Camping

It’s amazing how life rushes on past, not stopping for you. You’ve just got to hang on and take your opportunities when they present themselves. Sometimes you lose your grip and fall down and that’s okay for a time, but eventually you just have to stick your head up again and grab on.

I had been working for a local construction firm on the site of a new housing conversion – the old brewery was being turned into 300 apartments. The way of the world. Work was good, I’d been unemployed for so long. I got the job through a good high school mate, Adam Boys. Not what you know, but who you know, of course. 

Adam, Joel Brady and Tim Wade and I were all mates at school. The four of us grew up together and graduated from high school in the early nineties. After high school, Joel, Tim and I went off to uni, but Adam went to work for his dad in the construction business. We lost touch, as even the most well intentioned friends do. Life moves on in unexpected ways. Whoosh and it’s turned upside down.

After uni, I didn't know what to do with myself. Suddenly school was over and uni was over. Whoosh! What fucken happened? I opened a café and when that went cunt-up, I had a shot at a cleaning business. It went the way of the café and I disappeared into a bong haze for a while with like-minded housemates, after that, ashamed at being a failure.

The black sheep accepts his crown.

Joel passed the CPA exam on the first try and got a job with a major accounting firm. He seemed set. I envied him. On course. Then he discovered drugs and the party scene, I may have introduced him to them. I needed a mate to party with, as Tim had headed overseas to get away from precisely that. Joel grew tired of work and quit.

I felt guilty about it, for the longest time.

Somehow, we lost five years, in a haze of mediocrity and sedation. Joel, and I, were living on welfare, getting pox job after pox job just to keep our government hand out coming in.

Joel dealt party drugs, to supplement his dole and to get our drugs cheaper, for nix if you were hard-arsed about it like Joel.

What happened to all that promise?

One night Joel ran into Adam, at a club. He was doing well in his father’s company. His firm’s market share was expanding, profits were up. Adam offered Joel a job. It was a menial job, Adam made that clear, but it still paid more than the dole.

I signed up to do some temp work, three months worth, while some account manager was on long service leave and found myself working in the Adam’s company too.

Tim returned from OS and the four of us started to hang out together on Friday’s right after work. None of us ever had girlfriends to speak of, so we were glad of the company. We’d usually head to a bar close to the construction site, to down a few beers before we headed for home. It was slow, Adam being boss man and all, but over many beers as Friday night dusk fell, we became friends all over again.

We planned a camping trip for a late January weekend. We decided to leave for the campsite immediately after work on that Friday. What was the point of heading home? Joel volunteered to pick up Adam, Tim and me so we’d only have one car at work that day. Then we could head on to the camping site together. Of course, Adam wanted to take his brand new Peugeot GTI, but Joel won out. Joel and Adam have always been competitive with each other, just always been.

Joel drove a GTHO Falcon. When he turned eighteen his dad gave him the car as a birthday present. His dad had stopped driving the car as a daily driver and the car had been sitting in the garage, under a tarp, so it only seemed fitting. Joel loved that car even if he didn’t always have the money to take care of it.

It was hot. It had rained in the afternoon, which only made the hot day sticky. There were puddles all over the muddy construction site at the end of the day, simmering. There was a hazy quality to the late afternoon sun; steam seemed to be rising from the pools in ground. Hazy. Shimmer.

The four of us met at a local bar for a few of knock-off beers before we headed for the car together. The ceiling tried its hardest to cool us down. The bottoms of our work boots were covered in mud, as we approached the classic Falcon. Joel told us not to worry. He shrugged. The floor at the back was covered with clumps of dried mud, thanks to working construction. Joel shrugged again when he saw me looking at it. “Can’t be helped,” said Joel. He took off his hard hat and got into driver’s seat. Adam got in on the passenger side and Tim and I got in the back seat.

Joel slipped the key in the ignition and started to crank the engine. He pumped the accelerator with his mud-covered Blundstone. He pressed it down about half way. The engine turned over but didn’t spark.

“The Berryman deal has to finalise in a week,” said Adam.

“I know,” I said. “I’ve been onto the warehouse, but so far nothing.”

Tim waved his hands at us. “A whole weekend,” said Tim, grinning. “Nothing but wide open spaces to worry about.”

The engine didn't fire. Joel pushed back in the seat, sat up straight and sighed. He started to mutter to himself, "Come on, come on."

“Here’s to the weekend,” said Tim, twisting the top off a stubby.

Joel gave the pedal more pumps.

“If we get there,” said Adam, looking over at Joel.

Joel looked at Adam, snorted out through his nose and then looked away.

The engine cranked. It caught then chugged again. Joel pumped the pedal. "Come on buddy," Joel whispered.

Cough. Nothing. The ignition lights glowed red on the dashboard.

“I bet with this heat and humidity the thing has vapour locked,” said Adam. “Why don’t you pump it a little more while your cranking and see if that will get more petrol to the carb.”

Joel looked in Adam’s direction and started cranking the engine again. The car was trying to start, but just couldn’t.

We all sat in silence.

Tim pulled a cigarette packet from his top pocket, out of which he produced a neatly rolled joint. “Something for our nerves, gentlemen,” he said. The rich smell filled the car. I felt butterflies in my stomach, at the thought. I hadn’t smoked at all since I’d started work, since I resurrected my life.

Adam put his hand on Joel’s shoulder. “Get out and pop the bonnet.” Adam pushed Joel gently. Joel recoiled with a twitch of his shoulder, clearly unhappy.

He got out of the car while Adam slid over to the driver’s seat. He sat with his muddy right boot on driver’s side doorsill and his left boot on the floor of the car.

I puffed on the joint, after Tim.

Joel lifted the bonnet and took off the lid to the air cleaner and looked into the carb. He reached into his pocket and pulled something out and inserted it.

Tim stretched out and rested his head on the back of the seat and closed his eyes. “Tell me when it’s over,” he whispered to me. He touched me on the shoulder.

“The carb had flooded,” said Joel. “Try it now.”

Adam placed his right foot on the muddy ground outside the driver’s door and planted his well worn and muddy left work boot firmly on the pedal and pushed it down to the floor. He grabbed the key and turned it to "start" and kept it there. The engine cranked and cranked and cranked.

I sat back and puffed some more on the joint. Tim declined it when I offered it back to him. “Nah mate,” he whispered, with a flick of his head. “I’ll be humping your leg if I have any more.”

Somehow, I had a joint in one hand and a stubby in the other, from which I was alternating. My head spun.

“Hang on,” said Joel. He made some adjustment. “Okay Adam, try it again.”

Adam pushed his huge boot to the floor and turned the key. “Come on you piece of shit!”

Chug, chug, the engine sputtered to life. Black smoke billowed from the exhaust pipe. Adam gunned the accelerator. Broom! Broom!

“Don’t cane it, it’s still cold,” said Joel.

“I’ll fucken cane you,” said Adam.

“Hoo, hoo, hoo,” said Tim without opening his eyes.

"Like to see you try," said Joel.

The rich smell of unburned petrol filled the passenger compartment. I looked at Tim. He pinched his nostrils with his fingers.

Adam got out and walked up to the front of the car. “You need a new car, mate.”

Joel pushed Adam in the chest, kind of playfully, but not really. “Get in.”

Adam pushed Joel back, then walked to the passenger side of the car and got in. Joel took out the wonder implement, put the cover back on the air cleaner and lowered the hood with a whomp. He got back in the car.

The car rocked gently as it idled.

“Piece of shit,” said Adam grinning.

“You’re asking for it,” said Joel. "Fucken asking for it!"

He pushed the gear-stick into first. The rear wheels spun in the gravel, in the mud, I could hear the spray of gravel behind. We got on the highway and headed for the camping site. We downed the stubbies as we downed the kilometres.

“So how long is it going to take us to get there tonight?” asks Adam.

It was late and getting dark by the time we got there. Adam built a fire, with wood scavenged from not far away. Joel got the tents out. I found the billy, coffee and milk. Life's essentials. I got water from the geri-can. Tim produced another joint and he and I were wasted in no time.

"Can you help me with my boots," asked Tim, holding a leg in my direction. I took his foot in my hand and slowly undid the laces. 

"Thank you, Alfred," said Tim.

Then I took his other foot and did the same. "You're a natural," said Tim. He stroked his neck with his hand.

Late, after much drinking, Joel grabbed Adam by the shirt and pushed him backwards, up against a tree, on the edge of the camp site. I didn't really know why. Adam held his hands out in the air, as if to say he wasn’t going to fight. They gazed at each other like that for a few seconds, both breathing hard. Still. Silent.

Then Joel did an unexpected thing, when he thought Tim and I had looked away. He stepped towards Adam and kissed him hard on the mouth.

Adam kissed him back... as he wrapped his arms around Joel.

Really late, when we were maggoted, Joel and I got to confession time. Tim and Adam had long since gone to bed.

“I pinched some money from work to pay for my lifestyle, back then,” said Joel. “I got out before they realised. Too embarrassed to chase me, I presume.” Then he just smiled at me, waiting for my response. “That’s why I left my job.”

I didn't know what to say.

It wasn’t my fault, then?

Joel shrugged when all he got was the glow of the hot embers in my eyes.

I heard some muffled moaning from Adam and Joel's tent, after we'd all finally gone to bed.

Tim put his arm around me, after I turned out the light. He hugged me as we drifted off to sleep. As Tim snored softly into my ear, just as my body started to melt into the ground, falling into sleep, I heard Adam yell out, moan. 

Then all I could hear was frogs.

The Black Car

Amy sits at her desk reading her emails. An email circulating around the building said, ‘If you happened to have been parked in the Flinders’ Lane car park last Friday, at around 7am and you saw a black sedan with the license plate quite possibly JM 0 something, or JN 0 something, or possibly YJM something, could you please call the number supplied. You may be able to assist with an inquiry regarding a woman who allegedly parked in the car park at around that same time.’

Amy is taken back a little, as she had seen the car in question, she thought. Jeremy Marshall’s car. Her Jeremy. His BMW had the number plate JM 030. She had parked behind it, as she had on other occasions. Amy's car had been parked in the underground car park from 6am on the morning in question. Amy had been one of the first people to arrive, but she hadn't seen anyone else in the car park as she walked up the back stairwell, which is the closest to her office and it gives her a reason to walk the five flights of stairs, rather than being lazy and taking the lift. Of course, she could take the lift and just go back to the gym. Or suspend her membership, at the very least. But, using the stairs gave her a sense of, actually, doing something healthy, you know. Gym membership, or not. No further action required.

Had she seen anyone that morning? She didn't think so, she couldn't quite remember now, as she really hadn't taken that much notice, as she struggled with her two bags and her leather coat – it’s all very well having a briefcase with wheels, but the stairs? Was she talking on her phone and distracted, as she so often is as she arrives at the office? Was she talking to Jeremy? She couldn't remember now, she thinks, as she gazed at the number plate. 

Would anyone else remember the two door car? She only remembers it because the car meant something to her. Of course, the car isn’t a sedan at all, as it said in the email, it is a coupe. She feels relieved and then wonders straight after that thought why she should feel relieved at all.

In hindsight, that was the tactical phone call to sure up the proposal, later that night. She is a bit hung over from the night before, she remembers she was concentrating that morning, more than usual, her head ached, and she didn't want to forget anything. She must have looked a wreck. She laughs, at the thought, more of a defence mechanism than because she thinks it is humorous. Lucky there isn’t any security footage attached to this email. She wasn't hung over on alcohol. She's realised lately that she can't smoke anything, if she wants a clear head. Although she hasn't stopped, it is Jeremy’s influence, so it was vagueness she was battling. 

I don’t want to call anyone, she thinks. I don’t want to get involved. What did she care, Jeremy had asked her to marry him, just out of the blue? Well, clearly not just out of the blue for Jeremy. Amy’s head spun with every bridle picture she’d ever seen, as she found herself saying yes. She deleted the memo and then emptied the trash.

She wonders if she should call Jeremy.

What inquiry could this be assisting with, she also thinks?

If Jeremy was on the phone to her? What time was that? What could he have to do with another person? A woman with a bag?

She decides to call him.

“Jeremy, there is an email circulating around our office about anyone seeing a black car with the number plate something like your number plate last Friday morning in my parking lot?”

“Really,” says Jeremy. “Funny hey? But… but… I didn’t park in the parking lot, last Friday. I was at a client's office all morning.”

“Oh,” says Amy.

Amy hadn’t really thought that the memo was referring to Jeremy’s car at all, she suspected that she was being a drama queen, open to salacious gossip as we all are now a days, that was until Jeremy had just obviously lied to her. 

“Oh?” repeats Jeremy into the phone.

Still, he probably wouldn’t be stupid enough to park in the car park in the immediate future, whether he has, actually, done anything or not. Well, she thinks, you never know how these things are going to go?

She feels relieved, of sorts. Her mother’s words came into her head.

Stop mothering that boy, he’s more, um, worldly than you give him credit for. He’s more… Her mother shook her head.

Amy came back to the call in her ear. “Well?” She was still wondering why Jeremy was lying.

“Well?” repeats Jeremy.

“What?” says Amy.

“How,” says Jeremy.

“How?” repeats Amy.

“You just appear to be saying words,” says Jeremy. “So, I thought I’d play along.”

“What?” says Amy.

“No, we have already had what,” says Jeremy.

“Huh?”

“Oh, this is a good game,” says Jeremy. “But I really do have work to do.”

Amy comes back to the phone call. “Oh, yes, okay, well, I guess it doesn’t have anything to do with you then.”

“I’m not even sure what we are talking about now,” says Jeremy.

“Okay, talk later,” says Amy. She ends the phone call.

Amy gets up and goes to the door of her office.

Tim, Amy’s PA, was dutifully at his desk.

“Morning,” he says, as he did every morning. “When do you want to go through your schedule?”

“Oh, give me a moment,” replies Amy. “I’ll let you know when I am ready.”

She closes the door to her office and sits at her desk and switches on her computer, hoping that work would replace the troubled feeling she has.

She can’t get Jeremy out of her head.

She decides to go and make coffee.

She gets up again and heads out of her office.

“I’m just going to make a coffee.”

“I could go down stairs and get you a real one,” says Tim.

“No, it’s okay, I’m in the mood for instant.”

Tim looks perplexed.

She wants to be distracted. 

In the kitchen they are discussing the email and the rumour of what it all might have been about.

“What’s it about?” asks Amy.

“Oh, some girl got her bag snatched by some whack job,” says Dave from IT. “Apparently, the whack job took off in a black Holden Commodore. That’s why they are asking for witnesses, to collaborate the story.”

“A Commodore, you say?”

“I said Holden,” says Dave. “But yes, I believe it was a Commodore.”

“Oh, a Commodore.”

“Yes.”

That let Jeremy off the hook, thought Amy. But why did he lie? Why would a man lie to his girlfriend, she thinks?

She can't stop thinking about it all afternoon. By 3pm, she tells Tim she is leaving for the day. 

She heads to the local gadget shop and purchases a GPS tracker. It is the magnetic type. The nice sales boy says she could just attach it under Jeremy's mudguard on his car. Once she had done that, it was simple to track where Jeremy has been.

“If that’s what you really want to do,” says the nice sales boy.

“Why? What are you saying?”

“Well, people aren’t always happy with what they find out.”

She isn't really sure, she knows that, but she wants to know why Jeremy told her a lie.

Jeremy's BMW is parked in the street when she gets to his house. Amy feels a chill run up her spine as she looks at the black car. She looks over at Jeremy’s house to see lights on. She walks to the back of the coupe. She looks up and down the street, it is all clear. She opens her bag and slides her hand in. She stops. Hesitates. Looks up and down the street again. She slips her hand out of her bag, clicks it shut and turns and walks back down the street to where her car is parked, far enough away from Jeremy’s car, just in case... She chuckles to herself, just in case of what? She thinks

She stops. Looks at her red XJS for a moment. Now is the time, don’t fumble it, she thinks.

She walks directly to the back of the black coupe once again. She looks around for a final time and then reaches in under the rear mudguard and attaches the tracking device. Then she just casually walks away. Her stomach is in a knot, belying the whole scene.

Later that evening, she pulls the cork from a bottle of chardonnay and had pours herself a 'healthy' glass. She sits on the bar stools at her kitchen bench. She sips her wine and remembers her phone. She retrieves the phone from her bag. She unlocks her phone and scrolls to the tracking device app.

Jeremy’s car hadn’t moved. She isn’t sure what she expected. 

She puts her phone down on the bench and drinks her wine.

Why did she think Jeremy was lying? What possible reason could he have for saying his car wasn’t some place it was? Why would he say that?

She sips her wine.

Because he wants her to think he was somewhere else? What possible reason would he have for wanting her to think he was someplace else?

If that was the case, it was a rather clumsy lie, as she had already proved, she’d seen his car in the car park.

It was therefore a rather half-arsed lie. And for Jeremy to be telling a half-arsed lie, it pointed to him being rather desperate about something. Really out of options as far as it was concerned, she thinks.

Why would Jeremy be in such a position that he had to seemingly tell a rather desperate lie?

Jeremy has been to gym, early that morning. He gets to his office all sweaty. He pulls off his sweaty singlet and shorts and is just in his undies. The gym makes him kind of horny. He doesn’t expect anyone else to be in the office that early. He is going to pull on his towelling dressing gown and head to the shower on their floor, where he’s pretty sure he’s gonna whack one out. But, he’s been expecting some communication from his boss about a client he’d got with a big account. He is eager to see if he’s landed the client.

Emma his secretary, who had always clearly had the hots for him comes into work early and walks into his office to put flowers on his desk, when she’s been confronted by sexy Jeremy all sweaty just in his undies.

Emma has been clearly overcome by the half naked sight of her sexy blond boss, standing at his desk.

“Oh, I’m sorry,” says Emma.

“Oh, Emma, you will just have to excuse me. Sorry. I was just looking at emails.”

“I’m sorry,” says Emma. “I thought I was the only one in.”

Jeremy gazes up from his computer. Emma isn’t exiting his office, as her speech had kind of indicated.

“Sorry,” says Jeremy.

“It’s me who is sorry,” says Emma. She stands her ground.

“I’m just seeing if I got the Hunter case.”

“I’m just seeing, er…” says Emma.

“I’m sorry what?” says Jeremy. He is glancing down his new emails. He is distracted and only half aware Emma is still standing there.

“I’ve never seen this side of you,” says Emma.

“Oh, sorry, I’m just back from the gym.”

“I like… er… it,” says Emma.

“I’m sorry?” says Jeremy. He is still running his eyes down his emails.

“I like it,” says Emma. Her voice is kind of breathy.

“What?”

“You.” Emma giggles. “Like that.”

“Emma what?” Jeremy looks up and Emma is standing close to him.

“You look good,” Emma whispers.

“Oh Emma. What? No.” Jeremy brings his gaze back to Emma.

“I’ve always liked you, you must know that,” says Emma.

“Emma, I have a girlfriend, Amy.”

“I won’t tell her, if you don’t”

“Tell her what?”

Emma undoes her blouse.

“Oh Emma.”

Jeremy takes Emma in his arms. They kiss.

Jeremy makes the big cliched gesture of wiping everything off his desk with his arm. They screw on his desk.

Afterwards, Jeremy puts on his towelling dressing gown and has flees to the shower room on their floor.

Emma has managed to pick up Jeremy’s worn jocks from his office floor.

When Jeremy comes back to his office he gets dressed in his suit not thinking about his missing underwear.

Emma is very beautiful. Unbeknownst to Jeremy, Emma had targeted him when doing interviews, as she wanted a husband. She didn’t want to work anymore than she really had to and Jeremy was a star on the rise, according to her research. He would make partner fairly soon. Also, according to Emma’s research, he was single at the time of her interview. Her research didn’t uncover the existence of his girlfriend Amy. That’s because Jeremy and Amy had been taking it very casually, but just recently, Jeremy had to admit to himself how much he liked Amy.

Emma now wants more. She was threatening to tell Amy if Jeremy didn’t give her more of the same.

“I have your undies from that morning.”

“So,” says Jeremy. “They could be anyone’s.”

“They could be,” said Emma. “But they are not, they are yours.”

“And? So what?”

“I’m sure we could do DNA testing on them.” Emma smiles the smile of a killer.

“What do you want, Emma?”

“More of what I got the other morning.”

“That was just a…”

“Don’t say mistake.”

“I have a girlfriend.”

“You, perhaps, should have thought of that…”

Jeremy is not at all sure that it wasn’t the adrenaline still pumping in his system from the workout that caused him to, what? Act out of character. Oh, listen to me, he thinks, making excuses. Emma sure does look like Amy, certainly up close, and she responds sexually in the same way, so it all felt natural and normal, in the moment. Oh, he thinks, more excuses. What did I do? What he fuck did I do, he thinks? Just when his life was on the track he’d been looking for all his life.

When Amy called Jeremy that morning about the memo about the car that she said fitted the description of his car, he just panicked from the guilt he was feeling. He wasn’t really listening to what Amy was saying, as such. He was trying to work out if Emma had told her anything.

Amy is thinking that she can’t follow Jeremy in her red XJS, he would spot it in a moment. What to do, she thinks?

Amy’s mum calls her.

“Hi mum.”

“Hi darling.”

“How are you?”

“I’m great,” says her mum. “Your father and I have decided to go to Europe for a few months.”

“A few months,” says Amy. “When are you going?”

“The end of the week.”

“The end of the week?”

“Yes, sorry it such short notice, but we’ve just decided to be spontaneous, now your father has retired.”

“Good for you,” says Amy. “It sounds fantastic.”

“Your father has taken care of everything.”

“Of course he has.”

“You know what he is like.”

“Yes.”

“So, there is nothing you have to do, everything is done.”

“Okay then.”

“So, Friday we are going, we’ll be back, well, not certain at this stage, let’s say 3 months.”

“Oh, okay mum, you have a great time.”

“Thanks, darling we will. I haven’t told your brother Corey, he’s in Indonesia surfing with his buddy Carey, so if he asks…”

“Oh mum?”

“Yes, honey.”

“Can I borrow your car while you are gone.”

“My car, what’s wrong with yours?”

“Oh, you know how old Jags go.”

“Yes, of course, I know. Your father and old Jags. Yes, borrow my car all you like. The keys will be on the hook.”

“Thanks mum.”

“We’ll speak, anyway.”

Her mum’s silver Volvo, was just the car to follow Jeremy, he’d never suspect. Amy felt chuffed with herself.

Amy’s at home. Her phone lights up with the car tracking app. Amy throws on shoes, grabbing her phone and wallet and races out to her mum’s Volvo.  The Swedish tractor fires right up.

He is driving south down Surrey Road, Commercial Road, Punt Road. 

Amy cuts across and guns the Volvo down Punt Road. She hopes there are no speed cameras.

Jeremy turns into Fitzroy Street, 

Amy takes Fitzroy Street.

Jeremy parks in a car park on Marine Parade.

Isn’t this where guys pick up guys, according to Amy’s friend Bruno. Surely not? No, Amy thinks.

Amy follows Jeremy at a safe distance.

Jeremy sits out on a beach seat at night and smokes a doobie on the foreshore.

The dope smoke blows back in Amy’s direction and smells strongly.

A few days later, Amy’s phone app lights up again. She follows Jeremy to his best mate’s house in Fitzroy. 

So, this is nothing Amy thinks. She wonders if this tracking device is useless.

Jeremy tells Ed what he’s done.

“Jesus, mate, you have to learn to keep it in your pants.”

“What should I do?”

“Nothing, just hang on.”

“Should I tell Amy?”

“Noooooooo, no, no, no, no, no,. no, do not tell Amy. Under no circumstances. You might just scrape through otherwise.”

“Chances?”

Ed sucks in air dramatically. “Not great.”

“50 50?”

Ed winces. “Sorry mate, but probably not. You have blown it, by all accounts.”

“You are a great help.”

“Well?” Ed raises his two hands in the air on either side of him.

“I don’t know what to do?”

“Well, I think the first thing you should do,” says Ed. “Is get a new secretary.”

“Won’t that be like chucking petrol on the situation.”

“You have no choice.”

Jeremy speaks to Pam in HR the next morning, Friday.

“It’s just a personality clash, that’s all,” says Jeremy.

“So, when do you think,” asks Pam. 

“Immediately,” says Jeremy.

Pam sucks in breath. “Could be tricky.”

“Well,” says Jeremy. “I’d be really appreciative.”

“Jennifer, Al Cole’s secretary is now free, now Al has retired. She is just in the pool now.”

“Jennifer would be great.”

“Okay, I can have it done by Monday.”

“Thanks Pam.

Jeremy and Amy have dinner together Saturday night. Jeremy seems like himself, thinks Amy. She stays at Jeremy’s place that night.

Monday morning, Emma is at his desk.

“Don’t think you can get rid of me that easily, you are mine.”

“Emma, I didn’t get rid of you, I just had you reassigned because I don’t think we can work together any longer.”

“Really.”

“It is for the best.”

“Who’s best?”

“Both of us.”

“You know, you may be right, when we announce our relationship to the staff, it’s probably better we are not working closely  together.”

“We’re not announcing our relationship to the staff.”

“No, not yet, says Emma. “But soon.” She walks out of his office.

Saturday night Jeremy and Amy have dinner. Amy stays the night with Jeremy.

Jeremy is in early Monday morning, before Jennifer arrives. He got the big new matter, he is starting work on it. It is going to be a lot of work.

Emma’s walks into his office. “Jeremy.”

“Emma, how are you?”

Jeremy just happens to have his phone in his hand when Emma enters his office, he manages to hit record on his phone and records their conversation.

“Disappointed?”

“How so?”

“You’ve been seeing Amy.”

“She is my girlfriend, Emma.”

“I thought we had this conversation, Jeremy.”

“I thought we did too,” says Jeremy.

“You are mine now, I thought we understood this.”

“Emma, I thought we understood that not to be true.”

“Don’t play with me, Jeremy.”

“Emma, I am not playing.”

Emma walks right up to Jeremy’s desk. “Don’t make me tell the world what you did.”

Jeremy realises he had to change where the conversation was going. “Emma, what did you mean I have been seeing Amy?”

“Saturday night, Donatella’s”

“You were spying on us?”

“Let’s just say, I was in the neighbourhood.”

“This has to stop, Emma.”

“This is never gonna stop, Jeremy. Don’t you get that now.”

“I’m sorry?”

They hear Jennifer arrive in the outside office. Emma turns on her heel and walks out of Jeremy’s office.

Jeremy clicks stop on the phone recording. He listens to it back. He got every word.

Jeremy’s friend Ed is a tech guy and he was going to edit the recorded message to make it sound worse than it is.

“Jesus mate, I don’t need to do anything to this.”

“You reckon?”

“Yeah, she’s a bunny boiler, for sure.”

“Just as it is?”

“Play it to HR, just like that.”

Jeremy and Amy have dinner on Saturday night. Amy stays the night.

Jeremy then plays the recorded message to HR Pam on Monday morning.

“Oh. Oh. Oh. Oh,” says Pam

“I’m sorry to say, but I think she is unhinged.”

“I’m not sure why you are sorry,” says Pam.

“Oh well, I just want the best for her.” Jeremy knows that is a lie, not that he wants anything bad for Emma, but he now just wants the best for him.

Pam moves her hand across the desk and covers Jeremy’s hand. “I’m sorry you have had to go through this.”

“I’m sorry it has come to this,” says Jeremy.

HR walks Emma out of the building midday that day.

Jeremy’s phone rings. It is Emma. He hesitates to answer, but does. He thinks ignoring her will probably only make things worse.

“How dare you?”

“How dare I what?” He knows what he dared to do, but what else could he say.

“You went to HR, you told them I threatened you.”

“You did.”

“You conveniently didn’t tell them what you did.”

“I didn’t do anything, Emma.” Jeremy wonders if she might be recording him.

“You had your fun, and then you dumped me like something dirty.”

“I’m sorry, I don’t know what you mean?”

“On your desk, me and you?”

“I’m sorry, Emma, but I still don't know what you mean?”

“You really are a slime, just like all the other men?”

“How many men have there been, Emma?” Yeah, sure, he was just playing her with that comment.

“Don’t try and make me sound like a slut.”

“You’re the one who said all the other men.”

“Don’t put words into my mouth.”

“There were literally the words you used.”

“You think you are so clever.”

“Oh Emma, that is so not true.”

“Mr Big Shot, every word to be believed by HR.”

“I just played them your words, Emma.”

“I hate you.”

“I’m sorry about that.” That kind of stung, and Jeremy was truly sorry by this point.

“You have ruined my life.”

“I don’t think that is true.”

Emma started to cry. “I hate you.”

“I’m sorry,” says Jeremy. He was sorry. He was sorry for everything he’d done.

“I hate you.”

“You’ve said that Emma.”

“I’m going to kill myself.”

“Let’s not be silly, Emma.”

“You have driven me to it.”

“I’m sorry you feel that way.”

“I’m going to kill myself and I’m going to blame you.”

“Emma don’t say such things…”

“What? Unless I mean them.”

“No, just don’t say that.”

“I’m going to.”

“Emma, no.”

“I will.”

“No. That is stupid, Emma.”

“I’m going to.”

“No, don’t be stupid.”

“If I can’t have you.”

“Emma?”

“Come over to my place then, so we can talk.”

“What would that do?”

“It might stop me from killing myself.”

“Oh, Emma seriously.”

“I am serious.”

“Really.”

“I’m going to do it.”

“No, Emma.”

“I hate you.” She ends the call.

Jeremy calls back but it goes to voicemail.

Jeremy is unnerved. He’s never known anyone to threaten suicide. He starts looking for the suicide hotline number, just to ask advice, but when he finds it, he wonders if there would be official notifications involved.

He paces his lounge room. What to do?

He suddenly grabs his keys and his wallet and heads out to his car.

The tracking app on Amy’s phone lights up. Amy runs out to her mum’s Volvo and drives off.

Toorak Road to Glenferrie Road to Riversdale Road. Amy catches the black car and follows it up Riversdale Road out to an address in Burwood.

Jeremy pulls up outside a non-descript house with a black car in the driveway and goes inside.

Amy wonders whose house this is. She sits and waits. As she waits, she gazes around at the area, when her eyes come back to the black car in the driveway. It’s a black Commodore. Its number plate is JN 032. Where had she seen that before?

Amy calls crime stoppers about the black Commodore later that night.

Emma’s brother is arrested a week later and charged with a series of bag snatches.

Jeremy tells Amy it was just a case he was dealing with, quite separate to the bag snatches. 

“It was just a coincidence.”

“Your ex-secretary’s brother.”

He shrugs “Amy, my case is now closed.”

Saturday night, Jeremy and Amy have dinner. Amy stays at Jeremy’s place that night.

Amy’s mother calls her.

“Hi mum, are you back?”

“Yes, darling we’re back today.”

“Did you have a good time?”

“Oh yes, a lovely time, Europe is gorgeous this time of year.”

“That’s great.”

“Safe and sound,” says her mum. “We saw your brother Corey, he’s base jumping in London with his buddy Carey. He’s well.”

“Of course he is, I never see enough of him now a days.”

“Anyway, it’s just a quick call to say we’re home, I’ve got lots of unpacking to do.”

“Okay, mum, I’m glad your home. Dad’s good?”

“Yes, yes, marvellous, you know your father,” says her mum. “Did you get your car fixed?” 

“My car,” repeats Amy?

“You were having some problem with it?”

“I was?” Amy is confused.

“You said there was something wrong with your car that’s why you wanted to borrow my car?”

“Oh?” Shit, Amy thinks to herself.

“Why did you borrow my car then?”

“Oh? Um?” Amy couldn’t think of anything.

“Not that I mind, but now something isn’t adding up?”

“Well?”

“Darling?”

“Um?”

“What is it?”

“Well, It’s Jeremy. I think there might have been something with another woman?”

“Oh, darling, really?”

“I think it was a work thing, but she’s now left the company?”

“Did he tell you?”

“No. But, as you just said, things didn’t add up?”

“Things didn’t add up?”

“There was a weird incident.”

“A weird incident? What?”

“Oh, it’s complicated, but it is over now.”

“How do you know there was another woman then?”

“He asked me to marry him, kind of out of the blue.”

“He asked you to marry him? What?”

“Yes.”

“Well, that’s wonderful. Why didn’t you tell me?”

“But, what if it was a guilty ask?”

“A guilty ask?”

“To make up for what he’d done.”

“Darling, I’m sorry… but what makes you think…”

“Oh mum, I just know.”

“It’s true darling, we do just know.”

“He said he was sorry, in the middle of the night. He thought I was asleep. I think he cried.”

“Well, so they should cry.”

“Did you think once a cheater always a cheater?”

“Oh darling, that is an incredibly complex question.”

“I’m going to give him another chance, though. What do you think?”

“I like Jeremy,” says her mother. “But it’s what you can live with? What can you live with?”

“I can live with this.”

“Well? Then? I think it will be okay.”

Friends & Lovers

My friends are looking up and opening their eyes and looking around. I love that my friends seem to be opening their hearts to mixed possibilities.

My friends are finding love in many places, in mixed race relationships, in partners, perhaps, their parents wouldn’t have chosen as easily.

Cutting edge love, they say.

Cutting edge, hey?

Asian girls traditionally like Asian boys, so I am told, and white girls traditionally like white boys. Not amongst my friends. White girls are liking Asian boys more and more and Asian girls are liking white boys just the same way. A black guy likes an Irish girl, and she loves him back the same way. I like my girlfriends the same as I like my cars.

Their children are usually beautiful, the best of both races involved. It’s practical, you know, mix the genes, make the race stronger, it’s true. For the racists amongst us. Not that me and my mates are adding to ‘it all’ in that way. We’ve only managed one by mistake, as it turns out.

It is a modern world, it is a new time with choices expanding exponentially, it would seem. Why deny yourself. Why? Thank the universe, we all collectively sigh in relief. Barriers are being broken down. Love is expanding. Suddenly, the world is a bigger place. Brighter too for everyone. And better, you know

Aki has been seeing Lachlan, they met at the pub. Aki has been marvelling at how good she feels in Lachlan’s big arms, as she said, but that is just Aki being shy, because what she really likes is Lachlan’s smile and his kind heart and how he smells.

Kaito has been seeing Ava, they met studying architecture, where I met both of them. She loves his handsome face and his muscular arms when he wraps them around her. “He is just so lovely, gentle and kind. He took me to his grandmother’s place and she cooked a feast welcoming me into the family. It was really lovely.”

Lachlan took Aki to a football match with his mates and they ate meat pies and drank beer and Lachlan wrapped Aki up in his jacket when the weather turned cold.

Kaito to Ava on a car rally with his mates. Kaito has a Subaru rally car and he is promising to teach Ava how to navigate.

Aki took Lachlan to her favourite movie at The Astor Picture house. Lachlan said he loved it.

Ava took Kaito snorkelling for abalone at her favourite beach. Kaito said he’d never been snorkelling before.

One day, Aki found herself pregnant to Lachlan quite unexpectedly. She was worried what her mum was going to say, but her mum said she should stay calm and really decide in her heart what she wanted to do.

“Don’t worry about what other people think,” her mother said. “That won’t do you any good. Just find out what is in Lachlan’s heart, that is what is important.”

“I’m in his heart, mum,” said Aki.

“But is the little one in his heart too, Aki?” asked her mum.

“Yes. No, I don’t know,” said Aki.

“Well, my darling that is what you need to think about now.”

Grandma told Aki it was a blessing. “It is a joy and a life long delight to be blessed with a child.”

“But, we’re not married grandma.”

“Oh darling,” said Grandma. “That is not the important bit, the important part is the child and Lachlan. Does he want a child for which to be responsible?”

“He does now,” said Aki.

“That is a good start,” said Grandma. “But you had better find out for certain.”

Aki took Lachlan to the country for a picnic to tell him about the baby. Lachlan was over joyed and said he wanted to be a father. They aggressed the would continue living in their separate house for the time being.

They made love on the picnic blanket in warm afternoon sun.

“I have never had sex in broad day light out in the open before,” said Aki.

“I can’t believe how warm the sun was on my bare arse as we made love,” said Lachlan.

Aki laughed.

Lachlan’s parents were overjoyed at the baby news, saying they couldn’t wait to be grandparents.

Ava and Kaito decided to get married. In the summer, they got married bare foot in a derelict church with a dirt floor, they had bought a year before, less than an hour away from home. There were 50 of their friends helping them celebrate. Aki was 9 months pregnant when she attended Kaito and Ava’s wedding. Ava wanted to feel the earth as she said, I do. Kaito agreed to do it too. The whole dinner was in the filed in front of the church. There was no back up plan, and the weather held.

Baby Tao was born at the end of the summer. A beautiful baby boy. “We make pretty good children,” Lachlan said to Aki after Tao was born.

Kaito’s architecture practice started on plans for the wedding church renovation for Kaito and Ava to use as a country house.

“Nothing fancy,” said Ava. “Just a roof and windows to make it water proof.”

“And some heating to make it warm,” said Kaito.

“And a deck on the north side to sit on.”

Lachlan’s law firm gave him parental leave to help Aki who took a year’s leave from her doctor’s practice.

Aki and Lachlan bought a beach house down the great ocean road just before Aki’s 12 month parental leave was up.

We all went and celebrated life on Aki and Lachlan’s beach house deck the next summer. We all went snorkelling around the rocks at Wye River. That was a ‘hoot’, as ‘they’ say.

Kaito organised a car rally to the country church house when it was done. Lachlan acted as navigator. I got my old Alfa 33 16V rally car out of storage and our mate Joshua went navigator. The others drove up in normal cars. Lachlan was so excited by the rally experience he said he intended to buy a rally car of his own.

We all take turns in looking after Tao, he has a whole posse of acquired aunties and uncles who take care of him. He is a lovely little boy, easy going, easy to look after.

I looked after him one weekend where I was busy doing stuff, and I put him in one of those baby back packs and took him everywhere I went and he never complained.

My girlfriend saw me with Tao in the back pack that weekend and she said she was sure she ovulated. As I said, he’s a cute kid. I remind her of that sometimes. She strokes my face and smiles. “A moment of madness." Shrug. "That's all.”

No, none of the rest of us are having kids. We’re all in our 30s and no one else has reproduced yet. We all might say we want kids, but none of us want the disruption.

Ginger has been dating Chaquille for the last 6 years. He continues to make her smile.

“Oh, he’s just so big and strong.” That’s all Ginger has said in her gentle Irish accent. Then she blushes in the cutest way.

Chaquille is a personal trainer and a huge dude.

Ginger just says no if she is questioned about children.

My girlfriend, Xavier, is Italian, of course. Xavier Saverio. Those of you who know etymology, is it? Or is it Onomastics? (I should know this being an English major?) My girlfriend’s name is essentially Xavier Xavier. I make the tomato sauce with her family every year in their second garage in the garage. I’ve been to all the cousin’s weddings. I’ve picked veggies with Papa in his back yard. I’ve driven Ma to many of her doctor’s appointments. She calls me a good boy.

Xavier has her heart set on making partner, and nothing else, to be honest, is as important to her. She says, I don’t have time, if anyone presses her about kids.

And I don’t really give a fig, not really. Sure, I’d probably like to see a mini me of myself, but? Aren’t there too many people on the planet already?

Cody and Quinn are committed environmentalists. Quin came here on a GAP year from her Californian home, just on a whim to get as far away from home as she could. She realised pretty quickly she could never return to the States. If anyone ever anyone criticises America and then looks to Quinn to apologise, her normal answer is, with a shrug, “They are good reasons why I live in Australia.”

“Do you know what sort of life we are inflicting our kids with climate change being what it is?” asks Quinn.

“No, I don’t,” I say.

“No, exactly,” says Quinn. “How could we in all conscience do it to them?”

Besides Cody and Quin are house flippers, and they are juggling enormous financial debt at any given time.

Caitlyn is up front and honest, I love that about Caitlyn. “Fuck no, I’m far too selfish and self centred for that.” She lights another Marlboro. 

Joshua agrees with Caitlyn and kisses her on the side of the head. “I’m with her.”

Caitlyn smiles at Joshua as though he is just the cutest thing and she kisses him back.

Joshua is the cutest thing, of course. He is an English model now walking the runways of the world.

Caitlyn is a highly strung actress, known for that soap, As The World Churns. She does a lot of live theatre, we are all always going to see her in her latest play.

“You know, I would have said the same things as you guys,” says Aki. “But then Tao comes along and changed our lives completely.”

“For the better,” says Lachlan.

“Put me down to baby sit any weekend you like,” says Caitlyn. “And I mean this with all the love in the world, as long as I can give him back.”

"You can," says Aki.

“I’m doing a beach shoot in Bali in a month’s time,” says Joahua. “Why don’t you guys come and bring Tao.”

“You are on,” says Lachlan.

“I’ll take him on his first environmental protest,” says Quinn. When Aki screws up her face, Quinn adds quickly. “When he’s old enough, of course.”

“You can put me down for baby sitting duty too,” says Cody. “You never ask me to look after him?”

“You are on,” says Aki.

“You always seem to be too busy on the tools,” says Lachlan.

“Actually, I’ve been meaning to ask you?” say Ginger. “I’m doing a shoot for, um, well, it is for, well, a anti racism campaign, I guess is the easiest way to explain it, now that we are talking about Tao, and I’d like to use him for the shoot.”

“Oh,” says Lachlan.

“I don’t see why not,” says Aki.

And then Lachan looks at Aki like he didn’t agree at all.

You see Ginger has made quite a name for herself as an edgy photographer. The full nudes of Chaquille come into everyone’s mind. Her real name is Saoirse Quinn under which she has becomes quite famous.

“Not nudes,” says Lachlan.

“Of course not,” says Ginger. “But I do want to make a feature of his, and Chaquille’s skin colour.”

She’s called Ginger because Chaquille couldn’t pronounce Saoirse and Ginger has red hair.

“He’d have a full time body guard in Chaquille,” Ginger added, as though that might sweeten the pot.

You haven’t seen Chaquille, his legs are bigger than my torso, if that gives you some idea. Chaquille Ross is a big boy. Intimidating to look at, but the biggest softy under all of that.

“What about you?” asks Aki.

“Me?” says Ginger.

“Yes, you haven’t put you opinion in,” says Quinn.

“My opinion?” questions Ginger.

“Yes,” says Caitlyn. “Where do you stand?”

“Where do I stand?” says Ginger.

“Kids,” says Caitlyn, Quinn and Aki together.

“Oh, with my red hair,” says Ginger?

“It’s a life changing experience,” says Aki.

“I’m not sure I want to change my life,” says Ginger.

“It changes your life for the better,” says Aki.

“Listen to Aki,” says Chaquille. “Listen to what she is saying.”

Chaquille looks at Aki nodding his head. Chaquille is the only one of us who really wants to be a dad.

“How would our kids come out,” says Ginger?

“A black kid with red hair,” says Caitlyn.

“He’d be mocha choc orange,” I say.

“Mocha choc orange,” repeats Chaquille. "Trust the writer." He laughs. “I’d have a kid in any colour.”

Not Rape

"It wasn't rape," said Doug. "She got me all skank-arse drunk out of it and then drugged me, I mean, what could I do but oblige her, willingly, it seemed like the polite thing to do."

“Oblige her, willingly?”

“It seemed only fair, when she’d gone to all the trouble of getting the drugs and slipping them into my drink.”

“What could you do?”

“Well, not be too critical of her work, go with it, it’s tough work, but you know what they say?”

“No, what do they say?”

“Good for her, somebody has to do it.”

“Somebody has to do it?”

“Credit where credit is due. She bought the tape, she bought the knife, which bought a genuine feel to the whole thing, even if it was small, you know, that’s not a knife, this is a knife, chuckle. She laced the drink, she rented the room, she went to all that trouble.”

"That took some organising."

"I had to admire her work."

Ivan held up his fist, Doug bumped his fist with Ivan’s.

“You can’t help but admire it.” Ivan shook his head in admiration.

“Yeah, sure. Knives, tape, drugs," said Doug. "Just the organisation alone, you know, has to be commended.”

“Has to be commended?”

“Yeah, not to mention the muscle who cornered me in the parking lot.”

“There were other people involved?”

“Yeah, two huge thugs, in the car park, when I was trying to get to my car.”

“After you’d been slipped the mickey?”

“Yeah, the Mickey. Laugh. One of these huge bruisers was called Mickey.”

“What?”

“No, not what you are thinking. Mickey kept his pants on through the whole procedure.”

“I’m pleased to hear that.”

“I was out in the car park, it was dark and I was losing the fight against the strong sedatives, it turns out she’d given me.”

“Sedatives?”

“Yeah, Rohypnol. The date rape drug. Never thought it would be used on me.”

“Jesus!”

“And suddenly there were two massive guys standing in front of me, as I stumbled towards my car.”

“Massive guys.”

“They both had on shorts that looked as though they belonged to their little brothers. They had those massive thighs the ones that are all veiny.”

“Veiny?”

“You know, like the skin is set to bust right off the flesh they are so tight.”

“Mr Universe?”

“Two of them, right in fucking front of me.”

"Right in front of you?"

"Like they were blocking my way."

"Jesus!"

“What was it that my old dad used to say, like two brick shit houses.”

“They looked impressive?”

“Except they were blokes. I tried to walk, ha ha, stagger, around them thinking they'd just accidentally gotten there.”

“But not accidently?”

“No, that became pretty obvious when I couldn’t get around them no matter what I did.”

“What did you do?”

“I remember looking up at these couple of man mountains, and one of them said my name. I think my last thought was, how does this guy know my name.”

“That was your last thought?”

“The last thing I remember.”

“And?”

"I woke up in that dingy house, in that dingy bedroom, with both my wrists tied behind me to a brass bed head, and my ankles tied to the brass bed end like some terrible cliché from the worst B movie you’d ever seen.”

“You woke up like that?”

“It was more of a 'come to' situation. Jesus did I feel groggy. It took me the longest time just to kind of understand where I was.”

“Understand?”

“Well, there wasn’t so much understanding, as I didn’t have a fucken clue, there was a lot more, um, what would you call it, absorbing the situation.”

“Absorbing the situation?”

“Um, taking in something that was an absolute and complete befuddlement of all of my sense. I had no fucken clue where I was, or how I got there.”

“No clue?”

“Nothing. Just a huge fat blank.”

“Jesus.”

“It was as if my reality had been snatched from me, and while I was unconscious a new reality was morphed in.”

“Like that?”

“Actually, I don’t know why I say like, there was no fucken like about it, that is what had happened, I just didn’t know it at that point.”

“You. didn’t know what you didn’t know?”

“Exactly.”

“So, you woke up?”

“In the dingiest bedroom you have ever seen. With Mark Normand comedy playing constantly on a screen.”

“Fuck me. What did you do?”

“What could I do? Nothing.”

“Nothing.”

“Nothing. I had no idea where I was. I had no idea how I got there. I assumed those two muscled guys had something to do with it, but what good did that piece of information do me?”

“Nothing?”

“Nothing. I had no idea what they had to do with it, but that was all I had to go on.”

“Not much.”

“No. Except for that room.”

“The room you woke up in?”

“Except for that. It was green like ferns.”

“Like ferns?”

“No. More like algae. Rotting algae.”

“You mean it was wet, damp?”

“Not as such, just the colour, the wallpaper was the colour of slime, peeling off the walls in places. The ceiling was nicotine yellow as if a million cigarettes had been smoked in there. The carpet, what I could see of it, was green shag.”

“Green shag?”

“Old, like it was straight out of the 70s.”

“70s shag, sounds like my teenage years.” 

“There was one small window with a nicotine yellow blind pulled all the way down. It was the kind of room a 100 year old chain smoking grandma with dementia was left in to die, that was the feeling it gave me.”

“That gives me shivers just hearing it.”

“Until her emaciated, cancer ridden, 101 year old carcass was carried out in a body bag.”

“Poor grandma.”

“Poor fucken me.”

“Did it smell?”

“Like sweaty gym clothes left in a gym bag for too long.”

“Was it cold?”

“I was probably lucky it wasn’t winter.”

“So, what happened?”

“What happened? Ah, what happened?”

“Give me the gory details.”

“Well, it turned out to be my stalker, mad Charlotte.”

The Office

And then I was running down the street and the office was on fire behind me. I don't know if it was just that I was more sensitive to the smell knowing the building was burning, than if I hadn't known. I could certainly smell it in the air, but nobody around me seemed to be paying it much attention.

And then I was home. Closing the front door.

They were photographic chemicals, the delivery guy said. He made some joke about not lighting a match around them, probably the same joke he'd made at every stop ever since he began making his rounds, and jokes. Ha ha, everybody laughed. He was clearly a funny guy.

I’m guessing her never expected someone to, actually, light a match around them, despite what he said.

It had to be done, I decided there and then on the spot, as I was accepting the delivery. Everybody was full of so much talk against the evil overlords, but nobody was up for any action, despite the talk. If the despots in charge were to be toppled, something had to be done. Clearly.

I only tipped one of the containers over and, yes, I had to throw one lit match – I first considered using my cherished zippo, but realised that would look too much like evidence, then I found that box of matches in a draw – it didn't half make a woof when it caught. I was glad that I had hustled myself out of there when I had.

I liked the symbolism of the HR department going up first. Witches burn, at the stake, wasn’t that always done? 

No? 

It was some hobby of Di's, the photographic materials. She likes taking children's portraits, for her friend’s kids, or something like that. (I would say a hobby of the barren, but she had a beautiful son, I should talk about him?) I was lucky to get a moment to myself in the office, from the mail room, from the counter. And there it was, the few moments I needed, just like that.

All I had to do was unscrew the cap and roll up that old rag, like I’d seen them do the movies. What movie was that? The rag was one of Di’s scarves, I liked that touch. I knew it would come in handy some day for something, when I acquired it. The rest, as they say, is now history.

The people in the street were very slow in noticing the smoke billowing from the building, and I was able to get all the way up Main Street and around the corner. I just naturally check where the CCTV cameras are because, you know, in my fantasies of also had of fixing the restaurant next door to my house that doesn’t adhere to its noise levels, so I knew which route to avoid. Usually, the restaurant ‘fix’ involved a gun, and watching them all drop one by one but, you know, fire makes just as strong a statement. I knew exactly where to walk, I knew just to walk casually, as though it was any afternoon that I was walking home and I was home quickly, cuddled up to my dog Nudge.

I couldn’t tell if I was nervous, or excited? I was like a ginger horse in the wind, as my granny used to say. So, I made a cup of tea, it was the end of the day, after all, and drank it down strong and hot. 

My granny also used to say that nothing can’t be solved with a hot, strong cuppa. She used to stand the spoon up in hers, that is the expression, isn’t it?

The fire sirens seemed to wail loudly from every direction. (I only took the job in the first place because it was close to home)

Fatty Cake Snoop Lady, Lauren, my boss, had headed home early on one of her many excuses to head home early. Translation, she was heading out for a big dinner for one. She and her fat boyfriend, who she met at the Big Girl’s Night, for men who are interested in the larger lady, had split up weeks ago. Apparently, he’d found a bigger girlfriend.

I was surprised that was possible. But, apparently…

Our anorexic bitch boss, Belinda, who had been jogging the stairs manically, in all her decrepit glory, as she does starting around 5pm every night, was greeted with flames when she came back down to our floor. She called Lauren to see if she and I had been accounted for.

So, Belinda didn’t burn, more is the pity, maybe water would be more effective against the likes of her. "I’m melting! I’m melting!" The thought made me laugh.

Lauren called me in her little girl voice and broke the news to me, sometime in the evening, which meant she finished her all-you-can-eat buffet first, before she called.

“Oh Josh, I have some bad news,” Lauren’s voice was a near whisper coming down the phone, not unlike how those young boys would have heard Michael Jackson.

She told me that the head of HR, sorry People & Culture, Di's chiffon pant suit caught alight as she tried to escape and, from all accounts, she went up something like a Katherine Wheel, she was so panicked to get it put out. And all that black hair of hers, not a wig after all. So many people make the mistake of trying to beat the flames out in their panic.

“Oh, really when?” I feigned shock. “Now? That is terrible.”

I wondered if Di had a momentary realisation that I was as unsuitable for the role as she had always claimed, before she, at best, burned, or, at worst, suffocated? I guess we’ll never know? Shiver! I was made for that role. Or, more precisely, that role was made for me. She shouldn’t have plotted to get rid of me, after all I have put up with.

Lauren told me there would have to be an investigation, the police and the fire department would coordinate.

We were all advised to stay home until further notice. 

“It would be on full pay,” said Lauren. “Another office will be sourced quickly.”

“Could nothing be saved?”

“I don’t think so.”

“Do they have any leads?”

“I think it is too early to tell.”

“I see,” I said. I wanted more details than that.

“Apparently, it started in HR,” said Lauren.

“All that hot gossip, no doubt.”

Lauren laughed nervously into the phone.

“Do you think Di suffered?”

“Well, it all looks pretty grim for her,” said Lauren.

That made me smile. I knew I had to be careful not to let Lauren hear the smile in my voice. “Well, that’s…” Oh, I just couldn’t say it. “That’s…” Um, my mouth just wouldn’t work. “Poor.” It was poor that I couldn’t finish the sentence. 

“Yes, poor Di,” said Lauren. “We’re all feeling it.”

“We are.” My voice just naturally went up on the 'are', like a question, but Lauren didn’t notice.

“At least Belinda fared better,” said Lauren. “They don’t think she will be kept in hospital for very long.”

“Two birds…”

“I’m sorry?”

“Two of them,” I said. “Who’d have thought?” Dared to dream. My fingers were twitching, I was trying to keep them still, but I was having trouble.

“It’s awful,” said Lauren.

“Awful,” I repeated.

“I’ll keep you updated,” she said. She hit end.

It had been my role, it was coming to an end and they wanted someone permanent. Lauren had asked me to apply. “You are a shoe in,” she said.

A shoe in, I thought, that sounded good, even if I didn’t exactly know that I wanted the job. Lauren kept checking with me that I had applied.

They had a meeting about the role. My team managers were quite keen for me to get the role, apparently.

But there was Di, head of People & Culture, even if we didn’t exactly have a People & Culture department. She said in that meeting, in front of everyone, all the senior managers.

“Couldn’t we get someone younger,” said the head of People & Culture. “Someone more ‘with it.’” She would have said with her Jackie Kennedy hair do, now died a little too black for her paling skin, her pearls, her cashmere scarf and her silk blouse with her Katherine Hepburn trousers.

Don’t employee him, he is too old. Some one more with it? Seriously?

I mean, apart from all the employment laws she just broke, what was she, a 65 year old woman whose had too much work, with a sphincter that is permanently clenched? With a soft voice she has perfected as a purr? Does anyone buy that voice? With an HR department with only one person under 40? Fat Karen. 

And, I have to say, that I didn’t really, completely, want the job – or vengeance – up until that point.

Of course, I wasn’t in that meeting and I was told 3rd hand. Is OCD Jess prone to exaggeration? Not something I had thought about until that point.

At first, of course, I didn’t want the job after that. Oh fuck you, I’m leaving. 

I thought about Sarah, who I temporarily replaced originally, and how she told me that when she found herself taking tentative steps out into the traffic one night after work one night when the pressure had built to such an extent, she knew she had to say something.

I thought of Jesse, who had been the original ‘with it’ young thing who’d replaced me, and how she had felt so miserable after months in the job that she too had trouble making sense of her life altogether.

That was when Sara called me back to fill in, because she had no idea what she was doing. No idea. That was when she asked me to take the job, which I was disinclined to do because I realised she was a major part of the problem, not knowing what she was doing.

But then moments after I returned, Sara was walked out by the bitch Belinda – because the cruelty is the point of her life – Di’s, I can only assume, ‘with it’ manager who resembles an anorexic only moments off death, er, treatment.

Sara and I were at our desks after lunch one day. Belinda entered the room, saying to Sara, “Can I have a word with you?”

“Sure,” replied Sara.

“Would you like to get a coffee downstairs at the coffee shop.”

“Yes, okay,” said Sara. At that point, she gave me a wide-eyed look, which I recognised as odd, but I was unclear why?

Sometime later, Di came into the office, with a waft of Chanel and without saying a word she picked up Sara’s bag and left the office.

I never saw Sara again.

Sara was replaced by Fatty Cake Snoop Lady, my new obese Chief Financial Officer, who also encouraged me to take the permanent job.

It was Sara who told me what Di had said about me as a parting gift, I think by phone a few days later.

Fatty Cake Snoop Lady, you ask? Well, she was bought in as a (parenthesis) consultant to look at why so many people had been through the Financial Accountant’s position that I filled in for, a month, or maybe 6 weeks before Sara’s departure. Sara and I didn’t trust her, didn’t believe she had been bought in to help, hence the ‘snoop.’ She was obese. Now, when I say obese, she seemingly had a whole other entity hidden under the front of her dress which at times seemed to be moving independently to her, hence the ‘fatty.’ Just about every lunch time, certainly after Sara had been walked out by the anorexic, she would bring me back cake. 

“I picked up this lovely chocolate cake while I was out at lunch, and I got you a piece,” she’d say to me, hence the cake.

She immediately took over Sara’s role, and nothing more was said. Really, very little. “Sara has decided to look for new challengers at a new company,” she said.

“Really,” I said.

So, there you have it, I was in office services as Di said there was an important delivery and she had no one there to accept it, 

“Could you please wait for it, Josh, it should only be moments away. I have an important meeting I have to get to.” 

So, I did. 

It was a delivery of personal items for Di. The driver told me it was photographic chemicals for Di’s hobby, as I was staring down at the box of stuff, my phone rang.  

“Oh Josh, it’s Lauren.”

“Hi, sorry to call you at home…”

“I’m still in the office.”

“Why are you still in the office?” 

“Di wanted me to wait for a late delivery”

“Di did?”

“Yes.”

“Oh yes, she was going on a date tonight…”

“A date?”

“Yes. I guess it’s a last hurrah… you know, at her age.” Lauren’s one weakness, she liked to gossip.

“I see.”

“Did I leave my blah blah at work?”

“I don’t know, but wait, I’ll look.”

And there it was on her desk.

“Yes,” I said, “It is here.”

“Oh good.”

“Do you want me to do anything with it.”

“No, I just wanted to know where it was.”

That was not long before the delivery. No, not ideal. And if I’d known what was going to happen not long after that, I would have said I was at home. Still, it couldn’t be help, what was done, was done.

Don’t light a match around them, said the delivery guy. That was the last thought that went through my mind, as I flicked the match and made for the back lift door. Don’t use in case of fire, I read, as I pushed the button

I chuckled. I put Nina Simone on. It was definitely a Nina Simone moment. In The Dark started to play and I thought of the office again. 

I sat back in my lounge chair. I lit a cigarette. I blew the smoke into the air rather exaggeratedly.

How would I know that Di would come back to get her delivery? I wasn’t to know that.

I didn’t know that Belinda was coming back to the office having been out exercising every last gram off her 40 kilo frame at the gym.

I wasn’t to know that they had met up in the carpark and were probably heading up in the other lift to me, probably as I got out on the ground floor.

It was good that I didn’t know, as I probably would never have lit that match and chucked it at the spilt chemicals. 

And we never would have got the delicious result that we did.

The police said it was suspicious. They also acknowledge that I was the last person in the office.

“Yes, I took delivery and left the office immediately.”

As long as you stick to the exact truth, right up until you can’t, you should be okay, I told myself. Get away with it. That way, your story never changes, you can’t afford to change your story, no you can’t.

“And you left them on the head of People & Culture’s desk?”

“Yes, that is correct.”

“Was there anybody in the office when you left?”

“No, I don’t think so. The delivery took longer than anticipated, so I think I was the last.”

“So, Belinda Horton wasn’t in the office?”

“No, I don’t think so.”

“So, she wasn’t still in the office before the fire started?”

“I don’t think so,” I said. “Although, she could have been in her office and I just didn’t realise.”

“What is your impression of Belinda Horton?”

“Oh, I think she is possibly unhappy in her life, as she seems to take it out on the staff, for no apparent reason.”

“So, is she not liked in the office?”

“I don’t always understand he reasons for doing things.”

“Can you elaborate on that?”

“Well, sometimes the only point I can see to her behaviour is cruelty.”

“That’s very blunt.”

“Oh,” I said. “I assumed you wanted me to be blunt.”

“Could you make any comment on her health.”

“Well, she trains 5 nights a week, and her weight must now be down to 50 kilos.”

“Has that always been the case?”

“Oh, no, this has been true for her for the last 12 months.”

“And would you say her, as you say, cruelty has escalated with her loss of weight?”

“She’s always been hard work, but to answer your question, yes.”

“Do you think her obvious diminished physical capacity has affected her mental state?”

“Well, in my untrained capacity, I’d have to say yes.”

“Well, thanks you Mr Smith.”

“Oh, call me Josh.”

“Thank you, Josh.”

Di’s funeral was a simple affair, from all accounts, I didn’t attend.

Sometime later, Belinda left the company and from all reports entered a facility for the bewildered, as they say in nice circles.

I turned down the full time position and left the company.