Umbilicus: An autobiographical novel

CLANCEY'S

'WHAT? WHERE? HOW?' YOU gasp, reeling in shock.

She hands you a till receipt from Clancey's, a trendy new Chicago-style coffee shop in Silvervause Centre where you were waitressing up until two weeks shy of your twenty-first. It's got your unmistakable handwriting next to the two blank lines that say Gratuity and Total: Thanks! ~ Charlotte

'Last month, before your birthday, you served me and my husband Max.'

'What?!' You study the receipt. It's dated 10:42pm on 2nd August 1995, just two days before you got fired. Two coffees, one cake. Then the penny drops.

'Oh my God. Now I remember you! Well, not you per se, but serving your table. You were the couple who came in quite late, and the dude was asking me about the décor and the bodums.'

She laughs. 'Yes, that "dude" was Max. I was too scared to talk to you, so I asked him if he would try and make conversation. Just so I could hear you talk, and watch your mannerisms.'

'No freakin' way! I can't believe it. I can't believe you were sitting right there in front of me, and I barely even looked at you — no offense!'

'None taken,' she smiles, watching you take it all in.

You always thought if you saw your birth mother, you would recognise her instantly. Your whole life you have scanned crowds, seeking out one woman's features in a sea of faces. At school plays or sports days, at the beach or the shopping mall, you never, ever stopped looking. As it turns out, she was sitting there right in front of you, a month ago, and it had been a complete non-event. You were so busy jabbering away to her husband, trying to impress and earn a good tip, that you had barely glanced in her direction.

'I remember the whole conversation. About him running the restaurant at ML Sultan's Hotel School, and wanting to know where they could source these kind of French presses. I told him the owners would probably be able to help him out and he could phone the number on the bill. He paid cash, and when I brought back his change, he said I could keep it. I was shocked because although it wasn't a huge amount, it was the first time anyone had ever tipped me two hundred percent!'

'Yes,' she smiles sheepishly.

'That was incredibly lucky timing,' you say. 'I was fired just two days later.'

'Oh,' she looks a little taken aback. 'Well, when I came back on my own a week or so later, I asked one of the waitresses if you were on shift that day, and she just said you weren't working there anymore. I didn't realise you had been fired.'

'Yip. I've had a lot of jobs, and this was the first time I've ever been sacked. The one owner was a total asshole. Pardon my French. We basically had a personality clash. Nothing serious. Oh, and this was just after I'd gotten his restaurant a rave review in the paper, by an undercover critic, who'd even mentioned me by name in the article and everything! Luckily I got another waitressing job at a new restaurant called XS in Berea Centre straight away. It's part-owned by one of the guys who also part-owns 3-30, and has a nightclub attached. He's really sweet, but his partner is an asshole. Seems the industry is full of them.'

She laughs. You wonder how much she's heard or read in the papers about Club 3-30 on Point Road, and the burgeoning rave scene. Over the past year or so, you've noticed more and more grunge and goth kids 'defecting' from alternative clubs like The Station to 3-30 because apparently the drugs are better. It's probably a good thing you work such long hours and make such crap money waitressing, otherwise you may very well have gotten swept along in the tide of Ecstasy and seventy-two-hour weekend parties. You simply can't afford the luxury right now. London's calling.

'Anyway, I really hate it,' you continue. 'But it's better money than retail, even if we rely solely on tips.' You don't tell her about the slew of sexual advances from drunken male — and sometimes female — patrons, or having to walk home alone down Berea Road in the wee hours of the morning, wearing your moon bag with the night's takings and your fiercest 'don't fuck with me' face, clutching a little flick-knife you'd bought from a shop in The Wheel. She'd probably freak.

'I'm sorry to hear you hate the work. But at least it's not for terribly much longer. What with you guys moving overseas in a few months.'

'True. I just hope I can find a decent job over there. If I never have to serve another table, it'll be too soon.'

'Speaking of which,' she says. 'While I was chatting to this very sweet waitress with bright red hair, out of the blue she tells me that you're actually her flatmate, and that you guys are leaving for London soon.'

'Oh my God, that was Gretchen! Yes, she's still working there. For that shitty boss.'

'Can you believe the coincidence! Out of all the waitresses there that day, she happened to be the one I spoke to?'

'Er, I don't believe in coincidences.'

'Actually, neither do I. But anyway, now that I knew you were leaving the country I started panicking. I desperately wanted to meet you, properly, before you left. And after all these years of waiting and waiting — twenty-one years of hoping and praying that you would want to make contact with me, as I wasn't allowed to contact you — I realised it may actually not happen. That you had all these exciting plans to go overseas in the next few months, and finding your birth mother may very well not feature too high on your list of priorities right now.'

'Oh my word, this just makes me so angry! I also felt like I was in a race against the clock, like I was running out of time. If it wasn't for that stupid social worker going on a month's leave and just leaving me hanging, and then Child Welfare giving me such a damn runaround for the next five weeks, while the window period for us to meet was getting smaller and smaller, we could've met a lot sooner.'

'And saved ourselves a lot of stress.'

'I frickin' hate bureaucrats.'

Then something dawns on you. 'But hang on a sec. How exactly did you know who I was, and where to find me in the first place?'

'It was all through a really bizarre twist of fate.'