A Rolling Stone – Back Story – Sandra 53

 

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Down by the pond Frankie and Sandra were playing a game called ‘dolls and bulldozers’. In this game there was one unspoken objective. To bury your opponent’s doll in as much dirt as possible using the digger before they could bury yours. 

The game had progressed a long way from its origins which was actually one where the two dolls lived in perfect harmony in a small tree house constructed in a nearby bush. In the lazy, hazy and somewhat idyllic days when this game had started out, the world was one of co-operation and consistency, one where the occasional disagreement over who was making Mud Pie for the other that evening was swiftly resolved (because who DIDN’T want to make Mud Pie, for heaven’s sake?) and if volunteering didn’t get the job done, a swift round of scissors, paper, stone surely would.

Mud Pie making had been superseded over the past six months. There had been a dispute about the recipe - method more than ingredients - and as a result the girls were banned from even carrying anything that might make something pie shaped. During this time a few other things had occurred, some of which Frankie and Sandra were aware of, some of which they weren’t. 

Naturally they were aware that Frankie had had a birthday and for this birthday, she’d made a sudden decision that she wanted earth moving equipment rather than domestic appliances. Her parents blamed a rather interesting episode of Newsround for that. As a result she’d received a rather large bulldozer with flashing lights, a large scoop and an ear splitting noise which made her parents consign the kit to exterior use only. After a few months of moaning, complaining and fighting, Sandra’s birthday came around and she too invested in some heavy plant machinery, a JCB type digger with an operating shovel that really could shift earth. She was disappointed it did this silently but she was more than capable of fulfilling the noise requirement herself.

They were also both aware that their father no longer left the house during the day. They weren’t sure exactly why but they suspected it had something to do with his need to keep drinking the special red drink that came in many bottles. It also had something to do with redundant, skills and poor investment in industry, but neither their dad nor their mum explained these words to them.

Right now, Frankie’s doll (Jessie) was planning a rather cunning move on Sandra’s (Petra) which involved shifting a heavy stone from it’s semi-embedded place near the pond and gaining Petra’s interest and in it. Having done this, the bulldozer planned to suddenly spring to life and push a load of dirt on her head. That, at least, was the plan.

“Look!” said Jessie. “Dinosaur tooth!”

Petra was sceptical but came over to have a look anyway. She and Jessie weren’t palaeontologists (today) but did understand about heavy things and the difficulty in moving them about. (They were more site managers, perhaps quantity surveyors).

“Can you put it in the pond?” suggested Petra. “Maybe we could tell better if it was all clean?”

Jessie did a double-take at Petra and tried to work out where this might be going. She and her bulldozer took the stone to the water’s edge rather nervously and in an apparent act of co-operation used her scoop to pour water over the new find. 

“It’s a grey one,” confirmed Jessie. “I’ve seen ones like this before.”

“I’ve seen a bigger one,” said Petra. “This one is tiny. Probably from a small not very important dinosaur. Or it could just be a stone if you like.”

Jessie did not like but did not say because she was excavating the hole where the rock had come from. It was a big one, thought Jessie, and the hole I’m making will soon be big enough for you to explore and then be buried in so I will win.

Petra was curious as to how big the stone really was and decided the only way to really know would be to hurl it into the pond and see how big a splash it made.

Deidre was tired of life. The unemployed, drinking husband, the kids railing against each other about who knew what. The constant washing cleaning cooking talking coping cycle of it all. And now her kids seemed to be blaming each other over the loss of a doll who apparently had to go swimming to rescue a stone, or had just suddenly decided to go for a swim, depending on who you asked. Either way the doll was now floating in the middle of the pond and it wouldn’t get itself out of there, no matter how much personality and swimming skills Sandra claimed she had.

The doll would also not of get out of there if it were left to Eric to sort. So Deidre found a seaside fishing net and set off on the rescue mission. Maybe the problem started with her expectations of herself she thought. That and her name. Deidre, did not feel that as Deidre she was special or capable of anything truly exciting.