And so I became a clerk with the Quartermaster Corps of the US Army, working five days a week in the city, learning to dress and talk and type like an office girl and not the bushie I had been. I became confident, at least on the outside. I laughed as loud as the other girls and chewed gum and varnished my fingernails with Glazo nail polish and wore Mitcham Lavender. I made just over two pounds a week, and while most of it went to Mum and Dad, I still had enough to buy pretty things—those I could get with ration coupons; I made do and mended those things I couldn’t. Some evenings and weekends I went to coffee houses and picture shows with Dot and her friends. Watching them, I learned how to act around men, how to be mean or nice at the drop of a hat, how to bring them in and then hold them at arm’s length.

If we were friendly, the officers at work had ways of getting around the rationing. They brought us nylon stockings, tinned fruit, boxes of chocolates which you had to eat quickly before they turned sticky and soft in the heat. I learned how to hold a few drinks without acting too silly, and not to mix spirits and beer. Dot teased me when I drank a beer, because it wasn’t something many women did, but I always thought of Mum’s single Sunday glass and it seemed something that brought us closer, like a part of her which was now my own. I learned to dance, how to let go of my stiffness on the dance floor, what it meant to have a good lead, what it meant to follow.