by Kate Gordon
As I skip down Kelly's Steps to the Art Centre, I'm humming, a Mischa McPhee song, dedicated to my shrubberies. It’s called “Beautifully Wild.”
“You're in a good mood today!” Britta smiles at me from behind the counter, where she's counting the till, ready for the day's trade. “When you’ve hung up your coat, I have to show you Sophie’s Christmas ballet performance. I videoed it. She was the best little mouse of the whole lot.”
“I thought The Pied Piper shooed out rats?” I chuck my pink mini-backpack under the counter, licking the last of the strudel crumbs from my fingers.
Britta laughs. “Yes, it's meant to be rats, but Britta's teacher thought rats weren't cute enough. She has a bit of a phobia, I think. So, she changed it to mice.”
“I’d love to see it. Just gimme a sec?”
Britta winces, looking over my shoulder. “Um, scratch that thought. It looks like we might be in for an … interesting start.” She waves, and I turn to see Mr Blake peering through the glass. He points at his watch, scowling. I give him a sunny smile in return and his glare turns volcanic.
“Oh, stuff him,” growls Britta. “It’s not even nine. He can learn to wait.” I grin and Britta holds up her phone. Sophie does look adorable with a painted-on little nose — pink against her glowing dark skin — and a headband with felt ears stuck on it. I still have no idea what The Pied Piper has to do with Christmas, but I’ll give it a ten out of ten for cuteness.
Britta sighs. “It's nine o'clock. I think we'd better open the doors before Mr Blake has a coronary. Something tells me he won’t take ‘because cute’ as an excuse for a late opening.”
The morning is busy. It’s the pre-Christmas rush, and there are tonnes of tourists from a cruise ship just in dock, and regulars too. Mr Blake, of course, attempting to return a book on Hans Holbein the Younger because it “devotes far too much paper to ruminations on The Ambassadors, which, while being his most famous painting, is arguably his least interesting.” Britta placates him with a gift voucher and a proof copy of a new book on Hans Holbein the Elder. It only mentions The Ambassadors once.
“Tell me something interesting,” Britta says, joining me back at the counter, once Mr Blake has been soothed. “Today is kicking my arse. I need to find solace in vicarious adventures.”
I smile at Britta. “I have something,” I say. “I … sort of have a project.”
“Project?” Britta gasps. “All righty, Little Miss Mystery, spill.”
And, so, I tell Britta about the graffiti, and about my quest to find the one who wrote it. “Joe's going to help me,” I finish. “We're meeting after work to strategise.”
Britta blinks at me for a moment, before she grins, enormously. “I’m coming too,” she says.
She lets out a little squeal that makes me jump. “Ohmigod. This is more exciting than finding Freddo Frogs in the cupboard that the kids don’t know about! It's more exciting than when Dean told me I could sleep in last Sunday while he took the kids to the boat park!” She’s misty-eyed at the memory.
“Go Team 'Marry, Me Mischa McPhee!'” I cry, suddenly, infected by her enthusiasm. And then Kiefer from the café pokes his head through the door, and asks if any of us wants a slightly-bruised cupcake.
I place a hand to my chest and sigh, happy tears pricking at my eyes.
Some days, the universe just smiles at you. Today is one of those days.
4
We’re sitting in the square, by the fountain, eating chips from paper cones and sorting out my life.
“We have to start with the internet, obviously,” Joe says. His blonde hair has been pushed back from his face with a reindeer-printed headband, and he’s wearing an eighties-era Jenny Kee jumper, over calf-length jeans and boat shoes. It’s an inspired combination. He peers down at his iPhone, tapping his chin. He has appointed himself leader of this mission and is taking it very seriously.
“The internet?” Britta gasps.
“Yes, Grandma.” Joe rolls his eyes. “You know, that thing that lets you do all the Googling of retirement homes and music videos by The Seekers? It’s actually more complex than that.”
“Oh, shut up, smartarse.” Britta whacks Joe around his perfectly-primped head. “I’m five years older than you are. I know my Tumblr from my Twitter.”
“Ooh, snap,” says Joe.
“Don’t you mean Snapchat?” asks Britta, proud of her joke. “I just mean … isn’t it kind of completely unromantic? I mean, what are you going to do, Joe, sign her up on Tinder, with the user-name 'Mischa McPhee Lookalike', and just hope GA swipes right? Nup. Not going to work.”
“As if,” Joe replies, his eyes never leaving his tablet screen as he taps away. “We’re totally going to cyberstalk.”
“What, like, on Facebook?” asks Maddy.
“Yes, old lady, ‘like on Facebook’,” Joe mocks. “We make a page, invite a bunch of our peeps, and make it go viral.”
I spit out some of my cocoa. “Viral? Oh, Joe, I'm not sure I want this to 'go viral'. I’m not really the ‘internet sensation’ type.”
“You could be, Maddy Moo. What have I been telling you about plus size Instagram? It’s lit.”
I raise my eyebrow at Joe. This is a well-trodden path between us and, today, I’m not treading it. “Okay, maybe not viral, then. How about—” Joe pauses to wink at the cute waiter, wiping down one of the outside tables with suspicious slowness. The waiter winks back, points at his name tag and mouths something to Joe, then turns and saunters off.
“What did he say?” Britta asks, her eyes bulging. This is so obviously not her usual scene.
Joe looks triumphant. “He pointed out his name and mouthed 'Facebook me'. So, see. Point. Made. And, Maddy…” He turns to me, “how about we create the page but keep your identity a secret?”
I nod. That sounds okay.
“This is a thing that’s happening,” I say, quietly. I look up at the December Hobart sky. It seems bright with the joy of it all.
5
The next morning, I make a very important decision.
I'm in the bathroom applying my cherry red lipstick when it hits me.
I miss my old hair.
These long curls hide me; drown me. I miss my curly bob. I only ever grew it out because I was sick of being compared with Mischa.
But Mischa isn’t the only person who can rock a shoulder-length bob.
It’s time I rediscovered me.
Anita used to work weekends with me in the bookshop, but she left when she finished her diploma. She’s now my very favourite hairdresser.
“Please,” I beg her. “It's a life-and-death-and-true-love kind of situation. I need you, Anita. And I'll bring you whatever breakfast you want to say thanks. My shout.”
“If you come in right away I can do it before my first client,” she says. “But only if you bring me banana bread. With honeycomb butter. And maybe some ricotta hotcakes too. And a cappuccino.”
“Roger that,” I say. “Thank you so much. You're golden.”
“Tell Rohani that,” she sighs. Rohani is Anita's on-again-off-again girlfriend. “She's not speaking to me.”
“Why this time?”
Anita's sigh is loud down the phone line. “Something about towels, I think. Not sure. Anyway, I need that banana bread. It will repair me.”
I grin. “See you soon.”
“Have you lost your blow-dryer, Madeleine?” Mrs Hurley glares over her hedge, as I walk down my driveway.
“On my way to the hairdresser, Mrs H,” I say, sunnily, just to annoy her. “By the time you see me tonight, I’ll be a new woman!”
“If only you paid as much attention to your disgraceful garden as you do to your appearance,” she says, woefully. “I know you’re on school holidays. You must have time on your hands…”
I roll my eyes. “I'll get to it, Mrs Hurley.” (“I will absolutely not get to it,” I add, silently.)
“You know, Jack...”
“I really have to ske
daddle, Mrs H,” I say, quickly, before Mrs Hurley can launch into another lengthy monologue about the wonders of her Jack. I really, really hope I never have to meet this angelic child of hers.
I clip-clop off on my red Mary Janes, hoping she's watching me go; feeling jealous that she doesn't have shoes this good.
She probably isn't. She probably isn't even looking at my shoes. She's probably glaring at my shrubberies.
An hour later, I walk out of the salon with a belly full of banana bread, a huge smile, and glorious hair.
As I walk past the fruit market, a young guy in a beanie, with a triangle-shaped goatee says, “Hey, aren't you Mischa McPhee?”
“Nope,” I say, “I'm Maddy.”
And I do a little twirl.
“Hello, Mischa,” says Britta, as I let myself into the shop.
“You like?” I ask, posing for effect.
“I like. And you'll like what Joe's popped up on Facebook. I just got the invite to join.”
I look over her shoulder, deciding I won't remind her of our “No Facebook During Work Hours” policy. Technically, the work day hasn't started yet and, besides, she’s the boss. It’s her rule.
“The Mischa Project,” I read over Britta's shoulder. “Help us find the soul-mate of the most fabulous young rockabilly babe in Salamanca. We know nothing about this mysterious human, other than he or she is completely besotted with songstress (and icon) Mischa McPhee. Is it you? Or do you know who it might be? Tell us, and be responsible for smoothing the course of truest love.”
There is a picture next to the text of Mischa strumming on a guitar and singing, and there's a banner behind it, of hearts and music notes, and I know Joe's style well enough that I'm sure he's painted it himself. He's done a brilliant job — it's professional and arty. The whole thing is amazing. But one thing bothers me. “He hasn't said anything about the graffiti in the loos,” I point out. “Surely that's the one thing we should be mentioning. I mean, plenty of people might say they like Mischa McPhee, but only one of them likes her enough to write about it on a toilet wall.”
“Maybe he thought people would be afraid to come forward and say they'd written that.” Britta lifts a shoulder. “Maybe he thought they'd be embarrassed. Or worried they'd get in trouble for it. After all, it is defacing public property.”
“I guess.”
We lean over the computer, scrolling through the rest of Joe’s creation.
The shop door jangles as Shelley lets herself in.
Shelley is twenty-five, Irish, and looks like she's been kidnapped from the cover of a Regency romance — all raven corkscrew curls, hourglass figure, peaches-and-cream complexion and huge bright blue eyes. She’s ridiculously adorable.
She is also deeply tortured.
Shelley ran away to Tasmania at the age of eighteen, chasing an older Australian businessman, whose name she refuses to mention. She found out — after she'd quit university, packed up all her belongings, paid for a one-way ticket and told her staunchly Catholic parents she was never coming back — he was married and living with his wife and kids in a house on Tolman's Hill.
She won't tell us which house. She knows we'd go and toilet-paper it. Or put dead fish in his mailbox.
“Now, see, that wouldn't be fair, would it?” Shelley says. “I mean, his wife could be perfectly nice. And his little poppets shouldn't have to pay because he's a right ratbag.”
A year later, we still don't know the identity of Shelley's “Dreaded Ex”. And she still refuses to tell her parents back home that it didn't work out. She pretends she's living in loved-up bliss in his fancy mansion. When in reality she's living in a dog-box in North Hobart with a vegan hippy called Flower and a cat called Stevie Nicks.
“Whatcha looking at?” Shelley asks, as she hangs her purple duffel coat on the rack. “I hope it’s something dead thrilling. The most excitement I've had so far this morning is Flower accidentally eating mayonnaise.”
“We're finding Maddy's true love.” Britta winks at me as I glare. “We have a project and a team and everything, and now we have social media.”
Shelley nods slowly. “Hmm. Well, obviously you're going to include me on the team, aren’t you? Given I'm broken-hearted and pathetic and I need something like this in my life like a pig needs cherries.”
“Do pigs need cherries?” Britta asks.
Shelley shrugs. “Probably not. But they like them, I think. Or maybe they don’t even like them. I don’t know. Gah! Anyway! Can I join the team or what?”
I peer at Shelley, and I think…
Four.
Four seems like a good number. Superhero teams often come in sets of four, don't they? Well, The Fantastic Four did. And I'm pretty sure there were four musketeers, despite what the title would have you believe.
But she is looking at me so heartbreakingly.
“Of course you can be on the team,” I say, just as the bookshop computer bleeps.
Britta squeals. I sit down before I fall.
Our Facebook page has its first “like”. And he's written us a message!
6
“Hey there. Just stumbled on this page by accident — it came up when I made a typo looking up the 'Mona Ferry'. I just wanted to wish you luck on your quest. And ask if you know whether the ferry runs on public holidays?”
I sigh. “At least we know the page is coming up in searches,” Britta says, hopefully. “And once Joe starts sharing it around, we'll get lots more people looking at it.”
“See, look! Two more just now!” Shelley points to the number at the top of the page. It's changed itself as the page refreshed. We now have four likes.
“Click and see who they are!” I'm beginning to feel excited, despite myself.
Britta clicks.
I point to the first picture, a peacock wearing a feather boa. “Joe,” I say. The second is the Mona ferry man. The next “liker” is David Riordan, a friend of Joe's who works on an enchilada stall at the Saturday market. The next one doesn't have their own picture as an avatar — unless they actually are a Mark Rothko painting. “Andy Mac-Towel?” I wrinkle my nose in confusion.
“You know him?” Shelley asks. I shake my head.
“Well, I’m assuming it’s a pseudonym,” I say, smiling at bit at its cleverness. “A play on Andie MacDowell, the actress. Because she was in all those rom coms? I guess he's another one of Joe's friends. He sounds like one of Joe's friends! It’s definitely the kind of fake name only an arty hipster would make up!”
The page refreshes again and we — I — have five more likers. “This is a bit wonderful!” I concede.
Unfortunately, we can't spend all day watching the numbers grow. A small crowd is milling at the shop entrance. I check the clock to see it's nine-oh-one. “Oh heck.” Britta throws me a disgruntled look. She swipes through her phone and connects to the shop playlist. Mariah Carey warbles through the PA. It really is Christmas. “This is your fault,” Britta says, huffily. “I'll finish the till. You go and deal with the disgruntled crowd before they start lighting torches and coming after us with pitchforks. Shelley, you can start unpacking the deliveries. And once you've done that, we need to get on with the new Christmas window display. No tinsel, though. Okay?”
Britta opens the doors and within seconds the shop is full of people.
A twenty-something tourist from Turkey asks me about pop art. Britta fields questions about local sculptors. Shelley guides an older couple over to the Sidney Nolan shelf. It gets busier and busier and before I know it, it's lunch time.
At Tricycle, I say hello to Kiefer, who's standing behind the counter pretending he's not reading an Allen Ginsberg book between customers. Kiefer’s a poet — and a pretty good one. Like Hollywood, nobody is only a barista in Hobart.
As I wait for my coffee, I look across to the gallery, where there’s a new and bemusing “found art” installation featuring a toilet cistern, a taxidermied duck and a bowl of Weet Bix.
The exhibition is called “Graffit
i on a broken heart”, and if I did believe in destiny, I'd say that was a pretty big omen right there.
When my coffee comes, I sit down and pick up the paper. For the first few pages, everything is bad. Disease, war, politics. I grimace and flick through quickly before I can take too much of it to heart. On page five, I pause as an advertisement catches my eye. Well, not so much an advertisement as a call to arms.
My favourite thing in the whole, wide world.
A protest.
7
The advertised march is against a demolition order for a beautiful old building in the middle of the CBD. It’s called “Sassafras House”. It's been abandoned for years, left to go slightly decrepit. But it’s a place I remember from my childhood. Dad took me there on one of our trips to Hobart, and told me all about its history — how it was once a school for orphaned children, whose parents were convicts, or palawa people whose land had been stolen; their lives stolen, too. It might have a tragic history, but it’s a history that should be remembered and honoured. I can’t bear the thought of the beautiful old building being demolished and turned into a carpark or a fancy hotel.
It's wrong. It's evil. And I am going to put on my floral Doc Marten marching boots and make sure it doesn't happen.
“You with me?” I cry, as I stomp back into the store, brandishing the paper. I startle several customers, who look from me to Britta, wide-eyed, as if to say, “Aren't you going to throw this terrifying person out of the shop?”
Joe is standing in the Impressionists section. He rolls his eyes and shakes his head, and goes back to his book on Monet.
“It's fine.” Britta soothes the anxious browsers, shooting me a warning look. “She's a beloved staff member, not at all dangerous unless you take the last chocolate brownie. And she does this all the time. What's this one against? Or for?”
“Demolition order. Historic building. You in?”
“Does that mean I get to babysit again?” Joe asks. “Ooh! Maybe we can play Angelina Ballerina again! That was fun!”
