Read The Near Miss for Free Online

puttered out, and he shook his head.
    He tried again. ‘If we both hate our jobs, then let’s just quit. Sell the house.’ He shrugged. ‘There’s more to life than this. And I want to give myself a year, just one more year, to work on this and get it over the line. I know I can. This is a good one.’
    â€˜Tom, I couldn’t bear to sell the house. To go back to renting, to feel like we had let things slide down that far. A house is everything. The security we need. And I want to have a baby. That was the deal: that if you had your year, you would go back to work and save enough to have a baby for my year. And you’ve been back at work three months. Three months!’
    â€˜Yeah, three months. And I hardly ever see Lotte now. I’m lucky to get to say goodnight to her when I come home. If I was home she could do less time in childcare, and I could pick her up from kindy. Why would I have a baby when I hardly see the one we’ve got?’
    â€˜You had lots of time with her last year.’ A little too much, thought Grace jealously. All the little rituals father and daughter had developed; milkshakes at the café with the bear sign, and chats to the old lady with the cat on the walk home from childcare, and Lego out in the workshop while Tom worked on the robot.
    â€˜What about those people down the road? The Trappers? They have four little kids, they rent, they live on one income and they’re always happy. That guy’s always sitting on the front porch playing guitar, the kids are always running around, laughing.’
    â€˜Darl, they’ve got a house that’s too cold in winter and too hot in summer, a car that breaks down every second day. I talk to Anna. Those kids couldn’t even afford to go on the three-year-olds’ kindy excursion last year.’ She stared at him.
    â€˜No?’ he said mildly.
    â€˜No. They had to take the day off and stay home with their dad.’
    â€˜Oh. My. God. You mean they missed the Munich Children’s Opera, on its eighth Australian tour? Should we call Human Services?’
    â€˜Fuck off .’
    â€˜Mummy?’ The word trailed from a nearby window.
    Lotte. They went inside and to her door. She sat up, a shadow in the darkness.
    â€˜It hurts.’
    â€˜I’ll get your medicine.’ Grace brought the little cup and sat on the side of the bed and stroked back her precious girl’s hair. The mattress sank as Tom sat behind her and took Lotte’s free hand in both of his. Lotte drank her medicine and her parents sat together on the side of the bed and breathed in her smell. Around them swirled the horror of the accident, the near miss, the knowledge of how close they had come to losing her. Nothing else mattered.
    Finally, Grace spoke in the darkness. ‘Two years, Tom. If you could just work for two years while I take time off for a baby, then you can have your year off. How does that sound?’
    He sighed deeply, lying down to snuggle beside Lotte. ‘It sounds like hell,’ he murmured.
    â€˜Oh.’
    â€˜Would it include the three months I’ve already worked?’
    â€˜Yes.’ She had to hide the sympathy she felt. Her clever man, full of passion for his clever dream. She did not want to be his jailer.
    â€˜I guess I could keep working on the solar roof at weekends.’
    â€˜And nights,’ suggested Grace. It was a peace offering; she was sick to death of him working out in the shed every spare minute of his life, but if that was what it took.
    â€˜It would be nice to have another baby,’ said Tom. He stroked Lotte’s shoulder. ‘She’s so beautiful.’
    â€˜If anything happened to her . . .’
    â€˜We’re so lucky.’ That horrible luck that they had genuflected before since the accident. ‘When is the woman coming over, the one who saved Lotte?’
    â€˜Saturday.’
    â€˜I really want to meet her. And say