Dawn (Cutler 1)

"How can that be?" I whispered. Part of me wanted to understand Clara Sue's feelings. "How can that be?"

"How can that be?" Clara Sue mimicked cruelly. "How can that be? I'll tell you how. I’ll tell you! You've been a part of my life without even being in it! From the day I was born I've lived in your shadow, and I've hated every minute of it!"

"But that wasn't my fault." Part of me was starting to understand. The aftermath of my kidnapping had become a permanent part of life at Cutler's Cove, and Clara Sue had been born into it.

"Oh, wasn't it? I wasn't the first-born, like Philip, or the first daughter, like you. I wasn't even considered the baby of the family. Oh, no! I was nothing but the baby born to replace you!" Clara Sue closed the distance between us. "Get out of my room. Get out! The sight of you sickens me. But before you go, Dawn, here's a promise. A very special promise that I intend to keep. I will never accept you as a part of this family. I will never welcome you with open arms or make your life easier. Never! Instead I will do everything humanly possible to make your life a living hell. And when that isn't enough, I'll do even more. I will go out of my way to bring you sorrow and heartache. Your unhappiness will bring a smile to my face and make the sun even shinier. I will shatter your dreams until they're nothing more than twisted remnants of your hopes and will bring you only nightmares. Nothing less will do!"

I was speechless. "You can't be serious!" I cried. Clara Sue's reasons for turning in Jimmy were now crystal clear, and although I was still very angry at her, part of me pitied her. With everything she had, Clara Sue was miserable. I wanted to help her overcome her unhappiness. Maybe then she wouldn't hate me so much.

Clara Sue's eyes glinted wildly as she stared at me with open amazement. "I don't believe you! I honestly don't believe you! You just don't give up, do you? This isn't some sappy movie where we pour out our hearts to each other, have a good cry, and then kiss and make up. Get your pretty little head out of the clouds, Dawn. Didn't you hear a word I said? We will never be friends, and we will certainly never be sisters. Ever!" Clara Sue inched closer, and I backed away from her into the bedroom door. "Never let your guard down with me, Dawn," she warned. "Watch out for me. Always."

With those final words she turned her back on me. I fumbled with the doorknob, anxious to escape from my sister because in my heart I knew that what she had promised was true.

Neither my father nor my grandmother had time to see me the following morning since it was the day of a big check-in and checkout. I was busy with Sissy anyway because we had an additional five rooms to clean and remake. Nevertheless, I anticipated my grandmother's appearance in the kitchen when the staff had its breakfast. I hadn't slept well the night before, and I wasn't in the mood to be yelled at or embarrassed in front of the other workers. I made up my mind to stand up to her, even if it meant being confined to my room without food again.

Because Clara Sue had the early evening shift at the front desk, she always slept late, so I didn't have to face her, but Philip was up and with the other waiters, of course. He avoided me until it was time to go to work. Then he followed me out and called to me.

"Please," he begged when it looked like I wouldn't stop. I turned on him abruptly.

"I have work to do, Philip," I said. "I have to earn my keep," I added bitterly. "And I don't believe Grandmother. I'm not learning the business from the bottom up. I'll always be on the bottom as far as she is concerned." I gazed at him. He looked so different to me now, so cheap and pathetic since he had attacked me. To think I had almost been in love with him!

"Dawn, you have to believe me. I had nothing to do with my grandmother's finding out about Jimmy. She doesn't know I brought him down there to hide him when he first arrived," he said, his eyes showing his fear. So that was it, I thought.

"You're afraid I'll tell her?" He didn't reply, but his face answered. "Don't worry, Philip. I'm not like our precious younger sister. I won't deliberately get you in trouble just to get revenge, although I should," I snapped and pivoted to catch up with Sissy.

During the rest of the morning, whenever I heard footsteps in the corridor, I expected my father or my grandmother. After our work was completed and neither had arrived, I pulled Sissy aside.

"Take me right to Mrs. Dalton's daughter's house, Sissy. Please, before my grandmother finds more work for us."

"I don't know why you want to go see that woman. She don't remember things that well," Sissy said, looking away quickly.

"Why do you say that, Sissy?" I sensed the change in her attitude.

"My granny says so," she said, looking up quickly and then looking down again.

"You told her you were taking me and she didn't like it?" Sissy shook her head. "You don't have to go in with me, Sissy. Just point out the house. And I won't tell anyone you showed me. I promise."

She hesitated.

"My granny says people who dig up the past usually find more bones than they expected, and it's better to let bygones be bygones."

"Not for me, Sissy. I can't. Please. If you don't help me, I'll just go looking anyway until I find the house," I said, screwing my face into a look of determination to impress her.

"All right," she said and sighed. "I'll show you the way."

We left the hotel through a side entrance and quickly went down to the street. It was strange how everything looked different to me in daylight, especially the cemetery. Gone was its foreboding and ominous atmosphere. Today it was just a pleasant, well-manicured resting place, easy to pass.

It was a bright, nearly cloudless day with a soft, warm ocean breeze. The sea looked calm, peaceful, inviting, the tide gently combing the beach and falling back into small waves. Eve

rything looked cleaner, friendlier.

There was a constant line of traffic in the street, but it moved lazily. No one seemed to be in a rush; everyone was mesmerized by the glitter of the sunlight on the aqua water and the flight of terns and sea gulls that floated effortlessly through the summer air.

This might very well have been a wonderful place in which to grow up, I thought. I couldn't help wondering what I might have been like had I been raised in the hotel and Cutler's Cove. Would I have turned out as selfish as Clara Sue? Would I have loved my grandmother, and would my mother have been an entirely different person? Fate and events beyond my control had left these questions forever unanswered.

"There it is, straight ahead of us," Sissy said, pointing to a cozy little white Cape Cod house with a patch of lawn, a small sidewalk, and a small porch. It had a picket fence in front. Sissy looked at me. "You want me to wait here for you?"

"No, Sissy. You can go on back. If anyone asks you where I am, tell them you don't know."