Six

      But before I reached Amethyst there was the Garnet turnoff. And this took me back to where it all started. Back to McDonald’s. How appropriate. McDonald’s, that temple which was the meeting point of modern consumerism, efficiency and cleanliness. Those cold disinfected surfaces, those quickly dispensed drinks, those tightly wrapped parcels of burgers and cardboard-clad chips (for Australians still, after thirty years’ indoctrination, called them chips, not ‘fries’). All that order and control, all those precisely measured, weighed and timed burgers, buns, nuggets, fillets. All those smug rows of junior burgers, Big Macs and apple pies, slipping hygienically down their stainless steel chutes. All those obligingly happy Happy Meals.

      The McDonald’s in Garnet had changed. The playground had been rebuilt, and was bigger, brighter. There was now a drive-through facility. The palms were taller but still didn’t obscure the all-important signs. After I parked I thought about going in, but then I might have had to eat something, and even for Sonny’s sake I couldn’t do that. It was enough just to sit in the car, thinking.

      When I was last here, Sonny was eight. I thought he would have grown out of the place. But eight was a deceptive age, especially for a boy who also happened to be tall. Eight was past little-kid stage. Eight was when you attained a certain level of coolness, when style began to assert itself. You were no longer in the infants’ department at school, you did Real Sport (in Sonny’s case, soccer), and you were allowed the heady freedom of using a pen instead of a pencil in class.

      Eight was the beginning of the end of things like favourite cuddly toys at night, ritual comfort foods like hot chocolate before bed, special plastic cartoon cups, flotation aids in the swimming pool (becoming contemptible) or vests (despicable, even in the middle of winter, none of your friends wore them…). But eight was also, still, a McDonald’s Happy Meal.

      There was no McDonald’s in Amethyst. For some reason the town had banned all chain stores, franchises and commercial fast food outlets. But there was television. And therefore advertisements. And a neighbouring town twenty minutes away by bus, less if we got a lift with someone. I was a young single mother, equal parts guilt and indulgence, prepared to stand on my principles for only so long. So there we were, sitting over our Happy Meal. And Sonny was happy – I admit it – happy fiddling with the purple and green toy monster. Happy chewing his cardboard chips. Happy alternately sucking then blowing into his Coke, with furtive glances at me.

      It was possible that within three or four years he’d come either to hate the food or be bored by it. By the age of twelve he’d probably be into something cool and trendy, like only eating at places offering noisy electronic games, places with names like Radical Zone or the Shooting Arrow. Or he’d simply be able to go out on his own, or with friends. That is, without me. Without his mother. And at twelve, he could be left safely at home for hours at a time. Then I could consider Going Out. Like a date, a real date, as opposed to spending the odd evening after work at Mitchell’s bar, listening to the drifters and dreamers sucking up the oxygen while I parried their vague boozy requests for sex.

      Sonny looked up at me, cutting into my thoughts. He dropped the goofy toy, frowned, and asked me what was wrong.

      Nothing, I said. Why?

      You look sad.

      Sad?

      Or angry. This last was in a plaintive sort of tone. Maybe I was still angry, maybe just a bit resentful, after what had happened earlier.

      My heart twisted. Vital to bury your frustration, to put it behind you, to live in the moment, which is what children generally did. I told him I wasn’t angry, or sad, patted his free hand, the one that wasn’t now fiddling with the toy again, then took it in mine. A bold move. Eight was also when holding hands with your mother in a public place became pretty well verboten.

      Then it was my turn to pay attention. He looked pale. Was I just imagining a touch of grey under his eyes? Then I noticed he hadn’t eaten his burger, apart from one bite, and was only halfway through the chips.

      Hey, I said, are you feeling okay?

      He shrugged. That could mean anything in eight-year-old code. Really good or exceptionally bad. I already knew that kids weren’t always aware of feeling sick, somehow just didn’t have the words to articulate what, exactly, was wrong. Could be nearly comatose with something or other but drive their mothers up the wall with unrelieved whingeing or, even more bizarrely, excessive hyperactivity.

      Do you feel sick?

      No.

      Open your mouth and stick out your tongue.

      He snatched his hand back. No way!

      Go on, open your mouth, I’ll see if your tonsils are up.

      He folded his arms and sat back, glancing around as if every single member of his class was waiting to leap from the corners and tease him. Being sick was not cool. Being seen to be sick, less cool. Being seen to submit to a mother’s ministrations, downright fiery.

      I asked what was wrong then. That shrug again. I asked if he wasn’t hungry after all. He shook his head, pushed the food aside, looked at me, then away, then said,

      Are you sure Archie isn’t my dad? Can’t he be?

      Oh, that. That little big question. Guilt. Dismay. Bitterness. Helplessness. And the thousand other negative emotions the single mother was so familiar with, the reason she gave in and took her kid to McDonald’s, though it went against every principle she had.

      I risked a prod at his burger. It didn’t respond. Typical. It sulked dumpily on the tray, not a bit happy. The bright orange cheese that dribbled out one side had already set into a hard blob. Just out of spite, since I was wound up and guilty over Sonny’s undeniable lack of a father, I decided to mutilate it.

      He got into the spirit of the act. Children are great like that, adaptable, prone to quick changes in mood. Together we poured scorn on the thing, prising apart the dry yoyo halves of the bun, extracting the lone slice of pickled cucumber to deride it in the time-honoured tradition of every single Australian child – perhaps every child on the planet – and sniffing with exaggerated suspicion at the remaining contents, which by now bore less resemblance to a real burger than the gimmicky magnet I used to attach his latest drawings