Page 73 of The Trip of a Lifetime

The room was basic but clean and we sat on our beds dipping the bread in the hot broth. We didn’t say anything for the longest time and it was only when we were both underneath the covers and Erin had turned out the light that her voice came to me in the darkness.

‘What I said about Mum,’ she said. ‘It won’t affect how you remember her, will it?’

‘Of course not, darling,’ I said. ‘Clare was selfish at times, I know. I had blazing rows with her about all sorts of things. I was so angry after your school ceremony and when she got back from France, I told her she was lacking as a mother. She didn’t speak to me for a few days but when she did, she said she was a free spirit and needed to follow her truth. I told her she needed to grow up and set a better example.’

‘Did you really?’ Erin said, sounding surprised.

‘Just because I choose to remember the good stuff doesn’t mean I don’t recognise her failings. I remember the little girl I used to walk to school who wanted to stop and look at all the little bugs on the pavement, the toddler in her high chair, hands and face covered in the dinner she insisted on feeding to herself, the baby I spent hours nursing in the chair my father made me. And sometimes I also remember what an absolute pain in the arse she was.’

I stopped then because I was beginning to feel overwhelmed and Erin must have sensed it because she climbed in next to me and wrapped me in her arms.

‘But I also remember the young woman who came to me and told me she was pregnant and how much she wanted you. She loved you, Erin. She wasn’t perfect, far from it, but she considered you to be her greatest achievement.’

Erin fell asleep before me and I lay awake for a while overthinking. Clare had wanted a big life and she had had one. A short one, but a big one. She didn’t see that compromises would have to be made. She wanted it all but failed to understand that she couldn’t have it.

I pushed my thoughts back to the race. Getting me and Erin over the finish line seemed more imperative now than ever. It wasn’t about first place any more. It wasn’t about beating Harrison. It was about getting to the end. Finishing what we had started. The two of us, together.

I decided that before we did anything else we would need to find out our sailing options to Newfoundland and how much they would cost. That would really decide how the end of this race would play out.

32

ERIN

Erin woke to the excited voice of Martha. She had been in a deep and comfortable sleep and felt as if a weight had been lifted from her shoulders but she was wide awake now, watching Martha shoving everything she had with her into her backpack.

‘I’ve found us a few hours’ work and it will pay for our bus tickets over to the island,’ she said.

Erin sat up and let her thoughts reorganise themselves from dream state to reality, and snippets of their conversation about Clare came back to her. She had been honest with her grandmother about how she felt and it seemed that Martha was okay with that. Of course she was. Her nana loved her.

‘Work where?’ Erin asked, glancing at the bedside clock – six thirty.

‘There’s a restaurant that has a first service at midday. We can clean this morning and they’ll give us lunch before we get on the bus at three. Result, hey? I’ve also messaged Noah on the tracker so he knows where we are.’

‘Yeah, I guess,’ Erin said. ‘How did you manage to arrange it?’

‘I was speaking to the woman on reception downstairs about what two women with limited funds could do in Moncton for the morning and she said work. It’s a friend of hers who owns the restaurant and she called him to see if he could offer us a few hours. It will be washing the tables and floors out front and also the toilets. It won’t be glamorous but it will get us onto the bus without dipping into our funds.’

Erin eased herself out of bed and tried to get excited about a cleaning job.

‘We need to move though,’ Martha said.

They walked to the family-run restaurant with Noah trailing after them. Erin knew that she and Martha would never have had the conversation they’d had last night if Noah had been around and she wondered if that mis-booking at the hostel had been a divine intervention somehow.

The restaurant had a nice feel to it and they were met by the owner. He was a middle-aged man called Phillip. His family had owned the seafood place for years and he was obviously proud of it. After setting them up with what needed to be done, he took Noah off to film as much of the place as he could. This exercise was clearly beneficial to all of them.

Erin and her grandmother were being careful with each other this morning as if they were both nursing a hangover of grief. Erin offered to clean the toilets so Martha wouldn’t have to and left her with the tables and floor in the restaurant. Erin pulled on the gloves offered to her and got to work. For a couple of hours she scrubbed the toilets and sinks and then the tiles on the walls and lastly, the floor. She was surprised at how satisfied she felt after she had finished.

Martha had also finished in the restaurant and the two of them met by the doors to the kitchen.

‘I think we’re being set up,’ Martha said.

‘What? Set up how?’

‘I just heard Noah suggesting it would be good for the viewers to see us working in the kitchen as well. Phillip wants us to prep some seafood.’

This was something Erin had never done before but once Phillip had given them aprons and their hands and utensils were scrupulously clean, Noah filmed them as Phillip laid an octopus down in front of each of them.

‘I’m not sure about this,’ Erin said, lifting up the edge of one tentacle tentatively, before laying it down and stepping back.