Cleanskin Cowgirls

by Rachael Treasure

  She was filthy rich and filthy famous and all alone. Just her and her fix. As she drifted off on the ice-cold, stiffly made bed, she remembered the day in the dressing room years before and where it had all unravelled.

  Charity Buck had slid the small package towards her, then pressed a perfectly manicured finger to her lips in a seductive ‘shush’.

  ‘Don’t, whatever you do, tell Colorado.’ She had given EJ a captivating wink in the dressing-room mirror. A photo of her three children and a beautifully bare-chested Colorado was tucked in the corner. Elsie looked at Charity, shocked at the sight of the plastic-wrapped cocaine tucked inside a zip-lock sandwich bag with Marge Simpson on it. But Charity, the wife and mother of three, and iconic country star to millions, simply shrugged.

  ‘A girl’s gotta do what a girl’s gotta do.’ She pursed her lips and turned to check her intricately braided long blonde hair extensions in the mirror. She wore an otherworldly custom-made deerskin dress, stitched with eagle feathers, beads and perfection; she also wore the highest heels Elsie had ever seen. In contrast to Charity’s finery, Elsie wore a simple shimmering silver-and-black slip and tall patent-leather patterned Liberty cowgirl boots with diamantes on them. Her long blonde hair fell straight over her shoulders. She looked like a shapeless baby next to the towering, womanly Charity. And that’s exactly how Charity had wardrobed it, after many fights with Jacinta.

  Outside, Elsie could hear the roar of the fans in the stadium as they chanted for country music’s golden couple to appear. Charity looked at her image in the mirror, stooping forwards, applying a little more lip gloss over her perfect lips the make-up artist had already painted, hauling her surgery-enhanced boobs up in a super-sexy creamy lace bra, smoothing out the thick elastic underwear worn beneath her dress to keep any hint of ‘post-baby lumps’ at bay. She then set her eyes on EJ again.

  ‘At home, I mostly do it in the laundry so if I spill a little, he’s gonna think it’s washin’ powder. What a man don’t know, won’t hurt him none. Not that I ever do no washing, but Colorado don’t think like that. He’s a little slow when it comes to noticing the little things about me.’

  EJ hesitated. How could she break it to the queen of country rock that she really didn’t want to do any drugs with her? Least of all drugs offered to her by the wife of her idol and her mentor, Colorado Buck. Especially not behind his back. And not before the first night of their LA concert launching The Colorado and Charity Love Revival Tour, featuring Down-Under Darling, EJ. She’d have to say no. But saying no to Charity was like saying no to Adolf Hitler.

  ‘I . . . I . . .’ Elsie had stammered.

  ‘You haven’t changed.’ Charity grimaced coldly.

  Charity was referring to the first time she’d met Elsie inside a Nashville recording studio. Fresh from the flight over from Australia, Elsie had been overcome with nerves, blown away not only by Charity Buck’s expensive beauty but also the unarguable aura of her commanding presence. Elsie was temporarily rendered speechless, and Charity was merciless.

  ‘Do. You. Speak. English. In. Auz-tray-li-ya?’ Charity had said that first time. Elsie knew it was a power-play rather than mere teasing.

  Charity had leaned close. Elsie remained a gaping-mouthed idiot, star-struck and mute. Even Charity’s breath smelled perfume-sweet. How could Elsie ever measure up to these perfect people?

  Beside her, back then, in the insulated crush of the soundproof studio, Elsie could also feel the too-close, too-invasive presence of her music idol Colorado, who, like an old-style painting, had seemed to follow her with his eyes everywhere she went from the moment she’d been thrust into the room with him. According to her brand-new manager, Jacinta Tylermore, he was a man to ‘watch out for’ and to ‘avoid fucking at all costs’. Or her contract ‘would only be good for wiping her arse’. Jacinta sure had a way with words.

  Elsie got up from the hotel bed, the room a vortex, and drifted over to gaze down at the street below. It was daytime. She had a show that night. But where was she again? She widened her eyes, then scrunched them tightly shut. Then opened them. That’s right! How could she not know? She was in Nashville. She lived in Nashville, but the paparazzi had been hounding her so badly that Jacinta had booked her into the Select just while the concerts were on so she was near the venue. Shocked that it had taken her that much thought to process where she actually was, she decided to lie back down. She must be more bombed than she’d thought. This was her last fix, she promised herself as her head hit the pillow.

  She shut her eyes and began to hum a melody. She remembered that first night. That first night of the concert. A smile crossed Elsie’s face and she relived the memory of the freight-train thrum of that first-ever huge crowd. She could see her new Maton now, propped up like a star itself on the stage. In the stage wings, Colorado had swept past, giving her a wink. Then he steered himself to his wife’s side, burying his face in the nape of Charity’s neck.

  Elsie pushed aside her first flush of jealousy. Colorado was a father figure to her. A mentor, she tried to tell herself sternly.

  ‘Fuck off,’ Charity had spat at him. ‘You smell like you’ve drowned in Southern . . . and had your face buried in some brown-sugar back-up singer.’

  Colorado, hurt and angry, looked away.

  Elsie knew moments later on the stage, Colorado and Charity’s marital love for one another would shine like the Northern Lights, swirling and dazzling the audience. Wives twenty-five years married would slide hopeful hands towards their husbands as Charity and Colorado sang their duet ‘Valentine Divine’. Elsie watched as they plastered on winning smiles and claimed the stage, hand in hand. The royal couple of country rock. From the wings, Elsie looked to the guitar she would soon win the world with. She felt the stomp of thousands of fans shimmer through her heart. She wished she had someone here who loved her to see what was about to unfold. A face flashed into her mind. Zac, under a blue-jean sky, looking up to the clouds. She had hurt so many people that she didn’t ever deserve a normal boyfriend, especially one as kind as Zac. Music would be her love instead. She heard her cue and with her own winning smile strode onto the stage.

  In the hotel, the phone was ringing beside the bed. Elsie knew it would be Jacinta. She swore, lifted the receiver, then slammed it straight back down. She was enjoying her float down memory lane. Her body was feeling lighter than a feather, her mind in a shush of peace, like small waves sighing in and out on the shore. She remembered, after that first concert, a knock on her dressing-room door.

  ‘Hang on,’ Elsie had said, but before she could reach for her robe, the door had opened.

  In came Colorado. The expression on his tanned face was strained and panicked. ‘She’s that wasted,’ he said, his voice choked.

  It took him some time to register Elsie was standing before him in just her bra and knickers, her stage make-up and hair still done, about to step into her jeans for any kind of after-party that might unfold.

  Colorado hesitated for a moment, his eyes hungrily scanning her nubile body. He coughed a little, then averted his eyes. ‘Jacinta cain’t get no sense out of her neither. I really think she’s on more than just migraine tablets and the pick-me-ups the doctor gives her. She’s off her head.’

  Elsie grabbed up her robe, drawing the oriental silk number over her spray-tanned shoulders. She reached out and laid her small delicate hand on his upper arm. ‘I’m sure she’s just overtired,’ she lied.

  Beneath her palm Elsie felt a rock-hard bicep. She felt a rush of longing. He looked so vulnerable right now and open to her. She loved it when he wore his stage jeans so tight. Her eyes slid to his big rodeo buckle and the flat weightlifting stomach that his white T-shirt clung to. For an old guy, he was scrumptious. Smelled good too. It made her blush and she too had to drag her eyes away. She unstuck her hand from the pulse of his rock-hard arm muscle. How many times in the past few months had she felt this way in his presence when they were working closely in the studio? The buzz of song wr
iting bonding them closer and closer together.

  ‘Jacinta’s even talking about pulling her off the tour, she’s that bad,’ Colorado said. ‘It’d be just you and me. Could you do that for us, Elsie?’

  Elsie’s big blue eyes opened wider. ‘Of course I could!’

  His face lit up a little. ‘Great! That’s my girl.’ But then his expression closed again with concern. ‘It’s not the show that’s the problem, though,’ he said, his voice for the first time thin with despair. ‘It’s her. She’s been impossible lately. To me and to the kids. She’s not even interested in them. Angry all the time. Yelling, pitching stuff at me. She oughta get a place on the Giants team, she’s got that strong an arm.’ The joke fell flat. He shook his head sadly and glanced up apologetically. ‘I’m scared, Elsie. It feels like I’m losing her.’

  Elsie took his hand in sympathy. ‘No, you’re not losing her. It’s just the pressure of work. Once the tour’s over, you can all go out to the ranch for a holiday. It’ll be fine. She just needs a break. We all do.’

  Colorado’s dark eyes gleamed with gratitude and admiration. His gaze fell on her and stayed. ‘You think?’

  ‘Uh-huh,’ Elsie lied.

  ‘Oh, my sweet, sweet girl. You’re the best. C’m’ere.’ He pulled her to him and gave her the biggest of hugs. Elsie felt a rush of blood to her nipples as they pressed against his solid chest. She also felt his broad hands pressed against her back. They soothed up and down in a comforting way. She answered him by rubbing her hands up and down his long, firm back. But soon their touch morphed into something else.

  The rubs of comfort became gliding hands of desire moving over the fabric of their clothing. Their skin on fire beneath. Breath came to them more quickly, shuddering deeply, longingly. Elsie shut her eyes and leaned her head on his chest. Then it had happened. Like air rushing through an airlock, like the tide rushing in to meet the river mouth. An unstoppable current of desire. It took a matter of moments for Colorado to tug open his big belt buckle, lift Elsie up by her tiny backside, sit her on the dressing-room bench, unwrap her robe, drag down her knickers and bang her solidly, her back against the mirror, lipstick and hairbrushes scattering. It lasted less than two minutes and when he was done Colorado, breathing hard, couldn’t look himself in the eye in the mirror he was facing. Instead he buried his face in EJ’s neck and let the sense of relief soothe him. Ever since he had seen her on the demo tape he had wanted her. She was, he thought, his greatest muse. Elsie, on the other hand, couldn’t help but think, was that it?

  Just then Jacinta had burst through the dressing-room door. ‘There you are,’ she barked, pretending she hadn’t noticed the way Elsie and Colorado had pulled apart, their faces flushed with desire and now embarrassment, Colorado hoisting up his trousers, Elsie grappling to cover herself with the robe.

  ‘I’ve had to call a doctor,’ Jacinta said to Colorado. ‘But don’t worry, I’ve found a discreet one. She’s asking for you. You’ve got two minutes, so you’d better spray yourself with something pretty, then go soothe her or fuck her or something. If you can get it up again. Just do anything to stop her doing whatever she’s doing.’ Jacinta, with her long red nails, laid a hand on Colorado’s broad shoulders and practically shoved him out. Right before she left, she put her head back around the door and pointed from her own eyes to Elsie’s with her long talons. She hissed at her, ‘I’m watching you.’ Elsie had swallowed and nodded.

  Later, after Charity had been carted off to hospital, Elsie’d stood mute, watching as Colorado hurled a San Pellegrino bottle against the mirror so that shards of glass flew in an explosive smash.

  ‘Damned if I do, damned if I don’t!’ Colorado yelled at Jacinta, the veins on his neck standing up with fury. ‘She’s a good musician; so what if I banged her? OK?’

  Banged? Elsie’s mind reeled.

  ‘The world will know. Your wife will know.’

  ‘How will they know? You’re not cancelling the rest of the tour. And we are writing an album together. It’s the best stuff I’ve come up with in years. Years.’

  Elsie waited for Jacinta’s customary pause as Jacinta tugged a cigarette from a packet and lit it angrily.

  ‘Don’t the fuck smoke in here. You know I hate it,’ Colorado had said, grabbing the smoke from her, sucking on it deeply himself before stubbing it out in a shallow plastic tray of eye shadow.

  ‘Charity has to get her shit together is all. Then we’re back on. What city we on in next?’

  ‘You don’t wanna know. Biggest bible-belt town around . . . infidelity round those parts goes down like lead bullets in your balls. They don’t take to tramps neither,’ Jacinta said coldly in Elsie’s direction. ‘So you’d better keep your dick in your pants, Elsie must keep her legs shut and Charity’d better get clean, otherwise the tour’s cancelled. You can’t go on stage alone with EJ. The world will go nuts about it.’

  ‘Like I said, who’s to know I’ve been near her? The once,’ Colorado muttered at his boots. ‘Not for want of wanting more,’ he said, giving Elsie a private look, letting her know he was hooked.

  ‘Keep it in your pants, is all you need to do.’

  ‘What you think I bin doin’? I been playin’ it straight since the last baby was born. It was you who brought her here and dangled her in front of me. C’mon, Jacinta. Have you had a look at her? She’s gorgeous.’ He took Elsie’s face in his hands.

  ‘Gorgeous and dangerous and she’ll destroy your career and your marriage.’

  ‘I am in the room you know,’ Elsie said, taking his hands from her face.

  Colorado looked at the scattering of mirror glass around him, the way his broken image reflected back up at them.

  ‘I’ve about had it with you women,’ he said through gritted teeth. ‘Elsie excluded. And for your information, Jacinta, I’ll fuck whoever I like and I’ll fuck up whatever the fuck I like! I’m the one paying you. Got it?’

  Colorado had glanced at Elsie. She had already been feeling outside of this entire scene, and now she was even feeling severed from herself. Did Colorado really fuck whoever he liked? Elsie had thought she was somehow special to Colorado. Her talent with music surely made her special to him? More special than other girls? What was it with her and picking the wrong men? She saw Jake’s face. Then the face of Amos down by the billabong. She shut her eyes, but it didn’t help.

  Next she had heard a knock on the dressing-room door . . .

  But then the knocking got more insistent. There was banging on the door. Elsie barely opened her eyes. She was in Nashville now. Alone. Except not alone. There was someone at the door. Was it time to go to pre-show hair and make-up?

  ‘Huh?’ she said before she faded out again.

  The hotel concierge swung the door open for Jacinta.

  ‘Fuck me,’ Jacinta said, shaking her head. ‘EJ,’ she said sternly, stepping into the room, ‘get up.’

  Forty-six

  The sheep cast their heads low as they eagerly waded through long fresh grasses, browsing on seed heads. Amos sat on the four-wheel bike, Arnie, his Collie, panting behind him, wet from a quick dip in the dam, now soaking Amos’s back. Both man and dog watched as Elvis hitched the last electrical tape to the top wire of the permanent fence and made his way back to Amos.

  Amos didn’t like coming out to this section of the farm. Each time he looked at the shed and the sewage ponds it was a reminder of the past. Those awful days of the accident and the local persecution that had followed. If things had tracked right, the technology they’d built in the shed could have helped the world’s energy crisis. With global fossil-fuel supplies predicted to run out by 2088, Amos still felt such resistance to letting the project go. The small experiments they tinkered with at home were nothing compared to what they’d been doing in the larger shed. But maybe it was time to let it go? In Amos’s opinion the gaol stint had been harder on his father than his brush with cancer. His father looked like an old man now. He was greying, stooped over and had lost t
he proud tall way he had walked through the world. As his lifetime dreams had withered from the scandal, so too had his spirit.

  ‘He’s made the seat wet,’ Elvis complained, pointing to Arnie. The dog flopped a dripping tail and looked away guiltily.

  Amos shrugged. ‘Not much I can do about it. He likes a swim.’

  ‘On cold days like this?’

  ‘It’s refreshing.’ Amos grinned. Elvis smiled at his son. He was so proud of Amos. He always found a way through with humour for them. And he was so grateful he’d stayed to help Gwinnie during his time in gaol and was even still here, helping them claw their way back from the financial edge. Amos had leased more country and restored it in the way they had their own farm. They could now run more stock to pay off the legal debt; with more and more farmers walking off, Amos’s land leases were accumulating. He spent long hours, until well after dark, in the mechanics shop to make sure the job was done right for the few customers they had left after the scandal. He was pleasant to people at the bowser, even the cruel and condescending Councillor-Mayor No-Buttocks. Elvis just wished he’d live a little. Go meet some girls. Go travelling. But Amos didn’t seem to desire any of those things.

  Elvis swung a leg over the bike, shuffling Arnie back. Amos glanced over to the sewage plant.

  ‘What a waste,’ he said. Not only had they lost access to a valuable fuel resource, but also to the fertiliser that had been a by-product from their biogas production trials. The nitrogen-rich natural fertiliser from the algae that bloomed in the wastewaters of the gas production process had helped bring the soils here back to life. But since the pipeline was cut the fertiliser was now no longer available for the lease properties either. So much potential locked away.