The Serpent's Skin by Erina Reddan (top 5 books to read .txt) 📕

I filled teacups and tiny glasses with water. Georgie got bored, though, and wandered off, so Shelley helped us shape the chrysanthemums into the makeshift vases and arrange them on top of the long white mirror I’d got from the op shop and laid down the middle of the table. We stood back and even Tim broke off his price-of-wool talk with Geoff to twist his mouth in approval at the forest of white, actual and reflected. I was swimming the place in truth. Philly spoke a bit of flower, but if she knew the symbolic meaning of white chrysanthemums she didn’t let on.

‘Let’s get this show on the road, then,’ Dad said, rushing out from his bedroom like he had somewhere to go, the smell of Brylcreem strong about the wave of his receding grey hair. He sniffed the roast and rubbed his hands.

‘Like the old days.’ He looked at my jeans. ‘See you’ve made an effort, JJ.’

‘In my own way,’ I said.

He tsked, but I shrugged it off. There were bigger things to snag on when you were digging up your mother after fourteen years. ‘You’re looking back to yourself.’

‘Yep, yep. All good.’ He shrugged it off as if being gored by your beloved bull was an everyday thing. Despite everything, Dad hadn’t been able to bring himself to part with Max, who was still happily plotting conspiracy beside his trough and eyeing off the cows in the adjoining paddock.

He turned to Tye, and I made the introduction.

‘Good meeting you, Mr McBride.’

‘Beer, mate?’ Dad asked him over a shake of his hand. ‘Best thing in this heat.’

Tye agreed that it was perfect given the weather.

‘What time is Father McGinty getting here?’ asked Philly.

‘Not coming,’ said Tim.

‘Did you even ask?’ I said.

Tim shrugged. ‘The old man told me not to. Said he’d do it.’

Dad had outsmarted me again. I slapped away a barb of disappointment. Wasn’t going to let it infect the rest of the day though. Dad beamed his back to me as he got busy with the fridge door and the bottle opener.

I asked Philly to keep an eye on Tye while I went to do something. She frowned into a question, but I just winked, and Tye walked me to the Austin. ‘I won’t be long,’ I said. He put his forehead against mine like a blessing.

I bumped down the hill over the flat and pulled on the handbrake at Jean’s Corner. I took out the box of garden things and considered my options. I tested the hardness of the ground around the short stone bench, the baby’s cross, closer in under the apple tree, then by the creek. In the end I dug close to the reach of the water. I hadn’t been able to choose between Purple Loosestrife and its all that’s gone between us and the wattle, which had so much to say, but in among it was love and protection and the solving of mystery, and I thought there was all of that in the thickness binding Mum and Aunty Peg together. Then the rose bushes: one from Mrs Tyler’s garden, the dark red Munstead Wood Rose, one of Mum’s favourites because they’re survivors and yet so lush. The Bleu Magenta Rose was Mrs Nolan’s—because its deep rose purple was as unexpected as Peg, she said. Tye and I had dropped around on our way, told them what needed to be told. They’d held hands across the kitchen table with the pity of it. I dug the holes, poured in water and fertiliser, gentled the plants from their pots, placed them in the ground and covered their roots with soil. I thought of the millions of women who’ve ever held helpless hands in the face of implacable facts. Watered the plants in. Giving Mum a garden. I stripped off my gloves and reached into the box for the plaque Tye and I had worked on:

Sarah Anne Millet 1931–1968

Margaret Mary Millet 1933–1982

I stabbed it deep into the loosened earth and used the back of the shovel to bang in the rest enough so it would hold.

I sat back on my haunches. It was done. Over. This terrible trail of lies to which they both lost so much. I don’t know if this is what they would want. To be together again. But I do know they didn’t get a chance to find out. That had to end here.

When I got back to the house, Tessa was yelling for Georgie to come back out the back door. ‘Where’d you get to?’ she asked me.

‘Just doing a bit of reacquainting.’ I smiled, shading my eyes with my hand.

‘Mmm.’ She gave me a sceptical look. ‘Dinner’s ready.’

‘Twins?’

‘Down. Your old room.’

‘Hope there’s nothing catching in there.’

‘Better not be.’ She laughed.

Inside, Dad scraped his chair to the table and leaned back to get more of a swig of his beer. Tessa went to pick up his plate. He patted her forearm and she smiled.

I took Tye’s hand. His other hand came around mine. ‘All good?’ he leaned in to say.

‘Yep.’ I bit my lip. ‘Done. Now this.’ I blew air out and went to pull my hand away to dig into my palm.

He pulled it back and kissed the place I would have attacked with my nails. ‘You got this,’ he said.

Tessa spooned minted peas and roasted spuds on to Dad’s plate. She layered lamb slices beside parsnip and carrots, and put it all before him. Geoff got his own and Tessa moved on to Georgie’s plate. Dad sat at the head of the table alone as everybody filled their plates at the bench. He hunched forwards and drowned everything in gravy. He got his knife and fork busy and down went the first mouthful, wolfed in.

Tessa untied Mum’s apron and hung it on the hook beside the fireplace, just like Mum used to do. I was still only up to the greens dish when everybody else was settled, the steam of lamb and