Atria (Chapter 10)

Olivia woke up at 7:30 am that morning, crawled out of bed, and headed for the kitchen to make school lunches. Her son, Caleb ate more then both her daughters sometimes but Olivia didn’t mind, he was a healthy, growing boy who looked just like his father, Chris. Olivia smiled to herself as she buttered the bread. Natasha had left for work early that morning, she worked as an English teacher at the local high school and Olivia knew that they had a field trip to the historical society that day. To Olivia, it didn’t seem like six years since she started dating Natasha, more like six weeks. She made a mental list of all the things she had to do that morning. Go shopping, Do a stock take at the coffee shop, take Caleb to school and Alicia to pre-school. Olivia thought back to the day that she and Natasha had adopted their beautiful baby girls. Alicia was her pride and joy, a beautiful four year old, Russian girl. Their other daughter stuck to Natasha like glue, Christine was three and born in Thailand. As far as Olivia was concerned, they made the perfect family. She had a meeting with the Melbourne actors society to discuss the rehearsal times for their latest performance, “Brilliant Lies” Olivia was playing “Katy” and it made her think back to when it had been her fault that Natasha and the “real-life Katie had broken up. As she sliced the tomato for Caleb’s sandwiches, she wondered again whether she should tell Chris that he had a son. She couldn’t think of a reason to, she didn’t need the child support, between the coffee shop and Natasha’s day job they managed fine, perhaps not as well as Olivia would have liked but they coped alright, not to mention, even the idea of someone taking Caleb away from her for days at a time scared her half to death, her kids were her life, she was the stay at home mum, and she would never cope without them. She shook the idea of telling Chris the truth to the back of her mind as she had done on several other occasions and resumed the sandwich making. At 8:00 she woke Caleb and Alicia, she decided to let Christine sleep in a bit longer to save herself the trouble of chasing the child around the house while she opened all of the doors and screamed for Natasha. She got the two oldest kids to school alright and dropped Christine off at her mothers, Since Olivia’s parents found out the truth about her dating Natasha, they had disowned her, but they were always willing to look after the grand kids. They told Olivia it was because they didn’t want her behavior voiding the children’s right to grandparents who spoil them. Olivia knew the truth. Her parents figured that the more time they spent drilling Catholic religion through the kids’ heads, the less likely they were to end up like Olivia. Olivia didn’t worry though, she copped the same drilling as a kid and she had turned out all right, in her own eyes anyway. She reached the “Grand Plaza” in Melbourne around 9:30 and grabbed a few things before heading to the coffee shop. She reached the coffee shop appropriately named “Olivia’s Place’ at around ten thirty and walked through the doors. Olivia loved walking trough the doors of her coffee shop, the rich scent of roasted hazelnuts and caramel and freshly brewed espresso, of strawberry short cake, cheesecake and Pavlova and warm chocolate chip cookies. “Hi Karen” she yelled at the girl serving behind the counter. Karen yelled back before turning to serve a customer. Olivia walked around the back of the café into the storeroom. There were shelves that reached the whole way up to the ceiling, stacked with large brown boxes covered in packing tape. Olivia could see bright yellow labels that read things like “Cartarine, Prima Brazilian Coffee” and “ IKEA coffee mugs” She dwelled for a moment, she loved running the coffee shop, the place had so many memories, even from before Olivia bought it. When it still belonged to Mr Hewitt, the retired old pensioner, Olivia and Natasha had had the reception for their commitment ceremony in the same shop where Olivia just stood. Just walking inside could lift her worst mood and make her smile. She walked back out into the main room and leaned against the counter. Karen finished serving a customer and then came over to talk to her. “You’ll have the usual mam” she asked, Karen was only 15 and she had a strong English accent. Olivia thought it was cute. “Ta Karen” she replied. Olivia was a coffee lover and every morning when she came into the shop she would have a large Irish cream cappuccino. Karen handed Olivia her cup and Olivia sipped. “ Anyway” Olivia started “Anything I need to know about? I can’t stay long today so if anything needs fixing, tell me” “Nah, everything’s fine mam” Karen replied. “Alright then” said Olivia “ I best be going, I will see you tomorrow Karen? “O’ Course mam” Olivia smiled. She took one last look around, turned and walked out of the shop. She arrived at the town hall where her group always met and walked through the oak front doors and into the main hall. She expected the whole group to be in one of the conference rooms but they were warming up and changing into costumes on and backstage. Olivia walked up to the director with a confused look on her face. “Gary!” she said “You want to tell me what is going on?” she finished, now looking slightly pissed off. “Ah Olivia Darling” Gary replied, “Glad you could make it sweetheart, go and get changed, we are doing a dress rehearsal” He finished, with a flourish so gay, Olivia was having trouble not dry reaching. “What happened to just planning rehearsal times” she asked, “Darling, we are actors, spontaneity is our trademark, get used to it” he finished, in a voice that indicated that he was attempting to explain that two plus two equals four to an overemotional toddler. “Yea Gary, but some of us, have a life outside of this performance, and we can’t just drop every thing to attend one of your spontaneous rehearsals. Sorry, call the understudy in; I haven’t got time today. Keep me informed on rehearsal times. Thanks Gary.” Without giving Gary time to answer, she turned and walked out of the hall and to her car, well actually it as Natasha’s car, a blue Holden Rodeo V8, because of the field trip, Natasha hadn’t needed it that day and Olivia had borrowed it. She pulled out of the parking lot, and set off for home.
1