Chapter Fifty-seven

Friday, 15th November

In the morning, bacon and eggs waited under the silver dome in the kitchen, but Don was nowhere to be seen. Jack felt better with a full stomach, clean clothes and the warm sun beating down on his face as he crossed the white flagstones to the Toyota. He was going to meet Caitlin. The next edition of the paper was due at the printer in two days. It was a near impossible task, but Caitlin had offered to help him try to pull it together.

Jack passed the water tower as he drove down Paterson Street. A giant banner flapped in the breeze: ‘SAVE THE BEES – BAN 5G’. His anger rose as he remembered his treatment at the hands of Lars Nielsen’s acolytes the night before.

The traffic in town was diabolical so he parked a couple of hundred metres away from the office and walked. At the front door of The Beacon, a tradie in an orange fluoro jacket was working on the lock. When Jack asked him what he was doing, the man gave Jack his best oh-here-we-go-what-does-it-look-like-I’m-doing expression.

Jack persisted. ‘I didn’t ask you to change the lock.’

‘No, but he did.’ He jabbed a thumb over his shoulder towards the office before begrudgingly stepping aside to let Jack pass.

Inside, everything was as it always was, except for Angus Bain sitting in Jack’s chair, his feet up on the desk. Bain had changed. Not only was he wearing a blue Hawaiian shirt patterned with palm trees, he wore a huge smile, a genuine one.

‘Morning, Jack.’ His contrived bonhomie was also gone, and Jack apparently was no longer an ‘old boy’.

‘What are you doing here?’

‘I was going to ask you the same thing. Don’t you read your emails or texts?’

Jack felt his muscles tensing. He didn’t answer.

Bain rubbed his hands together with glee. ‘You’ve been released to explore other opportunities at your leisure.’ He smiled even wider. ‘I’m not one to give career advice, but I reckon lollipop man could be your calling.’

‘What?’

‘Lollipop man, you know, the ones that hold the stop–go signs at school crossings.’

‘Angus, cut the crap.’

‘You, Jack, have been fired. Again. Properly this time. You are no longer the editor of this newspaper.’

‘Says who?’

‘Management.’

‘What do you mean, “management”?’

‘Jack, I always took you for an idiot, but even I didn’t think you were this stupid.’

‘My father?’

‘He wants someone he can trust to look after Harris interests. Me. Your father was pretty annoyed when The Beacon wasn’t published for the first time in its history. But what really kicked him over the edge was when I told him you weren’t working on the next week’s paper at all, and that you could be found most days alternating between lying on top of a surfboard and a Brazilian backpacker called Rosita.’

Jack’s jaw clenched, along with his knuckles. He forced his breathing to slow down, to stop himself from hitting out at Bain. He kept reminding himself, if you show anger you lose, but it felt like he had already lost.

‘Smug’ didn’t begin to describe the look on Bain’s face. He held out his hand. ‘Keys to the car.’

Jack threw them onto the desk, never more glad he’d parked so far away in a little used side street – it would take Bain days to find it.

‘I also need all your documents – paper and electronic. And any O’Shaughnessy was working on before he …’ Bain paused, ‘… handed over to you. They remain the property of Harris Media.’

‘I don’t have any.’

‘Bullshit.’

When Jack didn’t elaborate, Bain waved him away. ‘Shouldn’t you be studying for your lollipop-man exam?’

Fortunately, the tradie wasn’t behind the door as Jack threw it open on his way out. He hurried to the street. He needed to buy a phone. Thirty minutes later he had one, but the experience hadn’t restored his mood. The heavily encrusted adolescent had given him the third degree, and only reluctantly recorded the name of Jack’s first teacher as ‘Jesus Christ’ and his favourite pet as ‘For Fuck’s Sake’. The SIM card, he was told, would take ten minutes to activate.

It was hot and humid outside, the sea breeze strangely absent, and Jack felt damp circles of sweat forming under his arms by the time the phone came to life. He punched in his father’s number and listened to it ring and ring until it cut out. Like God, Malcolm Harris didn’t have voicemail.

As Jack walked to the taxi rank, he entered his Harris email details into the phone. He stared as the wheel of fortune went around and around as servers connected to servers. An error message appeared: ‘Access denied’.

The only taxi Jack could find was a maxi-taxi. They doubled as mini-buses and mobile vomitoriums after the nightclubs closed. This particular taxi had duct tape covering gaping wounds in the seats. The air conditioning wasn’t working, and Jack wound down the window to dilute the pervasive smell of partially digested kebab. The driver was all courtesy, and seemed impervious to the heat and the pungent aromas as they drove towards Zoe’s apartment.

On his third attempt, Jack recalled the correct phone number for Irina Markov at Harris HQ and she answered the call.

‘Irina, it’s Jack.’

‘Well, well, well, if it’s not my long-lost boyfriend. Probably ex-boyfriend now. And no caller ID. Have you gone dark, Jack?’

‘Irina, what the hell is going on?’

‘You are the water-cooler topic du jour. And the tearoom’s. You’ve even made it into the women’s toilets. “Leper” and “fucked” seems to be the general consensus. What was it? Lines of white powder? Teenage pregnancy? I’m told Byron can do that to you.’

‘Why can’t I access my emails?’

‘Orders from on high, Jack. Don’t blame me, I’m just doing my shitty job.’

‘From whom?’

‘The bear. The one you’ve pissed off.’

Jack was silent.

‘Jack, you of all people should know how things work around here. If you’re not prepared to grovel to your father and give him whatever he wants, go and set up a florist shop. And then you can send me tulips every day, preferably yellow.’ She ended the call.

Jack stabbed hard at each number as he called his father again. No answer.