Donna Joy Usher - Chanel 02 - Goons 'n' Roses

by Donna Joy Usher

  ‘Hope you’re checking it twice.’

  Last year the girls at Dazzle had entered a drag queen competition. We had found out a few weeks ago that they had won, and as the first prize winners they were off to Las Vegas to perform. While Bruce and Bianca were staying behind to hold the fort, Martine, Mum and the rest of the girls were heading for the bright lights. There had been a couple of spare spots so Trent was going under the guise of security and I was an ‘executive stage producer’.

  Suzie, my best friend from the Police Academy, was coming to dog-sit Cocoa while I was away. This was a bonus as I was looking forward to the couple of nights I would get to spend with her. The only blackness on my horizon at that moment was the stupid psychology report, but I could worry about that when I got back.

  ‘What are we going to do about that?’ Martine asked, pointing at my right arm.

  ‘What about it?’ I was quite protective of my feeble, sickly-looking appendage.

  ‘It looks a little silly.’ She grimaced apologetically as she said it.

  I looked down at my arms. They appeared to belong to two different people. ‘What do you suggest I do?’

  ‘We could fake tan it.’

  ‘What if it goes a different colour?’

  ‘Than liquid-paper-white?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘I think that’s the point.’

  I’d never fake tanned before. Having inherited Mum’s olive skin, and her penchant for the sun, I’d never had to.

  ‘What do you think Bianca?’

  ‘Anything’s got to be better than that.’ She pointed her bread stick at my arm.

  I moved to the side a little to allow the waiter to place my lasagne on the table.

  ‘How long before we leave should we do it?’

  ‘The night before,’ Martine said. ‘That way it will last the whole trip.’

  I placed some cheesy, pasta goodness into my mouth as I nodded my head at her.

  ***

  Mum and the girls were training hard that week to get their performance for Las Vegas perfected, so it wasn’t too late when I got home. I took Cocoa out for his evening toilet break before settling onto the couch with him. The little book Dr Shooten had given me to write my thoughts in was sitting on the side table. I picked it up and examined its floral cover, its unbroken spine. He had obviously picked a pretty book, hoping it would inspire me. That was thoughtful.

  My mind skirted cautiously around the day’s session. Even though I could be stupidly stubborn, I wasn’t so silly to see that Dr Shooten had been telling me the truth. I could fight it if they tried to get rid of me. The media would love such a scandal. The Force removing a Probationary Constable for psychological damage received in the line of duty? The Force removing the Probationary Constable who had taken down the Kings Cross killer? That was just too good a story.

  But as much as I hated to admit it, the truth of the matter was that he was right. If I had a trigger in my mind that could cause me to freeze at an important moment, then I was dangerous.

  I wouldn’t want to work with me.

  Sighing, I opened the little book and picked up the pen that had been sitting beside it. The physiotherapist had said I needed to exercise my hand; I may as well combine the two therapies.

  How did I start this? I guessed the best thing was to go with the tried and tested method.

  Dear Diary,

  Some funny things have happened over the last 6 months. Firstly, my Mum moved from Hickery and morphed from a permed-haired, fluffy-slipper-wearing, middle-aged woman to a facebooking, fashion-leading, sexual predator with the twitter handle @hotbloodedlady.

  Where does that leave me? Aren’t I meant to be the sexual predator with the hip twitter handle while she lectures me on the error of my ways?

  Then she started dating Trent. He’s tall and muscularly lean and reminds me of a dangerous feline predator. Just the sort of guy I would go for myself.

  It’s probably for the best though as I’ve decided after you know who, that inter-office relationships are probably not a good thing.

  Anyway Mum’s apartment is directly above mine and I’m pretty sure the other night I heard her bed making thumping noises. I put my pillow over my head and said, ‘lalalalalala,’ but you can only do that for so long before it becomes tiring. Now if that’s not disturbing for my psychological state of mind, I don’t know what is.

  ***

  Everybody was at Dazzle that Saturday night so I decided to use my speed dating voucher. I was feeling pretty anxious when I turned up to the restaurant hosting the event. The only thing worse than a blind date, is 20 blind dates in an hour.

  Most of the men were mingling around the bar, checking out the women as they entered and making notes. Nice.

  I registered my name with Rita-the-Greeter (that was on her name tag), clipped my tag onto my blouse and then made my way to the bar. For tonight, alcohol wasn’t an option – it was a necessity.

  One of the other women, a petite, brassy-blonde, turned to me. ‘You’re new,’ she said.

  ‘Umm, you come here often?’

  ‘Every week.’ She held out her hand. ‘I’m Bettina.’

  I shook it and said, ‘Chanel. So are most of the people here regulars.’

  ‘A lot of them. He’s new,’ she said, pointing towards a man standing near the entrance door. He pushed his glasses further up onto his nose and looked around nervously. ‘Dibs,’ she said.

  ‘You can have him.’ I shook my head and wondered what the hell Daniel was doing there. ‘He’s a little well-groomed for my taste.’

  Bettina let out a tinkling laugh. ‘Oh, I remember when I was like you.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘After a good time, not a long time. These days I spend my whole time trying to find a decent man, with a steady income. When I’m not speed dating, I’m internet dating.’

  ‘But surely you wouldn’t have trouble finding a boyfriend.’ She was a tidy little package with a beautiful wide smile and perfect teeth.

  ‘It’s not the boyfriend part that’s the problem. It’s the father-to-my-unborn-children part that is.’

  I made a mental note to warn Daniel.

  ‘When you get to my age you’ll be wishing you’d snagged a sensible home-maker before they were all taken.’ She sauntered off in Daniel’s direction; probably not willing to risk her chances with him on the 180 seconds allotted us.

  ‘I’m not sure why they make the women progress around the room.’

  I turned to face a woman with hair long enough to make Rapunzel cry herself to sleep at night. It was pulled into a thick, dark braid which hung over her shoulder and down past her waist.

  ‘I mean, we’re the ones wearing the high heels. It makes sense to make the men move.’

  ‘Yes, but then they wouldn’t be able to check us out properly.’

  ‘That’s true.’ She placed a fingertip delicately onto the end of her chin. ‘Heaven forbid if they can’t see how big our bums are before they make a decision on our personalities.’

  ‘It could lead to total disaster,’ I agreed.

  ‘Oops, time to start,’ she said, moving off.

  I had wanted to start with Daniel, but Bettina had already taken her seat across from him, and was engaging him in a one-sided conversation involving a lot of eyelash fluttering and tinkly laughter. Daniel resembled a rabbit caught in the oncoming headlights of a semi-trailer.

  There weren’t many spare seats left so I hurriedly took one opposite a cleanly-shaven man, wearing a short-sleeved, white button-up shirt.

  ‘Go,’ Rita-the-Greeter, said in her chirpy voice.

  ‘Hi urhhh,’ I stared at my date’s name card, ‘Ben. How are you?’

  ‘Great. How are you?’ He got a gold star for enthusiasm.

  ‘Little overwhelmed. You come here often?’

  ‘Does it make me look like a loser if I say yes?’

  ‘Not at all,’ I lied. ‘I’d call it optimistic.�
�

  ‘I try to be optimistic, but it can be hard you know.’ His expression changed dramatically, from super-duper excited to sad.

  I hoped I wasn’t going to regret this question. ‘What can be hard?’

  ‘Rejection.’

  Phew. At least he wasn’t a dirty perve.

  ‘I come here every week, and yet none of the women ever want to see me again.’ He wiped at a tear that was quivering in the corner of his left eye.

  Whoa, where did enthusiastic Ben go?

  ‘All I want is to love someone and be loved in return.’ He pulled a hanky out of his jeans pocket and dashed at the tears free flowing down his face.

  ‘Perhaps you should try internet dating,’ I suggested, edging out of my chair, ‘I hear it’s very good.’

  ‘And change,’ Rita called.

  The next guy was a little more to my liking: Black t-shirt; faded denim jeans; motorbike jacket slung over the back of his seat. His name badge was lying on the table facing me – Daren Todd.

  ‘Well, hello there,’ he rumbled.

  ‘Hi yourself.’ I took a sip of my drink and leaned a little further across the table. I only had about 110 seconds left to make an impression and I was going to let my boobs earn their keep.

  ‘So what do you do for a living?’ he asked.

  I stared him in the eyes and said, ‘I’m a cop.’

  ‘Are you a good cop or a bad cop?’

  ‘It depends,’ I said.

  ‘On what?’

  ‘On whom I’m arresting.’

  He leaned towards me, a slow, lazy smile stretching his mouth. ‘What about if you were arresting me?’

  I took another sip of wine while I stared into his dark eyes. ‘Oh, if I were arresting you, I’d definitely be a bad cop.’

  ‘Change,’ said Rita.

  Pouting, I hopped up. ‘See you later Daren.’ I put in some extra hip action as I sauntered off to the next table.

  I sat down opposite an immaculately-groomed man who must have been at least 80 years old.

  He peered at my name tag and said, ‘Chanel. It’s a pleasure to finally meet you.’

  ‘Ahhh,’ I said, ‘the pleasure is all mine?’ I hadn’t read the fine print, but I had assumed there would be an age limit to speed dating.

  ‘We don’t have long,’ he said, ‘so I would like to tell you the rules of our engagement.’

  ‘Pardon?’

  ‘We would have to get married of course, but not too quickly or the gossip columns would be all over us.’

  I looked around to see if there were a team from Funniest Home Videos filming me.

  ‘But once we were married you would have full access to my funds. Of course there would be strict stipulations on how many times a week we were to have sex.’

  ‘Excuse me?’

  ‘Well, you don’t think you’re getting access to my money without having sex a few times a week?’

  ‘I don’t think I’m going to get access to your money at all,’ I said, standing up. His name badge said Bert O’Sullivan. I was definitely going to get Trent to look into him. He had to be running some type of scam.

  The next few dates were mind-stoppingly boring and then I found myself staring at a man who ticked all of my boxes. At least I found myself hoping he would tick all my boxes, later, when we were alone.

  He had a five o’clock shadow that I suspected never got shaved off; thick, dark, wavy hair that just begged to have my fingers curled into it; and deep-blue eyes that glinted with a naughty light. Yummy.

  He smiled at me and lifted an eyebrow. I aimed for a sexy siren smirk, hoping I wasn’t instead giving him the wide stupid grin I was feeling.

  ‘So Sebastian,’ I purred, ‘what do you do for a living?’ I was going to be awfully disappointed if he were an accountant.

  ‘I acquire special automobile parts for clients.’

  ‘So you’re a mechanic?’

  ‘You could say that.’

  Mechanics knew how to get down and dirty. ‘Do you have your own business?’

  ‘I certainly do.’

  Ooh, an entrepreneur who knew how to use his hands. This speed dating evening was working out quite nicely.

  ‘What on earth is someone like you doing at something like this?’ he asked me.

  ‘I could ask you the same question.’

  ‘You go first.’

  ‘I’m looking for Mr Wrong,’ I said. ‘You?’

  ‘Change,’ Rita said much too quickly.

  ‘What a pity,’ he said as I hopped up, ‘because I think I just found Miss Right.’

  The dates after Sebastian passed in a blur and suddenly I found myself sitting in front of Daniel.

  ‘You speed date?’ I said.

  ‘No.’

  ‘But you’re here now.’

  A faint flush of red coloured his cheeks and he breathed out heavily, causing his glasses to fog up. He took them off to clean them and glanced over at me. I had never noticed how beautiful his eyes were; soft brown, framed by long, black lashes. They were normally so magnified by the coke-bottle-thick lenses that they looked out of proportion to the rest of his face. Like a goldfish.

  He placed the glasses back onto his nose and said, ‘I came to make sure you were okay.’

  ‘Oh.’ It was possibly the sweetest thing anybody had ever done for me.

  ‘You are, aren’t you?’

  ‘Yes, yes, I’m fine.’ I was frazzled by his comment. Why couldn’t I fall for somebody kind like Daniel? ‘What did you think of Bettina?’

  He shuddered and said, ‘She’s scary.’

  ‘Anybody else take your fancy?’

  ‘No,’ he said, but he blushed as he said it.

  Ohhhooohh. So there was someone here who Daniel thought was nice. I wondered who it was?

  ‘Change.’

  ‘See you later,’ I said hopping up. ‘Oh and Daniel…’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Thanks.’

  ***

  I had wanted to talk to Sebastian at the end of the evening, but he’d had some business he needed to attend to, which was a good thing, because the brazen hussy part of me was wishing I was the business he needed to attend to, while the psychologically-scarred part was blithering on about how it was stupid to be alone with someone I hardly knew. I probably would have appeared schizophrenic. It was best to let Trent investigate him first.

  Instead, I headed home to Cocoa, who had been by himself far too much over the last couple of nights, and took him for a quick walk around the block. I had a day excursion planned the next day, and had organised with Bruce to take Lancelot (Cocoa’s poodle boyfriend) with us on the long walk into town and around the Botanical Gardens.

  After we were both settled onto the couch I picked up the diary.

  Dear Diary,

  I know I’m meant to be filling up your pages with deep and meaningful thoughts, but the problem is, I don’t seem to have many of those. I’ve always been more of a fly-by-the-seat-of-my-pants kind of gal. Perhaps that is my problem. Perhaps I need to think more deeply. But is that something you can learn or does it just come naturally to some people?

  I made progress tonight. I went speed dating – which meant I was surrounded by strangers – and I didn’t start blubbering. Baby steps: Today not blubbering in public, tomorrow the world.

  Although it’s not being in public that worries me… It’s the dark. It terrifies me. And to be totally honest, I don’t know if I’m ever going to get over that.

  ***

  ‘Here you go,’ I said, waving the list of possible love interests at Trent. Bob and Nathan looked up from the donut box they were raiding.

  ‘The first one’s not a love interest,’ I said, ‘but he’s running some type of scam. You need to look into him.’

  ‘Who is it?’ Trent asked.

  ‘Bert O’Sullivan.’

  He threw back his head and started laughing. ‘Bert O’Sullivan running a scam?’

  ‘He offere
d me access to his money on the understanding I’d have sex with him.’

  ‘I don’t see anything illegal in that,’ Nathan said as he wandered over.

  ‘It’s revolting.’

  ‘No law against being revolting,’ Trent said. ‘Anyway, Bert O’Sullivan is a textile billionaire. He probably just wants a young wife to look after him.’

  ‘And to bonk,’ Bob said around a mouthful of donut.

  Billionaire? I couldn’t even begin to imagine how much money that was.

  ‘Who else is on there?’ Nathan asked.

  ‘Daren Todd,’ I said.

  ‘Sandy blonde hair, rides a motorbike?’ Trent asked.

  I nodded my head.

  ‘Drug dealer. Who else have you got?’

  Well I’ll be damned. A drug dealer? I didn’t see that one coming. It didn’t matter. I had left the best till last. ‘Sebastian Levi.’ I could feel my smug smile stretching my face.

  ‘Hmmmm.’ Trent looked thoughtful. ‘What does he look like?’

  ‘Thick dark hair, five o’clock shadow, dark eyes, good tan.’ Utterly delicious.

  ‘Oh yes,’ he said, ‘I think I know him. But he doesn’t go by that name. Come with me.’

  I followed him through to the front offices, where Dave was interviewing a man. It was Sebastian.

  ‘What the?’ I said.

  ‘That’s Julian Lemur. He runs a chop shop. Stole Bert O’Sullivan’s Jaguar last night. Daniel saw him gaining access and called it in.’

  A chop shop? Well, double poo with icing on top.

  I did the only thing a sane woman could. I went back out to the office and helped myself liberally to the box of donuts. At least I knew how bad they were for me.

  ***

  I had finished my packing when Susie knocked on my door.

  ‘You’ve lost more weight,’ I said. I hadn’t seen her since graduation and she’d lost at least another couple of dress sizes.

  ‘Still got a bit to lose before…’ She stopped talking and held her left hand out. A fat diamond glistened on her fourth finger.

  ‘You’re engaged?’ I gasped. ‘You and Liam?’

  ‘I know it’s fast,’ she said. ‘But he’s so wonderful, and we get on so well, and we want the same things for our future and when he asked me, well… it just felt right.’