The Crimes and Punishments of Miss Payne

by Barry Jonsberg

  [Clayton Rioli—Cancer. You are a diseased little specimen with all the sex appeal of a bird-eating spider. This will prove no impediment to your love life, however, since you are romantically involved with a primordial life-form who cannot afford to discriminate in affairs of the heart.]

  After that there was the usual chorus of jeers and immature comments, so I retreated back into myself.

  The last lesson of the day—of the week, thank God—was English. The Pitbull thumped into the classroom and thirty bodies instinctively cringed in their seats. It reminded me of that Russian psychologist, Pavlov. He had this experiment with dogs. What he'd do is feed them when he rang a bell and after a while they would begin to drool whenever they heard a bell ringing, even if no food arrived. They associated the sounds with what they anticipated was coming next. Well, it was a bit like that with us. When the Pitbull came into the room, we knew what to expect.

  This time, though, it was different. Instead of leaping straight for the jugular or ripping out entrails, she smiled. Well, I call it a smile, but it was more like a crack appearing in the center of her face. It was unnerving.

  “I would like to place it on record that you have all worked exceptionally well this week,” she said. “There has been a remarkable improvement not just in your attitude, but in the quality of the work you have been producing. So today, I think we can afford a little relaxation as a reward for our efforts. What do you say to a game of literary Pictionary? I give you the name of a famous novel or poem and you draw pictures on the board as clues for the rest of the class, who have to guess what it is.”

  I knew what I wanted to say. Something to do with inserting the game into a place where the sun doesn't shine. I kept quiet, though. I knew what she was doing and I knew it wouldn't work. You can't terrorize students for weeks and then expect them to eat out of your hand or roll over on their backs to have their tummies rubbed. Just how stupid did she think we were?

  “Yeah, Miss!”

  “Great!”

  “Can I go first?”

  I looked around the class in bewilderment. What was going on here? Kids were smiling, putting their hands up in excitement. Melanie Simpson was rolling over on her back, exposing her belly. I felt betrayed.

  “Why don't you begin the game, Kiffo?” continued the Pitbull. “I'll give you an easy book title, just to get us started. There'll be prizes for those who do the best drawings or get the answers quickest.”

  Kiffo! She called him Kiffo! No one other than his mates called him Kiffo! He glanced at me across the room. It felt like the two of us were alone in a world that had just gone crazy.

  “Nah, thanks, Miss,” he said. “I'll sit this one out.”

  “All right, Jaryd. That is your prerogative. So who'll start? Melanie, your illustration skills are excellent. I've got a title here that I think you will find challenging.”

  And Melanie Simpson came to the front, looking like the cat who had not just got the cream, but had followed it up with a couple of succulent goldfish. What followed was fifty minutes of screaming laughter as twenty-eight kids had what looked like the best time of their lives. You got the impression that in fifty years they would be telling their grandchildren all about it. You know, sometimes human nature sickens me.

  I felt like standing up and giving them all a lecture on basic psychology. When you've been savaged by a rabid dog, it might seem a welcome relief to have it licking your face, rather than trying to tear it off, but there's a limit to what the human mind can cope with. Violent extremes are unsettling, if not downright dangerous. They can lead to a nervous breakdown. Which was just what I felt like having as I looked around my English class. I would have preferred a normal lesson, with gnashing teeth and involuntary bowel movements. You knew where you stood with them. I was relieved when it was all over. There's only so much fun and happiness you can stand.

  I went straight home after school and made myself a cheese and Vegemite toastie. The Fridge came home briefly, heated up some mess and then was off to the bar where she worked five nights a week. She'd be home sometime around midnight. I wanted to talk to her.

  OKAY!! I know. I know what you're thinking. And I can't blame you for it. Moody bitch, that's me. Wants to talk one moment and then doesn't the next. I guess I was mixed up. But I'd got it into my head that I needed to discuss what was happening with another woman. The trouble was that the Fridge and I didn't seem able to talk anymore. And I know it wasn't all her fault, but it sure as hell wasn't all mine either. She was fiercely proud after Dad took off. There was no way, for example, that she would claim any benefits for being on a low income, even though I knew for a fact that we were entitled. The one time I suggested it, she delivered such a lecture about bludgers that I didn't have the courage to broach the matter again. The way I see it, earning your way was all well and good, but there were other important things in life as well. Like having a daughter who you had time to talk to, or a mother who was around a little bit. But I knew that I wasn't the one to tell her. And that made me lonely and sad.

  I was half hoping that Kiffo would turn up on his way to the Pitbull stakeout, but he didn't. So I had a shower and bathed my injured foot. It seemed to be settling down. The swelling had subsided and the colors weren't quite so psychedelic. It was still a bit tender, but I could walk on it without looking like I had lost control of my extremities. Then I went to bed early and lay awake thinking over the events of the day, the cunning of the Pitbull and the best way of tracking down a man you had only seen once, briefly, under a streetlight in the middle of the night. By the time I fell asleep, I was no nearer to a solution. As it turned out, I needn't have worried. I virtually fell over the guy the next day.

  Year 6, Second Term

  You are sitting next to the red-haired boy in a quiet classroom. You are doing a math test, working quickly because math is easy for you. With fifteen minutes to go, you've finished and your eyes stray to the answer sheet of your neighbor. He is doodling a skull and crossbones. You notice that he has finished the first two questions, but the rest of the examination has not been attempted. You glance at the teacher, who is sitting at his desk marking, his head down. Your hand gently slides his answer sheet toward you. You manage to get twelve of his questions answered before the time is up. It will be enough to pass.

  You leave the classroom together. The boy touches you quickly on the shoulder.

  “Thanks,” he says.

  You look at him. Your expression is difficult to read.

  “Fuck off,” you say, without malice.

  Chapter 13

  Working girl

  I woke up late, about eleven. The Fridge was at work and the whole day stretched out before me. I decided to get a bus into the CBD. I'd stashed away twenty dollars of my pocket money and I fancied spending it on a blue halter top I'd seen in a city market stall. Donning my pink and yellow glasses, I headed off into the sunshine.

  There's not much to do on a bus other than stare out the window or examine the graffiti on the seat-back in front of you. In this case, the only thing to read was Darryl is nuff, which was a little skimpy in terms of plot, though high on romance. Suddenly, out of the corner of my eye, I saw him. The thin little man. He was hurrying along a busy shopping street, looking like a man with a purpose. I caught a glimpse of his profile and then the bus swept me away. Without even thinking about it, I pressed the bell, praying that the next stop wouldn't put me out of distance entirely.

  When I got off the bus, I was at least four hundred yards from the place I had spotted him. I walked back quickly, scanning the streets, but he had disappeared. It was really frustrating. Unless he had got into a car or hailed a taxi or something, he had to be around here somewhere. I decided to wander the streets and see if my luck was in.

  For the longest time, it seemed it wasn't. Then, just as I was about to give up, I saw him again. I had stopped outside a restaurant and a familiar silhouette caught my eye. I peered through the window into the gloomy inte
rior and there he was, sitting at a table with four other guys. They all looked like extras from The Sopranos. I glanced up at the sign above the restaurant. Giuseppe's. That figured, I thought. They were probably planning to take out the mayor with machine guns once they'd finished their pasta and meatballs.

  So now what? I needed to hear what they were saying. I had this really strong feeling that if I could just get close enough, I'd get some crucial information. Two options presented themselves. One: I could go into the restaurant as a customer and sit at a table next to them. I still had my twenty dollars, after all. The trouble was, the lunchtime rush hour had just started and the restaurant was crowded. There was one small table in the corner that was vacant, but I'd have needed a boom microphone to listen in to their conversation. Second option: I could try lip-reading. I had done a lip-reading course in Year 8—well, not really a course as such, more an introduction. Still, I had been quite good at it.

  I moved a little farther down the street so that I wasn't directly in front of the window. I didn't want the Godfather to look up from his garlic bread and find a large pair of lurid spectacles watching him above a mouth moving silently in translation. I crouched behind a parked car where I still had a good line of sight to their table. They say that nothing you have ever learned is entirely lost, it's just locked and filed away somewhere in your brain under “completely useless information.” All I needed to do was find the key. I let my mind go blank and just watched the Ferret's lips moving, hoping the words would float unbidden into my consciousness.

  And it worked! Suddenly I heard a little voice in my head saying, “My bum was anointing the jelly and scotch.” Perhaps they were speaking in code. Maybe I'd got it slightly wrong. Perhaps it was really, “My gun was pointing at his belly and crotch.” That would make sense, particularly if the person he was talking about had a very large, overhanging stomach. I concentrated again and this time picked up, “If the telly welly bit the leopard hard my pants were wet with dew.”

  It was no good. This was getting me nowhere. Anyway, my cover was blown when the driver of the car I was hiding behind accelerated into the traffic, leaving me crouched in the middle of the street and the subject of a few strange glances from passersby. There had to be an option three, though I was buggered if I could think of it.

  And then, like the first flash of lightning in a storm, the solution seared across my eyeballs. A blimp in a red and white checked uniform hove into view. It was Rachael Smith. She of the lesbian taunts. The one who had spread rumors about me to the entire English-speaking population of the world. She was a waiter at Giuseppe's! I watched as she leaned over a table with a carafe of water, smiling at the customers. They looked a little startled, but that might have been because she blocked out all available light. They also looked as if they were tourists. Rachael was probably going to tell them about me.

  Now, I want some credit here. You will understand that of all the people in the world, Rachael Smith is the one I definitely wouldn't wee on if she was on fire. Yet I needed her help. The fact that she was a loathsome putrescence wasn't going to deter me from talking to her.

  I ducked down the side street beside the restaurant and found a back door that gave onto a storeroom. I stood unhappily among the vats of olive oil, looking for inspiration or Rachael Smith—whichever came first. I have to admit I was nervous. I have no idea if it is some sort of felony to be lurking with intent among industrial packages of lasagne, but I had sudden images of a police bullhorn crying, “We know you're in there, Harrison. Come out slowly, with your hands on your head, kicking the tagliatelle in front of you.” Fortunately, at that moment another door opened and Rachael came in.

  When she saw me, a huge, imbecilic smile spread across her plump cheeks.

  “Calma Harrison,” she said, proving that she could remember a name overnight. “Or should I say, Gayma Harrison?”

  “Great one, Rachael,” I replied. “You must have been Oscar Wilde in a previous existence. Look, I'd love to exchange witticisms with you, but tempus is having a damn good fugit.”

  “What?”

  “Time flies. Oh, never mind. I have a proposition for you. I want to do your job for the next hour. No pay, of course. You keep that. I just want to do your work.”

  She was immediately suspicious.

  “Why would you want to do that?”

  “It's personal, okay? I don't want to go into it. Just an hour. That's all.”

  “What do I get out of it?”

  “What do you mean, ‘What do I get out of it?’ You get to sit on your fat ar—You get to relax while I do all the work. No catches. Simple as that.”

  “I dunno. I could get into trouble. Mind you, the boss is away today….” I could see the cogs whirring slowly. “Have you waited on tables before? It's very skilled, you know.”

  “Are you kidding? I was employee of the month at Pizza Pizzazz four times running. What I don't know about pizza and pasta isn't worth knowing.”

  “I still dunno.”

  “I'll give you twenty bucks.”

  “Deal! But I want it up front.”

  It was reassuring to know that Rachael's sense of obligation to her employers was so firm in the face of temptation. I handed over the twenty bucks and she handed over the uniform, a smocky number you could lose a sea cow in.

  “I'll be back in an hour,” she said, disappearing off through the outer door, probably in search of a cake shop.

  As you may have guessed by now, I had absolutely no idea what I was supposed to do. However, the first step seemed simple enough. I put the uniform on. It was like a sailcloth. Doing a fair impersonation of a hot-air balloon, I went out the door that Rachael had come in. Inside was a large anteroom and it was buzzing. Waiters were screaming around like dodgem cars. Chefs were yelling out orders, and plates of steaming dishes were being slung onto a low aluminum counter, where the waiting staff were collecting them. It looked like chaos. I didn't know where to begin. However, there was one woman who seemed a promising point of contact, on the simple grounds that she was screaming, “Where the hell is that Rachael?”

  I fronted up to her.

  “Who the hell are you?” she enquired, without modifying the decibel count.

  “Rachael had to go. An emergency at home. She'll be back in an hour. I said I would cover for her.”

  The woman looked me up and down and she didn't seem pleased with what she saw.

  “Hell, hell, hell. I do not need this. I really do not need this.”

  I explained that I was an ideal replacement, but she was only half listening. Occasionally she would yell at some poor waiter. “Not the lasagne for table four, you complete idiot. Table six. And where's the wine for table nine? What the hell have I done to deserve this?” Finally, she turned her attention to me.

  “I haven't got time to argue. You're on tables three, five and seven. There's a carbonara ready for five, two side orders of salad and a fettuccine special. Table seven are just about to order. Take the wine list. Table three will need the dessert menu in about ten minutes. Come on. Get moving. Hell!”

  And she was off, presumably to lash a few of the scurrying minions with a bullwhip. I moved to the counter and collected what looked like a carbonara and a fettuccine special. Listen, I might exist largely on a diet of microwaveable chicken offal and frozen pizza, but I watch all the cooking shows on TV! All I needed to do now was find table seven. Or was it table five? I breezed through the swing doors into the restaurant and looked around. My Mafia man was still sitting with his cronies, but it was obvious that my order was not for them. I decided the best bet was to spot two people who weren't eating, but looked hungry.

  It didn't take long to find them, I can tell you. I hurried over with a look of abject apology.

  “The fettuccine and the carbonara? I'm so sorry to have kept you waiting. Still, I can promise you that it'll be worth the wait.”

  I plonked the plates down in front of them and was about to rush off when the
man stopped me.

  “Excuse me! I ordered the carbonara and my wife ordered the fettuccine!” He pointed down at the plate in front of him. It took me a while to realize what he meant. I had the plates in the wrong places. My first reaction was to tell the lazy bastard to switch them himself. I mean, how much effort does it require to swap plates? Instead, I apologized and switched things around. I was halfway back to the kitchen when I heard his voice again.

  “Excuse me!”

  I felt like I was attached to him with a piece of elastic. I hurried back.

  “Yes?”

  “Side salad?”

  “Where?”

  “We ordered side salads.”

  “Ah, yes, I believe you did. Would you like them now?”

  “Well, it would be nice to have our salad with the main course, rather than with dessert!”

  Part of me wanted to warn him not to get into a battle of sarcasm with me. If there were a sarcasm Olympics, I'd be first choice to represent my country. However, I gave a simpering smile and scurried off.

  “Excuse me!”

  Now, I had excused him twice already, and my patience was starting to fray. I came back wearing one of those smiles that looks as if it has been ironed on.

  “The carbonara is cold.”

  “Would you like it hot?”

  The man's face turned red. Under other circumstances, it would have been an interesting phenomenon, but I quickly grabbed the plate and shot back to the kitchen. I had to get a replacement dish, pick up two side salads, take an order from someone somewhere in the room (pick the customers who were starting to eat the tablecloth?), find a bottle of wine, open it, give it to whoever ordered it and then take a dessert order from someone somewhere else. I decided that I could afford a small detour.