The Taming of the Bastard Read online

  “Told you. Drinks. For Johnny’s birthday. We made plans weeks ago.”

  Somehow, I didn’t believe that. In fact, I was positive he was following me. “Where are your other friends, then?”

  That’d get him.

  “Over there.” Sam grinned cheekily, pointing across the bar, to where a group of ten or so guys were standing, pints of Guinness in hand. Unconcerned that they were in a gay bar, they were laughing and waving to me.

  “Hmph.” I grunted, too angry to say anything else. If he thought I was going to give in and go out with him he could bloody well think again. I’d rather go on a date with an axe murderer.

   7 

  In the ensuing weeks, Sam asked me out a total of six times. I played it cool, much to the dismay of my colleagues who were in desperate need of some gossip to spread around the workplace. I played it so cool, they began to call me The Ice Princess.

  “Don’t you have something better to do?” I asked, as they made yet another schoolgirl noise when Sam swung into the dining room and stopped to ask me how my weekend had gone.

  “Nope.”

  “You’re being absurd, you know. I’m not going out with him. I don’t want a boyfriend. I have a five year plan.”

  Chantelle snorted. “You’re the one who’s being absurd. You could be in his pants as we speak, yet you’re piss-farting around playing hard to get. The guy wants you bad, Millie. He does. Why don’t you just go out with him? You know you like him.”

  “Because he’s an idiot.”

  “No, he’s not. He’s cute.”

  I rolled my eyes and tried to concentrate on putting plates into the sink without dropping them. They were so starved for entertainment they’d convinced themselves I had the hots for Sam.

  “I don’t even like him. He’s an arrogant…um….” I stopped mid-sentence. Sam was bending over the bar and though I disliked his smartarse ways, it was quite a distracting sight. The plate I’d been washing slopped back into the dishwater. Soapy suds sprayed over my top and apron, soaking the fabric. I looked like I’d been through a car wash without a car and they’d forgotten to rinse me off.

  Chantelle shook her head. “She’s got it bad.”

  “It’s worse than before,” Alex replied.

  “Yep. That’s one smitten kitten.”

  I groaned loudly if for no other reason that to shut them up. I hated to admit it but they were right. Sam was growing on me or maybe I was becoming as blind to his disastrous personality flaws as they were.

  *****

  The seventh invitation—to see Michael Bublé live in concert—was issued later that evening. Everyone knew I was in love with the man, in a totally musical appreciation kind of way, of course, but Sam looked only slightly puzzled at my rejection. He seemed to be getting used to the idea that I wouldn’t be falling for him any time in the near future.

  “Any special reason you don’t want to go? I thought you’d ‘cut off your right arm with a steak knife’ to see him?” he said, quoting an earlier remark to Alex.

  I shrugged. “Not really, I don’t think we have that much in common, that’s all.”

  “Who? You and Michael? I should hope not. He’s Canadian. And married.”

  I folded my arms in exasperation. “Don’t be a smartarse, Sam.”

  Couldn’t he see I wasn’t interested? I had no intention of becoming his plaything. My life was too full for a boyfriend, even one with a bum like that. Not to mention the grin. But we shouldn’t talk about that.

  “Fair enough,” he smirked, and sauntered off to eat his dinner.

  My next shift, he arrived with a t-shirt for me, from the merchandise stand at the concert, which surprisingly enough, was my exact size. I stood, staring at it in bemusement, on the bench in front of me. Sam shouldn’t be buying me gifts. Only boyfriends did that sort of thing. Then, I handed it back, feeling a bit like a traitor. I mean, the t-shirt was pretty, damn it. It was pink and sparkly, damn it. And Michael Bublé probably approved every piece of merchandise that was sold on tour. It was almost a betrayal. “I can’t take this.”

  “You might as well. There’s not a hope in hell it will fit me.” He chuckled and flexed a bicep. “Besides, it’ll shit Dianne off no end, and we both know how you love to do that.”

  True.

  I took the shirt and stretched it across my chest. It was cute. The rhinestones glittered in all the right places. It matched my Pandora.

  “Looks nice on you,” Sam said.

  “Oh, alright. I’ll take it. But only to shit Dianne off.”

  Sam chuckled. We both knew that was a lie.

  “So do you want to come to the races on Saturday? We’ve got a private box.”

  I had to give him points for persistence but despite the fact I had the perfect race outfit waiting in my wardrobe, I turned him down again.

  “You’re busy?” he asked.

  “I’m trying to save,” I replied, somewhat pathetically. “And wasting money gambling on horses is not a priority.”

  “You could waste mine.”

  I pursed my lips and tilted my head at him. Was he serious? “You have no money, Sam. And even if you did, I wouldn’t take it. I can pay my own way.”

  “Fair enough,” Sam shrugged, “Your loss.”

  I was beginning to think maybe it was.

  “There’s always next time,” he added, and went off to talk to Dianne about the size of her chest or something.

  Bastard, I thought. He could at least have shown a smidgeon of disappointment. And who said there’d be a next time? God, he was infuriating.

  *****

  Eight weeks of invitations and rejections ensued before Sam came up with the most bizarre invitation of all. It was so bizarre, in fact, I have no idea why I accepted. I can only blame it on hormones or the fact that deep down I was feeling he might genuinely like me to keep pursuing me in this manner. There was an inkling that I was not going to be another number in his phone.

  I was folding serviettes when he appeared, stopping on the other side of the counter to wait for his dinner. He had to be because he couldn’t be giving the date idea another go; not after I’d called him an arrogant bastard to his face on the last attempt.

  A little too casually, Sam leant over and smiled his cheeky smile. Then, as my knees began that terrible trembling thing they did when he was near, I realised it was fortunate paper napkins weren’t breakable or Bob would surely be firing me. Sam’s mere presence had made me scrunch them into wads of useless mush. He hadn’t even spoken.

  “Hi,” he said.

  “Hi Sam.”

  “You look nice tonight...”

  God, not the uniform thing again.

  “Thank you.”

  “Not too busy, then?”

  I looked around the dining room. Apart from the two old ladies in the corner it was dead as a doornail. “Nope. Hence the reason why I’m folding serviettes.”

  The conversation continued in this vein until, without warning, Sam threw his latest suggestion to the wind.

  “RUGBY!” I shrieked, causing the ladies to look at me as if I had sprouted another head. The delicately balanced pile of napkins ruptured across the counter and spilled onto the tiled floor. Struggling to regain myself, I attempted to restack them. Sam bent down to help me. Our fingers touched on top of the pile and I lost the ability to breathe.

  “Are you… out of… of your mind?”

  Of all the ridiculous things I would do for a man, watching a game of rugby—of which I knew nothing except that it was a bunch of men trying to stick their faces in each other’s bottoms—was not one of them.

  “I was actually quite serious,” he replied, taking a sip of his post-shift ale. Little specks of foam clung to the corner of his upper lip and he licked them away. Disturbingly, I found myself staring at his tongue.

  Bad girl, Millie. Bad.

  “And if you don’t come this time.” Sam paused and looked into my eyes, his genuineness masked by mi
rth, “I’ll be forced to ask Donna. She’s been sniffing around for weeks. You’d be doing me a favour. It wouldn’t be a real date.”

  I tried not to weaken. I’d been so strong until that moment but, clearly, I wasn’t immune to this brand of temptation. It wafted across the bench, musky and smooth, inviting me to agree. It hid in my head and skittered around my insides like bees looking for flower.

  “But I don’t know the first thing about rugby...”

  Absolutely true, though why it should matter was beyond me.

  “Neither do any of the other girls. They just stand on the sideline, clap a bit, look glamorous and drink wine. They don’t watch. It’s a social occasion.”

  I listened to his description. And apart from the chauvinistic aspect I had to admit that rugby sounded like the type of game I might like. If I'd been into sport, that is. Clapping and drinking wine I could handle and there was little damage I could cause in the open air unless I fell in a hole. I could feel my resolve slipping away. I should give him a chance. Just one.

  “Well, maybe,” I said, watching the napkins I had re-stacked fall to the floor in a muddled pile that looked something like the jumble in my head.

  Sam took another sip of his beer. He looked a little relieved, either that or he was a very good actor.

  “Where’s the game, then?” I asked, bending to pick up the serviettes and lurching the crown of my head straight into the countertop. I rubbed it and smiled up at him. My interest, carefully muted until that moment, was as blatant as the lump growing on my head.

  “Are you okay, Millie?”

  “I think so.”

  “Can I look? I have extensive experience in contusions to the head.”

  I’d no doubt he did. I leant forward, feeling the warmth of his fingers as they parted my hair, inspecting the skin. I could feel his breath against my temple as he peered at my scalp.

  “You’re going to have a nice egg there but it’s not cut.”

  I didn’t know whether to be happy or sad. “Thanks.”

  “I’ll get you some ice,” he beamed and zoomed off to the bar.

  Having returned, Sam wrapped the ice in a damp tea towel. He cupped my chin and tenderly pressed the ice to my head.

  “We need to hold it on for at least ten minutes,” he said.

  I knew it was an excuse so he could touch me but, frankly, I didn’t care. The throbbing in my temples shot down to my knees turning them to treacle. It swam in my belly and spread to a few other places that I was sure had become dormant until this moment. I leant against the servery to regain my balance. Burning sensations were coursing through my body and they were not from the ice. Sam was touching me indirectly.

  “The game’s at our home ground in Cottosloe,” he answered, his voice softer than it had been five minutes before. “We’re playing the black scum.”

  They sounded scary.

  “You’re the good guys, I take it?”

  “Yes, and the underdogs. They usually beat the living crap out of us.” He applied more pressure with the ice. His eyes captured mine and his face became—how do I say this—less like he was taking the piss? Anyway, he was looking at me, really looking and his smile was one I’d never noticed on him before. It was beautiful. I smiled back.

  Yes, we were having a moment. An actual real-life moment. Thank God there was nobody else around. I’d never have lived it down.

  “Then why do you do it? It sounds dangerous.” I said, pulling myself back into the universe.

  Sam chuckled. “Because it’s rugby. It’s the game they play in Heaven. Come along. You’ll see.”

  I wasn’t sure that I would, but the idea of heaven—thirty bodies like Sam’s, in tight fitting shorts and jerseys—sounded appealing. I mean, I’d seen photos of the Western Force and the Wallabies in the paper, for heaven’s sake. I knew who Matt Gitteau was. I was not a complete sporting retard.

  *****

  Having agreed to the date, I had the next hurdle to overcome.

  “Adele, is it okay for me to take Saturday afternoon off this week?”

  We were in the kitchen of the Richards-Shaw’s Nedlands mansion. I was mixing up the organic Bircher muesli Adele insisted the children eat for breakfast three mornings a week to keep them regular. Adele was arranged along the chaise, sipping her first double decaf, low-fat latte of the day. The sun was streaming in through the French doors of the family area, hitting the highlights in her hair and setting a surreal glow around her peignoir. If she hadn’t been hung over from the three bottles of wine the previous evening, she would have looked beautiful.

  She looked up from her paper—The Australian—which she had delivered by courier every morning. “I suppose so, Millie. Brian and I have no engagements. Why? Do you feel a pressing need to go shopping in Subiaco again? I thought you were banned from the Pandora shop.”

  “I’ve been invited to watch a rugby match.”

  Adele’s ears pricked up. Slowly, she put down her newspaper, a rare occurrence unless it was to chastise at the children for scuffing the travertine tiles. Her eyes sparkled. The mere thought of romance could send her into paroxysms of joy. “Do you have a date, darling?”

  “Not exactly. I thought it might be interesting, that’s all.”

  “Yes. Well, that would depend on which code we’re talking about. League or Union?”

  I stared at her blankly. There were different codes? Oh dear. I had no idea this would be so complicated. I’d thought the WAGs to be my greatest challenge, now I had to learn two sets of rules?

  “Oh, darrrrling. What are we going to do with you?” Adele released a disgruntled sigh. (Her usual response when I said something insanely ridiculous.) Then she shook her head, letting me know it was time for another ‘life lesson’. “Rugby League is a game of glorified chasings for brainless thugs who can run fast and enjoy beating other people up legally.” She sat up on the chaise, well versed and ready to share her knowledge. “Rugby Union, conversely, is a game of tactics and strategy. It’s like the Chess of sport. It’s the game they play in Heaven.”

  Amazed as I was that my boss could string such a coherent speech together at eight in the morning, it dawned on me that I’d heard that expression before. Maybe there was more to this game than I’d thought. Or it could be some sort of brainwashing thing. Like Scientology.

  “It’s a delightful game to watch,” she continued as she swung one leg over the other and took a dainty sip of her latte. “All those hard bodies. Brian used to play rugger in his younger days, you know. He was a wonderful fly-half. It was poetry in motion watching him. Not that you’d know it now, of course.”

  I had no idea what she was talking about but the sight of Brian in a pair of shorts was not something I would ever have described as poetry. His butt crack when dressed in tracksuit pants, straight from a workout, could rival the San Andres Fault. I went back to the breakfast preparations. “So it’s okay if I go?”

  “Of course, darling! Take the whole day. And keep an eye out for my godson. He plays in the local competition. He’s such a sweet thing.”

  I mumbled a ‘yes’ and promptly forgot about the whole thing. As if I would be going around looking for some nancy, private school boy who was Adele’s godson. I was going to have my hands full trying to figure out what was the hell was going on.

   8 

  So there I was, at five-thirty the following Saturday afternoon, alone in the corner of a rugby clubroom with a glass of cabernet for company. One side of the room was crowded with photos of teams dating back to the turn of the twentieth century. A selection of framed, autographed jerseys decorated the opposite wall. The bar area was delineated by a huge road sign from a place called Cowcowing, obviously genuine and obviously stolen. It was battered, rusty and still bearing the scars of the robbery. Next to me, overseeing my every move, a seven-foot high stuffed bear reared on its haunches with what looked like a year old sausage roll in its paw. A rough-drawn placard dangled from its neck declaring,
‘Feed Me!’

  Yeah, like I was going to do that.

  It was daunting.

  Everybody knew everybody and I knew nobody.

  They were in brown and gold and I stuck out like a lone spring bulb in a sea of autumn with my tulip coloured coat and cerise pink sneakers. The women were kissing the men and flirting while swilling champagne. The players were slapping each other’s backs and congratulating each other on their fine rucking and mauling—whatever that was—as if they hadn’t been trying to commit murder twenty minutes before. They were playing some weird sort of drinking game that looked like LUDO for grownups and doing shots of tequila. I didn’t belong here at all. I was an out-there girl but this whole scenario was too out there, even for me.

  I gazed hopefully around the room, praying I’d feel less like the girlfriend of the bear and more like someone people wanted to converse with soon. Where the hell was Sam? How much longer was he going to leave me here alone? I mean, it didn’t take twenty-five minutes to do his hair, did it? He didn’t have that much. Then, just as I was glancing at my watch one last time and deciding to ditch the place I heard a high pitched voice behind me.

  “It’s, like, um, totally scary isn’t it?” There was a tap on my shoulder so I turned in the direction of the voice.

  “It is a bit.”

  “I’m Kirby Russell. My fiancé-to-be, Rambo, is like, uh, the full back. Totally awesome.” The girl pointed the rim of her champagne glass toward the bar and blew a kiss to guy. It was a tall weedy guy I’d seen at Lux Bar. He had brown hair and shoulders that I’m certain only looked big because he’d forgotten to take his protective padding off. Someone had picked his nickname on a dark night. A very, dark night.

  “That’s Rambo,” she giggled.

  “Interesting nickname.”

  Kirby tinkled like a fairy escaped from an Enid Blyton story. Her manicured hand came to rest on my forearm. “O.M.G! That’s, like, what everyone says, you must be totally psychic or something.”

  “Totally.”