The Search for Astra Daks

By Pamela Kaplan

After being tormented by a recurring nightmare for years, Eve Penn searches for the one person who can put an end to it, Astra Daks. Based on true events, The Search for Astra Daks by Pamela Kaplan takes us on a journey through horrific secrets that leads us from the forests of Latvia in 1941 to modern-day Australia.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Tellwell Talent
• Release date: Apr 18, 2024
• ISBN: 9781779418111

Pamela Kaplan

Pamela Kaplan is a former writer of award-winning television commercials who turned her hand to novels post-COVID. Growing up in richly multicultural environments in Perth and Melbourne has provided her with an endless source of material to draw upon for stories combining fact with fiction. The Search for Astra Daks is her second published novel. Also by the same author, The Murder Stone.

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Copyright © 2024 by Pamela Kaplan

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the author, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other non-commercial uses permitted by copyright law.

Tellwell Talent

www.tellwell.ca

ISBN

978-1-77941-812-8 (Hardcover)

978-1-77941-813-5 (Paperback)

978-1-77941-811-1 (eBook)

To the Kostanski family,

who did the right thing when it counted.

Contents

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

1.

Eve sat up with a start, barely able to breathe. She could feel the sweat soaking into her pyjamas as she tried to wake herself, gasping, trembling. Her husband groaned into his pillow.

‘Not again.’

Eve didn’t say a word as she tried to gather her thoughts and settle her mind. Rob rolled over to face her and pummeled his pillow into a new shape.

‘That’s what - the third time this week? Look Eve, this nightmare of yours is now totally out of control. You have to talk to someone about it. Do you want a glass of water or something?’

Eve shook her head. Rob said nothing more. Just squeezed her hand and forced himself to close his eyes.

Through the slit in the blind, Eve could see it was still pitch black out there. She checked her phone. 3.45am. Too early to get up. She’d have to try to get back to sleep.

Rob, who’d come to accept these regular panics as something not to be worried about, was already asleep again, and his heavy breathing was reassuring - but Eve couldn’t quite stop the nightmare trying to intrude back into her thoughts. It was probably overstating it to call it a nightmare. More like a disturbing bad dream that insisted on visiting her more and more often. Unlike most dreams, this one wasn’t created by her imagination - at least not in the beginning. It sprang from a childhood memory of a silly transgression. A bullying incident in which a newly arrived girl with a funny name was endlessly teased about it. Her name was Astra Daks and her family was one of thousands of post-war displaced people who came to Australia in the 50’s. Astra stood out not just because of her name - but because she was different in so many other ways. For a start she was a good deal taller than every other kid in the class and strongly built too, with dead straight, totally white hair and pale blue eyes that appeared to be completely transparent. She also had a deadly stare that bored straight into you. The overall effect was slightly threatening, a bit like one of the children from the village of the damned. As a result, most of the children wanted nothing to do with her.

Astra didn’t help matters either. She was at best stand-offish - and at worst totally unwilling to engage with any of her classmates at all (although in retrospect Eve knew this was probably due more to her not speaking much English than anything else). Anyway, it didn’t take long for Astra to have a good reason to dislike her fellow classmates. To 9 year olds, daks was another word for pants and Astra was the name of a nearby drycleaning service, so none of them could resist making up all kinds of dirty pants jokes. To make matters worse, Astra never defended herself the way other kids did when they were teased about their name. She didn’t cry or run or answer back with insults of her own. She just stood there and stared right through you with that intimidating glare of hers. Her mum made matters even worse. Every day she would wait for Astra at the school gate and harangue the kids as they left, sometimes threatening them with an umbrella. Her mum didn’t appear to speak English either, but that didn’t stop her from ranting at kids in a loud, high pitched voice - and although none of them spoke Latvian, they all guessed what she was saying. At first, Eve - or Evelyn as her parents insisted she be called at school, was no better or worse than the others. She joined in teasing Astra, but also copped a fair bit herself over her own name - Penn, so it wasn’t really the name calling that bothered her. It was the extra torment she heaped on Astra that was now torturing her own sleep. For some stupid childish reason, she wrote a love letter to the most popular boy in class and pretended it came from Astra. Why anyone would have believed the letter came from Astra who knows, but there you go. The boy, Darren, who was popular mainly because he had an American father who everyone assumed was either very rich or a movie star, used the letter to take the teasing up a notch, pretending to vomit whenever Astra walked by. At the same time, the girls taunted her with ‘Astra loves Darren’ chants at every opportunity. At the time, Eve had no regrets about writing the letter. Not at all. There was a little pang of fear here and there that maybe she’d be caught out, but apart from that, all good.

Winter came and brought with it another reason to give Astra a hard time. Everyday she’d come to school wearing a different pair of hand knitted socks in bright colours and patterns. Sometimes with a jumper to match. The boys in particular would pretend the jumpers were so bright they hurt their eyes, while the girls were more offended by the socks which were another symbol of ‘foreign-ness.’ In recent years Eve often thought how horrible it must have been for Astra to complain to her mother about all the trouble the socks and jumpers were causing her when they had been knitted with such love and skill. Some of the others wore hand knitted jumpers and cardigans too. But they were always in traditional pastels for the girls and earthy neutral colours for the boys, with the occasional bit of fairisle thrown in. Nothing too fancy. Nothing that might attract unwanted attention.

There was a bit of a blank in Eve’s memory about what happened next. Maybe the kids moved on from teasing Astra to focusing on some other poor sod. Maybe they all grew up a bit and changed their ways. But sometime over the next few months, or maybe it was the next year, Astra disappeared from the school. At the time, it wasn’t a surprise to anyone. All the new arrivals started off at the local state school while their parents got to know the system. Then some would switch to Catholic schools or into a different class, or move to a different suburb. There was always a core group of local kids that went through primary school together, and a fringe group of others that came and went.

As soon as Astra disappeared from the school she was forgotten, just like all the others who left, and that’s the way things stayed for Eve until sometime around the age of 55. Then suddenly she had a disturbing dream in which Astra was being teased about the letter. In the dream Astra was looking straight at Eve as though she knew she was the one who wrote it. There seemed to be a lot of laughing in the background and a bunch of kids were pointing their fingers at Eve. The next day, Eve felt slightly unsettled all morning, but eventually got over it.

Then a few nights later, the dream came back again. This time Astra looked hurt - or maybe angry and it took days for Eve to get over it, but once the memory was gone, that was it. Several months passed without the dream interrupting her sleep - and then suddenly it was there again - more intense and real than before. Now the background laughter was deafening and Eve had to poke her fingers in her ears to block it out. In the morning, both ears were sore and red, with small specks of blood where she’d scratched at them in her sleep. This new development was extremely distressing and caused Eve to re-examine the whole incident. She discussed it with Rob too but he wasn’t concerned there was any deep meaning to it.

‘Maybe you saw something in the media about bullying and it started you thinking about this girl. You’ve always hated bullies and it probably bothers you to now realize you were one yourself…’

It seemed a logical answer, and the next night there was no recurrence of the dream. Nor the night after that, so any self examination of her behavior was soon forgotten about. Then, just as she was lulled into a complete sense of security that it had finally gone away, it reappeared.

This pattern repeated itself for over the next 15 years. Sometimes the dream would recur a few times a month, or not at all for weeks. Once there was a period of 18 months or so when it disappeared completely. Then suddenly it was back with a vengeance. In this new version, everyone’s behavior was more vicious; their faces dark with hate as they stared and pointed at Eve, while Astra stood crying in the background. Astra’s mother had also begun to appear, and when that happened she became a terrorizing witch looking for revenge. And the person she was seeking to take revenge upon, would always be Eve - which was odd because Eve had never been a target of her umbrella. It was always the boys - and just one or two in particular. Now things were starting to happen in the dream that had never happened in reality - or at least not that Eve could recall. There was blood and tears and maybe a murder in a park near the school where they all played. Astra’s mum now usually carried a blood-drenched umbrella when she appeared, while all around kids would be screaming in fear as they ran away from this wild woman. But not Eve. She was always rooted to the spot - and just as the danger reached her, she would wake up, sometimes dripping wet - always struggling to breathe. No matter how much she tried to redirect the dream’s narrative back to a more gentle reality, it would not change. She had totally lost control of the plot.

By now it had reached a stage where the dream was disturbing Rob’s sleep as much as hers. In the beginning he joked about her guilty conscience catching up with her. When it returned again and again, he’d been sympathetic. Then, after a few years when the murder scenes crept in, he found the whole thing amusing, ‘It’s like you’re writing your own horror movie.’

But once the dream became more and more frequent, he found it troubling. He tried talking things through with her but he wasn’t convinced she was telling him the whole story and they’d end up arguing. He couldn’t understand what all the fuss was about. He remembered far worse bullying incidents at his school.

"They were different times then. Every class had its bullies and no one did anything about it unless someone was injured. Then the dads would get involved and sort things out.’

It wasn’t much consolation for Eve.

As the nightmare continued its familiar pattern, Rob began to worry that Eve might be suffering from some sort of depression. He’d suggested numerous times that she speak to her GP but Eve didn’t want to consider the possibility that it might be linked to a mental health issue. Instead she tried mindfulness, aromatherapy and soft music to lull herself to sleep. All these things seemed to have some positive effect for a while, but none worked in the long term. Now, after years of trying to help, Rob didn’t want to buy into it anymore. He’d offered her his best advice and she’d ignored it. He’d reduced his role down to that of a ‘consoler’. providing a glass of water when she woke, a reassuring cuddle to help her back to sleep and a friendly face to cheer her up in the morning.

Once or twice, Eve had googled Astra’s name, to see if she showed up anywhere. But all it ever turned up was a list of things such as cars, cinemas and cafes, that had been given the name ‘Astra.’

At about the same time the dream had started to become more sinister, it also began occurring more and more often, until now, here she was at 3.45 in the morning, afraid to go back to sleep for the third night this week. Rob was right. She needed to get over her fear that there might be something wrong with her and speak to a professional about it. There was no denying she needed help.

Despite her anxiety, Eve must have fallen asleep again because the alarm woke her with a jolt at 7.30. Rob was already up and under the shower. She could smell coffee brewing, but her head felt like mush. On mornings like this she was glad she would soon be retiring and could live life to her own rhythm. After pouring a coffee she went online to look for local psychologists. There were at least 10 fairly close by. How would you know which one to call? Maybe she should try her GP first - just for a recommendation. The receptionist apologized but, ‘unless it’s an emergency, there is nothing available for at least a week.’ A week. That would give her too many nights to be afraid of falling asleep - and too much time to change her mind. She knew she needed to act now, while she was still motivated. She tried the 24 hour clinic. They could see her this evening. Why not? That’s where she’d gone for her COVID jabs. She’d also taken Rob there a few months back when he cut his foot, so they had all their details. 6.30 this evening was the next available. She pressed yes. Done. As soon as Rob stepped out of the shower she called out to him.

‘You’ll be pleased to know I’ve taken your advice. Seeing Dr Feeny at the 24 hour clinic tonight at 6.30. I’m going to ask for a referral to a psychologist.’

Rob poked his head around the bathroom door. ‘I didn’t think you needed a doctor’s referral for a psychologist.’

‘I don’t know if you do, but I’m hoping to get a recommendation. How would I know who’s best for my problem?

‘I think you have to try a couple out. See if you connect.’

‘That sounds like a lot of faffing around. I just want to find someone who specializes in this sort of thing.’

‘Recurring Nightmares?’

‘No, sleep disturbances.’

‘That’s a gentle way of putting it. But I am pleased you’re at least doing something about it. It’s gone on long enough. It’s like living with a werewolf….Suddenly in the dead of night you become this whole different person. It can’t be good for you. And I’m not just talking about your mental health here - there’s a lot of evidence that poor sleep can lead to all sorts of health problems. That Astra Daks has a lot to answer for.’

‘So do I.’

He put his arm around Eve’s shoulders and gave her a hug. ‘Eve, Eve..it was the 50’s, it was a childish love letter…..a one-off thing. It’s not as though you hit her or stole her lunch money. And you’ve said yourself many times that all the kids were teased about something at some time. Their name, the colour of their hair, freckles, what their dad did for a living….. That’s how it was. Now, you’ve got it stuck in your mind. Sort of like when you chip a tooth and your tongue keeps finding its way to the rough bit until it’s really painful….’

He pulled on the rest of his clothes. ‘ Now I’ve gotta go. Won’t be late - looking forward to hearing what the doc says…….don’t cancel out….promise?’

Eve nodded and headed into the shower.

2.

Dr Feeny had never been on duty on the days Eve had previously been to this clinic, so she wasn’t sure what to expect, except that the doctor was a ‘he.’ But it was a bit of a surprise to see just how young he was. Eve thought that he looked barely out of medical school - a sign maybe that she was getting old.

He welcomed her in and noted that she didn’t appear to be a regular at the clinic. Eve was embarrassed to admit she was here because her usual doctor was not available, but he was fine with that.

"We’re a 24 hour clinic, most of our patients come here because their regular doctor is not available.’

As quickly and as calmly as she could, Eve explained her problem, keeping the actual details of the dream to a minimum and placing the emphasis on the ‘sleep disturbance’ problem, rather than the ‘recurring dream turning into a nightmare’ problem. He seemed quite shocked that this problem had gone on for so many years without Eve doing anything about it but was quick to rule out drug therapy as a ‘first’ solution.

‘I’m pleased you said that doctor, because really that’s why I’ve never sought help. I don’t want to medicate my way out of this, so I’m hoping you can recommend a psychologist who has expertise in this sort of thing.’

‘I don’t think we have a list of people who specialize in sleep disturbance as such, we usually recommend our patients attend a sleep clinic for evaluation. But yours isn’t a straightforward sleep problem is it?’

He entered some words into his computer, then stopped and looked directly at Eve.

"Honestly, you may need to see a psychiatrist to get to the bottom of this - but if you’d feel more comfortable starting with some simple counselling, there are a couple of highly experienced people I could suggest. - But before I do that, can I ask..is everything else OK in your life? Are there any medications you might be taking?……any issues with alcohol?……drugs?

‘No, all good in my life. Up to date with all my regular tests, Not taking any medications except for the occasional multi vitamin when I remember…. occasional glass of wine, happy marriage, happy kids who are already grown up and out in the world. Retiring soon and looking forward to it, no major financial issues. Nothing that should cause this…’

‘Except a bit of a delayed guilty conscience maybe.

‘Yes…I think so.’

Dr Feeny didn’t seem especially comfortable about letting Eve walk out of his surgery with just a couple of names on a piece of paper. But he didn’t have much choice. She seemed perfectly normal. There was nothing in her behavior that raised red flags - especially as she wasn’t asking for medication to solve the problem. He looked at her for a sign that there might be more to her problem than she was letting on, then seeing no response, he handed her a prescription page with two names and numbers written on it.

‘I hope one of these people can help. Please keep in touch with me…or your regular doctor. If talking it through doesn’t help, we might need to try something else. You certainly can’t go on ignoring it. You’ve tried that and it’s only made things worse.’

Eve looked at the two names. She felt lighter just knowing one of them might be able to help. Rob was happy too and feeling hopeful that he might get a peaceful night’s sleep for a change.

But no - somewhere in the early hours of the morning, Eve woke yet again. This time she was crying. There was nothing for it except to turn on the light and break the spell. After a bit of deep breathing and a few mouthfuls of water, Eve was calm enough to talk.

‘The death is so real that I’m beginning to think it really did happen. Maybe that’s why she didn’t come back to school. Maybe someone killed her. Or maybe her mother killed one of the kids.’

‘Eve you’re turning this into a complete melodrama. I think you’d remember if there was a murder at the school. It would have been huge news at the time.’

‘No the murder didn’t happen at the school, it was in the bush at the back of the park we used to play in.’

‘I still think you’d remember it if it happened. Think about it for a minute - In those days a murder like that would be a major event. Everyone would be talking about it. They’d be horrified - and it would be all over the newspapers and everything. Your parents would never have