Lawrence visited Beth first. He wasn't sure why, perhaps because he'd known her the longest - for almost three years she had lived in his home, serving him and his wife their every meal, learning their quirks and habits. When he'd first learned of such a renowned chef wasting away in Jezebel's kitchen, it was a no-brainer to recruit her to his household, particularly as Eleanor's failing health made her incredibly particular when it came to food. Beth had been efficient from the beginning, she was sharp and had a bone-dry sense of humour, which he couldn't help but take to.
It was a shame that she would be dead within the next twenty four hours.
"I don't remember ordering room service, you must have the wrong floor" Beth said nonchalantly as Lawrence stepped into the cell.
"They wanted me to tell you that there was an issue with your steak, one of the apprentices overcooked it I'm afraid" he replied, nodding at the Guard to shut the door behind him.
"Hmm" she turned to face him from her seated position on the mattress, and he saw that one eye was completely swollen shut and stained purple from a bruise, "since it's his first offense I only ask that you take one of his fingers"
"As you wish" he nodded dutifully.
A silence fell that would have been awkward had they not been so used to each other's company. Although this time she was looking up at him expectantly - with her one functioning eye - waiting for what he had to say.
"Can I sit?" he asked, already anticipating the pain in his joints when he tried to get back up from the floor.
"Be my guest" she shrugged, and swung her legs to the other side in order to make room. He caught sight of her bare feet, which were littered with angry bloody wounds nearly an inch deep, and felt himself twitch in sympathy.
"If you're here to try to get me to speak; I genuinely don't know where those Handmaids are. But that's not really why I'm here, is it?"
Lawrence sighed heavily and leaned against the wall. He hadn't planned how this conversation would go, although Beth would most likely be the easiest.
"No, you're here to try and persuade June to tell them where the other Handmaids are. It's obvious that she knows, but she's not budging so far, and the beating to your face is just to get extra sympathy points", he explained plainly.
"June's not gonna fold" Beth smirked, "not when she's gotten this far"
"You're probably right"
It was Beth's turn to sigh slightly, and lean back against the wall. This was the closest he'd ever been to her, with their shoulders almost touching, while they both faced forward.
"Good for her" she said simply
"Bad for you" Lawrence prompted. The alliance between women had always been of great annoyance to him, and it was only exacerbated under the regime. He'd seen Commanders send their brethren to the wall for a glance at their wives, while handmaid's happily lost limbs for equally trivial measures. He found himself wishing that Beth was angry, bitter at least, wanted to see her flail her arms and huff as she did so frequently in his kitchen.
"I was getting bored of baking the same loaf of bread every day anyway. You have a painfully dull palette" she said candidly, all the rules of etiquette ofF the table now that she knew that this would be the last conversation between them.
"I'm sorry"
The words fumbled from his mouth on their own volition. He hadn't been planning on saying it - after all, what point did it serve? Even though the sentiment had been buzzing in his chest for years, he'd always found a way to muffle it with sensibilities.
Even Beth was taken aback, her brows shooting up, making premature lines appear on her forehead.
"Fuck off, if you're here to get all emotional I'd rather you did it elsewhere" she retorted sharply, a slight playfulness in her tone. She was giving him space to recover himself, even though it should have been the other way around. For the millionth time since Eleanor's death, Lawrence wondered how he'd become so emotionally inept.
"That's not why I'm here, actually" he defended, and as if she'd read his mind, Beth instantly brightened and held out her course hand expectantly. "You're shameless, you know that? What if I just wanted to pray with you in your hour of need?" he accused.
"Of all the things I've seen in Gilead, watching you try to pray would be it's own form of torture" she teased.
He rolled his eyes, thankful that no one could listen in on this conversation, before pulling out the flask from his breast pocket.
"Now you're talking" Beth gleamed, wasting no time in unscrewing the lid, despite her hands trembling slightly.
She caught him watching her as she took two generous gulps without flinching.
"Now seems like a good time to confess to drinking your scotch when you weren't around" she admitted, not an ounce of regret in her voice.
Lawrence raised his grey brows in surprise, "to think I used to blame that on Cora".
"There's no way Cora would have been that subtle, can you imagine her fumbling about your cellar?"
The corner of his mouth upturned slightly at the image of the former Martha - who could barely walk in a straight line without tripping over.
"Any other sins you committed in my home that you feel the need to confess? Defecating in the flower beds perhaps?" he prodded.
Beth smiled tiredly, mulling the question over. Oddly, she was more relaxed than he had ever seen her, perhaps knowing that you've already suffered through the worst of it, there's nothing left to be afraid of.
"Other than reading your weird Victorian Erotica novels you had lying about the place, I'd say I was pretty decent -except for assisting in the kidnap and escape of 84 children out of Gilead, but you know, I don't think anyone really noticed".
Lawrence rubbed his hands over his face, hoping to shift some of the bone-deep fatigue that had set in.
"Why didn't you get on that plane, anyway?" he questioned,
She shrugged once more, wincing slightly as one her inevitably cracked ribs shifted, "the only Martha's on board were bonded to whichever kid they were taking. It didn't seem right to take up a seat"
"You don't have any family on the outside?" he asked, and her gaze hardened.
"Don't bullshit me, I know the documents of my entire lineage is growing mould somewhere in your office"
She was right, of course. He knew that she was an only child, and both her parents had died years before the war. She'd been engaged twice but never married, and was a career woman in the time before, as so many women had been.
"I only asked in case you wanted to write a letter to someone, I could try getting it out in a couple of months when things settle down" he offered, and she took another swig of the scotch before handing it to him.
"No. There's no one out there waiting for me, and that's fine. Although if I'm being honest you being nice to me is really beginning to weird me out, even if it's only because I've not got long left".
"Jesus Christ, am I really that much of a piece of shit?"
Beth paused for a moment and contemplated her answer.
"I'd say you're one of the nicest Commanders in Gilead"
"Jesus, that is not a compliment" Lawrence winced, imagining the very sentence inscribed on his tombstone.
"It wasn't intended to be," she responded simply.
They sat in silence for a few minutes, long enough for Lawrence to feel the damp air sink deep into his lungs. He briefly considered staying there, waging his bets that Beth would break his nose if he were to fall asleep. Instead, he turned to face her once more.
"Any last words? I don't imagine you'll have much time to catch up before your final hour"
"Tell Sienna I always thought she cooked a better pumpkin soup than me, I never got round to telling her"
"What, is that some secret code of something? Does "pumpkin pie" refer to some bomb you've both planted in the basement?" Lawrence pondered.
Beth smiled tiredly, "Nah, pumpkin pie is just pumpkin pie. The kid is a good chef in training, I just needed someone to nag at all day"
"Got it" He began hoisting himself up from the floor, both his knees popped comically, a screaming reminder of his advancing age. "See you in the next one" he said finally, scanning Beth's face for the last time. She nodded.
Just as he motioned to the guards to open the door, the Martha spoke once more.
"Oh and Joseph?"
He turned to look at her once more, and her one open eye shone with a brazen defiance.
"Hmm?"
"Tell June she owes me one".
Sienna was second. She had been the latest addition to his household as well as the youngest, and the one who's name was most commonly shouted at from across the house, and for no particular reason other than that she was an easy target.
Lawrence had pondered it once a few weeks ago, when in a fit of blind frustration he had thrown a teapot at the spot directly next to Sienna's head. There was something so satisfying about frightening her - perhaps because it was so easy to do. He'd stared at the collection of photographs in her file; there was one of her modestly holding her degree to her chest while dressed in scrubs, one with her younger brother sat on her shoulders and laughing gleefully, the earliest photo was of her as a small child at a wedding, dressed in a sari and staring at the camera somberly. Lawrence guessed it was something about her doe eyes and the innocent intelligence that they possessed. Well, none of it mattered now anyway.
He'd assumed that she would be in a similar state to Beth, with a black eye and broken ribs, instead her wounds were noticeable even though she was turned towards the back wall of the cell.
Her hair had been shaved off.
In her file photographs it was her second most defining feature next to her eyes; a stream of thick raven hair that fell to her waist. Without it, Lawrence thought she resembled a hatchling that had fallen from the nest. She appeared smaller, somehow, and over exposed. The outline of her bony spine pressed against the rags she'd been dressed in, while her arms were wrapped protectively around herself.
When it became clear that she would not turn to face him, he signalled at the guards to close the door once more.
"What, you've forgotten how to greet your own commander?" he said flatly.
He watched her stir slightly, unravelling one of her arms and gradually shuffling around to gaze up at him with eyes that were now haunted with pain.
For the second time, Lawrence found himself sat down on the floor of a cell about a foot away from Sienna. He had the impression that she would go into cardiac arrest if he came any closer.
"I was going to become a doctor" Sienna whispered, her voice hoarse from screaming. Lawrence relaxed slightly; this was a route of conversation he could entertain, even if it bored him, but he owed Sienna being bored.
"Yeah, but isn't this so much more fulfilling, don't you think?" he replied with only a hint of sarcasm in his tone. Beth or June would have responded to his humour, instead Sienna rested her chin on a knobbly knee and stared blankly into the space in front of her. Something about the defeatedness in her gaze made Lawrence suspect that one of the Guards perhaps had his way with her in between the beatings.
"That's why you chose me, because I was smart," she said. It wasn't a question.
"I figured if I have to allow multiple sinful, wayward women into my home, one of them should be trained in CPR" Lawrence confessed.
There was a long silence while he figured the next thing to say, fortunately, he didn't have to.
"H-how long do I have left, Commander?" Sienna asked, his title rolling from her tongue despite her fear.
He sighed and absently scratched at his brow.
"About a day"
She flinched, but did not cry, although a single tear escaped the corner of her eye and trailed determinedly down her narrow face.
"If you're dreading coming home that badly, I'm sure I can arrange for you to be posted elsewhere" Lawrence said brutally. Just as he'd hoped, Sienna whipped around to face him.
"What? B-but the Guard said -"
"That they were going to execute you? And you believed him? Jesus Sienna, get your head out of the sand" he ordered, suddenly the conversation felt entirely routine, as though she had served him the wrong bottle of brandy after dinner.
"Why -"
"It's all a show, I thought you would have figured it out by now, that Lieutenant Stan guy has a real flair for theatrics"
At the mention of Lieutenant Stan, the blood drained from Sienna's face and she glanced at the door, as though he was a demon that could be summoned from words alone. She probably wasn't far off.
Lawrence cleared his throat and continued.
"Tomorrow night they'll drag you and Beth up to the rooftop, fill your head with a high tale about what he's going to do to you so you're both weeping in terror, then he'll bring June up and tell her that if she doesn't fess up to where the other handmaids are, that he'll push the pair of you off the roof"
"But June isn't going to crack, not now she -"
"Of course she won't" he patronised
"Then -"
"What is it with women and their incessant need to talk? It's like a disease with you people. I'm trying to tell you something of grave importance and yet you insist on yapping away" Lawrence lectured, watching as Sienna's expression turned to that of a scolded school girl.
"I'm sorry," she said sincerely.
"Mmm. Anyway, there are nets about halfway down connected to the opposite building, so you'll only end up falling thirty feet, so try not to fall weird because I have no use for a Martha with a broken arm" he explained in a bored tone.
Sienna sat in a stunned silence, yet Lawrence found that he wasn't remotely able to soak in her relief as he was all too aware that it was a vicious lie.
"B-but why? Why am I being spared?" she stammered.
He shrugged, "I told them I have a particular predilection to your pumpkin soup. Besides, we've lost too many Martha's and Handmaids in the last several months"
Sienna slumped against the wall, her eyes suddenly glassy.
"If you think that's good news, have a look at this" Lawrence remarked dryly as he reached into his blazer pocket and unfolded the front page of a newspaper.
She looked at him nervously once she held the crumpled paper in her hand, and he rolled his eyes.
"You think I don't know you have half of my Darwin collection under your bed. Just read it" he ordered.
Her wide eyes scanned the page hesitantly.
"First twins born in the United Kingdom in over a decade celebrate their third birthday" she recited, pausing to examine the photo, which depicted two toddlers - a boy and a girl - laughing uproariously, both pairs of brown eyes gleaming with merriment. "Praise be" Sienna whispered in awe, her chapped lips forming a half smile, but Lawrence still saw the hint of confusion across her features.
"Huh, so you don't recognise them at all?" He said casually, watching as her brows furrowed in confusion.
"No sir I -"
"It's no big deal, it must be what, seven years since you've seen your sister, right? She sure had made quite the name for herself-"
"These - these are Sakshi's babies?" Sienna whispered in the quietest of voices, as though any noise would destroy the earth shattering realisation that she had made. She stared back down at the photograph with a sudden ravenous hunger, breathing in every detail of her niece and nephew; their dark hair, the shape of their brows, the way their chubby hands were held by the other. He watched as tears began to freely fall down her face, and within seconds she was torn between sobbing and laughing with unparalleled joy.
"She's alive then, isn't she? She's with them?" She eventually asked in between hiccups.
"Sure is, from what I've heard she's got a better security detail than the queen of England" he said truthfully.
Feeling that his job was now done, Lawrence fumbled back to his feet - almost falling when Sienna grabbed his hand with surprising rigour. She was too weak to stand, and in an act of obscene gratitude and intimacy, she kissed the back of his hand.
"Whatever" Lawrence dismissed, but his heart wasn't in the rebuttal. He uncurled her fingers from his wrist with a gentleness that betrayed him, and she obliged.
"Thank you, thank you so much Commander" She said in earnest, her face was transformed by a hopeful glow.
"Yeah well, I want the best meal of my life when you get home, no doubt I'll be in a very particular mood"
She nodded dutifully, still smiling.
That was how he left Sienna; weeping as she switched between clutching the paper to her chest and bringing it to her lips to kiss the gleeful faces of her niece and nephew. Lawrence tried to feel soothed by the knowledge that it would be their image that would be burned into Sienna's mind in her final moments, right before her head smashed against the pavement.