The Wrong Daughter

by Dandy Smith

her parents’ warnings to stay inside are blown from her mind like dandelion clocks.

Alone. That word doesn’t carry enough gravitas. There isn’t a word big enough or wide enough or sturdy enough to bear the weight of its meaning.

‘And where’s that conniving brother of yours?’ ‘Good to have you home, dear Uncle.’ Heath’s voice rolls down the stairs and Elinor can taste the insincerity in it. Uncle Robert can, too. His eyes narrow. Her brother takes his time joining them, which only serves to further irritate Uncle Robert.

He’s a hedge-fund manager, though if someone put a gun to my head and made me explain what, exactly, a hedge-fund manager is, I’d tell them to put us both out of our misery and shoot me because I don’t have a clue.

Wanting to please your parents is one of those universal instincts, like opening your mouth to apply mascara.

I stop myself from saying more because if I picture that weight, it is her. It is Olivia. I grew up tethered to the rotting corpse of my presumed-dead sister.

‘Sometimes, the only person worth satisfying is yourself. It’s your life, you’ve got to live it for you.’

The only thing more valuable than being loved is being known by someone. Truly known.

know loneliness, the taste and smell and shape of it. The clawing desperation to slough it off like dead skin. Loneliness is the most harrowing kind of poverty.

I open my mouth to tell her that if I’m the one battling morning sickness, sore tits and heartburn, going through the trauma of labour and having to be sewn back together afterwards, I would not crown my baby with the father’s name simply because it is the done thing. To tell her that other than sperm, a man contributes nothing to the growth and birth of a child. To tell her that if it comes out of my body, it’s getting my fucking name.

‘Maybe real happiness is living the life you want, the way you want, without worrying about other people’s expectations.’

‘Don’t be afraid to play the main character in your own life. Don’t be a person that things just happen to because it’s easier than being a person who makes things happen.’

‘Did you expect me to stand at the foot of the bed and film it? Or would you prefer I joined in?’

‘You can love something so much that you hold onto it too tightly and crush it to death.’

‘Some people can’t love without destroying what they care for most,’ he says.

‘Heath,’ she answers. ‘Heath Ledbury.’