Painted Faces (5 page)

“
Fred!” Anny shouts energetically in greeting as I step in the door. She's one of the workers I am familiar with and a real nice girl, for the most part. She comes on nights out with me and Nora the odd time. Although, between you and me she might have a bit of a penchant for drinking too much and having thrilling one night stands with men she's never met before.

She's one of those people who are fun to drink with, but you wouldn't really want her as an everyday friend, as she's sort of hyper and will talk your ear off given half the chance. Remembering Nicholas' gig tonight, I decide that she might be interested in coming along.

“
You up for going out tonight?” I ask her, as I snap on some plastic gloves and put the cupcakes into their display cases at the front of the shop.

“
Great minds think alike, I was just going to ask you the same thing,” she exclaims. “What did you have in mind?”

“
Our next door neighbour is putting on a show at some club, he asked us to come see it,” I tell her, finishing up with the cakes and stacking the empty boxes to bring them back out with me.

“
Sounds like a plan,” she agrees. “I'll pop 'round your place at about eight or so. We can have a few drinks first. Wet the old whistles,” she elbows me in the side, with a very nudge, nudge, wink, wink tone to her voice.

God. She's the only one who'll be getting up to any nudge, nudge, wink, winking. I never go home with people, and Nora does only very rarely. If you didn't know us well you'd probably think we were wizened old shrews. I like to think of it as being selective, as in selecting
no one
. In some ways I haven't outgrown the age of sixteen, when you're too insecure and nervous to take up the advances of prospective “suitors”, as my granny would have called them.

At this, somebody creeps up behind me and pinches me on the bottom. Without even turning around I know who it is.

“
Harry, I'd recognise the pinch of those chubby little fingers anywhere. In for your usual breakfast is it? Six cream donuts and an extra large mocha frappuccino?”

Harry comes to stand beside me and Anny, hands on hips. He works as a teller in the bank down the street and tends to come in here for his morning coffees. “Nope, sure you've probably eaten them all,” he remarks. “I'm on a diet, so I'll just have two custard danishes and a chocolate croissant to go. Oh and a small frappuchino.”

He's joking, obviously. We like to tease each other about being big fat pigs, though neither one of us is obese. We're more what you would call “cushioned”, in the sort of way that shows we enjoy the finer things in life.

“
I was just saying to Anny that me and Nora are going out tonight to a gig, you want to come with us?”

Harry places an arm around my shoulder and kisses me on the cheek. “I wouldn't miss it. I'd resigned myself to a night of dinner for one and a DVD rental. A gig sounds like much more fun.”

“
It will be,” I tell him. “Come to ours at eight for pre-outing drinks. I better be off, my shift at the shop starts at nine.”

“
Right, see you later then,” says Harry.

“
Bye,” Anny waves as I exit the crowded cake shop.

Cycling back over to George's Street where the charity shop I work in is located, some bastard in a Mercedes honks his horn at me because I block him from pulling out around a corner when he'd had the chance. I go one-handed on the bike and give him the classic middle finger. I can't see his face properly through the glass of the car window, but I like to imagine his expression would have shown him to be appropriately shamed. Sheepish, even. Although it's more likely that he got angrier and made some similar gesture back at me. An Italian style chin flick perhaps.

I situate my bike outside the shop and lock it up. You probably think that I'm one of those women who give their bike a name, like Bertha or Betty. Well I most certainly am not. I find that sort of carry on highly irritating. Not to mention annoyingly self-important. Oh look at me, I'm so wonderful that I have to give every item in my life a human attribute. A girl I went to school with did that with her shoes, each pair had a different name. She called her comfortable flats her Marys and her sex kitten high heels her Tatianas. I told her that her Tatianas sounded like an Eastern European prostitute. She didn't talk to me again after that.

Inside the shop my co-worker Theresa is sorting through some of the new donation bags. Because all of the proceeds go to charity, we get people giving us bags of old clothes and such that they don't want anymore. Oh and by the way, I'm not a volunteer. I do get paid for working here, just a little over minimum wage, which isn't so great, but at least it's a job.

The shop is an outlet for one of the big charities, I won't mention the name. I wouldn't say it in front of Theresa if asked, but my personal opinion is that most large charitable organisations are fronts for evil money making administrators and hot shot CEOs. You'd be astounded by how small a percentage of the money donated actually goes to those starving African babies. I suppose you could call me a sell out, because even though I know all this I still continue to work for the place. What can I say, I have to pay my rent.

Theresa's been working here for almost a decade. Unlike me, she's innocent enough to believe that her work is contributing towards the greater good. She's in her sixties and has that whole kind of hippy floaty look going on, with her long skirts and grey hair in a plait down her back. She's a lovely woman and we get along, although I think the generational gap means that we misunderstand each other at times.

Like when she asks me about what I did over the weekend and I tell her about my antics with Nora and Harry and how we drank a whole bottle of tequila together, she'd draw the wrong conclusion and think I was trying to tell her I have a drinking problem. She comes from a very upper middle class background and doesn't get the whole casual abuse of alcohol that the “young people” get up to these days.

“
So, what treasures have there been bestowed upon us this time, Tessy?” I ask her, shoving my coat behind the counter and going to sit down beside her. I always love looking through the donation bags. However it's a good thing I'm not squeamish, because there can often be some questionable looking stains on the clothing. And sometimes they're quite – fresh.

“
Morning Freda. Oh the usual, old clothes, some books, children's toys,” Theresa responds. She has a problem with calling me Fred. She doesn't understand why I'd want to go by the name of some middle aged van driver when I could go by a pretty name like Freda. I told her I like to be economical with syllables. Another example of me saying something to her, and she not getting it in the slightest.

I pull out various items and fold them neatly into a pile. “Wow, take a look at this bad boy,” I say, showing her an extra large man's Hawaiian shirt. The bright colours hurt my eyes. “I don't think I've ever actually seen one of these in the flesh before.”

Theresa eyes me with a wan smile, her head tilted to the side. “You're a bit of an odd duck, aren't you Freda,” she says, her glasses hanging too low on her nose.

“
Quack,” I reply, deadpan.

We spend the next hour taking inventory, while intermittently serving customers at the register. I work here part time, Wednesday to Friday from nine to one o'clock.

At around twelve forty-five the shop door swings open and in walks Nicholas, wearing aviator sunglasses, a crisp navy shirt and dark designer looking pants. He casually strolls over to the cash register, slipping the glasses up to rest on his messy black hair.

He puts his hands out, gesturing around the shop. “Look at this place, so vintage, so cute,” he says.

“
Theresa, I'd like you to meet my new friendly stalker. His name is Vivica,” I joke.

Theresa's standing over by the bookshelves, adding some new items to the display. She smiles vaguely and waves hello to Nicholas, although she looks slightly confused. “That's nice,” she says and turns back to the books.

“
What brings you to this neck of the woods, Viv?” I ask, noticing the attractive beads of sweat on his forehead. The man even makes sweat look good.

“
I've been exploring the city,” he says. “I remember you saying you worked in a charity shop down the road last night. I took a wild guess and figured it was this one.”

“
Well, your skills of deduction did you proud. What can I do for you?”

“
I was hoping you'd join me for some lunch. There's a Mexican place across the street.”

I have to consciously close my mouth, because my jaw's in danger of dropping to the floor. He wants to take me to lunch. Perhaps he's decided I could be his cool gal pal just like I'd hoped. The operative word there being “pal”, since I acted like a virgin on her wedding night trying to fend off her randy husband with him yesterday. There'll be no more propositions of that variety for me, I'm guessing.

“
Ah, you discovered my one true weakness. I'm incapable of turning down free food.” I tell him.

“
Who said I was paying? I thought you'd jump at the chance of escorting a fine young damsel such as myself out for a meal.”

I snicker, grab my coat and fold it over my arm, since it's too warm out to wear it. I shout to Theresa that I'm going to head off and that I'll see her next Wednesday. She waves me away, engrossed in neatening up her bookshelves. Nicholas presents me with his arm and we dash across the road to the Mexican restaurant. The waiter greets us at the door and ushers us to a table for two at the back.

“
So, are you all nervous for your big Dublin début tonight?” I ask him, while perusing the menu.

He glances over at me. “I get the pre-performance jitters like everyone else, but once I'm on stage they all float away. I become another person, a persona I suppose you could call it.”

“
I invited my friends Harry and Anny to come along. I hope you don't mind.”

He grins, those sparkly blue eyes shining again. “I don't mind at all. The more the merrier, that's what I always say. Except if it's an orgy; you've got to be picky in matters of group sex.”

“
Oh, I completely agree. You can never be too careful in a gang bang.”

“
Sometimes you end up with too much gang and not enough bang,” says Nicholas.

“
I've never had a taste for too much gang. I much prefer the latter,” I laugh.

“
Ah, we have that in common then,” he replies in a low voice, just as the waiter comes to take our order. Nicholas gets the quesadillas. I go for the tacos with guacamole on the side. I love guacamole; I could eat buckets of it and never tire of the stuff.

Today I'm wearing a black sleeveless top with lacy trim. My bra strap is loose. It falls down my arm, and my eyes catch on Nicholas as I'm righting it. He tilts his head to the side and watches the movement of my fingers with rapt attention. Just then the waiter returns with our drinks. I decided to go wild and order a margarita. I know, alcohol at lunch time. Perhaps Theresa's correct in assuming I have a drinking problem.

I take a long gulp of the cool icy liquid, and ask, “Whereabouts in Australia are you from anyway?”

He sputters his water ever so slightly. “Oh no you didn't! You have just made a big offence, Fred,
huge
.”

“
What? What did I do?” I'm confused now; he gives me a look of mock indignation.

“
Think about it,” he teases, “think about what you just asked me.”

“
I asked you where you come from,” I state, my brow furrowing in annoyance.

“
Yes, but you assumed I'm Australian. That's awful Fred, completely and unforgivably awful.” He's having a real good time with this, I can tell.

“
You
sound
Australian,” I interject. “Although your accent is sort of vague,
sorry
for being presumptuous. So enlighten me, where do you hail from oh wise one?”

He shakes his head, feigning indignation. “New Zealand, you twat. That's like me saying,
so Fred where in England do you come from
?”