Extract from "The Daughter Game"
Anna was on her way to make coffee when she heard the letter box snap. Who was posting stuff at this time of night? But when she pulled the door curtain back there was nothing on the carpet. She glanced back to check on Jamie in the living room; no movement there, only a theme tune floating out and then the excited muffle of a voiceover. In another second she’d clicked the latch open and was looking out into the night, across the green. And there he was, Russ, standing under the lamp post opposite. Fuck. He waved his hand as though he’d been greeting her in the high street. He had no coat on. It looked as if he’d stepped out of his house on a whim.
He came swiftly across the road towards her and it was all she could do not to shut the door in his face.‘Don’t, Anna,’ he said as he got near. ‘Wait.’
She hung onto the Yale lock as he pushed a piece of paper at her. She took it out of fright more than anything. ‘Go,’ she hissed. ‘Please.’ To her relief he turned and walked back down the street, towards the main road, away.
Trembling, she slid the paper up the sleeve of her jumper like an exam cheat, pushed the door gently to, and sprinted upstairs to the bathroom where she could lock herself in. Then she ran to the window to peer out again, but dropped the blind in panic a second later to yank the light off. From darkness she scanned the road below, but there was no one now. Gone. She sat down on the toilet seat and closed her eyes. There was a faint cramping below her stomach.
After a while Anna made herself get up and switch the light back on. Then she turned the taps on full because she wanted nothing so badly as to lie in a warm bath.
The letter. She drew it out, blood thumping in her ears, and began to unfold it.
‘Anna?’Jamie was knocking at the door, fucking hell. ‘Yeah?’
‘You having a bath?’
No I’m climbing Mount Everest. ‘Yes. Why?’
‘Nothing. I made the coffee.’ A martyred pause. ‘Shall I leave yours outside, then?’
‘Ok.’ …kind of beacon in my life…she read with horror. …feel I haven’t been given a chance to put things….
She stripped off her clothes and laid them across the heated towel rail, then climbed into the water. You weren’t supposed to have the bath too hot when you were pregnant.
Dear Anna
Please read this all the way through. I know I should try to give it you at work but I can’t wait till tomorrow. You can text me. I’ll be up all night. I’m sorry for panicking
in the caravan. Even in her stressed state Anna winced at the spelling error. It was a shock. I said I loved you and I know that’s not what you want to hear, but now I’ve had a chance to
think it over I don’t think I do. That was a mistake. So if you’re feeling frightened off because I’m getting involved then don’t. But please please Anna can’t we carry on as we were?
You’ve been a kind of beacon in my life and I don’t want it to stop. All I want to do is talk things through with you because I feel I haven’t been given a chance to put things right and
I’ll do whatever it takes. Please will you see me just one more time to get things straightened out? I think we owe it to each other to finish it right.
I don’t owe you anything, she thought. Not yet, anyway.
She guessed he’d intended to post his note through the letterbox, then realised how mad an idea that was and drawn it back. She hadn’t thought of Russ as having a reckless side. That certainly had not been in the plan.
If it did all come out, what then? She could imagine too well Ruth’s collapsed face, the stares of the children. Ruth would call her something like a cold hard bitch because she secretly thought that anyway; she’d cry a lot and comfort-eat and go round to her parents’ begging sympathy, she spent half her life round there anyway. Anna would be at a stroke the most evil woman in history. Russ would run between them, or run away. Jamie’s reaction she didn’t dare consider.She mashed Russ’s note in the bathwater and fed it down the plughole in tiny scraps. She had no intention of acknowledging it. If she replied, the whole situation would drag on and on. But she couldn’t help checking the street again before she went downstairs. ‘You didn’t drink your coffee.’ Jamie saw her carrying the full cup to the kitchen. ‘What’s up?’
‘Nothing. Why should something be up?’
He raised one eyebrow. ‘Because you look a bit strange this evening. Spacey. You coming down with something?’
‘I might have a cold coming on,’ she said.
'The Daughter Game - out March 7th 2008
