Donna Joy Usher - Chanel 01 - Cocoa and Chanel

by Donna Joy Usher

  Shit. I was standing right outside the door.

  ‘I know. When will I see you again?’

  I started to walk towards my room, but the door pulled opened a fraction more and all of a sudden I was staring right into Nastacia’s grey eyes. I saw them widen in horror. She froze in the doorway, but the person behind her, not realising their danger, reached out and pulled open the door.

  I don’t know which part shocked me more. That Nasty was in love, or that she was in love with another woman? Of course as soon as I saw the brunette, her large green eyes and her perfect red lips both rounded in shock at the sight of me, several things clicked into place. That was why Nastacia never joined us in our perving on the Riot Squad Boys. That was why she kept to herself. Poor thing – I bet being gay didn’t fit into her family’s traditional plans for her.

  The drive home seemed a lot shorter than it had getting to Goulburn; mostly because I had a lot to think about. I was worried about my future, I was worried about what form Nastacia’s payback would take (a plague of rodents?), but mostly I was worried about Mum. And then I remembered Cocoa. Ah crap. Who was going to look after Cocoa while Mum was in hospital? My only friend that lived in Hickery was Becky and her landlord had prohibited animals after her Shetland pony had eaten the kitchen. All my other school friends were from surrounding towns, none of those towns being big enough to warrant their own school, and to be honest I hadn’t stayed in contact with them over the last few years. I tried not to think about it and concentrated instead on staying awake while I drove.

  When I got to Hickery I went straight to the hospital. My attempt to arrive before visiting hours were finished was vindicated when I pulled up in the parking lot at 6.30pm. If I was lucky I’d be able to steal Mum’s jelly.

  I don’t know what I’d been expecting but I was relieved when I entered the room and saw her sitting up in bed. Sure, her leg looked a little scary; its cast suspended by ropes from the bed frame, but apart from that, she appeared to be in one piece.

  ‘You’re okay,’ I said, giving her a hug.

  ‘What do you call that? Chopped liver?’ she said, gesturing at her leg.

  ‘Sorry, it’s very impressive. I mean apart from that you’re okay.’

  We paused while a nurse brought her dinner in. Tough roast beef and over cooked vegetables. Yummy.

  ‘I was lucky,’ she continued.

  ‘How was getting hit by a car lucky?’

  ‘The man who mugged me was carrying a gun.’

  Icy chills ran over me at her words. A gun? I shivered and reached for her jelly. She slapped my hand and moved the little container to the far side of the plastic tray.

  ‘Why did you chase him?’ I asked.

  ‘He took my handbag.’

  I would have chased him too; especially if he’d stolen my Louis Vuitton. It’s not that people didn’t have guns in Hickery, they did. Shooting was a favourite pastime for some. But they shot foxes, rabbits and pigs – not people. And their guns weren’t the sort you could hide in your pocket.

  ‘So they got him?’

  ‘The car hit both of us. I survived.’

  ‘He’s dead?’ It seemed totally surreal.

  She nodded as she peeled the top off her jelly. I sighed and sat back in the seat. Guess I was going to have to fend for myself in the food department.

  ‘Who was he?’ I asked.

  ‘Who was who?’

  ‘Did you hit your head as well? The mugger.’

  She licked the jelly spoon clean and lay back into her pillows. ‘They don’t know. He didn’t have any identification on him.’

  ‘Hopefully his finger prints will I.D. him.’

  ‘Oooh,’ she said, ‘listen to you – quite the little policewoman. How’s the training going?’

  I contemplated telling her about Sergeant Moores and Nastacia but as the sentences were forming in my head I realised how lame they sounded.

  Looking at her, lying under the crisp white sheets, her leg hovering above her, made me want to get through training even more. If I could stop just one mugger from hurting someone like my Mum then I was making the world a better place. All those times I had told that lie, only to realise now I had been telling the truth. For the first time in my life I knew what I wanted. I did want to make the world a better place. I did want to try for world peace. And I wanted to be a policewoman. The rest would sort itself out.

  ***

  Cocoa was as excited to see me as I was him. I pressed his soft body to my chest and breathed in his doggy scent. Then we rumbled on the floor for a while, wrestling and tug-o’-warring, before settling down on the couch to watch television and await the arrival of our pizza.

  I had rung Becky as soon as I got home but she hadn’t answered. I was tempted to run down to The Brimstone to see if she and Bobby were there but I didn’t feel like answering questions about Mum or my training. I had spoken to her the week before and she’d sounded stressed. She and Bobby had finally announced their engagement and already they were having trouble with the relatives. Both sets of parents wanted to host the wedding on their own farm. Plus his mother didn’t like her mother and the rivalry between the two was just warming up. I felt sorry for her and wished I could help in some way but all I could do was be there to listen.

  Mum was much the same the next morning. We tossed around possibilities for people who could look after Cocoa but couldn’t come up with anybody. They were either on holidays, had allergies or phobias, weren’t allowed animals, or didn’t like me. I was going to have to beg Becky to stay at Mum’s for the few weeks she needed to stay in hospital.

  Bobby’s 4WD was in the driveway when I pulled up outside their house. I could see Becky coming out the door, a bag in her arms. She manoeuvred it awkwardly into the back of the car before she noticed me walking up the driveway. I had expected her to be excited to see me – she wasn’t.

  ‘Chanel,’ she said awkwardly, ‘what are you doing here?’

  ‘Hi yourself,’ I said. ‘I’m visiting Mum.’

  ‘Oh…how is she?’

  I was surprised Becky hadn’t been to visit her. ‘In pretty good spirits considering her leg is broken.’

  She winced sympathetically and then shot an anxious look over her shoulder towards the road.

  ‘Is this a bad time?’ I asked. It felt weird saying it. Becky and I didn’t have bad times. We were always happy to see each other.

  ‘Of course not.’ Her words and voice were at odds with each other.

  ‘Becky what’s going on? You’re starting to freak me out.’

  She wiped her hands nervously on her pants and then beckoned me into the house, checking the road again before she shut the door.

  ‘I’m not going to find Bobby’s dead body in the kitchen am I?’ I said.

  She snorted in amusement. ‘No.’

  ‘In the bedroom?’ I asked.

  ‘Of course not.’

  ‘Ahh, he’s in that bag in the car.’

  She smiled. ‘Like I’d be able to lift him.’

  ‘People have been known to have amazing strength when they need it the most.’

  ‘Bobby’s fine,’ she said. ‘Well actually he’s better than fine.’ A grin broke through the stressed look on her face. ‘The thing is, well what with all the dramas we were having with the families….’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Well, we sort of got married this morning.’

  ‘Sort of got married?’ I tried to keep my voice level, but I heard it climb up an octave.

  She grimaced as she said, ‘Okay, we got married.’

  A part of me was devastated that I hadn’t been there; hadn’t been her maid of honour like we’d promised each other in primary school. But I managed to push it aside. Tears welled in my eyes as I reached out for her.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ she said as she hugged me.

  ‘Don’t be. I’m crying because I’m happy for you,’ I said, wiping my face with my arm.

  ‘Really, you�
��re not mad?’

  ‘I would be lying if I said I wasn’t disappointed I hadn’t been there. But I’m not mad.’

  She let out a huge sigh. ‘I’ve been so worried,’ she admitted.

  ‘Geez, don’t worry about me. What on earth are you going to tell your parents?’

  Bobby entered the kitchen as I was speaking. ‘We aren’t planning on telling them,’ he said.

  ‘Huh?’

  ‘The grapevine in this town works just fine. They’ll find out without us telling them.’

  ‘Ouch,’ I said.

  Becky crossed to Bobby’s side and put her arms around him. ‘You caught us packing for our honeymoon. We’re trying to get out of town before the hysteria starts.’

  ‘We’re hoping they’ll have time to reflect on their actions that drove us to this before we get back,’ Bobby added.

  ‘Good luck with that,’ I said, thinking about how upset Becky’s Mum had gotten when we’d bought Becky’s formal dress without her.

  I helped them pack the car and then waved them off on their round Australia trip. They wouldn’t be home for months. I didn’t bother mentioning my dilemma with Cocoa. It was my problem not theirs and it was just one more thing Becky would have felt guilty about.

  ***

  ‘What about a kennel?’ Mum said the next morning. I was leaving in only a few hours and we still hadn’t solved our problem.

  ‘That’s a great idea,’ I said. ‘Except…’

  ‘Except what?’

  ‘Well the only kennel near Hickery got closed down for cruelty to animals last year.’

  ‘Oh that’s right, it did too.’

  It had been a huge scandal.

  ‘However,’ I said, thinking furiously, ‘I could take him with me and put him in a kennel in Goulburn.’ That would be nice. I’d get to visit him.

  And so it was that Cocoa was riding shotgun when I left for the Police Academy. I was planning on hiding him in my room until I got him into a kennel. We drove the whole way only stopping once for a toilet break and pizza – I had Hawaiian, Cocoa had meat lovers – and made it back to Goulburn in record time.

  ‘Don’t make a sound,’ I warned him as I zipped up the small backpack I used for smuggling him places dogs weren’t allowed. I breathed a sigh of relief when we made it up to my room without running into anyone who wanted to chat. He seemed pretty impressed with my quarters, sniffing the perimeter before settling down on my bed.

  It wasn’t long before I heard knocking on my door. I opened it a little to check it was Susie before I let her in.

  ‘He’s so cute,’ she said in her shrill little voice when she saw Cocoa. ‘How’s your mother?’

  ‘Good,’ I said. ‘But I have to book Cocoa into a kennel until she’s out. Do you know if there is any nearby?’

  She pulled out her phone. ‘No, but I can Google it for you.’

  ‘Well while you do that I’m going to see if I can find Rick.’

  She looked at me with her eyebrows raised.

  ‘I’m going to ask him to train us in the evenings.’

  ‘Do you think he will?’ Her voice got even higher when she was excited.

  I hitched my boobs up in my bra and applied a coat of coraliscious gloss to my lips. ‘I’m hoping to put it in a way that he won’t be able to resist,’ I said.

  ‘When you left I thought that was it,’ she said. ‘What changed?’

  ‘It turns out I actually do want to make the world a better place.’ I pulled my hair back into a ponytail I was hoping made me look cute and not twelve.

  ‘That’s the spirit.’ She looked down at her phone screen and said, ‘There’s a few here. Do you want me to ring them while you’re gone?’

  ‘Do you think they’ll be there at 6pm on a Sunday afternoon?’

  ‘Someone’s got to feed the animals.’

  While she did that I went in search of Rick. I checked the gym, the canteen and even the library, but he wasn’t at any of them. Finally I ran into Mike, one of the other Riot Squad Boys, and he said he’d pass the message on to Rick that I was looking for him. I returned to my room hoping Susie had been more successful than I had.

  She was sitting on my bed with her hands over her face.

  ‘What’s wrong?’ I said. And then I smelt it. ‘Holy Batman.’ I pinched my nose between my thumb and first finger.

  ‘What did you feed him?’ she said through her fingers.

  ‘Pizza.’

  ‘Is it the cheese?’

  ‘I think it’s the salami. How did you go?’

  ‘Nothing.’

  ‘Really? Nothing?’

  ‘They’re all full,’ she said.

  ‘Christ, what am I going to do?’ I’d been so confident with Plan A I hadn’t even thought of Plan B.

  ‘Sleep on it,’ she said. ‘It will all sort itself out in the morning. Just you wait and see.’

  I tried really, really hard but was unable to share her blind optimism.

  4

  And That’s How We Do It Where I Come From

  I’m sure if it had been Susie’s dog we were hiding in the Academy it all would have worked out just peachy the next morning. But it wasn’t Susie’s dog. It was mine. So instead I shouldn’t have been shocked when Sergeant Moores pulled a surprise room inspection. Apart from the fact I had no time to get Cocoa out, my room was a mess and my laundry undone.

  I could hear him progressing his way down the hall, yelling and screaming at the other students. If I got caught with Cocoa in my room it was all over, I was sure of it.

  I shoved the mess on my floor under the bed with Cocoa and placed my bag in front of him. ‘Stay,’ I said in a stern voice, desperately hoping he wouldn’t decide to play with his squeaky pig.

  ‘Miss Smith?’

  ‘Yes Sergeant,’ I said, jumping to my feet.

  I saluted and stood to attention trying not to grimace as he ran his finger across my dusty window ledge. A week’s worth of laundry tumbled over his shiny shoes when he opened the wardrobe, and my shirts hung in all their crumpled glory. The men’s underpants I’d purchased to uphold the chaffing story were rumpled from my accessing the women’s ones hidden underneath. My bed was unmade and my desk littered with open study books. All in all it was a pretty poor effort. I would have been worried even if I hadn’t been hiding an illegal immigrant under my bed.

  Sergeant Moores finished his inspection and turned to face me.

  ‘Get it over with and go away,’ I thought, watching the grim expression on his face. I was trying hard not to imagine what would happen if squeaky pig noises suddenly came from under the bed.

  ‘Miss Smith,’ he said, ‘I’ve been doing room inspections for the last fifteen years and I can honestly say I have never seen such a …’ His voice had been increasing in volume as he whipped himself into a frenzy, but I didn’t get the chance to find out what it was he had never seen before because at that moment a smell so foul, so intense that we were both forced to cover our noses, invaded the room.

  I froze in horror. It looked like Cocoa’s salami was the gift that kept on giving. Sergeant Moores’ eyes bulged over the top of his hand and I did the only thing I could think of to waylay his suspicion.

  ‘Excuse me,’ I said.

  His eyebrows rode up his forehead to his impressive head of hair as he took his hand away from his nose and opened his mouth to speak. Another wave of putrid air washed over us even worse than the last.

  I put my hands to my belly and grimaced. ‘Dairy intolerance,’ I said. The smell kept on coming as Sergeant Moores attempted to draw breath. ‘And gluten,’ I added, apologetically.

  He walked out to the hallway, took his hand away from his face and said, ‘You need to get that looked at.’ And then he left.

  I closed the door before I flopped onto the bed and let out a sigh of relief. ‘Come here boy,’ I said softly. I could hear movement under the bed and then Cocoa commando crawled out. He trotted over to the door and whined, looking o
ver his shoulder at me.

  I was about to put him in the backpack when there was a knock at the door.

  ‘Susie?’ I said.

  ‘It’s Rick.’

  I shoved Cocoa into the wardrobe before opening the door.

  ‘Hi,’ I said brightly, desperately hoping the smell had dissipated. I was guessing by the way his face screwed up that it hadn’t.

  ‘It wasn’t me,’ I said. I could feel my face going red.

  He looked past me into the room. ‘Well who was it then?’

  I dragged him in to my room and shut the door. I could hear Cocoa scrabbling, frantically trying to get out of the wardrobe.

  ‘Don’t tell me,’ Rick said, ‘it was the ghost that lives in your wardrobe.’

  I let Cocoa out before opening the window as wide as it would go.

  ‘Is this why you were looking for me?’ Rick asked.

  ‘No. I was going to ask if you would train Susie and me in the evenings.’

  ‘Why not,’ he said, shrugging his shoulders.

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Got nothing better to do.’

  I tried to take that as a compliment.

  Cocoa wandered over and sniffed Rick’s boots. His efforts were rewarded with a scratch behind the ears. He groaned and leaned into him.

  ‘He likes you.’

  ‘My mother had a schnauzer,’ Rick said, working his fingers deep into Cocoa’s beard. I pictured him kneading my flesh in the same way and tried unsuccessfully to prevent the shiver that ran over me. Why oh why hadn’t I hitched up my boobs before I’d opened the door?

  ‘What are you going to do with him?’ he asked.

  I sighed and then filled him in on my predicament.

  ‘I might be able to help you out,’ he said when I’d finished.

  ‘Really?’

  ‘I know the guy who runs the Police Dog Training School. We might be able to get him a cage there.’

  ‘Not with a Police Dog?’

  ‘No, they often have empty cages.’

  ‘You have no idea how grateful I’d be,’ I said, hoping he might ask for a totally inappropriate form of payment.

  ‘Let me take him with me. If he can’t I’ll keep him at my room until we can find somewhere for him.’