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| showing emotion...an exercise in characterisation through action | ||||||||||||||||||
| It's late and he is due home soon. | ||||||||||||||||||
| She glances around the room, her eyes darting wildly from this to that, searching for triggers, anything at all that might set him off. | ||||||||||||||||||
| She spies a cup on the floor by the sofa and swoops down and sweeps it away in her palm. She trots out to the kitchen, aware that her heart is thumping in her chest. 'Close call' she thinks 'anytime now' | ||||||||||||||||||
| She rinses the cup under the hot tap, too busy listening for the sound of his key fumbling in the lock to notice that the water is too hot, until it is too late. Her fingers burn so hard she lets go and her shoulders droop as, in the distance, she hears the ominous crack of broken china. She looks down at the pieces in the sink and wonders for a second why the water swirling round them is flowing pink? And then she sees it, and she blinks angrily, as her tears drip, adding to the bloody puddles. She stands there staring for a second or two until she hears him screaming at her | ||||||||||||||||||
| 'You stupid bloody bitch. Look at what you've done now' | ||||||||||||||||||
| And she is jolted back to reality and realises she must clean this mess up before he gets home. So she swallows the tears, choking on their saltiness, and wraps a tea towel around her bleeding hand. Deliberately she picks up each broken piece between two fingers and slowly drops them into the waste bin. She holds up the largest piece and, before she releases it, she says in a steady voice | ||||||||||||||||||
| 'One day, you rotten bastard...one day' | ||||||||||||||||||
| And as she says the words, the merest shadow of a smile appears to play fleetingly at the corners of her mouth, and is gone. As she finishes the clean up, she listens for his footsteps on the path and the knot in her belly unravels. The dryness of her throat and the pounding in her ears begins as she hears the fumbling of the key against the lock and she knows.... | ||||||||||||||||||
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