A Pair of Lost Socks

There was laughter and drinking, and plates were cleared, then cake brought out. Happy birthday was sung to Norma, and afterwards she slowly returned to her seat in the window, her adult grandchildren such as Heather and Ryan joining her, while her great grandchildren generally ran out to the backyard.

Stuffed full of food and a couple of beers, Max also walked out the back, onto the veranda. He noted a couple of the older boys kicking a football about, a boy and girl were looking through the gate at the horses in the top paddock, while a few other kids played a chasing game, tiggy, their voices excited and happy.

"Maxie," Greggory said, and Max turned his head to see his brother also standing at the far end of the veranda, smoking a cigarette.

"G'day, Greggory," Max said, hobbling over to his brother.

"I, ah, spoke with Ryan and his, ah, lovely fiancé. She's...very beautiful. And funny too. I can see they're a good match, Ryan's a lucky boy."

Max smiled, stifling a slight snigger. "I thought she'd get the shock of her life meeting our mob down here."

"Why?" Greggory asked. "Because of what I said last year?"

Max shook his head and chuckled. "Nah, mate, because you go for Collingwood."

Greggory smiled and shook his head. "We did better than your Hawks last season."

"We both know last year doesn't count."

"Keep telling yourself that, Maxie," Greggory said. They both laughed and in the following silence Greggory drew long on his smoke, and exhaled, then broke the silence, declaring, "Bev left me after last year's effort here."

"Come again?" Max was floored, hearing his brother's sudden confession, but not sure if he'd heard right, wanting to make sure before proceeding.

"Bev said I was rude to you and Annie and Heather and Tim. And to her too. Said she weren't gonna put up with my shit if I didn't stop bein' a...a so-and-so. I took it pretty hard, but a couple of months without her I realised she might be right."

Max shook his head. "I thought you might be having issues, but didn't know the details."

"I'm a fool, Max. You know my first thought was she'd run off to you? Dunno why, but I...couldn't stop this idea in me head, though I knew it was bullshit."

"I didn't even know, mate. This is the first I heard of it."

Greggory nodded. "She shot through to her Mum's during lockdown, like Annie did with Mum here. And Rodney told me you and Heather went off to Yvonne's, but for a while me mind was comin' to all these conclusions."

Max thought for a moment, put his hand on his brother's shoulder and said, "She came back to ya, cobber, which says a lot."

"She did. Took a bit of convincing on my part, but I realised I was...wasn't quite the same without her, if you know what I mean. Like some part of me was missin'."

Max smiled and nodded. "She's a good woman, so yeah, I know."

Greggory took another puff on his cigarette. "So you and Yvonne are together again, and the Torana's back on the road, both yer kids are engaged and you've got a grandkid now. What's next?"

"You know what?" Max said, smiling. "I haven't thought that far ahead. One day at a time."

Greggory nodded, perhaps satisfied by Max's response. The door opened and out shuffled Norma, still quite able on her feet. Both her boys went to help her and she waved them off. "I've been looking for you two."

"We in trouble?" Max asked, grinning.

"It weren't me," Greggory said with a chuckle, thumbing his hand towards Max, "It was him!"

"You boys never change. Cheeky little bastards hiding out here, smoking cigarettes while your sister's in there still slaving away, cleaning up with both your lovely wives helping her."

"I haven't touched a smoke in years," Max said, his hands up.

"He hasn't helped clean up in years either," Greggory chuckled.

Norma approached them and Max moved out of her way so she could sit on the bench against the wall, looking out on the yard at her great grandchildren playing. "I'll have to get a cigarette from you again, Greggory."

Greggory offered the pack to his mother, and whispered to Max, "She does this every time I visit."

"I might be old but I can hear you," she said, and both Max and Greggory laughed.

They chatted with their mother, and soon Annie joined them, scolding her mother for smoking. Norma laughed and Greggory taunted Annie, but with good humour.

After the laughter died down, Annie said, "Max, it's fantastic to see you and Yvonne back together. And marvellous to see your car back on the road, even if it's a thirsty V-eight."

Karen came and took a photograph of Norma and her three children, then a larger family photo in the yard with grandkids and great grandkids too, and later Norma returned inside with Annie while Greggory began to kick the football with the boys. Max found himself alone on the bench, watching the kids playing in the yard where he'd played as a child.

Heather soon joined him, pacing the veranda with Alyssa, who was grizzly crying, trying to settle her, cooing soothingly, "There, there, my love, you've had a good feed, now time for sleepys."

"I think you're going to send me to sleep too," Max said with a chuckle, and Heather gave him a smile.

And he did fall asleep, because the next moment he was startled awake by a child's voice, "Uncle Max?"

"Oh, yep," he said, and looked harder at the young girl. "Lauren, right?"

She smiled cheekily and droned, "You ask this every time and my name's still Lauren every time."

"Steady, there, ya just woke me." Then he grinned. "Maybe I'll start callin' ya Laurie."

"Grandma calls me Laurie. Auntie Heather said you might want some company. She's over there by the horse gate."

"Oh, must've only drifted off for a second."

"I'm sorry for upsetting you, Uncle Max."

"It's okay, I'm not upset, I didn't intend to fall asleep."

"No, not for waking you," Lauren said, sitting on the bench next to him. "For last year when I upset you."

"Huh?" he said, confused, trying to recall their conversation. "How'd you upset me?"

The girl hesitated. "I'm not supposed to talk about it."

"Oh, that bad, eh," Max said, racking his brains. Then it came to him. "Do you mean talking about Justin?"

She nodded. "Heather's brother."

Max nodded too and smiled. "It's okay, we, ah, me and Yvonne sit with him in the garden sometimes, at sunset. We talk to him."

"Really?" Lauren's eyes were wide now. "You sit and talk with him?"

"He, ah...he's in a little pot Yvonne made. His, um...the atoms he was made of are in the pot."

Lauren thought for a moment, pursing her lips and asked, "Do you think he can hear you?"

Max nodded. "I know he can. Even if we can't see him."

The girl nodded too, then shrugged her shoulders, looking down at the old timbers of the veranda's decking between her feet, which she began swinging back and forth in front of her and under the bench seat. "Mrs Taylor used to speak with God, even if she couldn't see him, and she said she knew he was listening. Then Mummy said she died near the end of last year. I think Mrs Taylor sees God now and speaks to him in Heaven, because her daughter who's called Janine told me so. Janine put Mrs Taylor in a little pot too and Mummy said she keeps it above her fireplace!"

Max smiled, wondering if he'd end up in a tiny pot on Heather's shelf. Tim, exited through the back door, gave Max a nod and crossed the yard to Heather, who was still walking about with Alyssa, singing gently to her, and Max smiled when Heather turned to her partner and both gave one another affectionate caresses, smiling at their daughter, then Max chuckled at the thought of his daughter keeping his ashes around forever.

"Why are you laughing, Uncle Max?"

"No reason," he said, vaguely.

Lauren shrugged again, still swinging her feet. "I saw your race car out front. It's very pretty."

"No one ever called a Torana pretty before."

"Torana?"

"That's the kind of car it is. A Holden Torana."

"What's a Holden?"

"The brand of car. Not long ago they made cars here in Australia. Some used to joke they were just Holden together, but they don't even make 'em anymore."

"Oh." Lauren paused again, then said, "Grandma said cars are dirty and polluting."

Max smiled. "She's right."

"But Grandma drives a big car and tows her horses around."

Max laughed, nodding at the girl's perception. "Unfortunately, if your grandma wants to move her horses around she needs a big polluting car."

"She could ride her horses from our house to here and back. Well, it's not our house, it's Grandma's house, but we live there while she's living here. It's in the bush and has a long dirt road."

"Ah, yes, right," Max said, recalling the previous year's conversation with Annie when they sat in the Torana, and he looked up at the shed, its timbers rotting. The yard was empty now, the kids plus Heather and Tim having walked down the driveway, perhaps to see what was going on out front, leaving Max and Lauren alone. "You moved away, didn't you?"

Lauren looked down again, her feet still now, and Max noticed she wore mismatched socks; one sock slightly longer than the other, unicorns with rainbow manes all surrounded by bright shades of purples, pinks and blues adorning its length, while the shorter sock was blue like the sky with rainbow colours around the cuff-hem and several pink and purple unicorns among white stars, both of the girl's feet covered by laceless boots. "Yeah, we had to move away from Daddy. Mummy said they didn't want to be together anymore. I'm sad, because I don't get to see him very much."

Max nodded, sad he'd mentioned her moving away in the first place. He wanted to cheer her up, and he said, "Sometimes people are like your socks, a little bit mismatched."

Lauren started swinging her feet again. "These are my unicorn socks, and their other matching sock went missing. Me and Mummy can't find them anywhere. But I like them both, even if my brother says I'm weird wearing different socks, but I think different socks should be able to live together too. And they both have unicorns!"

"You're absolutely right," Max said. "And don't listen to anyone who says you shouldn't be different, because being different is okay. Especially different unicorn socks!"

Lauren held her legs out straight in the air in front of her, mismatched socks on display above the boot rims. "Mummy and Daddy should try harder, even if they're too different."

"Maybe you're right, but even some people don't match well no matter how hard they try, because they're too different. Your socks both have unicorns on them and rainbow colours, and I bet not many people noticed they weren't matching, but sometimes we can see socks aren't matching without hardly looking, and maybe your Mum and Dad need to find each other's matching sock friend instead?"

Lauren giggled, which was music to Max's ears and heart, and she said, "Sock friend...do you think they'll find their matching sock friends?"

"Maybe...I hope so. Everyone needs a friend."

"I hope so too, and I hope Daddy's sock friend isn't Uncle Dale, because he's in trouble with the police again for growing his smelly smoking pot plants and might go to jail. I wish Daddy met someone who grows nice pot plants with bright flowers instead."

Max nodded and they were silent for a moment, Lauren swinging her legs again, and the back door opened, Yvonne stepping through, followed by Ryan and Georgina. Bev briefly joined them too, asking if anyone knew where Greggory was, then she walked into the yard.

Max smiled at Yvonne, who smiled back, and then he whispered to Lauren, "I can assure you that sometimes two lost socks do find one another again, whether they were already a pair before going missing from each other, or sometimes they match close enough with another sock and just work, like your two socks do. Not always, but sometimes, and when it happens, it's wonderful."

Lauren smiled and so did Max, then Yvonne too, who quietly joined them on the bench. Ryan and Georgina stepped down into the yard, hand-in-hand, chatting in the sunshine with Bev and Greggory who were now returning towards the house, and Heather and Tim arrived too with sleeping Alyssa, joining the little gaggle standing on the grass.

Yvonne quietly said, "You two look like you're having a good old chat?"

"Laurie and I were discussing how her two mismatched socks work perfectly together."

Lauren piped up, smiling. "But Uncle Max said they might find their missing sock friends one day too!"

"He's right, sometimes a pair of lost socks do meet again," Yvonne said, smiling across at Max.

Max smiled back, then Lauren said, "Aunty Yvonne, my Grandma said you have the most beautiful hair in the whole world and she always wanted straight hair like yours. But is it true you wanted curly hair like hers?"

Yvonne looked to Max again with a bemused smirk, and Max smiled, stifling a laugh, and he looked out at his family as more of Heather and Ryan's cousins gathered on the lawn to chat, and he smiled.

~~~~0000~~~~

A quick note, dear reader. As I mentioned in my introduction, I'm aware the Australian Covid experience has been different to that of many nations in the global scheme of things. However, in the early days little was known or communicated, mistakes were made, where the situation could easily have spiralled out of control. This was the uncertain situation Max's family were facing in March 2020, particularly for Heather and Tim who were worried about how the disease might affect unborn Alyssa. By Easter 2020 considerable restrictions on movement were initiated at a federal level, and enforced by individual states, including nation-wide lockdowns. These lockdowns proved generally effective in curtailing the spread of the virus, and by June the lockdowns were easing, including in Max's home state of Tasmania (though, sadly, one Australian state, Victoria, was about to be placed under several months of further restrictions following a major Covid outbreak, where they managed to stop the spread, and even now as I finish writing outbreaks are occurring around Australia, where swift lockdowns are the most common method to deal with them). I'll leave the history lesson there, however, as much as I love receiving comments, I ask people refrain from politicising the pandemic and how I've portrayed it here.

Oh, and before you go, dear reader, perhaps you're thinking, "This is Literotica and there was hardly enough sex in this here long tale I've just invested my time in! Outrageous!!" Well, dear reader, if you'd like a tale with more sex, much more sex, you may wish to find out how Tim discovered Heather's Exquisite Map of Tassie. Check it out, it's a real good ramble in the Literotica wilderness!