One Whole and Perfect Day Read Online Free PDF

living room, she gazed tenderly at the wedding dress, dreamily running a finger along the beaded hem. ‘Look at this embroidery, Stan. The work in that ! Think she did it herself? Your mum?’
    ‘Dunno.’ Stan felt a small stab of guilt, because shouldn’t he know something like that about his mum? He remembered sitting with her out on the front verandah on summer evenings, Mum passing him a needle and a length of dull grey cotton. ‘Thread this for me, will you, love? My eyes aren’t what they used to be.’ Patches on his school shorts, that had been, and beside her chair lay a dress of Emmie’s, with its skirt waiting to be let down. No embroidery though – bringing up two kids on a widow’s pension wouldn’t have left much time for fancywork. But perhaps when she was younger, before she’d married . . .
    ‘They’re lilies,’ said May, tracing the pattern of tiny beads. ‘Little lilies. See, Stan? If she did it herself they must have been her favourite flowers. Were they?’
    ‘Can’t remember.’ Stan shuffled his feet like a schoolkid, feeling guilty again.
    ‘And now we’ve got a Lily in the family! Your mum would have loved that, I bet.’
    ‘Yeah.’
    May’s face lit up. ‘Stan! Wouldn’t it be wonderful if Lily could wear this dress on her wedding day!’
    Stan eyed the dress and snorted. ‘More like a miracle, if you ask me.’
    ‘What?’ May was indignant. ‘Our Lily’s a lovely girl!’
    ‘Didn’t mean that.’
    ‘Then what did you mean?’
    Stan jabbed a thumb at the dress. ‘Lil’s the wrong shape.’ May studied the dress for a moment, picturing her grand-daughter. She hated to admit it, but Stan was right: Lily wasn’t big, but she was stocky, square-shaped like Stan. The dress wouldn’t fit her either, wouldn’t sit across her shoulders for a start. A shadow of disappointment crossed May’s face; she would have loved to pass this dress on within the family, to see it worn at another wedding.
    And then she brightened. ‘Lonnie!’ she exclaimed.
    Stan frowned. ‘What’s he got to do with it?’
    Even to hear his grandson’s name made Stan’s face turn red. Lon had done his dash with Stan.
    ‘When he gets married,’ explained May.
    Stan glowered. ‘Wearing frocks now, is he?’
    ‘Of course not,’ said May. ‘And what if he was? But I meant his bride.’
    ‘His bride ? Who the heck would want to marry Lonnie?’
    ‘Lots of girls,’ said May loyally.
    ‘They’d have to be a shingle short then,’ said Stan, ‘and we don’t want another loony in the family. Lon’s enough for us.’
    ‘There’s nothing wrong with Lonnie.’
    Stan ignored this. ‘Reckon you’re behind the times, anyway. Kids don’t get married these days.’
    ‘Sometimes they do,’ retorted May.
    Stan didn’t hear her. Turning on his heel, he stomped out of the room.
    The back door banged and then creaked open again.
    May went out and closed it. ‘Born in a tent!’ she observed, inclining her head a little towards the old friend she felt should be standing right beside her. Then she went back into the living room and sat down on the sofa, patting the cushion, inviting her friend to sit down too. She lifted the dress onto her lap and stroked its creamy folds.
    ‘Beautiful, isn’t it?’ she said, turning to Sef with a smile. ‘Don’t you think so?’

6 ELECTRIC JUG
    ‘Consider:’ wrote Lily, copying down Mr Skerrit’s Friday discussion topic from the board, ‘if Hamlet was a teenager, how would this affect your view of Shakespeare’s play?’
    A lot, thought Lily, imagining Hamlet with her brother’s melancholy face, and that low, tragic voice she’d heard from her room those nights long ago when she’d been in Year 6 and Lonnie had been studying for the HSC. Lonnie muttering quotations and statistics as he paced up and down the hall, Lonnie telling Mum he was convinced he was going to fail; Mum crying, ‘No, no! Of course you won’t!’, which should have been