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| Cleanup Time - The Nikki Wade Retrial; Bad Girls Judge John Deed crossover fic | |
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| Tweet Topic Started: Aug 22 2007, 07:08 AM (13,915 Views) | |
| Cassandra | Aug 27 2007, 02:20 PM Post #16 |
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Thanks for another great update, richard. Interesting that they wanted "to give the impression of a ‘level playing field.’". I'm assuming they in this case means the LCD. Anyway I'm curious to know where this story is going! |
![]() You can't control destiny ... but YOU can control this storyline ... by writing a para! HOTCHPOTCH - A Helen & Nikki Story with a difference (click to enter)
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| richard | Aug 28 2007, 07:20 AM Post #17 |
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Hi Cassandra, thanks for the feedback. This next part borrows from the last episode of Series 3 and manages to be a springboard of what is to come. I understand that I am spending time with the John Deed characters but I'm building this up around the Nikki Helen storyline to come so please bear with me. Claire Walker comes more to the fore in this fic. Scene Four Claire Walker had slept like a log after the built up tension and the celebration of Nikki’s successful appeal. The trial had taken place on a Friday and the weekend following passed in a blurred haze and minimal physical activity. It was only as she got ready for work the following Monday that she realized that the court case had been and gone. Up till then, it had absorbed all her energies and consumed every sense of the future. There was a curious sense of something missing in her life, that life couldn’t return to the mundane and commonplace as she slipped on her suit jacket. Despite her unassuming nature, she couldn’t resist buying a couple of newspapers from a passing newsagent and slipped them under her arm. It gave her a curious feeling and that, when she got to work, one very bulky file could be finally laid to rest. She opened the solid old-fashioned oak door of the group practice where she worked as a comparatively junior partner. It had made itself a tidy reputation, which was now much enhanced. When she entered the office, she was greeted by a row of smiles. This disconcerted her. All she had somehow expected was to come to work to do a normal day at the office. “Well done, Claire. The firm is proud of you.” Claire found her hand gripped and pumped up and down by the senior partner, Jim Patterson. The tight smile on his face was matched by his smart shiny suit and his cold blue eyes. “I’m only too glad that there was a successful outcome. I’m sure the firm will benefit from such a high profile case.” In the ambitious pecking order of eager young, thrusting solicitors, Claire Walker found that her natural gifts of imperturbability and diplomacy were invaluable. Her talents would speak for themselves in the cases that she handled and not in boosting her public reputation. She turned to all the others who greeted her in various degrees of effusiveness and sincerity. After that, the day quietened down for Claire Walker as she entered her office, which was neat and airy. It overlooked a quiet side street situated a little distance from the heart of the City of London. She could have let this success go to her head but she carried on in her normal unpretentious fashion as prospects opened up for the routine criminal trials for assaults and robberies. She was greeted by her warm-hearted mumsy secretary who organized her work with quiet efficiency. “I’ve given your files and all your work a good spring clean. There’s not much to look at which is just as well as you look tired.” Claire smiled freely at the other woman’s thoughtfulness. It enabled her to look at the papers with a clear conscience. She rifled through the typical respectable broadsheet, which had devoted a small column on page 7 to the case. FREE AT LAST “There were sensational developments at the Court of Appeal over Ms Wade’s original sentence for killing DC Gossard. Lawyers acting for Ms Wade have been challenging her conviction for murder. Fresh evidence was presented so that the original conviction for murder was reduced to manslaughter. Ms Wade, having served a three-year sentence has left the court a free woman. Ms Wade was quoted as saying ‘It goes without saying that I’m delighted to be set free. Prison’s a terrible place. People don’t know the half of what goes on. There’s male officers employed on female residential wings, abusing vulnerable women.’ A spokesman for the Home Office was unavailable for comment.” She sighed with mild exasperation at the modest placing in the reporting of the day’s news. The case must matter more than the editor thought. Next, she took out the broadsheet and immediately, she wished she hadn’t. Her stomach heaved when the spiteful vindictive headline assaulted her sentence. The article, which followed, was sheer prejudice, dressed up in polite language. CONSTERNATION AS LESBIAN COP KILLER IS FREED. “The controversial decision of the Court of Appeal to free Miss Wade, notorious cop killer, into the community has given grave cause for concern. She had been jailed for life for a particularly cold-blooded murder of a well-respected member of the police force which expert opinion considered was a particularly open and shut case. Sources close to the Home Secretary questioned just how much licence the judges should have in the modern age when traditional authority is flouted and the streets of England are not safe from crime. If judges are unable to keep their more irresponsible members in order, then it may be the case that legislation may be needed to curtail their powers.” Claire threw the paper away. She remembered the original lurid reporting of Nikki’s original trial and life sentence on page 1 of this tabloid. It was obvious that they were eager to pander to the bigoted audience it imagined to exist out there whereas in reality, it fed them with the poison which it had given them the appetite for. Some distance away, other equally concerned eyes studied the newspaper with great concern. “I don’t like the look of this one bit,” fumed John Deed in his chambers as his hands crumpled the newspaper. Coope, his personal assistant had, of course, seen the newspaper and looked on in some concern. Her approach to him was somewhat ambivalent. On the one hand, her attitude was somewhat maternal as if he were her wayward son who could recklessly get himself into trouble, both in his personal and professional life. On the other hand, her astute nature enabled her to secure through the listings office cases that she knew ought to come his way. They made a good combination as her superficially serious and correct manner concealed her talent for the creatively unorthodox. She had maintained her position with the tenacity of a limpet and so far, Lawrence James had not detached her from her master. One ace that she had up her sleeve was that there was no other personal assistant that would fit John Deed’s idiosyncratic ways. She was not surprised that John suddenly got up to his feet and strode out of his chambers with that suggestion of violence of manner. His face was set hard with anger as he headed for the chambers of a fellow judge, Monty Everard, who raised his eyebrows as John burst in, brandishing the newspaper. “Have you seen that the gutter press is saying about the Nikki Wade appeal?” Monty Everard was a stiff natured, touchy man who was reasonably willing to help grease the wheels of the machinery of justice and not rock the boat. It was no secret that he regarded John Deed as a bit of a maverick. “If the press are giving us a lashing, then it could be argued that some of your outlandish judgments have given them ready ammunition.” “Monty, will you listen to a reasoned point of view. For once, this article does not relate to a case that I handled or influenced in any way. You can hardly say that Huntley is the sort of judge that likes upsetting the apple cart.” “You mean like you John.” “Be that as it may, Huntley must have had very good reason to make the judgment as he did. He could have possibly pushed it further as I might have done. This isn’t an attack on me but all of us.” “You mean,’all for one and all for one,’” scoffed Monty. “Well, it could be you next time. Just how comfortable are you with making a judgment and being sniped at in the press? You can hardly say that our beloved Home Secretary is our natural defender and you know that the Lord Chancellor will sit on the fence. These days, we are right out there in the open.” Monty Everard paused for reflection. He had a contempt for the press, the gutter press most of all and also disliked public controversy. He knew Huntley and had to admit that the man was sound. If the Times had denounced Deed, it wouldn’t have come between him and his sleep as Deed positively courted and relished controversy. Huntley was different. “We must seek out Joseph Channing and make some preliminary enquiries though I don’t exactly want to make a public spectacle where it isn’t needed,” he pronounced in measured tones. John let the other man lead the way and of his former father in law who was a Senior Appeal Court judge. Relations between the two of them were frosty, both on the personal level and in their political outlooks. He laid the blame on John in the breakdown of the marriage of his beloved daughter and considered that the man let his emotions ruin his understanding and application of the law. “What can I do for you, Monty? Oh, I see John is with you.” “Is that a problem, Joe?” “No, oh no, you can both take a seat, take a seat. A cup of tea perhaps or would you prefer something stronger?” Joe Channing was disconcerted by the challenge and ingrained courtesies automatically covered took over. His favourite tipple was finest malt whisky. Monty accepted the offer with a gleaming eye while John declined. In matters of food and drink, he was perversely abstemious in relation to both his restless nature and likewise the general preference of his peers for hard liquor. His manner was that of some old time actor and he rumbled when he spoke with a very expressive intonation in his voice, a million miles away from the standard BBC announcer “I suppose you’ve come about that article in the gutter press?” “We have, Joe. It raises some cause for concern.” “As you know, I never pay heed to the gutter press as a rule. I’d lay odds that it was some junior hack flying a kite. After all, it says ‘sources close to the Home Office.’ It does not name him. He probably made it all up to boost sales as they’d had a bad week. Sensation sells those kind of papers, that and page 3.” John rolled his eyes and chafed impatiently while the other two men had that disinterested abstracted manner of an Oxford debating society. For all their learning, they seemed to be political innocents. In their efforts to further their careers, they were blind to the steadily encroaching power of the establishment. “You think so?” asked Monty, willing to be reassured. “I’m positive. Some hothead will be carpeted by his editor and he will know how to behave himself in future.” Murmuring sounds of mutual reassurances signified the concensus on the matter. At that point, John decided that he had to spoil the party. “What if the journalist got a tip off from the Home Secretary to judge if he could chance their arm.” “It wasn’t in the Times,” proclaimed Joe Channing, self-importantly. “There is a world that exists outside the Times. In any case, conspiracies are never launched on their front page. It gives away the advantage of surprise.” “Stuff and nonsense.” “So if I am the victim of an over active imagination and my suggestion is so absurd, it won’t do any harm to have a quiet word with Neil Haughton. It would set my mind at rest so that I can adopt a cool, relaxed approach to the world,” John urged in silken tones. They were trapped. Monty and Joe Channing exchanged glances, expressing their discomfort. “Perhaps I might make the approach as I am the most concerned of the three of them.” “You will not,” argued Joe Channing with twice the force of character than he appeared to have on first acquaintance. It was fear of the consequences that roused him to action.” I will ask him myself. I think that I can trust to my sense of diplomacy than yours. There are ways of handling these delicate matters.” John let it go. He could do no more and his concern was that the minister would have all the false guile of a second hand car salesman. The problem was that Joe Channing wanted to believe there was nothing untoward. “Bastards,” snapped Nikki concisely in disgust.” They never give up do they.” “Hush now sweetheart,” Helen urged.” That’s the establishment throwing the rattle out of his pram. The case didn’t go the way they wanted so they’re venting their spleen at you. You’re free and you’ve got the job you were after. In a day or two’s time, all it will be used for is wrapping up fish and chips and that hack journalist will find something else to write about. Forget about them and move on.” The tensions in her body evaporated as Helen embraced her. She was right. They weren’t worth bothering about. |
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| Cassandra | Aug 29 2007, 12:21 AM Post #18 |
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Thanks, richard. Keep the updates coming!This made me laugh! :lol: |
![]() You can't control destiny ... but YOU can control this storyline ... by writing a para! HOTCHPOTCH - A Helen & Nikki Story with a difference (click to enter)
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| richard | Aug 29 2007, 06:16 PM Post #19 |
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No problem, Cassandra. I'm glad you liked that bit. I've got one more Judge John Deed to come part before I switch back to Helen and Nikki. |
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| richard | Aug 30 2007, 07:21 AM Post #20 |
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This scene is archetypal John Deed, which does show his capacity to rock the boat just like a well known BG character. I freely admit to borrowing the last bit from the TV series as George Channing is so good to write for but this all sets the scene for what is to come. Scene Five Joe Channing had mixed emotions in setting off with Monty to confront Neil Haughton. He was an elderly patrician whose lifetime orbit of the judiciary made him feel ill equipped in dealing with the ruthless men of the political world. It was not what he was accustomed to. At one time, everyone knew his place and the system moved forward in an amiably paced fashion. Everyone he knew went to the right schools and universities and it was a guarantee of good behaviour. He was uncomfortably aware that his world had been taken over, a bit at a time, and life was changing, going to the dogs as that old fashioned phrase had it. He was only half convinced of the necessity of the visit. Surely some grubby little hack had been acting over zealously. Monty wasn’t really relishing the occasion and both men greeted John curtly when he strolled into the room. “I can see that you are both worried. Perhaps I can also come along for the ride,” John added in soft, nonchalant tones. “That is likely to make matters worse. You know that he loathes the sight of you and your quarrels with George haven’t improved your standing,” snapped Joe Channing testily, his eyebrows riding up and down. “Is that my standing in Haughton’s eyes? I never knew that he was such an exemplar and a paragon of virtue,” drawled John deliberately lightly. “If you do the talking, you will get nowhere with him. It needs someone with a sense of diplomacy, some savior faire,” Joe insisted. John could sense that the other man was digging in his heels and offered an option that he could get away with. “I suggest a fair compromise, Joe. I’ll stay in the background and only make a few helpful suggestions, only if I absolutely have to. I can be discreet if I want to.” “Just remember, John that the status of the negotiating team is decided by status,” Monty cut in nastily.” That makes you a definitely junior member of this …group.” John thrust his hands in his pocket and nodded calmly. He had a feeling that he could insinuate his presence no matter what the other two had decided. He agreed to tag along with the others for the moment while Joe made the necessary phone call. Joe hailed down a black cab and directed it to Neil Haughton’s offices in the new block of offices outside the Houses of Parliament. They were duly frisked at the entrance to ensure that they weren’t international terrorists while John took in the opulence of modern brickwork and glass, and the dining areas where no expense was spared. They zoomed up on the lift, were shown to the first room on the right and entered. “Ah Joe,” Neil greeted them, a dazzling smile on his face and hand outstretched, greeting first Joe and then Monty. His smile stayed frozen on his face but his eyes turned cold as John came into view and his greeting perfunctory. Joe took the chair nearest the Minister. “Ahem, ahem, we’ve come to see you on a rather delicate matter which we hoped a friendly chat might resolve amicably.” “That’s what I’m here for,” came the utterly insincere reply in his best soothing tones. “Quite by chance, we caught sight of a front page article in a gutter rag. We thought that possibly, some overenthusiastic cub reporter got overexcited but some of us thought it would be best to check, from the horses mouth as it were.” The slippery man’s mind immediately put two and two together and waited to see what this old dodderer wanted. “I’m only too happy to put your minds at rest if I possibly can.” There was a pause as the Minister’s reply only served to confuse Joe Channing further. Monty was no help in coming to the aid of the party while John longed to jump in with both feet. “It’s that it was suggested that there were suggestions to restrict the right of judges to pass sentence. Now, you know that, if such an idea were serious, it would upset some of the brethren. They would feel unsettled, yes unsettled.” “Now, now, Joe, I can assure you that I at any rate have no plans to curtail the power of judges. They have a very right and very proper function in upholding the rule of law. Where would we be without their learned ways?” Neil pronounced, visibly fitting the frame of a television party political broadcast round himself. “The article did quote ‘sources close to the Home Secretary.’” Monty said mildly. “Well, you’re talking to the genuine article and I can give you my personal assurance that is simply no reason to make any changes. What’s the point, I ask you?” “You can?” a very flustered Joe Channing said, totally taken aback. He was prepared for a bit of an argument and now the wind was taken clean out of his sails. “I’m always having problems with the press in getting just a bit over zealous. Someone, somewhere in the vast department that I run floats a suggestion off the top of his head and, next day, the press are door stepping me about a matter which I haven’t the faintest idea about it.” “Dear me, how very inconvenient.” John said at last, fighting a losing battle with his urge to give voice and let rip. “Yes, very,” Neil replied in a less oily tone of voice, struggling to suppress his feelings of anger. It was the stock in trade of his profession to trade honesty of self-expression for material advantage. “I’d pass the word round that there is plenty of room for a natural understanding between the Home Office and the learned judges of this country. All of us are there to help the hard working men and women, yes and children too, to sleep peacefully in their beds tonight.” “And how do you see the work of the prison service,” John slipped in his retort just before an overflow of fuzzy bonhomie could sweep all before them.” Just out of interest.” “Well, I won’t beat about the bush. I’ve only recently taken over and I can see that there is a misplaced liberalism in the higher echelons of the home office, an over concern with prisoner’s rights. It’s all very well in its way but it tends to overlook with the rights of victims. It’s of great personal concern to me, from the letters I receive from my constituents, and I intend to make this my personal crusade.” “Quite,” mouthed Joe Channing, smiling nervously.” So long as we have an understanding.” “Oh yes, we understand each other very well. I’d like to talk longer but I really have to get on with my work. The life of a busy minister never ends, you know.” Joe exchanged glances with Monty and, after a little while, both raised themselves to their feet in stages. John sprang to his feet. He wanted to get out into clean, unpolluted air and with congenial company but couldn’t resist one parting shot. “Oh, next time you see George, tell her that I enjoyed my last meeting with her.” Neil Haughton looked murderously at John, his false veneer being brutally stripped from him, revealing the petty minded, vindictive, egomaniac for all to see. It wasn’t an attractive sight but John wasn’t expecting any better. John smiled impishly and headed for the door followed by an apologetic Joe and Monty. Everyone remained silent until they got through security and then the two other men rounded on John. “Did you have to aggravate that man after we were doing so well to create a harmonious working relationship and preserve our independence. Just out of petty spite, you risk jeopardizing our position.” “That was shoddy behaviour, John, damned shoddy.” Monty stormed. John laughed out loud. The matter was serious but he needed some light relief. “We have let that man bamboozle the pair of you with a promise that isn’t worth the weight of air that it is breathed upon. An utter reactionary will set his foot on the prison service and will bind us to his project. Surely, you could see what he was getting despite his weasel words. You two have given notice that you will be craven accomplices.” “Now, now, John, you are going too far. You are letting your emotions get the better of you.” “Time will tell,” John shot back at the other two.” What I’m gravely afraid of is that ‘that man’ will make his moves, bit by bit, and you and the others won’t see it until its too late. If nothing else, do you really want the apparatchiks of the LCD telling you how to do your job?” John could see that he had struck a chord. He could see that they were both having second thoughts and becoming uncomfortably aware that they had got less out of the conversation than they had thought. The problem was they didn’t want to lose face. “We’ll think about it John. It would be unfair and unwise not to pay heed to your remarks.” “And if they cross that line which I think I sense that both of you have marked out, you will consider that sterner action is required?” pursued John relentlessly. “If the time is right, should the need arise, John,” Joe Channing finally conceded, half annoyed and half alarmed at the frightening vista John opened up before his eyes. “I shall hold you to your word on this,” John said, his presence commanding in the power of his words. The edicts of the Old School Tie, unwritten but nonetheless all powerful, spoke through John’s voice. Yes, they had committed themselves, however vaguely and reluctantly. Hours later, John lay on the sofa on his front lounge. He was eating the last remnants of a Chinese takeaway, in defiance of the meat and mashed potato diet and because he felt like it. His eyes were glued to an old black and white American western and gunfire and shouts echoed in the front room and held him captivated. He had a positive weakness for such films. “Are you trying to make your position even more untenable than it is already?” The female voice that burst in on his consciousness from somewhere above him broke his concentration. That aristocratic anger and the lack of consideration could have come from only one person, John’s ex wife George (short for Georgia) Channing and mother of their child Charlie Deed. George was a QC but engaged in the highly lucrative field of civil cases, having earned a solid reputation as a tenacious and dependable advocate. She had longish blond hair, a curved aristocratic nose, large blue eyes, a short temper and a willful personality. She and John had parted acrimoniously some years ago yet it did not stop John from admiring her elegant figure and flirting outrageously with her to defuse her anger. “You mean, my encounter with Lover Boy and hearing his not so subtle megalomaniac plans to shackle the judiciary to the over mighty executive.” “That’s not what Daddy told me,” George retorted defiantly, rising to the bait that John dangled in front of her in his sneering, sarcastic reference to the all-powerful Minister. “The man is a modern day politician, someone whose ethics would fit inside a matchbox, with all the matches left inside it. Don’t believe a words he says, just unscramble his twisted and inadequate version of the English Language.” “Oooohhh,” stormed George in a fit of rage with the sound of the Great Western hurtling through a railway tunnel at high speed at John’s dig at her boyfriend.” I suppose you think he is engaged in a ‘conspiracy’ like all those cranks who spout on about Kennedy’s assassination. I suppose it pays some publisher a nice fortune.” “It sounds perfectly feasible. My concern is that too many of the brethren are insular, self-centred or have no stomach for a fight when needed,” John replied in languid tones, still trying to watch the TV programme. George grabbed the TV remote control and clicked the programme off just to annoy John. “You’re only going to sound like some tiresome man carrying placards shouting out that ‘The End of the World is Nigh,” she retorted with heavy-handed sarcasm. “You know, you’re awfully attractive when you’re angry. You’ve still got great legs.” John silkily replied, lying on the sofa and looking up at her swirling green cocktail dress. “You’re still insufferable, John. I suppose that you have not listened to a single word I’ve been saying. Just this once I’ve given you good advice not to be so pompous and self righteous and there’s nothing in it for me.” “You’re quite right, I haven’t listened, at least not to anything that you say to help Lover Boy.” “In which case, I have nothing more to say. Goodbye.” With that, George threw the remote control into a corner of the room and stormed out in a swirl of back draft. John got up, retrieved the remote control and switched the programme back on. |
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| Lizi | Aug 30 2007, 10:28 AM Post #21 |
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G3 Curtain and Duvet!
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ive just caught up with this, its really good, keep going thanx Richard!
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| Cassandra | Aug 30 2007, 05:55 PM Post #22 |
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Thanks, richard. Great piece of John Deed indeed!
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![]() You can't control destiny ... but YOU can control this storyline ... by writing a para! HOTCHPOTCH - A Helen & Nikki Story with a difference (click to enter)
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| richard | Aug 30 2007, 06:58 PM Post #23 |
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It's really fantastic to have this feedback, not least if my John Deed characterisation works and hopefully if readers can see the fic as a panorama of both sets of characters and feel them interact as they will do. |
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| richard | Sep 1 2007, 08:10 AM Post #24 |
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As a complete contrast to the political storm brewing up, this is a pure romantic Helen and Nikki scene. I am grateful to the Series 3 discussions which have had an input into this scene. Scene Six To Nikki, things looked better in the morning. Before her sleepy eyes opened, she had dreamed that she was back in Larkhall, lying on a thin hard bunk and discoloured scratchy blankets on top of her and facing the drab yellow brickwork of the opposite wall. Instead, her world changed so that she was floating on a soft white double bed and a fresh white duvet rested gently on her skin. Most delicious of all, Helen’s straight nose, soft cheeks, parted lips and straight brown hair faced her. Nikki lay back in their bed sighing with relief. Everything was normal in her world, reassuring. She could forget about the newspapers as Helen said quite rightly. They were history while their future was just opening out around them. She glanced sideways and the intensely cold November sky looked through a gap in the curtain at them. She cuddled up close to Helen and drifted off happily to sleep. First thing in the morning was bright and cheerful. They each sipped a steaming hot mug of coffee while condensation ran trickles of moisture down the windows. Nikki’s heart was so full to bursting that the words came out of her. “I’m just so happy, darling. I never thought that life could be so perfect.” “You must know how amazing it has been in just a few days living with you. We can go for a walk if we want to, go to the pictures, go to a pub and do the sort of ordinary things couples just take for granted? Everything has been so magical, like walking on air. Everything seems so brand new. At one time, the prospect frightened me- you remember when we kissed and cuddled in the library?” Nikki smiled warmly. She remembered. What was fascinating was how the words just poured out of Helen in a stream of emotion. “You’re a completely different lover to anyone I’ve ever known.” “I hope you mean better ……” “You’ve always been so honest with me, whether I’ve liked it or not. I know now that it’s the only way to be. I feel different, talk different and act differently than I’ve ever been before but it’s taken a lot of getting used to.” “You’re talking about men,” Nikki answered eagerly but there was a lurking fear in her eyes, which Helen spotted straightaway. “This is important, Nikki. I have to stay with this one while it’s on my mind. Bear with me.” The gently pressure on Helen’s hand from Nikki’s reassured her. “You must know that, if I have a fault, I’m a bit of a flirt. I can’t understand or explain it. It meant with my looks and not knowing better, the boyfriends in my past. I can see now that what I was doing was playing a part, of acting in the way that I expected men would want me to be to be attractive. The other half of me that really wanted to prove myself and do some good in the world……..I really used to be a pretty mixed up girl.” Helen added dazedly, shaking her head. She had never revealed herself so much but, curiously, the words came quicker to her lips than her mind could digest the implications. “Playing a part, that’s what I was doing with men. If they got too close or possessive, it made me back off. ‘There’s plenty of fish in the sea,’ ‘I’m young, a carefree single girl,’ I used to tell myself. I never questioned why I behaved that way. I now know the reason why. I never knew what love is- till I met you.” Nikki felt weak at the knees when the full intensity of the other woman’s emotions looked right into her own eyes. Helen placed her forefinger on Nikki’s lips. There was no need for answering. “It meant that I had to unlearn everything I knew about relationships and take a step, a large number of steps into the unknown. That is what scared me. Deep down, I knew what I needed to do but the rest of me took a long time to catch up. Old habits die hard.” “Let’s face it. We never had much of a chance to go somewhere private and talk things over the way we now can if we want to.” “You bet……..which means that we have to talk about our past.” Nikki’s blood was chilled by the quiet determination in Helen’s voice. She knew that the other woman meant every word that she said. The last week had been deliriously happy and serene, all her dreams come true and she didn’t want anything to spoil it. “Do we really have to?” Nikki asked wearily. “We don’t have to but you and I both know that we’ve had a rocky road to get to where we are now.” “That may have been true some of the time but what are you getting at?” “So both of us got hurt along the way. It isn’t a blame thing. We need to heal old wounds, not put sticking plaster over them. I want us to be in the position that nothing holds us back again, ever. I want nothing so much in my life as the rest of my life living with you.” “And you think this is necessary?” questioned Nikki though she flushed slightly at Helen’s bold declaration of faith in their future. Helen had changed markedly ever since she had got out of Larkhall. She expressed herself straightforwardly and exposed her emotions in bold simple unmistakable colours. “I could never order you to do this. I voluntarily gave up that power that I had over you when we met outside your club. I’m simply asking you.” “So where do we start?” Nikki asked, fumbling for a cigarette. She needed something to calm her nerves. In turn, Helen’s eyes flicked nervously round the room before closing them and gathering her thoughts together. “When we were at Larkhall, we had to watch every step, how certain it was that someone or other would come through the door and risk us being ‘outed.’ I felt that I had to wear a permanent rubber mask and almost pretend to be someone else so that I could keep my hands off you. The only faint trace she had ever had of anything like normal was when we first slept together.” “So what went wrong, Helen? I know I completely lost it when I had that mad idea of going on the run to San Francisco. You were right to drag me back to Larkhall. What you didn’t know was how much being on the outside of those gates suddenly went to my head. On top of that, all those dreams I had of wanting you came true. You’ve no idea of how the combination of the two felt to me.” Helen was taken aback by Nikki’s words. She had never really thought just what it might be like to be shut up as a prisoner. It was all around her but she had never made that imaginative leap. Nikki’s actions made the sense that she could feel rather than some abstract psychological condition that she had read as part of her degree. “I never really thought……you’re right, Nikki”, came her halting reply. “That’s the first time you’ve said that, Helen darling,” came her grinning reply, which made Helen laugh. “There’s a lot of things I’m doing for the first time,” came the wry answer. It helped unlock her thoughts as that interchange helped them break the riddle of what had really gone down between them. The craziness of the riot, for one, started to make sense, as they talked. Together, each one laid a piece in the puzzle that the other one hadn’t known of. So Nikki really didn’t mean to betray Helen’s incredible hard work to get the petition for granting Nikki’s appeal as there were reasons why she acted as she did. So Helen’s remoteness from Nikki was more comprehensible when seen through her eyes. More than anything else how ironical it was that each of them was trying to contain the madness that had been unleashed from opposite ends. “What you didn’t know Nikki,” said Helen thoughtfully,” was just what it took to manoeuvre the petition through the home office. You take a look at the wider picture. You’ll remember that I came back to Larkhall doing reports into just why Britain has the highest proportion of women lifers in Europe. Therefore, there are those in the Home Office with my kind of politics…and yours when I come to think of it. You’re only going to ask a particular question when you suspect there may be an answer and not one that the ‘hang them and flog them’ brigade want to hear. Then again, there were those in the Home Office that welcomed some young keen progressive getting to reshape how prisons should be run. I wouldn’t have got my chance unless someone on high was willing to give me a chance, especially as I never hid my opinions and especially when I got the job of acting Governing Governor. On the other hand, there are the reactionaries. You remember when Shell, Denny and Shaz escaped? There was an enquiry led by Area and I came under the spotlight when this very dodgy diary written by Shell Dockley was in their hands.” “Dockley writing a diary? Some chance,” exclaimed Nikki in disgust. “There was a definite attempt to stitch me up and no guesses as to which bastard helped her out. However, he overreached himself and they had to look around for another scapegoat, first ensuring that no blame attaches itself to them. I remember those two very hard-faced investigators, Alison Warner being one of them and the more dangerous of them being typical of some of those at the top of the shit heap. They have this outlook that, once they make a decision, they can’t be seen to back down. They have this completely macho outlook on being tough on crime and are the last people to present a petition to. The worst of it was that I was working in the dark. I never knew that the person who I thought would be best to approach was going to slam the door in our faces. Once you make a false move, there’s no retrieving that step. I was just incredibly lucky to chance upon that opening and made contact with the right people.” “Jesus, I never knew it was that hard. So that’s why you got so angry with me.” “It’s all right, sweetheart,” Helen whispered tenderly as she instinctively clasped the other woman to her chest. She allowed a decent interval to elapse before plunging onwards. She was feeling more certain of the way ahead. “It shouldn’t have been that way,” exclaimed Helen angrily.” I should have been able to make a straight professional approach and had the case heard fairly on the merits of the case.” “So I really did risk screwing up my appeal.” “You did what you had to do, Nikki. I was in such a wierd position. On the one hand, I had had to struggle so hard with the appeal and the rest of the shit that went down at Larkhall, including Fenner sexually assaulting me and not being able to do a damned thing about it, to finally get all the authority I ever dreamed of from when I first joined the prison service. Everything went to my head until the riot blew up in my face. Then you look off with Caroline…” “The less said about her, the better. I really got used……” came the terse reply. “I couldn’t make head not tail of what was going on and Thomas Waugh was around.” Helen could almost feel the sharp intake of breath on her arm. This was the trickiest area to negotiate. “So, about Thomas,” Helen added with more firmness than she felt. She couldn’t help feeling the other woman’s jumpiness as she held her in her arms. She let Nikki move away a little distance from her as she knew that it was important for Nikki look at her as well as hear her. “I’ve only just worked out what I ever saw in him which I never knew at the time. Do you know just how similar he is to you? He’s got that same gentle irony, he cares, he’s got principles and he’s got a fiery temper when he needs to.” “Worse than me?” Nikki asked incredulously. She had only observed him in a handful of situations and her immediate reaction was that he was no fool. She was pleasantly startled by the way the conversation was going and knew that there was no one better placed than Helen to make this comparison. “The night that Thomas and I split up, just before I was going to order the salmon at some restaurant, I noticed that there was bruising on his knuckles. He said that he’d had a verbal run in with Fenner, just before I’d done the same on my way out of Larkhall. He’d made one wisecrack too many about the two of us and I wouldn’t be surprised that he’d punched Fenner out.” “What? That’s fantastic news,” exclaimed Nikki, laughing. “I thought that would cheer you up. Thomas has one big fault, though.” “And what’s that?” enquired Nikki, casting her mental net around and overlooking what was right under her nose. “The real problem with Thomas was that he is a man and he isn’t you. He could never give me that shiver up the spine just to hear your voice. I went back to playing that part, the same as I ever did. He was happy enough in his role but I wasn’t in mine. He was smart enough to realize what I’d been bottling up and told me in no uncertain terms that ‘I wasn’t being honest with myself.’ He was right.” “So come on, what did you see in me,” Nikki asked mischievously with a half smile on her lips “ Having arrived in the snake pit that was G wing, Larkhall, I knew that I needed allies. I told myself that you would make a great ally on the wing as the one person even more contemptuous of ‘the old boy’s system’ and for the right reasons. I always respected and admired you from afar even if you were a pain in the arse……” The grin with which Nikki received such frankness was an enormous feeling of relief to her. Helen continued speaking slowly and deliberately, inscribing the air between them with all the heartfelt emotion within her. “…….It was when I saw the softer side of you that I really fell for you. I suppose that I’ve never really been in love till I met you only that it took time to work out what love is and for us to be safe to love each other as it is now.” “Come here, Helen.” That delicious feeling ran round Helen’s system to hear those sultry tones. It was the height of pleasure to see those incredible eyes looking into her soul. Everything was cleansed, made whole despite verbalizing a lot of painful memories. She moved closer to Nikki and rejoiced in the glorious thought that nothing and no one could stop them. |
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| Cassandra | Sep 1 2007, 11:30 AM Post #25 |
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Nice one, richard! I love that scene! It's one I always wondered about ... whether they would talk through all their misunderstandings or not. For most of S3, they just didn't get where each other was coming from. I'd like to think that they would have laid the past to rest ... and something very similar to what you have written. Thanks. |
![]() You can't control destiny ... but YOU can control this storyline ... by writing a para! HOTCHPOTCH - A Helen & Nikki Story with a difference (click to enter)
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| richard | Sep 1 2007, 07:47 PM Post #26 |
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Enhanced
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Hi Cassandra, that is a huge compliment from someone who was as active as anyone in the Series 3 discussions, which was a step into sometimes difficult territory. Thanks ever so much.
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| Emms | Sep 1 2007, 10:39 PM Post #27 |
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G2 landing
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Great chapter. They really needed to have that conversation and you handled it very well indeed. Kudos. xoxo Emms |
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I registered at G Wing and all I got was this lousy tshirt. “After my time at Larkhall, I deserve to take it easy for a long, long while. I’ve been there, done it, and worn the bloody T-shirt..."~ Helen in: Unfinished Business by Richard | |
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| richard | Sep 2 2007, 06:38 PM Post #28 |
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Enhanced
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Thanks ever so much, Emms, for the compliment. The trickiest bit to write in this scene was about Thomas and Helen's petition to the Home Office has some resonances with this fic. |
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| LahbibLover | Sep 2 2007, 07:55 PM Post #29 |
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I said SIT IN THAT CHAIR
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Really like the conversation Richard. Kind of reminds me of the letters abzug wrote that we never got see in the series. Thanks
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| richard | Sep 3 2007, 07:19 AM Post #30 |
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Enhanced
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Thanks for that one, Lahbiblover, I remember Abzug's letters and it is possible that those went into the unconscious influences into the writing. This is a distinctly edgy Nikki Trisha piece directly following on from the Series 3 finale Scene Seven Once again, Nikki stood outside the club, where she’d been only two weeks ago. So much had happened since then. She remembered Helen’s feelings and hers of delirious excitement of them. They chattered away to each other to fill in the gaps of what they couldn’t say in the past, and really got to know each other. Most of all she recalled their passionate lovemaking. Somehow, this was different from every relationship she had ever entered into because, after all, they were good friends who had known each other for a long time. It was blindingly obvious to each of them from that intense discussion of a week ago just how incredibly constrained they had lived their lives and how deeply the prison officer / prisoner relationship had distorted the natural balance of their personalities at every turn. Above all, both women knew that, if they had somehow survived the incredible pressures on them, then they were well set up for the long haul. It felt very strange to go further back in time and remember also that she and Trisha had set up this club years ago. What was still vivid in her mind was how much effort and toil she had put into it, just like anything else in her life. In particular, the ‘Chix’ emblem reminded her just how that emblem typified the union that there had been between them. They had worked so hard to scrape the money together and taken that dizzying step into launching their business with no guarentees of anything but bills to pay and the uncertainties that the income to cover them rested on their own efforts and nothing else. They had made a fine partnership as Trisha had a natural business flair and Nikki’s experience of working pubs and clubs gave her the solid grounding in the practicalities of how a club operated. She remembered having given the bar counter one last nervous polish on opening night and wondered if she had done the right thing. Much to their surprise, the club had got off to a flying start as the money came rolling in. There had been more women amongst the teeming hordes of London and further afield who needed that place where they could be themselves and let their hair down after the working day. As she and Trisha found out in talking to them, there were so many of them who pretended to be someone else and were lonely amongst the crowds in which they worked. As Nikki contemplated the past, she couldn’t help thinking of the plain and ordinary concrete wall where she’d first kissed Helen, the first time they were both on the outside of Larkhall. Someone ought to put up a blue plaque on the wall to show how sacred it is in their memories for whenever they passed that way, she thought to herself. This was where her future lay. She felt curiously and inwardly calm and relaxed for what she had to do yet her thoughts kept flitting about at random. Finally, Nikki addressed the here and now and turned her key in the lock to the front door to the club. The feel of the action was unfamiliar, as if she was speaking the words to a language she’d last spoken when she had studied it at school. She didn’t feel more at home with it than when she had just got her freedom. It wasn’t just that sense of dislocation in ceasing to be a prisoner. Nevertheless, she opened the door to do what she had to do. Once inside, she peered through the gloom of the corner of the club. Silence hung on the air along with last night’s tobacco fumes. It was the time to clean up after the celebrations of the night before. A faint trace of the routine wafted its way through to Nikki’s consciousness but only a trace. So many nights had been passed in dancing and drinking while she had been away. Nikki stared at every corner of the club as it brought back memories yet she knew that they felt disjointed from the woman that she now was. That was the problem. “Hi ,Nik,” Trisha called out from the neighbourhood of the bar. It was where she had last seen her, drinking from a bottle of Moet to drown her sorrows while Nikki shot out to catch up with Helen and hope she wasn’t too late. “Hi Trisha. The place hasn’t changed much, hey.” “You probably have.” Nikki nodded silently, her thoughts floating away from the here and now. Trisha was right on the mark. The bare austerity of Larkhall and the mixture of shared hardships and naked injustices had seeped into her soul. It made her past existence as the party girl she used to be as something unreal. Lying in Helen’s arms at night and exploring the wide open world that she offered distanced her from this past most of all. In all her most secret dreams in her bare bunk at Larkhall, she had never guessed the nature of Helen’s passionate love for her, finally laid bare. “You have something pleasant on your mind, Nik. I can read you like a book. It must be Helen.” “I’m living with her, if that’s what you mean. I don’t suppose you are surprised by that.” Nikki replied, mixing her customary honesty with a flicker of embarrassment at the way Trisha behaved. She couldn’t stop the muscles in her face flinching at delivering a straight answer. “No, I’m not.” “It isn’t some kind of fling,” Nikki said defensively. “I never thought it was. I know you, Nik. I got the feeling that night you were released that you really weren’t back with me as soon as you came into the club. You looked like a fish out of water. The moment that Helen came to talk to you, I knew it for certain. I could feel it. I could have kept quiet and said nothing but I would have only been laying more trouble for myself in the long run. I wasn’t being noble and self sacrificing when I pushed you away in her direction. I was really thinking of myself.” Trisha responded with more firmness and decisiveness in her voice than she felt. “I’m glad we understand each other.” “You’ve come to see me and it’s not just to talk about the old times.” Nikki looked embarrassed and then took in everything that Trisha was saying. She might as well not beat about the bush and get to the point. “I’ve got a problem that I need to make a living. It would be obvious to take my place back here running the club with you but…….” “Would you really want it or would I want you to?” “You’ve obviously had three years running the club on your own while I’ve been away. I remember you saying that you’re doing very well. You’ve learnt to manage without me.” “Not altogether but I’ll manage,” Trisha interjected, not successfully keeping her feelings out of her voice.”…………….but that’s not really why you came to see me.” “Ah yes,” came Nikki’s uncertain reply.”When we used to work the club together, we were working the same shifts together and no matter how weird the hours, we always had the time together when we needed it. We both know that there isn’t a future in me coming back to the club. I’m doing a job on normal hours, the same as Helen. It isn’t much, seeing as I’ve still got a prison record but I could do with my share of the money from the club.” “You want me to buy out your share, Nik?” “Something like that, less the three grand I’ve had already.” Trisha smiled faintly. Nikki’s fearless honesty had that ability to move her from way back. Best not to dwell on it or I’ll only regret it, she thought to herself. “I can afford it, Nik, I’ve been doing fine in the last few years, better than in the old days when we were struggling. The gay scene has gone semi overground in the last few years. The Pink Pound and all that.” “I’m really glad.” “Give me a chance to go over the books and see how much of a bank loan I need to raise. Leave it to me.” “Of course.” A heavy silence hung upon the air. This felt like the final stages in what an amicable divorce hearing would sound like in the straight world. Everything sounded so incongruously civilized to Nikki. In the past, her break ups with previous partners had been emotional and acrimonious and her temporary rifts with Helen had been the same. This was something new. “What will you do with the rest of your life, Trisha?” Nikki finally enquired with gentle concern written all over her face. ‘Oh, I’ll get along. I’m having a great time with the club, making lots of money out of it. I get to enjoy myself every night, whatever new experiences come my way. Right now, I’m just a happy go lucky single woman.” Nikki’s brown eyes looked straight into Trisha’s soul, She could see through the falsity of Trisha’s smile and felt sad for the other woman. Right now, she felt that she had all the luck and that Trisha had none. “Hey, Nik, you’ve got your life to get on with. You deserve some good luck coming your way especially the last few years. You don’t have to worry about me.” “So we’ll still be friends.” “Would we be anything else but?” Nikki briefly kissed Trisha on the cheek, gave her a quick reassuring hug and turned on her heel. She emerged from the darkness into the bright light. Trisha was right. Helen was waiting for her and their future together. |
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thanx Richard!



8:47 AM Jul 11