Black Ice

by Leah Giarratano

  Intent silence from the toilet.

  'Shut up, bitch. Don't you go starting trouble now.' Crash stopped walking. 'Come on, baby.' She turned to her girlfriend. 'You know you like some three-way.'

  'Why her?' Little Kim spoke.

  'What do you mean? She's here. We're here. Why the fuck not?'

  'I thought you didn't like her,' said Little Kim.

  'What does like have to do with it? Come on, babe, don't act stupid. Let's all just have some fun over here. I'm tired, all right?'

  Crash moved again towards Seren's bed, reaching a hand out to touch her. Seren slapped it away. Crash laughed.

  'Don't call me stupid.' Little Kim stood up from the toilet, her pants still around her ankles.

  'What? What's your fucking problem?' Crash straightened at the foot of the bed and turned to face Little Kim.

  'I said. Don't. Call. Me. Stupid.'

  'What? What are you going to do?' Crash stood with her arms out, staring down the huge woman opposite her. Seren made herself small on the bed.

  'Why you gotta go near that skank? Aren't I good enough for you?' Little Kim obviously wanted an answer to Seren's question.

  'Look, babe. This has never been an exclusive thing, you and me. You know that. And you're pissing me off over here. You know I don't like people telling me what to do.' Crash's tone was menacing.

  'You're always telling me what to do.'

  'Who keeps you out of trouble in here, huh? Now do me a favour, Kim. Either sit the fuck back down, or come over here and make me real happy like you do.'

  Seren briefly considered that the woman in the cell next door must have invented some new kind of language. She crowed with madness. Crash turned back towards her and put one knee on the bed. Seren almost dry-retched with the musky stench caused by the movement. Time to move. She pulled the broom handle from behind her back at the precise moment that Little Kim said, 'I'm offering you out.'

  Seren froze.

  Crash whipped her head around. 'What? You are what?'

  Seren couldn't believe she'd heard right. Offering you out: prison slang for a challenge to a fight. Seren pushed the handle back between the mattress and the wall, but kept it close.

  Oh, fucking hell. Little Kim was going to fight, and that hadn't happened since Rhonda Whiteman was shanked thirteen times in the shower block.

  And Seren was stuck in the same cell.

  10

  Monday 1 April, 9.20 pm

  Cassie knew that every eye was tracking her as she stalked across the foyer of the gallery. Even the outrageously gay artist exhibiting tonight took his eyes from his artwork to follow her movements. Doesn't she know the cat suit is so last century, he inwardly sniped, knowing full well that by the next season half the women in the country would own one, even though most of them would never wear it out and the rest of them shouldn't.

  Cassie wore no underwear and the lush lycra acted as a second skin. Although sheathed neck to toe in black, she was more naked than had she been wearing the most minuscule dress.

  Used to the attention, Cassie had her mind on only one thing.

  Christian Worthington watched her approach from the other side of the room, a small smile playing on his lips. Although he'd just arrived, everyone in the room knew this woman would go straight to this man. It was natural selection. There was no one else present she would stride to with such purpose. Well, except perhaps the aged Western Australian mining magnate in the corner who'd previously been the most fascinating person there. But the Barbie doll he'd arrived with, with the trout pout and the silicon, would go to the mat pulling hair if this woman came anywhere near him. Half the men in the room would have paid plenty to watch that happen.

  'Drink, darling?' Christian brushed Cassie's cheek with his lips, his fingers touching the small of her back. 'Fuck me now,' he whispered into her ear.

  'Yes please, darling,' she said.

  'Red, white, or sparkling?' he asked.

  'Tequila.'

  'Back in a moment.'

  Cassie felt the cocaine rushing through her body and it felt like love. Hell, maybe it is, she thought. She knew she felt great when she was with Christian. He treated her right and he had his own money; not like her last boyfriend, Aidan, who'd left her with a debt to their dealer and a black eye when she'd told him it'd been real, but see ya. She and Christian shared many of the same friends; he had a beautiful home and a nice car and he was absolutely gorgeous to look at. Top all that off with the fact that he seemed to be able to get the best blow and anything else she fancied, and Cassie thought that perhaps she'd hang on to this one for a while.

  She glanced around the room, and just for kicks gave the mining magnate a luscious smile. When his date stood and blocked their eye contact with her tits, Cassie laughed out loud. A waiter offered crayfish hors d'oeuvres, but she simply smiled and declined. She waited on her man and her tequila.

  Although not comparable to Sydney Harbour, tonight Darling Harbour was a jewel, throbbing and glittering, pulsing with colour. From the darkened balcony of a sixth-floor penthouse apartment, Cassie Jackson stood, completely naked, staring out over the bay and city skyline. Red wine sloshed from the oversized glass in her hand as she tiptoed towards the balustrade of the terrace.

  She thought she could fly.

  Cassie took another deep sip from the glass and set it down carefully on the lip of the balcony. The pills and the wine had smoothed the hard wire of the coke and she felt fluid, sedated, liquid, like a part of the sky. She leaned forward into the night, the April breeze bathing her overheated skin. She boosted herself up a little, tilting further forward. If she could just . . .

  Cassie felt Christian's hands on her back, smoothing and stroking, moving around to her belly, her breasts. She leaned back into him, reaching her arms over her head, revelling in his hands on her body, gliding down now over her ribs, her hipbones. He turned her face to meet his and his lips found her mouth. Christian turned Cassie around and led her by the hand back to the lounge room. He pulled her down onto the thick carpet, the only light in the room washing in from the city skyline. He bent over her body and continued to stroke her skin, reaching everywhere, until it felt as though his hands were all over, all at once. Cassie moaned and reached her arms wide, her throat exposed, like a cat at full stretch. He nudged at her legs with his hands and she opened herself completely to him.

  Christian reached across to a low table beside them and brought out a small package. With her eyes closed, Cassie did not feel him sprinkling the cocaine between her legs, but she certainly felt him licking it off.

  When Cassie stopped shuddering and he felt her breath relax into sleep, Christian rolled her onto her stomach and knelt behind her. Shaking a little more of the powder into his palm, he rubbed the tip of his cock with one hand and used the other to spread the cheeks of her arse.

  11

  Monday 1 April, 9.20 pm

  The thing is, when the worst of the damage is being done, it doesn't even sound that bad. Seren knew that the moments in between the screaming and crying were the most dangerous. Of course, you could still hear it. Like now – a dull splat, like a raw steak dropped onto a kitchen bench. And a whoof and sigh. And again, a wet clap. A moan.

  Seren wanted to close her eyes and put her pillow over her head like she used to. But she forced herself to watch the scene playing out in front of her. Little Kim had tried to retreat several times, not because she was losing, but because she'd already hurt Crash so badly. The white bone of Crash's forehead shone where her left eyebrow should have been, and blood streamed from the gash. Seren had watched one of Crash's teeth float along in the rivulet of blood and come to rest in the nook of her collarbone.

  Stay down! Can't you just pass out? Seren wanted to scream. But when Little Kim tried to move away, Crash would pull her back by her hair, or launch herself onto the mountain of the other woman's back.

  The cells were otherwise silent. The new arrival next door was finally sleeping
or too hoarse to be heard. A dreamy stupor began to overtake Seren. For her, the fight had morphed into some macabre ballet. Little Kim had finally kicked off her pants and her huge fleshy thighs were mottled pink with exertion. Crash fought like some tribal warrior, her breasts slick with blood.

  Surely, I'm not here, Seren thought. This can't be real.

  The feeling was familiar. At night, when Bradley had gone and Daddy was dead, she'd stuff herself into her wardrobe with her toys. In the dark, with her winter parka and her skates, she'd pretend to be on her way to Narnia, ready to step out into a winter wonderland. Once, the fantasy so compelling, she'd snuck out of the wardrobe – the screaming must be part of the battle with the Ice Queen for Narnia, she thought – her friends needed help. She'd stolen down the corridor, Humphrey in hand, on her way to the adventure.

  Her stepfather faced the other way, thank God. But Mummy could see her. Mummy was crying. She always cried now. He had hold of Mummy's hair. He pushed her head down there. Mummy talked to her, only she didn't speak. Her eyes told Serendipity that she should go away. Her eyes said Serendipity couldn't help Mummy and Mummy couldn't help her. Please, Serendipity, her mother told her silently, you've got to go.

  Serendipity left that night, and Seren remained. She'd stayed in the house until she'd turned fifteen, for as long as she could take it. But Mummy had been right. Seren couldn't help her, and no one could help Seren.

  12

  Tuesday 2 April, 3.15 am

  When the remains of the cocaine conquered the oxycontin in her blood, Cassie Jackson rolled over and woke.

  Christian sat naked on the lounge, his skin painted blue by the videogame he played on the huge plasma TV. The volume was low.

  'What time is it?' she murmured.

  'Ah, three, I think.'

  'Don't you have to work?'

  'Yep, breakfast meeting. Might as well stay up now. Hungry?'

  'Not really.' She sat up and winced, feeling a dull ache in her bottom. She searched for the memories of what she'd done before passing out, but everything was a big smudgy blur.

  'You ever done shabu?' he asked.

  'I don't think so.' Cassie stared at him. 'Do I look like I smoke ice?'

  Christian laughed. 'No. Do I?'

  'So you use ice?'

  'Oh, every now and then. What do they say – sometimes when you have lobster every day, you feel like a little hamburger?'

  Cassie reached for a cigarette and the remainder of Christian's wine.

  'Oh, what the hell. Could be fun,' she said. 'So, what do we do?'

  'Oh no. Can't you find someone else? I've just done eight hours.' Gabriella Marmon leaned her head against a partition at the nurses' station, the phone cradled on her shoulder. Her buddy, Georgia, made faces at her from the other side of the desk. 'But you know I hate the graveyard shift . . . yes . . . and there's no one else . . . okay, then, all right, yeah.' She slammed down the phone.

  She stared daggers at Georgia, who capered about. 'Don't you start.'

  'It'll be fun. We've ordered pizza.'

  'Fun. I'm exhausted. And you look like one of the bipolars, dancing around like that. You better stop it before Radisson sees you.' She picked up her nurse's badge and pinned it on again, dropped her bag back into the drawer at her feet and locked it. 'So where's the pizza?'

  Gabriella stood to begin her second shift for the night. Four am. They could be lucky. Even though it was St Vincent's Hospital, Sydney, it was only a Tuesday morning, and Tuesday was usually the quietest night of the week.

  And then she heard the screams from the end of the corridor.

  'You coming?' asked Georgia.

  'Yeah, I guess. Just tell me when the fun starts.' She walked tiredly from behind the nurse's station and followed her friend down the hall.

  'Hey, Gary, what have we got?' asked Gabriella, moving forward to help the ambos restrain a young woman who was struggling in his arms.

  'No idea. We found her down near the truck out the front.' The tired-looking man moved calmly, but he used full force to restrain the girl. She wore a man's business shirt and nothing else, and she was screaming at the top of her lungs.

  'Another one dumped.' Gabriella and Georgia stepped aside as two orderlies rushed to take over from the ambulance officers. When they threw the girl into a wheelchair, the screams died down to a low moan and, as they strapped down her arms and legs, Gabriella leaned over and shouted, 'What have you taken?'

  The patient opened her eyes, stared straight at Gabriella and screamed hysterically.

  'Hell, I don't look that bad,' Gabriella said to Georgia, who was trying to take the girl's pulse. 'My name is Gabriella,' she tried again. 'Can you tell us your name?'

  'They'll kill me! Let me GO! LET ME GO!'

  'Can you see any ID?' she asked Georgia.

  Georgia rolled her eyes. 'Can you?' The shirt could not cover the woman's body completely as she thrashed and struggled, and Georgia and Gabriella had already seen every part of her.

  'I'll order the blood work,' Gabriella said.

  'Already done. Gary called it in on his way out,' said Georgia.

  Georgia suddenly gasped. 'Don't look now, honey,' she said to her colleague. 'I told you you were going to be glad you worked tonight. Guess who's coming down the hall?'

  'He is not!' Gabriella blushed.

  'Yep. Sergeant Scott Hutchinson and he's heading our waaay.'

  'What's he doing here?'

  'On the job, I'd guess – unless he's coming to see you, of course.'

  Gabriella quickly smudged her finger across the front of her teeth and surreptitiously flicked out her hair. Within a couple of strides, Scotty was by their side, beaming. Gabriella's smile was pretty wide too until she saw the look of horror cross Scotty's face.

  'Oh my God!' he said. 'That's Cassandra Jackson!'

  13

  Tuesday 2 April, 10 am

  Seren sat on her hands in the waiting room of the parole office, staring straight ahead. She'd been out of that hellhole for just an hour, but the view wasn't much better yet. Posters on the wall advertised free needle exchanges and women's cottages for survivors of domestic violence. The only reading material on the pockmarked coffee table consisted of a Bunning's hardware sales catalogue, a flyer for the latest Maserati, and a discarded Streets Cornetto ice-cream wrapper. She couldn't afford any of those things at the moment. She had a cheque for her first week's rent, a fifty-dollar Salvation Army food voucher, and fifty dollars cash, for which, she had been told at the gaol, she had a debt to the Department that she would have to pay back from her first month's pay.

  A floor-to-ceiling metal partition separated the waiting room from the balding man behind the desk in front of her. At least I'm not the one in the cage anymore, she told herself.

  Needing to stretch, she stood and walked over to the water dispenser in the corner of the room. On a wall above the unit was a fly-speckled mirror. Seren filled a plastic cup slowly, staring into the reflection of her eyes.

  The woman who stared back always surprised her. At twenty-five, with a ten-year-old-son, she half expected to see the image of a forty-year-old in the mirror. At other times, she imagined the glass would reflect back the little girl she remembered from her dreams. But instead, she saw this person.