The Other Daughter Read online

  Table of Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  The Other Daughter

  Sara Alexi

  oneiro

  PUBLISHED BY:

  Oneiro Press

  The Other Daughter

  Copyright © 2017 by Sara Alexi

  This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

  Also by Sara Alexi

  (Click the images below to buy on Amazon…)

  Chapter 1

  Dawn slams the brakes on, one wheel on the kerb, yanks the door open, runs to the house and fumbles in her bag for the keys. ‘Don’t be dead, Mum, don’t be dead!’

  She leaps up the four steps to the back door, hands trembling. The key won’t go into the lock. It’s always stiff; she’s been meaning to get someone to fix it for years.

  ‘Please don’t have left your keys in the other side …’ A whispered prayer.

  A click, and relief flows as the door swings open and Dawn hurries inside. The silence is thick and the smell of musty carpets mixed with the aroma of old coats, as usual, sticks in her nostrils. Her feet slow and then halt. Her heart thumps in her chest and the sound repeats itself in her ears.

  ‘Mum?’ She whispers the word, terrified that if she says it out loud there will still be no answer.

  The utility area that connects the back door to the kitchen is narrow: washing machine and freezer down one side, supporting a worktop on which there is a microwave and stacks of tin cans. Once upon a time, when both she and Amanda lived here, and Dad was still alive, these tins were filled with Mum’s home-baked cakes and scones. They’ve been empty for years now. Above the counter are shelves, sagging under the weight of tins of food, some of them three and four years old, probably older at the back.

  In the kitchen, she puts her keys down silently on the table, listening. Nothing! Her bottom lip starts to tremble. Her vision blurs and her eyes swim. Once she has passed through a second door, into the hall, the sound of her footsteps is muffled by the carpet, laid on a thick layer of bubble wrap underlay, Dad’s clever idea. The popping stopped long ago.

  The television room door is closed. That is where she will most likely be. There is no sound of a television.

  ‘Mum?’ Dawn calls out, slightly louder. The sound of her own voice ringing in the emptiness calms her, but there is no answer. Taking a deep breath and then clenching her teeth, she opens the door.

  ‘Oh Mum!’ She exhales rapidly. ‘Oh, thank goodness.’ She hurries to her mother’s side and puts her arms around her. ‘Are you all right?’

  ‘No, I’m not. Look at these poor mites!’ Mum is staring at a charity letter, on her knee, which shows photos of faraway places, and little African children so thin it is amazing that they are alive.

  ‘No, I meant you, Mum? Are you all right?’ Dawn backs off and looks her over from head to foot.

  ‘Me? Yes, why would I not be? But these little children aren’t, look how thin this one is. Came yesterday, it did. Imagine how they are today.’ Her bent finger traces across the picture.

  ‘Mum, I got a call, you fell!’ Dawn crouches so they are eye to eye.

  ‘Did I?’

  ‘Yes! I got a call from your window cleaner. John, is it? He said he had to get Jim to help pick you off the floor.’

  ‘Such nice men. John and Jim. You wonder where their parents are.’ Her fingers still on the child’s face.

  ‘Mum, it’s just a begging letter. You can’t afford to give away your money. Throw it in the bin. We’ve talked about this before.’

  Mum looks at her with surprise.

  ‘Several times.’

  ‘You want me to put the children in the bin?’

  Dawn gently eases the cheap print from under Mum’s hand and puts it on the little round table next to her chair.

  ‘Mum, tell me about the fall, tell me about Jim and John.’

  ‘Such nice men. Window cleaners. Both of them. I think they work together. Is it Wednesday already?’

  ‘No, Mum, it’s Monday.’

  ‘This isn’t your day.’ A frown passes across Mum’s brow.

  Dawn comes on Wednesdays for tea, and leaves after Midsomer Murders, reruns of which are on most days. On Fridays and Saturdays she is at Mum’s for tea again, and they watch television after that – usually an old film, a repeat. She arrives at five thirty and leaves at nine: the same routine these past sixteen years.

  Now she is back on her feet. ‘You’ve dried blood in your hair. Mum, what happened?’

  ‘My head does hurt.’ Mum is looking at the letter on the round table.

  ‘I’ll get you some painkillers, but you must tell me what happened.’ The painkillers are in the kitchen, in the bottom drawer. She leaves both doors open so she can still hear Mum’s voice.

  ‘It was the Damart catalogue.’

  ‘What was?’ Next to the pills is a half-eaten family-size chocolate bar and a stack of leaflets from local takeaways. She puts the leaflets on top to hide the temptation.

  ‘It was under the door.’

  The tap runs cold and Dawn fills a glass and wets a tea towel, takes them through.

  ‘What has the Damart catalogue got to do with anything?’ She passes the glass and Mum holds out a curled hand to receive the pills, and then she starts to gently dab at the dried blood with the wet tea towel. Mum does not flinch; Dawn has never known her to flinch at anything. It is almost as if she is disconnected from her body.

  ‘I told you, the Damart catalogue was on the step. I’d been out to the post office, for my pension. Now where is my bag …’

  ‘I’ll find your bag in a minute. Sit still and tell me what happened.’

  ‘The catalogue was wrapped with plastic, and it was slippery when I stepped on it, that was the problem.’

  ‘Oh God, Mum – you didn’t fall back down the steps, did you?’ Dawn stops dabbing to look in her mother’s face.

  ‘I don’t think so. I sort of twisted, I think. Which reminds me, there’s a twenty-pence piece under the stool by the back doormat.’

  ‘So you fell by the back door?’

  ‘I suppose I must have done. I called out and John and Jim came.’

  ‘Oh Mum, how long were you calling out for?’

  ‘I don’t know. I looked around for a bit, not knowing what to do. I was like an upturned beetle. That’s when I saw the twenty-pence piece. You can have that, it’s under the stool by the back door. I might have had a little sleep, too, I don’t recall.’

  ‘John and Jim?’ Dawn puts a hand to her own forehead; the pain there is spreading, a dull ache. It might be the beginning of a migraine.

  ‘Yes, they came, they heard me. It took the two of them to get me up. There was no room, you see, not with me lying in front of the washing machine. John, with his long legs, stepped over me. Pushing and pulling, they were.’

  ‘It sounds horrible. I’m so sorry.’

  ‘Why are you sorry? You didn’t leave the Damart
catalogue under my door. I think I’ll write to them.’

  ‘Yes, you write to them, Mum.’ Dawn balls the damp tea towel. The cut is really very small and it isn’t bleeding any more. ‘You want a cup of tea?’

  Mum’s complexion is not pale, she has colour in her cheeks, but Jim must have been worried at the time; why else would he have called her, why else would Mum have given him her number?

  ‘Oh, that would be lovely. Is it time for Midsomer Murders yet?’ The charity leaflet slips from the table and arcs to the floor as Mum leans over and reaches for the television remote control.

  ‘Too early, Mum.’

  ‘But you’re here …’

  ‘I came out of work early, when I got the call.’

  ‘The call?’

  ‘John and Jim.’

  ‘Nice men.’ She turns the remote in her hand, pointing first one end and then the other at the blank screen.

  Dawn goes through to the kitchen, fills the kettle.

  ‘I have a new supervisor,’ she calls back down the hall.

  ‘Bit early for supper,’ Mum calls back.

  Dawn opens the bottom drawer and snaps off a line of chocolate, pops it in her mouth. She closes her eyes to concentrate on the velvety sweetness, the instant lift it seems to give her, the comfort. But all too soon it is gone. She kicks the drawer shut to hide the temptation and the kettle starts to hiss.

  ‘No, I said I have a new supervisor.’ She goes back into the television room and slumps into the other comfy chair, on the other side of the gas fire. The sofa, on the opposite wall, side on to the television, is piled high with magazines and catalogues and letters from charities; packets of notelets from the RSPCA show cute baby animals, and there are free pens from the NSPCC.

  ‘A new supervisor?’

  ‘She’s one of those people who loves the power. I hope she doesn’t notice that I left early.’

  ‘Why did you leave early?’ Mum is still pressing the buttons on the remote but nothing is happening.

  ‘Because you had a fall, Mum.’

  ‘Did I?’

  ‘Press the red button at the top. I’ll make the tea.’

  Her shoulders drop as she walks; the threat of a migraine is leaving her. She will take her time to make a pot of tea, let herself slow down, reflect a little.

  ‘Stupid!’ She condemns herself for the way she drove to get here. The roadworks were still going on and the light was turning red as she approached. Her foot hovered over the brake. That was when she felt the first twinge of a migraine and she closed one eye in an attempt to alleviate the sensation.

  ‘Traffic lights for a single small hole on the pavement!’ she comments, and she drops two teabags into the pot. The kettle clicks off.

  There was no one coming so she stamped hard on the accelerator, at the last moment. The red light flashed across her eyes as she passed; a check in the rear view mirror showed the silver car behind stopping. A glance at her phone told her there had not been another call. She would have heard it anyway. Both arms stiff, tightly gripping the wheel.

  She sniffs at the milk and pours it into a little stainless steel jug.

  All the time she was driving, all she could think was, ‘What if it’s worse than John said?’ The hill drained the car’s momentum and the silver coupe that had stopped behind her at the traffic light cruised past.

  ‘Come on!’ she remembers shouting, urging the little blue car on and glancing again at her phone. Nothing. ‘Keep calm,’ she told herself. ‘If it is bad, John or Jim will have stayed with her. If it’s really bad they’ll call an ambulance.’ She imagined her mother adamant, insisting that she wanted no doctors, however bad the damage.

  She puts a piece of kitchen paper on the plastic tray so the teapot and milk jug do not slip and she finds two cups.

  Finally the little blue car crested the hill and gained speed, catching up and passing the coupe on the way down the other side. The roundabout at the bottom looked clear. With no decrease in speed she turned the wheel hard and the car lurched, and for a moment she wondered if the near side wheels lifted. Her instinct was to slow down, but she couldn’t, she dared not, and so she exited the roundabout as fast as she entered it.

  ‘Just stupid!’ she repeats, and she lifts the tray, then puts it down again; they could do with a biscuit or two, after the shock.

  Savouring another strip of chocolate, she looks at the calendar on the wall. Two kittens playing with a red ball of wool advertise the local veterinary surgery. The muscles around her heart seem to tighten at the sight. She could have done it, with just a little encouragement. It might have taken her longer than most but she could have been a vet, or a veterinary nurse at the least. She lifts the page to look at the miniature ponies that grace next month’s page. But no, she was not allowed to be the one to shine. Amanda got all that glory. On the corkboard by the cooker, there is a new card from Australia. She plucks it free of its coloured pin.

  Dear Mum,

  The sun is still shining here in Australia, the sun always shines here. The boys are well and send their love, as always. Carl loves high school and is doing well. Lucas is jealous but I have told him he will go next year. They have cut my shifts at the hospital which I guess is a relief. Brax sends his love as always. Love Amanda. P.H.D.

  ‘P.H.D.’ stands for ‘Please say hello to Dawn’. When Amanda first emigrated to be with Braxton, she would address the postcards to both of them, but somehow, over the years, it turned into an afterthought, an abbreviation. Twelve years, to be exact. It’s meant to be a sort of joke, as she is a doctor of medicine but does not actually have a PhD. Dawn pins the card back to the corkboard.

  She takes the last strip of chocolate and puts the wrapper in the bin, stuffing it under the empty milk carton, then takes the tea through.

  ‘I should have been a vet, you know.’ She wants to add if you had given me one second of encouragement.

  ‘Did I find my bag?’ Mum has put down the television remote control and picked up the charity letter again. ‘I need my chequebook.’ The adverts are on silent.

  ‘You always have so much to give others, don’t you, Mum?’ Dawn mutters, but quietly enough not to be heard clearly.

  ‘What, dear?’

  ‘Here’s your bag.’ Dawn takes the bag from behind the sofa.

  ‘I’ll just give them a little something.’ Her crooked fingers scrabble for her cheque book and pen, both of which she finds with remarkable ease, considering how full she stuffs her bag.

  ‘Mum, you can’t afford to. Listen! You don’t have the money to be giving it away.’

  ‘I have a house, dear, I’m one of the lucky ones.’

  ‘Yes, but you have bills to pay and food to buy.’

  ‘I’m sure it will be fine.’ She starts to write out the cheque.

  Dawn wants to swear as she watches the old woman pretending to be all official, notes the sense of power it seems to give her to write a cheque, and then in a moment of lucidity the old woman becomes her mum again and looks up.

  ‘So, a new supervisor. Maybe that will improve your job.’ She smiles and tears off the cheque, and puts it in the prepaid envelope.

  ‘I don’t think anything could improve that job,’ Dawn grumbles, pouring the tea.

  ‘Yes, but you stick with it, girl. It has a pension, and you’ll be glad of that in the long run.’

  ‘In the long run,’ Dawn mutters, and she pours the milk. Sixteen years have slid by since she took the job. Sixteen years of her life gone in that hideous role.

  The television is now unmuted and the familiar music of Midsomer Murders fills the room at full volume.

  ‘I do wish they wouldn’t mutter, can you make out what they are saying? They mumble.’ Mum says the same thing every time she switches on the television. She can eavesdrop on conversations at a hundred metres, but the television she always needs on full volume. Dawn takes her earplugs from the porcelain box that jostles for space with an assortment of family photos o
n the shelf above the radiator. Carl and Lucas, the grandchildren Mum has never seen. Amanda in her graduation gown. Amanda on a tricycle aged two. Amanda and Braxton getting married on the beach in the Seychelles. There is also a photo of Amanda with Dad and one of Mum and Dad in their twenties.

  ‘You know, you don’t have one photo of me here.’

  The moment she has said this, she wishes that she had not. Not one part of her wants to hear the excuses that serve to avoid saying the actual words, the real reason why her image is not there with the rest, which is that her mum does not want to see her there. She is a disappointment.

  ‘Why do I need a photo of you when you are here nearly every day? Could you get me my chocolate, please, dear? Bottom drawer, in the kitchen.’

  Chapter 2

  They watch Chief Inspector John Barnaby solve a crime of passion, with Mum giving a running commentary throughout. Each time the adverts come on she mutes the sound and the images flicker in silence. Justice prevails in the final scene of the drama and Mum sighs, satisfied.

  ‘I knew it would be him who done it. Never liked him as an actor. Shifty eyes.’ She turns the television off. ‘I’d better get the tea on.’

  Leaning to one side, with one hand flat on the round table and the other on the arm of her chair, she shuffles her bottom forward and then, rocking her weight forward over her feet, she stands unsteadily. She’s misjudged it and her weight is too far forward; she tries to put one foot in front, to halt the momentum, but doesn’t manage it quickly enough. Her fingers fumble to grip the occasional table but it is an unstable three-legged affair. Dawn is on her feet, her hands out, and balance is re-established.

  ‘Mum, you nearly fell again.’ She says it as kindly as she can, to counteract the unexpected fury raging in her gut.

  ‘I just missed my step, which is not a fall. Don’t exaggerate.’

  ‘Okay, walk to the kitchen then,’ Dawn challenges her, trying to calm her own unexpected internal response.