The Daughter's Promise (ARC)

by Sarah Clutton

  They pulled up out the front of Dan’s house and he said, ‘Wait here. Back in a tick.’

  He dashed into the little orange brick building. The house block was bare apart from some patchy grass and a single old sycamore tree that stretched across the yard towards the clothes line. Sylvia had told her that the house was part of the Merrivale estate and that Dan rented it cheaply from his uncle. She looked around. In the paddock next to her, neat rows of bushy green potato crops extended out towards the deep green-grey of the ocean beyond the cliff. The crop was starting to brown off in patches, signalling that the potatoes were only a month or two from picking time. Sylvia had climbed through the fence and dug out a few when they’d had a barbecue here after Christmas, but they were small and pale then, not ready for proper harvesting.

  Annabelle was distracted by a swirl of storm clouds moving across the sky. She jumped as Dan opened the car door and dumped a cardboard box on the back seat.

  ‘We won’t walk,’ he said. ‘Those shoes you’re wearing won’t like it, and the rain’s coming back, I reckon.’

  He started the ignition and backed out. Within a minute, they had passed the entrance to Merrivale, marked by an avenue of old trees. Dan drove for another fifty metres and swung the car into the driveway of The Old Chapel, opposite the big house.

  Annabelle opened the car door and put her feet carefully on the muddy ground. The mud squelched thickly and her heart sank as it oozed up the side of Sylvia’s shoes. She avoided looking at Dan in case he sensed her shame, her stupidity.

  Dan gave two loud knocks on the door of The Old Chapel, then opened it. She hurried to follow him.

  ‘Len?’

  ‘G’day, Dan.’

  Annabelle wiped her shoes on the mat and followed Dan inside. She was pleased to see Len’s face light up when he saw her. He took another drag of his cigarette before speaking.

  ‘Hello, Annabelle pet. How did I get so lucky?’

  ‘Annabelle needed entertaining,’ said Dan.

  ‘Hi, Len. Thought you could give me a game of rummy.’

  Len balanced the cigarette between his fingers and deftly wheeled his chair out of the little kitchen with the heels of his hands.

  ‘Not unless you want to be whopped,’ he said, winking.

  Annabelle put her bag on the bottom tray of a wooden drinks trolley, out of the way of Len’s wheelchair. On the top shelf of the trolley sat a decanter of whisky and two dirty-looking glasses. Behind it was the free-standing candlestick-style ashtray Lillian had given Len for Christmas. It was exactly the right height for him in his chair. The base was made of some kind of heavy stone so he couldn’t easily knock it over. He tapped his cigarette on it.

  ‘Brought a bit of work along,’ said Dan, putting his box of files on the tiny dinner table. ‘Annabelle reckons she’ll keep you entertained, though, so I might head home for a bit later if she’s going to chat your ear off.’

  ‘Dan! I will not,’ said Annabelle. She smiled nervously at Len.

  Len laughed. ‘No worries, love, it’ll make a nice change. Lillian’s always at those paintings after work. Barely get a word out of her these days.’

  ‘Righto,’ said Dan. ‘Let’s see what the boss has left us for tea.’ He walked into the kitchen area, and Annabelle followed. This was her chance to make good. On top of the cooker there was a pot with peeled potatoes and carrots floating in some water, waiting to be boiled. On a tin plate there were four lamb chops sitting out. Dan picked up the plate and moved it across to the cooker.

  ‘You can have one of my chops, pet,’ Len told Annabelle.’ And there’s some peas in the fridge that Lil picked yesterday. We’ll do some of them. Peel another few spuds, will you?’ He wheeled himself across to the trolley and poured a Scotch that filled up nearly half the glass.

  ‘Len, Lil told me you’re not to have that before your pills and dinner,’ said Dan, pretending to be stern. ‘And then only half a nip.’

  ‘Go on with ya,’ said Len. ‘This is my chance to have a good night.’ He brought the glass to his lips and closed his eyes as he sipped.

  ‘That daughter of yours does know how to keep us boys in line, I’ll give her that,’ said Dan. He bent down beneath the sink and pulled out two dirty potatoes from a basket, handing them to Annabelle. ‘You said you’d do the boring bits.’

  While Annabelle cooked the dinner, Dan went to the table and started going through his papers. After they’d eaten, and Dan had made sure Len had taken all his pills, she and Len sat watching the television and Dan carried on working. Len began nodding off, so Dan wheeled him into the bedroom. Annabelle could hear the faint murmur of voices. She wondered how Dan was getting him into bed and how he’d use the toilet, but she was too scared to ask. She did the washing-up and left the dishes to drain on the rack.

  The night had turned cold, so Dan had lit the little woodburner in the corner of the room and it warmed the kitchen area nicely. Eventually he came out of the bedroom.

  ‘You happy to be here for a couple of hours if I head home to finish some work?’

  ‘Okay,’ said Annabelle.

  ‘Lil said he shouldn’t need anything, but maybe pop your head in now and again, just to check he’s okay. He hasn’t had an episode for a few months, but you never know, I s’pose.’

  ‘An episode?’

  ‘An epileptic fit. From the head injury when the tractor rolled.’

  An awful image of Len formed in Annabelle’s mind; his face contorted, mouth frothing.

  ‘Oh, okay,’ she said. ‘What if he does, though?’

  Dan pointed to a padded wooden spoon in a cup on the bench. ‘You put him on his side and stick that in his mouth so he doesn’t bite his tongue. Then run and get me. Or get Constance, she’s closer. They don’t have a phone here, so you could use hers to call me.’

  ‘Oh,’ said Annabelle.

  ‘Don’t worry. It won’t happen.’

  Annabelle stood straighter. She was almost grown up. Of course she could do it. It was just that she felt a bit terrified at the idea, now that she was faced with being on her own. She saw Dan glance downwards. Maybe he was appreciating her cleavage. The thought made her happy even though it shouldn’t.

  He looked away. ‘Just say if you need me to stay.’

  ‘No, I can do it.’

  He picked up his files. ‘Good. I’m snowed under.’

  ‘Dan, what if he needs to go to the toilet?’

  ‘He’s got his little urinal thing next to the bed. He’ll be all right on his own with that.’

  ‘Oh, okay.’

  ‘I’ll be back in a couple of hours, or when I see Lil’s headlights go past my place. I’ll drop you home.’

  ‘Thanks.’

  Annabelle watched him hurry to the car. The rain had started again, just lightly, and the day was finally receding into twilight. The summer evenings were long, and usually Annabelle loved them, but tonight the fading light felt like a betrayal. She looked down at Sylvia’s shoes, the sides still caked with mud, and knew she’d have to work hard to clean them tonight before she went home.

  Out the window, Dan’s car had slowed outside the Merrivale gardens. A tall man in a black raincoat was holding a dog on a leash; a boxer she thought, but she didn’t know if that was right. The hood of the raincoat was obscuring the man’s face. Dan was talking to him. It must be his Uncle Andrew.

  Annabelle had spoken to Andrew Broadhurst once, when she’d stopped in at the law firm where Lillian and Dan worked with him on her way home from school. She’d been there to pick up an envelope for her dad. Andrew had come out of his office while she and Lillian had been talking, and had made a special effort to come over and say hello. He looked like a film star – like her mum’s favourite actor, Cary Grant, from the old films in black and white.

  He’d smiled at her that day, when Lillian had introduced them. Of course, Annabelle had seen him around town plenty of times over the years – he was hard to miss – but he’d never taken any
notice of her until then. He’d been really nice, and Annabelle wished she hadn’t been wearing her school uniform, because she’d felt like a kid, and he was such a strong, good-looking man. A proper man. Several people had come in and out of the office while she was there, and it was as if he had this magnetic force around him, where people waited for him to say or do something before they could move. Carol Hines from two years above her at school had just got a job on the reception desk, and she had been almost breathless when he stopped to ask her about a client before heading back into his office. He had given Annabelle a genuine smile before he left, and shaken her hand, saying he was pleased to meet her; he’d looked at her like she was really someone, not just a kid, and inside she had melted.

  Annabelle pulled herself out of the memory as the sound of a raised voice penetrated the small gap between the sill and the window. The man in the raincoat wasn’t leaning down amicably towards Dan’s car window any more. He was posturing, waving his hand, as if he was angry. Annabelle looked around, fearful that Len might wake, though she knew it would be hard to hear the noise from inside the bedroom. She leaned against the window frame and raised the sash another inch. The voices got louder, and the man slammed his fist on the top of Dan’s car before striding off down the lane, towards the lighthouse, pulling the dog after him.

  Annabelle pondered this exchange for a moment, then she closed the window and went across to the sink and found an old cloth. She bent down and carefully pulled the shoes off her feet and put them on the bench, having an immediate sense of regressing into her smallness, her childish self. She felt her mood deflate. Blow! The mud was everywhere. She wetted the cloth and began rubbing at the stains. If she didn’t get the shoes back to being perfect, her life wouldn’t be worth living.

  A loud knock at the door startled her, making her heart jolt. Who would be out here, so far from anywhere? And in this weather? She glanced out of the window. The raincoat man was nearing the far end of the lane, the dog trotting beside him. Perhaps it was Dan’s Aunt Constance at the door. Leaving the shoes on the bench, she slipped across the room and opened the door.

  ‘Hello, Annabelle.’

  She blanched as the huge young man leaned forward and the smell hit her. His clothes were layered with dirt and the look in his eyes wasn’t quite right. He held out his hand and offered her a jar.

  ‘Need to give this to Len.’ His voice was nasal, and dragged with the sloppy, unformed movements of his mouth.

  ‘Tippy.’ She let out her breath in a rush. She’d always been wary of Tippy, even though Sylvia said he was harmless. She knew he did jobs for Dan and his Uncle Andrew sometimes, and if she ever ran into him, he would stare at her, his mouth hanging open, his head moving in line with her wherever she went. Once he’d left her a scrawled note on muddy paper, almost indecipherable, in the letter box after he’d delivered some honey to her house: I luv yoo Anabel. Yoo pritee. From Tippy.

  ‘Honey? Thanks, I’ll give it to him,’ she said.

  ‘Constance said I gotta put it away for him. Have to come in.’

  ‘Oh,’ said Annabelle.

  As soon as she stepped back, Annabelle knew she’d done the wrong thing. She was always too nice to people. That was what Sylvia told her. But she never wanted to offend them, and now she’d let a huge, simple-minded man into the house, a man who’d been watching her weirdly for as long as she could remember. As he stepped past her, a sick chill ran down her spine.

  Tippy lumbered over to the kitchen and put the honey in the pantry cupboard. Then he turned around and stood with his feet planted apart. She flicked her head around to look back out the door, letting her face scrunch up for a millisecond: just go, please please please.

  ‘You’re my friend, Annabelle.’

  ‘Thank you, Tippy,’ she said. ‘You’d better go now. You don’t want to wake Len up.’

  ‘He never wakes up at night,’ said Tippy.

  Fear began to pool in Annabelle’s stomach.

  ‘You need to go, Tippy.’

  He walked towards her and stopped, his arm pressing up against hers at the doorway. The thick, sour smell of him made her want to gag.

  ‘Please, Annabelle. I just gonna stay for a little while.’

  ‘No, Tippy.’ Annabelle put her hand on his arm and nudged him towards the door. Tippy stood like a solid concrete statue. Then he took two steps back into the house.

  ‘We’re friends,’ he said. He pointed towards the couch. ‘We can play.’ Annabelle gulped, her mind racing. He reached forward and clasped her arm. ‘Please, Annabelle. Won’t take long.’

  She felt his grip tighten on her arm. Scream, she thought. All I need to do is scream. But when she opened her mouth, no sound would come out.

  Fifteen

  Sylvia

  Sylvia sat in the car park of the retirement village, contemplating the fragrant oils for Annabelle that had been sitting on her kitchen bench for two days. She had also dug out the booklets about managing cancer through lifestyle change she’d ordered for Lillian.

  Hopefully Annabelle’s lump wasn’t actually cancer. It could be anything really. Her doshas were clearly out of balance. Aggravated. The trouble was that Annabelle needed a whole-life overhaul, not just herbal remedies and oils. The hormone tablets she was taking were bound to be adding to the problem too.

  Sylvia should have been up to Merrivale already to give the oils to her sister. She should be making her a nice pot of kitchari every day too. The lentils would be nourishing for Annabelle’s body and soul. But it felt wrong to act like she cared, even though she did. Especially when her own terrible behaviour with Dan was no doubt part of the cause of whatever toxins Annabelle’s poor body was dredging up. Sylvia knew that these things were always holistic, and on some deep unconscious level, Annabelle had probably sensed something was awry months ago.

  Perhaps it was fear that was stopping Sylvia from taking the oils up to her. Fear of facing up to her own little sister. Yes, that was it, she realised. She was officially a coward. A miserable, fickle, shallow coward. How sad, to discover this about herself at the age of sixty-two.

  She sighed. Across the lawn, a woman was wheeling an elderly man out of the front door of the main building. She pushed him along the path until they passed a birdbath surrounded by lavender bushes. Every time she arrived at Annarbee Lodge, Sylvia felt a niggling sort of guilt tapping at her conscience. It was the same as when she occasionally ate bacon or stuffed a plastic container in the rubbish bin when the recycling bin was full. Be a better person. But who was counting?

  She supposed the guilt about old people stemmed from leaving her father on the farm when she was twenty, just when he needed her support. Leaving him with Annabelle and her wild moods. He was ageing and he had needed her, and she had left. Then she was too poor to afford the flight home for his funeral ten years later. She was barely surviving in an ashram in Israel, getting by on basic rations and meditation. So this was her penance. Old people. They made her squirm with inadequacy. But she refused to run from it, which was probably why she’d agreed to teach this yoga-for-seniors class when they’d asked her. There were plenty of other yoga teachers on the north-west coast. But they had asked her, maybe because her silvery-blonde hair made her less threatening to the class.

  Dan had pointed out to her a few weeks ago that technically she was almost old enough to be admitted to Annarbee Lodge herself. Later, in bed, she had tensed her pelvic floor around his penis and he had widened his eyes, and she had said, ‘I bet nobody in Annarbee Lodge could do that.’ He’d laughed and kissed her neck and she had thought: I really am a bad person.

  The minor bacon-eating guilt would have been welcome today, though, if it could have replaced the real guilt she’d been feeling since Annabelle had been delivered to her door by the paramedics. It was eating at Sylvia’s insides.

  Her phone buzzed and Dan’s number appeared on the screen. She’d spent the last few days ignoring his calls, but they were coming every few ho
urs now, messages pleading to see her after she had specifically told him not to contact her. She sighed again. Be real, Sylvia. Why would he take her seriously this time? She’d always given in before. She was her own worst enemy.

  But Dan hadn’t been able to hear the conversation she’d had with Annabelle in the living room the other night. So how could he understand that this time, things really did have to change? He hadn’t seen the betrayal written in Annabelle’s eyes.

  A surge of irritation made her answer the phone. ‘Stop calling me.’

  ‘Syl, stop avoiding me. I need to see you.’

  ‘No, Dan. No way. It’s over. I’ll be leaving Tasmania as soon as I get myself sorted.’

  ‘Please don’t. I’m leaving Annabelle. I need to be with you.’

  ‘You can’t leave her if she’s about to start chemotherapy, Dan. That would make you a prize arse.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Her breast lump. Did they confirm it was cancer?’

  ‘What are you talking about? She hasn’t told me about a lump.’

  Sylvia hadn’t talked to him about Annabelle’s lump the other night. When he came out of the bedroom, he’d left with barely a word being spoken.

  ‘Well you should talk to her. And don’t call me again.’

  ‘Syl, don’t do this. You know as well as I do that we’re meant to be together. I’m not taking no for an answer.’

  ‘Bugger off, Dan.’

  ‘Don’t speak to me like that,’ he said angrily.

  ‘I’m not your wife. You don’t get to boss me around.’

  ‘I’d have you as my wife! You know I would. I’d have you between my sheets every night if I could.’

  Sylvia cringed. Was it only about the sex for him? How typical. How tedious. ‘Well you already have a wife, in case it slipped your mind.’

  ‘You’re the one I would have married if you hadn’t left. I wouldn’t have bloody been in this marriage hell if you hadn’t disappeared off the face of the planet. She’s a twit, Syl. I know she’s your sister, but seriously, the woman is a moron. And she spends my money like it’s water! I’ve been planning to leave for years, but divorce is bloody expensive.’