Mandy had asked Sarah what prison would be like for Jo the last time they spoke. It was a question she dreaded. It’ll be fucking awful was the unutterable truth. She couldn’t bring herself to tell Mandy that most women who went to prison ended up going back, time and again. That women prisoners suffered from high levels of depression and anxiety, that suicide attempts were common, and that it was rare for women to come out unscathed.
‘It will be hard,’ Sarah had said. ‘She’ll need all the support you can provide.’
By the time the committee members (several legal aid lawyers from across the city, including from the Victorian Aboriginal Legal Service and Women’s Legal Service Victoria; a social worker; two police officers; a couple of bureaucrats; the representative from the Victorian Law Reform Commission; and representatives from various prisoner support groups) gathered, it was quarter past ten. Sarah’s knee ached, and she became increasingly annoyed with the chair, a long-haired middle-aged lawyer who was happy to wait for a couple more minutes until everyone gets here. The agenda was long — and included the discussion of the submission that Sarah’s working group had drafted on the discrimination against women in Victorian prisons. Writing and researching the submission had taken five months: it included substantial evidence that women prisoners faced more health problems (especially diabetes and heart disease, not to mention the mental-health issues) and were given fewer educational opportunities, which resulted in many of them being unable to cope once they were released. The outcomes were even worse for Indigenous women. But Sarah and the other members of the committee were proud of the report. They wanted these issues highlighted, they had recommendations that would make a difference; now they needed the support of the committee to lobby for change.
An hour later, Sarah thought about Jo as she walked out of the meeting towards the station. The work they were doing had a real chance of improving the conditions of women in prison, and the whole committee was behind it, thankfully. They’d allocated funds to implement the recommendations. But it was unlikely anything would change in time for Jo.
Back in her office, interned by files that required action, Sarah gazed out the window. Across the road, a group of boys in their teens were smoking outside the 7-Eleven. She wasn’t worried about them — they weren’t drinking alcohol. Lately, the majority of her cases were alcohol- and drug-related. Kids as young as twelve and thirteen were already alcoholics and addicts. The judges were frustrated. In the courtroom, the judges, the lawyers, the probation officers, the youth workers, and the cops sat in different sections and acted as if they had something against one another, but in truth they were all in it together. They were all throwing their hands up in the air. As the judges pronounced their sentences, they made grand statements — It shouldn’t be this way; there should be more support and help — but, generally speaking, they locked them up because the parents and the community needed some relief.
Her clients often complained about being picked on by the cops, about being moved on from shopping centres and kicked out of venues for being young, or for not being white and ‘Australian’, or for hanging out together, having fun. And they were right to complain, and she’d often taken up the cause of young people wrongly accused. Because they were a gang — which meant three or four kids standing around together — or looked like trouble. Because they were Sudanese or Vietnamese and weren’t speaking English. Because they were too loud. The problem was that sometimes it was difficult to tell if a group were going to be trouble or not. Sarah was a reasonable judge of character, but sometimes the young people she represented committed crimes that shocked her, even after more than eight years working in legal aid. Still, you had to make an honest case, as honest as you could — you were obliged to even when you wanted to say to the judge, You should lock this one up and throw away the key. You never did — they knew you never would.
The boys in the street were throwing something around. Sarah couldn’t see what it was. Not a ball. Something small and square. On the bench, a younger boy was crying. Sarah considered opening the window and yelling at them to give it back, but that would be a bad move — both for her and for the kid on the bench. She kept one eye on her files and one eye on the boys.
The day before, she’d interviewed Ashleigh’s boyfriend, Kevin. He hadn’t hesitated when Sarah had asked to meet. ‘Sure. Ash and Jo were mates. Whatever I can do to help.’ Now she read over her notes.
She had interviewed Kevin at his home in Brighton. The house was about as different to Jo’s as a house could be; it reminded Sarah of her parents’ place. Kevin’s mother and her mother probably bought their floral silk-screened curtains from the same South Yarra decorator. They probably went to the same dinner parties, the same theatre productions. The house, set back behind a high fence on a corner block, was what her mother would call substantial. A period home (Sarah had no idea which period) surrounded by a lush lawn and well-established trees — grey and ghost gums. Standing on the doorstep waiting, she pondered how Kevin had met Ashleigh. Sarah’s parents and their friends didn’t go to the western suburbs; they said things like, I never drive across the bridge unless we are going to Lorne. Recently, Sarah’s Aunt Sophie, her mother’s youngest sister, told them that a friend had dragged her out to Yarraville. ‘I was kicking and screaming, I kept saying, “No, why would I want to go there?” But, you know, I was pleasantly surprised. There are some nice boutiques and cafés. I bought the perfect little clutch bag for Annie.’
Kevin had been alone when Sarah arrived. He led her through the hallway and the kitchen to a small table in the garden. The view, like the house, was expansive. There was no sense of the surrounding suburb. The backyard sloped down to a tall hedge, beyond which Sarah could see a golf course. He offered her a tea and she accepted. When he brought it out, she could see he was shaking, and she reached out to take her cup. He was lanky and tall, dressed in black jeans and a white t-shirt. His black hair was wet, and since there was no pool, Sarah assumed he’d just had a shower.
‘Thanks for letting me come and talk to you,’ Sarah said.
‘No problem. I can’t concentrate on anything. Can’t study. Can’t work. Just been hanging around the house all day.’
‘I’m sorry.’
‘What do people do?’ he asked.
‘Grief takes its own time.’
‘I want to talk about Ash all the time, and everyone’s getting sick of me. They don’t say anything, but I can sense it.’ He stopped speaking to pour the tea. ‘I don’t usually talk much, but now I can’t stop.’
‘You and Ashleigh were going out? You were her boyfriend?’