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Chapter 3

Massage Chair Diet

There were still twenty minutes or so until I had to meet Gemma. I was walking innocently enough toward the nail place, glancing into the windows of shops whose clothes I could no longer afford when, out of nowhere, something barrelled into me, causing me to trip and fall. Stunned, I glanced up wondering what had happened. I was sure I was concussed and not seeing straight. A small boy approached me, yelling, ‘You’re gonna have to pay for that, lady!’

I looked around for the ‘lady’ he was referring to.

‘Did you hear me?’ he repeated, somewhat huffily.

Miffed, I asked, ‘Are you implying I’m old?’ Lady? I mean, come on, I was early to mid-twenties, for God’s sake.

‘You broke my car!’ He dissolved into tears as a mother-looking figure raced out of the toy shop to investigate.

I looked down at my knees that were now covered with blood, guts and gore. Very unattractive. Jeans for the next month then. My beautiful and expensive red ensemble was now ripped and shredded like a hula skort. I was not pleased.

‘Excuse me, little boy, but look at the damage you’ve done to me! I think I’m gonna sue your parents!’

The mother-looking woman scooped the young boy into her arms and hushed him before looking at me in scorn. ‘That car just cost me $200!’

‘Um, are you some kind of crazy person? Your son just hit me with a remote-controlled car as I was walking along the footpath. It came out of nowhere! Do you know this skort cost me $200? Not to mention the fact my knees are most likely busted up! I’ll probably need some kind of surgery to fix this,’ I said, pointing at my bloody wounds and legs that were all akimbo. ‘I think I have concussion. I hope I don’t die in my sleep. Then you’ll really be in trouble. Actually, now my neck is starting to ache. Maybe you should call an ambulance. Do you have insurance?’ I ferreted through my bag to find my phone. Mother-woman stood looking at me in disbelief.

I dialled Kylie’s mobile, only because she was good in an emergency. In the past, she’s fussed and faffed over me, making me feel quite special. She answered on the sixth ring (much better: not so needy looking).

‘What now?’ she hollered.

‘If you must know, I’ve just been hit by a car and I think I need an ambulance. The crazy woman whose child was in control of the car is trying to get me to pay for it, if you can believe that!’ I shot the pair standing over me a viperous look.

‘Oh my God! A child was driving a car? Did he steal it?’

‘What? No! His mother just bought it for him in a toy store.’ She was slow to catch on this one.

‘Wait, I’m confused. Are you saying you were hit by a toy car? And you think you need an ambulance?’

‘What’s with all the em-phasis? Yes, a big, motorised toy car. I’m quite badly hurt, I’ll have you know!’

She sighed right into the phone. ‘OK, drama queen, I’ve got a colour on a client that needs rinsing before their hair falls out. You know, like, a real drama. So I’ll see you tonight,’ she said and hung up. Again. Of course, I wasn’t going to let devil mother and child know that, so I kept up a one-way conversation. ‘Yes, Kylie, that would be great. Call the ambos and ring Uncle Siegfried for me. He’s in the Yellow Pages under Q. As in Q for Queen’s Counsel. Chief of lawyers. I’ll just wait right here since I can’t walk any more anyway.’

Sure enough, the evil duo was gone as fast as my dad’s wages at a two-up game. It was just the mangled car and me. Finally, a toy shop employee came out to assist me. He was a young boy looking about fourteen who stared down innocently at me. His head hiding the sun made it seem like he had a halo.

‘Are you OK, Miss?’ His cute little cherubic face looked quite concerned, so I held back my wrath about how long it had taken someone to come to my rescue.

‘I’m not sure,’ I said, glancing at his name badge. ‘Cooper, I could really use something to clean my leg up and a couple of ibuprofens. You look at the damage, please. I worry I might faint with the blood and everything.’

He looked down at my knees. ‘A couple of Band-Aids should do it.’

‘Band-Aids? Band-Aids? Are you some kind of masochist? Then the hospital will have to rip off the Band-Aids to sew it and possibly make the gash even deeper!’

‘Hospital? You’ve only got a couple of scratches on your knees.’

God! Teenagers were so rude these days, don’t you think? He was probably one of those Generation Z kids that didn’t worry about simple things like school, or working, or the future, and just spent all day surfing and I don’t mean waves. I worried, reallyworried, about our country’s future with kids like Cooper.

‘Cooper, do me a favour. Go back to work. Try and commit to it, OK?’

I got to my feet, definitely unsteadily, brushed as much of the street grime as I could from my clothing and hobbled into the nearest clothes shop. I was on a credit card diet, but this was classified as an emergency, so without any guilt I selected a few outfits. A mere ten minutes later, I was refreshed, redressed and walking to the nail bar, albeit more cautiously.

I could smell the acetone a few hundred metres away. I was now running about thirty minutes late and wondered why Gemma hadn’t called to ask why. Another thumbs-down for her. No one cool waits around like a stood-up date without at least ringing to check that nothing serious has happened to prevent them arriving on time. Which, luckily for her, had happened, but she didn’t know that, so it was still uncool.

A gorgeous Vietnamese guy greeted me as I entered the nail bar. It was the funkiest nail place in town and run by men. That’s not why I went there, if that’s what you’re thinking.

They just so happened to be the very best at acrylic and they were super-fast. Kylie reckons they flirt just so you come back, but I disagree. I didn’t see them flirt with her at all. They were just being friendly. I, on the other hand, had my favourite technician, and whoa could he flirt! He was hot for me for sure, but I drew the line at a boyfriend who touched feet all day. I imagined us getting intimate, and then him caressing me with those hands and instantly saw hundreds of feet belonging to hundreds of different women. It sort of felt like cheating, not to mention the whole ‘ick’ factor of so many dirty feet. Not exactly a turn on.

I asked the guy if Hoang was available for French tips and a pedicure and saw Gemma waving frantically to me. Then she does the unthinkable and yells across the shop, ‘Sammy, you look great! You’ve lost weight!’

Can you imagine? Who says that? Instead, as the consummate together person I am, I casually strolled to the empty chair beside old loose lips and smiled in a friendly and endearing manner that I totally didn’t feel.

‘Gemma, great to see you again. Blue hair, wow, how did you manage to get it that colour?’ Notice I didn’t say anything about her hair looking great. I don’t lie to friends outright like that, unlike some people I know (Kylie).

‘Do you like it? Kylie did it for me. She’s great with hair, isn’t she?’

‘Yeah, I love it. Kylie, hmm, don’t use her myself.’ I didn’t have the heart to say blue hair was so 1990s. I mean she really should know these things, being a performer and all.

So, how are you? How’s that fabulous advertising job of yours?’

OK, so I may have bent the truth slightly about my actual role inside the office. ‘Oh, you know how it is, I could only climb the corporate ladder so far before I need to expand to somewhere bigger and better like, you know, Tokyo.’

She nodded in rapt approval. ‘Really? So are you off overseas then?’

‘Well, not at this stage. I thought I’d take a few weeks off, do some yoga, eat lentils, you know, de-stress from that whole pressurised environment. I tell you, it was killing me. It was work, work, work. Deadlines, KPIs, budgets, bonuses, and boys. It’s a man’s world out there in corporate-land. It’s tough going being one of the players when you’re a young, good-looking woman. I must say, I envy you. Being able to turn up unwashed, ungroomed, with just a guitar. Lucky you. Lucky, lucky you.’

She started laughing, although I’m not sure what at. ‘You’re so funny! Kylie was telling me your boss sent you out clothes shopping for him!’

Thankfully, Hoang walked over to me at that moment. Do you see what I mean about Kylie? She can’t help but spread malicious gossip around. It’s the bloody hairdresser in her. Now I was just going to have to spill one of her secrets.

‘Hoang. How are you?’ I said in my best sultry voice.

‘Very good today. What you want today, Miss?’

‘The usual, Hoang, plus a full set of French tips.’

‘OK, French tips no problem. What’s the usual, Miss?’

Coy, very coy. ‘Ha, ha, Hoang. You know, the usual pedicure!

Last time you said my toes reminded you of your long-lost love, Quelo.’

‘Ah, yes, Quelo. My bullmastiff. Had to be put down after he ate our tax bill. All the ink poisoned him. How I miss him!’

Hoang became emotional while I was still reeling over the fact he likened my toes to a friggin’ dog’s! Although, when I thought about it realistically, I could see he didn’t mean my feet visually, he meant metaphorically. He loved me, he loved Quelo. I could see that.

Hoang proceeded to fill up the foot spa and turned my chair massager on to ‘mile-high-club’ mode. It vibrated the bejesus out of me. I knew what he was thinking. The quicker, the harder, the faster – the better. Men. They were as transparent as the defence in the Stapler-Gate affair.

I relaxed into my chair and closed my eyes as Hoang worked his magic. The vibrations of the chair worked all the suddenly unemployed stress right out of my body. Kylie said that sitting in those chairs for thirty minutes or more was equivalent to running on the treadmill for five kilometres. Something about the way they work every muscle in your body. I tried to get a manicure or pedicure every week after I heard that. Incidental exercise, she called it.

I remembered ‘old blue hair’ next to me and figured since I’d invited her here I should really put some effort into some sort of conversation.

‘How’s the band going?’ I asked.

‘Great! We start touring next month. I’m so excited. We start here in Perth and work our way around Australia. It will be great to see the whole country, although we won’t have much time for sightseeing. It’s a gig, then back on the bus to race to the next gig, then back on the bus …’

‘Bus? You’re travelling with a group of grunge boys on a bus? For how long?’

‘We’re booked solid for the next six months. Major cities and regional.’

‘Couldn’t your agent secure a plane? How will you shower?’

She did that infuriating easy-going laugh thing again. ‘Who knows? I guess some of the venues will have bathrooms. That’s all part of the excitement of the trip! We don’t know who we’ll meet, where we’re going. We’ll sleep on the bus, write another album.’ She had a faraway look in her eyes, so I let her escape to the land of the great unwashed. She was totally off the BFF list. Not only because she was going away for most of the year, but because she didn’t care where she would shower and she was happy to sleep on a bus.

Hoang looked up at me with sex written all over his face. I was sure he winked at me, but I was concentrating on holding my stomach in, so I may have just missed it. From where he sat, you know, at my feet, it was kind of an unflattering angle.

‘Excuse me, Miss, what colour you like?’ asked Hoang. See what I mean? He really is interested. Next it will be something like ‘What’s your favourite movie’ and BOOM! He’ll ask me out.

‘Hmm, good question, Hoang. I used to love pink, of course, every girl does. Now I like yellow, sometimes green, but I guess I’m a little partial to purple these days too.’

‘I meant for your toe nails, Miss.’

‘Oh, yes of course … I’ll have red please.’

He walked away from my perfectly pedicured toes and selected the red varnish off a shelf near the front counter. He started speaking in Vietnamese to the guys who were grouped there.

Hoang pointed to me and gesticulated wildly, then the group burst out laughing and looked in my direction. At this point, I felt sort of bad for Gemma. They were obviously laughing about her blue hair. Really though, she brought it on herself.

He strutted back to me and knelt at my feet again (very empowering) and proceeded to paint my nails red. My Mum calls it horrid, as in ‘Whore red’, which is a plus for me. If she thinks it’s tacky, it must be good. I would hate my mum to approve of anything I do, then I would definitely know I’ve lost my edge.

Gemma’s technician asked for her colour choice and she picked, you guessed it, blue. Poor girl. If she were a better friend, I’d take her aside and teach her a few things about the ‘real world’, but at this stage I really had to focus on myself. Put me first for a change. I couldn’t rescue everyone.

‘Any chance you could swing me an appointment with your mum?’ said Gemma. ‘I’ve tried to get in, but she’s booked out for months.’

‘What? Not you too! What is this fascination with my loopy mother lately? Everyone’s on the bandwagon.’

‘You mean, you don’t know? She’s fantastic! Everyone is raving about her. Her Reiki is second to none. I’ve never felt better.’

‘God, Reiki schmaki, it’s all a crock. I mean, really, holding her hands ten centimetres above your body is meant to heal everything?’

Gemma narrowed her eyes at me and said, ‘You can be kind of hard on people, you know that? I think you need to see your mum yourself for some kind of therapy. She has this thing called “Bach flower treatment” that’s great for depression, anxiety and stress.’

‘Are you implying I have some kind of medical condition?’

‘I’m just saying, it’s a natural alternative for relaxation.

Everyone needs an escape now and then when life gets hard. A few bottles of red wine and a packet of ciggies is really not the answer.’

Can you believe this blue-haired monster? Seriously, was she giving me a lecture?

‘Gemma, I hardly ever drink red wine and I definitely don’t smoke, so whoever you’re getting your information from is totally barking up the wrong tree.’

‘Kylie told me she had an emergency call from you last night to fix your hair, because it caught on fire when you tried to light a smoke off the stove while you were plastered.’

‘Wow, who are you suddenly? Oprah? Is Dr Phil gonna run in with a film crew and do an intervention? My mother, too? Clutching a handwritten letter I can take off to rehab with me for my darkest moments?’

I know what you’re thinking. And you’re probably right. She has multiple personalities. I mean, where the hell did that come from? I remember now why we didn’t stay friends long in high school.

I lowered my voice, not wanting to make a spectacle out of myself and said, ‘I’ll have you know that Kylie is one of the worst exaggerators I’ve ever met. We aren’t talking at the moment, so I guess she has to make up these ridiculous lies to feel better about herself or something.’

‘She has photos of last night. You, totally wild-eyed, smoking, your hair a charred mess on one side.’ She had the nerve at this point to start laughing. ‘Oh, and your apartment! What a pigsty! How can you live like that?’

Well, I can tell you right now I was shocked at her utter rudeness. I mean, who says things like that? As for Kylie, oh man, was she going to cop it tonight when she came over. I had some nasty photos of her hidden away for times like this. It was war.

Hoang had just finished my toenails and was clearly feeling the angry vibe we had going on. He made himself scarce.

‘Obviously my mother’s “releasing negative energy tea” has done nothing for you! This has been great but, unfortunately for you, I have other obligations today. You know, with nice people.’

I stood up as daintily as I could so I didn’t smudge my nail polish and walked to the counter to say my goodbyes to Hoang and cancel my French tips. Really, I only had so many hours each day, I should be a little bit fussier about who I dole them out to. Blue-haired band freaks were a big NO from now on. What was I thinking?

Hoang snatched my money and secreted it away like I’d just performed a sexual act for him. He winked at me while I air-kissed him, allowing me to walk out with my head held high. I immediately rooted around my bag for my phone. I was still pissed I wasn’t going to drop a kilo or two by getting my false nails applied.

It took all my might to walk slowly down the street. I suddenly felt like I was living in a parallel universe. It was unheard of for people to speak to me like that. First Kylie, now Gemma, of all people. Even my mum would usually intuit something was wrong, bring me dark chocolate and give me a foot massage. Had the world gone mad? I thought back to my mother’s warning about the kimono, but it was just too preposterous to believe. There was no way a piece of antique silk could be causing my friends to be so mean-spirited. Something was going on and I was going to figure it out, just as soon as I’d organised lunch. I can’t think when I’m hungry.