Dot (Araminta Hall)

closer to knowing what had happened. ‘Mavis said she was amazing, drove her to the hospital and everything.’
    ‘Good,’ said Alice and the word was undeniably heartfelt.
    They were on the open road now with fields whipping past as if they didn’t really exist. Dot thought America might be nice.
    ‘I know I’m not the best mother, Dot. But you do feel able to tell me things, don’t you? I mean, you wouldn’t go through something like that alone, would you?’
    The question seemed absurd. They never said anything to each other and yet Dot realised she probably would tell her mother if she got pregnant. She might even tell her grandmother. Something important stretched between them, like a spider’s web. Ask her! Dot screamed at herself. Do it now, do it now! But the moments sped past as quickly as the fields. They left the past behind and sped into the future, always, always avoiding the present.
    ‘What’s she like?’ asked Alice. ‘The baby.’
    ‘Gorgeous.’
    ‘Has she got a name yet?’
    ‘Rose. Rose Dorothy.’
    ‘Oh Dot, that’s lovely.’
    Dot rubbed her finger into the worn material of her jeans, soft and giving.
    ‘Things will get back to normal now,’ her mother was saying.
    ‘Don’t be silly, Mum. Everything will change.’
    Alice looked over at this, her expression earnest. ‘Well yes, babies do change things. But normally for the better. I meant you’ll get the old Mavis back.’
    ‘Did I change things for the better for you?’ asked Dot, the effort of speech filling her up.
    Her mother laughed. ‘Of course you did. What a question.’
    ‘But you were only a couple of years older than Mavis is now when you had me. I must have been a mistake.’
    They were on the outskirts of Druith now. ‘You weren’t a mistake, Dot, more a happy accident and I never regretted it for a single second. You must know that.’
    ‘Yes, but it must have been hard bringing me up alone.’
    ‘It was hard.’ Her mother’s voice was shaking and Dot could hear how carefully she was choosing her words, as if she was stepping over ice. ‘But I wasn’t alone, Clarice was around and so were you. So are you.’
    It is always impossible to imagine life without ourselves in it and Dot failed to do so at that moment. But she could hear the love in her mother’s voice and she felt a sense of – what? – gratitude, luck, good fortune? They were unfamiliar words to apply to herself.
    Her mother turned the car into their drive and they both saw Clarice standing looking out of the dining room window, concern wrinkling her features, a smile only appearing as she saw them both in the car.

14 … Arrival
    Considering how prepared Tony was for the birth, he still felt like he made a fool of himself when it came to it. When Alice woke him with the news that her waters had broken in the depth of a night which would never reach complete darkness, he sat up and said, ‘Hang on, I’ll get my spanner.’ He had no idea what he’d been thinking; he wouldn’t be able to fix a leak even if he had a spanner.
    She looked young and scared, standing over him, her stomach so absurdly huge in front of her that it seemed impossible a baby could emerge without ripping her in two. He’d made her pack a bag a week before, just as Miriam Stoppard advised, and he was pleased at his forethought, telling her now to get dressed, he’d go and start the car. Except his limbs didn’t appear to be connected to his brain any more and simple tasks like turning his trousers the right way took what felt like hours. In the end, though, it was lucky that he hadn’t gone on ahead because she needed to lean on him while they went down the stairs, walking as gingerly as if they were on the side of a mountain.
    ‘Should we leave a note for your mum?’ Tony asked when they reached the front door, but Alice shook her head and gripped his shoulder more tightly.
    The car was surprisingly cold, but Alice was sweating, her hands white as she held on to the sides of her seat. Tony tried to put the seatbelt across her but she pushed him away as if she was burnt and he knew better than to argue.
    Cartertown General seemed too far; he could see the route in his mind and knew all the twists and turns of the road, but still willed some of them to have disappeared overnight so they could get there quicker. Alice moaned next to him.
    ‘How far apart are they?’
    ‘I don’t know.’
    Tony felt a surge of irritation with his wife for not reading