Simple Fact
There was the simple fact
she was pregnant and by him.
Three months late. Morning
sickness. Throwing up after
breakfast. If she had breakfast.
And Thornton knew nothing
of it and that was the way she
wanted it: him ignorant of that
fact of her being with child as
Mother called it. She’d not seen
him since the big bust-up after
the Chekov play. He rang twice
but she put the phone down with
a mighty slam. That temper of
yours, Mother used to say, will
be the death of you. Not yet at
least, she thought. Mother always
thought she knew best; a childhood
of constant nags and slaps. She lay
in bed listening to birds. Father
was a bird watcher, knew them all,
where they laid and when and
what colour the eggs of the birds
were. She remembered him and
his binoculars and that hat which
made Mother laugh. Soon she’d
get up and puke. The smell itself
was enough to make her puke again.
Thornton’s one minute act of sex
brought all this. God’s seven days
of creating beauty and light were
reduced by Thornton one minute’s
sex, to making hell in a single night.
You’ll make it all work, a voice
inside her head said. But it was a
big step from single self to another
human being lying helpless in the
hands wailing and flailing its arms.
She sat up on the side of the bed.
All thoughts of Thornton, Mother
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poem by Terry Collett
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