Joel & Cat Set the Story Straight

by Nick Earls

The mains are cleared, the first six stories are read. Plenty of examples of tame, simpering teamwork. Did these people have no fights at all? Where’s the conflict? Where’s the tension? Where’s the prospect of a companion essay in any of it?

  Desserts are served. It’s pavlova, but I can’t eat it. Every time I think of our story, my veal parmigiana wells up in my throat. I stand up and tell the others I’ve got to find Mr Ashton. Cat stands and follows me.

  He sees us coming towards his table, and puts down his spoon.

  ‘Problem?’ he says.

  ‘Ah, yes, sir. It’s about our story,’ I tell him. ‘I’m really not sure we should read it. And I think Cat’ll back me up on that. There’s a whole lot of issues with it, and I really think it’s not ready.’

  ‘I’ve changed my mind,’ Cat says.

  ‘No you haven’t. Trust me.’

  ‘Oh, no, no,’ Ashtoe says. ‘It’s ready. It’s rough, I’ll admit, in some ways. But isn’t that what we’re looking for? Collisions? Conflict? Tension? It’s quite dramatic. And a big finish. That’s why I’m saving you until last. You have to read it.’

  ‘I’m sure it’s great,’ Cat says, looking me in the chest again and blushing. ‘I’m sure what you’ve written’s great, and we needed to finish the story. We needed to wrap it up somehow.’

  ‘Ah, no, what I’ve written’s kind of stupid, like you thought earlier.’ But this is getting me nowhere. Getting me absolutely nowhere. ‘And I think I might have left it at home.’

  ‘That’s fine,’ Ashtoe says. ‘I brought copies of everything, just in case. They’re up on stage.’ There’s nothing I can say to that. ‘You’re on last, after Luke and Aaron. That’ll make an interesting contrast. You’ll see.’

  ‘I think it’s nice that you’re nervous,’ Cat says on the way back to the table. ‘But I’m sure it’s very clever, the last paragraph.’

  We sit down, and I stare at my pavlova until the tables are cleared. One story is read, and then another. Kidnaps and innocent misunderstandings and days at the beach – on it goes. Four stories down.

  Luke and Aaron are called to the stage. From the very start, Luke is trying not to laugh. Their story is about a dull-witted giant called Lester Pound who goes to Sydney for Mardi Gras and dances his big clunky heart out, only to return to Brisbane and fall for a co-worker called Joel when they are forced to collaborate after fifteen months of antagonism. Joel lives with his mother, an eccentric salsa dancer and fortune-teller who now calls herself Desdemona. He is at least thirty. He is a big loser. He and Lester are both extreme losers, in fact, but at least they’ve found each other, against the odds. In the final scene, they’re at the Wickham Hotel, sipping cocktails while Doctor Dee’s hit ‘Notorious Finger Love’ (from the double-platinum album ‘Keep it in the Family’) plays in the background.

  There is cheering and woo-wooing from the crowd. I have no secrets among these people, none at all. Mr Pickett says he had no idea Luke was such a good writer. Cat looks pale. Emma laughs more than anyone. Dr Davis applauds like someone who hasn’t quite worked it out and who thinks ‘Notorious Finger Love’ must be a song the young folk are into in a big way. The reference to it got quite a response.

  Lester Pound, and stodgy hapless Joel. Fifteen months of antagonism, and a happy ending. Cat tries to catch my eye, but I can’t look at her. Our business is now everyone’s. I’ve liked her – liked her in that gut-churning way you think everyone’s able to see, but hope they don’t – for about an hour now, and Luke’s been set to out me for days. All my denials, most of which I meant, and it turns out it’s Luke who sets everything straight.

  In the moment I most need to talk to Cat, just Cat, it feels as if eighty people are staring at us. And it feels like that because most of them are. I don’t know what she’s feeling, and I wish I did.

  And I wish I hadn’t written that last paragraph.

  Mr Ashton calls us to the stage. I pull the story from my bag, and follow Cat. He gives us an encouraging smile as we walk up the steps.

  ‘I think I’m going to be sick, sir,’ I tell him. ‘I really think this is a bad idea. I think the refec staff’d take it badly if I threw up.’

  ‘It’s just nerves,’ he says blithely. ‘Nerves are good. Work with them. I’m sure you’ll turn them into a killer performance.’

  And then he abandons us at the lectern – Cat, me and this ugly, ugly story.

  – Wednesday

  ‘You ready?’ I smile at Joel and squeeze his arm. He grimaces and goes back to looking pale and nervous. I didn’t realise he hated public speaking so much.

  We read, a paragraph in turn. The audience laughs as we wrestle for control in the early days, the days of big guns and slow tea, of plummeting and the ivory-handled hairbrush, of the love of custard and the warty dead man who smells like fish. This is way more fun than I thought it would be, and the audience seems to be enjoying it. I start to play up to it and milk it for maximum laughs. Joel, on the other hand, looks like he’s going to hurl.

  We hit the semi-truce of the film set, David Spade, Spielberg. Kat Perfect appears, to cheering. A little too much cheering. I give my last paragraph everything, letting the audience know that there’s more to Kat than they might think, letting them in on her secret deep-seated pain. And then it’s all down to Joel. I hand the microphone over to him and whisper, ‘Knock ’em dead.’ I’m intrigued now to hear how our story ends. I stand to the side, ready to hang off every word.

  Joel clears his throat a few times and begins:

  ‘She stumbled as she walked, feeling the deep-seated pain that only the truly vacuous feel, the deep-seated pain she had felt every day since she was a child, that deep-seated pain in her feet that came from being too stupid to know which shoe went on which foot. Since birth, she had been plagued by the fact that there was altogether too much air in her head for even the basic life skills to stick. And what was in there that wasn’t air was all pretty much meanness and self-love. Even her tiny chihuahua, Emma, had more to offer, and it had significant behavioural problems. Meanwhile, Max Eislander – victim of circumstance, stifled talent, thwarted hero – opened the case in the boot of his car. He clicked the sleek, black thirty-shot magazine into place. Kat Perfect sat there in her school uniform, scolding Emma for soiling herself again. Emma snapped and snarled, and soiled a little more. Kat Perfect looked down at the prefect badge on her lapel and said, in the airheaded way that had stunned millions, ‘Hey, I think they got the E and the R the wrong way round.’ She was so caught up with herself that she didn’t hear a sound. Didn’t notice Eislander’s approach. Didn’t feel the hail of bullets that scythed her head off like the head of a corn doll. The end.’

  OH MY GOD. I stand there while the room erupts into laughter and try to make sense of what Joel has just read. I’m an airhead who can’t put her shoes on properly? And then he shoots me? I die in a hail of bullets? And did he say something about me soiling myself? Oh my god, he actually made out that I soiled myself or something. This is the most humiliating thing that has ever happened to me. I look around the theatre and realise people are still laughing. And not just laughing – standing and clapping. And Sandy’s mystery date, Enzo, is cheering the loudest – doing one of those whistles through his fingers and teeth. I turn and look at Joel who is shaking his head sternly in Enzo’s direction, motioning for him to sit down and shut up. Then he looks at me.

  ‘Cat…’

  Forget it, buddy. That’s all I can think right now. Forget it.

  Mr Ashton is walking towards us with a big stupid grin on his face, giving us two thumbs up. I can’t deal with him right now, either. I need some space, some air. I make a move towards the stairs, but I’ve hardly started when Joel takes my elbow.

  ‘This way,’ he says. ‘Please. Please.’

  Maybe it’s the desperation in his voice that means I don’t fight him, I don’t know. He steers me behind the curtains and backstage.

  ‘Look, I’m sorry,’ he says, w
hen we’re hidden by a giant, glittery piece of Rock Eisteddfod set. ‘I’m really sorry. That was just, god, totally stupid.’

  Mr Ashton looks our way, but can’t see us. It’s too bright where he’s standing, and he’s lost us in the dark. He turns to the audience and starts droning on about what a great evening it’s been. Through a gap in the curtain, I can see my mum pushing a lock of my father’s hair out of his eyes. I realise that it feels good seeing them together. Together and happy.

  ‘So, you’re not going to talk to me?’ Joel says quietly.

  I turn to face him. He’s biting the inside of his lip and looking back at me with anxious eyes.

  ‘Cat –’ He reaches out to take my hand.

  ‘Don’t,’ I snap, yanking it out of reach and taking a step back. ‘I don’t get you, Joel. Before you were saying that you didn’t hate me and, I don’t know, I started to think that maybe we… That maybe, you liked me. Or something.’

  He opens his mouth to speak, but I immediately put my hand up to stop him.

  ‘Then you were on stage saying all those horrible things. I mean, is that what you really think? That I’m vacuous and mean, and – what was the other thing you said? Selfish?’

  Joel moves towards me and runs his fingers through his hair. ‘No, see –’

  I back further away. ‘Actually “meanness and self-love” – that’s what it was.’

  ‘Okay, yes,’ says Joel, throwing his hands in the air in what looks like frustration. ‘That’s what I said. And a whole lot of bad things about deep-seated pain. None of which – none – I would have written if I hadn’t been so angry about the Emma thing. I made a mistake.’

  But it’s too late for apologies. All I can focus on now is the humiliation I’m feeling and the things he said about me on stage. There was something else. What was it?

  ‘And I wet myself.’ That was it. I knew there was one bit I’d forgotten.

  ‘What?’ Joel looks confused.

  ‘In your story. You said I wet myself – “soiled” myself,’ I say, doing inverted commas with my fingers.

  Joel seems relieved. ‘You had me worried there for a sec. I thought I was going to have to go and get your mum.’ He’s smiling at me now and I try not to notice the dimples in his cheeks or how totally hot he looks in the grey Roy T-shirt he’s wearing. Try not to smile back. Try not to focus on how good it feels to be standing so close to him in the dark. I remind myself that this is not about how cute Joel is. Or about the fact that I think deep down I might want to kiss him. No, this is about him humiliating me on stage. In front of my family and his family and everyone in our class…

  ‘But see, technically it wasn’t you soiling yourself. It wasn’t Kat. It was, um, Emma,’ he says, still trying to dig himself out of the hole he’s in.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Emma, your chihuahua.’

  I’d forgotten that bit, too. I try to stop my lips curving into a smile. ‘That’s not funny.’

  ‘I know,’ he says. ‘It’s not. It is totally not funny.’ His eyes are shining as he tries to suppress a grin.

  ‘Joel, don’t you dare laugh!’

  He looks away and then glances back at me. ‘Maybe it’s just a little bit funny?’ he says, holding his thumb and forefinger apart slightly.

  And despite myself, I start to laugh. And he does too. And I realise that Joel is the one person who can always make me smile – even when I’m in a bad mood. Even when he’s pissing me off. Even when I’m loading too much fake-crab salad on my plate at Sizzler.

  ‘Cat,’ he moves towards me and this time I don’t pull away when he takes my hand. ‘I didn’t mean all that stuff. You know that, right?’

  I look at Joel’s hand in mine and for a moment I can’t even remember what we’re fighting about. Because this is the Joel I know. The Joel who gets my jokes and always made me laugh out loud when we used to hang out with Emma. The Joel who shares my love of books and old movies – even if the ones he really likes do have a lot of bloodshed in them. The Joel who makes me feel like the smartest girl in the room. And I realise I’ve had a crush on him for years – before he and Emma started going out. And long after they split up. It was just easier for me to deal with it by avoiding him.

  ‘You’ve gone all serious…’ Joel looks worried. He’s trying to catch my eye, trying to work out what I’m thinking.

  It’s now or never.

  ‘Joel?’ I take a deep breath. ‘So, ah, how do you feel about giants?’ I say, looking down at the floor. ‘Co-worker giants who don’t mind dancing their big clunky hearts out – could you ever see yourself going for one of those?’

  Joel bends his knees and tilts his head so that his eyes are meeting mine. ‘I don’t know, Lester,’ he says, ‘but I think I could.’

  And I smile back and say, ‘Yeah? All right then… Amaze me.’

  joelandcat.com.au

  Acknowledgements from Bec

  Thanks to my wonderful family, my fabulous friends, my dearly loyal dog, Buster, and my gorgeous husband, Brad (who regularly took the bowl of cereal out of my hands and steered me back to the laptop). Thanks to Laura, Anyez and Sally at Penguin and special thanks to our editor, Michelle Madden. Michelle, you did a tremendous job and you were a joy to work with – thank you. Big thanks to Pippa and Tara at Curtis Brown who championed the book from the start, and thanks to Catherine Drayton for guidance along the way. And, finally, thanks to Nick for everything except the bit where you gunned down my character. Start sleeping with one eye open, buddy.

  Some Additional Acknowledgements from Nick

  Yes, Bec Sparrow, it was you who had the idea in the first place, so thanks for that. Thanks also for tossing me the First Eleven cricket badge about two thirds of the way through the novel, when Joel had never mentioned playing cricket, or gone to training or lined up for a game. And for killing Eislander when poor Joel hadn’t even managed to land him. (Who do you think you are? Cat Davis?) Mainly, though, thank you for making me laugh and finding more in these people than we knew was there.

  About a year or two after Bec first said we should write a novel together, and I agreed and said all we needed was the right vehicle, my mother – courtesy of her spam-happy friends – delivered that vehicle when she forwarded a widely circulated email allegedly featuring two US college students in a tandem-story exchange. Thanks, Mum, and keep it coming, in the usual judicious amounts.

  I also have to thank Matthew Reilly, without whom Joel would have had no compass to navigate the world of blockbuster fiction – and who, it must be said, can land his heavily armed paratroopers far more quickly than Joel. Matt, you’ve earned all the foil lettering that comes your way. I’m grateful as well to Christine for keeping me up-to-date with the Reilly ouevre at just the right time.

  And I’d like to add my thanks to our agenting and publishing team, and to thank Sarah and others close to me for tolerating the writing process graciously, as always.