New Australian Stories 2 by Aviva Tuffield

wasn’t far, but they took their time doing it. Sarah felt a sense of urgency about Sheba but couldn’t translate that urgency into hurry. She felt the way she did in those anxious dreams when she was due somewhere important but was unable to find the items she needed to bring with her. They spent whole minutes standing on the side of the road in order to watch a woman move around her lit basement kitchen, ironing.
    As they approached their apartment, David said, ‘You know I’m coming with you,’ and she didn’t argue. They changed their clothes, and it felt to Sarah, briefly, as if it had been David’s suit and her dress that had married each other earlier in the day. David followed her to the car. Before lowering herself into the driver’s seat she shook her head, just a little, as if she might clear it. She didn’t feel drunk.
    It was an old car, friendly but unreliable, that flew with dog hair when the windows were down. It required patience, particularly in the winter; even now, in June, it demonstrated a good-natured reluctance to start. Sarah turned the key; the engine kicked in and then out. David played with the radio to find a good song and when there were no good songs, he turned it low. As if encouraged by this decrescendo, the car cooperated. Cambridge was lit with orange lights. They passed through the city with exaggerated care and were in the country very suddenly, with the lights of airplanes far overhead. England became a long dark road, then, with bright windows visible across wet fields and trees against the sky.
    â€˜What’s wrong with this cat?’ said David.
    â€˜Urinary tract.’
    â€˜I know that. But what’s wrong with it.’
    Sarah grew defensive on behalf of Sheba. ‘He can’t help it.’
    â€˜Why call a tomcat Sheba?’
    â€˜They let their kid name it,’ said Sarah. ‘It’s the name of a brand of cat food. It uses real cuts of meat rather than by-products.’
    â€˜Crazy.’
    â€˜Don’t.’
    â€˜It’s crazy. It’s like your mum naming your brother Leslie and your dad doing nothing to stop it.’
    â€˜It’s a family name. It’s a boy’s name! And I don’t want to think about my mother. Right now I’m pretending she doesn’t exist. I left my phone at home,’ said Sarah. ‘If she calls, I don’t want to tell her we’re married, and I don’t want not to have told her.’
    â€˜So just don’t answer.’
    â€˜I’d have to answer. I couldn’t not answer. And then — you know.’ She spread her hands in order to indicate her predicament and then quickly placed them back on the steering wheel.
    David lifted in his seat to feel at his back pocket and said, ‘Shit. My phone’s still in my suit.’
    â€˜What do you need a phone for, darling? Call all your girlfriends?’
    â€˜I’ve given them the night off.’
    She hit at him with her left hand.
    â€˜Watch the road!’ he said, laughing.
    She watched the road. ‘My first drive since getting married,’ she said.
    â€˜First this, first that,’ he said.
    At this moment, Mr Ronald pulled out of a dark side road and turned directly in front of them. Sarah’s veer to the left met the back corner of his car; trees moved in front of the windscreen, tyres made a long noise against the road; the car jolted over the grass and stones of the verge; they hit a low wooden fence and felt the engine splutter and stall. And as this took place they were aware of something more urgent occurring behind them: the spin of Mr Ronald’s car, its dive into a roadside tree. Sarah and David remained still for a moment and then noticed the way they were both hunched over, preparing for an impact that hadn’t come.
    â€˜Fuck,’ said Sarah, looking back down the dim road. The muted lights of tiny Cambridge hung orange at the bottom of the