The Wrong Door by Bunty Avieson Read Free Book Online

would suffer a few a month. Often they were precipitated by a fight with Peg but not always. When she was in full flight Marla was like a hysterical fishwife, screaming abuse. Not much of what she screamed at her mother made sense to Clare. But Clare listened and stored it all away, snippets and fragments that she tried to piece together when she was alone.
    The voices upstairs dropped and Clare had to strain to hear.
    ‘What kind of example do you think you set?’ said Peg.
    ‘Oh, and you can talk? You stitched-up, frigid old cow,’ replied Marla.
    Peg would bear such accusations resolutely. The angrier Marla got, the calmer and more authoritative Peg became. Peg’s manner alone was enoughto intimidate Clare into submission. She didn’t dare argue with her mother. But often Peg’s cold authority just made Marla worse.
    Clare was poised to react, every nerve alert. The ceiling to the right of her head creaked. Marla was outside Peg’s bedroom door. Clare braced herself for whatever might come next. The ticking of the clock in the hallway and the constant hum of traffic on the main road less than a kilometre away were the only sounds.
    Clare didn’t dare move. She gripped the edge of the kitchen table, forcing her nails against the hard wood. The pain offered some small distraction. There was only silence above, then Clare heard a door slowly open. It could be Marla’s room or Peg’s. It was hard to tell. Everything creaked and groaned in this old terrace house.
    The frustration of not knowing what was going on drove Clare out of the kitchen and up the stairs. She expected more yelling and door slamming but as she ascended she thought she could hear muffled sobs. Upstairs she found Marla slumped on the floor at the end of the hallway. Peg was beside her, an arm around her shoulders. Marla’s hands covered her face and the effort of crying made her body heave.
    It was an unexpected sight, but what really shocked Clare was seeing Peg in tears. At fifty-nine, her mother was a vibrant and stoic woman, full of energy. She always knew what to do, or so it seemed to Clare. But as she rocked her elder daughter in her arms, she looked beaten.
    Clare knelt beside the two huddled figures, tears pouring down her face. She couldn’t bear to see her sister and mother in so much pain and be unable to help. The three women sat like that for many minutes. When finally Marla stopped sobbing, instead taking deep shuddering breaths, Peg raised an eyebrow to Clare and tilted her head towards Marla’s bedroom. Clare understood and they helped Marla gently to her feet, half-carrying her to her room. They lay her down on the bed, pulling the doona over her. Peg sat beside her daughter stroking her hair. Marla stared up at her mother then away, her face expressionless.
    ‘Make tea, love,’ Peg said quietly to Clare.
    Clare was relieved to have something to do. In the kitchen while she waited for the water to boil she looked across to the roof of Mr Sanjay’s garden shed. He had called it his gazebo, as if it belonged in some vast English estate. Clare couldn’t imagine anything less like a gazebo. It was a tin shed – a bit rusty in places – with a door that had warped in the weather and wouldn’t open fully so Mr Sanjay had to squeeze through it. But inside was his private chamber, fitted out like an English gentleman’s study. Books, papers, an old wooden filing cabinet and his desk.
    Clare felt a dull ache in her chest. God how she missed him. Marla and Peg were getting worse and worse and it terrified her. Mr Sanjay would at least have been able to provide a different perspective. She had never been able to anticipate what advice he might give when presented witha problem. It was part of what made him so endlessly interesting.
    She remembered when she had first confided in him about her volatile sister. It was after a particularly ugly fight when she was about fifteen. Clare had been terrified Marla was going to hit her