Divas Prison Ch14
Charlotte was sitting by herself, writing a letter home, her family had all but disowned her after the tragedy that took her brother and sent her to prison. That wasn't going to stop her trying to rebuild the bridges between them. That did include her father, who ran the prison, but not to get better treatment, just to rebuild the father/daughter bond. She didn't want him to treat her any different, as it already had risked her being able to bond with the women she had to share her space with. She had already had arguments with him for trying to do so, he had agreed that the guards would not look out for her any more than they did anyone else. Her friendship with Paige had not started off on the best foot as they locked her in her cell just for helping out. She wanted to make sure that didn't happen again. The two had put it behind them and had got on well since, but she didn't want to risk alienating her and the others she might lose at the same time. She didn't feel like she needed protecting anyway, she felt she could handle whatever she needed to, especially with Paige and others watching out for each other now. It had gone down worse with The head guard, who everyone else called 'Sting' but she knew as Steve, as he had worked with her dad for a long time and had visited her house many times. Now he was 'Sir'. He'd wanted to protect her, knowing what can happen and what he'd seen in his years of service. He too, had argued with the warden over this. Charlotte had been able to hear them in his office while she was doing the admin job she was assigned.
"You don't care that it's your child?"
"She doesn't want it, and I don't want you to do it. She's got to serve her time, just like every other woman in my prison!"
"You want to risk losing her too?"
"That won't happen, not if your people do their jobs right from now on, and we don't have another incident like before."
"Sir, that was investigated and all officers involved were written up, it will not happen again."
"I know that, and the matter is closed, but it still was a lapse we won't allow to happen again. Focusing on any one prisoner can affect the running of the block."
"Yes sir, I know that, but..."
"And we don't want other prisoners to know who she is, right?"
"Of course."
"So that's it, from here on, she's just another inmate, same rules as anyone else. You can consider it an order from the warden, or a request from a friend, but it needs to happen."
"Ok, I'll make sure all A block guards are aware."
"Thank you Steve, now, let's move on to better conversations, let's have a drink."
Charlotte couldn't hear much from that as the conversation was at normal volume and much harder to hear from where she was working. She was relieved that she could expect normal treatment when in the cell block. Her identity had been found out, which was the one thing she didn't want to happen, because she feared she'd be intimidated or coerced into getting her father to do things or even used as bait to get him to do things by threatening her safety. She'd got lucky that the group who knew were rational in the way they went about it and nobody else, not even the guards or her father, knew that they knew and they'd agreed to keep it between them. Since then they had been friends to her as much as they could, and Charlotte hoped to be able to thank them all properly for that someday.
"Mind if we join you?" Charlotte looked up to see Natalya and Becky arriving at the table, they sat down, not that she was going to stop them.
'Writing home? Becky asked, spotting the letter.
"Yeah, I've written what feels like the same letter home a few times now. To my Mom and the whole family. They haven't written back but that's ok. I don't think they know what to say to me yet. Hopefully one day they will."
"Of course they will, it just takes time, don't try and force it." Natalya said, Becky nodded her agreement. "She's right, just keep positive, for them and for you."
Charlotte looked at her letter and tore it up. "I think you're right, if I keep pushing them, they'll just end up resenting me more. I can wait. One thing they did tell me is that I've got nothing but time now. Anyway, I think I need to change the subject. Where are Paige and Emma? She's not working again is she?"
"No, she actually isn't in the kitchen today, she's in our cell." Natalya said. "Haven't seen Paige though, Becky?"
"She went to shower, sure she'll be with us in a minute."
They spotted Paige return from the shower area just a little while later. Before any of them could flag her down, she disappeared into her cell. Natalya considered going to get her to try and get another card game going, it had proven popular among them, even more since Charlotte joined them, since they really needed four and Emma was working so often, and today she'd asked for space and time to herself. She didn't get the chance to get to her as she heard a noise from her cell that sounded like things getting thrown around, like the guards did when they searched the block. Paige then flew out the door like she was escaping a fire, she clocked eyes with them briefly, then turned sharply and went down to Natalya and Emma's cell. She went inside and the two of them came out not long after, heading for the rest of them. Emma got there first, "look out, she's on a rampage." She said as she sat down. Becky got up so Paige could sit down and tried to perch on the end of her seat afterwards but Paige wouldn't budge so she crouched down at the table. She had a look of disbelief on her face, kind of like she wasn't all there right now. This bothered them all, they didn't want to see her fly off the handle again. "So what's going on? Must be important for you to drag me from my alone time." Emma asked.
Paige looked around the area and said to all of them, very serious but still quietly. "I think that there is a thief among us." Natalya and Emma both let out a little laugh. Paige looked at them in annoyance. "What's so funny?"
"Did you forget where we are? I imagine there are several thieves on this block." Emma said.
"And" Natalya continued, "if memory serves me right, you're the only one at this table here for robbery."
"So what, you're saying I did this to myself? That makes no sense. I thought there was some kind of honour code here?"
"What, 'honour among thieves?' I think you're hoping for a lot. Lita tries to keep the peace with things like this but she's not all powerful, she can be everywhere to enforce it and sometimes things can go, well, missing." Emma said. The smiles had gone now as they could see her annoyance.
"What exactly have you lost?" Charlotte asked.
"I haven't lost anything, someone took my coffee jar."
"Wait, is that it?" Paige shot Charlotte a look that could kill. She got the message. "Right, um, so what are we going to do? What can we do?"
"There's not a lot we can do, not without any proof. We can't go on a manhunt, Lita won't allow that kind of disruption, and if the guards get wind of it, they'll go on their usual power trip." Natalya tried to defuse the situation and calm Paige down.
"I bet it was Sasha, some kind of petty revenge." Paige sounded convinced she'd be the one to do it.
"Nah, not her style, when she does things, she wants as many people to know about it as she can. If she took it, she'd be rubbing it in your face right now." Emma was right, in Paige's mind anyway. "I don't want to go looking for a fight anyway, I just want my coffee back, it was a nearly full jar and it's so expensive." She sounded defeated
"Wow, you really are nuts about your coffee, no wonder Becky goes on about you and it." Charlotte only realised what she said when she saw that everyone else was looking at her. Paige was now looking between her and Becky. "What does that mean? Actually, Bex, you've been incredibly quiet through this whole thing. Do you know something about this?"
"No...I'm not going to stay here and be accused" Becky said in a completely unbelievable way as she started to move off toward her cell.
Paige got it now, she was being made fun of. "Oh yeah, right, and if you believe that, you'll believe anything." She looked back and saw that Natalya and Emma had grins all over their faces. "Oh I'll deal with you two later" and went after Becky, who broke into a run with Paige quickly after, both getting to their cell before a loud call of "WALK!" could, and did come from the guards. The other three were left at the table. Charlotte looked confused. "What did I do?"
Natalya smiled at her. "Don't worry, we wanted to tease her but she found out before we got the chance to tell you what we were up to. Sorry we had to leave you out but that was fun."
"It was." Emma agreed, it may have ended earlier than we planned but she was nearly begging to get it back. 'I just want my coffee back'" her Paige impression wasn't great, but they all got a laugh out of it.
"Should we make sure she hasn't killed Becky?" Charlotte asked.
"Nah, I haven't heard a scream or another crash, I'm sure they're OK. I'm going to get some more rest, it's still my off day from working." Emma got up and went back to her cell. Charlotte watched her go then turned back to Natalya. "Sorry I gave the game away."
"It's fine, we would have told her somehow anyway, before it got real. Next time we'll make sure you're in on it." Charlotte and Natalya then started talking about other pranks they've pulled on people in the past.
"Where is it?" Paige asked Becky.
"Where's what?"
"You know what. Where's my coffee?"
"I have no idea what you're talking about."
"Yeah? Well tell your face, because the smile you've got says otherwise."
"I think the lack of caffeine is affecting your mind." Becky laid down on her bunk, taking care with exactly where she put her arm.
"Yeah, you're really fooling me with that, give it back."
"Give what back?"
"You know what, give it back!" Paige went for broke, dove forwards Becky, getting an arm underneath her just enough to be able to move her and get her hand on the jar, which she pulled out.
"Hey look, you found your coffee jar, I knew nobody had stolen it."
"You're lucky I don't put you in the hospital right now." Paige was now able to see the funny side of all of it, since she had it back now. Becky realised that, and that meant the game was over, this time. "You're not too mad are ya? It was just a little bit of fun."
"You scared me though, taking away my liquid gold, you guys all suck."
"If I knew how you'd react, I'd have done this sooner, you were a mess."
"My nerves are shot, I need a coffee."
"Yeah, that's what you need when you're all up in the air like this, caffeine." Paige stuck out her tongue as she started to prepare it, then stopped. "Does it bother you, the coffee? Charlotte said you were going on about it when she ratted you out."
"Oh no way, I love the smell in the morning, not sure how I did without it."
Paige let out a deep breath, "That's a relief, thought I was going to have to choose between you, not sure you'd have won that one." Becky couldn't be offended, the look on Paiges face showed she didn't mean it seriously either. "So you forgive us?"
"Yeah I do, but I'll get you all back someday."
A/N: Hope you enjoyed reading this chapter. Was meant to be a bit more light hearted than some others. Hoping to do a Xmas chapter next to be up as close to the 25th as possible.
The glitch with views still continues so thank you to those who followed/favourited and reviewed, it's always great to get those notifications but now, if it's possible, it means more as its the only way I know you're there!
The poll for this story is now up on my profile page, it took me a day or two to realise it hadn't worked so wasnt up when I posted the last chapter despite what I wrote. Please do cast your vote on there for what couple (if any) you'd like to see. If there are clear leaders then I may start the ball rolling sooner. You can vote for two characters so you can choose your own pair, or even for there not to be one. I'd be interested to know your reasons if you have any so feel free to say in a review or PM if you prefer. Thank you in advance if you vote.
Hope everyone enjoyed TLC, Raw and NXT. I was obviously disappointed with TLC and Paiges result. Happy to see Roman take the title, he deserves a run with it. Takeover was great. I enjoyed Asuka vs Emma in particular, both deserve to move on to bigger and better things.
Thanks again for reading. Till next time...
