The Alphabet Sisters by Monica McInerney Read Free Book Online

conversations. She had been very firm about it from the start. “You are grown women, and it is up to the three of you to sort this out in your own good time.” Matthew’s thoughts on her mother came to mind. “That’s just the way she is, Carrie. Anyway, you’d hate it if she was the fussy, nosy type of mother, you know that.”
    She tuned back in, trying to look sympathetic as Geraldine outlined the latest episode of her silent war with Lola. It seemed she had caught Lola using the office computer to print up some sort of flyer. “I’ve asked her not to do it, but she just ignores me. She goes through paper like nothing else, and never thinks to order more to replace it. I had to print out last week’s menus on colored paper, because she’d used all the white paper for a new batch of birthday invitations or some such thing.”
    “She’d try the patience of a saint,” Carrie agreed, unconsciously echoing one of Lola’s own Irish sayings. The difficulty was Carrie could see both sides. Lola could indeed be the most annoying, interfering, meddling old woman on the planet, and Geraldine in turn was sometimes the most inflexible, single-minded, humorless woman in Australia, as Lola had once put it so succinctly. Carrie dragged out another fake laugh. “Still, I suppose it’s not every day she turns eighty.”
    “No, thank God.” Geraldine glanced at her wristwatch, a functional one bought purely for timekeeping, not decorative purposes. “So, can you come and help me move these tables? Your dad’s not back from the wholesaler’s yet, otherwise I’d ask him. I also want to go through the casual staff rosters with you. And I wouldn’t mind your help with the new computer program, either, if you don’t mind. I still can’t make head nor tail of it.”
    “Of course.” This was more like it. Back onto work matters, not the precarious rocky shores of emotions and feelings. Carrie felt much better as she followed her mother into the function room.

Chapter Three
    I n the forecourt of the Valley View Motel one week later, Len the local butcher slammed the door of his delivery van. Short, plump, and with a bald pink head, he often joked that he wasn’t unlike one of his tasty homemade sausages himself.
    “All set for old Mrs. Quinlan’s hooley tonight, Jim? Sure you don’t want me to DJ again?” He started speaking in a bad American accent. “ ‘You’re listening to Len’s Mobile Disco, spinning the hottest new tracks for young and old.’ ”
    Jim Quinlan remembered the last time Len had DJed at a motel function. He’d had to refund half the room booking fee when the twenty-one-year-old and her parents complained. Len had been unrepentant. “Islands in the Stream” was a classic, a beautiful song, he’d insisted. Not seven times in one night, though. “Not this time, Len. No thanks. You just come along as our guest and enjoy yourself.”
    “It’s going to be some party, by all accounts. The two older girls still coming home for it?”
    “That’s right.” Jim wondered, not for the first time, if his family’s daily activities were actually being broadcast directly to television sets around the Valley. Fifteen years they’d been here, and he was still amazed at how news traveled. He made a point of looking at his watch. “They’re due any minute, actually. So if you can give me the invoice …”
    Len gave a throaty laugh. “The Alphabet Sisters together again. What I’d give to be a fly on the wall at that first meeting.”
    Jim kept his face expressionless. It seemed the entire population of the Valley was hoping to be a fly on the wall at this reunion of his three daughters. One spray of an extra-strong pesticide and a good percentage of them would be lying on the floor, legs wriggling. It was a comforting thought. “Good to know my family’s providing so much entertainment, Len. I would have thought you’d have plenty of other things to keep you busy.”
    Len was unabashed.