‘Hello,’ I said.
I thought,Christ this is uncomfortable.What’s that all about? It feels like a first date with a stranger.
‘Shit this is weird,’ Dawn said. ‘It’s like being on a bloody first date or something.’
I smiled at the fact she’d said almost word for word what I’d been thinking and stepped forward to wrap her in my arms.
For a moment I was fighting back tears, but then I realised that Dawn was actually crying and as my concern switched from myself to her, the pressure behind my own eyes dissipated.
‘Hey, hey,’ I said, squeezing her tighter as she shuddered. ‘What’s all this about, eh?’
‘I’ve wrecked the car,’ she spluttered. It hadn’t been at all what I was expecting.
‘The Polo?’ I asked stupidly, because she didn’t have any other car, and she nodded into my shoulder. ‘Well,thatdoesn’t matter,’ I said. ‘As long as you’re OK, that doesn’t matter at all.’
‘I know,’ she said.
‘That’s not why you’re crying?’
She shook her head. ‘No, I’m crying because of something else.’
‘OK,’ I said. ‘Do you want to tell me, or…?’
‘Later,’ she said. ‘Can I tell you later?’
‘Of course you can,’ I said. ‘But you’re OK, are you? You’re not hurt?’
‘No, I’m not hurt.’
‘And everyone else is OK? Lucy’s OK?’
‘Yes, everyone’s fine as far as I know.’
‘Then whatever it is, I’m pretty sure it doesn’t matter.’
She started to sob properly then – the full-on, snotty shuddering kind. My own eyes teared up again in sympathy.
‘Oh, Dawn,’ I said. ‘Jesus, I’m sorry. Whatever it is, I’m sorry.’
‘Me too,’ she said. And then she moved her arms so that she could hug me back, and I started to smile. Because whatever was going on, and whatever was going to happen next, right then, at that moment, we were choosing to hug each other, and Christ that felt good.
Understandably, things remained strange all day.
We drifted around each other keeping busy, doing chores, filling and emptying the washing machine, all the time scrupulously avoiding eye contact. It really was as if we were both shy and that was the strangest feeling.
That evening we decided to rent a film – my idea, but one Dawn jumped at just a little too enthusiastically. I think we were both terrified that if we didn’t fill the void we might have to actually speak to each other.
The next morning I woke up to find that Dawn was already downstairs. This was unusual enough to merit comment.
‘Oh, I know,’ she said, when I mentioned it. ‘I’ve been awake since half past four. You were snoring like a… like something that snores very loudly.’
‘Like… you when you were pregnant, maybe?’
‘Yes,’ she said. ‘Exactly like that.’
‘Well, I didn’t sleep much the night before,’ I offered in my defence. ‘I was kind of catching up.’
I poured myself a coffee and sat opposite Dawn at the table. It would have been weird to sit anywhere else but also the atmosphere in the house seemed to have changed and I’d realised we were going to have to talk. The requirement for conversation seemed to be hanging in the air.
