Slights by Kaaron Warren Page A

remember the little girl could barely walk, she was so devastated."
      It's very hard for me to make sense of the day Dad died. I was nine and considered myself grown up. I was in Year Four and finally doing real work; Art was now a subject with a name and we only did it once a week. There were three whole years of babies below me, kids I could bully. There were only two years ahead of me, and half of those kids were scared of me. I was a clever one in class and that made me feel older still.
      I always got home before Peter. He liked to dawdle home, kicking stones, looking at boring boy things. I couldn't stand it. I wanted to be home as soon as I could, wanted the school part of the day finished with. I wanted to get home and investigate what Mum had done all day, look at the clues and tell her what I thought.
      If there was washing on the line, that was easy. Or if dinner was bubbling. Her other activities were more difficult. A faint scent of perfume in the air and an empty pantyhose packet meant lunch with her friends. Parcels on the bed meant lunch with Dad. Parcels on the bed and something nice to eat in the cupboard meant shopping.
      This is what should have happened. My Dad took me to the zoo. Not Peter; just me. He told me that I was the one who has to look after Mum and Peter. I am strong, and clever, and I will inherit everything. I promised I would look after them. I said, "But why, Dad? You're not going to die."
      He hugged me, stroked my hair. "We all have to die," he said. And two days later, after a fight with my mother (because she so loved to feel guilty, I'll give her this part of the fantasy), after telling Peter off for acting like a baby, after winking at me, he left for work, to chase a criminal who wanted to kill the innocent, chase and catch and kill him. But the criminal had a partner, as they do, and the partner shot Dad in the back. Dad was paralysed, he lay in the gutter. He knew he couldn't live like that; he was not strong enough to live with any affliction. So he willed himself to die, knowing that I had everything under control, that his family would be safe.
      Or this may have happened: he is taken to hospital, where he begs me to turn off the machines keeping him alive. This I do.
      This is what did happen. I slept in, lied to Mum, said I was sick, sank back into sleep knowing I would not have to do sports that day.
      There I lay, not wanting to move, because every crack and crease in the bed fitted me perfectly. Peter came in and stared at my face, waiting for me to smile.
      "She's not sick," he told Mum.
      "Leave her alone. Boys don't always know when girls are sick."
      That was fascinating to me. I hadn't realised until then what magic I held. Men didn't understand, didn't want to understand, but liked to pretend they knew all.
      Dad was still asleep. He was a good, solid sleeper, hard to wake once he slipped away. This was lucky for Peter and me. We didn't have to sneak about on his mornings in; the house wasn't run on his sleep patterns. He often worked night shift, because he felt people were more real then, less protected by routine. He liked to talk to people then, while during the day his tongue was still.
      Mum and I spent the morning together, and when Dad got up he jumped straight in the shower. I thought that was odd. Usually he'd come and say hello first, see how we were going. And he'd already had a shower in the night.
      Mum said, "We might leave your father to it," and she bundled me up and we went shopping.
      I called out "Bye, Dad," but he didn't hear.
      When we got home after picking up Peter, Dad had left for work.
      Mum hated Dad's job. Peter and I loved it; loved his uniform, his baton. He never brought his gun home. We both wanted to be policemen. Peter wanted to be like Dad, a uniform guy, out amongst it. I wanted to be a detective, catch the real crooks using my brain.

    This is also what happened:
      Dad's boss