Her Mother's Daughter
Read Her Mother's Daughter Online
Authors: Lesley Crewe
Tags: #Literature & Fiction, #Women's Fiction, #Domestic Life, #Genre Fiction, #Family Life, #FIC000000
PRAISE forâ¦
Hit & Mrs.
If you're in the mood for a cute chick-lit mystery with some nice gals
in Montreal,
Hit & Mrs.
is just the ticket.â
Globe and Mail
Crewe's writing has the breathless tenor of a kitchen-table yarn.â¦a cinematic
pace and crackling dialogue keep readers hooked.
â
Quill & Quire
Ava Comes Home
She expertly manages a page-turning blend of down-home comedy
and heart-breaking romance.
âCape Breton Post
Shoot Me
Possesses an intelligence and emotional depth that reverberates
long after you've stopped laughing.
âHalifax Chronicle Herald
Relative Happiness
Her graceful proseâ¦and her ability to turn a familiar story into
something with such raw dramatic power, are skills that many veteran novelists
have yet to develop.
âHalifax Chronicle Herald
LESLEY CREWE
Her Mother's
Daughter
Copyright © Lesley Crewe, 2010
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means without the prior written permission from the publisher, or, in the case of photocopying or other reprographic copying, permission from Access Copyright, 1 Yonge Street, Suite 1900, Toronto, Ontario M5E 1E5.
Vagrant Press is an imprint of
Nimbus Publishing Limited
PO Box 9166
Halifax, NS B3K 5M8
(902) 455-4286
nimbus.ca
Printed and bound in Canada
Cover design: Heather Bryan
Author photo: Sarah Crewe
This novel is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental.
Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication
Crewe, Lesley, 1955-
Her mother's daughter / Lesley Crewe.
ISBN 978-1-55109-774-9
EPUB ISBN 978-1-55109-833-3
I. Title.
PS8605.R48H47 2010Â Â C813'.6Â Â C2010-903050-8
We acknowledge the financial support of the Government of Canada through the Book Publishing Industry Development Program (BPIDP) and the Canada Council, and of the Province of Nova Scotia through the Department of Tourism, Culture and Heritage for our publishing activities.
To my daughter, Sarahâ¦
who took her first breath of life,
and saved mine.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
A READER'S GUIDE TO Her Mother's Daughter
CHAPTER ONE
2000
Bay Gillis shovelled compost out of her ancient wheelbarrow and scattered it between the rows of vegetables in the garden at the back of the house. Her neighbour Flo hung sheets out to dry in the next yard. At the sound of tires squealing, Flo shook her head.
“Teenagers. They'll be the death of me yet.”
Bay smiled to herself. Everything was going to be the death of Flo, but nothing in her sixty-five years had succeeded yet.
Bay became aware of her sore back and put down the shovel. She reached behind, placed her hands above her hips, and had a stretch before wiping her brow with the sleeve of her shirt. She surveyed her work. Bright green sprouts of cucumber and beans and peas popped out of the dark soil.
Flo headed for her back door with the laundry basket. “You've got a nice garden this year, Bay.”
“My luck, the slugs will eat everything.”
“Put plates of beer around and that will be the end of the slugs.”
“I can't. Merlin gets drunk when I do that.”
At the sound of his name, Merlin raised his shaggy head and tilted it to look at Bay. She reached down and gave the top of his head a pat. “Don't you, you silly dog.”
“It's not Merlin who drinks the stuff. It's that no-good drunk I'm married to.” Flo threw open the door and marched inside her house.
Nothing ever changed. Bay remembered Flo complaining about poor Ira when she was a young girl. Bay's mother used to roll her eyes whenever Flo came across the yard with that look in her eye, the one that said she was going to kill him.
At the thought of her mother, Bay's heart ached. Even a year later, Bay couldn't believe she was dead. Her mother had loved this garden. Bay used to take a cup of tea out to her in the early morning, so they could sit together on the swing and decide where to stake the tomatoes and how many pumpkins they might need for the fall fair.
This was the first planting without her.
Bay looked past the garden and Flo's flapping sheets to the water in the harbour beyond, but the noonday sun made it hard to see, so she raised her hand to shield her eyes. Seagulls circled the lobster boats as they returned to the Louisbourg wharf, but she didn't hear their sharp cries, as the wind was blowing out to sea. She thought of the many times she and her mother had watched from this vantage point, waiting for her father's boat to come back to shore loaded with catch.
And seared in her memory was the day he and Bobby died out there on the water.
Her reverie was interrupted by the sound of the phone ringing through the open kitchen window. She hurried to the back steps, but Merlin got there first. When she opened the screen door, he charged in ahead of her. She made it to the phone on the fourth ring.
“Hello?”
“Bay, it's Ruth.” Matt's mother.
“Hi, Ruth. What are you up to?”
“Trying to track down my son. Is he there?”
“No. Ashley's still asleep.”
“Well, where is he? He practically lives at your house. He yelled that he was taking the car and jumped in it before I could tell him I need it to go to a funeral in Sydney this afternoon.”
“I'll ask Ashley and see if she knows. It's time she was up anyway.”
“Thanks.”
Bay put down the phone and raced up the stairs. She knocked lightly on the bedroom door and then pushed it open. The usual chaos greeted her. How on earth did that child sleep in a bed piled high with clothes, wet towels, magazines, and stuffed animals? She approached the lump underneath the duvet.
“Honey.” Bay reached out to put her hand on what she thought was her daughter. When the soft covers gave way, Bay was startled for a moment. She picked up the duvet. There was nothing there except the huge panda bear Matt had won for Ashley at the circus.
“That little minx.” Bay threw the covers back on the bed and rushed to the phone.
“She's not here either.”
She heard Ruth sigh. “This is getting out of hand, Bay. They're only seventeen. It frightens me how attached they are to each other.”
Bay held up her forehead with her hand. “I know. Lately she's become such a handful. I try and talk to her, but she tunes me out. It's almost as if I don't matter anymore. What do you think we should do?”
“I know one thing,” Ruth said. “I've scrimped and saved to get that boy to university, and he's damn well going. I'm not going to let Ashley or any girl ruin his future.”
Bay sat up in her chair. “Well, excuse me, but I can say the same thing. Do I need some boy getting her pregnant? It's worse for a girl, Ruth. She'd be the one left with a baby.”
“Then I suggest you put her on birth control.”
“And I suggest you tell your son to keep his pants zipped.”
“If you told your daughter to stop wearing clothes that are so tight you can see everything God gave her, then maybe he wouldn't be sniffing around.”
“Excuse me?”
“You heard me.”
“And here I was going to offer you the use of my car. Well, you can damn well walk into Sydney.”
Bay hung up the phone in Ruth's ear and covered her face with her hands. Why wasn't her mother here? How was she supposed to raise Ashley without her? She felt a soft wet nose press against her thigh. She looked down at Merlin. He always knew when she was unhappy. She reached out to ruffle his ears.
“What would I do without you, eh?”
Merlin put his head on her lap.