Les Gillespies Gold: Exerpt - Chapter 15

I'm back to writing Les Gillespies Gold again and thought I would share this exerpt, which I had a lot of fun writing. As with everything, it may not make it into the final draft of the story, but it felt good to write such an exchange. Let me know what you think.

Emily had squeezed between him and the table cuddling into him for warmth.
         ‘Good morning little one, why are you out of bed?’ Tilly had asked if she could stay with Joe and Laura overnight.
         ‘Couldn’t sleep.’
         ‘Hungry?’
         Emily shook her head and stared at the changing sky. ‘Pop, you know how Mum and Jeff are getting married.’
          ‘Yep.’ Joe said. ‘Why, don’t you want them too?’
          ‘It’s not that. I like Jeff, but do I have to call him Dad?’
          ‘Not if you don’t you want too?’Joe wondered how Emily would take the changes. He would sooner have Tilly and Jeff answer these questions, but he loved that his granddaughter could come to him for counsel. ‘What do you want to call him?’
         ‘Jeff, it will seem funny to call him, Dad now, but he’ll be like a dad, won’t he? I just want to call him, Jeff, like before, that’s all.’
         ‘I think he’ll be fine with that too.’
         ‘And do you think Mum will love him more than me?’
         ‘Hmm, what do you think?’
         ‘Well, I don’t think she will stop loving me, maybe she will love us the same, but different. You know, she will love him grown up ways.’
         ‘Yep, that’s what I would have said. You are one smart young lady.’
         ‘I heard Mum tell Jeff, that if you said he couldn’t marry her, to tell you, it’s a shottie. What does that mean?’ Emily screwed her face around, trying to squeeze the same inflection her mother put into the word she didn’t understand.
        Joe struggled to hold his composure, Emily was serious and these were questions, he’d rather not answer. What would she ask next?
       ‘How about some pancakes with whipped butter and maple syrup?’ Joe said.
       ‘I don’t think so, not yet anyway.’ She snuggled in, shivered, and dragged his flannel shirt around her. ‘If mum has a baby, then it will be theirs won’t it, hers and Jeff’s. Do you think they will love it more than me?’
       ‘How could anybody love anyone, more than your Mum loves you? You should have seen her the day you came into the world, a little wrinkled up red bundle of arms and legs. She had a bit of trouble and was in a lot of pain, but the moment you arrived she was complete. Her world was right again, but you, Emily Beatrice Gillespie, you screamed the hospital down.’
       ‘Did I, did I cry a lot?’
       ‘Cry... I think they heard you in the next town. You were louder than that old rooster over there. The hospital told us you had the strongest set of lungs they’d ever heard.’ He placed a hand on her tummy and tickled her. She writhed and giggled in time to his touch. ‘You settled down once you had a feed, but boy that day was special. And well, you let everyone know you had arrived.’
       She loved his storytelling, and he knew a flood of questions would burst from inside her. ‘Was I quiet from then on?’
      ‘Only until you started to talk and we haven’t been able to shut you up since. Just like now questions, questions, questions.’ He turned away. ‘Look, if they do decide to have a baby, and who’s to say they will. I reckon there will be more love in your house, than in any other place in town, in the State, or even the whole of Australia maybe. Things’ll be fine. Do you reckon you can love Jeff too? What do you think?’
      ‘Yep, if he doesn’t make Mum sad.’
      ‘Do you think he will?’
      ‘Sometimes she’s cross with him.’
      ‘Sometimes she’s cross with you too, and sometimes Granny’s cross with me. In the end though, it’s only a little thing and the love is bigger than that. You’ll see, we’ll all be fine.’
     ‘You sure?’
     ‘Yep, as sure as I am that I make better pancakes than Jeff Rankin.’ Joe cuddled her; his big arms covered her tiny frame. ‘Let’s eat. You can get the butter and syrup out of the fridge.’
     ‘Pop?’ Emily put the margarine on the table.
     ‘Yep’
     ‘What’s Chanel No5?’
     ‘Why?’
     ‘Before we left the pub, they were whispering, and I heard Mum ask Jeff what pyjamas she should wear. And he said Chanel No5.’
     ‘Come on, I’ll need some help with the batter.’ Joe said. ‘That’s a question for your grandmother.’