The Stepdaughter. Debbie Howells
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Название: The Stepdaughter
Автор: Debbie Howells
Издательство: Ingram
Жанр: Триллеры
isbn: 9781496706966
isbn:
I’d guessed that already; otherwise she wouldn’t have been waiting for me at the bus stop.
“She gave me one of those talks about not missing school. I thought she was different but she’s just like everyone else. I used to imagine I could talk to her.” Hollie sounds tearful. “No one knows how I’m feeling, Niamh.”
Suddenly I’m irritated. It’s like last night all over again. Hollie tells me something terrible is going on, something she can’t talk about, and I’m supposed to just let her lie on my bed and wallow. Folding my arms, I stare at her. “I can’t help if you don’t tell me what’s happened.”
Before she can reply, there’s the scrunch of car tires on gravel. Hollie leaps up and runs to the landing window. I follow more slowly.
“She’s back. I have to go. Shit.” She sounds hysterical again. “I don’t want to see her.”
Running back to my room, she goes to the window and opens it. It’s the craziest overreaction. My window is too high for her to jump from. I put my hand on her arm. “Wait. She might go into the garden or to the bathroom or something.”
From my bedroom, I hear the back door open as my mother goes into the kitchen, then cupboards opening and closing, before she runs the tap and turns on the kettle. Then I hear her boots on the wooden floor as she comes to the bottom of the stairs.
“Are you up there, Niamh?” At the sound of my mother’s voice, behind me, Hollie shrinks back.
“Yeah.”
“I’ve put the kettle on. Would you like tea?”
“No. Thanks. I’m doing homework.”
As I turn to go back into my room, Hollie’s distraught, cowering behind my door. “Why are you so upset? Does it matter that you’re here?”
“Shhh...” Hollie’s eyes are wide as she shakes her head. “She’ll know you’re talking to someone. You have to help me. I have to get out.”
Just then, I hear my mother coming up the stairs. Holding my breath, I glance at Hollie, then I hear the door to my parents’ bedroom open, then another door inside to the en suite.
“Now,” I tell Hollie urgently. “She’s in the bathroom. Just be really quiet.”
Without speaking, Hollie flies down the stairs. I don’t hear the back door open, just glimpse her from an upstairs window, running across the grass, before I go back to my room and get my homework out. Five minutes later, there’s a knock on my door, and my mother pushes it open.
“I just saw Hollie running across the garden.”
I look away. “Yeah. She suddenly remembered something she had to do.”
My mother gives me an odd look. “Be careful, Niamh. I know you and Hollie are close, but there’s something going on. I’m worried about her.”
My mother is now an expert on Hollie? I don’t think so. I raise my eyebrows at her. “I have homework,” I say pointedly.
Heat rises in my cheeks as she glances toward my unopened schoolbooks. “No doubt you do.” Her voice is cool. “In that case, I’ll let you get on.”
5
Elise
In this house of charades, Niamh pretends to do her homework, while I arrange the rest of the flowers, then start dinner for my disunited family. On the outside looking in, there’s nothing to set us apart from anyone else: Soft gray curtains are drawn against the darkness; the smell of caramelizing onions filling the house; the serene sound of Classic FM floating in the air; the teenage daughter reluctantly studying in her bedroom; the wife cooking dinner for the doctor husband, who’ll soon be home after another day of healing people. Ludicrous façades, when underneath, we barely know each other. For a moment I imagine a different kind of life—one with honesty, laughter, lightness; where love is demonstrated, not withheld or wielded with intent.
My daydream is interrupted by the sound of a car outside. It pauses while a door slams; then as footsteps on gravel come nearer, it drives away. When the back door opens, it’s clear the day hasn’t improved Andrew’s mood. If anything, it’s worse.
“You’re early.” I’m icily polite, imagining he’s been stood up by his lover. Otherwise he wouldn’t be here.
“Hardly,” he snaps. “But I might have been, if I hadn’t had to sort the car out.”
“Is it fixed?”
“For Christ’s sake!” he bellows. “Didn’t you see it when you came in? You don’t give a shit, Elise.” He looks around in disgust. “Why are there flowers everywhere?”
Because there is more to life than vile deception and anger. Remember beauty, Andrew? How it feels to be touched gently? To be loved?
“I wanted to cheer up the house. You know I hate winter. Dinner will be about twenty minutes.” Speaking as calmly as I can, I go to the fridge and pour a glass of white wine. But he’s already storming through to the living room. Seconds later he comes back, slamming something down on the counter behind me; I hear the splintering of glass.
“Can’t we have one fucking room without fucking flowers?” As he marches out, I turn to see a vase that used to belong to my grandmother, its crystal dulled by age. There’s a jagged crack down one side, from which water’s seeping, pooling on the counter, then dripping onto the floor.
Ripping out the flowers I arranged only a little while ago, I drop them on the worktop, then empty the vase and throw it away. The flowers are still scattered there when Niamh comes downstairs, her cool eyes skimming over them before settling on me. Her gaze is impenetrable. I wonder if she heard the way Andrew spoke to me just now, or the shattering of glass, before telling myself, of course she did. How could she possibly not have?
“Can you lay the table, honey?” My tone is light.
Without speaking, Niamh sets three places at the kitchen table, then fetches the peppermill and water glasses.
“Do you have much homework?”
“Not really.” Niamh’s voice is expressionless, as she comes over and peers into the pan I’m stirring.
“Pork,” I tell her, suddenly aching for connection, for a joking aside, an affectionate exchange, but Niamh and I are not like that. What we share can only be described as a detached coldness. “Would you like to tell him it’s ready?”
Without speaking, Niamh wanders out and I start serving food onto plates. I wonder what’s going through her mind, but then she comes back, followed by Andrew. After pouring himself a glass of wine, he picks up a plate and a fork and goes back to the sitting room.
It’s a pattern I’ve grown used to, but today, rage flares inside me at his deliberate contempt. Stifling the urge to tell him what I think, I take the two remaining plates over СКАЧАТЬ