The Good Daughter: A gripping, suspenseful, page-turning thriller. Alexandra Burt

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СКАЧАТЬ rest of the day sweeping the crickets out of the house, and I do the long-neglected laundry. As I finish folding the towels, a Dr. Wagner calls me from the hospital. He’s calm but curt. Emotionless. After scribbling down his number and asking him to repeat it back to me three times, I ask him about my mother.

      “Your mother is a bit confused,” he says, and I wonder if that’s a word a doctor ought to use regarding the mental state of a patient. “I have her on a mild sedative and we’ll keep her for a few days. She has asked to stay and seems content for the moment.”

      “When can I see her?”

      “No visitors for the time being.”

      “But she’s okay, isn’t she?”

      “She’s requested a few days of peace. That’s what she called it. No reason to be alarmed.” I hear him take in a deep breath. “Something seems to have happened?”

      A few days of peace seems like something she would say. In the back of my mind I hear my mother’s voice during our last conversation, sharp as a knife, the day after I found Jane.

      “Why did you bring the cops to my house?”

       “I told you last night, I found a woman in the woods.”

       “You lied when you were a child,” my mother said. “You’d tell stories, get people in trouble.”

       “You mean when I broke my arm?” There were many incidents but the one with the broken arm was big.

       “There were others,” she said and kept wiping the sink that was already clean.

       “Give me an example. I don’t remember any of them.”

       “Reliving your glory days? I’m not repeating any of your stories if that’s what you’re trying to get me to do.”

       “Why don’t you tell me something else then?” I asked her, feeling myself getting upset. That sharpness in her voice, the cold eyes. “Tell me why we moved so much, why I never went to school. I don’t even recall going to school until we moved to Texas.”

       “No one remembers their childhood. It’s not unusual.”

       “Why didn’t I go to school like everybody else?”

       “I homeschooled you.”

       “You were never home.”

       “I worked, more than one job at a time. You’re going to blame me for not being home?”

       “If you worked so much, why did we live in squalor?”

       “You want me to hand you a résumé? What’s with all the questions?”

       Her spotted, blue-veined hands held the dirty rag, shaking ever so slightly, hardly noticeable, but I knew there was a storm brewing underneath her cool and calm demeanor.

       “Who is my father?” The question hung between us like a heavy gray rain cloud about to unleash its fury. “I don’t remember him at all.”

       “He ran off when you were a baby, I told you that. He was—”

       “I remember Bobby’s father taking us to the police station. I remember when they filled out the paperwork and you told them my name was Dahlia.”

       There was a long moment of silence. It stretched beyond the kitchen, beyond the house, beyond both of us, her need to keep secrets a gaping divide no bridge would ever overcome.

       “Dahlia was not my name,” I add. “You called me Pet before that.”

       Finally she broke her silence. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. He stopped us because we had a broken headlight. You know that.”

      I know better. I knew better then and I know better now. There was no broken headlight. There are, however, questions that I must ask before she drifts off deeper into this murky world of hers, infested with crickets and her fear of police. Our love for each other is fierce, we are all we’ve ever had to hold on to, and it was enough when I was younger, it was even enough when we just talked on the phone the past fifteen years, but it’s not enough now.

      Later that night, I wake up. When I open my eyes, I can feel something is wrong. Off somehow. It’s dark outside—not even six judging by the lack of light—but something is glowing up ahead of me, almost like a pinprick-sized dot of light at the end of a tunnel. I blink and blink again. Is it possible to observe light and it remain obscure at the same time? It takes me a while until I realize that it’s not an actual glow but more a feeling of being lit up from the inside out that is reflected off my eyelids. It remains within me, never leaves my body. My hand tingles, then twitches. My skin feels snug and hot and I remain completely still, hoping it will just go away. My hand twitches again, stronger this time, no longer just a feeling but a visible spasm now. As quickly as the feeling materialized, it vanishes.

      I don’t hear the AC humming and that’s all the explanation I need. Nothing wrong here, just the heat. The air is thick and heavy, making it hard to draw a breath. Stagnant and idle, capable of melting candles. Texas heat has a fierceness to it, everyone knows that. It makes people lose their minds, my mother always says.

      I lie in the dark, unable to shut off my thoughts. Like a bundle of yarn, my mind loops around itself, repeating things to me, no matter how hard I try not to think at all. It’s been ten days since I found Jane and still there’s no update. I have no job, no money. My mother is in the hospital after wandering down a country road in the middle of the night. I want to call her, talk to her, and convince myself she is okay, but then there are these fears I have. That I’ll call and she’ll be confused and dismissive. That I’ll never get to the truth if her mental decline continues—I am halfway there myself, it feels like at times, with my headaches and smells and twitching limbs. I am as afraid for her sanity as I am afraid I’ll lose my own before I ever get any of the answers I need.

      When the sun comes up, I check the news on my phone, call the hospital for a report on my Jane (I call every day even though they are not allowed to give me any information, but they have taken to No change now instead of Only relatives may inquire). Just as I hang up, I get a call. It’s Dr. Wagner.

      “Your mother is well,” he says and after a short pause he adds, “Relatively speaking. She agreed with me that it would be best if she stayed with us for a few more days. Her exact words were Going for a walk is not a crime.” Dr. Wagner goes on and on about how she doesn’t think there’s anything wrong with her, although he believes there’s a personality disorder or two but “without proper counseling and an official diagnosis I’m unable to categorize her just yet.”

      He calls her actions a behavioral pattern of impairment in personal and social situations. I don’t care about what he’s saying—his medical gibberish is redundant; after thirty years I know my mother is teetering on the edge of crazy. She hasn’t quite fallen in, yet she’s staring into the abyss. That’s what I know during this moment of clarity: the crickets, her secretive nature, the suspicion СКАЧАТЬ