Calex One-Shots

The Conscience

I wrote this chapter to Glitter In the Air by Pink. Enjoy :)

She can't move.

She tries to but she's too weak and the glass is cutting her, so deep and she wonders why she's still bleeding.

The tile is cold and her cheek is pressed to the ground. One of her arms is twisted behind her back and the other is sprawled out, fingertips curled over the glass and spilled whiskey.

She's shuddering for breath and she tries to put her weight on her left hand but falls again, slicing her palm open and she thinks she might've screamed but she can't hear it. She can't hear anything.

Not guilty.

"I had the evidence", she whispers.

A phone call; hours later, telling you the victim was dead.

"She didn't have to die." The tears mix with blood on her cheeks and she can taste a dreadful combination of the two in her mouth.

She'd killed herself, after her rapist had gone free.

"I had the evidence. I had the fucking evidence!" She balls her hand up in a fist and brings it down, on the floor and the broken glass. She hisses through her teeth, but she doesn't care that she's in pain because what Danielle Joyner went through was much worse.

It was your fault.

She's shaking her head. "No, no it wasn't. I had the evidence. It wasn't my fault the jury couldn't see it. Don't you see that?"

Maybe if you went before the jury with a stronger case, he wouldn't have gone home tonight. And, she wouldn't have died.

"But I stayed up for days. I had it together."

You should've stayed up longer. What's more important; your petty fucking beauty sleep or Danielle's life?

"I tried so hard, don't you understand?"

I think we both know that you could've tried harder.

"It took everything out of me. I thought I could win. I didn't know she'd kill herself; I would've tried harder. I would've tried harder."

Always about you, isn't it?

"No." She holds her arms out again, nearly falling but she pushes herself through the alcohol and glass. The whiskey burns the cuts on her knees but she doesn't care. She slides herself backwards, back to the counter. "It shouldn't be about me."

But it is; it always is. You selfish bitch, you can't take your thoughts off yourself for a second.

"I'm sorry."

Sorry isn't good enough. A girl is dead and the guy who practically boosted her into it walks the streets. The other one who contributed to it though, you, sits in a pool of her own blood and a smashed whiskey bottle, throwing yet another useless pity party.

Alex Cabot flattens her hands and slams her palms into her forehead, body trembling with sobs. Her face is hot and her cries are loud. Tears come fast and relentless. "This is my fault."

Not completely your fault, but yes, you had a significant part to play in it.

"How do I make it better?"