Free The Good Daughter by Honey Brown Page A

standing at my door expecting … I don’t even know what you’re expecting.’
    ‘Why do you all of a sudden act as if you’re older than me?’
    ‘You’re behaving strangely, Zach. I don’t know why you’re here …’ She starts to turn away.
    He puts a hand on her shoulder and pulls her round to face him.
    She reefs herself from his hold. ‘Don’t touch me! Christ! Don’t come over here and do that!’
    ‘I hardly laid a finger on you!’
    ‘What are you doing here? Who do you think you are? I know you’re only over here because you think I’m some lowlife who’ll relate to the violence or whatever in your life – well, I don’t relate to it, all right? I don’t get it and don’t want to get it. No-one touches me and no-one’s ever touched me. In my family no-one goes missing. You’re the same as your father – sitting there looking at me, thinking he knows me or has some right to speak to me the way he did.’ She rubs the top of her arm in what seems like an unconscious action. Her eyes are bright and her cheeks flushed with colour. ‘It’s selfish – coming here trying to tell what has happened —’
    ‘Keep it a secret with me.’
    ‘Keep what a secret? I don’t even know what you’re talking about!’
    ‘I was serious, Rebecca – on the bus I was being serious. I would kiss you out the front of school, in front of anyone. I want us to go out.’
    She looks off across the room. ‘I can’t believe you’re talking about this. Something’s happened to your mother and all you’re worried about is kissing out the front of the school? It’s not important.’
    ‘It is to me.’
    ‘More important than your mother?’
    ‘Maybe.’
    ‘Then perhaps you shouldn’t push me around and scream out in car parks that I sleep with anyone. You shouldn’t whistle at me from across the schoolyard and ignore me in class. You shouldn’t tell me things you know put me in a bad position. I don’t want to have secrets with you, Zach. And we’re not going out.’
    Zach says, his voice rising, ‘You go on and have this superior attitude because you think you’ve got it so tough , you’re so self-righteous about all the terrible things in your life – well you’ve got no idea, you’ve never been hit. You said it yourself – no-one’s ever touched you.’
    ‘Great! So you come over and deliver that, right? Because that’s what I’m missing – I really need you Kincaids pushing me around. That’s it, isn’t it? That’s what your father has done to your mother. Has he pushed her around? Is that what’s happened? Has he hit her? Is that what it is with you?’
    ‘You don’t want to know what it is with us,’ he hisses.
    He puts his hands on her chest and pushes. He doesn’t realise how hard he’s pushed until her eyes are wide and she’s falling back. The bed behind her breaks her fall. She gropes for the mattress, but slips off the edge and lands on her side.
    She scrambles up, pulling down her dressing-gown. ‘Get out!’ she screams. ‘Get out! Get out or I’ll call the police!’
    She backs up further, bumps into her bedside table and knocks the lamp onto the floor. In a high, wavering voice she says, ‘I mean it, Zach …’
    ‘I didn’t push you that hard.’
    ‘Get out.’
    ‘I didn’t mean it.’
    ‘I will call the police.’
    ‘Rebecca, I’m sorry.’
    ‘I don’t care.’
    ‘You tripped.’
    ‘Get out!’
    ‘Please let me stay and show you I didn’t mean it.’
    ‘If you don’t get out …’
    He takes a step forward and she leans back, the bedside table tipping with her weight. Her face is now completely white, her lips parted and pink. Zach feels light-headed, outside of himself. He hears himself say, ‘You’re overreacting.’ Her breathing is rapid, her chest rising and falling, the dressing-gown is open over one knee, and parting either side of her long smooth leg. He thinks how her eyes and lashes look darker against her pale face, and sees how