The Search (4 page)

A dunny budgie delivering pizzas? Kay looked across at Flick then she made up her mind.

‘Okay, but give your hands a good scrub first. On second thoughts, you’d better wear gloves. Have you got a clean T-shirt? And shorts?’

‘What’s wrong with the ones I’m wearing?’ Rob looked down at his bulging belly, torn shirt and dirty shorts.

‘If you’re delivering pizzas you need to look clean,’ Kay explained quickly. ‘People associate clean clothes with clean food.’

‘I’m clean.’

‘I know, I know, but frankly, Rob, you can’t have your dunny budgie image getting mixed up with your pizza image.’

‘You’re going to let
him
deliver the pizzas?’ said Purple Face, looking horrified.

‘You got a problem with that, mate?’

Rob put his hands on his hips and glared. Purple Face was not in choice physical condition. Rob
wasn’t exactly Mr Universe either, but he was certainly fitter than the overweight city pencil-pusher standing before him.

‘You can wear Cam’s clean overalls,’ said Kay quickly. ‘Now, sir, do you want to take your Mexican now, or wait till Rob suits up and delivers it, by which time it will probably be stone cold and need reheating.’

‘In which case you’d better make me another one!’

Things were getting nasty. The other customers were looking annoyed. They had families waiting at home or in the camping ground for them to bring back hot food for the evening meal: they didn’t want a full-on blue in the store and aggro from this pompous twit who might be a big wheel in his own narrow little world but certainly wasn’t one here in Coolini Beach.

‘Listen, mate,’ said a bloke who was built like Godzilla and was wearing black motorbike leathers, ‘would you just take your bloody Mexican pizza and get outa here?’

Purple Face took in the tatts, leathers, ham-fisted hands, tough-looking face with broken nose and jagged scar and decided it might be a good idea to grab his pizza and go while the going was good. He shot out the door as a cheer went up from the
remaining customers, especially the other two bikers in the far corner.

‘Keep goin’, ya mug!’

‘Yeah, and don’t come back.’

‘Nice classy establishment you’re running here, Kay,’ whispered Flick with a wink, as Rob shuffled out the back to get suited up for his new job.

At last the dinner rush died down and it was time for the ice-cream mob, as Kay called them. Dessert time. People had eaten their main meal and ice-cream was on the sweets menu. At least that was easier.

Out the back Nathan was tidying up and replenishing some of his ingredients, although there’d be still a few more orders to do. Rob had managed to deliver a pizza to the wrong place and they’d grabbed it, paid and eaten half of it when he’d found out his mistake. He’d taken a corner too fast at Sunrise Creek and run off the road, getting bogged in a ditch. Then he’d tried to chat up some babe in a brief bikini top when he’d handed over her Vesuvius, making reference to her own twin volcanoes, and got his face slapped. Hard.

But apart from that it had been just another ordinary day!

It was close to eleven when the last customers left the shop. Kay looked totally wiped out and Flick was feeling like a zombie. Tomorrow, more staff members
would start and things would get easier. Kay couldn’t keep working fifteen-hour shifts. She’d flake out. Permanently.

‘I’ll sleep here tonight,’ she said. ‘I can make up a bed on the floor in the office. I’m too tired to drive home.’

‘Come and sleep in the bus,’ offered Flick. ‘I’ve got a spare bed and it’s comfy, clean sheets, nice doona, and you can draw the curtain for privacy.’

Liz had gone at nine because she was rostered to start at seven. There was just Flick and Kay cleaning up. Kay still had to do the till, but that wouldn’t take too long because she’d already put most of the notes away. The takings had to be put in the safe and the store locked up for the night.

Kay phoned Cam to say that she was staying the night at Flick’s and they strolled along the street and across the road to the camping ground on the foreshore. The moon shone mistily from behind the sea fog which promised a fine hot day once the morning sun pierced through the soft cloudy barrier. Flick could smell the sea, sharp and salty, with just a faint whiff of seaweed drifting on the balmy night air.

Some of the campers were sitting around quietly talking outside their tents, and they said a brief hello to Kay and Flick as they walked past. A group of
holiday makers were playing cards in their van. Flick could see the outline of their heads and hear the faint murmur of voices and the occasional shout of triumph as someone trumped someone else.

The outline of Flick’s bus was silhouetted against the bank of trees as they walked toward it.

‘Isn’t it a beautiful night?’ said Kay softly as Flick unlocked the door and switched on the light. Luckily she’d left the bus tidy that morning, so that it took only a matter of minutes to pop on the kettle in case Kay wanted a cuppa and to find a clean towel for her to use.

It wasn’t a big bus, but there was plenty of room and the two compartments separated by the curtain meant that two people could share it and still maintain some privacy. A low pig-like grunt told Flick that PK was in the tree overhanging the van.

‘That’s PK Grunt. If you hear a noise in the night like a bomb going off that’s only him landing on the roof.’ She grinned. ‘He might be small and furry but he’s very chunky.’

Kay decided that she didn’t want a cup of tea after all, so, switching off the kettle, Flick went to her end of the bus and got ready for bed.

It didn’t take long for Kay to fall asleep, snoring gently. Flick lay on her back staring up at the dark
ceiling above her. She knew she still wasn’t over Todd. In her imagination he’d decided that he was madly in love with her, had made a dreadful mistake, and wanted her to go back to him. She could see herself serving in the store and Todd bursting through the door and folding her in his arms, showering her face with kisses and telling her how stupid he’d been — he’d just been infatuated with the other girl, and would she, Flick Flack, his pet name for her, please take him back?

Dumb, dumb, dumb.

Todd didn’t know where she was, even if he did care about her.

‘I’ve got to get Todd out of my mind,’ she told herself firmly. ‘I can’t get over him while I’m thinking like this. But how could he have looked into my eyes and told me that he loved me while he was seeing someone else? Does that mean he still loves me? Or he never really loved me at all? And if another guy says he loves me, how am I supposed to believe it? I’d never tell anyone that I loved them unless I really meant it. No way!’

She thought about her girlfriends and their boyfriends. Two of them were still going with their long-term guys, but then Anna and Danni were both airheads and always compliant. They did what the
guys wanted and never argued. The other two friends, Pip and Georgie, had also experienced major bust-ups. Idly she wondered if they’d got over the experience and were going out with new partners.

Well, she’d had enough of so-called love to last her a lifetime. She wasn’t going to stick her neck out again like that and get her head chopped off from her body by some guy, because that’s what it felt like. She still felt emotionally detached, as if her head was permanently severed from her heart. How was she ever going to trust someone again? Todd had always said their relationship was built on trust, then he’d knocked it down like some fragile castle built of sand that had been jumped on then washed away by the swirling tide.

Unable to sleep, Flick switched on the TV. She turned the sound right down until it was a soft murmur. There was some late-night panel show on, a debate about the sexes.

‘Just what I need to cheer me up,’ grimaced Flick, but she watched it anyway.

‘The most important things in life are power, money, sex appeal and charisma, and you need those four if you want to succeed and get to the top,’ said this sleazy-looking guy called Mark Thornton who was an ex-rugby player and now a TV panelist
renowned for his fast girlfriend change-overs. He was nearing fifty, had obviously dyed hair and was nothing spectacular to look at.

‘Power, money, sex appeal and charisma,’ said Flick to herself. ‘Most women haven’t a hope of getting those things. Power. That’s a pretty tough call. Power as in leadership? Or in manipulating others to get what you want? Money? Most women I know with money have married into it. I suppose there’re a few who’ve earned it with their own talent, but most of them hit the glass ceiling and can’t go any further. Sex appeal? Well, I know girls who use that to get what they want. Is that what he means? And charisma. Most politicians have got that. And TV comperes, too. Used car salesmen? Actors? Are they born with it or do they learn to conjure it up from somewhere? And because they’ve got charisma, does that mean they then get sex appeal? And money? And power?’

It was all too complicated. Fuzzily, Flick remembered a woman saying something about it being a man’s world. Men could look old, grey and wrinkled but if they had money it didn’t matter, they could still pull in some good-looking bimbo as a trophy bird. Whereas, if women looked old, grey and wrinkled they were considered over the hill and past their use-by date. It wasn’t fair.

When she woke the next morning the TV was still on, but now it was an early morning cartoon show. Suddenly the curtain swished back and Kay was standing there holding two steaming mugs of tea.

‘I thought you were awake because the TV was on,’ she said, handing over a mug as Flick sat up and drew her knees to her chin.

‘I fell asleep last night with it still on,’ she said. ‘Some debate about men versus women. Mark Thornton, you know, that ex-rugby player, said that if you want to succeed you must have power, money, sex appeal and charisma.’

‘Anyone can have sex.’ Kay perched on the end of the bed. ‘It depends on how fussy you are. Now sex appeal’s another thing!’

Flick thought about it. Power. Money. Sex appeal. Charisma. She sighed. She, Felicity London, didn’t have any of those things.

But she could get money if she worked hard enough. She could work on the sex appeal. And the charisma.

And she knew just the person to practise on.

Liz sighed as she turned over in bed and looked at the alarm clock. Three minutes to go before its loud jangling ripped through the room.

Yesterday had been hell in the store, and she was wondering if she could keep up the pace. Today was Friday and there’d be hordes of customers. But then Roxie would arrive on Saturday and more staff should be starting soon. If they were good — and two of them, Angela and Braden, had previously worked for Kay so they should know the routine — it would make life easier. If they were duds, it would make her life harder.

They wouldn’t be all rostered on at once, however. There would be split shifts. They would all work the regulation eight hours per day with proper
breaks, unless of course Kay wanted them to work overtime.

Liz didn’t mind working hard but yesterday had been a killer! As the alarm pierced the stillness of the misty morning, Liz leapt out of bed and headed for the shower. She had to be at the store, bright and bushy-tailed, by seven, ready to do the surfers’ breakfasts.

The holiday house was built on the hill overlooking Coolini Beach. It was set in the bush and gave a magnificent view of the beach, the point, the store, and the winding road further up the coast. For the past ten years her parents had always brought their van to the camping ground, but then Dad had decided it would be good to have a house, so he’d bought the land and had the beach house built by a local builder. This was their first summer season in it.

There were four large bedrooms, two with bunk beds, so they could invite friends, but since she was working at the store, Liz hadn’t bothered. Her older brother Tim had three of his mates staying, and they usually rushed off early in the morning in their V8s to search for the ultimate wave. Yesterday they’d gone to Moonlight Head, but today they’d probably surf at Coolini Beach. Evidence that they were still asleep was all over the verandah — their surfboards were
propped against the wall and wetsuits and towels were draped over the balcony.

Dad had made sure that the huge lounge room faced east to catch the morning sun. There were floor to ceiling windows and sliding doors right along the verandah. In the afternoon when the sun was moving to the west, the room was cool and comfortable. At the far end of the verandah was a table and chairs, with a barbecue in the corner.

This house had been built for entertaining, and to make life easier for Mum when they had hordes of visitors. It stood high off the ground on stilts, and the underneath part had been turned into another shower room, toilet and rumpus room with second TV set, a pool table and table tennis table, so people could play games on wet days.

Standing on the verandah Liz swiftly spooned up her cereal as she watched the mist-shrouded black bobbing figures in the waves near the point. The surf looked good. But that meant every surfer for kilometres would show up here to ride the waves. She knew enough about the surfing jargon to know that they were always on the eternal search for the top waves. And today it looked like the end of the quest was right here at Coolini Beach, but of course there could be better surf further down the coast. They’d
check it out then come back. They seemed to spend half their time searching instead of surfing.

Liz grimaced as more panel vans and cars with surfboards bristling out like echidna quills pulled into the parking bay. It was going to be a very busy day.

Five kookaburras landed with a thump on the railing, eager for their morning snack of raw minced steak, so she hurried inside to the fridge and brought out a handful for them.

‘You guys are on the search too,’ she joked as she popped small pieces into each open beak. ‘The search for food. There you go, guys, that’ll keep you happy till the first bus comes in.’

When the tourist buses arrived, Kay or one of the girls would get some fresh meat pieces and call the kookaburras so that the tourists could feed them and take photos. There were nine of them in the area and usually they turned up in threes, seeming to know which ‘shift’ they were on. The rest of the time they were searching for lizards and small snakes to supplement their steak diet.

While she was in the kitchen, Liz scooped up a container of sunflower seeds for the king parrots and rosellas that were waiting patiently in the gum trees near the verandah. Then she got some millet seeds for the finches which she called the Little Guys, and
sprinkled it on the ground below, because they wouldn’t try to compete with the parrots at the food trays.

Time to go. Dragging on some navy shorts and a perky blue and white striped T-shirt, Liz darted to the door where her sneakers were airing on the steps. Shaking them vigorously just in case an errant spider or bull ant had decided to spend the night in them, she pulled them on.

It was a five-minute walk down to the store. The sea mist was still clinging tenaciously to the hills but the sun was beginning to peek through over in the east where the surfers sat like watchful cowboys riding their boards and waiting for the big one that would carry them swooping to the shore. The road wound downhill through gum trees and scrub to cleared land where there was a tennis court and the store, with the river winding its way lazily through the valley to the left, and the camping ground sprawling on the right.

Liz wondered whether Angela and Braden would be easy to get on with at the store this year. She knew them both from being a customer and then a shop assistant briefly over Easter. Braden was all right, although he loved to gossip, but Angela had proved to be a two-faced little cow. She was a good worker
so Kay had ignored her alternate bouts of sunniness and sulkiness, but Liz had found it hard to stay calm when she was rostered on with Angela. She was never sure how the other girl would react, and sometimes the tension had stretched her nerves to screaming point. Not that she had ever actually screamed, of course. Whenever her breaks came she’d walked furiously up the hill past the holiday houses, or strode briskly along the sand and round to Shelly Beach, and burnt off her anger that way.

Liz arrived at the store just as the sun broke through the mist and turned the sea to molten gold. Its rays were already piercingly hot on her bare arms and legs. Unless a breeze came in from the sea to cool the air, the day was going to be a scorcher!

Already the delivery vans were rolling in and the early bus had brought the crates of milk. It was all systems go.

Flick and Kay were bustling around inside making brekkies. The full Special Surfer’s Breakfast consisted of eggs, bacon, sausages, tomatoes, hash browns and hot buttered toast for $5, which was very good value, but Kay was smart and knew they’d wash it all down with milkshakes at $2.50 and buy other stuff to take with them. As she always said, ‘What you lose on the roundabout, you make up on the swings.’

Privately Liz thought that the Special Surfer’s Breakfast was a total fat fest, but the guys and few chicks who tucked into it every morning didn’t pile on any weight. They probably burnt it off shooting waves all day.

The surfers lounged about on the seats outside eating and eyeing off the other surfers who were rolling in. The really eager ones had hit the waves straight away without fuelling up, but the cool ones knew it was better to feed up first so they could stay out there longer.

‘Ho Bobby, hi Randy, hi Tom,’ said Liz, grinning at the bunch near the door.

She knew most of the regulars because their parents had holiday houses too, and these boys had been surfing at Coolini Beach since they were practically out of nappies. They’d been the junior grommets and now were the experienced Coolini Beach crew because they surfed all through the year, rain, hail or shine, when they could get weekends off. The icy cold wintry waters of Bass Strait and the Southern Ocean didn’t worry them at all. So long as there were top waves and a big swell with even sets they were in surf heaven.

‘Josh down yet?’ asked Tom.

Liz felt her cheeks going red. Why did she always
blush when good-looking guys like Tom talked to her? Or when someone mentioned Josh?

‘Dunno,’ she mumbled as she hurried indoors to wash her hands and put on her apron.

Several campers were waiting to be served, clutching their morning papers, bread and milk.

‘Gunna be a scorcher today,’ said one man as she took his money.

‘Do you know if the fish have been biting out at Maggoty Point?’ asked another man.

‘Is it a total fire ban today?’ asked a third. ‘I want to burn some rubbish.’

Like Kay always said, the store was really a general information depot. Yes, the fish have been biting, and you’ll have to check the paper to see if it’s a total fire ban day, Liz told the customers. Yes, we’ve got two brands of Factor 30 sunscreen, she told a woman with two little kids. Yes, we’ve got tent pegs, she said to a young and harassed-looking man. It was amazing how many people set off to go camping and left their tent pegs behind.

The morning went quickly and before Liz knew, it was time for a break. Just as she sat down outside to have a quick caramel malted, Angela strolled round the corner.

‘Hi, Liz.’

‘Hi Angela. I like your hair.’

Privately, Liz thought it looked ghastly. She wasn’t exactly sure what colour Angela’s hair was without highlights or a dye job. She suspected mousy brown. Now it was vivid red, brassy in the sunlight. She looked like she’d set herself on fire!

‘It’s called Blazing Sunset,’ said Angela cheerfully.

More like Blazing Bushfire, Liz thought to herself, as Angela perched on the seat opposite her to chat.

She’d also got herself more earrings and one through her right eyebrow. Kay would have a fit!

‘Anyone worth knowing about here yet?’ asked Angela, lazily scratching her midriff with one purple nailpolished fingernail.

Liz knew that she meant any good-looking guys.

‘Nope.’

‘Typical.’

Angela shrugged, stood up, and marched confidently into the store to the accompaniment of wolf-whistles and hubba hubbas from the crew having shakes and sandwiches outside, ready to start her day’s work. And little wonder she was getting the attention.

Angela was wearing a brief white halter top and dark green shorts, with a large blue tote bag slung over one shoulder. She had impossibly high platform sandals on her feet.

Liz thought there was no way that Kay was going to let Angela tromp round the store in those ridiculous shoes. For a start it was a health risk. The sandals offered no protection if she dropped something heavy on her feet. Plus she wouldn’t last eight hours tottering round on
those
orthotic accidents! And the brief top wouldn’t go down too well with Kay, either. She’d have Angela covered up with a neck-to-knee apron quicker than you could blink!

By the time Liz had finished her break and reentered the store, Angela was in the kitchen bawling her eyes out. Kay had set her to work peeling and slicing a mountain of onions. She didn’t look quite so attractive now. In fact she looked positively grotesque with black mascara running in sad rivulets down her cheeks.

‘I
hate
peeling onions,’ she snuffled, her eyes all red and puffy.

‘It’s not so bad if you run them under the cold water tap before you start chopping them,’ Liz offered helpfully.

‘Do you want to do this and I’ll do your job?’ asked Angela quickly, always the opportunist ready to slide out of the grotty work. She liked being out front at the counter where she could flirt with the cute guys,
or do some waitressing and wiggle seductively along the verandah carrying food.

‘Liz, I need you out front,’ said Kay, poking her head round the corner from the office where she was on the phone giving an order for more chocolate bars.

‘I don’t mind doing the onions, and…’

‘Shop, please!’

When Kay spoke in that tone there was no argument. Liz scuttled back behind the counter again and started serving the customers.

‘Here comes the first bus,’ said Flick, bustling past with a tray full of dirty dishes from the tables outside.

It was the morning tea stop, and the twenty-two seater was full. The travellers piled out, yawning and stretching. It was a long drive from Melbourne, at least two and a half hours, and they were glad to stretch their legs after their brief stop in Geelong to buy coffee and go to the rest rooms.

Liz and Flick took the orders and whipped them into the kitchen where Kay was now ready to start churning out sandwiches, drinks and Devonshire teas at the speed of light.

‘Good timing!’ Kay smiled as Braden walked into the store, ready for his eleven till seven shift.

Liz grinned at him too. She liked Braden, even if he was a bit of a twerp sometimes. He thrived on gossip,
and if there wasn’t any, he created it. He had dark straight hair, pale skin with a smattering of freckles, soulful brown eyes, and a serious demeanour. Sometimes when he got excited he developed a lisp. He didn’t laugh very much, but when he did it sounded like a braying donkey. He was a mate and not boyfriend material. He wasn’t interested in Liz as a love goddess, anyway. He liked brash and brassy girls with blonde hair and big tits who never ever gave him a second glance, unless of course he dropped a cold drink on one of them, which he occasionally did, especially if the girl was sitting outside wearing a brief bikini.

Kay seemed to think that Braden was overcome with embarrassment at seeing so much bare skin, causing his hands to shake so that he couldn’t help spilling the drinks. He was therefore in some way blameless, but Liz often wondered if these little episodes
were
accidents, seeing as it had happened a number of times, and he always picked his target, a girl wearing a brief bikini so that the mess could be washed off without too much fuss.

‘I reckon he lays in his bed at night reading girlie mags,’ Angela had sneered. She wasn’t interested in Braden. He was just
there
, someone she had to work with in the store. She thought he was a dweeb, and
when he’d asked her out once she’d fallen about clutching at the counter for support and doubling up with laughter at the thought of her and Braden actually going on a date together.