Love and Punishment Read online

  Francie still had her eyes closed. A picture of herself standing stiffly, clutching the ridiculous gold basket, was burned into the inside of her eyelids.

  ‘Uh . . . huh,’ Francie managed a choking sound through the tears which were now sliding quietly, smoothly down her face. As if they’d been doing that forever and had worn their own path.

  ‘Well, what I want you to do is to go back now as an adult, as you are now, and take that young girl by the hand and comfort her. She needs you, Francie. I think she’s a very sad little girl.’

  In her mind Francie walked up the steps to where she stood looking so beautiful in her princess dress. She took herself in her arms and kissed her own blonde hair. She took little Francie’s hand and they walked down from the veranda together. They walked away from Mum in her dressing gown. Past Dad in his black suit holding open the car door, and Joel already in the back seat. Away from the golden basket of dead white flowers.

  They walked down the street, turned the corner and kept walking. They held hands and just kept walking until Big Francie and Little Francie eventually grew into each other.

  Nine

  ‘So, Stupid Cupid—are you going to go?’ Olga was leaning over the table at Café e Cucina with the ribbon from her sleeve trailing in her gnocchi with mushroom sauce. Under normal circumstances Francie would have pointed this fashion faux pas out to her friend, but tonight she just watched as the olive oil seeped up the grey silk in a greasy tide.

  ‘Oh . . . do you think I’ll be invited?’ Francie looked at Olga with a sick smile and then drained her wineglass. She was already halfway through a bottle of red while her seafood risotto sat in an undisturbed blob in its chunky white bowl.

  ‘Well, you could come with me on my ticket,’ Olga offered.

  Francie threw up her hands in a theatrical gesture. ‘Thanks, dahling! That would be fabulous! To come as an uninvited guest to a show about my own fucking life! What would ever make you think I’d sit and watch that pathetic luvvie prancing and dancing across a stage singing about true love? She wouldn’t know about true love if it bit her on the arse! She’s an actress, Olga. She fakes emotion for a living. But she must be doing a good job because she’s got you sucked in.’

  Olga stuffed another forkful of gnocchi in her mouth so she didn’t have to respond.

  ‘You know what, Olga? The reason we are having dinner tonight is because I decided I at least owe it to you to tell you to your face that you are really pissing me off! First you go to her birthday party and now you are sitting here telling me that you are going to go to their show. Do you care about me at all?’

  ‘Of course I do!’ Olga protested. She tried to swallow and almost choked.

  ‘I went to the party, I’m going to go to the show, because I’m your friend. An embedded friend. You know, like the journalists in Iraq? I’m operating behind enemy lines. I’ve told you everything, haven’t—oh shit! Look at my sleeve!”

  At that moment the waiter, in a long snowy starched apron down to his trouser cuffs, squeezed between the tables with a napkin. He dabbed at Olga’s sleeve as she looked up at him with adoring eyes.

  ‘There you go . . . belissima,’ he crooned.

  Francie watched with mounting annoyance. That was the trouble with Olga. She was so desperate for affection that it was like sending a cocker spaniel on a reconnaissance mission when you needed a Doberman.

  ‘Ohmigod! How cute is he?’ Olga exclaimed as she watched the waiter go.

  Francie sighed. ‘Can you just concentrate for one minute?’

  Francie was becoming even more isolated with this Nick and Poppy thing. Her best friend Amanda was pregnant and could now be counted on to have a care factor of nil about Francie’s troubles. Johnno was utterly compromised as Nick’s friend and now housemate. Even Olga was showing that she couldn’t be trusted to maintain the rage.

  Francie took another hit of her drink, regarded Olga and decided to give her one last chance. Olga’s brown eyes were wide with alarm and she raked her fingers nervously through her hair.

  ‘Can you begin to understand why this whole thing is freaking me out? I mean, what part of this don’t you understand? They are going to do a show in front of everyone in this whole city about the most painful thing that’s ever happened to me. I feel ill just thinking about it. OF COURSE I CAN’T GO!’

  Olga’s slender hands flew to the front of her silky blouse. She was twiddling the self-covered buttons and looking at the tables to either side of her in case someone had overheard.

  ‘Yeah, I knew you would think that,’ she leaned over to Francie and whispered, ‘but imagine if you turned up on opening night? Sitting down the front, looking utterly fabulous. You know, really amazing? And imagine if you weren’t with me. I mean, imagine if you were sitting next to some incredible man. Think about the message that would send to everyone. It would say: I’m so over all this. I’ve grown up, moved on, it’s a pity you two can’t. Don’t you think?’

  Francie paused before answering. Olga could see that her dinner companion was trying to overcome her first impulse, which was to stab her in the eye with a fork. She could see that Francie was trying to marshal her thoughts to make them as clear and unequivocal as possible. All this made Olga stop twiddling her buttons and instead begin nervously tracing the outline of her antique peacock brooch.

  Francie finally spoke: ‘No, I don’t think it would say that. I think it would say to everyone: Look at poor screwed-up Francie. She can’t stay away. How pathetic! And you know what, Olga? They would be absolutely right.’

  Francie was reaching behind her and wriggling her arms into the sleeves of her coat as she delivered her ‘goodbye’ speech.

  ‘I know everyone wants me to be better by now, but I’m not. And I don’t know when I will be. I’m sorry if I’m not everyone’s perfect cardboard cut-out balanced human being anymore. I’m sorry if I’ve thrown everybody’s schedules out.

  ‘I wish I could give you a completion date: Francis McKenzie’s personality repaired, renovated and open for business January 2005. But I can’t. Sorry about that. Sorry to inconvenience everyone.

  ‘So . . .’ Francie was standing, pulling her bag off the back of the seat, ‘here’s the money for dinner . . . and keep the change for a bag of popcorn to enjoy during the show. Meanwhile, I HAVE TO GO OUTSIDE AND BE SICK!’

  Olga covered her face with her starched napkin and sank into her chair as every head in the restaurant turned to look at their table. There was a stagy silence as forks and glasses paused in midair. They didn’t pause long. This was Chapel Street, Melbourne—the hip, urbane clientele prided itself on being unshockable. And, after all, they were in an Italian restaurant which thrived on such marvellous melodramas.

  In a Melbourne minute Francie was marching up Chapel Street in the dark, wrapping her cherry-red trench coat around her. It was November, but an unusually chill wind was blowing down the street from the bay to the river. She didn’t turn to see if Olga was following her and guessed she wouldn’t be. She imagined Olga was accepting a complimentary glass of port and a consoling flirtatious chat with the hunky maître d’.

  To hell with her, thought Francie. She knew she was on her own. There was no-one to whom she could admit her deepest fear: that Francis Sheila McKenzie, thirty-two, resident of St Kilda, was about to be revealed to the world as a deranged psycho. For a moment she allowed herself to recall her night of shame and the episode she feared would one day be exposed. But she quickly pushed it back into the dark recesses of her subconscious mind. It didn’t bear scrutiny during waking hours.

  She hadn’t been normal then, she reasoned. In fact, she was barely functioning now, but six months ago she had truly lost control. Looking back, she could forgive herself. It was not like there had been a list of options in boxes where you could tick either ‘tremendously brave’, ‘mildly upset’ or ‘totally irrational’. There seemed to be only one logical course which took her down a dark road. She didn’t hold out much
hope that anyone would understand.

  The wind was blowing up dust and rubbish around Francie’s knees as she struggled with her flapping coat and finding her car keys in the bottom of her bag. She could hear pieces of tin banging on shop awnings and the sharp flailing of paper. And there it was on a brick wall near the railway bridge, illuminated by a streetlight—another poster with Nick and Poppy looking out at her! Their faces were framed in two pink hearts like the King and Queen of True Love.

  She ran over and ripped the poster off the wall. She was crying, scrabbling at the bricks, tearing her fingernails. As she scraped away the last fragments of paper she wished she could do the same to her own body. Scrape away her eyes and face and flesh until she was just bare white bones that didn’t feel anything at all.

  Ten

  From: [email protected]

  To: [email protected]

  Subject: Revenge

  Francie, I know someone who superglued cigarette butts and rubbish all over her ex boyfriend’s car. What’s the best revenge story you’ve ever heard?

  Kylie

  Hah! How about the one where the ex and his new girlfriend put on a show and invite everyone in town?

  Francie was sitting in the newspaper office with her head in her hands when Gabby Di Martino came to take up her favourite perch on the corner of her desk. Today she was a vision in fawn suede. Fawn suede, fawn hair, fawn tummy. She reminded Francie of a baby antelope as she folded her long limbs and licked at her lip gloss.

  ‘So, how’s the column coming along? Can you have it in by five so we can split this joint on time? I’ve got a hair and nail appointment.’

  ‘Sure, almost finished,’ Francie replied wearily.

  Gabby leaned over and read the email on the screen.

  ‘Oooh, revenge! Sex it up, will ya? The punters love all that revenge crap. Personally I think the best revenge is just looking fabulous and totally ignoring the bastard! But I’ll admit I’ve had years of practice and it’s not something everyone can manage.

  ‘Speaking of looking fabulous, watcha wearing tonight? Something glam? It’s always so much fun after the show. We all sit in the Green Room and watch Jessie as the program goes live to air, then she comes in and we all tell her she’s brilliant and then we hit the town and get wasted.

  ‘And the most compelling feature of the Talkfest Green Room is the talent. All those hot international musos, movie stars and their entourages in town for the weekend! So lonely and all looking for a tour guide to the local sights!

  ‘Can I help it if the best attraction in this dump is my bare arse?’ And here Gabby laughed so hard she slid off the desk. Francie managed a smile.

  ‘Awww . . . c’mon, Francie! You’ve been in the fun house a week now. Please tell me Dave has at least crossed your radar.’

  ‘He seems really nice,’ Francie replied. Fuck off and leave me alone. If I want a nurse I’ll push a call button.

  ‘Oh Jesus.’ Gabby’s head pitched forward towards her lap. ‘You know what, Francie? Being single is not a life-threatening condition, but being celibate is. If you don’t have sex with someone soon, YOU WILL ACTUALLY DIE!’

  Francie refused to be entertained. ‘I don’t think I should get involved with anyone in the house. I’m not really ready for a relationship.’

  ‘Whoa, girl! Involved? Relationship? How much time have you spent with Dave? Those words aren’t in his vocabulary. I’m talking about a late night oops . . . I seem to have stumbled into the wrong room and fallen face down on your dick, Dave . . . He is seriously cute.’

  Francie was surprised to register a twinge of possessiveness over Dave. That was a laugh! As if anyone would be seen dead with her after the opening night of Stupid Cupid. Which raised an interesting point. Gabby must have seen the posters and advertisements. Was it like when she and Nick broke up? Everyone knowing about it but too polite or embarrassed to mention it. Or too afraid to say anything in case Francie fell apart.

  Would Gabby go to the show if she were Francie? Francie was just about to ask her advice when Gabby snapped to attention.

  ‘Uh-oh, I’ve gotta go. I can tell by the look I’m getting from the boss that we’ve had a visit from the fuck-up fairy again. This isn’t an office. It’s hell with fluorescent lighting!’ She leaned over and squeezed Francie’s hand.

  ‘I wanna see you trashed tonight, Francie. Sitting on some divine man’s knee, with his hand up your little black dress and your tongue down his throat. Let yourself go, for God’s sake. The way you are, you’re shit for morale around here.’

  And thanks for that caring speech.

  Francie watched Gabby go. There was no-one in the office who could not watch her traversing the expanse of green carpeting as if she was loping across the grasslands of the Okavango Delta.

  Francie turned her attention to next Sunday’s column. Revenge—that was the topic at hand. You could talk about crustaceans in the curtain rails or watercress seeds in the shag pile, but the reality was that revenge was all in the eye of the perpetrator. One could sit and imagine the havoc wreaked by a violent, ingenious or expensive revenge, but truly, did it change anything . . . ever?

  Did you ever hear of a bloke who came running back after his windscreen had been smashed by a harridan with a house brick: ‘My God . . . I spent all morning waiting for the repair truck to arrive and I just realised that I do love you after all?’ No. Did you ever hear of a man brought to his senses by a dead rat nailed to the front door? ‘What was I thinking? She probably caught that rat with her bare hands. I’ve made a hideous mistake. I love her, not you!’ No. What actually happened was that the lovers huddled closer together as the storm of vengeance wheeled around them.

  Francie wished she had been able to play it cool like Gabby. She’d always admired those women who were able to loose the cold steel and execute a bloodless decapitation. Women who were able to say, ‘Fine, I will never see you ever again and don’t even think of calling.’ But that wasn’t Francie. She had called and called again, begged, cried and staggered around all over town making a sorry, soggy spectacle of herself. And she could sit and regret what she had done for as long as she lived, but it was over. Done and dusted. So, what to say to Kylie? She typed:

  Dear Kylie,

  I don’t actually believe in revenge. All the best ones have been done—filling cars with cement, posting nudie pix on the internet, prawns in the hubcaps—done, done, done!

  To be a witty and original bitch takes a lot of time and money. Why spend that on your ex? Spend it on yourself and leave it to a higher power to exact karmic retribution. Have faith, my child!

  As ye sow, so shall ye reap . . . (and the only thing you’ll attract with dead prawns is flies).

  Love, Francie XXX

  Francie shut down her computer terminal and collected her handbag. Of course she was wise about all this revenge stuff—in retrospect. She didn’t want to think about that night anymore. She must—she was determined to—start looking back on the break-up with a bit more detachment. Be kinder to herself. It wasn’t the first time she’d thought this, and it wouldn’t be the last. It seemed you had to say this stuff to yourself over and over until you nursed every damaged brain cell back to health individually. Francie figured that meant she only had to tell herself this a few million times more.

  Tonight was Friday night. Maybe Nurse Gabby was right and she should start kicking up her heels. She knew exactly which heels they would be—the sweetest little pair of strappy silver sandals with pearls on the toes that she’d seen in a window in Toorak Road. If she ran now, she’d still have time to get them on the way home.

  Eleven

  The Green Room at the television station was in party mode and it was only halfway through Talkfest. Francie was sitting with Dave, Robbie, Johnno and Gabby watching a massive plasma screen on a wall. Everyone talked through the advertisements and all shooshed each other whenever Jessie appeared on camera. They had already raided the refrigerator for three bott
les of white wine and made short work of a cheese platter.

  It was all very glamorous. The Green Room was actually green. The recessed lighting in the ceiling and the table lamps rendered the space theatrical, dramatic, and everyone there was superbly cast.

  Gabby looked edible in a cinnamon coloured mini-dress dusted with transparent beads—like a sugar-coated cookie. She was balanced (she always seemed to be perched, as if she was about to take flight at any moment) on the arm of Robbie’s black leather chair. Her long legs were crossed at Dave’s eye level, so that if he turned even slightly he was presented with yards of tanned bare skin. Francie idly wondered, not for the first time, whether Gabby and Dave had been lovers. But tonight it was Robbie who was sitting on a chair next to her, his arm around her trim waist with that easy privilege gay men seem to have as a birthright. Perhaps they were all just good friends.

  The spotlights shining on Robbie’s hair turned it translucent white and threw sculpted shadows on his muscular chest and arms. Francie had already noticed a frisson of interest between him and the equally hot, dusky Cuban percussionist who was here with the band—tonight’s guest musical act on the show.

  Johnno had come along as Francie’s date and he was reclining on a leather couch, beer in hand, in his usual scruffy uniform of ripped jeans and equally desiccated black suit jacket over a T-shirt with political protest. Tonight his cause was battery hens and a cross-eyed chicken peered out at the room from between his lapels. Francie glanced at him and smiled. With his big dark eyes and thick hair flopping over his forehead, he looked the arty poetic type that any number of women would be unable to resist taking home. And Johnno was so loyal, so loving. It would be like rescuing a puppy from the pound.

  She took another peek at Dave from under her fringe. Oh yes, Dave was seriously cute alright. He was so easy and confident he didn’t need a prefab slogan to announce his arrival. He was wearing beautifully cut plain black trousers, a white shirt and a black leather jacket which reminded Francie of fresh liquorice. Dark, sweet and substantial. She realised she wanted to lick him.