Gibber’s Creek Gazette, December 1973
And a Merry Christmas from all at the Gibber’s Creek Gazette. This year there will be no edition on Christmas Day, but our regular daily edition will continue as usual through the holiday period.
SAM
If life could be evaluated by its Christmases, which was as good a way as any to do it, Sam thought, waist-deep in the river below the Drinkwater homestead, his toes in its shifting sands, his hand keeping Scarlett’s flotation device steady, and his eyes on Jed, wearing the briefest crocheted pink bikini he had ever seen, his life was just about perfect.
Not quite, of course. Sam grinned at Scarlett, also bikinied, though more modestly than Jed, giggling as she splashed a similarly bikinied Leafsong; at Jed, with her long brown legs and arms and seal-wet hair, diving and graceful like a platypus; grinned at the sheer joy of life. But there were still some important bits that needed to be accomplished before perfection was achieved.
The first was convincing Mum to give him Great-Gran’s engagement ring to give to Jed, though he suspected she had already had it cleaned and put in a new box. And was probably looking at layette knitting patterns in Woman’s Realm for future grandkids as she and Dad travelled home.
Sam could afford a new ring, of course. But Jed liked old things, and the ring linked him to the maternal great-grandparents he had never known, though he could just remember Mum’s funny old great-aunts, turning up like bad fairies at Jane’s christening. They had sent him The Good Child’s Book of Martyrs one birthday.
The next step was to ask Jed to marry him, which was going to be the most incredible moment of his life so far. He needed the perfect time and place for that.
And after that, if Jed agreed, he’d build an extension at Dribble, because even though Scarlett only had two years before she went to uni, it would always be her home, and he and Jed could do with a bit of privacy, plus they’d need more bedrooms for the kids.
He smiled. He’d seen Jed with the River View kids often enough to know how much she loved children. He’d like two: one would be lonely, three bad for the planet, two about perfect. But if Jed wanted more or less, or asked him to build her a turreted castle to live in before she’d marry him, it would be fine by him. And he’d been saving up a couple of 1890s stained-glass windows scavenged from a building site that would be perfect for a glassed-in patio out the front, a place to leave muddy boots and raincoats and warm up the air in winter, then open the windows up to create a thermosyphon to suck hot air out of the house in summer. Natural air-conditioning.
If Jed was happy with their living at Dribble, he’d turn his cottage at Halfway to Eternity into a combination of business office and showroom, where customers could see solar hot-water panels, photovoltaic panels, a hydraulic ram pump, adobe walls and a composting toilet actually working.
And he needed a business name. He didn’t want to go on being ‘that nice young McAlpine lad, he can turn his hand to anything’ forever, especially once he was married. Maybe ‘Sam McAlpine: Alternatives’. That would fit on the side of the ute.
‘What are you daydreaming about?’ Jed popped up beside him, pushing her sodden hair out of her eyes. ‘You’ve got a smile on your face like you’ve seen a chook lay a golden egg. It’s time to go back to the house. Matilda says dinner is ready.’
‘How do you know?’ Sam glanced up at the Drinkwater homestead, where Matilda was probably still chatting to Jim and Iris and their sons, and Carol, dressed almost like a solicitor in a neat purple paisley dress. If dinner was ready, it meant that Michael and Nancy and their kids had arrived with Matron Clancy and Nancy’s mum.
Jed pointed. Maxi panted in the shade of the red gums. A card dangled from her collar: Dinner is served.
Sam laughed. ‘How did Matilda get Maxi to come down here?’
‘Matilda can do anything. Haven’t you noticed?’
‘Jed used to say she turned into a dragon at night,’ said Scarlett, doing an excellent job of propelling herself to the bank with her floater.
‘Maxi knows I keep dog biscuits in my pocket,’ admitted Jed. ‘Matilda just has to tell Maxi, “Find Jed.”’
‘If Maxi knows where you are.’
‘She’s a dog. She can smell dog biscuits a mile away. Come on, lazy bones.’
‘Lazy bones, yourself,’ he said, ducking her, then bobbing under the water too, to kiss her till they both emerged, spluttering.
‘Yuck,’ said Scarlett, watching with interest from her floater. Leafsong grinned next to her.
‘A tactful girl would look away,’ said Sam.
‘Probably,’ agreed Scarlett. ‘Good thing I’m not.’ She held up her arms for Sam to lift her into her four-wheel-drive wheelchair, then turned the wheelchair by herself, despite the sandy ground, and steadily if laboriously made her way up the slope with Leafsong to the big house.
Sam waited till Jed had blotted her hair — his ponytail could stay wet and dripping — and wrapped herself in a sarong. Jed looked almost as good in a sarong as in a bikini . . .
An almost perfect Christmas. And next year, the dinner table would need an even longer extension, with Mum and Dad and Jane, and Auntie Mah and Uncle Andy back home again.
And Jed would be Mrs Sam McAlpine. Or Mrs Jed McAlpine. Or Ms Jed McAlpine-Kelly. Or just Ms Jed Kelly. Names didn’t matter. But he and Jed did.