Burnt Socks and a Love of Books

‘Penny for your thoughts.’

‘Huh?’

‘I said, “penny for your thoughts”.’ my friend Sam repeated, nudging me with her elbow. We were sitting together on the bank of a creek – not that there was much of a creek – just a trickle with some deeper puddles that were home to a handful of tadpoles, and thick mud that once it attached itself to your shoes, you never got rid of it. Either that or it sucked your shoe off and you lost it in the mud forever.

Sam, or more correctly, Shirley Ann McWilliams, and I had walked home from school together as we usually did and saw my mother waiting at the front gate. This was unusual, and I wondered if I’d done something wrong that I didn’t know about.

Sam continued on and as I walked through the front gate, my mother told me my father had died. I can’t remember her exact words. I think it must have been shock. My mother’s eyes were red from crying I wasn’t sure what to do or say, my thirteen-year-old brain just couldn’t take it in.

I changed out of my school uniform and walked past my father’s closed bedroom door where he still lay on his bed waiting for university to pick him up. He’d willed his body to medical research. I walked into the kitchen where my mother sat drinking a cup of tea and said, ‘Can I go to Sam’s?’ My mother nodded wordlessly and I turned and fled out of the house.

* * *

‘What are you thinking about?’ Sam’s question brought me out of my fog.

I shrugged. ‘I don’t know… my dad I guess.’

We sat in silence for another five minutes. That’s what I like about Sam, we could be together and not say a word, but still be comfortable in each other’s company.

‘Sam,’ I said at last. ‘I can’t remember my father.’

‘What do you mean you can’t remember him, didn’t you see him this morning?’

‘I mean, I can’t remember anything about my father before I was about five. Nothing… it’s totally blank. I don’t have any memory of my mother either. I can remember other people, and things that happened to me, just not my parents.’

Sam looked at me strangely but didn’t make any comment.

Another five minutes of silence.

‘Your dad was old wasn’t he?’

I nodded, ‘Yes, he was sixty-two when I was born and my mum was forty-two.’

‘Wow! That means he was nearly eighty.’ Sam said in awe.

‘I remember…’ I sighed, ‘I remember my dad always let me come into his workshop and use his tools. He taught me how to make a boat, and a train. We always watched the cricket on TV together and the wrestling.’

‘What else do you remember?’ Sam had apparently taken on the role of counsellor. She was the oldest of five children while I was an ‘only.’*

‘My dad bought me a book every two weeks when he’d go in to town. You know, Gulliver’s Travels, Black Beauty, Tom Sawyer, Treasure Island… that sort of thing.’ I smiled. ‘I guess that’s why I love books so much.’ I thought some more and then laughed. ‘When I was eight, we were having our Sunday school anniversary concert and I had a new dress and new shoes and pink socks with lace around the edge. My dad decided to help me get ready and ironed my socks to get the wrinkles out of them.’

‘Ooops.’

I smiled. ‘Yep, holes burnt in both socks, so I wore my white school socks. Mum was mad at him, but I didn’t care – I didn’t want to wear pink foo-foo socks anyway.’

I lay back in the grass and closed my eyes, trying to piece together what memories I could. A snatch here and there, but anything about my parents refused to leave their deep, dark hiding place.

‘Dad taught me how to write with invisible writing using lemon juice. When the person you sent the secret letter too wanted to read it, all they have to do is heat it over a candle or something like that. Another time he taught me to make ink using water, starch and a couple of drops of iodine. You could use it like normal ink, but it disappears after 4-5 days. He tried to teach me Morse code too, but I kept getting my dots and dashes mixed up.’

Sam looked at me wide-eyed. ‘Was he training you as a spy?’

One thing Sam and I had in common was an overactive imagination.

‘No, I think he’d been hoping for a boy instead of a girl.’ I shivered, the sun had set and the breeze was getting cold. ‘I’d better go home. Mum will be wondering where I am.’

There was no funeral for my Dad; I don’t even know where they buried him after they’d finished with his body. I wish I did; I’d like to go and say goodbye.

*Note: About ten years ago, I discovered that I wasn’t an “only,” but that I had a twin brother who died at birth or shortly after. Finding that out made a lot of things from when I was a child a whole lot clearer – but that’s another story.