The Girl in the Hard Hat (3 page)

Frankly, Wendy thought Neil was a little full of himself. Carl was the project manager. It was his right to hire and fire as he saw fit. She said nothing, however, not wanting to rock the boat further. After all, she was going to have to work with this guy. Better to shut up and make peace as quickly as possible.

‘Well, I want you to know,’ she said slowly, ‘that I’m only here to make your life easier. Whatever I can do, just say the word.’

His greasy mouth tilted into something she couldn’t quite call a smile. ‘I need some milk for my tea and our fridge is all out.’ He pointed at the door. ‘The smoko donga is down that way.’

Her mouth dropped open in disbelief as he turned and walked away from her. She opened her mouth to yell back at him when a man stepped conspicuously in front of her.

‘I wouldn’t. Wait till you’ve calmed down a bit.’

‘Conspicuously’ was actually an understatement. Her advisor was, in a word, massive. Both tall and wide, with an arse and stomach so generous that Wendy would be surprised if he didn’t have to turn sideways to get through the door. Brown haired and in his early forties, he gave her a sympathetic smile.

‘I’m Bill Walden, by the way. But everyone around here calls me Chub.’ He leaned in, patting his belly affectionately. ‘Yes, that’s short for chubby. But just between you and me, most of it’s muscle.’

‘Right.’ She blinked.

‘I’m the HR manager. So I think you better come with me for the moment. I can get you a new shirt. That one is currently causing a few problems around here, if you know what I mean.’

‘Why is everyone so against TCN?’

He tut-tutted. ‘That’s like asking why everyone smoked in the sixties. It just is, love, and if you want to fit in you better learn the rules of the fraternity. Rule number one, all TCN are scum.’

‘What’s rule number two?’

‘Under no circumstance should you forget rule number one. Okay.’ He rubbed his pudgy hands together. ‘Let’s get you a Barnes Inc wardrobe. Now when I turn around to lead you off to our storage container, don’t look at my arse. It makes me uncomfortable.’

Wendy choked.

‘I’ve been told it’s a real chick magnet. But I wouldn’t know. Never seen it myself.’ He indicated his thick neck with his pointer finger. ‘Can’t get my head around that far.’

He was absolutely shocking, yet seemed to be the first person in this town she actually found herself liking without hesitation.

She returned his grin with one of her own. ‘No problem.’

‘Cheers.’ He gave her the thumbs up before turning around. ‘Okay, let’s go.’

He led her to an old shipping container outside the donga which appeared to act as a storeroom. There was a lot of PPE, Personal Protective Equipment, in there – which was good to know.

‘Try not to let Neil get to you,’ Chub offered as they trotted out. ‘He doesn’t eat much and I think he must suffer a lot from hunger pains.’

She giggled.

‘He may warm up to you yet,’ he added optimistically.

If Neil generated any warmth at all over the next six hours he certainly didn’t share it with her. After dumping a five-hundred-page safety manual about permits and tagging on her desk and telling her to study it, he pretty much left her to her own devices.

The room itself seemed to get colder and colder as the day progressed. Neil kept the air conditioner up so high, going outside was actually a relief from the icebox that was now her office. She wondered why the other occupants of the donga didn’t complain until she realised that most of them didn’t spend the majority of their time there the way she, Neil and Chub did. They’d grab their hard hats off the wall and be out most of the day.

As she shivered through the afternoon, it became clear that Neil was under pressure. He was on the phone practically the whole time and most of the calls sounded like complaints. He had a pile of memos on his desk almost half a metre tall. And there were small piles of foolscap files sitting on the floor behind his desk rather than on the empty bookshelves against the wall. She couldn’t work out what his system was but was anxious to get in and lighten his load.

The other thing was, he didn’t look well – what with the sweating and the occasional hand tremors. The guy clearly had a problem but refused to ask her for help. When she tentatively suggested she might take a couple of files off him he practically bit her head off. In resignation, she retreated back to her desk.

By six pm, she didn’t know whether her brain was numb from the cold or the dryness of the material she was reading. In any event, she was very thankful to be getting out of there. The next day she was coming in late so that she could sort out her accommodation and have her safety induction in Wickham at ten o’clock. Once that formality was out of the way, perhaps she’d start getting out of the office too and into the real action.

She said goodbye to her colleagues. Neil ignored her, Chub gave her a jovial wave and she stepped out into the warm, balmy air.

The red sun, halved by the horizon, made the blue sky pink and the ocean violet. Clouds struggled to keep their own colour too, streaking across the sky, lit from behind.

She decided to take this beautiful sight as an omen. Everything was going to be okay. Her search for her father was coming to an end.

Here.

She got in her car and started her engine. It was a forty-five-minute drive back to her hotel in Karratha. This evening, she didn’t mind the long commute. She was feeling a little philosophical and whiled away the time reminiscing about past fly-in/fly-out roles she’d taken. If, fingers crossed, things with Neil improved, it would be good to be back doing the work she loved.

After the incident at Parker Point she hadn’t been able to face working there any more. Sure, nobody knew what she had done. But she did.

So she’d fired herself. Being out of work for a couple of weeks hadn’t really helped, so that’s when she’d decided to extend her sabbatical to a year. Backpacking around Europe had seemed like a good way to get her mojo back. And the time had given her perspective. She’d realised she couldn’t give up a job she loved because of one stupid mistake. After spending more than a year overseas, she’d been ready to start again and prove to the world exactly what she was made of.

She went job-hunting and even had a post lined up in Port Hedland. She’d been all set and ready to make a comeback . . .

Then along came that awful moment that she’d remember for the rest of her life. The revelation that had tipped her world on its side.

Eight months earlier

‘Department of Births, Deaths and Marriages.’ Wendy smiled at the boredom in the clerk’s monotone voice down the phone.

‘Er, hi. My name’s Wendy Hopkins.’

‘Uh-huh.’

‘I’m starting a new job in Port Hedland and I need to provide my employer with a copy of my birth certificate.’

‘Uh-huh.’

‘I’ve moved a few times and seem to have lost my original. Could you send me a new one?’

‘There is a fee for birth certificate replacement.’

‘That’s all right.’

‘Very well.’ Wendy heard the sound of paper rustling, a chair creaking and a tongue clucking. ‘Let’s see. What did you say your name was again?’

‘Wendy Jane Hopkins.’

‘Place of birth.’

‘Perth, Western Australia.’

She heard the
click-click
of fingers fluttering across a keyboard, pushing keys, pulling files.

‘All right.’ The clerk seemed to have found it. ‘Would you like the original certificate or the one after adoption?’

Wendy’s brow furrowed. ‘I think you have the wrong Wendy. I’m not adopted.’

‘When were you born?’

‘March 15.’

‘And hospital of birth?’

‘St Bernard’s. My mother’s name is Helen and my father’s name is Parry Hopkins.’

‘Yes.’ The clerk clicked her tongue. ‘Parry is not on the original certificate.’

Wendy’s heart stopped. ‘
I don’t understand.
’

She heard the ruffling of papers. ‘It seems after your adoption you were issued with a new certificate. Shall I issue both the original and the adoptive one to you?’

Wendy grabbed her chest as she struggled to breathe.

‘Hello?’

She put the phone down and stepped back from it like it was diseased. Sweat broke out on her brow. Her eyes blurred.

I’m adopted.

No.

I can’t be.

She was shaking from head to foot.

Can’t you?

Milestones in her childhood that had before seemed strange now stood out like big flashing neon signs, all pointing towards this conclusion. She paced the room, rubbing her arms as a chill spread through her chest. It was a thirty-five-degree day and yet she had goosebumps.

Didn’t people adopt because they wanted a child?

When she thought of her parents, she couldn’t help but see them as the least likely people in the world to adopt a baby. After all, didn’t she spend half her childhood in boarding school? After the age of six, she was away from home more than she was there. Why would her parents adopt a kid when they didn’t really want to raise it?

An awful thought that had plagued her from very early in her life seemed to be confirmed.
Maybe I was a disappointment. Not the type of child they wanted.

She stopped pacing and sat down, wondering what to do.

In the end she got in her car and went in person to the Births, Deaths and Marriages department in the city. She purchased both her certificates. They were printed there and then and handed to her across a beige counter by another uninterested clerk.

After a quick scan she could see they were identical in nature except for one crucial detail.

The first certificate read,
Father: UNKNOWN
.

The second read,
Father: Parry Hopkins
.

So it seemed her mother was still her mother – it was her father who was in doubt. This new information should have given her some reassurance but it only seemed to disturb her even more. How could there be a secret in her own past that she didn’t know about? Had her mother really lied to her her entire life? Or was there just some sort of misunderstanding?

She went to her parents’ place situated north of the Swan in their own private patch of suburbia. Her father was at work. He owned a pub in Leederville and always seemed to be busy. Her mother had had many jobs in Wendy’s lifetime but currently, at the age of fifty-eight, she was a homemaker. She had been in Perth since she was twenty, having originally come to Australia on a working holiday when migration through marriage had occurred.

Very English and very proper, Wendy’s mother had never been an overly affectionate parent, but Wendy had put that down to her background. Now, as she knocked on her parents’ door, she had to wonder.

Helen Hopkins took her time in answering. ‘Wendy,’ she said from behind the flyscreen door. ‘I wasn’t expecting you today.’

Wendy realised with a wince that she usually made ‘an appointment’ before turning up. Pop-ins, drop-ins, just weren’t done in her family.

She licked dry lips. ‘Can I come in?’

‘All right, I’ve just made a pot of tea. Do you want some?’ Her mother opened the door and turned to walk back into the house. Wendy followed.

‘No thanks.’ She closed and locked the door before joining her mother in the living room.

‘I wanted to talk to you about something I found out today from the Births, Deaths and Marriages department.’ She took both certificates out of her handbag and gave them to her mother, who had already sat down calmly on the couch.

‘Oh.’ Her mother took the papers and scanned them.

‘What does this mean?’ Wendy felt panic bubbling up her throat again. ‘Is my father not my real father?’

That white-blonde hair, pale English skin and blank blue eyes, all of which she’d inherited, just stared back at her crossly as though it was she who had put her mother to gross inconvenience. ‘I really wish they would be more careful before handing out private information like that.’

‘Private information,’ Wendy repeated, scarcely able to believe what she was hearing. ‘We’re talking about
my
birth certificate here. Don’t you think I have a right to know who my father is?’

Her mother raised her eyes, seeming to realise, perhaps for the first time, how distraught Wendy was over the situation. ‘Darling, I’m sorry if you are upset. I just thought all this was behind me. I never meant to get you involved.’

Red sparks flew behind Wendy’s eyes. ‘I think I’m pretty much front and centre of this story, Mum, and I want to know everything.
Now
.’

Her mother frowned and was silent for a moment. ‘All right. But for goodness’ sake, sit down. You’re giving me a crick in the neck having to look up at you like that.’

Wendy sat on the couch opposite her mother. It was a very English-looking couch, cream coloured with a pink rose print across the fabric. It made Wendy think of how reserved and withdrawn her mother had been all her life. Even her father had been more loving – until she got older, of course, and was sent away. She braced herself for the truth, gripping her hands in her lap.

‘Well?’