Daisy Sunshine Chapter 1
by Susanne Gervay
Making Tracks Collection
National Museum of Australia Press
Chapter 1
Mother Goose Escapes
'There's a nice book for you. 'Baking cakes: Helping Your Mother.' The lady in the mobile lending library hands me the book. I groan.
Every Saturday Mum drops me at the mobile lending library while she goes shopping. I love the library but I don't love the library lady. I stare at her with her hair pulled into a tight bun. 'Brush your hair out of your eyes,' she sniffs at me. My hair is brown, fairy-floss fluff and I like it like that.
I ignore her and fiddle with my glasses. I hate my glasses. They're black square ugly boxes on my nose. I want glasses with bits of pink in them. When Mum bought these for me, I couldn't say anything. Glasses cost a lot of money and these were the cheapest pair at the optometrist. Mum was so excited that I could see.
The library lady nods at Mum. 'I'll keep an eye on her.' She rolls her left eye and I grit my teeth. I think it's a glass eye. It rotates tracking me between the shelves. She's always calling out – 'Not that book. It's too old for you. Not that book. They're not for girls.'
When Mum comes back with her shopping, I slip her the Hippies book. She hides a smile and borrows it on her library card.
I have a secret. My most favourite book is Mother Goose Nursery Rhymes. Mum bought it for my fourth birthday. I'm eleven now and I know that I'm too old for it. Mum used to read Mother Goose rhymes to me every night when I was little. I love the pictures of pudgy cats dressed in lace and children dancing with ribbons flittering in a spin. I used to laugh and laugh when Mum read:-
'Georgie Porgie, pudding and pie,
Kissed the girls and made them cry;
When the boys came out to play
George Porgie ran away.'
Then one day I stopped laughing about Georgie Porgie. 'Please Mummy. Don't read it anymore.' She stroked my cheek and never read Georgie Porgie again. I didn't either.
My father's name is George. I don't like him when he swaggers home from the Royal Pub. He smells of beer and he never has any money left. I hate him rampaging around the house. I hide under the table like the tiny mouse with wispy whiskers in Mother Goose.
'You haven't paid the rent,' my mother would whisper.
He'd yell, slurring his words as he headed for the bedroom. 'What do you do with all your money?' My throat would clamp into a lump.
Dad always slumped onto the bed after his scenes. Mum and I'd stay in the kitchen until he was snoring.
Mum doesn't earn much money. She wanted to be a book-keeper because she likes numbers. Her parents wouldn't let her. 'Girls didn't stay at school then,' Mum always tells me. She just accepted that. 'Girls married and looked after the family. Mum started at the clothing factory when she was fifteen.
The factory closes from Christmas to the middle of January. Mum only gets paid the hours she works. Dad's different. He gets paid even when he doesn't go into work, when he's supposedly sick after a late night at the Royal Pub. He gets paid even when he takes holidays. Fathers get paid much more than mothers. I don't understand, but Mum says that's the way it is. I've tried to argue with Mum, but she just waves her hands in front of her face until I stop.
Mum saves money from her pay packet for groceries. I feel guilty when she gives me pocket money, but she says that it makes her happy. One day I go to the shops with my pocket money. I notice a strip of watermelon pink chiffon tucked at the back of a shop window. My heart jumps. It's only a remnant. Not too expensive. I race home to show Mum. She loves it as much as I do. Mum twirls the chiffon into a ribbon merry-go-round. I don't feel guilty then.
Dad's late home. Mum and I have dinner together. It's fun when it's just us. Afterwards Mum helps me sew the chiffon into a scarf. The pink shimmers in the evening light. I swish it around my shoulders.
The sudden stomping on the front steps, makes me jump. Dad's back from the Royal Pub. As the door is shoved open, his red and angry face screams into the kitchen. He hits his fists on the cupboards and my scarf slips off my shoulders. Dad charges into the kitchen knocking my Mother Goose book onto the ground. My heart is beating so hard I can't move. Mum's hand softly pushes me until one foot unglues, then the other. I scurry under the table.
Dad shouts, 'I've lost my job.'
He runs away that night. Mum crawls under the table and holds me for a long time. Then she opens my Mother Goose book and reads to me.
'What are little girls made of?
What are little girls made of?
Sugar and spice
And all things nice,
That's what little girls are made of.'