Inner Walls

ACT II: The Void

***

When Jessy saw Faith arriving, accompanied by a guard, she could not repress a thrill of anguish. Since the begin thi this sexy brunette had been making her feel uncomfortable and what she had done to Trisha ie ree refectory only confirmed the idea that she had to beware of her. Faith had still this strange blank look which at the same time puzzled and scared Jessy.

"Hey Faith! Congratulations! You won the award of the most staggering entrance in that fucking prison!"

Faith turned her gaze towards her without reacting. Jessy noted that Faith had been beaten by the guards. Severely.

"They gave you pills, didn't they?", she asked trying to rto reveal in her tone her hope of a positive answer.

"Yes..."

"They're gonna calm you... You'll need them here. Nobody can hold on without that crap."

Faith climbed on her bed and lay down. Her head was spinning and the light went on hurting her eyes. Jessy leaned against the wall and studied her silently for one minute.

"Faith?"

"Huh?"

"What did you do to land here?"

The silence fell again in the cell.

It was an accident... It could have happened tu...u...

Jessy did not dare to repeat her question because she feared Faith's unpredictable reactions. She wondered if this woman should not have been locked up in a mental hospital rather than in jail.

"Thefts, assaults, murders."

Faith's voice was neutral. She seemed to enumerate simple facts that did not touch her.s des detachment worried Jessy even more, and she did not dare ask for details.

"How much did you get?"

"There hasn't been a trial yet."

Jessy thought over Faith's last words then made up her mind to make an effort.

"Faith... You seriously fucked around the other day... If you're in custody, you'll have to calm down because you risk adding you some extra years... And you're up shit's creek with Trisha's gang... Now she wants to bump you off."

Faith made no remark. All this was just so familiar; violence, hatred, revenge. Feelings she knew so well and against which she kept fighting continuously. But against which she often lost.
Jessy was wondering if Faith was listening to her. She continued nonetheless.

"You don't know who you're dealing with. There are two or three girls here with whom you'd better be friends if you don't want to finish with your bashed head in the loo. Trisha is one of . So. So am I by the way."

Jessy was pacing up and down the cell, disturbed by ttherther woman's muteness.

"Actually I don't know why I'm tiring myself out explaining you those things, apparently you don't give a fuck about them... It may be partly 'cause I've always dreamt to blow this cunt's head up and 'cause you've been the one to have dared to do it for years..."

I'm looking at your pretty mug that I'm gonna explode against the wall...

"How long have you been here?"

"Almost eight years..."

"What for?"

"Drug traffic, gangs, all that crap, you know..."

"You killed?"

The question surprised Jessy. Faith had risen and leant against the wall. She looked hard at the young woman.

"Once."

"But it's not the reason why you're here, is it?"

It was not really a question. Jessy lowered her head.

"So how did you do to be among the respected leaders?"

Jessy looked up and showed her fist.

"With that. And by finding allies among the right people at the right time. But Faith, there are things that can't be done. Like humiliating Trisha in front of everyone for example. If she catches you, you'll pray that the guards might be the ones who'll beat you up..."

"I don't care..."

Jessy sighed.

"Listen, you don't understand! Your trial hasn't been held yet, it's your interest to play it safe to get out as fast as possible."

"I don't care. There is nothing waiting for me outside."

I did it for you B...

"And no one."

With these words, Faith climbed down her bed and got out of the cell.

***

Faith had decided to visit the prison. Along the passages, the prisoners she met stepped aside when she went past and talked to one another under their breaths. Did they fear her for what she had done or did they shun her because Faith had become cursed, the first name on top of the hit list of Her Majesty Trisha?
Faith walked out into the yard in which the prisoners played football, did body-building, traded illicit goods or plotted against one another. A few exchanges stopped at Faith's presence then resumed, the gazes never leaving the one who had defied Trisha.
She leaned against a wall and took out her pack of cigarettes, the only thing she could have kept from outside.

But I still have my scar...

"You give me one?"

Jessy had finally joined her. She held out the pack to her then lighted a cigarette for herself.

"You're crazy to go out."

Faith could not help smiling bitterly.

Psycho... Psycho Slayer...

"I know, I'm a psycho-slayer... I'm used to it.", she said smiling at the other woman.

Jessy did not know how she had to interpret this sentence and this smile. Faith's mental state worried her more and more. She seemed to be suicidal, indifferent to everything, resigned, weird.
Faith was studying a small group of women gathered in a corner of the yard.

"That's Trisha's gang?"

Jessy followed Faith's gaze and nodded. She also noted that the women were staring atm tom too.

"You shouldn't stay with me if it's dangerous.", Faith said blowing smoke rings.

Jessy did not answer. She did not take her eyef thf the group which was heading towards them. Five women looking determined and little affable stopped before them. Trisha wore a bandage around her hand and a sticking plaster on her nose.

"I like your new look.", Faith said.

Jessy c not not believe her ears. She had definitely classed Faith among the incurable dangerous maniacs.

"You're dead.", Trisha said containing her rage with difficulty.

I'm already dead...

Faith smiled and blew the smoke of her cigarette at her face.

"You little bitch!" spat Trisha.

Her gang had to hold her back because the guards were watching them closely. It was not the time and Faith knew it.

"You're dead.", Trisha repeated before walking away with her gang.

"You're mad, Faith, completely loony...", Jessy concluded resignedly.

"If you're scared, nobody forces you to stay with me, and, by the way, I thought that you said you wouldn't be my protector, Jess."

"Fuck off!" exclaimed Jessy going away.

***

Faith stubbed her cigarette out and made up her mind to pursue her tour. She watched the girls who were doing sports. Some were striking a punching bag with boxing gloves. Some were doing weightlifting. Some others were doing push-ups. She approached the punching bag.

"May I?", she asked the two muscular girls who were training.

They looked at her up and down mockingly sizing her up. One of them finally held out the gloves to her.

"No, thanks."

Faith gave a few punches to test the solidity of the bag. It would not resist long to the Slayer's strength. The others kept watching her sniggering.

Remember B when we trained together... We had to pull punches so as not to tear Giles' nth bag... In the end we had to fight each other to relieve our frustration...

Then she gave a sidekick with all her might. Just one, which literally unhooked the bag and made it fly seventy feet away. The sniggers ceased at once. All the gazes had turned towards her. In them could be read incredulity but also fear. And a timorous respect.

"Sorry.", she apologized to the two boxers who were gaping at her.

She walked away smiling.

***

She came back to her cell. Jessy was lying on her bed and was smoking.

"There are showers somewhere?"

"Yes. Downstairs."

Faith took one of the towels provided by the prison and was about to leave when Jessy called her back.

"Faith!"

"What?"

"You shouldn't go there..."

"Why? You're afraid that I could get lost?"

"The showers... are used for many things... among others to settle scores... and the screws turned a blind eye..."

"So come with me."

"I can't protect you, Faith... Not against Trisha..."

"I don't need you to protect me, Jess."

I'm already dead...

Faith got out of the cell.

***

The showers were in the basement of the prison. Several rows of aligned individual cubicles devoid of doors for reasons of safety. The room was large and plunged into semi-darkness, which was not reassuring but propitious to intimacy. A guard was standing by the entrance door. She searched Faith to check that she did not have a hidden weapon then held out some soap to her.
Faith headed to the cubicles at the end of the room to avoid finding herself under the guard's eyes. She heard water running somewhere. She disappeared into a cubicle and undressed. She realized how much she missed her leather clothes. She turned the water on and let herself be soothed by the noise and the soft touch of the liquid over her skin. After a moment, she realized she could hear something else behind the noise of the showers.

Moans...

She pushed aside a lock of hair stuck on her face and, without turning the water off, headed silently towards the noise. It came from the cubicle at the very end.
Faith leaned in slightly. Two women were making love under the shower, trying to stay as discreet as possible. The blonde woman, who was facing her, had her eyes shut and relaxed under her partner's caresses. Faith watched them mutely, the want suddenly tearing her stomach. She observed their bodies moving slowly, their hands sliding down their skins, the brunette's fingers giving pleasure to the other woman who kept on moaning.
And who was looking at her. She had opened her eyes and was smiling at her.

"What's going on over there?", asked the guard walking heavily towards the cubicles.

Faith smiled at the blonde and came back to her shower as the guard arrived.

"Nothing... Nothing... If I can't have five minutes of intimacy... I didn't know you were eavesdropping. Unless you want to join in, my hand is a bit tired...", said Faith so as to divert the guard's attention and protect the two women.

The guard looked at her with a pout of disgust and went back next to the door, but not before she had called Faith a "Fucking perverse dyke".
Faith smiled and finished her shower trying to ignore her painful desire. At the moment when she surrendered and began caressing herself, the moans stopped in a muffled cry. She withdrew her hand, an intense frustration overwhelming her body, Buffy's image superimposing suddenly with the blonde's.
She heard the water being turned off and saw the two women walking past her a few instants later. The blonde cast an appreciative look at Faith's body and whispered "Thanks." to her, a little smile in the corner of her lips. Faith watched them going away with regret, her desire even stronger and still unfulfilled. She felt exactly like when Buffy touched her inadvertently or in a friendship gesture, like after training when their bodies fought against each other, brushed each other, like when they rolled on the floor, their bodies tangled, like when her fragrance intoxicated her and that she dreamt of plunging into her blonde hair, of breathing her skin, of drowning in her eyes...

Frustration... I wanted you so much...

She sighed, clenched her fists tightly and finally hit one of the shower walls leaving a hole into it.

I wanted you so much...

She slid slowly onto the floor, her back against the tiled wall. She stared at the blood of her wounded fist disappearing in a whirl down the drain. The pain was more bearable than the desire tormenting her. Her tears running down at last, mingled invisibly with the water streaming down her face.

I did it for you...
But you, what did you do for me?

***

Two weeks went by at the pace of the daily routine in which most of the prisoners took refuge. The routine and the tranquilizers. Faith continued to take them, she felt that they calmed her violent impulses. Above all they preed hed her from thinking really, from turning over her tortured thoughts, from suffering. But Buffy's image never left her mind.

The satisfaction on her face...

Trisha's gang had become discreet, which boded no good according to Jessy. She thought that Trisha was waiting for her wounds to heal so as to deal with Faith personally.
The other women avoided the Slayer prudently preferring not to be seen in her company but above all bewaring of her reactions and her strength. The episode of the punching bag had spread around the prison. Trisha claimed to everyone that unhooking a bag, though impressing, did not mean that she knew how to fight.
Jessy had softened. Faith understood that she played a role that protected her from the others.
Faith had met her lawyer, appointed by the court. There was no question of a trial before, at best, one year because of judicial slowness. The judiciary was not in all that much in a hurry because Faith had made a confession and that she had acknowledged all the charges. Moreover, he had given her to understand that she should not delude herself about the outcome of the trial. At best she would get between fifteen and twenty-five years, at worst life imprisonment or eventh.\rth.

Is this what you're expecting from me, B? You want the law to end what you didn't succeed in finishing with my knife?... In that way your hands will stay clean, your conscience clear, and you'll remain perfect and innocent Buffy. And you'll be satisfied. You already were... The satisfaction in your eyes... This is what hurts me the most... The satisfaction in your eyes I loved so much...

"Faith?"

You're gonna pursue me with this satisfied look until the day of the final injection?

"Faith? Fuck it! Answer me!", Jessy shouted exasperated by Faith's repeated absent-minded moments.

"What?"

"I saw Trisha a few minutes ago."

"And?"

"She had no more bandages."

"I'm happy for.&qr."

"Fuck! Faith, how should I tell you that she's gonna bump you off?!"

I'm already dead...

"And so what?"

Jessy despaired of ever understanding this frightening, though so attractive, girl. She scared, disconcerted and exasperated her, but she could not deny that she attracted her irresistibly. She had not made love for a long time. Since her former girlfriend, Pat. The want was always terrible in jail. Almost worse than the drug withdrawal.


*******

To be continued in Act III