boyfriend's car having sex. She'd only just met him a week ago. He was 23 and she was 14.

Elsewhere, Amber was working the late shift of volunteer candystriping at St.

Luke's Hospital. She was in Tara's class. The two did not get along...or rather Tara made it her everyday business not to get along with Amber. Amber had suffered much of the typical high school humiliation at the hands of Tara.

Towards the end of the summer holiday, Tara went with her mother to the doctor to be put on birth control. After a routine blood test, Tara discovered she had contracted full blown AIDS from her boyfriend. She was immediately put on treatment, but Tara's health began to fail. Weeks before Christmas, she was hospitalised with AIDS related pneumonia.

Amber checked in early one Saturday at St. Luke's to find Tara's name on her duty roster. After cleaning bed pans and changing sheets in the other rooms, Amber bravely stepped into her tormentor's room. Lying there was a thin, pale and coughing Tara.

"Hi,'' Amber said hesitantly in the doorway. She tried not to make eye contact.

"What?!'' Tara's frail mouth snapped. "You aren't taking care of me are you? Oh God!'' Amber wanted to leave badly. She gradually turned towards the hallway, but was strangely urged to stop.

"Can you move?'' Amber asked quietly.

"Yes,'' Tara snapped again. "Why?'' "Go sit by the window while I change your sheets.'' Tara stood up somewhat curious as to why the girl had remained.

Bewildered, she sat down in a chair by the window and watched as Amber stripped the bed.

The room was silent the whole time Amber went about her tasks. Finally, she was done.

"Get in bed,'' she told Tara sternly with only a hint of her earlier passiveness remaining in her tone. Tara's thin and weak frame crawled onto the mattress like a creaky old woman. Amber pulled the covers up over Tara and headed for the door.

"Wait!'' Tara almost shouted. She eyed her hairbrush lying on the table across the room. "Could you hand me my brush?'' Amber crossed the room, grabbed the brush and handed it to Tara. Seeing how weak her arms were in working the brush, Amber gently took it form Tara and began to do it herself.

Again there was silence.

Then finally, "Why do you do this?'' Tara asked. The strokes of the brush running through her hair had caused a warm sensation to pass over her aching body. "Why do you do a job you don't get paid for? Like a hospital too?'' Amber smiled, realising how ignorant Tara really was, but she allowed that to pass.

"Because I enjoy helping others get better,'' Amber said.

"Even AIDS people who aren't going to get better,'' Tara stammered, "like me?'' "You don't deserve to not get helped,'' Amber replied.

"To me, everyone deserves the same rights as a human being, sick or well, until the day they die.'' Tara's eyes welled up. A wave of guilt rushed over her from all the nasty things she had done to Amber in school.

Amber continued to brush Tara's stringy brown hair knowing that Tara was crying. And again silence.

"You were happy when you found out I had AIDS, weren't you?'' Tara suddenly burst out amongst a volley of sobbing and tears. "I mean, you should be from all the crap I gave you.'' Amber smiled again at Tara's immature ignorance.

"I cried when I found out you were sick,'' she said. "You could never hurt me enough to want you dead.'' After an hour it was overtime that Amber had to go. She looked down at the sick girl in front of her.

"I'm gonna go now,'' she said with a kind smile. "I hope you're feeling better.'' Tara reached out and grabbed Amber, reeling her in for a hug. "Thank you for caring about me, Amber.'' "Don't ever think you're someone less than human just because you got a little virus,'' Amber said. Tara started crying again.

"See you tomorrow,'' Amber said as she walked out into the hallway, her own tears flowing down her cheeks.

By Kurt James 4-N Warwick Academy CONTEST COMPETITION CPN