by Cate Kendall
‘Yes,’ the stout woman answered with pursed lips, ‘I certainly did.’
‘Hmmmm … well, you know what,’ Mim said, a thousand inappropriate words rushing into her head, ‘I’ve just remembered that Charley has a dental appointment, so I’ll be taking him out of class for the rest of the day. Goodbye.’
Without a backward glance she swung Charley from his seat, stamped out of the room and to her son’s amazed delight the two of them spent the rest of the day giggling and chatting as they painted multicoloured animals all over huge sheets of butcher paper on the playroom floor at home.
Ellie was a celebration of slavish devotion to brands and fashion as she breezed into the café for the obligatory Monday morning lattes with the Langholme mums, a gossip opportunity for all different factions of the parent community. Her tiny flared-leg Seven jeans made the most of her toned thighs and non-existent butt; the white Guess T-shirt stretched suggestively over her enviable breasts and her blonde and multi-highlighted tresses were held in place by her Gucci frameless sunglasses – which had little other purpose on this grey Melbourne day.
The seat at the head of the table had, by unspoken agreement, been left vacant for Ellie, and as she unquestioningly took her prime position she sang out ‘Morning dahlings’ and blew Mim, at the far end, a fingertip kiss.
The coffee and complaints were already flowing, though the mums interrupted their conversations to register Ellie’s outfit, study her make-up and wonder how she got her hair so shiny, before greeting her.
‘A latte as a matter of some urgency, good man,’ she instructed the waiter at her elbow.
‘And breakfast for madam?’ he asked naively.
‘Oh good lord, no,’ she replied, tuning in to the conversations surging around her.
‘… that’s just ridiculous,’ one mother cried, ‘they can’t make him go swimming if he has a scratchy throat, it’s simply not medically appropriate.’
‘Well absolutely not. I was livid. I’ve already scheduled dialogue with the principal, let me tell you. I trust Willie’s self-diagnostic decisions now that he’s in the second grade. That boy knows a malady coming on when he feels it. Goodness knows the complication that may now arise from his contamination in that bacteria-ridden cesspit. I’ve insisted the doctor start him on a strict course of antibiotics for safety’s sake.’
‘Good plan,’ Ellie agreed, clapping her hands in glee, shaking a few dozen grains of sugar into her latte. She loved a confrontation, even if it was vicarious. ‘When Rupert insisted on taking that awful sink plunger to school with him for weeks, at first I didn’t have a problem with it really. I mean he was five and who knows what nonsense goes through a boy’s head at that age. Bryce is fifty-two for goodness’ sake, and he still has fixations on new toys and gadgets. He still sleeps with his mobile on vibrate, I mean what’s that about?
‘Anyhoo, then Mrs Hargreaves asked us to authorise an assessment for Rupert from the school psychologist: apparently he had full-blown plunger issues – which of course can be quite common in the gifted – but one hardly wants to be given such a terrible fright by a teacher. For goodness’ sake, what do teachers know about children?’ Ellie took a break from her caffeine-induced ramble.
‘So, LJ, sweetie,’ said Hortense, displaying the teeth and laugh of a well-bred mare. ‘When’s the next big exhibit? Got anything in the pipeline?’
‘Yes, LJ, what’s happening next? Loved the last one,’ piped up Rosy Glow (tragic how she’d changed her name after taking a course on aura reading).
LJ Mahoney flicked her talon-like nails and looked coyly down at the table for all of a second before favouring the other mums with an electric smile and tossing back her hair dramatically. She loved an audience and shone into life under the warm gaze of attention she was commanding.
‘Well,’ she began, with her long fingers splayed forward, looking left and right to ensure that every ear at the table was hers and speaking slowly to maximise the limelight. ‘I have had just the most delicious opportunity float right under my pretty little nose!’ She scrunched the said proboscis and giggled merrily.
Not a bad nose for $20,000, thought Ellie.
‘But back to the story. Philby recently snapped up a simply to-die-for Victorian building in Swanston Street. He’s going to relocate the PR firm; so much more CBD, really. When he popped in for a look-see he realised that it was the former premises of Club 22, which was that swanky little strip club back in the late seventies, early eighties. I mean, what a scream. I died with laughter when he told me. To think of all those rich old men who used to frequent it and those slutty little numbers who entertained them. It’s just too fabulous.
‘Anyway, Philbs found the most divine treasure-trove of original posters and advertising material from the club’s heyday. It’s so tits-and-arse, girls, like you wouldn’t believe!’
She paused as Hortense snorted with unattractive and truly unacceptable laughter.
‘So,’ LJ continued, arching an over-waxed eyebrow at her friend. ‘You should see this stuff – it’s gold! Buxom strippers in gaudy silver platform boots, straddling poles, tiny silver stars glued to their tits. And the hair, my god, bouffed up, flicked back, it’s a wonder they can hold their little heads up. The graphic design is unreal: balloon typefaces, rainbows. It’s so kitsch it’s cool.’
‘And so retro, so now,’ said Rosy.
‘Oh it’s so now it’s almost tomorrow,’ LJ enthused. ‘Très zeitgeist, girls. You know how I love to stay ahead of the game.’ She licked her scarlet lips with delight and ran her fingers through her cherry-red hair. ‘Of course, it all needs an artistic touch, girls, these club promoters were hardly artists and most of the chicks in the pictures could do with their share of air-brushing.’ She paused as Hortense honked annoyingly. ‘Sooooo, I’m going to enlarge the brochures, lime wash some of the images, collage others. I’ll be a busy little buzzy bee, let me tell you.
‘And,’ this last bit of news was the icing on the cake for LJ and she enunciated carefully so her words could have their intended effect. ‘I have one special little piece that’s going to look particularly good as the hero shot: blown up life-size, to underscore the entire exhibit. It’s of a gorgeous young girl with a sad little face wearing these amazing purple cork-wedged sandals, and … well … poor love, not much else,’ she tittered gaily. ‘You should see it, Ellie, you’d so love it.’
‘Sounds fab,’ murmured Ellie.
‘Oh, LJ, how amazing, you clever little pussycat,’ chipped in another voice.
‘How superb,’ sang another.
‘You are such a visual genius.’
‘Aren’t you the artistic one?’
LJ closed her eyes and let the gentle balm of adoration wash over her. She sighed with contentment and smiled around at these silly women who wouldn’t know art if it kicked them in the arse.
‘What do you think, Ellie, do you remember Club 22?’ she asked serenely.
‘Oh, yes,’ said Ellie vaguely, sipping her latte, ‘I think so, but it’s been closed for years, hasn’t it?’
‘Oh yes, it’s so passé, of course, that’s what makes it so now. I mean, do those sorts of dirty little places even exist any more? With my help, the memories will be all shiny and new and given a slick millennium twist for my opening next month.’ LJ smiled and turned back to Hortense to savagely suggest she try laughing with her mouth shut in future.
Ellie sat quietly as the conversation ebbed and flowed around her. Mim had had enough of the shallow chatter and one-upmanship and wondered if she dared skip next week’s session. Then she noticed Ellie’s vacant look from the other end of the table, and, realising that something was bothering her friend, picked up her mobile.
Ellie pulled the tinkling phone from her crocodile-skin bag and read the new SMS.
Blow this scene? My house? the text read.
GR8, Ellie texted back, and waited for Mim to air-kiss her way around the table before making her own escape.
She walked to the driver’s door and saw in horror that Ellie had her head down on the steering wheel and was sobbing her heart out, which was obviously a bad sign – Ellie would never waste good make-up unless it was something serious.
‘Oh, Ellie, sweetie, darling, what’s the matter?’ asked Mim, putting her hand on Ellie’s shaking back and feeling the knotty ridges of her spine.
‘Oh, Mim,’ said Ellie, looking up at her friend through blackened eyes. What a day to forget the waterproof mascara. ‘Oh Mim,’ she repeated, and her huge turquoise-blue eyes re-filled with tears. Her cheeks glowed pink and her hair framed her face, making her look like a vulnerable waif.
Why don’t I look this good when I’m miserable? thought Mim as she helped Ellie out of the car and into the house. ‘Sit down, sweetheart, let me get you some water.’
Mim grabbed mountain-bottled spring water from the fridge and poured it into a crystal beaker, adding ice cubes, a slice of lemon and a sprig of mint. Picking up a napkin, she set the glass on a coaster on the mahogany coffee table in front of Ellie, who was denying her perfect posture by hunching over like a factory worker who had found the weight of the world too much to bear.
‘Mim, what I’m about to tell you is something that I can trust only you with,’ Ellie said moistly. ‘I haven’t told anybody this before, and I know that you won’t judge me.’ She sniffed noisily and, slightly shocked, Mim jumped up to pass her an embossed, scented, over-sized tissue.
‘Of course I won’t judge you,’ she said, looking at Ellie with great concern. ‘What on earth is happening?’
‘Well,’ Ellie took a deep breath, and blew it out towards the ceiling with her eyes closed. Opening her eyes again and looking straight at Mim, she said, ‘I am the girl in the purple cork-wedged sandals.’
‘THE BITCH!’
‘The bitch, I know, she’s a complete bitch,’ replied Ellie.
‘She knows it’s you, she must know,’ said Mim.
‘I know, of course she knows what she’s doing, she’s doing it on purpose.’
‘But … but … why? What a BITCH!!’ Mim was furious. She stood up, and started pacing; she wanted to punch something, preferably a red-headed smug little bitch. What kind of community was she a part of where such nasty backstabbing was so commonplace? It wasn’t a community at all. People like LJ were only looking out for number one and everyone in their way just got burnt. Mim just didn’t want to be a part of it any more, she wanted out. She stopped and stood at the floor-to-ceiling plate glass window and stared futilely at the storm clouds forming in the distance.
‘I know,’ Ellie replied, sounding resigned. ‘She’s a nasty piece of work and she’s doing it on purpose, and there’s nothing I can do to stop her.’
‘But you never trashed her stupid exhibit in the first place, can’t you just explain that to her?’ Mim asked, desperately thinking of a way to help her friend and stop this avalanche of humiliation.
‘Hang on a minute,’ she said, turning slowly, with a quizzical look on her face. ‘What on earth were you doing in purple cork wedges at Studio 22?’
‘Well, here’s the thing,’ said Ellie, sighing deeply, and she told Mim her story.
Ellie Fitzpatrick was trapped in a hideous life. There was no way out. She couldn’t see any kind of happiness in her future. She could only see more junkie-filled parties, more strange men hitting on her and nowhere for her and her little sister Sarah to turn.
Her eventual escape came from the most unexpected source: her next-door neighbour Roxanne. Two years older than the gentle Ellie, she was a real wild child. Ever since they were small children, Roxanne had lived on the edge. Smoking at seven, hooking up with boys at twelve, dope at thirteen. Ellie and Roxanne had little in common except for the dysfunctional and violent home lives they had both endured, and thus an unlikely friendship had formed.
The whole street had witnessed constant screaming matches between Roxanne and her family. The fights usually resulted in Roxanne slamming their front door and going straight over to Ellie’s house to drag her to the park, where they would sit in the bright red plastic globe at the top of the A-frame slide and smoke and talk about their rotten lives and what they were going to do when they were rich and famous and out of this place.
One day Roxanne took off, but this time she didn’t stop at Ellie’s house. She had just turned fifteen and no-one saw her for the next year. Ellie hadn’t relied on Roxanne as much as the older girl had needed Ellie’s sympathetic ear and therefore didn’t miss her. Her younger sister Sarah filled the void of confidante and they grew closer as they faced the debauchery of their household together.
When Roxanne eventually returned she was different. She had new sexy clothes, a more angular, harder face. She was just back to collect her things. ‘I’ve done it, Ellie, I’ve blown this scene.’ They sat in their usual hang out, smoking SuperMild and drinking Tab. ‘Ya gotta come and see me work: I’m in show business, I’m a real live dancer. And I get paid a fucking fortune.’
So, when her sister Sarah was safe at school, Ellie went to see Roxanne work and was not at all surprised to discover that Roxanne’s job was at a strip club. To Roxanne, coming from her grey and dingy world, the sparkling mirrored disco balls, red plush banquette seating and strobe lights were as glamorous as any show-business job.
After that, Ellie would often escape the violence and misery of her life to visit Roxanne at the club. She loved the kindly Mrs Mac who worked in the ‘Wardrobe Department’ (this was just a glamorous way of saying she cleaned the filthy club, patched up the pieces of scrap the girls called costumes, and mended the never-ending stream of broken hearts and bruised bodies). But to Ellie Mrs Mac was a maternal figure who would listen to her teen worries and offer advice and comfort. Ellie loved being in that ‘Wardrobe Department’ more than anywhere in the world, and if she hadn’t had to go home and care for Sarah, she’d have stayed there and helped Mrs Mac all night as well as all day.
Ellie loved the girls too: girls just like her, every one with a different sad story to tell, everyone optimistic about the future and looking forward to a time when they could escape. She’d spend hours chatting, helping them with their clothes, and giggling with them, just like the group of teenage girls that they were. It made her feel like she was part of a real family for the first time in her life.
Then the manager sprung her hanging around. Ellie had blossomed and there was no hiding her generous bust-line and long, slim legs. Cowboy Nick was a short, stubby man, whose pocked face glistened under a sheen of grease. His trademark burgundy polyester pants and pink ruffled shirt competed with his slicked hair and large side-burns for ugliness. The clink of his signature gold bracelets and oversized opal cufflinks gave away any hope of a silent approach, though he usually avoided the ‘cattle-cars’, as he liked to call the dressing rooms. He would just hit on the girls when they were working the bar after their show. But one day he wandered backstage and noticed Ellie sitting in the dressing room chatting to Roxanne. Her youth and innocence glowed beside his jaded, worn out old tarts in their faded sequins.
He stalked the fresh meat. He began by separating her from her pack, blocking her exit when the other girls ran on stage for the finale. He favoured her with lecherous grins, a slap on the arse or a tweak of her breast each time he passed, until Ellie was terrified and confused.
But the slime ball was after something more than merely a quick grope and poke. One day he barrelled her up in an empty dressing room, with his filthy paw up her school dress and his hot breath on her neck. He knew she would beg for mercy. She did, and he made his move with a deal: ‘Go on stage and I’ll leave you alone.’
Ellie stressed over the decision for weeks but finally realised that she was trapped. And the only way out of the trap was money. She needed to earn enough to buy her and Sarah’s escape from t
heir miserable existence. And she’d seen how well it had worked for Roxanne, who now had her own flat and was in control of her own life.
The offer – albeit a sleazy one – of a well-paid job was in fact a blessing, and she swallowed her pride – and her modesty – and went back to the club.
So Ellie became an ‘exotic dancer’. The girls gave her a makeover to hide her youth. She stopped going to school. The money was good, but the tips she got after from ‘working the bar’ were unbelievable. Her wide-eyed naivety and little-girl charm had all the punters throwing the bills at her. They particularly loved the fact that she pretended to be scared of them.
Then one day, just a few months after she started, Bryce came in. He didn’t usually frequent Club 22, but as the producer of a high-rating football program he often catered to the tastes of his on-screen talent.
He took one look at the fresh-faced Ellie on the stage and just wanted to protect her. He spoke to her as soon as she entered the public area after her performance. Ellie was attracted to him immediately. He was no Greek god, but in his eyes Ellie saw a warmth and honesty she had never known.
They started dating and married a few months later.
‘And that’s that,’ said Ellie, looking up at her confidante. ‘That’s the real “Ellie Fitzpatrick” story. Not very sophisticated, is it?’
‘Oh, Ellie,’ said Mim, throwing her arms around her friend. ‘What a story. You poor love. Whatever happened to your mum?’
‘What you’d expect. She overdosed one day about a year after Sarah and I left home,’ Ellie said with only a hint of sadness. ‘She was young and stupid and so screwed up. There was really no hope for her.’
‘I am sure that LJ wouldn’t exhibit if she knew the real story.’ Mim was back on the issue at hand.