Australia Street

Chance had nothing to do with the fact that life for the Gordon family took a sudden turn for the worse on Hannah Gordon's thirty-sixth birthday. Her daughter Allie's birthday was on the same day, February 13, and this year it fell on a Friday, the first of only two Friday the thirteenths in the whole of 1948. Added to all that, it was the day of a full moon, and if the moon could push and pull at huge oceans and cause tides to change, it stood to reason it would affect air in much the same way. No one could feel this pushing and pulling, but it had to influence people's moods. More fights and arguments happened during a full moon. That was common knowledge. More murders took place; more people went missing or mad. Hannah didn't need Grandma Ade's warning, 'Bad luck's coming, I can feel it in me water,' for her to realise the odds were against them.

Hannah was determined not to give herself time to start making guesses on what might happen. She drove a taxi all week, but Fridays and Saturdays were her days off, so she had mapped out this day hour by hour with chores like window cleaning, floor polishing and whittling down the pile of mending stacked on the Singer treadle. Added to all that, Grandma Ade had a few jobs lined up that would take most of the afternoon. Not that this was the kind of birthday Hannah would have chosen if she had any say in it. A salon visit would be the preferred option. A professional cut to bring out the curl in her long dark hair, and a beauti­cian to shape her too-thick eyebrows and massage away the crow's-feet that were just beginning to appear. Even a pot of good commercial face cream to replace the rose water, lemon juice and rain water she blended herself. But those things cost money she didn't have, and wasn't likely to get in the near future. At least the bonus of a housework-free weekend would sweeten the sour.

Reviewing the list for the third time that morning, she wondered if she'd been too ambitious. 'There's not enough hours for all of this,' she told Tom while picking up his yesterday clothes off their bedroom fl oor.

He grunted something the pillow over his head made unintelligible, but it would have contained more than a few oaths. Hannah was head­ing for the laundry when he tossed the pillow after her and repeated the oaths loud enough for everyone to hear.

'A hangover is self-inflicted punishment so you get no sympathy for it,' she shouted in an effort to drown out his curses.

Time was a whip cracking at her heels, urging her through the house­cleaning ritual at full speed: quick flicks with the feather duster over the furniture, half-circle sweeps across the wood-panelled walls, and brooming through each room without bothering about hard-to-reach places. Every one minute and ten seconds she'd race into the kitchen and take out the toast, then thrust two more slices of bread into the toaster. All this while a mixture of oats, water, honey, butter and a dash of salt simmered on the wood stove. She knew that in another three minutes, the porridge would start catching on the bottom.

'Janet, you'll be late for work,' she called, wiping down the linoleum-covered tabletop with lunging sweeps of the dishcloth. 'And, Allie, you said you'd be responsible for getting Hal off to school this year.'

'Don't know why you have to get us all up at sparrow-fart because you can't sleep,' Tom griped as he stumbled past, bleary-eyed, on his way to the bathroom.

He hadn't buttoned his pyjama top, and a stream of light through the kitchen window highlighted the pallor of his skin. It also showed a stomach beginning to pot and a slackening of his muscles. Yet even with his fair hair sticking up in greasy clumps, courtesy of yesterday's Californian Poppy hair oil, and the morning glare diluting the deep blue­ness of his eyes, he would turn most women's heads. But Hannah pre­ferred the tanned, wiry body and angular good looks he'd brought home from Darwin when his role in the war ended. She thought he was still handsome, but the rest had gone: the tan, the wiriness, eighteen years of marriage. Like the passion, the loving glances, the long foreplay. Now it was the beer-smelling wham-bam like last night. She hated nights like last night.

'There's no reason for you to get up,' she said, 'But the rest of us have things to do. I promised Grandma I'd help with an inventory of the herbs, seeing as she won't be open for business today, and I have to make up some cod-liver oil emulsion before herb day on Sunday.'

'Ten ounces of cod-liver oil, six ounces of glycerine, a little tin of condensed milk, and one and a half gallons of lime water,' Hal chanted as he entered the kitchen. 'And Allie won't have to be responsible for me. See?' He indicated his grey shorts and shirt, the long socks held up by elastic bands, and the well-polished if rather shabby shoes. 'I can get ready by meself. I'm nine now, remember.'

'Of course you are, love. It's just that you usually need a bit of prodding to get you out of bed and moving along. And you get an excellent for the emulsion recipe,' Hannah told her foster son, and leaned down to receive a good-morning kiss on the cheek when he stood on tiptoe and lifted his face. She kissed his forehead as she straightened, but her action was a little too quick, trying to gloss over an initial hesitancy. She didn't want to hurt his feelings, but she was still trying to get accustomed to these demonstrations of affection – something Hal had started after spending a few days with Cousin Maria and her tribe of kids.

Hannah considered herself to be affectionate, but she showed it with a smile, her eyes, words. She wasn't, never had been, a kissy­huggy kind of person. That, she believed, was through no fault of her own. Growing up, she'd had no role model as far as that sort of thing was concerned. Her parents had rarely done either; her grandmother never. 'It's the English coming out in us,' Grandma Ade once said, and Hannah could see the truth of that. The only demonstrative member of her extended family was Cousin Maria, whose mother's ancestry was Italian. Maria and her greeting and farewell hugs tended to make Hannah feel awkward. Though thanks to Hal, she was learning to over­come this inherited reserve.

Tom had paused at the door to watch the exchange. His expres­sion altered from annoyed to what seemed to be wistful, and Hannah wondered if he wished she'd greet him like that of a morning.

As if that would happen, she thought. Though maybe if he stayed out of the pub for a week I might think about it.

'Seeing as ya got a day off, I reckoned we could do something for yer birthday,' he said when she raised an eyebrow at him. 'You know, just the two of us like we used to. The zoo maybe, or a picnic. I'll even do the museum if yer twist me arm.'

His offer caught her unawares, and he looked so vulnerable standing there with both hands bunching the front opening of his pyjama pants together, that her tongue caught behind her teeth, holding back a quick-smart answer about having no money for those things. Mainly because of his unwillingness to find another job. He'd walked out on the last one four weeks ago. But what would be the use of bringing that up now?

'I promised Grandma,' she said instead.

'I can make the emulsion,' Hal offered as he slid onto a chair at his usual spot closest to the wood stove. Nobody else wanted to sit at that end of the table. Not in summer anyway.

I'll get an electric stove one of these days, Hannah promised herself, smiling at Hal's pleased as Punch look when Tom crossed to his side and said, 'Good on ya, mate,' as he ruffled the boy's hair.

Hal looked up, matching his grin, and Hannah paused in the middle of setting the table, struck by a sudden realisation that the older Hal grew, the more he resembled Tom. Hal had lived with them since the age of two and she'd almost forgotten that she and Tom weren't his birth parents. She knew his mother but not the identity of his father, and most of the time she couldn't care less. But at times like this she couldn't help wondering if it was someone from Tom's extended family. If he hadn't been away in the army around the time of Hal's conception, she might have started asking questions.

'What?' Tom challenged as she continued to stare.

'Nothing.' Placing the rest of the plates and cutlery on the table, she slopped a large spoonful of porridge into a bowl and handed it to Hal. 'The emulsion ingredients have to be blended in the double boiler. You're too young to be handling things on the stove, Hal love.' Too short, she almost said. Not that Hal seemed worried by his lack of height. Which was just as well. He'd read her thought.

'I can stand on a chair,' he told her.

'Let the kid 'ave a go,' Tom said.

'Oh, Dad, do you mind? Go and put some clothes on,' Janet ordered before Hannah had time to answer. One hand covered their eldest daughter's eyes as she staggered in from her bedroom, pretending to be blinded by his bare chest.

Hannah shook her head, feigning disgust, but couldn't hold back a snort of laughter when he flicked the opening wider.

'Garn, yer won't see a body like this too often,' he said, dropping the shirt back onto his upper arms. Adopting a female model's pose, he winked at her over his shoulder.

'Idiot,' Janet said, and burst out laughing when he jutted a hip and fluttered his eyelashes. 'Yer dad's mad,' she told Hal, bending to plant a kiss on the top of his head before adding, 'Good day to you, gorgeous one.'

'Gorgeous back to you,' Hal answered, grinning when Janet kissed him again as a thank you. This was their usual morning greeting to each other, and had been since Hal declared that apart from their age difference, they could be twins. True, they both had blue eyes and freckles, and the same ginger-blond hair – though Janet mostly wore hers in a pinned-up plait while Hal's was short back and sides when it didn't needed cutting, as it did now. The main difference was in physique, Hal being thin as well as short while Janet liked to call herself well-built.

Curvaceous is what she is, Hannah thought, looking her up and down.

'Why are you staring at me like that?' Janet asked.

'That uniform has seen better days. Where's the other one?'

'In the wash.' Janet grimaced a refusal when her mother held out a bowl of porridge. 'It's a factory uniform, isn't it? They're all BBB.' She winked at Hal. 'Blue, button-through and bloody awful,' she added before he could ask. 'Anyway, you should talk.'

'It's a housecoat. I don't wear it outside the house,' Hannah protested.

'Looks as if ya dug it outter the rag bag. It's gotter be ten years old.'

'Don't be silly,' Hannah said, not wanting to admit that the fl oral cotton housecoat was closer to fi fteen.

I suppose I have been getting a bit lazy about the way I look, she thought, but it still fits, so that means I'm not putting on weight like Tom.

'And I always dress nicely and wear make-up at work,' she added, reassuring herself more than Janet.

'I work in a factory full of women. Nobody looks twice at me,' Janet told her. 'And if they did, they wouldn't be able to tell me apart from everybody else.'

'I'd hate that,' Hannah admitted. Frowning at Tom, who had slumped in the chair next to Hal and grabbed the bowl refused by Janet, she pushed the billy can of milk aside. 'No, Tom, not until you're properly dressed.'

'Who made you the dress police?' Tom asked. 'And talking about getting dressed, when are ya gunna get Hal his long pants?'

Hal sat up straight, looking hopeful.

'Soon as I get a few shillings to spare,' Hannah promised. 'Be a love and wake Allie for me, will you, Jan?'

'I already did, and her majesty reckons she's got a right to lie in, today being what it is.'

Hannah heard the note of sourness but didn't comment. Except for their ages, the girls were as far apart as sisters could be, and seemingly growing further apart every day. Allie resented the fact that Janet usually got the new clothes while she had to wear the hand-me-downs. Janet hated the idea of Allie still being at school while she'd been working since she turned fourteen. Yet there was a lot more to it than that. Very different natures for a start. And Allie insisted that her sister came first in more ways than birth. Janet hadn't forgiven Allie for being born.

Janet had been born during a baby-free couple of years as far as the local kin were concerned. Until the age of two, she'd had the extended family to herself. They gave her presents almost weekly: home-made dolls, knitted bears, sugar treats, stories invented especially for her. She was their all until Allie stuck her bib in. Though even at that early age, Janet must have guessed something was about to change. She should have known by the way people exclaimed over that stomach growing bigger every week, the bulging thing emptying out in the middle of the night and growing into Allie of the lustrous dark hair, brown eyes and pale olive skin, so lovely that she made her cute big sister a plain Jane by comparison. Still did for that matter, though looking at Janet here and now, she was more than average pretty despite the multi-freckles.

And, Hannah thought, it's vain of me to think Allie's lovely when people say she looks just like me, though she's more lanky than I've ever been. Sometimes I wonder if she's ever going to fi ll out.

'Mum, while you're daydreaming the toast is burning. And I'm already up, thanks to all the noise,' Allie said from behind her.

' 'Bout time too,' Janet said, one hand switching off the toaster, the other grabbing the slice of toast Hal had just smeared with Vegemite. 'Thanks, lovie. I'm off.'

A peck on his cheek, a touch on Hannah's shoulder on the way past and, giving a quick wave to her father, she vanished through the back door.

'And so long to you too,'Allie called after her. 'Hullo, Hal sweetie.' She dropped a kiss on the top of his head. 'Morning, Mum. Dad, shouldn't you get dressed before coming in for breakfast?'

'We can't all be chirping with the birds and looking spick-and-span like you,' he retaliated, but patted her cheek when she wrapped her arms around his neck from behind. 'Hullo, me darling. Yer look and smell beaut as usual.'

When Allie grinned and said 'I know,' Hannah cut in with, 'A little modesty is always nice,' though she knew it to be true. The smell was courtesy of a birthday gift from Grandma Ade, a tiny vial of rose oil, and Allie shined her shoes and ironed her uniform and blouse every night. Her socks folded just so, a snowy handkerchief tucked into her belt, and her long hair tied back in a neat ponytail completed the picture of a girl, a sixteen-year-old young woman now, who took pride in her appearance.

'Sorry, Mum,' Allie said, then, 'You haven't forgotten you know what, have you?' she asked her dad.

'I haven't forgot. Now sit yerself down and get a feed. Yer need to fill out like yer sister. Not that yer aren't a knockout looker anyways,' he added when she placed a light slap on his shoulder.

'Mum, do you want me to help Grandma?' Hal asked hopefully. 'I can check what herbs have to be ordered and I can write the list.'

Hannah considered his offer while tossing aside the burnt toast and slotting in another two pieces of bread. 'You can't miss another day, Hal,' she finally said. 'You took too much time off last year and I promised your teacher that would change. I know you don't much care for school, but you have to go.'

'So do I,' Allie said. 'Right now. I'm supposed to meet Roma and the others in ten minutes. Her dad is going to shout us a milkshake at his cafe for breakfast.'

'At least have something to eat. And a very happy —' Hannah began.

'A milkshake will be enough and Mr Tomasi will have them ready by now and the others will be waiting,' Allie told her, and was through the door before Hannah could argue.

' — birthday to you,' Hannah finished.

'Janet says we're not to say anything about birthdays until this afternoon. We'll all be together then and nobody in a hurry,' Hal said.

Allie's head reappeared around the door. 'Same to you, Mum. And a taxi's just pulled up out front. Your boss is driving,' she said before disappearing again.

'Darn, I bet he wants me to work.' Hannah pulled a face. 'Someone must be off sick. Guess it can't be helped.'

'Well, that puts an end to a day out with me, don't it?'

Not waiting for an answer, Tom shoved his chair back and shuf­fled into the bathroom, slamming the door behind him. Hannah stared after him for a few seconds, then glanced at the Hal-made calendar. Beneath a collage of fl ower pictures he'd thumb-tacked onto the wall, the oblong of brown paper – ruled in twenty-nine squares for the days of February – showed a thick red line circling the number thirteen.

'It's started already,' she muttered, placing a finger on a white-coloured circle just above the line. 'Full moon, and Grandma's right. It's going to be a mongrel of a day.'

As it turned out, the day wasn't too bad after all. Not until early evening after Hannah had been driving a taxi for six hours while Tom spent his afternoon at the pub.

Not even Grandma Ade could have predicted what happened then.