Read Online My Place by Sally Morgan - Free Book Online Page A

Arthur,’Mum said proudly, ‘he’s Nanna’s brother.’ I stared at him in shock. I didn’t know she had a brother.
    Arthur returned to the lounge room and us kids all sat on the floor, giggling behind our hands and staring at one another. Mum slipped into the kitchen to make a cup of tea. I glimpsed her going into Dad’s room. Then she returned, finished off the tea and dug out some biscuits. I helped pass them around.
    Mum said, very brightly, to Arthur, ‘He’s asleep. Perhaps he’ll wake up before you leave.’ I knew she was lying, but I didn’t understand why. Sleep never came easily to Dad.
    After a while, they all left. I was surprised to hear Arthur speak English. I thought maybe he could speak English and Indian, whereas the kids probably only spoke Indian.
    I don’t remember ever seeing them again while I was a child, but the image of their smiling faces lodged deep in my memory. I often wondered about them. I wanted them to teach me Indian. I never said anything to Mum. I knew, instinctively, that if I asked about them, she wouldn’t tell me anything.
    Dad seemed to be getting sicker and sicker. By the time September came around, he had been in hospital more than he’d been home. At least he managed to return for Jill’s birthday towards the end of September.
    Mum asked a special favour of him that day. She wanted him to stay in his room while the party was on. It was the first party Jill had ever asked her friends to, and Mum didn’t want Dad to spoil it by walking around, drunk. To my surprise, he actually agreed.
    It was halfway through a round of Queenie, Queenie, Who’s Got The Ball that Dad appeared, a bottle and glass in his right hand. I watched as he casually seated himself on the front porch and poured a glass of beer. After a couple of drinks, he began to call out and make comments about the game we were playing. Mum suddenly appeared behind him in the hall and began to whisper crossly, ‘Bill, come inside, you’re making a fool of yourself, the neighbours will hear you.’ As Mum’s whispersbecame more urgent, so Dad refilled his glass more often, he delighted in taking the mickey out of Mum.
    One morning a few weeks later, Dad emerged from his room early, we were just finishing breakfast. All the previous week, he’d been in hospital, so we were surprised by the cheery look on his face. Nan hovered near the table, intent on hurrying us along. She knew we’d seize on any pretext to miss school.
    â€˜Come on, you kids, you’ll be late,’ she grumbled when she noticed our eating had slowed to a halt.
    â€˜Aw, let then stay home, Dais,’ Dad said. ‘I’ll look after them.’ Had I heard right? I froze halfway through my last slice of toast and jam, it wasn’t like Dad to interfere with anything to do with us. I’d heard him call Nan Dais before. It was his way of charming her.
    Nan was as surprised as me. She flicked her dirty tea towel towards us and muttered in her grumpiest voice, ‘They have to go to school, Bill, they can’t stay home.’ I sensed that she was unsure of herself, and beneath her lowered lashes, she eyed Dad shrewdly.
    â€˜Well, let little Billy stay then, Dais,’ Dad coaxed. I smiled, he’d called her Dais again, how could she resist?
    â€˜All right,’ Nan relented, ‘just Billy. Now, off you girls go!’
    Billy waved at us smugly. Jill and I grumbled as we dressed. Nan had always favoured the boys in our family, and now Dad was doing the same.
    By lunchtime, we’d forgotten all about Billy. Jill and I had been taken off normal classwork to help paint curtains for the school’s Parents’ Night, which was held at the end of each year. We were halfway through drawing a black swan family when the headmaster came down and told us we could go home early. We were puzzled, but very pleased to be leaving before the other