A Home Like Ours by Fiona Lowe (feel good books .txt) 📕

words seemed to have fallen out of her head. All she could think about was the fact her T-shirt was smeared in dirt and she hadn’t washed her hair.

So? You’re not trying to impress him. The thought unsettled her and she suddenly wanted to leave.

‘I have to go.’

‘To Helen’s meeting?’

‘Yes,’ she said distractedly, not aware they’d reached the cottage. ‘What?’

‘Hello, you two.’ Bob handed them some papers. ‘Thanks for coming. Helen’s got some examples but feel free to do it in your own words.’

‘What’s this?’ Jade scanned the paper. ‘You want me to write a letter about houses for old women?’

‘One day, God willing, you’ll be older, Jade.’

‘Yeah, but …’ She thought about how she struggled to pay her own rent. ‘What about affordable housing for single mothers?’

‘You’re right, that’s important too.’ Helen walked out of the cottage and set down a jug of water and some glasses. ‘But your Centrelink payment’s been indexed. The dole is the same as it was twenty-five years ago. It’s impossible for an unemployed single woman to afford the rent to live on her own, and when you’re over fifty-five it’s almost impossible to get a job.’

Jade put down the paper. ‘Yeah, well, I don’t get how a letter’s going to work.’

‘Unlike that filthy rag of a paper, we’ll tell the real story.’ Helen handed her a pen and paper. ‘You write it and I’ll post it.’

Jade laughed. ‘Snail mail? Who even does that? Email’s old school now. You should start a Facebook page.’

Bob nodded. ‘She’s got a point, Helen. All the pollies are on Twitter.’

‘What about an online petition?’ Lachlan said.

‘There’s nothing to petition yet. What I want is to correct the misinformation being peddled by Granski.’

‘Might be worth doing it both ways,’ Lachlan suggested. ‘If you start a Facebook page, I’m happy to invite the blokes at choir and the tennis club. Well, the ones with a social conscience anyway.’

Jade snuck a sideways glance at Lachlan. He was what, twenty-five? Definitely less than thirty anyway, a bloke and working in what Jade assumed was a good job. Why did he care about homeless women? He probably didn’t even know any. But he was offering to help Helen, who’d yelled at him and Bob the other day. Jade didn’t get it, but that didn’t stop a twist of envy that he had friends he could ask to help. The only person she knew who might be interested was Fran at the library and she wasn’t a friend.

‘I don’t even have Facebook,’ Helen was saying. ‘Or a smartphone.’

‘You don’t need a smartphone. I’ll set it up on your computer,’ Jade heard herself saying before fully thinking it through.

‘Good on you, Jade.’ Bob smiled encouragingly.

‘My laptop’s a dinosaur and I don’t have the internet,’ Helen said.

‘I’ll do it at the library.’

‘Just setting it up won’t be enough. You’ll need to show me how to work it too.’

‘I s’pose I can do that.’

‘Don’t put yourself out on my account.’

‘I won’t.’

Even though teaching a super-grumpy Helen would be a pain in the arse, it wasn’t enough to dent the rush of exhilaration spinning through her. For the first time, Jade knew more about something than Helen. It felt fantastic.

CHAPTER

16

‘Thanks for your help, but what if I’ve got it wrong?’ The young bloke’s hand rested on the box. ‘She’s fussy.’

Tara had just sold him a state-of-the-art mixer with ten attachments that made it everything from a food processer to an ice cream maker and a meat grinder.

‘Unless she wants a different colour, I think you’re safe. But keep the receipt. If she doesn’t like it, send her in and I’ll personally help her find exactly what she wants.’

When he’d walked away from the counter Tara eagerly checked her phone for a message from Zac about a possible afternoon run. Nothing. Her butterflies flatlined. She was staring at the screen, willing a text to appear, when the device vibrated in her hand, making her jump.

‘Tara Hooper.’

‘Tara, it’s Sam. Jon needs you at the store. Now!’

Tara bristled at the bookkeeper’s critical tone. ‘I’m here. I’ve been serving customers for the last hour.’

‘Come to the timber yard office immediately.’

Before Tara could ask why Jon had asked Samantha Murchison to call her instead of finding her himself, the line went dead. Was this a new low in their relationship?

Irritated, she exited through the garden section, marched to the portable office in the timber yard and tugged open the heavy door. A white-faced Jon sat on a chair with his head tipped back. Samantha’s face was almost as pale as his and her gloved fingertips pressed a wad of bloodied gauze against his forehead.

‘Oh, God!’ Love for Jon surged to the surface, trouncing Tara’s frustrations.

‘Here.’ Samantha stepped away smartly. ‘I don’t do blood.’

As soon as she moved her hand, blood gushed down Jon’s forehead, dripping off his eyebrow and onto his thigh. The sight pierced Tara’s shock and she darted forward, snapping on a pair of gloves from the open first-aid kit. Jon flinched at the pressure of her fingers on the gauze.

‘What happened?’ she asked.

‘Some moron didn’t stack the F-seventeen properly. I came around the corner and slammed straight into it.’

‘Did you black out?’

‘Don’t think so.’

Tara eased the gauze away, trying to estimate the depth of the wound before the blood squirted like a geyser, obscuring everything. She just had enough time to glimpse jagged skin edges and a flash of white before blood pooled again.

‘You need stitches.’

The fact Jon didn’t argue worried her.

He was unsteady on his feet and needed her help walking to the car. Although she was strong, she was slight and his height and weight threatened to knock her off balance.

During the short drive he was unusually quiet and each time his eyes fluttered closed she panicked he’d blacked out. She kept up a line of patter trying to keep him awake.

‘At least your timing was perfect. Any earlier and I might not have sold the eight-hundred-dollar mixer.’

He didn’t even manage a smile.

Their doctor was