One True Thing

by Nicole Hayes

  ‘Fine. But you do it. Okay? I don’t have time.’

  ‘No, no. I insist,’ Kessie says, all teeth and smartarseness. ‘It is your band, after all.’

  For the win.

  I glower at Kessie before I face Jake again, refusing to buckle to those penetrating eyes. ‘Fine,’ I say. ‘Just stay out of the way for rehearsal.’

  And without waiting for a reply, I signal to Tyler to count us in.

  CHAPTER 6

  DEMOGRAPHICS

  There’s only a week before the election launch and Mum needs us to ‘fill in the gaps beside her’. Not her words – Harry’s. He says it’s important that Mum’s constituents see who she is when she’s not at work, that although we’re not running for election ‘as a family’, that’s what ends up happening anyway. And in that spirit, I guess, Mum called for some Mulvaney-Webb time, which means that tonight the dinner table is full: Mum and Dad, Luke and me, and Sarah, because, well, it’s Sarah, and she’s been hanging out with us for as long as I can remember. She doesn’t have kids, ‘or a life’, as she says dryly, so we pretty much always set the table for five when we’re doing the family thing. It’s the first time we’ve all eaten together in days and we’re about to tuck into Dad’s pumpkin and baby spinach risotto when Harry shows up with a bottle of wine and his usual strained expression, though tonight it seems closer to stifled panic.

  ‘You might as well sit down,’ Mum says, continuing to eat, ‘because I’m not going anywhere until after dessert.’ Harry is already half-seated when she adds, ‘Plus, that’s a good wine.’

  ‘So, we need some gap-filling.’ He cocks his head at Luke and me. ‘School athletics track opening ceremony tomorrow,’ he says. ‘Perfect family moment.’

  Mum shakes her head. ‘I’d rather wait for the actual campaign to start,’ she says, and winks at me. ‘We don’t want to wear you out.’

  Mum knows she can drag me into a handful of events when it’s crucial, but she also knows that if it were a choice between attending one of her public events – particularly the ceremonial, speech-giving, handshaking type that can drag on forever – and, say, amputating a limb without anaesthetic, I’d probably have to toss a coin. So she doesn’t want to use up all my goodwill in a single blow.

  Harry shows us his palms, indicating there’s nothing he can do. ‘The campaign’s already started, Premier, whether it’s official or not. Every moment counts. You know that.’

  Mum sighs. ‘Where’s the event?’

  ‘Northwoods Primary.’

  Mum’s fork hovers by her mouth, risotto clumped on its tines. ‘Northlink territory?’

  ‘They’re pretty feral at the moment with all the roadworks and traffic chaos.’ Harry tugs at his shirt collar and glances at me. ‘And the protests.’

  ‘Rowena?’ Dad peers over his glasses. ‘We talked about this.’

  ‘I know, Brant,’ Mum says, ‘except this isn’t a typical election.’ They look at each other. ‘Is it?’

  Dad doesn’t argue – he sets down his wine glass with such deliberate care that he doesn’t need to.

  ‘I hate those stupid people,’ Luke says.

  ‘What “stupid people”?’ Sarah asks.

  ‘You know … people people.’

  We all kind of share a look then – the ‘I have no idea what Luke just said but he’s pretty funny’ look, which gets a regular run when we’re all together.

  Mum laughs. ‘Don’t worry, champ,’ she tells him. ‘You’re excused. You’ve got training.’

  ‘Yes!’ Luke cries, high-fiving Sarah.

  ‘Why do I have to go if Luke doesn’t have to?’ I protest.

  Mum hesitates. I could probably push this, and I’m about to go all teenager on her when Dad lays his hand over mine and says, ‘We’ll talk about it later.’

  Mum blinks. I guess she wasn’t expecting that. ‘Right,’ she says, but it sounds more like a question than an agreement.

  There’s a stilted silence, broken only by Luke’s noisy shovelling of risotto into his face. Harry watches my parents mutely, his objection almost visibly taking shape behind those pursed lips. This one must be important, but he knows better than to take it up it with Dad.

  I decide to spend the rest of dinner working out a plausible escape plan.

  ‘So,’ Harry says a little too brightly, ‘how’s the band, Frankie?’

  Mum picks up her fork and resumes eating.

  I’m still pissy from Jake’s interruption during rehearsal and the mess that followed. Kessie refused to back down on the lyrics, and I’m starting to wonder if we’ll even be able to include ‘Love Song’ in our set now. I can’t play something I don’t feel. Maybe I should be able to but I can’t, and I bet Eddie wouldn’t either. I know Kurt Cobain never did. Though, Kurt probably isn’t the ideal role model for how to manage a musical career. Or life, let’s be honest.

  ‘It’s all right,’ I say, pushing a chunk of pumpkin around my plate. ‘Not great.’

  ‘When’s the audition?’

  ‘Couple of months. Mr Campaspe says we’ve got a good shot, but …’ I set my fork down, my appetite gone.

  ‘You’re terrible?’ Luke asks helpfully.

  I glare at him. ‘It’s just not happening.’

  Harry leans over and gives me a nudge. ‘I’ve got something that might help.’

  ‘What?’ I say. ‘A new band?’

  He laughs, but Mum shoots me a look.

  ‘I’m joking,’ I say.

  Mum doesn’t believe in giving up – not on dreams and especially not on people. Ever. You pick your team, she says, and you stick with them through good and bad. Even Dad agrees with that one.

  Harry retrieves a CD from his laptop bag and pushes it across the table to me without explanation. I read the label: Mookie Blaylock, 22 October 1990.

  I look at Harry. ‘No way.’

  Harry grins. ‘Yes way.’

  ‘What is it?’ Luke is out of his seat, trying to read the label. He squints and frowns, then declares, ‘That’s Pearl Jam’s first gig!’ His eyes are so wide he looks a little demented. ‘Before they changed their name!’

  I laugh and shake my head, feeling a little demented myself. ‘How …?’

  Harry crosses his arms and sits back, his face breaking into a massive smile. ‘Connections.’

  ‘I hope it’s all above board, Harry.’ Mum can’t help herself.

  ‘Absolutely, Premier,’ Harry says quickly. ‘I went to school with a local gun-for-hire roadie. He’s mates with all the international acts, knows the guy who used to take care of Eddie Vedder’s guitars. He gave me a copy. I didn’t once mention your name.’

  ‘Oh my god! Thank you, Harry!’ I rush around the table and give him a hug. ‘This is amazing.’

  I’m about to leave the table to listen to the CD when Mum stands up. ‘Luke, why don’t you get ready for bed?’

  ‘What? I want to hear the CD!’ His whole face crumples mid-whine, making him look more like Yoda than a human boy child.

  ‘You will. After your shower.’

  And because Mum has given him ‘the look’ – the one that could scare the straitjacket off Hannibal Lecter – he relents and slinks off into the bathroom, careful to slam the door on his way.

  ‘So, the event?’ Mum says after Luke’s gone.

  ‘Come on, Ro,’ Dad says. ‘You agreed to keep the kids out of it.’ He shakes his head. ‘It was your suggestion.’

  ‘We also agreed there would be a few exceptions.’ She turns that wide, breathtaking smile on me, and says, ‘This is one of them.’ But it’s an apology too.

  ‘I’m skipping school, then?’

  Harry laughs. ‘Nice try. It’s after school.’

  Dad sits back. ‘It’s up to you, Frank.’

  This is the second time in a week I’ve been asked to do something I don’t want to do – both times involving the media. This is not the typical request mothers are asking of their teenage daughters in kitchens around Aus
tralia right now, but when was the last time that kind of everyday, normal-people request was made in this house? Still, I know Mum’s under a lot of pressure. I feel my resistance fade.

  ‘I’ll owe you one,’ she adds.

  I sigh a deep, loud, heartfelt sigh in case Mum doesn’t get how much I hate this. ‘I’ll add it to the list,’ I say slowly, ‘on one condition.’

  Mum raises an eyebrow.

  ‘Kessie comes too. These things drag on for so long. At least she can help keep me sane.’

  Mum hesitates. Harry clears his throat. They share a look.

  ‘What?’

  And then it’s Mum’s turn to take a deep breath. ‘Seamus Hale is playing dirty,’ she says, announcing it like I should be surprised.

  ‘And in breaking news, rain is wet,’ I say.

  ‘This is different,’ Mum says.

  ‘It’s nothing to worry about,’ Harry rushes to add.

  ‘Dad already told me,’ I say. ‘But it’s under control, right? I mean, he won’t find anything.’

  Something flashes across Mum’s face, too fast for me to identify. I watch as she visibly steels herself. ‘We don’t know what he’s sitting on,’ she says evenly.

  Dad looks up at this.

  Mum offers me that half-grimace she does which means there’s a whole lot of stuff she isn’t telling me. ‘Whatever it is, I’m sure we can contain it.’

  ‘Right. So what’s the problem?’ I look at Dad, but he’s staring into his glass of wine as if he’s lost something in there. ‘What’s Kessie got to do with it?’

  ‘I love Kess,’ Mum says, that tiny dent in her brow warning me of the ‘but’ I know is coming, ‘but I need her to … play it down a bit.’

  ‘Play what down?’ I frown. ‘You don’t mean the gay thing, do you?’ I don’t try to hide my disbelief. Mum is a passionate advocate of gay rights and has been since way before it was cool.

  ‘No,’ she says, shaking her head, shocked that I would even suggest such a thing. ‘No. God. No. Just … generally. I know she’s not a big fan of the Northlink project and the women’s shelter having to shut down … And this is in project heartland.’

  ‘So, no Northlink talk then.’ Easy. That stuff bores me stupid. Good reason to shut Kessie up.

  ‘And there’s the woman thing,’ Harry says lightly.

  I laugh. ‘The woman thing?’

  ‘We’re trying to minimise it,’ Harry says. He forks a generous pile of rice into his mouth and chews without looking up.

  I turn to Mum. ‘Wait … What?’

  Mum seems to be measuring how much she’ll say. She glances at Sarah, who shakes her head in disgust. ‘Apparently,’ Sarah says, ‘the electorate haven’t noticed that their Premier is female.’ She sips her wine. ‘And will continue on, oblivious, as long as we don’t tell them.’

  Mum shoots Sarah a stern look. ‘We’re just choosing to place the focus on my policies – on the work we’re doing, rather than who’s doing it.’

  Sarah snorts.

  ‘Not helping, Sarah,’ Mum says.

  Harry looks annoyed. ‘Half the electorate doesn’t care the Premier is a woman. The other half hates the fact,’ he says, waving his glass about. ‘Hate wins every time.’ He offers me a thin smile, and says, ‘Hate generates more power, makes more noise.’

  ‘Most depressing thought ever,’ I say, reconnecting with the reasons I despise politics so much.

  Mum places her hand on mine, gently but firmly encouraging me to look at her. ‘It has to be about policy,’ she says. ‘It has to be about what we do.’

  ‘Okay,’ I say slowly. ‘Whatever. So Kessie can come?’

  Mum hesitates. ‘Yes. Of course.’

  Dad offers me a careful smile when I excuse myself from the table. I head to my room, set up the Mookie Blaylock CD so it’s ready to go the second after I’ve called Kessie – a kind of tonic to the strange burning sensation Mum’s words have left in my chest.

  ‘Hey, funny thing happened at dinner tonight.’ I tell Kessie an abridged version of Harry and Mum’s request, without mentioning Dad’s weirdness or the rumoured dirt file. ‘So, wanna come? The food will be good.’

  There’s a long silence over the phone and I brace myself for an argument I’m not even remotely interested in having.

  ‘Fine,’ Kessie says, sounding a little distracted.

  ‘Um … Great?’ I say, confused.

  ‘Time and place, Francesca Mulvaney-Webb,’ she says mysteriously. ‘Time and place.’

  When I hang up and am finally free to listen to Eddie and the boys rocking out for the first time in public – their young voices hopeful and passionate, the sound scratchy and uneven but so real and true that I could reach out and touch it – I’ve almost convinced myself I don’t care what Mum, Dad, Harry or even Kessie are on about. It’s got nothing to do with me, anyway.

  CHAPTER 7

  THE HUSTINGS

  I watch Mum speaking into the microphone. She searches the crowd, measuring their reactions, the jokes that work, the ones that don’t. She says she likes nodders the best – the people who visibly move their heads, positive or negative, to show her whether she’s won them or not. But the ones she focuses on are those who meet her gaze, unflinching, the ones who give nothing away and who will probably leave unmoved by anything she’s said.

  ‘They are my target audience,’ she tells us. ‘The undecided – the voters who won’t commit right away. They want to weigh it all up before they make their choice. They want to think about it and understand.’

  I scan the crowd in the unseasonably warm sun, trying to see who these undecideds might be, but the sea of upturned faces – tired-looking parents and noisy, face-painted kids – is about as interesting as Mum’s speech, which is as boring as bat shit when you’ve heard it more than twelve times already. And it’s even worse when you’re not interested in the first place.

  ‘Oh, Jesus,’ Kessie whispers, nudging me not very discreetly. ‘Is that a clown?’

  Kessie and I are seated under the VIP tarp right beside the stage, thankfully out of the hot sun, our faces aching from smiling at anyone who looks at us. Across the stage, in the wings, is, indeed, a clown, complete with rainbow-coloured hair, and a tiny, ruby-red hat hardly any bigger than his – or her? – shiny red nose.

  ‘Definitely a clown,’ I say.

  Mum finishes her speech, takes her applause and hands the microphone to the emcee, a short, round man wearing a suit too small for him and sporting a comb-over that flops over his forehead every time the wind blows. Jesse the Amazer, which Mr Comb-over informs us is the clown’s name, looks slick by comparison.

  ‘Will this never end?’ I groan.

  I still have no idea what Mum was talking about – these are exactly the kinds of boring policy issues that Kessie loves and I try to avoid. That doesn’t stop Kessie from blathering on about them any chance she can, but I’m very good at tuning out what I don’t want to hear. When you spend most of your childhood overhearing your mother discussing the intricacies of Section 49(b) of the Clean Water Act for hours at a time, and your dad rabbiting on about landscape and loss in Voss, it’s amazing how sharp your fade-out skills become.

  The only problem with this approach is that it sometimes feels like your mother has more in common with your best friend than you do. At least Kessie left her badges behind today.

  ‘You know how I feel about clowns,’ Kessie hisses at me, a stiff smile in place, as it has been for the past hour.

  ‘It’s a middle-aged bloke in face paint, Kess. How can you be afraid of that?’ I whisper. Though, hearing it aloud, it does sound kind of creepy.

  ‘Stephen King has ruined clowns for everyone. Admit it. They’re ew.’

  At least it’s almost over. Most of the media packed up and moved on once Mum finished her speech, apparently not interested in Jesse the Amazer’s ‘AMAZERING balloon sculptures’, but there’s always someone – an intern or a wannabe blogger – desperate to
snare a candid shot of someone famous embarrassing themselves or looking unattractive. Good luck finding a bad shot of Mum. She’s a freak the way she always looks good. ‘It’s how you hold your mouth,’ she jokes when I complain how unfair it is.

  ‘I thought you loved this crap. That’s why I asked you.’

  ‘This isn’t real politics,’ Kessie says.

  ‘Actually it is.’ Christie leans over from the row behind us. ‘School fetes, music festivals, arts centre openings …’ Christie gestures towards the stage. ‘Enjoying the skills and feats of the Jesse the Amazers of the world. This is what politics really looks like.’

  ‘And you wonder why I hate it?’ I say.

  ‘Yeah, well, thanks for inviting me,’ Kessie says, ‘but unless the food is spectacular, I’m going to have to pass next time. I’d rather rally on the steps of Parliament.’

  ‘That’s so last century,’ I say.

  Jesse the Amazer takes a bow, and the crowd politely applauds. Almost as one, waiters with platters of food appear in each corner of the VIP tent.

  ‘I guess now we find out if it’s worth it,’ I say.

  ‘Thank god,’ Kessie answers, and we both stand up, free to stretch and talk. My thighs are sore from the hard plastic seats, and I’m tempted to slip off my heels, just to let my feet breathe for a minute.

  ‘Can we get some shots with your mum?’ Harry asks, approaching from the stage wings. He nods at Christie, who’s rounding up a couple of photographers. ‘No Luke?’

  ‘Swimming. Remember? Dad’s taken him. They’ll meet us later for the dinner.’

  ‘Right. I knew that. But your dad’s gone too?’ He fidgets with the collar of his jacket.

  ‘Yeah. The regionals are next week. We told you this.’

  ‘Right. Yep. All good,’ Harry says, offering the kind of smile I save for the media. He waves Christie over to us, and then I see him talking discreetly with my mum.

  ‘Where do you want me?’ Kessie asks brightly, beaming at Christie, who she’s always had a bit of a crush on. ‘Up front? I have another change of clothes if you’d prefer something more feminine.’