The Near Miss by Fran Cusworth Page B

someone’s esky and used up almost all their milk, saving the last centimetre for Romy’s coffee. Washed spoons and then handed out a bowl of Weetbix and milk to each child.
    â€˜Sugar?’ A little one held her bowl up to him, baby legs bare below a too-big jumper. She belonged in a seventeenth-century orphanage.
    â€˜Rots your teeth.’
    Back in the tent, Romy sat with her head in her hands. She accepted the coffee and huddled over it.
    â€˜There’s no sugar?’
    â€˜Romy. You could say thank you. I did have to wash up and feed half a dozen children out there before I could even get to the coffee.’
    â€˜Thank you.’ She sipped sadly. ‘You’re not having a good time, are you? You don’t like these guys.’
    â€˜That’s not true. They’re okay, it’s just their parenting skills leave a bit to be . . .’ He lowered his voice to a whisper. ‘I mean, if they’re going to bring their kids, it might be nice if they actually looked after them.’
    â€˜Mmm.’
    â€˜They’re fine, they’re fine, these people. They’re your friends, I know. It’s just . . . you get different around them. You’re not you.’
    Romy put down the coffee and stared thoughtfully out of the tent’s flaps. ‘I feel like I am . Sometimes I feel I’m more me with these guys than anyone. And then I go home and I wonder just who I’ve become? Who am I?’
    Eddy sighed. They would drive home today, and Romy would be deflated. ‘You’d be a better mother than any of them.’
    She made a face. ‘I don’t know about children.’
    He smoothed her hair, and cupped her jaw. ‘We could make one, you know. I’ve heard it’s quite easy.’
    Romy put her forehead between her fingers and rubbed desperately. ‘I think I’m going to be sick.’

    There was a knock at the front door, startling Eddy from his memories. He inhaled sharply; he would not answer. He checked that his pale blue pyjama top was buttoned. He rolled the navy piping that edged the jacket between his fingers. He froze; there was the ghost of a face in the window. He stared at it for a full half a minute before realising that it was his own reflection. He was losing it. More knocking. Who was it? He could not speak to anyone, he felt too close to weeping. Real men didn’t weep. Was it his mother, maybe bearing a plate of hot roast? He was kind of hungry. But he wanted to see no one except for Romy, and Romy would not knock. This was her home. Or was it, in her eyes? Maybe it was her, maybe the knocking was an apologetic overture, an acknowledgement that she had betrayed him. He stood and reached the door in giant steps, his heart bursting for terror that she would creep away again, into the mysterious world of Missing.
    He threw open the door, but it was not Romy. A man stood before him. The little girl’s father. From the road accident. From the dinner. Tom. He was momentarily unrecognisable in a navy suit and white shirt, although he had loosened his tie and was holding a six-pack.
    â€˜G’day, brought some beers. Wanna drink?’
    Eddy looked down as if feigning surprise to find himself in sleepwear. ‘Uh. Okay.’ At this time of morning? But then he saw the time: it was well after lunch.
    Tom had flowed inwards by now, like a liquid. Eddy could not remember whether he had gestured his guest inside or not, but Tom roamed through the house swigging his beer and checking out the décor. Patches of mud and grass stuck to the back of Tom, on what looked like a good-quality suit, but Eddy decided not to mention it. He did not really think Tom would care. Was he drunk? Not very. The school children would walk past again soon. He felt ridiculously sad at the prospect of missing them, and anxious to return to his window. ‘Shall we sit in the front room?’
    â€˜Here in the kitchen’s