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Authors: Nikki McWatters

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BOOK: One Way or Another
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PART 2.
WELCOME TO THE JUNGLE
11.

Embrace your inner rock star. It became my mantra. My dress sense was still more masculine than feminine but now I opted for a bigger and bolder version of my pirate persona with black tights, puffy shirts, shoulder pads and big, big hair. The fringed miniskirt and limbo-low cleavage look was not for me. Ankle boots and a dark slash of lipstick completed the ensemble.

My theatrical background meant I was comfortable on stage and although I shied away from singing in school musicals, rock singing was a whole different kettle of mullet. I was up for it. Madonna was no Dame Sutherland and frankly I'd listen to the Material Girl over caterwauling opera any day. I adored Madonna – the attitude, the irreverent Catholicism and the overt, uncontainable sexuality. Rejecting the dogma of my Catholic education, I retained a penchant for religious iconolatry: jewel-encrusted crucifixes appealed on a deep level. But what I loved most about Madonna was the gap between her front teeth.

My new look was a cross between Madonna and Kate Bush. Kate was built like me – thin with melonous breasts – although when I tried to recreate her haunting screech I sounded more like a dying rodent. We had studied
Wuthering Heights
at school the previous year and I'd fallen deeply for Heathcliff. Dark and brooding, he had much in common with my Poet – or maybe I just imagined the Poet that way. My own selfish rebellion was mirrored in Catherine's wilfulness. Sadly, it seemed our future together would be just as ill-fated as theirs, but nowhere near as interesting.

I'd owned a guitar since I was fifteen but it sat gathering dust and cockroach droppings most of the time. Occasionally I'd pull it out of my wardrobe and pluck the strings, trying to produce a melody. Now, with the pocket money I'd saved by abstaining from midnight romps, I bought a basic ‘how-to' book of simple chords and progressions. Mum and Dad promised to send me along for guitar lessons if I spent a fortnight doing atonement for my alleged binge-drinking session.

With diligence and sombre patience I studied, minded my little brother and sister, washed up, hung out the laundry and cleaned the pool without complaint. I was a model daughter. I rang Bob, the former Skyhooks guitarist, and booked a weekly private lesson to start the first Wednesday after my two-week penance was up. This dangling carrot kept me on task for the two long weeks. My deep grey mood began to lift with the promise of rock stardom just around the corner.

*

Bob was a funny fellow, not what I had expected at all. Nothing about him screamed hedonistic rock star; he was more like a quiet guru, with an ethereally arrogant quality that was hard to define. Little wiry Bob, with his shiny head, tiny spectacles and aura of serenity, reminded me of Mahatma Gandhi, whom I had embraced as a hero after seeing the famous film the year before. Gandhi taught that anyone can hear the whispering voice within, if only they are ready to listen. Given the cacophony in my own brain – the constant bickering and shrieking and wailing and complaining – this message moved me profoundly. And it was a great relief to realise that my disappointment in Christianity was not unique. Gandhi said that while he admired Jesus Christ, he could not embrace modern Christianity because its adherents were so un-Christlike. I couldn't have said it better.

Bob lived in a converted garage in the shabby beachside suburb of Miami, under a house belonging to the parents of two drop-dead gorgeous young men who were playing in a new band with Bob. I met them once as they cruised through the garage during my lesson. My jaw ached at their physical beauty, but I put my cravings on the shelf and focused on my C scales. With years of piano lessons under my belt I had a basic understanding of musical theory. This helped, but only a little. My hands were small and I struggled to master some of the chords. To win a smile of approval from Sensei Bob, I would practise until I had blisters on my fingers. The professionals made it look so easy; Bob's fingers glided over the neck of the guitar like a skater on ice. I was about four steps ahead of a kindergarten kid with a recorder. I sounded awful.

Bob was a patient and talented teacher, although I managed to divert at least half of every lesson into conversation. While my guitar playing progressed slowly and discordantly, he kept me amused with rock and roll anecdotes, sprinkled with philosophy. He was perhaps the first adult male I had had such an opportunity to connect with on a platonic level – the big brother I never had. To him, of course, I was just another spotty kid without talent, but he never made me feel that way.

While Bob was a worthy mentor, his wasn't really the image I was going for. He could fine-tune my ear for music, but I needed a female role model. In earnest I began poring over magazines, searching for stories about female rockers.

Blondie's Debbie Harry was like a Barbie doll that had been left out in the rain, pretty in a post-punk way. But there was nothing blonde about me; I was the antithesis of a Barbie doll.

Pat Benatar was wonderfully angst-ridden. Her fuzzy Muppet hairdo and intense eyes were more my style. She was short with boobs and, in her tights and puffy shirts, looked like she shared my taste in fashion. But she was just so serious.

Madonna, of course, was the newest sensation. But it would be sacrilegious to blatantly copy her and anyway, I was no dancer. I would sing. I would rock. But I would gyrate, not dance. I would learn the guitar and maybe wield it occasionally, like Suzie Quatro or Joan Jett, but my plan was to be a killer frontwoman. I wasn't a great vocalist – but that didn't stop most rock singers.

A new girl had just burst onto the Australian music scene like a howling banshee: Chrissie Amphlett of the Divinyls. Straightaway I put my other heroes aside and Chrissie, with her unique guttural voice and slutty school uniform, became my idol. I clipped out photos of her and teased my fringe into a thick ball over my forehead. I practised my pout and kohled my eyes. She was so dangerous and brazen. I wanted to
be
her.

I studied my chords and warbled out tunes in my bedroom when no-one was home to hear me, all the while picking Bob's brains for inside information about the rock industry, filing away everything he told me for future reference. One thing all the women rockers seemed to have in spades was attitude. They reeked of anger and menace. Maybe it was just an act, a necessary protection in a male-dominated world. But female rockers were
tough
, and I was not. I was a giggling groupie, the silly plaything of rock stars. If I wanted to be a real rocker, I had to stop being used by them and stop using them. I had to learn to kick butt for myself. Snarling and pouting and frowning at everything, I rustled up some attitude, working as hard on my new persona as on my fingering.

*

The walls came tumbling down when Mum collected me from my guitar lesson one afternoon, a few months after my first session. Usually Dad parked on the street and read a book until I was finished, but Mum drove right up the driveway. The lesson ran a little over time and Mum glared as I farewelled Bob at the door. A gentle soul, Bob put his arm around me for a playful hug as I left. He waved and grinned as we pulled out of the driveway. He had such a beautiful smile.

Mum's silence told me drama was brewing.

‘You seem very chummy with your teacher,' she spoke through tightly clenched jaws.

‘He's really nice,' I offered tentatively.

‘I think there's something not right about it all. He's bald!' she exploded.

‘So?' I countered. ‘Lots of men are bald. No big deal.'

‘Old men. Men who have lost their hair are bald. Not young punks who shave it off as some kind of statement.'

‘Mum, he's not a punk. It's just a fashion thing ...'

‘It's not natural,' she fumed.

I couldn't help it. I rarely spoke back to my mother but she had it coming.

‘Neither is your hair. You dye it blonde.'

I thought she was going to lose control of the car.

‘That subversive attitude just cost you your guitar lessons. Over. Kaput!'

A wall of silence fell. Inside I was bubbling over with rage. In ways that I could not articulate, the lessons had been the therapy I needed to get me through my suicidal fog. I marvelled, at seventeen, at some parents' inability to nurture their children. Adults seemed better equipped to raise a pot-plant than a child. Sunshine. Water. Air. Soil. Easy. Children were more complicated, but not much – they simply needed enough space to be heard, to be safe, to feel and express their emotions, to make their own mistakes and to be loved unconditionally – whatever their musical tastes, their hairstyles or their clothes.

My parents provided a comfortable home. They encouraged and supported me in my studies and in a plethora of extracurricular activities. They worried about my spiritual growth and sheltered me from what they considered to be harmful influences. Almost everything in my domestic environment was designed to protect me – but nothing and no-one could protect me from myself. Without more candour between us, how could my parents know what it was that I needed, and what I needed protection from? Not even I knew.

I felt completely powerless. My opinions counted for naught and my status as a child meant I was unable to make important decisions for myself. In some cultures I would have been married, raising children and making decisions as a mature woman by seventeen. It was only natural that I would try to test the limits of the role society prescribed for me.

12.

In the privacy of my darkened bedroom, I continued to practise my guitar. I would draw the heavy gold curtains, sit on my green patchwork quilt, switch on my ghetto blaster and strum along, trying to wrap complementary chords around the melodies. Sometimes I'd put the tortured verse from my diary to music, creating odd reworkings of songs.

‘The gold and emerald spider takes advantage of my pain. His eager eyes, they hypnotise and drive me insane. When I'm low and all is dark, he glows and aims his sting. That spider's poison eats my mind, though I try to hide beneath his wings.'

My songs didn't sound too bad when I was singing them. But when I recorded my masterworks to cassette and played them back, I knew I had a long way to go before anyone would pay money for such noise.

My sexual fantasies still revolved heavily around my rock and roll adventures, but after a few months off the horse, I was out of practice. It was time to get back in the saddle. I dutifully paid Sister Superior three dollars and snuck out for a tame night at a Pseudo Echo gig at Bombay Rock. I ended up backstage chatting to their lead singer, Brian, and bass guitarist, Pierre. I liked Pierre, but the attraction was purely cerebral. He was a walking hairdo and an interesting musician and we chatted about current affairs. This was a breath of fresh air in an industry that often viewed girls backstage as meat on legs. With their synthesisers and bouffant hair I considered Pseudo Echo a bit ‘wet', but they were a decent bunch of young men. I made bedroom eyes across the room at their tour manager but wandered home in a wholesome state, proud that I could keep my knickers on if I chose to. The idea that I was addicted to sex had crossed my mind and I worried that it was like alcoholism or a poker-machine compulsion – something I needed to tackle.

Meanwhile, my ‘real world' love life was cruising along in low gear. I had been dating Richard, a cadet journalist whom I knew through mutual school friends. We chatted on the phone and went to a few parties as a couple. The odd kiss goodnight in the front seat of his car when he dropped me home at a sensible hour; holding hands; not much more. I liked Richard. A good-looking young man with a wicked wit, he was the archetypal Nice Guy. I even started paying more attention to the morning newspaper, combing it for his articles. But I was not ready for a Nice Guy. I still had too many lessons to learn.

We hadn't seen each other for a few weeks when I heard from him one Friday afternoon. He'd been sailing the high seas in the Brisbane to Nouméa yacht race and had just come ashore.

‘I'm going to a dinner at the Southport Yacht Club with the crew. Please come. I'd love your company. Really.' He was a smooth operator.

‘I'll have to see. Mum mightn't let me,' I lied. ‘I've got to learn my NIDA monologues.'

‘Please cover for me, Mum,' I begged after hanging up. ‘Tell me I can't go. I'll ring him back and say I'm not allowed to. I am just not in the mood to go to a sit-down dinner with a bunch of strangers. I have too much work to do.'

‘Dickie is lovely,' my mother crooned. ‘He's handsome and clever. Just go. You'll have a good time.' Protestations about homework and rehearsals would not sway her. I couldn't persuade her to ground me.

‘I like Richard,' I moaned. ‘I just don't want to marry him so there's no point pursuing it. Not this weekend.'

‘Listen, love,' Mum urged. ‘I was going out with someone else when I met your father.' She gave me a smile and a wink. My mother never winked. I shuddered.

Yachting was the sport of kings. Well, of the wealthy, at least. It was the gene pool Mum wanted me to be swimming in. And she would not take no for an answer.

Dressed in my green parachute pants suit and a dark scowl, I dragged my heels to the clubhouse on Main Beach. The stench of salt and seaweed hung in the air. A cool ocean breeze wafted back from the dunes. Richard and I joined a large table of rowdy crew. They were a mixed bunch, from young blokes with pierced ears and punkish hairdos to ancient mariners with ruddy faces and tubercular laughs.

Drinks flowed and the dinner was delicious. I loved food, and I relaxed and opened up in the convivial atmosphere. After the main course, the group decided to play musical chairs: every five minutes, every second person moved clockwise around the table in an attempt to get everyone more acquainted. I met such a lovely bunch of people, some shy, some gregarious. But when a Rod Stewart look-a-like sat beside me and gave me an enveloping smile, I melted. I wanted the table train to stop right there and then.

He sported spiked blond hair, an avant-garde outfit (with his pointed shoulder pads and crazy tie, he could have been a member of the Talking Heads) and a side-splitting sense of humour. We clicked like the final number in a combination lock.

‘So you're still at school. A little schoolgirl,' he teased me.

‘And what do you do then, …?' I didn't even know his name.

‘Billy. I'm Billy and I play bass guitar in a band.'

And there it was. The dial went click and the safe swung open to reveal the treasure inside.

I smiled at him with renewed interest. He did look like Rod Stewart. Tall – very tall – and lean. His smile was devilish and his blue eyes sparkled with raw energy.

When a sleeve of photographs from the yacht race circulated and I began dutifully to flick through them, my new friend began rolling his eyes and feigning embarrassment. I soon saw why when I got to the photo of him scaling a mast – completely naked.

‘It was my twenty-first birthday,' he groaned. ‘I was very, very pissed.'

I did my best not to peer too closely at the picture.

*

The night wore on and we were all invited back to the house of the owner of the yacht. From garbled conversations I gathered that not only had they not rated a place, they had gotten lost and returned to Brisbane over a week after all the other boats. Richard had a morning shift the following day and was keen to call it a night, but I gave him a pleading look and the poor fellow gave in.

We drove back to a lavish house in a waterfront estate. There was a sauna off the main bathroom. Decadence! It transpired that the yacht owner was the Rod Stewart look-alike's father and although Pseudo-Rod had a mousey girlfriend in tow, he showed me a flirtatious amount of attention, giving me a tour and plying me with alcohol.

Weird jazz oozed from the stereo and middle-aged drunks swooned about the living room, doing some kind of interpretive dance. When one of them pulled out a joint and passed it around, my eyes nearly popped out of my skull. I was pretty sure this wasn't what my mother had had in mind. I had a deep toke and fell instantly into a dreamlike haze. It was strong ganja.

Richard declined a smoke and sat in a corner like a guard dog, ears pricked for any sign of trouble. Pseudo-Rod looked deep into my eyes and told me his short life story. I heard only the words ‘bass player' and ‘punk band'.

He wanted me. I could see it in his steely blue eyes. His wallflower girlfriend sat like a bookend at the far end of the couch. Fate. Destiny. My mother had told me to come.

Much later, as my head began to clear, I wandered into the kitchen for a glass of water and saw again the photos of the failed yacht adventure. Furtively I shuffled through them and found a nice one of Pseud-Rob (with his clothes on). I tucked it into my parachute pants and hopped back out just in time for Richard's last call for a lift home. The gathering had melted into a wet smudge on the floor and I reluctantly said my thankyous and farewells.

Richard drove me home in silence and didn't offer me his smooth cheek for a goodnight peck. His disapproval hovered like a toxic gas between us. That was our last date.

BOOK: One Way or Another
6.45Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

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