by Foster, Zoe
‘Marg Milton, reigning champion.’
‘Man. She looks like a real bitch,’ Lily said, facetiously.
Jack shot Lily a Look. She laughed; he really was taking this all far too seriously. He hadn’t even been this worked up for his first live TV segment.
‘That’s her partner, Beth. Been together forever. First married gay couple in the district.’
‘Good on them. Couldn’t have been easy with all the country boys hooning round in their utes, playing footy and sinking slabs and picking up chicks at the pub.’
Jack laughed and turned his head to look directly at Lily. ‘Is that who you think I am?’
‘Ssh, they’re about to make a decision.’
‘Marg will win,’ he whispered. ‘Mum says she puts maple syrup in her recipe. Sure, I could copy and beat her convincingly, but Nan wouldn’t want it that way.’
‘And this is all for Nan, is it?’
Lily looked at Jack, her eyebrows raised. She was acutely aware of how physically close they were, of how his hand had occasionally brushed hers as they baked all afternoon. The fact they would be in the truck together, just the two of them, for five hours tonight. The fact that he wasn’t just a wholesome rural bumpkin, but a reformed drug-addict bad boy, which, bizarrely, she found sexy.
‘If you’d met Nan, you’d understand. She was incredible. Taught me to cook as a kid, inspired me to follow it through, and supported me even in my darkest days. She’d have loved you,’ he said, smiling. ‘You’re a rascal, just like her.’
‘When did sh—’
‘If we could have your attention please,’ Brown Suit’s feeble monotone came over the microphone. He pushed his glasses back up his nose every ten seconds, a move Lily guessed he’d done since he was in school 500 years ago.
‘We have selected the winner and runner-up. The winner will receive a plaque, which must be returned at next year’s show, and a $100 cheque; the runner-up will receive a certificate and a $50 cheque. All contestants will receive a certificate of participation.’
‘God, he’s all razzle-dazzle, isn’t he,’ Lily murmured.
‘Runner-up: contestant 27, Ms Marg Milton.’
A collective gasp went up, followed by slow, then robust clapping.
‘Ohmygod, ohmygod, you’ve won, you have so won!’ Lily said, clapping excitedly. Jack raised his brows and turned down the corner of his mouth.
Marg, laughing and gracious, walked up, a slight preference given to her left leg, Lily noticed, but otherwise beaming with youthfulness. She kissed Brown Suit and the other two women, both of whom seemed extremely apologetic, and then blew the crowd a kiss. Lily wished Marg was her grandma; she seemed like the fun type who would drink brandy and cheat at bridge.
‘Winner,’ Brown Suit said, raising his voice over a room full of people flying into gossip about Marg not winning, because Marg always wins, who could possibly have won if Marg didn’t? Jack had both arms folded; Lily’s hands were up over her mouth. She had not been this excited in – she couldn’t remember how long.
‘Contestant 22, Mr Jack Winter.’
‘AHHH!’ Lily squealed, jumping up and down on the spot, grinning at Jack. In an instant, he had his arms wrapped around her and was picking her up off the ground in glee. All too quickly their faces were suddenly level, their lips only centimetres away. Their eyes met, and Jack quickly blinked and placed Lily back on the ground. Lily was blushing, deeply, but Jack was already walking to the judges, and she was left alone to clear her throat, shake her head and try to calm herself. Don’t overthink it; underthink it, if anything, she warned herself. All friends hug like that in triumphant moments.
She clapped along with the rest of the crowd while Jack had his photo taken and accepted his plaque. Marg came out of the crowd to shake his hand and kiss his cheek.
When Jack finally returned to Lily, holding his small wall plaque, his face was set into a wide, genuine smile, and his eyes were filled with . . . something. Lily couldn’t pick it.
He handed her a white envelope.
‘What’s this?’ she said.
‘Your prize money,’ he said. ‘Gerald said it was the delicate rose flavour that set my scones apart, and that, Woodward, was all your doing. I couldn’t have, wouldn’t have won without your help.’
She blushed, handing the envelope back. ‘Not a chance. Here, let me get a photo for the show. And your mum.’
‘Would you mind grabbing one on my phone too?’ He pulled it out and handed it to Lily, who was beaming for him and his ridiculous new title. His wallpaper was a photo of his dogs. Of course.
As he sent the photo to his mum, Lily glowed in the knowledge she had helped Jack, a proper, professional chef, not only cook some lovely scones, ridiculous as that triumph was, but win a title that obviously, in its own silly way, meant a lot to him. God, she’d had a good day. They’d had a good day. Both of them. She didn’t want it to ever end.
‘I can burp on demand, you know,’ Lily said, riding high on sugar and caffeine after the obligatory pit stop at McDonalds. Oh, good. She’d morphed into Alice.
‘I don’t doubt it, I saw how quickly you put away those nuggets.’ Jack smiled, facing the long dark freeway ahead of them. The truck was rattling, and thanks to the rain, the wipers, fresh from 1976, screeched across the windscreen with the charm of a possum being strangled. Still, it was undeniably cosy.
‘Just say the word.’
‘Will do.’
‘Was that the word?’
‘No.’
‘Okay, well, let me know.’
Lily felt incredibly playful. She knew it was probably the artificial colours and flavours and sugar spreading through her veins, compounded by the thrill of finally having finished the tour, but mostly she knew it was because she was on a road trip with Jack. In the truck. At night. In the rain. If they slid off the road in some horrible, unthinkable accident, she would die happy. She spied his iPod and headphones, which he’d grabbed from the ute before Grimmo had hooned off and, before realising the truck wasn’t equipped with any speakers, had an idea.
‘Let’s play a game. I’m bored. How about I press shuffle on your iPod, and before I hit play, and I don’t look, by the way, we both have to try and guess the song. No, the artist.’ She popped one headphone in her left ear and switched the iPod on.
Jack laughed. ‘You won’t know who I have on there, that seems a bit unfair.’
Lily scrolled through the albums and artists quickly. A lot of rock, fair amount of moody folk, Bon Iver, Kings of Convenience, Grizzly Bear and The Shins, and more than enough soundtracks. Millions of soundtracks.
‘Like soundtracks, huh?’
‘That’s how I find new music I like. Natural Born Killers is unbeatable. Django Unchained is pretty good too.’
‘Hmm. It’s going to make my game hard, but let’s try anyway . . . Okay, shuffle, pause and . . . call it.’
‘Um, Powderfinger.’
‘I’ll go with Destiny’s Child.’
‘I don’t have any Destiny’s Child on there,’ he said, laughing.
‘We’ll see.’ Lily looked down.
‘Damn. Foo Fighters? Okay, go again.’
‘Okay, Kanye.’
‘Keeping in theme, I will go with Jay-Z . . . damn. Led Zeppelin.’
‘I am starting to see flaws in your game. Also, I can’t hear the song, so you could potentially cheat.’
Lily sighed. ‘Give it a chance, the suspense will make the win even sweeter. Go.’
‘Cold Chisel.’
‘Ooh, good one. I will say . . . The Police.’
She looked down.
‘OHMYGOD, OHMYGOD, it’s The Police, I shit you not, I SHIT you not, look, look, no, no, definitely safer if you don’t look, but here, if I press play, listen!’ She popped one of the headphones into his left ear and the first strains of ‘Roxanne’ piped through. A smile spread over Jack’s face. She gently removed the headphone, beaming at him.
�
��Very clever, you shonk.’
‘I promise on Marg Milton’s grave I did not rig that! That’s why it is SO amazing, don’t you see? Jesus . . . What are the chances . . .’
‘Right, so you just made up this game and happened to nail a one-in-a-probably-ten-thousand song choice.’
‘YES! And that’s why I am flipping out! First the scones, now this. I gotta buy a scratchy when I get home . . .’
‘You didn’t cheat?’
‘Eat a leek and chicken pie, cross my heart and hope to die.’
He said nothing, just kept a closed-mouth smile and watched the road.
‘Unbelievable. Statistically unthinkable.’
Lily shook her head and stared at the iPod. A good luck omen? Who knew.
‘Okay, well, when you’re ready to marvel, let me know.’
‘Are you always this chatty on car trips?’ Jack asked, still smiling.
Lily most definitely was not. She had barely said a peep all week on the road, except to talk work, or chat Homeland plots with Mackenzie, who was equally obsessed. In fact, Lily usually put her headphones in and worked until the vague nausea of motion sickness kicked her in the stomach.
‘I can shush now,’ she said, trying to not sound defensive or wounded. Maybe she was being a bit hyper. She had a flashback to how she used to feel around Jack, back when he was mostly mute and rude.
‘No, no, I like it. I’ve done this trip a thousand times, and it’s usually so boring. It’s nice having you with me.’
Lily went quiet. Wasn’t that the kind of thing the guy said in the movie before some kind of ‘I like you’ confession fell from his mouth? Maybe this road trip was a bad thing. This whole day was a bad thing. She should’ve left with Dale and the crew.
‘Hey, we should call Sim,’ she said suddenly, guilt mingling with obligation in her head. ‘It’ll be fun. Tease her about all the cool baking contests she’s missing out on.’
She pulled out her phone and called Simone’s mobile. It rang out. She tried again. Same thing.
‘Does she ever answer?’ Lily muttered.
‘Not for me either.’
‘I haven’t seen her for ages,’ Lily said. ‘Miss her.’
‘Yeah, busy girl,’ Jack said, his tone unreadable.
‘Everything okay between you two cats?’ Lily probed, telling herself she was not being disloyal to her friend, they were all friends and this was all fine.
He didn’t say anything at first, and Lily figured he was also probably tossing up how loyal it was to Sim to discuss her with her friend. Guys who talked about their girlfriend to other girls were creeps.
‘Never mind. Hey, so, I think I have some work news,’ Lily said, knowing she had to drop a bomb to create a thorough and authentic conversational shift. The rain was coming down extremely hard now, and the truck had been expertly, carefully slowed to around 50 k’s.
‘You’re quitting,’ he said, face serious, the strength of the rain clearly unsettling him in an unfamiliar vehicle.
Lily reeled a little. How did he guess?
‘Quitting sounds a bit harsh, I think of it more as leaving. And I haven’t even decided for sure yet.’
‘It is because of Nikkii?’
‘No,’ she said, trying to sound believable.
‘Do you have a new job lined up?’
‘Well, no, not yet, but I kno—’
‘Is it because you didn’t get the promotion?’
‘No!’ Lily said defensively, giving herself away.
‘Because of me?’
‘Jack! Are you mental? No.’ If only he knew that he was the one and only reason she was considering staying on.
‘So you’re quitting for no reason, then, is that it?’
Lily was silent. She frowned. When he put it like that, it did seem a little lame. God, he was such a bully. She regretted bringing it up.
‘Look, I haven’t made up my mind for sure yet. But to be honest, no, I don’t want to work under Nikkii. I also don’t love the new direction of the show, so there’s that too. And Sasha and I had a good talk and she —’
‘She thinks the world of you, you know.’
Lily let that sink in for a second, luxuriating in the words.
‘I love Sasha too. She’s the reason I wanted to work on The Daily in the first place; I wanted to learn from her. But then I got lumped with Eliza, who was sweet but grossly incompetent, and now Nikkii, I mean, I don’t need to elaborate on that, surely. What could I possibly learn from her? I need to respect my series producer.’
‘So you think you’re above Nikkii?’ Jack was just shy of yelling in order to be heard over the rain.
‘Who are you? Dr Phil? What’s with all the questions?’ Lily started to get her back up. ‘Jack, with all due respect, I’ve been here two years longer than you. It starts to wear you down.’
‘I’m not saying it wouldn’t. But I am interested to know the real reason you’re leaving, because my concern is that it’s not the right one.’
‘Gee, Dad, okay, well, what is a good reason then?’
‘The fact you’re getting aggro means you’re defensive about something. I’m just saying if you were completely at ease with your decision, you would have a clear conscience about it.’
Lily sighed.
‘I liked this car ride better when I was eating fries and magically selecting Police songs,’ she muttered.
‘Look, obviously, I don’t want you to leave. You’re really talented, Lil. You’ve taught and helped me so much and, I mean, this whole food-truck idea, what a cracker. It’d be sad, disappointing even, for you to go just because you’re annoyed at Nikkii.’
Lily was building up to such rage she forgot to properly hear all of the lovely things Jack was saying about her. Thankfully, the rain was starting to lessen, making the moment slightly less tense.
‘Alice has been let go, did you know that? She was my saviour.’
‘This is a job, Lil. Not school. You’re here to do the best you can in your role, and I think you are doing that, will keep doing that, and will get even better, despite these changes. Survival of the fittest.’
Lily was suddenly feeling frustrated, claustrophobic and shitty. She didn’t appreciate being lectured. What would he know, she thought bitterly.
‘But where is there for me to go? I’m stuck in my role, nothing will change, there’s no moving up now. Do you see that?’
‘Do you even know what you want to do next? Have you got a clear idea?’
Lily felt embarrassment wash over her. She didn’t. She just knew she wanted to be . . . higher up. With superiors she respected and some kind of goddamn professional challenge. Why was he being so mean?
‘It’s easy for you to say all this. You come in, do your bit, smile and cook, everyone loves you. You can’t go any higher than —’
‘You’re kidding, right? You think morning TV is the pinnacle for me?’ He laughed, but it wasn’t unkind.
‘See? That’s what I’m talking about, wanting to reach higher! I want to do amazing things and test myself, but as long as I’m doing your segment, no offence, it’s not going to happen.’
‘I understand that part. I just want to make sure you’ve thought it through fully before I lose you.’
His words hung in the air. They were far too loaded and meaningful to simply fall to the ground with the corpses of all Lily’s petulant but-but-buts.
He looked over at her briefly, an earnest expression on his face. She coiled up the headphones neatly, placed his iPod in the console and folded her arms.
‘Mum’s taking me to Greece for my thirtieth in a couple of weeks. I was going to use the holiday to think about what’s next.’
‘Is she! Oh man. You’re gonna love it. What a great place to turn thirty.’
Lily much preferred excited-tour-guide Jack than stern-career-coach Jack.
‘I will think it through. Promise. Even though I know deep down the reason you don’t want me to leave is becaus
e I’m the only one who will deal with your burnt pans.’
Jack smiled. ‘It’s a bit more than that.’
Lily sat pondering his words, listening to the rain begin to pour down around them again. She loved the way he was quietly, protectively guiding the two of them home in the storm. It felt hyper real in that small, dingy cabin, just the two of them discussing her life and career. The reality of not seeing him every day suddenly struck her, hard. But feeling the way she was about him, particularly after the World’s Best Day, and knowing how inappropriate and unfair to Simone that was, she realised with melancholy acceptance that it might just be for the best not to have him in her life any more.
29
‘I can so get you a job here. This music festival is fucking mega. It’s like Big Day Out and Future Music Festival and Lollapalooza all donated sperm and had a big, grotesque baby. Hang on.’
Lily could hear the phone being muffled.
‘Is there a banana in here? DAMON. No! You know about the no-banana rule, why would you do that! Go outside. No, I’m not kidding. Do, yes, really, go, go!’
Alice was not overreacting. Lily had seen her vomit into a wastepaper basket once when Grimmo ate a banana on set.
‘You’ll have to let him go, obviously.’ Lily cradled the phone between her neck and ear as she rearranged the small colourful bowls on Jack’s cooking bench. It had only been two weeks since Alice had been retrenched and she had already snagged another job, as producer on a huge, touring summer music festival.
‘I even made a sign with a banana and a big red cross over it. But do they care? Fucking creatures.’
‘It took us a few months to get used to your anti-banana regime, they’ll learn.’
‘Damo’s too cute and useful to release into the wild, sadly. You might even like him, he’s got a bit of that layabout, vague muso vibe you love. Byron notwithstanding. Did you ever text him back by the way?’
‘No . . . Got side-tracked with the tour. What a bitch I am. God.’ Lily poured some milk into a small jug and water in another.