Just as she was inadequate, completely inadequate as a mother.
Chapter 5
Sydney seemed to have many faces, Erin thought as she walked along George Street. The city centre itself was sophisticated, urbane and very corporate, totally at odds with the character-filled inner suburbs like Balmain and the relaxed, leafy beachside suburbs she’d explored with Mel at the weekend. The streets hummed industriously with cars, taxis, vans, and couriers weaving on their pushbikes. People strode past, busy on their smartphones. The sun was out in full force, and the buildings, streets and commuters were glossy and clean-cut against the azure sky.
Erin stepped out of the sun and bustle into the dim, still interior of the Medicare office. She had applied for her tax file number online, but there was a different process for Medicare. She – along with her passport and a copy of her visa – was required to attend one of the offices, and so here she was. A computerised ticket machine stood directly inside the door of the office. She pressed the appropriate selection, took her ticket and went to sit on one of the few remaining seats.
After a few minutes, she realised that she was in for a substantial wait. There were six clerks, fifty or so customers, and the transactions at the counter did not appear to be particularly fast. She looked around, studying the other people who were waiting on this Thursday morning. It was an eclectic mix: backpackers, mothers with babies, old people with walking aids, a melting pot of nationalities across all the ages. The couple next to her was speaking to each other in Mandarin, or perhaps some other Chinese dialect. Across the way, a mother of Middle Eastern appearance scolded her young child in a foreign tongue. Two young men – South American? – chose to stand rather than sit, their tight clothing and gold jewellery making a clear, proud statement of their sexuality. Earlier on, as Erin had walked through the streets amongst the people of the city, she had noticed for the first time how multicultural Sydney was. Here in this Medicare office, where everyone was still, rather than in transit, their differences were even more evident.
A mild disturbance at the ticket machine brought Erin out of her reverie. A couple in their sixties with matching grey-peppered hair, dark clothes and swarthy skin stood at the machine, debating with each other in a foreign language. The woman waved her hands with growing agitation, the man shrugged and repeatedly shook his head. Erin assumed they were having a difference of opinion, maybe over what option on the machine suited them best. But the disagreement endured, new arrivals lining up behind the couple and, when it became obvious that they were stagnant, overtaking them in the queue. The woman’s face shimmered with sweat. She was clearly beginning to panic, and Erin finally realised that neither of them could understand the instructions on the machine. Everyone in the waiting room was staring, adding to their humiliation.
Erin rose from her seat and approached the couple.
‘You need some help?’ she enquired with a friendly smile, pointing at the machine. The woman nodded frantically, looking close to tears. As she didn’t have the language skills to determine the exact nature of the woman’s transaction, Erin took the liberty of selecting a general option, hoping that the clerk would be able to deal with whatever query it was at the counter. But when she handed the ticket to the woman with another smile, the woman glanced at it, and then at the big digital screen behind the counter, and raised her hands helplessly. Quite evidently, she didn’t even have the literacy skills to marry the four digits on her ticket to the screen.
‘I’ll stay.’ Erin pointed to herself, and then to the service-calling screen. ‘I’ll stay until it’s your turn. I’ll tell you.’
The woman waved from Erin to the screen, and Erin nodded and said yes until she secured a shaky, grateful smile. She stood with the couple, smiling intermittently, until her own number was called. Then she waited another fifteen minutes until the couple’s ticket came up, and escorted them both to the nominated booth. Before she left, the woman grasped her wrist and thanked her with a torrent of words Erin could not understand but which seemed profoundly sincere.
Erin left the Medicare office with her temporary Medicare card and the rest of the day to spend exploring the city. She was now another step closer to joining the workforce and becoming a true resident of Sydney. She bought herself a coffee and sipped it leisurely as she strolled towards Circular Quay. Along the way, she glanced at every face that passed her by, noticing and revelling in the different shades of skin and hair and eyes. She listened for accents and snatches of different languages and the sounds of other cultures. She wanted to work here, in the city, in the midst of its wonderful, on-tap diversity, and not in some suburban school where ninety per cent of the population spoke and looked the same. This thought and its sheer definiteness took her by surprise.
As did the fact that by the time she fell into bed that night, after a long, tiring yet extremely enjoyable day of sightseeing, the woman’s face and her panicked, helpless eyes were still on her mind, as though they somehow held the answer to her dilemma.
* * * * *
Laura used her own set of keys to unlock the varnished front door of Moira’s house.
‘Hello,’ she called, alerting the older woman to their arrival.
‘Hellooooo,’ Olivia echoed in her small, sweet voice.
‘I’m in the kitchen,’ they heard Moira reply in the distance.
Laura shut the door behind them, and hung their coats and scarves on the post at the end of the stairs before leading the way down the narrow hallway to the kitchen.
‘Something smells nice,’ she smiled.
Moira, stooped over the frying pan, nudged some pieces of bacon with the spatula before looking up. ‘Just making a spot of breakfast,’ she said brightly. ‘For some reason, I fancied a cooked one. I’m sick to my back teeth of cereal.’
‘But it’s dinnertime, Auntie Moira,’ Olivia exclaimed. ‘Breakfast was hours and hours ago.’
Moira looked confounded by this. ‘Dinnertime? Really?’
Olivia nodded solemnly. ‘Yes. When we were in the car, Mummy said it was five o’clock. You did, didn’t you, Mummy?’
Laura shrugged as though the time was irrelevant. ‘Yes, but it doesn’t really matter because bacon and eggs makes a nice dinner as well as breakfast.’
Moira looked confused and quite embarrassed by her mistake. ‘I must have had a nap, and assumed it was morning when I woke up. Yes, I think that’s what happened. What an eejit I am!’
‘Eejit isn’t a nice word,’ Olivia contributed in a holier-than-thou tone. ‘Idiot isn’t nice either. Mum says silly is okay to use.’
Moira regarded her gravely. ‘You’re right, child. I’m silly, very silly indeed. Tell me, have you had your dinner?’
‘No. And I’m starving.’
‘Maybe you and your mother can have some bacon and eggs with me. Then I won’t feel so silly.’
‘Can we, Mum?’ Olivia asked excitedly, her imagination captured by the notion of eating breakfast at dinnertime.
Laura couldn’t think of any reason why they couldn’t. In the car on the way over, she’d been racking her brains on what to have for dinner. Esteban was away, so they didn’t have him to consider. As for Kasia, so far she tended to take or leave mealtimes with the family.
‘Thanks, Moira, it’s very kind of you. Let me help with the cooking. Olivia, maybe you can set the table, love.’
The breakfast-cum-dinner was delicious: crispy bacon, runny eggs and French toast, laden with fat and calories, but for once Laura didn’t care. The food settled comfortingly in her stomach, and the stream of conversation between Moira and Olivia was nourishing in its own way, too. They seemed to share an honesty and earnestness that transcended the age gap.
‘And you’ve no brothers or sisters?’ Moira asked Olivia conversationally.
‘No,’ Olivia