Wednesday, 15th August 1945

Melbourne, Victoria

Margaret Mary Ellen Johnson’s mother would have a fit if she knew her daughter had wandered anywhere south of Edinburgh Gardens on her own, let alone out of Fitzroy altogether and into the city. But Maggie didn’t care. There wasn’t time for a single sensible thought anyway. Everyone had lost all sense and no wonder—the city was in chaos. Bourke Street was heaving! She had never seen anything like it in all her nineteen years. There had to be thousands of people! The news was scrawled on placards, on grocer’s boards, cardboard boxes and crates, and even chalked on brick walls and shop windows.

THE WAR IS OVER

Pulling off her suede gloves, Maggie thrust them into her coat pocket, ignoring the fact they would get scrunched, which would require an excuse for their rumpled appearance. Mum insisted on gloves no matter the season because Dad was quite capable of dressing the women in his family as befitted his status. But Maggie had already lost her hat, her handkerchief and a button from her coat as she squeezed through the crowds so what was the point in worrying about any of it? Not today!

VICTORY AT LAST!

People had heard the news just as they began their working day, with every one of them downing tools and hustling onto the streets to check if it was true or if they were dreaming. Dad had come flying home only minutes after he left for work, behaving in the most flustered manner. Mum had been frozen to the spot, breakfast dishes in hand as she asked if he was having a heart attack. That was when he told her to switch on the radio—the Japanese had surrendered! He said Mum was to don her best coat and hat as they were going to call on a few of his clients to show their appreciation that such a joyful day had arrived. Maggie was supposed to have gone with them but she begged off, making up an excuse that she wanted to visit Gran instead and share the day with her. Her parents agreed, busy with their excitement at being able to appear before Dad’s most valued associates and their families with a bona fide reason to do some showing off.

So here Maggie was, in the heart of the city, on her own.

The atmosphere was thick with emotion almost suffocating in its potency. Women and boys were piled onto factory trucks lining the street with more driving in from the city outskirts, all of them cheering and waving. A conga line was snaking its way around a group of women who had slung their handbags over their shoulders or piled them in a pyramid and were dancing the Jitterbug. People blew whistles and there was paper fluttering down from office windows until the sheets littered the pavement in a shifting sea of white. On the street, people ripped up telephone books and newspapers and threw the scraps in the air, letting them fall in cloudbursts of confetti.

‘Best day of our flaming lives!’ the woman next to Maggie said, her broad smile trembling.

Then an elderly man caught Maggie’s hand in both of his and clung on tight. ‘It’s fabulous, love, that’s what it is! Bloody fabulous! Good luck to you. Good luck to us all.’

This was what Maggie wanted. More! More living for today and not worrying about what she should or shouldn’t do tomorrow. She wanted more independence too. She deserved it after everything she’d succumbed to, because this was fabulous and not at all what she expected when she’d snuck out of the house an hour ago.

She moved on, trying not to elbow anyone in the ribs as she pushed her way through. They were all one this winter Wednesday morning, if never again, and Maggie was here to witness it. People cried tears of joy, kissing and hugging whether they knew each other or not. The poor and the well-off were friends and neighbours no matter their colour, no matter their background, no matter their status. Every person knew what the others had lived through, with the deprivations during the war, and nobody cared who they were talking to or who they were smiling at.

A man in front of her threw his walking cane into the air and tap danced around it when it fell to the ground. A woman joined him, then another, and another, kicking up their heels, the hems of their dresses and coats flapping around their knees. A man with his arm in a sling had parked his Ford utility in the middle of the street and was selling beer from the crates beneath an oilcloth on the back. The bunch of women around him started singing ‘It’s a Long Way to Tipperary’ and one of them scrambled up onto the truck and kissed him. She probably didn’t even know him but she kissed the man on the mouth.

Maggie made her way forwards again, accepting handshakes and hugs as she went. Then she paused, flushed with more than the squeeze of the crowd. It was going to be strange referring to the war in the past tense but one day soon, Peter would be home. Her darling brother.

She straightened her shoulders at the thought of how brave Peter had been. All through the war she’d tried to echo her brother’s bravery here on the home front and would continue so until he came home. She wasn’t going to give the slightest consideration to the reprimand she would receive if her parents discovered her whereabouts, even though her mother had expressly enforced the rule that Margaret was to go straight to Gran’s and return directly home…