The shopping centre's fluorescent lighting seemed to exacerbate the girl's crying. Maria was drawn to the girl. A shop assistant was holding the girl's hand trying to calm her. Maria watched the woman bend down to be at the child's eyeline. The girl pointed away from the shop, presumably to where she last saw her mother. The shop assistant stood up and looked around to see if anyone was looking for her.
Maria assumed the girl was the same age she was when she had come to Australia, migrating from Poland after World War 2. Her father had died of tuberculosis in a refugee camp in Italy. Then sometime later, her mother had re-married Visali, a Lithuanian man. He was not cruel or mean, but Maria thought that often she was an afterthought when Visali and her mother were together. Visali said Maria talked too much and asked too many questions. Like many displaced persons, Maria and her family arrived in Australia on the Fairsea arriving at Newcastle. She had few memories of the voyage, but could remember the vile smell of strong disinfectant everywhere.
The shop assistant had now taken the girl to the counter and was on the phone. The girl's face was puffy from crying, and she held on tightly to the tissue that the sales assistant had given her to wipe her eyes. The shopping centre was busy with people on their lunch breaks, others shopping for groceries. Maria waited and watched. The shop assistant put down the phone and wrote something on a notepad.
After arriving in Newcastle, Maria and her family boarded a train for the Greta Migrant Camp, Silver City. The August rain was teeming down as they reached the camp. Their room at Silver City was lined with thin masonite. Maria was suddenly flushed recalling how stifling it was in that room. She made friends with the other children at school, learning her times tables from the nuns. She loved standing by Silver City's mess hall, where the smell of borscht and pierogi came drifting by.
Maria remembered a time her class visited a local farm and watched the farmer deliver feed from the back of his truck. The scent of the hay reminded her of her village in Poland.
Like most men who were at Silver City, Visali worked away, but Maria was never sure where. He only ever said that it far away, but when he'd return once a month, his face had become harder. He'd come home tired, with his alabaster skin leathered by the sun.
Usually when Maria started asking questions, he'd answer there was nothing but dirt and told her to go outside and play with the other girls.
It was as if the broken cities and smell of war from Europe had followed them to their new home.
The girl had now settled onto a stool and seemed to be enjoying the attention that the shop assistant was giving her as she sipped from a plastic cup. The thought of her mother never coming back was not an option in the girl's mind. She looked at the shop assistant's face, which was calm and safe. The make-up on her face added softly to her features.
As Maria looked on, she felt a pain from a memory tattooed to her insides. She remembered walking with Visali and her mother through Silver City's dusty streets. They passed some friends, and remembered Visali and her mother nodding towards them, but not stopping to talk. The three of them stopped at the junction of two streets and waited. The mess hall down one way and the school down the other.
Visali left and Maria's mother bent down to be at her child's eyeline, touched the side of her face and cupped her cheeks and chin. Maria's mother looked deep into her child's eyes. From behind, Visali called out, "Come quickly. Hurry". The mother looked at her daughter one last time and whispered in Polish 'moje serce nigdy nie przestanie ama' (my heart will never stop breaking).
Maria's mother turned and left, leaving Maria at the corner.
Maria watched as they walked away, with her mother and Visali getting swallowed in a throng of people. Recounting the event, Maria wished she would have called out if she could fathom that this was the last time that she would ever see her mother. Instead, as if steeling herself for what was to come, Maria put her hands into her cardigan pockets and narrowed her eyes. Her mother never stopped to look back.
Maria's attention was brought back to the bustle of the shopping centre.
A lady came in frantically to the shop looking for her daughter. Her face dropped with relief when she saw the girl. The girl's mother looked as though she would scold her daughter, but her face calmed when the girl flung herself into her mother's arms, acting as if she'd been gone for a lifetime. Maria had nothing but envy for the situation that was playing out in front of her.
Abruptly, Maria could feel a tugging at her dress. She looked down and smiled, her granddaughter at her side. Maria felt the blood and warmth rush back to her face. Her attention now aimed solely to where she was.
"Bubcha, look what I bought with the money you gave me."
Her granddaughter showed her a sparkly pencil case and note pad.
Maria smiled and in a thick accent said, "What a nice thing you have there."
Maria's daughter arrived and apologised for taking so long. Maria shrugged her shoulders. Remembering, she turned to find the lost girl and her mother. They were gone together, to keep moving through each other's lives.
Maria's daughter asked, "Want to go for a coffee?"
"Of course."
Maria turned to follow closely behind, gripping her granddaughter's hand more tightly than she had before.
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