Dot (Araminta Hall)

Gerry heard Sandra’s voice rise and fall as he fitted together an innocent picture of a little girl pulling a duck on a string next to a river. The simplicity of an action that required no more than the ability to locate the right piece which would then reward you by slotting into place seemed revolutionary.
    Sandra burst back into the room. She walked over to where he was sitting on the floor and touched the congealed blood that had formed over the cut on the back of his head. ‘You fucking shit.’
    He stood up. ‘What?’
    Mavis started to cry.
    ‘I knew you were lying last night.’ Sandra’s eyes were red and bulging.
    ‘San, sit down. What are you talking about? What did she say?’
    She jabbed her finger at him. ‘I bloody knew it. I knew it.’
    Mavis tugged on his jeans so Gerry picked her up. ‘For God’s sake, you’re scaring your daughter.’
    ‘She said you made the pass at her, you shit.’
    ‘She’s lying.’
    Sandra looked at him; they knew each other too well for this. ‘I hate you.’
    ‘Sandra, please.’
    ‘Please nothing. I should have fucking known. Everyone told me not to marry you.’
    ‘But I love you. I’ve always loved you.’ His words sounded pathetic, even to himself.
    The tears were cascading out of her eyes now. ‘You do not love me. Don’t say that. Don’t you dare.’
    ‘San, please, sit down. Come on, think of the baby.’
    ‘Think of the baby!’ Sandra spat the words into his face.
    Mavis howled.
    ‘Hasn’t it entered your mind that she might be lying?’ he shouted back, trying to match her anger. But in the open air the words didn’t sound as he’d meant them to, they fell into a black hole and were lost to themselves. Sandra calmed at this and looked into him; Gerry felt as if she was rooting through his bone marrow, dissecting his soul.
    Finally she turned round and he heard her going upstairs. He kissed the top of Mavis’s head and tried to think of something useful, but his brain felt blinded. She came back a few minutes later, dressed. ‘You’re pathetic,’ she said as she started to put on her coat.
    Gerry followed her into the hall. ‘San, please. Come back in. You haven’t eaten anything and you’ve been sick. Let me at least make you a cup of tea.’
    Sandra picked up the car keys from the hall table and shut the door without looking back. Moments later he heard her driving away.
    There was nothing to be done after that apart from get on with the day. Gerry felt tired and stale, ridiculous in his little box as the day unfurled relentlessly around them. And Mavis needed things like lunch and wees and playing with and so things beyond his control pulled him forward. At half past two there was a knock at the door and he foolishly answered it thinking it might be Sandra even though she had her keys. Two policemen were standing on his doorstep and for a moment he thought they’d come to arrest him for being a terrible husband.
    ‘Mr Loveridge?’ asked one.
    Mavis hung off his leg. ‘Yes.’
    ‘I’m afraid your wife’s had an accident.’
    Fear crashed into the house, exploding the walls with its hugeness. ‘Oh my God, is she OK?’
    ‘She’s alive. They’ve taken her to Cartertown General. She was very lucky, she was going double the speed limit.’
    ‘Oh shit.’ Gerry felt his knees buckle but knew that they couldn’t.
    ‘Do you know where she was going?’
    He shook his head, knowing and not caring what he looked like. ‘Was anyone else hurt?’
    ‘No, she went into a tree.’
    ‘What about the baby? She’s pregnant.’
    ‘I’m sorry, Mr Loveridge, we don’t have that information. But we can drive you to the hospital.’
    He grabbed his and Mavis’s coat but the policeman put his hand out. ‘Isn’t there a neighbour or someone you could leave her with? She might not want to see her mother in, well, in a state.’
    ‘Really?’ Gerry’s mind spun on to paths where Sandra was disfigured or maimed – or maybe they were lying and she was already dead? He ran to the house opposite even though he couldn’t remember the name of the woman who lived there. He knew that she had a daughter Mavis’s age and that she and Sandra often had coffee. He stumbled over his words, knowing that he wasn’t making any sense, but the woman seemed nice and reliable and told him not to worry, Mavis could stay as long as he needed and to give Sandra her love. He nearly laughed.
    The drive to the hospital was much too slow. Time wound