There was only one performance, and this time my brothers and sisters were all coming to watch us perform, as were some of my old friends from school. Unfortunately, Miss Hansen was not well enough to come to the performance, so I arranged with the artistic director, Harold Collins, for her to come to that afternoon’s dress rehearsal instead. At least she saw us practising La Esmeralda on the stage. Although we weren’t performing fully, as we had to save energy for our performance that night, she was thrilled with us. We spoke briefly and I noticed she looked quite frail but was still immaculately dressed and beautifully poised.
‘I so enjoyed that, Mary!’ she told me. ‘You are dancing beautifully. Your husband is a good dancer too. I’m so sorry that I can’t be there for you tonight. Good luck with the performance.’ It meant the world to me that she was there, and I treasured her words.
My family had booked a lot of seats in Brisbane’s 2000-seat Lyric Theatre. It was a far cry from the old Festival Hall where Grandma Bridie had brought me to see my first ballet. Now here I was back in Brisbane in this beautiful theatre about to perform myself. Grandma Bridie would have been so proud of me.
Many Rocky friends came, as well as students from Miss Hansen’s ballet school. Normally I could control my nerves, but this time the combination of nerves and excitement made it worse. What would my family and friends think about my dancing? For years they had supported me in my ballet lessons in Rocky, and from afar when I moved to London. Now I was a principal dancer with one of America’s premier ballet companies, who had been invited to Australia especially. This performance meant the world to me – I did so want them to be impressed.
As soon as we stepped onto the stage we were in that other place, with room only for the music and the movement and each other. Li partnered me beautifully once again. Then it was all over and I swear I could hear my brothers whistling as I saw my whole family standing and clapping above their heads, calling, ‘Encore! Bravo! Encore!’ Li took my hand and we stepped off stage, then returned again and again to more applause. The feeling was indescribable. My whole family had got to see me dance at the top of my career for the first time. And, in front of my family, I really did feel like a star.
Backstage, Li hugged me tight. ‘Darling, you were wonderful. It was such special performance. I’m so proud of you!’
‘We did it, Li! We did it together. I love you.’ I kissed him. I knew that his dancing had blown the Brisbane audience away, just as it had in Sydney and all over the world.
After we changed, we found that Matt had shepherded the whole family into the backstage bar, where we were showered with hugs and drowned in bouquets of flowers.
‘Just stunning, Mare,’ said Ger.
‘It was a triumph, darling,’ said Mum.
It was delicious to have them all with me, even for so short a time. The whole lot of us went to a Chinese restaurant in Chinatown in Brisbane’s Fortitude Valley afterwards. As always with my big family, we had to work out how many cars to take and who would go in which. The restaurant was very overdone in Chinese decor, with dragons on the wall and wallpapered with Chinese prints. The food was Australianised Chinese, Li commented – sweet and sour pork, honey prawns, chow mein, fried rice with chunks of Windsor sausage – but my family liked it.
Luckily Niang and Dia weren’t with us as they wouldn’t have approved. In fact, they had offered to cook for the whole family, which they did for Sunday lunch. They chopped and cooked all morning – steamed vegetables, succulent pork ribs falling off the bone, tender stewed chickens and pork stir-fry. There were chopsticks for the pros, forks for the rest. It was a real feast – well, they were cooking for about twenty-five people. The whole McKendry clan descended and we just ate and ate. Everyone loved Niang’s feast, and they still remember it. Niang was shocked and kept saying to Li, ‘If only I’d known how much they can eat, I would have cooked more dishes.’ In the Chinese tradition, the host would rather have too much than not enough food.
The next day, Li, Sophie and some of the others went to a park. I was in the flat helping Niang prepare the food for dinner. She was preparing the minced pork for Li’s favourite dumplings, while I was cutting pastry into circles, rolling it out thinly, and putting in the pork filling. Dia was keeping an eye on the rice. A couple of hours later, Li and the others arrived back. Sophie was hanging onto a string with a burst red balloon at the end of it. Everyone bustled around and started to ooh and aah at the lovely smells emanating from the kitchen and the hundreds of dumplings Niang had made.
Li took me to one side, clearly agitated. I asked, ‘What? What’s the matter, Li?’
‘Mary,’ he said with a worried look on his face, ‘we passed birthday party on way back. Balloons everywhere and Sophie got hold of one. I was following her up stairs and balloon popped with loud bang.’
‘Yes, yes, I saw that. I hope she put it in the bin,’ I said, and turned back to the pastry.
But Li said, ‘I think something going on with Sophie. She right in front of me coming up stairs. When balloon popped, other children all startled but not Sophie. She didn’t move.’
‘So what?’
‘Mary, you’re not listening,’ he persisted. ‘The balloon popped. It was very loud and Sophie just stood there. All other children startled.’
‘What do you mean, Li?’
‘She didn’t move.’
‘Don’t worry,’ I said. ‘She’s fine.’
I completely dismissed what Li was trying to say at that moment – Sophie was fine. She was meeting all the baby stages according to the books, and although she was a bit late talking, she was definitely making sounds, babbling and pointing, just like any other baby her age. And as Dr Boyd had said, she was living in a two-language household. In any case, I couldn’t think about it right then. We had a meal to cook and family to entertain. It was a gathering that couldn’t be put to one side, a rare occasion to be enjoyed to the fullest. Nevertheless, the thought of Sophie not responding to a loud balloon pop played in the back of my mind.
We were at Mick and Robyn’s house the next day with the clan for yet another barbecue. Ger was downstairs holding baby Kate, watching the kids run in the garden. Sophie was playing with her cousins in the backyard when she got bitten by an ant and started to scream. I raced over and took her in my arms. All eyes were on her, and with Li’s words clearly in my head, I went with Mick to get some ice for the bite to help ease the pain. Once the commotion died down, I asked Mick, ‘Do you think everything’s okay with Sophie?’
‘It’s just an ant bite, Mare. She’ll be fine.’
‘No, I mean generally,’ I said. ‘Li said she didn’t react to a burst balloon the other day.’
‘If you’re worried, why not have her checked?’ he said.
I couldn’t imagine anything being wrong with Sophie. She was such a perfect child, didn’t hide behind my skirt and just had a wonderfully calm personality. Nevertheless, I knew that Li – ever the doting father – was worried. So when he said, ‘Let’s go and see the doctor when we get back,’ I agreed. But I was still not overly worried.
The next morning, exhausted but energised – still euphoric – I scooped up my beautiful girl. ‘Come to Mama, Sophie. Listen to this!’ She smiled her sweet smile as I jiggled her on my knee. ‘We’re going to the park today. You’re going to see all of your Australian family one more time before we go home. Niang and Dia are coming, and lots of other people too. Let’s go.’