We’d reached the ‘business end of the season’ and winter in Perth was colder than it had been for the last forty-seven years, or so the weather bureau said. All I could see was rain and, on the odd occasion, a slash of fog that ran along the Stirling Highway as I drove Paige to school or came home from a shift, late at night. I couldn’t have given a fig less. Underneath my skin it was as hot as Hades. Sam was my boyfriend. I had sixty-five thousand, seven hundred and nineteen dollars in the bank. I’d been allowed back into the Pandora shop after signing a declaration that I’d never ogle or kiss the glass cases again unless I was buying something. Life was brilliant.
To end the rostered part of the season, the boys had gone on an ‘away’ trip to some godforsaken part of the countryside. I knew it was only for a day and Sam had promised to be good so I was, sort of, okay with it. I mean, I trusted this new improved version of Sam. It was other women I didn’t trust. They were like leaches when I was out of range and between them and the devil—whose name was Mischief—I was a little worried. Sam and Mischief worked closely together, it seemed. It was something to do with Sam’s sarcastic nature, I was sure but when Mischief was around Sam rubbed people the wrong way in the name of humour. They didn’t get it. What they did get was angry and Sam was often on the receiving end. I couldn’t name the number of Saturday nights in the recent past when we’d been ejected from venues because Sam had incited some sort of riot with his words, then laughed all the way home.
After enquiring about the nature of the day, I was informed that womenfolk did not attend ‘away’ trips. I hadn’t bothered to ask why. All I knew was that I found myself, after finishing my dinner shift, sitting in a booth at The Lederhosen with Kirby, Melanie and Sasha. Kirby had told me on the phone, that it was customary for the ladies to gather in one place to wait for the lads and tonight The Lederhosen had been designated that place. I had a feeling they’d come to peruse my second place of work so that they could gauge whether I was suitable friend material but I didn’t say anything. I was happy to have something to do on a Saturday night when Sam was away and Alex had been struck down with a case of tonsillitis.
Kirby handed me a champers, as I slid into the booth next to her. “Like, totally quaint uniform, Millie. Frills are like, so, this season.”
I looked down at my red checked dress. I was like Dorothy from the Wizard of Oz next to her. Only Kirby was wearing the sparkly shoes. “Should I go and change? I have spare clothes out the back.” Not that I felt like changing. After being up all night for the last two nights with the twins and a nasty case of gastro, putting party clothes on was the last thing on my mind.
Mel shushed me with her hand. “We don’t give a flying fuck what you’re wearing, hon’, sit and relax. Anyway, the boys will be back soon. I’ll bet Sam loves it when you wear that little number.”
I grinned. It did look like something you’d see in a German porn flick starring Naughty Helga.
We sat waiting and waiting. And waiting. These road trips were very long and tedious, or so I was told. It hadn’t occurred to me that Bunbury was only two hours so by car and that the boys should have been back by nine. And as we waited we talked about all manner of inane things.
“Why girls don’t go on the trip?” I asked. I couldn’t get a sensible answer from Sam. All he’d muttered was something about tradition.
“Girls don’t go, Millie, because girls stay and keep the home fires burning,” Sasha explained. Peevishly, she rapped her fingernails on the table. Then she pulled out her phone, checking for missed calls. Again.
“And make salads for barbecues,” Kirby added. “I make a totally divine marshmallow and mango. I’ll have to email you the recipe. It’s like, unreal.”
We stared blankly at her. Sometimes it was quite difficult to follow Kirby’s train of thought. She was on a different platform to the rest of the world.
“It’s one of those unwritten rules,” Mel explained. “Like the one that says girls can’t be in the Boat Race Team even though most of us can down a beer faster than the boys. It isn’t the done thing. It would make them less manly and us less girly.” The others nodded sagely. They’d been part of the club a long time. They’d witnessed many a girl come and go who couldn’t keep up with the program. So far, broken trophies aside, I was faring well.
Kirby shifted in her seat. “The boys like to get away so they can, like, do whatever it is that men do when we’re not around.” She didn’t seem to care that Rambo was off doing whatever with whomever. What happened on the road, stayed on the road unless you got tagged on Facebook the next day. She was never going to hear about it.
“Don’t you worry?”
“They go on a ‘tour bus’ that leaves loaded with alcohol and returns loaded with various bits of junk collected on the journey, like… um … town signs, bollards and, once, a hideous one hundred year old statue,” she said, matter-of-factly. “What’s there to be concerned about?”
“Oh, I don’t know, the fact that it’s stealing?”
The others gawked at me in disgust. Boyish pranks were not in the realm of criminal activity. They were, well, boyish pranks.
“Don’t be silly. As if Bunbury would miss a sign or two. It took six months before that misplaced statue made the news. Not that it matters anyway; the Hornets are banned from the town centre after Sam ran down Blair Street with a lit newspaper between his butt cheeks. Apparently, his display did little for the café culture they were trying to cultivate.”
Oh dear. And just when I thought it was safe to call him my boyfriend.
A moment later there was a vibration from my apron pocket. It was a message from Sam.
<bac soon hav big sprs!!! xxx>
With visions of what the girls had told me swirling through my head, I began to imagine all sorts of things. Had he stolen a big spear to bring home? What in heaven’s name would I do with it? I couldn’t see Adele letting me bring it inside the house. Puzzled, I showed the message to Sasha, who shook her head in confusion. Her message from Simmo was equally puzzling.
<mt me at flat in 30>
“Why would he to do that? We haven’t had that flat for over a year. God. He’s probably pissed again and forgotten we’re married. Once, after we’d been married about six months, he got legless and forgot where we lived for two days. I was about to file a missing persons report when he turned up,” she groaned. “He should stop playing rugby, I’m positive it’s making him punch drunk.”
“You mean he should stop shagging other women and face up to his responsibilities as a husband. Christ Sash’, when are you going to see that man as he is? I think, if it’s at all possible, he’s gotten worse since you got married. He needs an ultimatum.”
Sasha looked down at the cryptic message on her phone and flipped the phone shut. She knew the truth; facing it was a little more difficult.
Then, Mel’s phone buzzed. Pressing the message button, she glanced at the screen, slamming it onto the table with venom. “Fuckwit.”
“Who?”
“Johnny.”
“What did he want?”
“Here….” She threw the phone towards me. “He’s such a dickhead.”
<u hav awesome tits. Cn I hav a feel?>
“At least he asked this time,” I replied.
Mel merely snorted and finished her glass of bubbles.
“And he remembers who you are,” Sasha added.
“And he, like, never says you’ve got a big bum either.”
I sat listening to their rants. I knew I complained about Sam, everyone did, but compared to what the other girls put up with he was a prince in my book. A smartarse cocky prince, but a prince all the same.
“So, you like Sam a lot?” Mel asked, after a minute. She was twiddling her fingers through one of the napkins I had so lovingly folded, trying to keep her tone light, but I could tell she was fishing.
“No we’re just friends.” It didn’t sound convincing but my feelings for Sam were developing into something that was way more than friends. I didn’t, however, want to shout it to the world if it wasn’t going to be reciprocated on a deeper level than a funny clown with a bunch of balloons.
“Oh fuck off, Millie. You’re so transparent. You drool when he looks at you.”
“Maybe a little.”
Melanie looked thoughtful. She was very good a reading people, or so I was finding. That was why none of the boys tried to pull the wool over her eyes. They didn’t have a hope of success.
“The whole bastard thing does it for you,” she said. “Even though you’re revolted by that, you love the way he treats you and looks at you. So what if he’s stubborn and pigheaded and a little too out there with his humour, even for me. You absolutely love it. What he needs, you know, is someone softer to calm him down. He needs you. You’re perfect. That’s why he’s hot for you.”
“You think Sam’s that into me?”
“No, I think Sam is in love with you and because of that he’ll do anything you ask, even tone down the bastard. We’ve noticed the changes.”
Kirby and Sasha nodded enthusiastically.
“He’s, like, totally a new man. He was cool before but now he’s nice too.”
“He hasn’t groped my bum in weeks. You’ve done that Millie.”
Looking around, I wished Sam would hurry; I needed to see his face so I could find out if what they said was true. If he was in love with me it would be all over his face, wouldn’t it?
At about eleven fifteen, Kirby pointed to the window. “Sam’s here.”
“Where?” I heard the sound of screaming and laughing. People were gawking and pointing at the window. I followed their lead to spot a bottom, no two muscular bottoms, quite naked, pushed against the panes of glass. One had writing in permanent marker across the cheeks that read, ‘Millie is my sex kitten.’
Oh God. Sam.
It had been a matter of days since we’d had the talk and he’d promised to be more sensitive, to try harder. How could he be so juvenile? Surreptitiously, I looked to the bar. It was a busy evening. Bob must have gone out the back to connect a new keg. His too-darkened hair was nowhere in sight. Dianne had her head in the fridge searching for something and saving me from what could have been real trouble. She would have recognised Sam’s butt in an instant. She’d perved on it often enough. Nervous, I looked back to the window. The bums had disappeared. I dreaded to think what they would be replaced with.
All a fluster, Kirby shuffled to the edge of the booth and with a shove of her hip, pushed me out and ran to the bar. Towing me behind, she wedged herself in between old Jack-one-arm and a bikie. Then she waved a credit card at Dianne who had surfaced from under the counter.
“May I have four schooners of Guinness, please?” She tittered and gave her neck a quick squirt with Britney perfume while she waited.
“Those boys,” Kirby giggled, unconcerned. “They’re so naughty.”
From behind her, I reached across to pick up two of the beers, helping her to carry them to the table. “Don’t you care?”
It amazed me that her boyfriend, the Assistant Principal at a well known, highly respected school had also flashed his bare bum to innocent bystanders and she was calmly buying schooners like he was a returning war hero.
“What’s there to care about?” She giggled again as she lined up the beers on the end of the table. “It’s, like, not my butt on the line.”
Then, laughing at her own joke, she turned to the others. “Hey, that was good wasn’t it, Sash, did you get it… not my butt?”
Sasha sighed and patted Kirby’s hand.
“Look, Millie,” Sasha explained. “The boys do stupid stuff like this all the time. They have high powered, high stress jobs. Playing rugby and acting the fool with their mates is how they let off steam.”
I stared at her wide-eyed. The only time Sam had ever felt stress was when he couldn’t decide which girl to vote for in the Cougar Wet T-shirt competition, the girl with the big breasts or the one with the really big breasts. Too appalled to reply, I sat and sipped my champagne, trying to understand what she meant. I knew the girls put up with the odd sarcastic comment —they could give as good as they got— but this was way beyond that. They accepted everything the boys did as a given. Without question most of the time. It was second nature for them to laugh off the pranks, flirting and drinking games as innocent boy’s stuff. Well, I wasn’t about to get used to it. Sam could bail himself out of jail if he got arrested.
“Hey,” Sam arrived at our table, picked up his Guinness, and took a long deep slug. “See you got my message.”
He leant in, kissing me long and hard. The brown tinged ale from his lips wet my skin. He smelled of stale beer and cigars and fish and chips. Ick.
“You mean the one that’s tattooed on your bum?” I studied him coolly. I didn’t care what other girls let their men do. Sam was not going to flash his bum in public. Not with my name on it, anyway. It was childish and embarrassing. Not to mention a minor criminal offence.
“Yeah, I couldn’t find my mobile.” He chuckled, seemingly vaguely amused at my horror. Then, he slung a sloppy arm over my shoulder and tried to give me another kiss. The stench made me dry reach.
“So, you thought I’d know you were here if you sent a smoke signal out of your bum, is that it?”
“Hey chill, Mill’, it was a compliment.”
Oh for God’s sake. He’d had way too much to drink. There was no situation in which I would ever decide that having my name plastered across his bum was a compliment.
“Please, don’t give me compliments like that again,” I replied. “I don’t appreciate it. Bob could’ve seen, or Dianne. Then you’d be without a job.”
“It’d take more than my naked arse, babe. Besides, it’s nothing Dianne hasn’t seen before.” He guffawed loudly and slapped his leg. I ignored him.
I looked towards the door where the other boys were leaning against the high bar tables. I dreaded to form the words but I supposed I should get ready to go into damage control. “So where’s the spear?”
“What spear?”
Pulling out my phone, I showed him.
“You dope,” he smiled and wrapped his arms, python-like around me. I could feel his shoulders shaking. He was trying not to laugh. “It says… back soon have big surprise.”
“So you don’t have a spear?”
“No. Just a surprise. The message said, <have big surprise>
“And?”
Sam gazed at me. His eyes were filled with tenderness. Suddenly, he was no longer drunk or silly. The putrid smell of cigar and alcohol seeping from his pores had disappeared into oblivion. His lovely vanilla musk was returning and making everything fuzzy. He was almost bashful.
“Well, the surprise is, I just wanted to say, well, um, I love you; I really, really love you.”
I sat for a moment, looking. Stunned. It was written all over his face. He loved me.
“I love you too,” I whispered, and kissed him. “A lot.”
I twined my fingers into his hair and laced them around his neck. I placed my lips against his cheek and eyelashes. If he hadn’t been so incredibly smelly it would have been truly romantic.
*****
That night I woke up in a sweat. Bolt upright, I sat in bed panting, trying to catch my breath or calm my nerves. I was shaking all over. God. Sam loved me, I loved Sam. And because I had naively assumed our relationship was not serious, I hadn’t bothered to tell him of my plans. His love had changed everything.
What was I going to do?