ALL Saturday morning, while Lina helped Nonna around the house, she was distracted and clumsy, until finally, after dropping a whole apron-full of eggs, her grandmother shooed her out of the kitchen. Lina sat on her bed, her Maths books on her knees, trying to study. In all the excitement about the magazine, she hadn’t forgotten what her teacher had said about failing the exam. Still, Lina couldn’t help looking out the window every few minutes to see if Julia had arrived.

Finally, there was the noise of a car drawing up outside their house and Lina sprang from her bed to open the front door.

‘Julia, hi!’ she said, a little too excitedly, then tried to look casual, like she had friends dropping over everyday.

‘Lina!’ Julia said and threw her arms around her. ‘Sorry we’re late! Dad had trouble finding your street.’

‘Oh,’ Lina mumbled, wincing. ‘I guess it’s more of a laneway, really. I should have explained.’

A tall, skinny man with olive skin and glasses emerged from the driver’s side of the car. He had the same black wiry hair as Julia’s but it was sticking out at the sides, like a clown’s, and he was shiny bald on top. The moment he loped around the rear of the car and spied Lina in the doorway, his face broke into a goofy grin, and all Lina’s anxious butterflies fluttered away.

‘I’ve been so looking forward to meeting you, Lina,’ he gushed, sticking out a hand, but then he changed his mind and pulled her into an unexpected hug. ‘You are quite a writer! And your family sound fascinating. May I come in?’

‘Oh, um, thank you! Yes, of course,’ Lina said, feeling a little overwhelmed by all the enthusiasm. ‘Please come in, Mr Goldbloom.’

‘Oh, please! Call me Alfred!’ he insisted. ‘Mr Goldbloom is way too formal.’

Lina felt her cheeks turn pink. She had never in all of her life called a friend’s parent by their first name. What an unusual family Julia had!

Alfred strode down the corridor ahead of Lina, looking like a great gangling giraffe in a gloomy narrow cave, and within only a few giant steps he had reached the kitchen. Lina skipped to catch up to him but before she was able to shoot her grandmother a warning look, he had grasped the stout old lady in both arms and was kissing both her paled cheeks with gusto.

‘That’s how they do it in Italy, don’t they?’ he said, pulling back to admire Lina’s grandmother, who was now blushing like a girl. ‘Is it three kisses or four? I can never remember.’

‘Da-ad!’ Julia sighed, rolling her eyes. ‘You are sooo embarrassing!’

Nonna shot Lina a desperate look and Lina quickly translated for her benefit. Nonna mumbled something in return.

‘She says it depends on the region,’ Lina told Alfred.

‘Oh, how fascinating!’ Alfred said, gazing at Lina’s nonna again like she was a beautiful young movie star, not a plump old granny. ‘I have been so looking forward to meeting the famous matriarch of Lina’s story! Oh!’ he sighed, as Lina’s mother walked in from the backyard, a basket of freshly picked herbs on her hip. ‘And this must be your mother?’ He bowed theatrically. ‘She is even more beautiful than I’d imagined.’

When Lina’s mother spied the tall, well-dressed man in their kitchen, she quickly smoothed down her hair and pulled off her apron. ‘I didn’t know we had a guest,’ she said shyly in her heavy accent. She shot Lina a furious look. ‘I’m sorry, this house is so untidy!’ She began clearing things off the table and onto the benches, as if it made any difference to their cluttered kitchen. ‘Please, sit down!’ She pulled out a chair and brushed off some imaginary dirt from the seat. ‘I will make coffee.’

‘Dad!’ Julia hissed. ‘You can go now.’

But Alfred had already folded his long legs under the worn wooden table and was looking up at the two women eagerly.

Julia grabbed Lina by the arm. ‘Oh boy, I knew he’d do this,’ she said, rolling her eyes again. ‘Come on, let’s split. Can we go out the back? I want to see all your animals.’

Lina giggled and led Julia out into the back yard. Instantly she forgot how grubby and small her house had once seemed. Through Julia’s eyes, everything was fascinating.

‘Oh, you grow your own vegetables!’ she exclaimed. ‘How fabulous! And look at those beautiful sunflowers.’

They reached the end of the yard, where the chickens lay limply in the shade of the fig tree. Even Bessie the goat was so hot and tired she let Julia stroke her greying muzzle without baring her teeth for a single nip.

‘You definitely have a way with animals,’ Lina said. ‘I’ve never seen Bessie this calm for anyone. Not even Papa!’

‘I love them,’ Julia sighed. She squatted down and rested her cheek against Bessie’s neck. ‘When I grow up I want to be a vet. You’re so lucky to have so many animals at home. We can’t keep anything with fur because Babushka is allergic. But I have a lizard, an axolotl and three Mexican fighting fish. I used to have four but Cupcake died.’

‘Cupcake?’ Lina giggled. ‘You called your Mexican fighting fish Cupcake?’

Julia grinned and stood up, brushing dust and goat hair off her skirt. ‘Cupcake, Popcorn, Fairyfloss and Sugar. It’s a reverse psychology thing. Dad’s a psychologist and his theory is that if you call people bad things they’ll be bad. If you call them good things they’ll be good.’ She shrugged. ‘My lizard is called Precious. Hasn’t stopped her biting, though.’ She showed Lina some tiny pink tooth marks on her hand.

Lina laughed. ‘What’s your axolotl called?’

‘Magdalena.’

Lina laughed again. ‘And where’s that name from?’

‘It was my mother’s name,’ Julia said simply.

‘Was?’ It came out before Lina could stop herself.

‘She died when I was a baby.’

Lina’s hand flew to her mouth. ‘Oh gosh, I’m so sorry! I . . . I had no idea!’

Julia shrugged. ‘During the war she was put in a concentration camp. Dad, too, but he survived. I was sent away to my grandmother’s village in Russia to hide from the Nazis. When the war was over Dad came back to get me and Babushka, and brought us out to Australia.’

‘That’s awful,’ Lina said, feeling suddenly grateful for her own mother. ‘Do you remember her?’

‘Not really. But that’s okay. I get along really well with Bron. She’s my wicked step-mother. She only tries to put me in the oven occasionally these days,’ Julia joked. ‘Come on. We should check on my dad before he makes a complete fool of himself in front of your family. How embarrassing was it when he flirted with your grandmother?’

Julia tugged Lina’s hand and the two of them jogged back inside, their feet making little plumes of dust in the sun-parched soil. By the time they got back to the kitchen, Lina’s father was also there, woken from his nap, and wearing his suit jacket. The whole family were sitting stiffly around the table sipping sweet black coffee and nibbling on Nonna’s biscuits, listening to Alfred tell stories that made his arms swing about in the air.

‘Oh, I’m so sorry, Lina,’ said Julia. ‘He just makes himself at home wherever he goes. It’s appalling!’

‘Don’t worry,’ Lina insisted. ‘My parents love entertaining. And they probably understand only half of what he’s saying anyway. Besides, they obviously like him. Look, he makes Ma laugh, and that’s no easy task, believe me!’

Lina decided she liked Julia’s father enormously. It was hard to believe, watching him tell jokes and funny stories, that he had been through so much hardship not so very long ago.