The Daughter by Lucy Dawson
Prologue
I stop running. Everyone is shouting and my ears don’t like it. I want to go home. Mummy would say, ‘You poor bunny’, and make me a bed on the sofa. My body feels all hurty and hot.
‘Mrs Fey?’ I go and find her. ‘Can I take my jumper off, please?’
She does her nice smile and bends down. ‘It’s too cold out here, sweetheart. You should really have your coat on.’
‘I feel hot.’
‘That’s because you’ve already been doing so much rushing around! It’s not long until the end of playtime; why don’t you come and sit down for a minute?’ She reaches out and puts her hand on my head. ‘You do feel warm, actually. Do you?—’
But then she stops because someone calls her. Emily from the other class is crying next to the climbing frame, and she’s got sick all on her dress and on the floor.
‘Oh dear!’ Mrs Fey stands up again. ‘Just a minute, Beth, I’ll be right back.’
It’s gone on Emily’s shoes too. Everyone is looking, and the boys start shouting ‘Urgh! That’s really smelly!’, holding their noses, and falling over. Mrs Mottram gets cross and tells them not to be silly. We watch Mrs Fey and Mrs Mottram move the climbing frame away from the sick, and Cara whispers: ‘I’m going to hang upside down’, which we are not allowed to do.
Cara climbs up really fast, then sits on the top bar, swings backwards and TAKES HER HANDS OFF so she’s hanging upside down, but Mrs Fey doesn’t say anything because Emily is still crying. Cara’s hair is all over her face and her dress has gone up. I can see her tights and a bit of her tummy where her vest isn’t. She looks funny and I laugh.
‘You do it!’ she says.
I really want to, and I don’t even feel hot any more now I’m not running.
I start to climb up. The bars are colder even than when I go to the shop with Mummy and she gets the frozen peas to put in the trolley but lets me hold them first.
It’s wobbly and slippy at the top when I sit next to Cara and I have to hold on hard. She thinks it’s funny to try and tickle me, which I do NOT like, and I ask her to stop it, but she doesn’t. I try to wriggle along the bar on my bottom, away from her, but she chases me. I take my hand off to stop her because she’s going to tickle me again – her hand is out – but then the sky goes the wrong way and the surprise makes me scream.
Mummy.
Part 1
Chapter One
22nd November 1999
I didn’t see the woman approaching our car. Nirvana had just started playing on the radio; the DJ crashing the vocal with the helpful observation that he couldn’t believe half a decade had passed since we’d lost the great Kurt Cobain to suicide. I reached over immediately – Beth was only five – and turned it off, bracing myself for the inevitable ‘What’s suicide?’, but actually all she said was: ‘Can I undo my seatbelt, Mummy?’
‘Yup. I’ll come and get you, hang on.’ I grabbed the book bag and drink bottle from the passenger seat, got out and walked round to the pavement. Opening her door, I put a hand out to steady her as she wobbled precariously on the edge in readiness to jump down. ‘Careful, sweetheart.’ I tucked the bottle in my coat pocket and the bag under one arm. ‘Let’s just zip you up first, OK? It’s freezing. Where are your gloves?’
She squinted up at me worriedly, the sharp sunshine shining right in her eyes. ‘I think I left them in my tray at school.’
‘Oh Beth!’ I scolded gently, letting go of her now-fastened coat. ‘We talked about this! Always keep them in your pockets so you’ve got them when you need them. Will you please make sure you put them on at playtime?’
‘Yes, Mummy.’ She nodded obediently.
‘At least you’ve got your hat.’ I grinned at her to lighten the tone. ‘Come on. Let’s go. We don’t want to be late. I’d better hold onto that paw to keep you warm, I think.’
I offered her my hand but she slipped past me, a little puff of breath visibly clouding as her feet landed squarely on the floor – her head only millimetres from the car door.
‘Beth!’ I exclaimed again before I could stop myself and, ignoring me, she snatched the bag that I was now holding out, ducked past and ran onto the enclosed grass of the square on the other side of the pavement, where she started to twirl, freely. I slammed the door shut, just as the female voice said: ‘Excuse me?’
I turned round with a ready apology, thinking I must be blocking the narrow pavement for someone trying to get by, but in fact the unfamiliar woman was on the road behind our car, astride an old-fashioned pushbike, complete with wicker basket. One lace-up clad foot was down on the road for balance as she panted slightly, having just stopped pedalling.
I waited for her to speak again, but rather she hesitated and pushed her half-moon glasses back up her nose. Probably in her early forties, her mousey hair was escaping from a loose ponytail clamped under a helmet, and her soap-scrubbed skin was completely devoid of any make-up. The top of a button-down shirt was just visible under a long, heavy tweed coat and a tightly wound woollen scarf. She looked like an eminently sensible librarian. Still, I waited respectfully. Although – was she going to say anything?
Just as the silence we were locked in became actively uncomfortable, and I had opened my mouth to ask, ‘Can I help you?’ she suddenly blurted: ‘I have the strongest feeling I need to tell you how much God loves your little girl.’
I froze, before recovering myself enough to quickly glance round at Beth – bent over, peering at something on the ground, safe and completely oblivious to what was going on. I turned back to the woman.
‘I don’t know why, but it felt very important that you know.’ She appeared horribly embarrassed – as if she was not in the habit of making outlandish announcements to strangers. ‘That’s all, really.’
There was another pause, before I managed to say: ‘Thank you’.
She looked relieved, and smiled, before pushing down with one foot on the pedal, and lifting the other from the ground. Wobbling slightly she steered the bike round the car, calling out behind her: ‘Goodbye, then’.
I stared after her in astonishment, not sure if I should be expecting to see a delicate pair of snow-white angel wings poking out of the back of her coat, or if it was actually rather creepy the way it was now streaming out behind her like a dark cape. She cycled off up the street, and headed over the crossroads – onto the cobbled private road that led to the cathedral. Possibly she was a volunteer there.
‘Who was that?’ Beth appeared at my side, and we watched together as the woman took the left fork of the path, across the heavily frosted green, disappearing round the corner and out of sight.
‘I don’t know. Did you recognise her?’ We began to walk up towards the crossroads ourselves.
‘No.’ Beth shook her head. ‘Can we go and light a candle after school?’
‘Of course.’ Taking Beth to light prayer candles in the cathedral was about the extent of my religious practice. I certainly didn’t consider myself in any way pious, although I very much wanted to believe in God, and there being more beyond this life. We reached the top of the road and I held out my hand to her again. This time, she took it.
‘Wow,’ I remarked. ‘You’ve got toasty little mitts today. Warm hands, warm heart!’ I looked carefully left and right, scanning the road as completely out of nowhere, an image suddenly flashed into my mind of answering the phone and discovering something awful had happened to Beth, having not told her God loved her. I gripped her hand more tightly. Beth didn’t notice; we were about to cross, after all.
‘Can you see anything coming?’ I said, managing to smile, and she shook her head.