ALICE SETTLED BACK, getting comfy against his threadbare pillows, as he continued his story. “One thing I didn’t dig during my time at the mine was the plans for fracking in other states, and setting up a huge coal mining plant with partners from India in the far north of Queensland. I knew if they ever got it going it would totally stuff the Barrier Reef.”
“Wow — that’s what’s going on right now,” said Stain, eyes wide.
“Yeah well, when I got back to Perth, I had a good bankroll. I started a band called Gypsy with a couple of mates. It was a heavy metal cover band, doing ACCA DACCA songs around the pub scene. I started writing songs about the things I hated — bad foster care, nuclear war, fracking, polluting the reef. The band didn’t dig it, so I put those songs away and we stuck with doing covers. A few years later we eventually got an agent, a Malaysian Chinese bloke called Jimmy Lee. He got us a regular gig at a Perth metal venue called Blazers. A year later, a mate of Jimmy’s, a promoter named Jeff Hardie, came in from Asia. After he heard us play, he had a record producer from Sydney fly over. We recorded our first album. At the same time, I showed the producer my songs. He dug them, and we used them. He also came up with a new name for the band: Black Alice. We named it for Alice Springs after an imagined nuclear attack that left the desert all blackened.
“I wrote a bunch more songs with the guitar player, Jamie, and when the album was released it did really well. I was blown away. Never thought we were any good, let alone that our songs would be appreciated. The album took off in Europe. So after six years of slogging it out in pubs, we were an overnight success, ha!
“The band split up right after making the big time, the boys didn’t want to tour. I did. So I packed up my life and came to Sydney with a new identity — I’d become Black Alice.”
“This is amazing,” said Stain. “What happened next?”
“You sure you wanna hear all this shit love?” Alice said, suddenly self-conscious. He wasn’t used to this kind of communication, this kind of bond.
“If it’s about you, I want to know it all baby,” said Stain. “Is that okay?”
“Just don’t want to bore your tits off that’s all…”
She pinched the pink nipple of her lovely left breast and said with a smirk, “Don’t worry, they’re not going anywhere.”
He kissed her, gently. Stain was the first girl he had ever really cared for. To have her listening to his life story, and apparently with interest, was making him feel even closer to her. He realised right then that keeping his story secret all this time had done him no good. All it had done was build a wall around his emotions. He’d always believed that if he was to care, to open up — or worse, to love someone — he’d be making himself too vulnerable. The experiences of his youth had drilled into his soul the determination never to expose his feelings. He realised now he was wrong. “I’m glad I came to Sydney,” he whispered. “Because I found you.”
Stain’s eyes where shining as she looked back at him, and all at once he realised that both of them were in the same place. But all she said was: “That’s so sweet … Go on, tell me the rest.”
“When I got to Sydney I had to start all over again,” Alice went on. “I went and saw the bloke who’d produced the first album. He was happy to see me and told me he planned to produce a short film. I asked if there might be a gig in for me in it and he told me he’d write me into the script. A month later I was on location at the St Peter’s brickpits in Sydney shooting Knightmare — a short film, basically a long-form music video — and I was the star. The song I sang in it went to number one, and that let me put a band together.
I pinched Ratsso, Blue and Slut from another band — because I had a hit record it was easy to coax ’em on board. We called the band Black Alice and we went on tour all over Australia, playing every pub, town hall, scummy club and HM disco that would take us. Pretty soon we had three quality sets of original songs. And the rest is history. Ha. We had some crazy times.”
“I bet you did,” said Stain, with a knowing smile. “What’s your craziest story from the road?”
“Ha! That’s easy … we were booked to play at the Palace Hotel in Broken Hill, far west New South Wales. When we rocked into town we booked into the pub and went down to the bar for a drink. We probably looked to the locals like we just lobbed from another planet. It didn’t help that we were dressed heavy metal — studs, leathers, tatts and weird hair — you could’ve heard a pin drop when we rocked in. But after a few games of pool against the best players in town, we won ’em over.
“That night, after the gig, a pretty little chick barged in backstage and hung around Slut like a bad smell. One of the roadies, Mullet, had heard the girl was under age and off limits, but Slut being Slut wasn’t gunna listen. He reckoned he was onto a winner. Mullet was dirty because he’d promised the girl’s brother he wouldn’t let her get into any trouble. So he decided to make a moral of it…
“We were due to hit the road, the roadies had packed the truck, all we had to do was get into the van. I was packing my stuff in the hotel room, when I heard a bloke’s voice, really loud, outside, saying: ‘Come on baby, just take your panties off.’ Then a girl’s voice, saying: ‘No, yuck, put that ugly thing away, I don’t want to touch it!’
“I go to the window, out in the street Mullet and the other roadies are rolling round, shitting themselves laughing. They’d put a microphone under Slut’s bed, with a lead running out the window, down two storeys and plugged into a bass amplifier in the back of our truck. It was broadcasting Slut’s dodgy proposals to the entire population of Broken Hill. Within minutes cops arrived and he was arrested — turned out the girl was the daughter of the town Sheriff.
“Man, we thought we were sunk that time. But turns out no-one could recognise the girl’s voice, so the Sheriff just told us to keep quiet and beat it out of town. We were lucky, he could have locked Slut up and thrown away the key. But he just wanted the whole thing to go away. Lucky for us. Specially Slut.”
“He’s a naughty boy Slut,” said Stain, amused in spite of herself. “Puts it on anyone.”
“Yeah, he reckons if it ain’t in the back of a truck and you can’t play it, you can screw it.”
“That’s terrible!”
“That’s how he got his nickname. But he’s one hell of a guitar player.”
“That’s true,” said Stain. “Still, what a … well, what a slut!”
Both of them laughed. Then Stain’s face changes, went more serious. “Alright, tell me the rest of it,” she said. “How did you end up involved with the Octagon?”
“Christ,” said Alice. “That’s another long story. Okay, I’ll tell you!” he added, as Stain opened her mouth to encourage him.
“The election four years ago gave us an independent as Prime Minister for the first time since federation, remember? We all thought things were gonna change for the better. He changed the constitution, called himself President, dissolved parliament, made us a republic. We thought that was great, because everybody was well over the two-party system and sick to death of politics. We thought the President was a socialist. Ha. Were we wrong. He’s a fascist bastard. Things went downhill fast. Remember what it was like? Mandate this mandate that...”
“I remember,” said Stain. “It turned into a dictatorship. It was bad enough when he set up the Oceana trading bloc without consulting the nation. Then he went and formed that bastard SSD, bunch of freaking Neo Nazi’s.”
“Right,” said Alice. “Anyone with a social conscience got seriously worried, right? So, I shared my point of view in interviews, packed my songs with anti-government messages, generally used my popularity to try to influence things. And that attracted the Octagon.
“Loads of musicians were joining. My pal Mal Function — you’ve met him — sucked me into attending a meeting. It was a set-up, because next minute I’d been voted in as the leader. Just like that. I mean, no regrets, it wasn’t like they bent my arm up my back — they just asked me if I’d like to head up their campaigns and I said yes … it’s been a good thing,” Alice finished. “It’s connected me more closely to the people.”
Stain smiled at Alice proudly, “I remember watching you on TV, before I met you,” she said. “You were always amazing. The Octagon couldn’t have picked a better leader.”
“Thanks babe,” said Alice. “Alright, I’ve been talking about myself for hours. I want to know more about you. What’s your life been like? How did you end up here, lying next to an old metal geezer like me?”
Instead of answering, Stain rolled out of bed, picked up her handbag and sashayed over to the tiny en-suite bathroom, swinging her naked bottom in a tantalising tease.
Alice grinned, watching her firm round butt flashing with red neon and glistening with sweat. She blew him a cheeky kiss and said: “We’ve got all night, babe. Just let me freshen up a little, I’ll be right back.” Half closing the door behind her, she started singing a sexy version of her back-up line from Something in the Air:
“We have got to get it together, now!”
“I’m on the news tonight at eleven,” Alice called out to her.
“Well, we wouldn’t wanna miss that, would we?”
Alice could make out her reflection in the mirrored bathroom door. She was standing on her tiptoes over the sink, douching. “All those little Alices being washed down the drain,” he yelled. “You’re a mass murderer!”
She turned threw the washer she’d been using at him, slapping him right in the face. “You’re the one who condemned them to death!” she joked.
Peeling the washer off his mush he returned serve, “You’re right you know, that pretty well sums up mankind. A prick sends in the troops, some pussy wipes ’em all out. Sex is a metaphor for life, we’re always at war with the great unknown.”
“You’re so profound,” said Stain, rolling her eyes with a giggle. Her toe delicately nudged the bathroom door closed for a little more privacy.
Outside, although it was still dark, the early-hours morning air was tainted with the sound of police sirens, traffic noise and the general hum of the city machine. Alice sat back in bed, thinking about the world beyond his room. His eyes were filled with intelligence and wit, and a new warmth that contradicted his usual rough-and-ready, don’t-care demeanour. He reached beside the bed and picked up an old, well-worn acoustic guitar, balanced it on his lap and picked a few out-of-tune notes. He started tuning, when a slight noise from the bathroom caught his ear.
“What’s happening, treasure around whom my universe rotates?” he crooned, glancing up at the bathroom door. It had creaked open just enough for him to see Stain’s reflection. This time he had to squint, trying to refocus his eyes, unsure of what he was seeing.
Her naked back to him, Stain had a rubber tourniquet flexed round her arm, then clamped in her teeth. Her other hand, crooked to her elbow, was just about to insert a needle into a bulging vein. As she started to press the plunger of the syringe, her head rolled back, a look of ecstasy in her eyes.
Alice leapt from the bed, and ran like a man possessed to the bathroom, smashing the guitar into pieces against the door on the way.
Stain swung around sharply towards him, eyes and mouth wide with fright. “No!” screamed Alice, smacking the syringe out of her hand. “No!”
Too late. The syringe, now empty, hit the floor and Stain dropped like a rag doll. Alice caught her, panicking. This was the last thing he’d expected from her. But he could help her, he’d help her quit, get clean, get healthy. They’d have plenty of time together, he could help her change.
Suddenly he noticed the ruby lips he had been kissing all night were turning blue. Stain’s eyes were glazed, she was staring listlessly at the wall. Reality struck — she had overdosed, she was dying. The noise of the city pounded in his ears, celebrating its claim, another victim for the night. He had to save her. He had to. Lying her gently on the floor, he placed his folded hands over her chest and started CPR, pleading all the while: “Stain! Stain! Stain!”