Danielle Steel - The long road home

She lay in her bed, unable to cry after her mother left, it hurt too much. She shook violently instead. She was desperately cold as her entire body trembled. Her lips were swollen, her head ached, and every inch of her body hurt, but the worst was the searing pain from within whenever she tried to breathe and found she couldn't. She thought maybe she would die that night, and hoped she would. There was nothing she had left to live for. Her dolly was dead. And she knew that one day she would meet the same fate at her mothers hands. It was only a matter of time before her mother killed her.

Eloise slept in her black satin evening gown that night, too tired to undress. And Gabriella lay in her own blood, waiting for the angel of death to claim her. She tried to think of Marianne and the moments she had shared with her that night, but she couldn't think of that now, couldn't think of anything. She was in too much pain, and hated her mother too much. The hatred she felt took over everything. It almost made the pain bearable. And as she lay in her bed, at that very moment, her father lay in the arms of a pretty Italian prostitute he knew well on the Lower East Side. Gabriella had no idea where he was, nor did Eloise, and it no longer mattered to either of them. Eloise told herself she didn't care where he was, she wished him in hell, and with her he was. And Gabriella knew that wherever he was, he would never save her. She was alone in the world, without saviors, without friends, without even her doll now. She had nothing. And no one. And as she lay there, unable to move that night, in too much pain, she finally peed in her bed, and knew with utter certainty that in the morning, when her mother discovered it, she would kill her. She lay thinking about it, welcoming it, wondering how the end would come, how much more it would hurt, or maybe it wouldn't hurt at all… and as she thought of it, welcoming death into her life, she slipped mercifully into an inky blackness.

Chapter 3

T HE FRONT DOOR of the town house on Sixty-ninth Street closed quietly, shortly after eight o'clock, the morning after the party. John Harrison walked silently up the stairs, and paused briefly outside Gabriella's room, knowing she would probably be awake by then. But when he looked into her room, he couldn't see her stirring. Her eyes were closed and she lay on top of the sheets, which was rare for her, but he thought it was a good sign. Instead of hiding at the bottom of the bed as usual, she was lying in the open. More than likely it meant that her mother hadn't bothered her the night before. Eloise had probably been too tired after he left, she had had too much to drink anyway to waste her time with Gabriella. At least for once the child hadn't been punished for the sins of the father. Or so he thought anyway, as he walked down the hall to his own room.

Eloise was still sleeping in her dress, her diamond necklace was still on, her earrings were loose in the bed, and she was still so sound asleep that she didn't move when he slipped into bed beside her. He knew her well enough to know that when she woke, she would say little about his hasty departure. She seldom did. She would be cool with him, distant for a day or two, but once the battle ended, it was never again mentioned. She just held it silently against him.

And just as he thought she would, she woke at ten, stirred lazily, and when she came fully awake, she glanced at him, not surprised to see him beside her. He was still half asleep by then, catching up on the sleep he'd missed the night before, in the apartment on the Lower East Side. There were a number of addresses just like it that he went to. Eloise had no idea where he went when he left her. She suspected, but would never have asked him.

She said nothing to him as she got up, left her jewelry on her dressing table, and walked slowly into her bathroom. She remembered everything that had happened the night before, particularly the part after he left, but there was nothing unusual about it, nothing worth commenting on now. She had nothing to say to her husband.

Gabriella was still in her room when Eloise went downstairs to make breakfast. The housekeeper had stayed to help the caterers clean up the night before, and she was off now because it was Sunday. She was a quiet, unobtrusive woman, who had worked for them for years. She didn't like Eloise, but was civil to her, and Eloise liked her because she minded her own business. Although she silently disapproved of it, she never interfered with Eloise's disciplining of Gabriella.

Eloise put a pot of coffee on, sat down at the breakfast table, and picked up the paper. She was reading it, sipping coffee in a Limoges cup, when John finally came down and joined her, and asked about their daughter.

“Where's Gabriella? Still in bed?”

“It was a late night for her,” Eloise said in a chilly voice, without looking up from the paper.

“Should I go and wake her?” Eloise said nothing and only shrugged in answer. He poured a cup of coffee for himself, took the Business section of the Sunday Times , which Eloise never touched, and read for a half hour before commenting again on Gabriella's absence. “Do you suppose she's sick?” He sounded worried, it didn't occur to him what had happened the night before, although it should have. He didn't realize that Eloise always took it out on her when he left at some ungodly hour after an argument. He should have suspected instantly, but as usual, he didn't really want to know. It was nearly eleven when he went upstairs to find her.

He found her changing her bed, moving with the awkward stealth of someone in great pain, but still he seemed not to see what had happened.

“Are you okay, sweetheart?” Her eyes bulged with unshed tears as she nodded. She'd been thinking about Meredith, her doll, and she felt as though someone had died the night before. And someone had. Not only the doll, but she had. It had been the worst beating ever administered by her mother. And it had dissolved whatever small hope she had had left that she might survive her life here. She had no further expectation of that now. She knew it was only a matter of time before her mother totally destroyed her. She had no illusions anymore, no dreams, nothing at all, just the unbelievable pain in her side, and the memory of her doll being pounded against the wall, just as she knew her mother would have liked to do to her, but had not yet dared to.

“Can I help?” He offered to put the blanket back on the bed with her, but she shook her head. She knew only too well what her mother would say if she found them. She would accuse her of whining to her father, or manipulating, or trying to turn him against her mother. “Don't you want to come downstairs to breakfast?” The truth was, she didn't want to see her mother. She wasn't hungry anymore, might never be again. She didn't care if she never ate, and every time she breathed it seared her like fire, and twisted a knife of pain in her rib cage. She couldn't imagine being able to get down the stairs, or sitting next to her mother at breakfast, let alone eating.

“It's okay, Daddy. I'm not hungry.” Her eyes were huge and more sorrowful than usual. And he told himself she was probably very tired. He refused to see the awkwardness with which she moved, the place where her hair was still matted with blood, the lip that was still more than slightly swollen. He told himself fairy tales about all of it, just as he had from the beginning.

“Come on, I'll make you pancakes.” As though he had something to make up to her. As though he knew, which he would have insisted he didn't. If he allowed himself to think of what Eloise had done to her, it would have made him feel far too guilty.

He walked slowly into the room, and saw that Gabriella had a sweater on over her dress. That was usually the sign that her thin arms had been too badly bruised to expose them. It was a sign he always recognized, and one he never acknowledged. Even at seven, Gabriella understood that she had to cover herself so as not to offend them, especially her mother, with the outward signs of her “badness.” Her father didn't ask her if she was cold, or why she wore the sweater. Sometimes she even wore a sweater, a long-sleeve shirt, or a shawl, at the beach for the same reasons. And no one said anything, they just let her do it. It was a silent vow, a tacit agreement between them.