Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    Jigsaw
    Jigsaw
    Jigsaw
    Ebook120 pages1 hour

    Jigsaw

    By Deirdre Jonklaas Cadiramen

    ()

    Read preview

    About this ebook

    A collection of fifteen diverse stories which add unique dimensions to human experience. Themes focus on the unexpected, intensify perceptions of the familiar and proffer insight into the unfamiliar. A child's dream was a premonition in The Bride Wore Black. A belated medical diagnosis comes to light in It Began with the Birds.
    This is the author's third book.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherWe Green Solutions
    Release dateJul 4, 2014
    ISBN9789810912208
    Jigsaw

    Related to Jigsaw

    Related ebooks

    Short Stories For You

    View More
    View More

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      Night Flying

      Aug 2, 2018

      Night Flying
      10 min read

    • Article

      Four Of A Kind

      May 3, 2023

      Four Of A Kind
      4 min read

    • Article

      100-WORD-STORY COMPETITION Winners

      Aug 16, 2022

      We’ve been delighted by the huge response to our 100-word-story competition. The entries have flooded in thick and fast during the past few months, but while we’ve enjoyed reading every story, only a few can come out on top! You, our readers, voted t

      5 min read

    • Article

      Summer Reading Guide

      Jan 2, 2022

      Summer Reading Guide
      6 min read

    • Article

      That Particular Sunday

      Jul 6, 2023

      That Particular Sunday
      26 min read

    • Article

      At Her Historic Ancestral Home Belvoir Castle The Duchess Of rutland Is An Open Book As She Talks Candidly About Her Extraordinary Life In A New Autobiography

      Oct 10, 2022

      At Her Historic Ancestral Home Belvoir Castle The Duchess Of rutland Is An Open Book As She Talks Candidly About Her Extraordinary Life In A New Autobiography
      5 min read

    • Article

      Little CHARMS

      Oct 19, 2022

      Little CHARMS
      6 min read

    • Article

      Every CLOUD

      Aug 31, 2022

      Every CLOUD
      6 min read

    • Article

      Cornwall CALLING

      May 4, 2022

      Cornwall CALLING
      9 min read

    • Article

      Come the DAWN

      Apr 8, 2020

      Come the DAWN
      21 min read

    • Article

      BOOKS TO READ in September/October

      Aug 19, 2022

      BY MARINA FILIPPELLI (HARDIE GRANT, R270) Looking for new picnic ideas? You’re in the right place. In Foolproof Picnic, discover 60 simple, easy-to-share recipes that celebrate throwing down a blanket and enjoying the sunshine. Marina Filippelli, foo

      5 min read

    • Article

      Books

      Mar 23, 2020

      Julia Ebner works for a counter-extremism think tank that watches and documents radical groups from the outside. Worrying that she isn’t getting the full picture, she goes undercover, joins various groups and experiences them from the inside out. Thi

      4 min read

    • Article

      The Chicken Line

      Mar 4, 2024

      The Chicken Line
      14 min read

    • Article

      Sweet Fantasy

      Nov 20, 2021

      Sweet Fantasy
      8 min read

    • Article

      Yara And The Witch Queen

      Oct 1, 2019

      I knew the dangers of witchcraft. My parents had told me about the time before I was born, when magic plagued our desert kingdom of Bahati. Untrained witch doctors trying to cure warts ended up paralyzing their patients or turning them into crocodile

      10 min read

    • Article

      The Wind Feels Loss

      Aug 8, 2019

      The Wind Feels Loss
      7 min read

    • Article

      Writing Family History

      Dec 15, 2021

      Writing Family History
      5 min read

    • Article

      Tiny Love Stories

      Oct 28, 2020

      Tiny Love Stories
      3 min read

    • Article

      The Family Plot

      May 7, 2020

      The Family Plot
      10 min read

    • Article

      Haunted

      Sep 27, 2023

      Haunted
      6 min read

    • Article

      A New Beginning

      Mar 25, 2022

      A New Beginning
      5 min read

    • Article

      Magnets: Carried through time, lovers seek their purpose.

      Feb 6, 2014

      Moon Colony B, 2213 Former Ponzi-schemer Mary Pillar digs through a trashcan. It smells like rotten eggs and milk. She is elderly and homeless, living in an alley between two eco-efficient skyscrapers. Dust particles dance around her. She has lost ev

      11 min read

    • Article

      Too late FOR LOVE?

      Jun 8, 2022

      Too late FOR LOVE?
      8 min read

    Related categories

    Reviews for Jigsaw

    0 ratings

    0 ratings0 reviews

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

      Book preview

      Jigsaw - Deirdre Jonklaas Cadiramen

      By the same author

      Thursday’s Child

      Kaleidoscope

      Published by the Bay Owl Press, 2009

      an imprint of the Perera Hussein Publishing House

      www.ph-books.com

      ISBN: 978-955-1723-10-2

      First edition

      All rights reserved

      © Deirdre Jonklaas Cadiramen

      Jigsaw is a work of fiction. All characters and situations are fictitious or are used fictitiously. The right of Deirdre Jonklaas Cadiramen to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act.

      This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, hired out, copied, extensively quoted or otherwise circulated, in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published, without the express written permission of the author.

      Layout by Jeremy Muller

      Printed and bound in Sri Lanka by Samayawardhana

      To offset the environmental pollution caused by printing books, the Perera Hussein Publishing House grows trees in Puttalam, Sri Lanka’s semi-arid zone.

      Ebook ISBN No.: 978-981-09-1220-8

      Ebook by We Green Solutions Pte Ltd

      Smashwords Edition

      CONTENTS

      The Bride Wore Black

      Attitudes

      A Quirk of Fate

      The True Story of the Heist

      It Began with the Birds

      Friendship, Flowers, and a Funeral

      War Widow

      Black Friday

      Wedding Guest

      It Happened in the Swinging ’60s

      Opportunity Only Knocks Once

      A Friend Indeed

      The Gift

      Signed, Sealed and Delivered

      The Visit

      Glossary

      THE BRIDE WORE BLACK

      Ruth was an only child. Lonely, she overcame solitude, daydreaming of siblings and good times they’d share. Transparent were her white lies, ending unfinished games with children of the neighbourhood in unvarying pretext. She would look at her watch, re-tie her shoelaces, arrange her plaits on either side of her face, shake creases from her skirt, and announce:

      Got to go feed my baby brother, and check my little sister’s homework.

      No amount of urging made her relent. She was adamant she must leave.

      We never see them.

      Who?

      Your brother and your sister. How come?

      Her fake smile accentuated freckles that dotted her cheeks and exposed the gap between two front teeth.

      You will, one day, she vowed, with a confidence destined to betray her.

      At night her dreams invariably became reality in waking moments at unexpected times. On her eighth birthday, her grandmother gave her the walkie-talkie doll Ruth had already dreamed she would. The lost puppy was found sleeping in the pigsty two days after Ruth dreamed it wandered in there. Mother’s long-missed engagement ring was found in her sewing basket after Ruth dreamed it slipped off her finger while sewing.

      As a gawky adolescent her dreams took a different turn, focusing on matters of such consequence that she forced herself to lie awake, until defeated by exhaustion and sleep took over.

      She dreamed of a bride with the face of Aunt Mildred. Over Sunday breakfast next morning she recounted that dream.

      Mother gulped on steaming hot tea, her angular face grotesque as it scalded her tongue. The burning liquid spilt and stained her skirt and the freshly laundered tablecloth. Her cup and saucer shattered on the floor.

      Now look what you’ve done! she moaned.

      Father’s florid face framed by beetling brows appeared over the newspaper he read, his expression droll; for once not annoyed at being disturbed from a ritualistic pastime. A halo of cigarette smoke formed a haze around loose jowls supporting a staircase of chins that shook like jelly as he guffawed. The newspaper dropped onto his protuberant belly when he slapped ham-like hand against ample thigh.

      That old maid? Not a day younger than thirty-nine? Is there a shortage of eligible women around here?

      No further questions? his wife countered sarcastically.

      Much to the chagrin of his wife and mother-in-law and the confusion of his daughter, his laughter took more than a few minutes to subside.

      Grandmother’s stoicism was implacable. The soft contours of her features hardened as her lips compressed into a line so thin that a pencil could have drawn.

      Afraid of the scene she unwittingly orchestrated, Ruth placed her hands in her lap, lacing and unlacing her fingers.

      Within the hour a radiant Aunt Mildred emerged from the wing of the house she occupied with Aunt Cornelia, and broke the news that she would soon get married.

      Ruth’s parents lapsed into shock, incapable of remarks either congratulatory or derogatory.

      Grandmother’s gaze was inscrutable. She got up and hugged Aunt Mildred.

      I’m so happy for you.

      Ruth woke up the following morning with a mild fever.

      Ruth dreamed of another bride. This one had the face of forty-eight year old Aunt Cornelia. Ruth woke up in the middle of the night and drank a glass of water. She fell asleep again and dreamed the same dream, which she narrated to Grandmother next morning.

      The others needn’t know, declared Grandmother, thoughtful and tense.

      In keeping with time-honoured custom, Aunt Mildred, the bride, turned her back and threw her bouquet over her head to eagerly grouped spinsters at her wedding reception. All eyes followed its course; women with bated breath, men with cynicism. Saccharine smiles of spinsters concealed high hopes they nurtured, as they compared themselves to the big-boned horse-faced bride.

      There was a concerted gasp when the bridal bouquet bypassed would-be brides-in-waiting and landed with a thump on Aunt Cornelia’s ample bosom. In reflex action, she raised her hands and grasped it, unaware of the comical spectacle she presented.

      Grandmother noticed Ruth strive to shrink into some obscure corner.

      Ruth dreamed Aunt Cornelia walked out of a gate on a dark night with a bulky suitcase. This dream was followed by another, of a bride dressed in black. The bride was Aunt Cornelia.

      Non-dancers at the church social sat in groups chatting animatedly, Cornelia among them; left foot tapping in time to the catchy rhythm, upper body bouncing, head and shoulders shaking in sync to the beat. She smiled when she spoke, and smiled when she listened.

      The next session will be an ‘Excuse me’ dance, announced the compère. Come on, everybody! With your partner! On the floor! There’s a prize for the one who changes partners most.

      While Cornelia’s group debated whether to remain seated, someone made the decision for her: a man with greying temples and serrated jaw, whose pectoral and triceps muscles strained at his silk shirt as he leant towards her with outstretched hand. She automatically got up and allowed herself to be led to the centre of the dance floor. To escape would have created a scene. She did not want to create a scene. Nor did she want to escape.

      The music’s too good to waste, he smiled down at her.

      She smiled back.

      Name’s Randolph.

      Mine’s Cornelia.

      They exchanged smiles.

      From foxtrot to quickstep, waltz to samba, tango to twist, cha-cha to jive, they danced until the music stopped. That was the start of what friends termed ‘a permanent dancing partnership’. Whatever the event, it began and ended with them dancing together sharing light conversational patter; talking of everything, and yet nothing.

      This pattern persisted until one day Randolph stood still with her on the dance floor, held her hand tight, looked down at her and said:

      Can’t spend the rest of our lives dancing. Let’s get married.

      The date was fixed. The excitement that prevailed over Mildred’s wedding preparations seemed to have telescoped into Cornelia’s arrangements … and D-day dawned.

      Ruth’s father, looking like a scrubbed apple in his new suit, gave away the bride. Mildred wore her ‘going-away’ dress for her role as matron-of-honour. Ruth wore her dreamiest expression as flower girl. Randolph’s friend, Jeremy and his neighbour’s son, Sean were best

      Enjoying the preview?
      Page 1 of 1