Chapters (50)
- Cover
- About the Book
- Dedication
- One
- Two
- Three
- Four
- Five
- Six
- Seven
- Eight
- Nine
- Ten
- Eleven
- Twelve
- Thirteen
- Fourteen
- Fifteen
- Sixteen
- Seventeen
- Eighteen
- Nineteen
- Twenty
- Twenty-one
- Twenty-two
- Twenty-three
- Twenty-four
- Twenty-five
- Twenty-six
- Twenty-seven
- Twenty-eight
- Twenty-nine
- Thirty
- Thirty-one
- Thirty-two
- Thirty-three
- Thirty-four
- Thirty-five
- Thirty-six
- Thirty-seven
- Thirty-eight
- Thirty-nine
- Acknowledgements
- About the Author
- Also by Sandie Docker
- Book Club Questions
- Welcome to the Kookaburra Creek Café
- Prologue
- One
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I have not entered many times over the years. Only on the odd occasion to clean. It is good to see it used once more. Though I will be happy to have our bench back once he is moved in with Lucy. I miss my Sunday mornings sitting there, looking for you in the waves. I have no family left now and I fear what will become of me once Lucy is married and has a new family to call her own.
Take care, my dearest. Watch over Father.
Forever yours,
Ivy
PS Lucy manned our Christmas stall while I was in Sydney with Father. She sold every one of my sculptures. William Tucker is the new coach of The Rangers and he bought one of my angels for his Iris, who was so taken with it she has convinced him to invite me to set up a small table at all their home games. We will see how it goes.
Twenty-six
With a black and white scarf around her neck, Nicole walked down to the oval, Mandy waving when she saw her coming.
‘Well, look at you,’ she said. ‘A true convert at last.’
She tugged on the tassels hanging from the end of Nicole’s Rangers scarf and grinned.
‘When in Rome …’ Nicole shrugged and smiled. ‘So what are our chances?’ She nodded towards the middle of the field where the two teams were warming up.
‘Yet to beat them. Riverton have been champs three years in a row. But we’ve never had our lucky charm on the sideline when we’ve played them either.’
‘Oh, no pressure then.’ Nicole laughed, fanning her face with her hands.
‘None at all.’ Mandy smiled. ‘You can handle it,’ she whispered in her ear and wrapped her arm around Nicole’s back.
‘Maybe.’ Nicole hugged Mandy back. Maybe she could.
Nicole found herself cheering out loud as the Rangers scored the first points of the match when Danny went over the line. And she found herself clutching at her scarf in despair as Riverton pulled ahead just before half-time. When the hooter blew, her shoulders fell and she realised how tense she’d been.
‘Let’s grab a sanger,’ Mandy suggested.
The smell of barbecuing onions filled Nicole’s nose as they walked through the market.
‘Hey,’ she said. ‘How long have the markets been here? At the footy match?’
‘Gosh, forever I think.’ Mandy shrugged her shoulders. ‘Certainly all of my life, at least. Maybe longer. Why?’
‘Just curious. I’ve never really seen it before. Just wondering how it started.’
Was her hunch right?
‘Cheryl might know,’ Mandy suggested, as they arrived at the line for the sausage sandwiches.
‘Back in the early sixties.’ Cheryl put onions on Nicole’s bread and Jim served up a fat, split sausage. ‘A couple of CWA women, I think, set up a stall one day and it grew from there. I was pretty young, so my memory, well, you know …’