with another woman before you even got in here? You need to get over him - why bring a photo of someone who cheated on you!"
"He's dead," she said, quietly and slowly.
"What, it wasn't him you killed was it? My goodness, you have a picture of the person you killed? And they allowed you to bring it too?"
"Just SHUT UP!" Lara yelled, finally losing her cool. "Is this some kind of sick joke to you? Because I suggest you leave it before you make me do something I'll regret later."
"Ooh, I could tell what crime you're in for even if I didn't know already."
"You don't know me, you don't know the reasons behind my being here, and as far as I can tell you don't have a clue about how to treat a fellow human being."
"Maybe that's why I'm in here," she said matter-of-factly, and Lara could just see her smirking. "You don't know me either, do you?"
"I know you felt strongly enough about something to try to kill yourself."
"And I know you feel strongly enough about something to cry about it. We all deal with things in different ways."
"People who try to kill themselves are quitters and time wasters."
"People who cry are weaklings."
"Maybe I have a reason to be weak."
"Maybe I have a reason to quit." They were both silent, unsure what to say now, or if there was even anything to say.
Lara lay on her back staring at the bottom of the mattress above her. She realised that she was acting like a stereotypical prisoner, arguing with the other inmates. The person talking wasn't the Lara she was, it was some stranger she'd suddenly turned into, and she didn't like her at all. She could barely remember a time when she'd been happy, and able to easily laugh about things. And anytime she remembered something like that, it brought on a bad memory too. She couldn't help wishing that her life had been simpler. That she hadn't been determined to study medicine, hadn't been rebellious and gone to Sierra Leone, and had never met Patrick. Life would be so much simpler, and nicer. So much less hurt, and more happiness, something which she was in real need of right now. She could have stayed in Melbourne and been an accountant: her parent's still would have been just as proud of her as they were of her being a doctor. And they wouldn't have to deal with their daughter being in prison. She wouldn't be happy if she wasn't a doctor though, she thought. But she was hardly happy now, was she?
Unable to bear the silence in the room any longer, she got up from the bed, and picked the letter up. She'd go somewhere where there were more people and read it.
As she made her way to the door, Amber spoke. "Mr. Handsome: what happened to him?"
"He was killed in a car crash."
"Do you still love him?" She nodded. "I'm sorry."
"Thank you," she said hoarsely, amazed at this sudden show of compassion.
"Don't read this the wrong way. I still hate you, Aussie bitch." Lara smiled as she opened the door and walked out: the first real smile since she'd entered the prison.
***Fin***