One Long Thread Read Online Free Page A

judge anyone or anything and it was one of the things I most admired about him. Dad was the ultimate pacifist. I could have brought anyone home for dinner and he’d carry on as normal while rummaging through the cutlery drawer for an extra knife and fork. He always poured me half a glass of wine for special occasions and never treated me like a child. Just a person, the same as he was and, most of the time, I loved that about him. But sometimes I wanted to feel like a child, to know that he would stand in front of me while waves crashed towards us or arrows came at us. It should have been enough that he would take my hand, equal to equal, and we would face, whatever came, together. Yet I wanted him to climb a fence and sit on it, to raise a flag, hang a banner and stand for something. Anything. Leaving Mum was one of his few defining moments; a time he chose a road for himself.
    At first I wondered whether he missed Sally the way I did and whether Sally missed me. But I tucked those thoughts down, worked hard at school and filled my sketchbook with dress designs and matching accessories. Drawing by torchlight under the covers late into the night. Hiding my habit for no other reason than it felt good to do it.
    â€˜At least I have you, though,’ Dad said, placing his glasses back on his nose and adjusting the paper. ‘How ’bout you make us a cup of tea, Button?’ he said and I thought the warmth of an Earl Grey with lemon might just make me feel better. For a while.

6.
    At first I imagined the kinds of wedding dresses my mum was sewing in Darwin. I’d flip through Beautiful Brides or Vogue or Woman’s Day and cut out photographs of wedding gowns and stick them inside my scrapbook. I imagined these were the creations Mum laboured over. I conjured up the sound of her sewing machine grinding as she sped the needle through the cloth. She’d sew silk flowers – I’d been studying how to make these myself – and stitch them to bodices and hemlines. For the groom she would stitch a miniature flower for the edge of his pocket handkerchief and it would only be the likes of us – seamstresses – that would appreciate the detail. I imagined us sitting in the back row of churches watching brides walk down the aisle in our gowns. Mum would catch sight of a tiny flaw beside the back seam near the zipper – it would have happened after delivery – and we’d whisper what a shame it was we weren’t called to the vestry before the service. What possibilities existed in us being together.
    Mum had always been handy with a sewing machine and fabric, though she was more suited towards practical, no nonsense projects. On occasion she’d make us matching smocked frocks or dressing gowns but more often than not she resorted to the sewing machine for the purposes of mending skirts or shirts, pants or socks that were otherwise perfectly adequate. She would sew costumes for school plays and Sally’s ballet recitals – primary school only – though she always used a pattern and followed each and every instruction. Including tacking seams before sewing.
    When I was old enough to use the sewing machine I found patterns and tacking – even pinning, sometimes – a waste of time and creative energy. I preferred to work a garment from an idea, pinning and tucking, so to speak, in my mind as I went along. Mum couldn’t stand this way of sewing and it was all she could do not to rip the project from my hands and finish it herself.
    â€˜You’ll only waste good fabric that way,’ she’d say. ‘You’ll save yourself time in the long run.’
    And she was right. I did waste fabric. I ruined as many outfits as I finished. But those that made it through from first cut to final fit were worth it all.
    â€˜It doesn’t look like anything like this,’ Mum would say, looking at the pattern picture and then my sketches. ‘It doesn’t