Tiffany put her arm around her and pulled her close, wanting to feel her skinny little body for a moment. She had forgotten all about her up until now. 'Ruby fell in the fountain. She nearly drowned.'
Dakota immediately pulled away from her hug and grabbed Tiffany's arm. She said something, but Tiffany couldn't hear her over the increasing volume of the helicopter.
She saw Vid at the end of the path that led down the side of the house, gesturing for her to come out the front. He had yet another policeman with him. He wouldn't like that. Vid had a police phobia. One of his greatest, genuine but amusing fears was going to jail for a crime he didn't commit. 'Innocent people go to jail every day,' he often told Tiffany, completely straight-faced, as if it were more likely than not that this could happen to him. It made him excessively law-abiding. He'd paid far too much tax until Tiffany had taken over his financial affairs. He still wanted to throw extra money at the tax man just in case.
'Daddy needs me. Go and wait in the house!' she yelled at Dakota. 'Everything is fine.'
Dakota grabbed at Tiffany's arm again, pinching the flesh too hard. Tiffany shook her off. 'Later!' she yelled. 'Go!'
Dakota ran off, shoulders rounded, her face in her hands, and Tiffany thought impatiently, Jeez Louise, I don't have time for this Dakota, it's not about you.
chapter fifty-four
Tiffany and Vid listened to the rain and stared dully at the crash site on the kitchen floor created by the dropped jar of chocolate nuts.
'You wouldn't think there'd have been that much glass in that jar,' said Vid.
'Or that many nuts,' agreed Tiffany. 'We're okay, Dakota!' she called out. 'Just in case you're wondering! Your dad dropped a jar!'
There was silence. Tiffany could just make out the hum of the television beneath the rain.
'Nobody is hurt!' called out Vid. 'We don't need any help!'
There was a pause. 'Okay!' called back Dakota in a magnificently dismissive tone.
Tiffany and Vid smiled at each other.
'I should have guessed why she was behaving so strangely,' said Tiffany. 'It's so obvious to me now that she would blame herself.'
'You kept telling me there was something wrong,' said Vid. 'But why didn't she just tell us how she felt before today?' He lowered his voice, although there was no chance Dakota could overhear. 'Why keep it all bottled up like that? That's not good.'
'It sounds like she was worried that we blamed her too. She seemed to think we were angry with her.'
'Crazy!' said Vid angrily.
'I know. Well, we were upset, obviously, and distracted, and that's what children do. They assume they're to blame for everything. So everything we did she misinterpreted.'
'But she wasn't even there when it happened!'
'That's the point.' Tiffany tried not to show her impatience. Vid had been there too when Dakota had sobbingly explained exactly why she thought everyone blamed her for Ruby's accident, but he was so busy throwing up his hands in disbelief he hadn't listened properly to a word she'd said. 'She got it into her head that Clementine believed Dakota was in charge of the kids. I mean, we did keep telling her she was such a good babysitter.'
'Yes, but -'
'I know,' said Tiffany. 'Of course Clementine and Sam wouldn't blame her. No one blames her. She's ten years old, for God's sake. We all knew she'd gone inside to read her book. If anyone was to blame in this family, it was me. I was the one offering lap dances to our guests.'
'Stop that,' said Vid quickly, predictably. He'd shut down every conversation like this since the barbeque. 'It was a terrible accident.'
Yeah, talk about keeping things bottled up. No wonder Dakota thought that what had happened at the barbeque was a shameful secret. They'd never said a word to her about it! That must have seemed so strange and freaky to the poor kid. Of course she thought it was about her.
She remembered how the week directly after the barbeque she'd been so preoccupied with work. That bloody townhouse that had been nothing but trouble from the start had got passed in at auction, and the Land and Environment Court decision hadn't gone her way. It had been a shit week all round, and beneath all that stress was the absolute horror of what had happened. She hadn't given Dakota a thought. Not a single thought. Dakota had just been another job to cross off her list. As long as she had her uniform and lunch and was safely deposited at school, then the job was done. Vid had been the same. It had been a shit week for him too. He'd lost that government contract, which had turned out to be a blessing in disguise but he hadn't known that then
. By the time Vid and Tiffany had emerged from their fogs and started talking properly to Dakota again, the damage was done. The poor kid interpreted their re-emergence as her parents forgiving her.
Forgiving her!
'I'll get the dustpan,' said Vid. 'Don't move. You have bare feet.'
He went to get the dustpan and broom.