‘I was watching TV this morning,’ continued Sylvia obliviously, ‘and it was so inspiring! Neighbours helping neighbours. I had tears in my eyes.’
‘Oh, for God’s sake,’ said Erika.
Oliver put his hand on Erika’s shoulder. ‘The things we cannot change,’ he murmured.
He was quoting the serenity prayer to her. Oliver went to Al-Anon meetings, for families of alcoholics. Erika didn’t want to learn serenity.
‘What’s that, Oliver?’ said Sylvia. ‘How are your lovely parents, by the way? Were they affected by the rain?’ She was as sharp as a tack, that woman. ‘I haven’t seen them in a while. We must all get together and have a drink.’
‘Mum,’ said Erika.
‘We should,’ said Oliver. ‘Although, as you know very well, with my parents it’s more likely to be ten or twenty drinks.’
‘Ah, they’re good fun,’ said Sylvia fondly.
‘Yup,’ said Oliver. ‘They are that. Oh look, here comes our skip bin.’
‘Great. What can I do?’ said Sylvia as the truck pulled into the driveway and slowly lowered the massive bin.
‘Stay out of our way,’ said Erika.
‘Yes, although you’ll need me to make sure you don’t accidentally throw out anything important,’ said Sylvia. ‘Do you know what I found the other day, caught up in a box of old papers? The funniest little photo of you, me and Clementine!’
‘That seems unlikely,’ said Erika.
‘What do you mean it seems unlikely? Wait till you see it! I guarantee you will laugh. Now just imagine if we’d thrown away that precious memory! You and Clementine must have been about twelve, I think. Clementine looks so young and pretty in it. She seemed kind of worn-out the other night to be frank, not aging well. You should take a look at it, Oliver. See what your future daughter might look like!’
Oliver’s face closed down. ‘That’s not happening now.’
‘What? Did she pull out on you? After you saved her child’s life?’
‘We pulled out,’ said Erika. ‘Not her. Us. We changed our mind.’
‘Oh,’ said Sylvia. ‘But why? That’s terrible news. I’m crushed!’ Erika watched in amazement as her mother conveniently forgot everything she’d said on Thursday night and made herself the victim. ‘You let me get my hopes up! I thought I was going to be a grandma. I was looking at those pretty little girls at Pam’s place and thinking how nice it would be to have a grandchild of my own. I was thinking I could teach her how to sew, like my grandmother taught me.’
‘Teach her how to sew?!’ spluttered Erika. ‘You never taught me how to sew!’
‘You probably never asked,’ said Sylvia.
‘I’ve never seen you with a needle and thread in my life.’
‘I’ll just go and pay the driver for the skip,’ said Oliver.
‘I’ll go inside and see if I can find that funny little photo,’ said Sylvia quickly, just in case, God forbid, anyone would expect her to pay for anything.
Erika took the opportunity to snap on some plastic gloves, bend at the knees and pick up a broken laundry basket filled with miscellaneous junk: a headless doll, a sodden beach towel, a pizza box. She carried it to the skip bin and chucked it in, hard, like a grenade. It landed with a bang against the metal. Throwing stuff out always gave her a wild, terrified feeling, as if she were running into battle screaming a war cry.
‘Jeez, you’ve got a job ahead of you,’ said the skip bin guy as he folded up the yellow form Oliver had handed him and stuffed it in his back pocket. He crossed his arms across his barrel chest and studied the front yard with an expression of pure disgust.
‘Want to lend a hand?’ said Oliver.
‘Ha ha! Nah, you’re on your own there, mate. Better you than me!’ He kept standing there, shaking his head, as if he were there to supervise.
‘Well, on your bike then,’ said Erika irritably, and she heard Oliver stifle a laugh as she turned away to pick up the old Christmas tree. A Christmas tree, of all things. She couldn’t remember ever having a Christmas tree growing up, and yet here was an old, mangled one with a single sad strand of gold tinsel.
The driver roared off in his truck, and Erika threw the Christmas tree in the bin while Oliver picked up a broken pedestal fan in one hand and a bag of rubbish in the other.
Her mother came out the front door triumphantly holding a tiny photo between her thumb and finger. A miracle that she’d found something.
‘Look at this photo!’ she said to Erika. ‘I guarantee it will make you laugh.’
‘I guarantee it won’t,’ said Erika sourly.
Her mother leaned over and removed a tiny piece of gold tinsel from Erika’s shirt. ‘Yes, it will. Look.’