I can still feel my heart pounding when I think about going over the old Fremantle traffic bridge, late at night. Us kids knew we weren’t too far away from the jail. We would always wonder if anyone was going to escape that night. But that wasn’t the main reason our little hearts were beating so fast.  

Mum worked as a cook in the old asylum with my auntie. They told us the story of how it was haunted by a poor lady that lost her mind and died because they took her child away. They said that sometimes you could see her in the window. 

We would sit in the car with our father, down in the poorly lit carpark, waiting in anticipation to see the ghost. Staring up at the windows of the building, our eyes would be like dishpans, not willing to look elsewhere in case we missed it. Too scared to wind down the windows, even though we were fogging them up from our heavy breathing. We wouldn’t give up, until we saw my mum and auntie come out of the building’s doors below. 

We went there time after time and our interest would never cease. Still today, I glance up at the windows when I am at the Fremantle Art Centre, just in case.