Goofballs - by Chris Saliba

Chapter One

2004-07-29T06:44:00.000-07:00

       Best friends Wayne Grimwood and Guthrie Dulwich were the dumbest kids in their class. Each year they barely scraped together enough marks to pass. They were lucky only in that their teachers gave them the benefit of the doubt, granting them an annual graduation despite their below par academic performances. So far Wayne and Guthrie had made it to year ten. Despite this fragile achievement, not much hope was held out for their futures.
       Parent teacher nights were a nightmare from which Wayne and Guthrie’s parents hoped to wake. They went with grim faces and locked jaws, pretty much preparing for the worst, which was always delivered. Of the two sets of parents it was Guthrie’s folks who took things the best. Marilyn and Jonathon Dulwich wished that Guthrie would do better, but looked on the bright side that their son would eventually discover some trade that didn’t require any academic skill. There was always hope, they felt, and besides, school wasn’t really the be-all and end-all. Surely there were other options?
       Wayne’s parents were a different ketttle of fish. Noel and Thelma Grimwood’s disappointment was clear. Wayne should do better, should stop slacking off and listening to music and put his nose down and bum up. Wayne’s father – rather ominously - liked to remind his son that he could not always rely on his parents to look after him into adulthood. His mother completed the bleak picture by stating that job prospects had never been worse, and that those without good school marks could kiss away any chance of getting a job.
       ‘Do you want to shovel shit all your life?’ Thelma Grimwood liked to ask. ‘Or do you just want to be a shit kicker?’
       The future worried Wayne Grimwood.
       At their lockers Wayne and Guthrie stood discussing the upcoming year. It was early days, their first week back at school, a time when you can allow yourself all sorts of unbridled optimism. They were on their way to their first media studies class of the year, which was a bit of a relief. Everyone knew media studies was a complete bludge, although they had heard dark stories about its teacher, Mr Allcock.
       ‘Dad said he’ll think about giving me twenty bucks if I can get a C+ for English,’ Wayne said cheerily, taking out a fresh exercise book from his locker.
       ‘Gee!’ Guthrie exclaimed, impressed. ‘Your dad must really want you to do well.’
       ‘I have to get good marks in English first,’ Wayne said. ‘It’s my worst subject by far. I got 51 percent last year.’
       'But you passed,' Guthrie said, looking on the bright side.
       'Yeah, but I almost failed too,' Wayne said.
       ‘Did you read any of the books?’
       ‘Na. I tried, but couldn’t get into them. Books make me go to sleep.’
       ‘Tell me about it,’ Guthrie flicked through a copy of Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice that he had in his hand. ‘Have you tried reading this yet?’
Wayne didn’t know what he was talking about. He frowned at the book. ‘What is it?’
       ‘Pride and Prejudice, we have to read it this term for English.’
       ‘Oh,' Wayne's eyes went sleepy. 'What’s it like? Do you get it?’
Guthrie shook his head. ‘It was written hundreds of years ago. None of it makes sense. I don’t even think it’s relevant,’ he said, suggesting there could have been a serious mistake made at the administrative level choosing the novel.
       ‘Do you know if you can get it on video?’
       ‘Yeah, I’ve heard so.’
       ‘Good. We don’t have to worry then.’
       Guthrie felt a twinge of guilt. ‘Shouldn’t we at least try to read it?.’
       ‘What’s the point, if it doesn’t even make sense?’ Wayne slammed his locker door shut. ‘At least on video you can pick up the story. Besides, they give you all the relevant stuff in class.’
Guthrie shrugged his shoulders. Wayne’s arguments seemed to have cleared his conscience. ‘I guess you’re right.’
       ‘Trust me,’ Wayne said. ‘I’ve got a great plan to pass English this year. What we’re going to do is get our own copy of that Prejudice video made and watch it nonstop until we know it back the front.’
       'We're going to watch non stop television to pass English?' Guthrie was amazed.
       'Exactly,' Wayne said. 'Isn't it a great idea!'
       It was during this discussion that year ten’s most popular kid, Brett Austen, came cruising along the corridor. He had with him a posse of so called friends, most of whom were either sycophants or hangers on. His friendship worked like a medieval monarchy, he was the king, and his sycophants formed the court, all ready to do the monarch's bidding. It is unfortunate to relate, but not only were Wayne and Guthrie, to put it mildly, academically challenged, they were also chronically unpopular. If their geeky personalities weren’t enough, they were also cursed with ugliness.
       Guthrie was addicted to junk food – jam filled doughnuts with chocolate icing and hundreds and thousands were his first love – and so he was quite chubby. He wasn’t chronically over weight, and it wasn’t something that couldn’t be fixed with a little more exercise and a little less pigging out in front of the television, but he was on the puffy side nonetheless. Wayne, too, suffered physical problems that could be remedied, even if it was in the long run. He had terrible acne. His face was a landmine of red splotches and gross whiteheads. He tried all manner of remedies to get rid of them, and frequently suffered the humiliation of creeping into his local chemist in search of a wonder product that would put his woes to an end. Unfortunately, it seemed genetic. His father had had bad acne too. When, despondent, Guthrie whined about his splotchy face, his father would snap that he was being precious. ‘What are you complaining about? I had acne and I never made a fuss about it. I swear, you carry on like an old woman. You’ll grow out of it eventually!’
       But that was the problem. Eventually seemed, no, actually was, an eternity to Wayne. In the meantime, he had to endure being taunted as ‘pizza face’.
       Naturally the likes of Brett Austen looked upon Wayne and Guthrie as targets for bullying.
      Noticing Brett swagger along the corridor they shrunk back, trying not to be noticed.
       ‘Wayne! Guthrie!’ Brett came to an abrupt stop, his greasy followers and hangers-on almost crashing into him. Both boys were taken aback. It was totally unheard of for the year’s most popular boy to stop and talk to the year’s two biggest losers. Yet this was what was happening.
       ‘Hello Brett,’ Guthrie mumbled, staring at the floor.
       ‘Hi Brett,’ Wayne was a bit more confidant, thinking his luck might have changed and that he was on his way to being accepted. As soon as he said this someone mimicked ‘Hi Brett’ in what was almost a high pitched squeal. Hearing this King Brett turned to his subjects and raised a palm then lowered it gently, thereby informing his people to cool it.
       ‘Boys,’ Brett launched into what appeared to be the beginning of good relations between the two camps. ‘I hear you’re going to be in my media studies class.’
       ‘Yeah,’ Wayne confirmed.
       ‘It’s the next class,’ Guthrie added, peeling open a muesli bar. He always ate when under pressure.
       Next Brett did something which totally disarmed the boys. He slid an arm around Wayne’s shoulder, then an arm around Guthrie’s, bringing them close together into a huddle. ‘Look,' he said. 'I’ve just been given word from Mr Allcock – you know he’s our media studies teacher, right? – that the room for our first class has been changed. The timetable says room A12, but it’s been changed to the theatrette. We’re going to be watching a movie for our first class. Pretty cool, eh?’
       If either Wayne or Guthrie could have looked over Brett Austen’s sizeable shoulders (which had been artificially built up in the school gym) they would have seen Brett’s followers trying to muffle their giggles. So intoxicated were Wayne and Guthrie with Brett’s being nice to them that all was a blur. They had no idea that they were being set up.
       ‘What’s the film?’ Wayne asked.
       ‘Oh, er - American Pie.’
       ‘That’s my favourite!’ Guthrie squealed excitedly. ‘That apple pie scene is hilarious.’
       Brett looked at Guthrie down his nose for a moment. He was disgusted by the easily excited fat kid, but soon dropped the expression. If he wanted the joke to work he had to make Wayne and Guthrie believe that he was trying to befriend them.
       ‘Yeah, it’s a cool movie,’ Brett agreed, dropping his arms from the boys’ shoulders. ‘I’ll check you there in five,’ he said, cocking a finger in the direction of the theatrette and clicking his tongue. Brett then swept past, his entourage following.
Wayne and Guthrie took a deep breath. They looked at each other knowingly, sure that this totally out of character gesture must mean a good year ahead. At last, they had been admitted into the fold.
       ‘Shit, did you see that!’ Wayne was gobsmacked.
Guthrie looked over his shoulder. ‘I don’t believe it. He’s changed. It’s not like Brett at all to be so nice to us. Remember last year when he pinched my history book and used it in the dunnies for toilet paper? I had to go and pick it up out of the cubicle. The entire section on the Federation of Australia was missing. That was so embarrassing.’
Wayne appeared not to be listening. He had strange moments when reality completely escaped him and he looked out towards some mythical, rosey future. ‘I knew this was going to be a good year for us. Our bad luck has to come to an end at some stage, right?’
       ‘I guess so,’ Guthrie wasn’t so sure.
       ‘Trust me, Brett’s changed his mind about us now.’
Upon reflection Guthrie sensed something was wrong, but didn't want to say so. His irrational, superstitious side told him to believe, no matter what. He couldn't live on cold reality twenty -four hours a day. ‘If you say so,’ Guthrie agreed with his friend, knowing somewhere at the back of his mind that he shouldn’t.
       ‘I wouldn’t be surprised if we get invited to his seventeenth birthday this year,’ Wayne continued in a trance like state. ‘They say it’s going to be huge.’
       ‘Hadn’t we better get going?’ Guthrie suggested. ‘Otherwise we’ll be late. They say Mr Allcock can be pretty strict.’
Wayne snapped back into reality. ‘Yeah, you’re right. Let’s go.’
They grabbed their books and made their way to the theatrette. It was dimly lit, with only a few students already seated. Wayne and Guthrie looked around for somewhere to sit, and decided on front row seats. When they saw films they preferred the characters well amplified, even if they had to crane their necks. They arranged their books in a neat pile on the little writing bench attached to every seat and waited patiently for the class to file in. They watched the entrances as more and more students entered the theatrette, all of them female. Pretty soon there were lots of girls bustling about, laughing, making jokes, gossiping, throwing things at each other. They gave weird looks to the boys, but didn’t say anything to clear up the confusion. Guthrie was the first to sense that something was wrong, very wrong. He got a creepy feeling that they’d been had.
       ‘Wayne, do you notice that there are only girls here, from years ten and eleven? Something doesn’t seem right.’
       ‘Hmm. I’m sure Brett will turn up soon,' Wayne sat contented. 'Him and his friends are probably being held back somewhere. You heard him say that class had been changed to the theatrette. We’re going to be watching a movie.’
       ‘But why are there people here from year eleven? That's not right.’
       ‘You know how sometimes they do these things with both years. Maybe year eleven is studying American Pie for their media studies class or something.’
Guthrie looked around uncomfortably. The theatrette was now positively flooded with boisterous female students. He felt himself drowning, knowing that Brett had played a rotten trick on them. Wayne continued to sit patiently, although even he started to look uncomfortable. With the theatrette now full there were giggles and titters from everyone. Guthrie was about to suggest that they jump ship when a young woman in a track suit entered the room with Mrs March, a science teacher who liked to organise special lectures with guest speakers. She tried to break the babble of loud voices with her own considerable voice, a voice that carried quite a reputation. The young woman by Mrs March’s side stood with her hands behind her back, a thin smile of amusement creeping in at the corners of her mouth. It was natural for young school girls to behave in this way.
       ‘Girls, girls!’ Mrs March hollered. ‘Please quieten down.’
       Seeing that no one paid any attention the science teacher was forced to resort to her famous short, sharp yell. It could cut through any thick wall of sound. ‘Hey!!’ she hollered, her eyes catching fire. Suddenly everyone shut up and paid attention. ‘Thankyou.’ Mrs March took in a little breath. ‘Now, I would like to introduce our speaker for today, who will talk on the very important issue of self esteem for young women. Kathy Summers is a world class volley ball champion, who plays at the very top professional level. She will be giving you a short talk on success in sport, and how that can translate into very useful skills for later on in life, no matter what profession you choose to follow.’
       By now Wayne and Guthrie could feel the sweat dripping down their backs. There was no way out; they were going to have to embarrass themselves completely. The only question was when would they gather up courage to explain that there had been a mistake. They needn’t have worried on that score. Mrs March’s sharp eye soon caught them.
       ‘What are you two doing here?’ she demanded, sensing that they might be up to some type of smart trick.
       The boys fumbled for an answer.
       ‘We were told our media studies class was going to be held here,’ Wayne said.
       ‘We thought we were supposed to be watching a movie,’ Guthrie explained further.
       Mrs March crossed her arms. She was not a patient woman. ‘No,' she said forcefully. 'This is a lecture on self esteem for girls. Not boys.’
As if on cue the whole theatrette dissolved into laughter. The humiliating noise rang in their ears. The morning was quickly turning into a nightmare, one which they knew they could not wake up from. And to think there were further trials to come. They still had to front up to their media studies class and explain where they had been.
       Shellshocked, the boys remained frozen, unable to figure out what to do next. Did they have to wait to be excused? Would they need a note to explain what had happened?
       ‘Well, don’t just sit there like a couple of stunned mullets,’ Mrs March hollered. ‘Mr Allcock will be wondering where you’ve got to. It’s hardly a very good way to start the year now, is it?’
Wayne and Guthrie hastily grabbed their books and sprung from their seats. In their rush for the side exit, Guthrie dropped one of his books. Seeing this, Wayne moved immediately to help his friend. As luck would have it, as though they were mimicking some Three Stooges routine, their heads knocked against each other. All that was missing was the empty numbskull sound. A second wave of laughter immediately rippled through the theatrette. Mrs March stood looking on, arms crossed and shaking her head, then promptly intervened.
       ‘It’s not funny everyone,’ she raised her voice. ‘It’s nothing to be laughed at.’
       Rubbing their heads, and the room still in fits of laughter, Wayne and Guthrie finally made it out and into the sunlight of the school yard.
       ‘That arsehole Brett,’ Wayne was furious, pacing the concrete. ‘He’s a turd.’
       ‘I thought something strange was going on.’
       ‘I feel like wagging now. What's the point with the rest of the day?’
       ‘We can’t. Everyone knows that we’re here.’
       ‘We should go to the sick bay and say we’re sick.’
       ‘Both of us? Don’t you think it will look a bit suss?’
       Wayne groaned.
       Meanwhile, Mr Allcock introduced himself to his class and set the bench mark for what he expected.
        ‘I know a lot of you think that media studies is a bit of a bludge,’ he said, sitting on the edge of his desk. ‘Well, I’m here to tell you that that is one of the biggest fallacies that does the rounds of the school yard. Everyone may think we just sit around watching Neighbours re-runs, but the reality is that this is probably one of the most demanding subjects you will do. There is more written work, more essays and special projects, that are required for this subject than probably for English. So if you think you can just coast through this class and come out with a comfortable pass, then forget it. I will make you sweat!’
       A chorus of groans went up in the classroom.
       ‘Oh yes!’ Mr Allcock smiled, relishing the surly whining of his teenage students. ‘We are going to have one busy year together!’
       Mr Allcock was one of the younger teachers. He had been a brilliant student himself, and was, to put it succinctly, quite up himself. He liked to boast of being up to date with all the latest educational fads, and this gave him an air of aloofness, as though he were intellectually superior. Whereas most of his fellow teachers preferred to follow the tried and, as far as such a thing is possible, true method of teaching, Mr Allcock liked to quote jumbled and nonsensical theories from various up to the minute journals. He liked to swap new words for old, make heavy use of fashionable buzzwords and was ever ready to try – and believe – any new fandangled thing, as long as it came from what he regarded as an authoritative source. Shakespeare was out one moment, and movie versions were in, popular music was ‘relevant’, then suddenly facile, TV soaps had hidden ‘subtexts’ and should be paid attention to while 19th century novels were no longer relevant. The only way ‘text’ (Mr Allcock's emphasis) was to survive, he liked to assure his juvenile audiences, was electronically. What that meant no one really could tell, although it sounded impressive enough. In fact, Mr Allcock had an unfocused disdain for what he liked to call ‘text based works’, and somehow felt that their time had passed. For Mr Allcock, in the media age the image reigned supreme and would continue to do so.
       Wayne and Guthrie had never been in one of Mr Allcocks classes. Guthrie, forever consumed by worry, looked at his Simpsons watch, which featured Bart Simpson riding his skateboard, his head completely free of worries. Guthrie wished he could care less, like Bart, but reasoned it was all fine and well in a fantasy world, but not reality. Reality had consequences.
       ‘At least we’re only fifteen minutes late,' Guthrie said hopefully as they rushed for Mr Allcock's class. 'I guess that’s not so bad.’
       ‘It’s a third of the class,’ Wayne deadpanned.
        Guthrie reassessed the situation. ‘I guess that is pretty bad then, eh?’
       They were pacing along the corridor and counting down the door numbers to their dreary destination. A terrible feeling hit them in the guts. They really didn’t want to go in, didn’t want to face the sneering Brett Austen. He’d be the first with some type of smart arse comment.
Wayne suddenly stopped dead in his tracks. ‘Let’s turn back. We’ve missed most of the class. There’s no point in going in now.’
       Guthrie looked at his watch again. ‘C’mon, at least we’ve made the effort. We’ll just explain what happened. It’s about time Brett got in trouble.’
       Wayne grabbed his friend. ‘Are you crazy. We can’t squeal on Brett. He’ll bash us up. We’ll need police protection.’
       ‘Alright. We may as well get it over with then.’ Guthrie took a deep breath. He could hear the murmur of Mr Allcock’s voice in the hallway.
       Wayne and Guthrie approached the door and could see Brett through the window, slouching in a back corner of the room. Mr Allcock sat on the corner of his desk, leaning forward, his right elbow leaning on his right leg, unconsciously trying to look like a TV journalist. The boys braced themselves, then took their stride into the class. Mr Allcock didn’t seem to notice and kept on talking.
       ‘Now you’re not going to like this, but I have some homework to start you on already,’ he said.
       Wayne and Guthrie stood nervously behind Mr Allcock. Guthrie tried to speak, but all that came out was a whisper. He didn’t exactly have a forceful personality.
       ‘Excuse me, Mr Allcock?’ Wayne raised his voice a little higher.
       Poppy Vane-Best, who was pretty much the leader of the girls, and who happened to be sitting at the front, studying her nails and obviously bored with Mr Allcock, thought she’d put an end to the misunderstanding, not out of a feeling of sympathy for the boys (they frankly gave her the creeps) but rather because she was somewhat of a control freak who liked to think she was running things.
       ‘Mr Allcock, there are, like, these two nervous creatures jumping up and down behind you,’ she said, pointing a nail in their direction.
        Mr Allcock looked behind him. Brett Austen and his friends started giggling.
       ‘Hello?’ he said sharply. ‘Who are you? I hope you’re not here for my class, because if there’s one thing I can’t stand it’s tardiness.’
       ‘My name’s Guthrie Dulwich,’ Guthrie said.
       ‘And I’m Wayne Grimwood.’
       'We're both late for your class,' Guthrie blurted out.
       Mr Allcock immediately recognised their names. ‘That explains a lot then,' he said. 'I’ve had warnings about you two from the other teachers.’ Mr Allcock got up from his desk and looked for his roll call. ‘What do you know, you two are in my class. Well, I can tell we’re going to have a fun year together. You’re certainly off to a great start,’ he said sarcastically.
       ‘But we have an excuse,’ Guthrie pleaded.
       ‘I have no time for excuses,’ Mr Allcock raised his hands and shook his head, indicating he didn’t want to hear any more.
       Guthrie persisted. ‘We were told there was going to be a movie shown for media studies in the theatrette. We can prove we were there.’
       Wayne became anxious. He thought Guthrie might easily get carried away and blab that Brett had told them to go to the theatrette.
       This seemed only to make Mr Allcock angrier. ‘I don’t care where you can prove you’ve been. It doesn’t interest me. And who told you such a load of rubbish?’
       Wayne could now see Brett sitting in the back row, hiding his hands, but making sure Wayne saw the punching motion he was making, fist into palm. Brett showed his gritted teeth as he made this dire warning. Wayne felt his legs turn to jelly.
       Wayne grabbed Guthrie before he could say anything and virtually dragged him to a seat. ‘I don’t know,’ Wayne said. ‘It was just something we heard going around, that’s all.’
       Mr Allcock sighed impatiently. ‘The next time make sure you get your facts straight.’
       ‘Oh, we will,’ Wayne said, looking over at Brett, a king size rat if ever there was one.
       ‘I suppose I’m going to have to repeat everything that I’ve said?’ Mr Allcock grumbled, but it was obvious he was only saying this for effect. ‘But why should I put the class back by wasting everyone else’s time? You’re just going to have to pick up what you’ve missed from your fellow students. Now, as I was saying, I have a term project that I want you all to start thinking about from today. It is going to be worth fifty percent of your term’s assessment. It is to be a profile of a media personality, using whatever medium you wish. So it could be for example done in the format of a magazine article, or it could be like a documentary. Maybe you might like to try setting up a web page. It’s completely up to you.’
       There was a murmur of excitement that ran through the classroom. This sounded like something that was going to be fun.
       ‘Can we choose anyone we want to?’ Brett asked.
       ‘Yes, anyone you want. It’s completely up to you. The important thing is for you to get in there and really see how the media works, hands on, by interviewing and profiling someone with a strong media presence.’
       ‘Can we do it in twos?’ Wayne asked.
       ‘You can do the project as a couple,’ Mr Allcock agreed, ‘but remember I will be assessing it as the work of two people. You can’t slack off.’
       Wayne and Guthrie looked at each other excitedly. This sounded like something they could do. Wayne remembered that his father had a video camera – they could use that.
       ‘You will have to the end of the term to hand in the project,’ Mr Allcock continued. ‘I will be keeping updates on how it is going. If you ever have any questions with regard to what you're doing, then please, ask.’
       After class, out in the hallway, there was a lot of buzz about what everyone would do. Brett bragged that a famous sporting hero was a friend of the family. Poppy Vane-Best explained to her girlfriends that she would be making some type of magazine, with free give aways and her own personal column. Wayne and Guthrie themselves didn’t really have a clue about what they would do. It all sounded like a good idea, but they couldn’t figure out who they should approach to interview. Nor could they imagine anyone accepting a proposal to star in a school project. They felt both confusion and excitement at the prospect. All they had to do was get a star for their project. The big question was, who?

Chapter Two

2004-07-29T06:00:00.001-07:00

       The boys hung out mostly at Guthrie’s house, because his parents weren’t as strict as Wayne’s. By and large they didn’t hassle you over homework, which meant afterschool time could be what it should be, a total bludge. Wayne and Guthrie made mega-sized Milo drinks and sat down to try and figure out who would be the star of their school project.
       They scouted the house for magazines, looking for ideas. They really wanted a low profile star or media personality, someone who they thought could be roped into it.
       Guthrie’s mother, Marilyn, arrived home from work and saw the boys ransacking the loungeroom's coffee table for women’s magazines. She found this rather odd, but then again the boys were doing lots of odd things these days.
       ‘Hi guys,’ she said, flinging her handbag onto the couch. ‘What are you up to?’
        ‘Hi mum,’ Guthrie said.
        'Hi Mrs Dulwich,’ Wayne said.
       ‘We’re looking for someone to be a part of our media studies project,’ Guthrie explained.
        ‘In the pages of the Woman’s Day?’
        ‘We have to interview a media personality. It can’t be just anyone.’
        ‘It’s called a profile,’ Wayne emphasised.
       ‘Yeah, and we can do it together. We’re thinking of doing it like a documentary. Wayne’s dad’s got a video camera - a camcorder. We’re going to ask if we can borrow it.’
       ‘We even borrowed a video to study,’ Wayne held up a video biography of the life and times of Britney Spears.
       Mrs Dulwich shook her head. ‘Things have certainly changed since I was at school.’
       ‘It’s because we live in the age of the super information highway,’ Wayne explained, parroting something Mr Allcock had said.
       ‘If you say so,’ Mrs Dulwich took this lightly. It all seemed harmless enough, as long as it wasn’t done at the expense of Guthrie’s other subjects. His English was terrible. He had to put more time into that, not making amateur videos.
       ‘We’re really going to get stuck into this project,’ Guthrie tried to show he was determined to put in a good show study wise this year. ‘It’s worth 50 percent of the term’s marks.’
    ‘Plus we can do it together.’ Wayne thought this another feature of the project worth commenting on.
       ‘Alright, just as long as you don’t go overboard with it. You’ve got all your other subjects to pass as well, not just media studies. Your English and Maths is more important as far as I’m concerned. Anyone can point a video camera and push the on button, but not everyone can write a good sentence or add up a sum in their head.’
       Wayne and Guthrie inwardly groaned as they thought of these two boring subjects. So taken away were they with the media studies project that they had completely forgotten about their other academic responsibilities.
      ‘Right,’ Mrs Dulwich put her hands on her hips, having sorted this business out. ‘I’m going to make some toast. Would you like some?’
       ‘Yeah, thanks,’ both boys nodded eagerly.
       ‘What do you want on it? Honey or jam?’
       ‘Jam, please,’ Wayne said.
       ‘Honey.’
       ‘Okay. I’ll bring them to your room’
       ‘Thanks mum,’ Guthrie said.
       In the privacy of Guthrie’s room the boys flicked through an assortment of magazines. Guthrie lay on his bed while Wayne was sprawled out on the carpet. They skimmed through story after boring story, passing over fashion features and heartbreak stories about battles with obesity. Nothing really grabbed them. They felt pretty sure that they would have to look elsewhere for inspiration when Wayne came across a picture of what he thought was the most gorgeous woman he had ever seen. So instantly mesmerised was he with the picture before him that he stopped talking and just stared at the photo. He didn’t even want to tell Guthrie, preferring to keep the image a secret so he could brood over it longer. Yet before long Guthrie knew something was up. He’d had to ask for the third time, ‘What’s up? What you got there?’
       ‘Check this out,’ Wayne held out the page with the picture of the stunning woman on it, refusing to let go of the magazine in the process.
Guthrie’s greedy hand grabbed the page. ‘Oh my God,’ he quickly whisked it out of Wayne’s hand. ‘Shit! She’s beautiful!’
       Suddenly there was a hard knock at the door. Toast was ready. Inexplicably Guthrie felt guilty, like he was doing something that he shouldn’t be doing. He put down the magazine, as though trying to hide it.
       ‘Come in mum,’ Guthrie authorised his mother to enter. She walked into the room with two plates of toast, handing one to each of the boys.
       ‘What you looking at?’ Mrs Dulwich nodded at the magazine face down on Guthrie’s stomach.
       Guthrie was defensive, as though he’d been caught with a copy of Playboy or Hustler.
       ‘Nothing,’ he insisted, protesting a little too much.
       ‘Really?’ Mrs Dulwich thought his behaviour suspicious.
       ‘Yes!’ Guthrie again insisted. He held up a copy of the Woman’s Weekly magazine and shook out the pages, proving his innocence.
       ‘Okay,’ Mrs Dulwich accepted the evidence before her. ‘No need to be so defensive.’
       ‘I was not being defensive.’
       ‘Perhaps a little sensitive,’ Guthrie’s mother smiled. ‘Alright. I’ll leave you boys alone now to get on with your school work, or whatever it was you were up to.’
       Mrs Dulwich left the room.
       ‘Give me the magazine back,’ Wayne said. ‘I was looking at it first.’
       ‘Hang on, I didn’t get a proper look,’ Guthrie ruffled through the pages trying to find the spot that he had lost.
       ‘C’mon, I saw it first,’ Wayne grew impatient, considering himself to be first in line.
       Another knock came at the door.
       ‘Sorry sweetheart,’ Mrs Dulwich apologised, looking again at Guthrie’s hands on the magazine. ‘I forgot to ask if you had any dirty washing?’
       Without saying anything Guthrie got up off the bed and did a quick surveillance of his room. He picked up a pair of jeans and a t-shirt, rolled them up, and handed them over.
       ‘Is that a pair of knickers I see on the floor?’ Mrs Dulwich pointed to a pair of shorts peeping from under the bed.
       ‘Oh, yeah.’ Guthrie picked them up and rolled them into the other dirty items.
       Mrs Dulwich shook her head in mild disapproval.
       ‘Will that be all?’ Guthrie asked, with a touch of cynicism.
       ‘Don’t be facetious,’ Mrs Dulwich said and again left the room, banging the door shut.
       Guthrie went back to his bed. ‘Hopefully that’s the end of that.’ He picked up the magazine and looked for the picture and article. After considerable fumbling, with Wayne now trying to take control of the magazine, insisting that the article was towards the back, whereas Guthrie was certain it was somewhere near the front, they finally found what they were after.
       Wayne and Guthrie must certainly have had their own peculiar tastes in women, not that the woman whom they found so compelling was entirely unattractive, more that she looked quite domineering and intimidating, almost scary. The picture showed a professional woman in her early thirties. She had fierce gold hair that was cut into a razor sharp bob, dropping like a steel guillotine just above her shoulders. Her eyes were a vibrant, piercing blue. She had a long, challenging nose, that was not entirely out of place on her arresting face. Although it did make her look a little arrogant, as though she would stick that nose into anyone’s business. Her lips were a little thin, yet certainly pretty. And when she smiled a strong, healthy set of teeth flashed (they were frequently given a special treatment by her dentist to whiten them). The magazine picture affected a casual, at work pose. The woman sat at her desk, but turned towards the cameras. She wore a smart black suit, a short skirt and well cut jacket. A large brooch was pinned to her lapel, a shiny gold heart that looked like it had been given a vigorous polishing.
Her name was Kirsten Steele, and the Woman’s Weekly was doing a feature on her. She had only recently turned thirty, and was a newly elected member of parliament. The article was nothing more than a puff piece, an opportunity for Kirsten Steele to be photographed sitting at her desk, looking glamorous and important at the same time. In the magazine interview Kirsten Steele talked about what it was like to be so young and in politics, and made it clear that she had no intentions of being a boring, run of the mill politician. ‘This is a new era in politics,’ she proclaimed. ‘The days of the old school are over.’ She then launched into a discussion of her interests outside politics – fashion, shopping, charity work – just to show that she was a girl at heart and not some dreary professional politician who was out of touch with everyday reality.
The boys read the article right through to the end. It was probably the longest consistent piece of reading they’d ever done (bar the comic books they both occasionally picked up). Kirsten said a few things that appealed to Wayne and Guthrie. She professed to be very interested in youth issues (she didn’t really specify beyond that), and answered her critics' claims that she would turn up to the opening of a toilet, were the media to be there. Defending herself, she reminded her detractors that it was a media age, and that is was the most logical way to communicate with a mass audience. She accused those who denounced her for appearing as a celebrity panellist on game shows and being profiled on lifestyle programs as naive. ‘I find it the worst kind of snobbery,’ Kirsten Steele declared. ‘Just because these programs are popular people say a politician should not appear on them. They seem to think it is beneath the dignity of an elected public servant. But I think that is patently ridiculous. As a democratically elected member of parliament, I depend on popularity! I wouldn’t be here if I hadn’t been voted in by a majority of people. So the argument that I shouldn’t appear on programs that attract large ratings seems absurd, and condescending to the people who watch those programs, I might hasten to add.’   After this minor tirade, exasperated with those whose opinions she thought barely rated on the intellectual Richter scale, Kirsten Steele announced with more than a little vanity, ‘I do not suffer fools gladly’.
       ‘She seems nice,’ Guthrie said, perusing some of the other pictures from the photo shoot.
       ‘Yeah,’ Wayne agreed.
       ‘It’s a shame we can’t use her for our project,’ Guthrie mused.
       A lightbulb immediately lit up in Wayne's head. He stared into space for a second. ‘Hang on. It says in here that she does all sorts of interviews. She said she’s always available to the media, no matter what,’ Wayne read Kirsten Steele’s own words, as reported in the magazine. ‘I’m certainly no snob about what magazine or TV show I’ll appear on. Look, they’re her own words,' Wayne pointed. 'She said she's no media snob. She'll turn up for anything. This is our chance. It's staring us right in the face.'
       Guthrie indeed followed Wayne’s finger along these printed words, moving his lips as he did so.
       ‘You can’t be serious,’ Guthrie was dismissive.
       ‘Can’t you read dummy? It says right here that she’ll do any type of interview, and she also says that she’s interested in youth affairs.’
       Guthrie couldn’t be persuaded. ‘She means the proper media, not some school kid’s project.   She’ll laugh at us.’
       Sometimes Wayne became truly exasperated with Guthrie’s negative attitude, yet Wayne needed his friend for moral support. He’d never have the courage to ring up Kirsten Steele on his own. ‘C’mon, we can at least give it a try.’
       Guthrie looked over at his empty plate that was on the floor. ‘I feel like some more toast. Do you want some?’
       ‘No, I don’t want any more toast. Guthrie, we’ve got the person for our project right here in front of us. Plus she’s totally gorgeous. What have we got to lose? Let's do it!’
       ‘You’ve got your head in the clouds. Get real. It won’t work. She’d hang up on us straight away.’
       ‘Maybe. But how will we know if we don’t try? If no one ever gave anything a go, just thought that nothing would work so don’t bother, then nothing would get done.’ Wayne stopped for a moment to catch his breath, then a great metaphor suddenly came to him. He felt good when he had these mental flashes, like he wasn’t as dumb as everyone thought. ‘If everyone had your attitude we’d be living in the stone age. No one would ever do anything. Cars wouldn't have been invented, no man would have landed on the moon. There's be no computers, no television, no CDs.’
       ‘Other people are different. They’re geniuses.’
       ‘Won’t you even give it a try?’
        Guthrie sighed. It was obvious that Wayne had no intention of quitting his nagging. ‘How are we going to get her phone number then?’ Guthrie asked.
       Wayne stopped for a moment. This seemed like a real obstacle. Then the answer came.   ‘We’ll call the magazine. They can give us a contact number.’
       At last Guthrie relented. He knew he couldn't win anyway. ‘Well, as long as you do all the talking, I guess we can try. But I know what the answer will be: a big fat no.’
       Wayne refused to believe this. ‘You’ll see,’ he smirked confidently. ‘I’m right. She’ll say yes.’

Chapter Three

2004-07-29T05:58:00.000-07:00

            Kirsten Steele’s parents were both high profile members of the Middle of the Road party. Walter Steele was the party’s longtime treasurer (he had held the position for some twenty years) and his wife Marigold was a tireless fundraiser for the same cause. Her energy was boundless, and she was forever playing hostess at various Middle of the Road party dos. Both parents had always had high expectations for their daughter. After she graduated from university they paid for an overseas trip, to round out her education. Her family connections had found her work in London, where she settled for several years before coming back to Australia. In Australia she floundered around, looking for something to do. She found work as a business executive for an IT company, but then that went bust and she was looking around yet again for something to do.
            Kirsten had never really had a strong interest in politics, although she had a reasonably good understanding of the subject, having grown up in a political family. Her parents, though, had always hoped that their daughter would do something in the party. They never pushed her explicitly in this direction, but they were always open with suggestions of career paths within the Middle of the Road party. With their daughter back in the country and obviously casting about for something to do, an opportunity seemed to be looming.
            Walter and Marigold, who lived in the thick of the Middle of the Road party, naturally knew every tick that animated the party's clock. They were the masters of an extensive phone network that gave them all the latest gossip as it broke. It was no secret within the party that the sitting member for Yupyup, Barry Waters, had seen better days. Six months before his death, he had suffered several mild strokes.
            Aware of the sitting member’s precarious state of health, Walter and Marigold Steele monitored the situation closely. More properly they hovered like vultures. Putting the situation delicately to their daughter at one of their family Sunday breakfasts, they suggested to Kirsten that she might like to consider running for parliament.
            ‘You have given it thought, haven’t you?’ Mr Steele asked his daughter. ‘I know we’ve had this discussion before.’
            Marigold Steele bit on her corner of toast, filled with suspense. The possible vacancy of the seat of Yupyup was something both parents had been working hard at for some time.
            ‘Yes and no,’ Kirsten was ambivalent. ‘I’d have to wait for the next elections, wouldn’t I? That could be ages off. I have to find something to do in the meantime. I can't just sit around and do nothing forever. The boredom is killing me.’
            Marigold Steele brought a crisp white napkin to her mouth and dabbed the corner. She looked at her husband, as parents look at each other when they are about to bestow some great gift on their child. ‘An opportunity could present itself sooner than later,' she said. ‘There could be a vacancy – a by election might be called quite soon.’ Mrs Steele paused briefly for effect. ‘We have inside information.’
            ‘You mean someone’s going to quit?’ Kirsten asked flat out.
            ‘No, it’s actually a bit more delicate than that,’ Mr Steele intervened, suggesting that the following discussion might be best kept secret, a matter for the family only. ‘We have been monitoring the health of one of our sitting members, a Mr Barry Waters.’
            ‘Lovely man,’ Mrs Steele assured her daughter. ‘You met his two boys once, many years ago. At a fundraiser barbecue. The wife’s an absolute angel.’
            Kirsten shook her head, trying to rattle a memory. ‘Can’t say I remember.’
            ‘Anyway, the present member has not been the best for some time,’ Mr Steele looked with regret at the floor, then out into the distance.
            Mrs Steele shook her head in commiseration. ‘He has heart problems. The situation doesn’t look very promising.’
            ‘We’ve been carrying out our own investigations – with great sensitivity of course – and it seems like there’s not a lot of hope for him, if any,’ Mr Steele said.
            ‘It’s a tragic situation,’ Mrs Steele said with feeling. ‘People closest to him have tried to get him to slow down but he won’t listen. Our people have even found out that his wife has asked him to quit politics.’
            ‘But what can you do?’ Mr Steele said. ‘Politics is the man’s life. He has no outside interests.’
            Kirsten sat thinking. The atmosphere became filled with what no one would say. Both parents were waiting for Barry Waters to drop dead so they could move their daughter in his place.
            ‘So what are you saying?’ Kirsten asked nonetheless, feigning ignorance and innocence.
            ‘What we’re saying is,’ Mr Steele determined to clarify matters, ‘the member for Yupyup is killing himself by persisting in his current position. If he were a responsible man he would quit politics right away. He has a wife and family, and then there’s the party to think about.’
            ‘He needs to make room for someone who is more…..capable,’ Mrs Steele carefully chose her words. 'Without sounding too coarse, he really is being rather selfish, hanging onto that seat for dear life.'
            No more double-talk was needed. A great opportunity was being worked up for Kirsten. Kirsten told her parents she was indeed interested if it would be a walk in, and they in turn told their daughter not to worry any more about it. They would settle after matters.
            Unfortunately for Barry Waters, his exit was no picnic. A subsequent attack left him languishing alive, but rendered useless. He was paralysed down one side of his body. It was not the kind of end the Steeles had wanted. They would have preferred, as they later put it, a 'clean cut’. A straightforward death, and then their daughter could have effortlessly moved in. There was a certain amount of discomfit with Kirsten running for the seat of a man who had vacated it due to such tragic circumstances, totally bedridden by a heart attack. But with all the busy activity that followed finding a suitable candidate, Barry Waters was very soon forgotten. His name popped up here and there within the Middle of the Road party, and there was the odd sad reflection on his sorry circumstances, but the immediate needs of the party finding a successor took over, and moved into top gear.
            Barry Waters had occupied a very safe seat for the Middle of the Road party. The party had held it for more than forty years. Should Kirsten Steele win the party’s endorsement as its candidate, she would be assured of a job for life. There could be no two better connected people within the Middle of the Road party than Marigold and Walter Steele, and naturally Kirsten won the endorsement. There were a few grumbles here and there, some saying the party should stand for individual initiative, and others complaining that the Steeles were a little too well connected. But these were criticisms from a fringe group within the party and were soon forgotten or deemed irrelevant.
            Even though some cried foul play, Kirsten Steele had a lot going for her, and may have even swung an endorsement on her own merits, had she put in the necessary hard work. She was young, attractive, intelligent and what was described as being ‘in touch’ at street level. She also had hands on experience working at the executive level in business, and this was looked on very favourably. When contrasted against Barry Waters, who had held the seat for more than twenty years, Kirsten was seen as a breath of fresh air, someone who could give the party a bit of a fresh new look. This was the argument of those who, besides her parents, fought hardest to have Kirsten as the Middle of the Road candidate. These days the Middle of the Road party was deemed to be looking on the old side, full of stuffy old men who were so out of touch they didn’t even know how to access their own party website. Kirsten would be the new rising star. This sort of hype Kirsten hadn’t really thought of, but once she’d heard it enough from those around her, she too started to believe in it.
            Kirsten Steele had been in office only six months when she did her splash for the Woman’s Weekly, and had done her utmost to maintain a high profile. This impressed a lot of the movers and shakers within the party. Being young and photogenic helped, as did her forward personality. She let it be known that she was available to do any type of media gig, and self mockingly called herself a media junkie amongst friends. Her media presence had been kept to light and breezy pieces, basically talking about herself and how she hoped to be a role model for younger people, trying to make politics interesting and relevant for them. She talked very little actual party policy, but made much of her favourite music and movies. A lot of people started commenting on how ‘real’ Kirsten was and so she started to develop somewhat of a following.
            She had a boyfriend, Brad Payne, who she was now kissing. She sat on her desk’s edge while Brad gently pushed into her, working aggressively on her lips. Kirsten giggled as she tried to push him away.
            ‘Don’t,’ she laughed. ‘I know that political office is really boring, but c’mon. What if there were a few cameras lingering outside? I don’t want to appear in the paparazzi pages. It could look tacky.’
            ‘Who cares if it looks tacky?’ This was Brad trying to be romantic, showing he didn’t care what the world thought. ‘I think it’s kind of funky, you know, the sexy politician. It could get you a lot more votes maybe.’
            ‘Well I think it’s tacky,’ Kirsten pushed Brad away in one effective shove. ‘This isn’t how I want to be seen,’ she fixed up her hair and got out her compact. ‘It’s not part of my look.’
            Brad stood confused. He felt rejected. And being a highly sensitive professional – he was an aspiring actor – he considered Kirsten’s words to be a veiled slight on his own career and prospects, which to him seemed terminally bogged. To Brad she was making it plain that she had a media presence (hence her ‘look’) while he had no presence to talk of. It was a sore point with him that so far in his acting career he had only gotten body parts. He went to the gym three times a week, and so was in excellent shape. He looked good, yet he couldn’t get his face on the TV. His other end, though, had. In three ads his buttocks had been featured, ads that were mostly targeted at women. At first Brad was flattered at the attention his butt received, but then his enthusiasm waned. What was worse, he was getting a name around the agencies as the owner of a hot ass, and nothing much besides. He was treated as a sex object, but Brad wanted to make it as an actor, a serious actor. His aim was Hollywood. He looked to one day getting paid a couple of million dollars a picture. Every other deal on that long road to success he held in contempt, as something beneath him. He presumed that once he attained the dizzy heights of fame he would be truly happy and all his problems put to an end. Yet ironically, with every successful step he had taken in the direction of his goals, a fresh batch of insecurities and problems would crop up, making his situation even worse.
            ‘Maybe I’m not part of your look,’ Brad said sourly.
            ‘Now come on, there’s no need to be like that,' Kirsten turned on her winning charm. 'Being a politician is serious. If I got caught having a grope while at work, it could get me into hot water. Imagine how they'd write that up in the papers.’
            Kirsten returned to her seat. Brad picked up some papers that were on her desk. He was taking a desultory interest in what she did. More to the point, he was actually trying to figure out what it was she did.
            ‘What are all of these?’ he asked, flicking through the papers.
            ‘Party policy,’ Kirsten said. ‘Boring mostly.’
            ‘I don’t know how you get through all of this stuff,’ Brad was amazed that someone could read so much.
            ‘I have to,’ Kirsten looked for something through her top drawer.’ It’s my job to keep up to date with all the issues. I have to keep on top of everything. I don't want to seem like a dummy.’
            A local florist found her way to Kirsten’s office. She had a vase with an arrangement of jonquils in it.
‘I’ve got your flowers, luv,’ she announced, placing the jonquils on Kirsten's desk and touching them up to try and maintain their good looks.
            Kirsten was not happy. The florist was about to write out an invoice when the politician’s words broke through her docile mood.
            ‘I specifically said, anything but no jonquils,' Kirsten said testily. 'They are a nauseating flower. Don’t you people listen?’
            Brad thought nothing of his girlfriend’s throwing a wobbly. He was used to seeing her get her way. He personally couldn’t have cared less about the flowers, but Kirsten was different. She couldn’t stand sloppiness, and being delivered the wrong flowers she considered sloppiness.
            The florist whisked the flowers up just as soon as she had put them down. ‘So sorry luv,’ she apologised, trying to diffuse the situation. ‘I’ll get that fixed up right away. I’ll write a special note for the girls about it. No jonquils.’
            Kirsten let out an impatient sigh. ‘Thankyou.’
            The florist bowed her way out of the office. Kirsten kept a hawk’s eye on her as she left.
            ‘I don’t know how anyone can run an office with such incompetent people,’ Kirsten moaned.
            It was true what Kirsten had said in that interview with the Women’s Weekly: she didn’t suffer fools gladly.

* * * *

            For some insane reason Wayne and Guthrie had decided to call Kirsten Steele from a public phone booth. They were both highly secretive about the whole enterprise and wanted it to remain, as they were fond of putting it, ‘a covert operation’. The last thing they wanted was prying ears at home.
            There was a perfectly good phone booth just a few blocks away from Wayne’s house. The boys had ridden there on their bikes and had now squeezed themselves in. Wayne had the number written on a piece of paper. Guthrie, who had merely to stand there, was the most anxious. He breathed so heavily Wayne could hear his noisy wheezing.
            ‘Well, here goes,’ Wayne said, dropping in his coins and pressing the numbers.
            Guthrie gulped. The tension became so great that he had to get out of the phone booth. He walked in little circles outside, then when he heard the call go through he blocked his ears. It was too terrible to hear, somewhat akin to watching a friend get mauled by a man-eating tiger.
            At Kirsten’s office the phone rang. Brad looked on impressed.
            ‘Important person? he presumed.
            ‘Could be.’
            ‘The president calls you sometimes, doesn’t he?’
            ‘You mean the Prime Minister,’ Kirsten corrected with a 'duh' look on her face.
            ‘Oh. Right.’
            ‘Sssh! I have to answer this.’
            Kirsten picked up the receiver. ‘Kirsten Steele’s office,’ the member for Yupyup announced in clipped, professional tones.
            ‘Ur, err, I need to speak to Kirsten Steele,’ Wayne fumbled.
            ‘Speaking.’
            ‘Oh, hi. Um. My name is Wayne Grimwood and I go to Breezedale High School and me and my best friend Guthrie Dulwich are doing this media studies project and we need someone to be our model, I mean someone to star in our project. It’s going to be, like, a profile, or a sort of documentary. We’d just have to ask you a few questions or something. It probably wouldn’t take much of your time……’ Wayne would have kept rambling on, but mercifully he ran out of things to say. There was a moment of uncomfortable silence.
            Kirsten had an answer before she’d even considered the proposition. She gave a blank refusal and apology, in a manner that gave the impression she’d given it a million times before. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said in a sickly sweet manner. ‘Your media studies project sounds very interesting, but unfortunately I am pressed for time at the moment. And besides that I don’t participate in amateur projects, unless they have some sort of broader agenda. Once again I am sorry to disappoint you, but thanks nonetheless for taking an interest in me as a potential subject.’
            Wayne was amazed at how quickly the whole conversation was over. He wasn’t even sure he understood what had happened, although he got the overwhelming feeling that his request had not been successful. He wondered if he should call back to make doubly sure the answer was no, but then realised the answer must be no if no date for a meeting had been confirmed. Wayne walked out of the phone booth in a daze of dejection. Guthrie was now standing with his back to the booth and his fingers still stuck in his ears. Wayne grabbed his friend by the shoulders and swung him around. Guthrie immediately unplugged his ears and expected the worst. Maybe the police would be onto them for harassing a member of parliament.
            ‘What happened?’
            ‘I think she said no.’
            ‘You think?’
            ‘Well she didn’t say yes, so that must mean no. Right?’
            ‘She could only be saying one thing, really.’
            Wayne leaned back on the phone booth and crossed his arms, depressed. A car then came to an abrupt stop near the phone booth and a woman leaned over to the passenger’s side and vigorously wound down the window.
            ‘Wayne, what the hell are you up to loitering around a public phone booth?’ It was Wayne’s mother, Thelma Grimwood. She was on her way home with the shopping, but to all intents and purposes may as well have been patrolling the area. ‘Have you and Guthrie been making prank phone calls to people?’
            ‘No!!’ both protested.
            ‘Then what have you been up?’ she demanded.
            At Kirsten’s office Brad wanted to know who had called. He knew it couldn’t have been anyone important, probably a tele-marketer, but curiosity, mixed with a sense of petty jealousy, demanded an answer.
            ‘It was nothing. Just some kids,’ Kirsten half fobbed off the question, moving her attention onto other matters.
            ‘What did they want?’ Brad persisted.
            ‘They wanted to use me in some school media project. Weird,’ Kirsten shook her head.
            ‘Are you going to do it?’ Brad asked, obviously thinking she should pursue the offer.
            ‘Of course not. It’s for a school project. It’s hardly the professional media.’
            Brad was taken aback. Any attention, as far as he was concerned, was good attention. If a bunch of school girls had rung him up and asked to be interviewed for their school newspaper he would have turned up in a flash. ‘I can’t believe what I’m hearing,’ he said, gobsmacked.
            ‘Why? I can’t give my time to every school kid who’s got a school project to do. I mean, if they wanted me to come and give a talk at their school, then I suppose I could try and fit that in. That would give me an opportunity to have some positive influence. But not a media studies project. That's silly. Knowing what kids are like these days I probably wouldn't even be in focus.’
            ‘But they want to use you in a school project. Wouldn’t it add to your profile? Think if the newspapers got a hold of the story: the politician who does school projects with the kids. They’d love it. I reckon you’re passing up an opportunity. You could use it to your advantage.’
            Kirsten hadn’t quite thought of it that way, exploiting it to her own advantage. She just saw it as a pesky, annoying kid wasting her time. She had to hand it to Brad, her not-so-bright boyfriend sometimes came up with a good idea. In those few moments the more she thought about it the more the idea appealed to her. It would really make her look like she was in there at the grass roots level, the kids – who would all be old enough to vote in a few years – would think Kirsten Steele had street credibility. And then there would be the Middle of the Road party. It would help to cement her position as a rising star, in touch with the younger generation. Critical to the success of her participation would be her ability to make sure that it was well reported by the media. Otherwise, of course, it was hardly worth doing.
            ‘You could have something there,’ Kirsten tapped her fountain pen (a gift from her parents upon winning the seat for Yupyup) against her lips. ‘Damn, but the kid’s gone now. I can’t even remember what his name was.’
            ‘Hit the redial.’
            Just as hastily as Kirsten had blown off Wayne’s request she now back pedaling. And the more she considered how indeed she could turn it to her own advantage, the angrier she got with herself for having been so dismissive in the first place, although that anger frequently came down heaviest not on herself but those unfortunate enough to be around her at the time.
            ‘C’mon! C’mon!’ she urged, like a desperado gambler about to roll the dice. ‘You gotta be there. I only spoke to you a moment ago.’
            Wayne tried explaining to his mother what he had been doing, without telling her a thing. It was a tricky operation. He had blundered through, and under his mother’s cross examination contradicted his own version of events. Backed into a corner he was about to tell the truth when, in what was a bizarre turn of events for everyone involved, the phone in the booth rang. Everyone looked towards the booth, amazed. Thelma Grimwood’s suspicions grew.
            ‘Who is that calling?’ she demanded, nodding her head in the direction of the phone booth.
            Wayne shrugged his shoulders, without much conviction. Guthrie looked desperately at his friend.
            ‘So you don’t know, is that what you’re telling me?’ Mrs Grimwood challenged.
            Guthrie felt like he would explode under the tension. Suddenly his nervous energy overtook him and he blurted out, ‘Let’s see who it is then. It might be an emergency.’ To Wayne’s amazement he went to the booth and answered the phone.
            ‘Hello?’
            ‘Hello? I was just a minute ago talking to a young man about being in a media studies project. My name is Kirsten Steele. Was it you I was talking to?’ she demanded.
            ‘Wh…what?’
            ‘I can’t remember the young man’s name, but he said he wanted me to be in a media studies project. You don't sound like him though,’ Kirsten said impatiently.
            ‘You said this was Kirsten Steele?’ Guthrie said, not believing what he was hearing.
            Wayne’s eyes lit up like a Christmas tree at the mention of Kirsten’s name. Mrs Grimwood's eyes narrowed.
            ‘Yes. And who are you?’ Kirsten demanded in return.
            ‘I’m Guthrie Dulwich. It was my friend Wayne who you spoke to before.’
            ‘Well, is he available to speak to now?’ Kirsten demanded.
            Guthrie nodded dumbfounded. ‘He’s right next to me. I’ll just get him.’
            Guthrie held out the phone with a searching look on his face. Wayne in turn gingerly took the receiver.
            ‘Hello?’
            ‘Hello, Wayne?’
            ‘Yeah, that’s right.’
            ‘It’s Kirsten Steele here. We spoke a few minutes ago.’
            ‘Um, yeah, we did.’
            ‘Look, as luck would have it there’s been a few cancellations in my schedule, so I’m pleased to say that I could put aside some time for your school media studies project.’
            ‘Really?’
            ‘Yes. I think it will be a great opportunity, not only for you, but for me to see how young people are dealing with their education and any other related issues. I’m sure it’s going to be a learning curve for all of us.’
            Wayne was going to ask what a learning curve was, but thought better of it. He didn’t want to seem too ignorant at this early stage. ‘Yeah,’ Wayne agreed, not one hundred percent sure of what he was agreeing with. ‘I've always wanted to curve my learning.’
            Kirsten thought this an odd thing to say, but paid it little attention. She wanted to set a time and get off the phone. Other more pressing concerns demanded her attention. ‘Now I’m just going through my appointment diary here,’ Kirsten said. ‘I guess you will only be free after school hours?’
            ‘We could wag,’ Wayne immediately suggested, thinking nothing of it. He also forgot that his mother was eagerly trying to follow the conversation.
            ‘What do you mean wag school!’ Thelma Grimwood hollered from the car.
            Wayne didn’t hear at all, so intensely involved was he in the conversation with Kirsten Steele.
            Kirsten laughed lightly at the proposition. ‘Now I don’t think that would be a good idea. I’m free Wednesday evening. How does that sound?’
            ‘Good, good,’ Wayne eagerly agreed to the arrangement.
            ‘We can conduct the interview at my office,' Kirsten suggested. 'Do you have the address?’
            ‘Yes, no. What is it?’
            Kirsten started to rattle it off when Wayne suddenly interjected.
            ‘Hang on. I don’t have a pen and paper. Guthrie, do you have a pen and paper?’
            Guthrie shook his head helplessly.
            ‘Look, don’t worry,' Kirsten said. 'I’m in the phone book. You can find me easily under the Federal Government section.’
            ‘Okay. I’ll look you up.’
            ‘Good,’ Kirsten said. ‘I’ll look forward to our meeting.’
            Kirsten hung up. Wayne looked like he’d just come off a roller coaster ride.
            ‘What’s happened?’ Guthrie asked desperately.
            ‘She’s agreed to meet us,’ Wayne said.
            ‘I can’t believe it,’ Guthrie’s face was a mixture of shock, joy, amazement and desperate worry.
            Thelma Grimwood felt herself still left in the dark. She called her son over to the car, where she was leaning out the passenger side.
            ‘Now tell me, who was that?’ she insisted. ‘And what’s all this talk about wagging school? I swear Wayne Grimwood, if I find out you’ve been wagging school I’ll wring your bloody little neck. And that’s a promise!’
            Now that their project had met with success Wayne saw no reason to hide it any longer. He was proud of the fact that they were going to be interviewing what they presumed was an important person.
            ‘Her name is Kirsten Steele,’ Wayne said.
            ‘Who is she? I didn’t know you had a girlfriend. Why are you trying to keep it a secret? Have I met their parents? Are you in trouble with her?’
            ‘No!’ Wayne now lost patience. ‘It’s nothing like that. She a politician.’
            ‘Oh, pull the other one that plays Jingle Bells!’
            ‘It’s true, Mrs Grimwood,’ Guthrie said. ‘We’re going to be interviewing her for a school media studies project.’
            ‘Guthrie, you keep out of this. I’ve a good mind to tell your mother what you’ve been up to.’
            ‘Mum, he’s telling you the truth. She’s a politician with the Middle of the Road party. We read an article about her in the Woman’s Weekly magazine and decided to ring her up and see if she’d be interviewed by us for our school project.’
            Thelma Grimwood would have none of it. ‘And since when do politicians ring school boys at public phone booths to organise interviews for school projects? Come off it, I wasn’t born yesterday.’
            Wayne sighed exasperated. There was nothing more he could say. He’d told the truth and it had been found stranger than fiction.
            ‘Don’t get huffy with me young man,’ Wayne’s mother threatened ominously. ‘I want you to get on that bike immediately and peddle straight home. Me and your father will be having a long talk with you when he gets home. Guthrie, I’m sure you have lots of homework to do. I suggest you go home directly. Your marks are nothing to sing home about.’
            As the boys were picking up their bikes and attaching their helmets Mrs Grimwood shook her head despondently; afterall, she did have very real worries when it came to her son’s academic performance. ‘Sometimes I really question whether you two should be separated,’ she suggested darkly. ‘All you seem to do is get into trouble and other various time wasting schemes. Who knows where you'll end up one of these days!’

Chapter Four

2004-07-29T05:56:00.000-07:00

            All the other troubles that Wayne and Guthrie had in their lives seemed to pale when compared to the excitement of doing their media studies project. Yes, Wayne was dragged over the hot coals by his parents. And Guthrie had to lay low for a while and keep out of Mrs Grimwood’s way.
            The boys immediately launched upon what they called their research. They had never done an interview before and so they tried to figure out a set of questions to ask Kirsten. They knew absolutely nothing about politics. If asked who the current Prime Minister was, that they could answer. But if asked how he or she got there, they were at a complete loss. They understood there were things called elections, and that everyone boasted that it was a free country. Yet as to how the whole picture hung together they were totally clueless.
            But politics was not the point for the boys. If Kirsten Steele had advocated the return of the death penalty, military conscription for teenagers and life sentences for pot smokers, Wayne and Guthrie could not have cared less. They weren’t interested in her mind; they were attracted to her physically. They were obsessed with her mild dominatrix looks and dreamed of being her lackeys. They more than anything wanted to belong, and what better way to belong in this world than to a beautiful, powerful, influential woman?
            Wayne had persuaded Guthrie that they should at least give the idea of interviewing Kirsten a go. Now the gamble had paid off.
            At their local library Wayne and Guthrie flicked though various teen magazines looking for an appropriate interviewing technique. This was the only sort of material that they were really capable of reading. Naturally, trying to model what should have been a serious political interview on the transcripts of a teenage pop star chat-fest could only produce surreal results. So far they boys had managed to put together a short list of questions. They were as follows:

1.      What did you eat for breakfast this morning?
2.      Who is your favourite pop star?
3.      What is your favourite TV program?
4.      Do you watch the Simpsons?
5.      What do you like to do on a Saturday night?
6.      How did you become a politician?

            This last question was originally worded ‘How were you discovered.’ The boys had cleverly transformed it for their own purposes. For the next hour they flicked through a few more magazines and then decided they had better leave. There was still other unfinished business to be dealt with.
            They had a subject for their project. They had prepared a preliminary list of questions (they hoped their questions would lead into other interesting areas of conversation, and that their subject would be a real talker.). Yet they had not secured the video camera they needed to make the whole project at all possible. Wayne knew how attached his father was to his video camera, which is why he had been ceaselessly procrastinating about asking him. The video camera, a camcorder, was the property of adults. Wayne was forever being reminded how much it cost and not to touch it. He was made to feel that he would be spoiling it were his grubby teenage fingers ever to touch it. But now Wayne and Guthrie were in desperate straits. They had organised to interview a federal politician, but they had no recording equipment. Wayne had naively presumed that his father would lend him the camera when he learned it was for a school project. What father would stand in the way of his son’s education, Wayne reasoned?
            Noel Grimwood frowned darkly at his son when he asked if he could use the camcorder. Guthrie stood in the background as these negotiations went under way, biting his nails. To make things even more difficult Wayne’s father did not particularly want to be interrupted at this point in time. He was watching a sporting re-run on TV.
            ‘What do you want to do that for?’ he responded when asked to loan the camcorder, intimating that Wayne was stupid to even consider such a thing.
            ‘We have this school project to do,’ Wayne pleaded.
            Noel Grimwood lifted a buttock off the couch and scratched it. ‘That doesn’t mean you need to use a video camera, does it?’
            ‘For this school project it does.’
            Wayne’s father refused to take his eyes off the screen. He tensed up as he watched a particularly tricky tackle. ‘Why?’
            ‘Because it’s for our media studies class.’
            Guthrie appeared to nod and simper at this. He thought Noel Grimwood had looked in his direction, which was a miscalculation on Guthrie’s part. He didn't notice Guthrie at all.
            ‘So?’ Mr Grimwood pressed the volume tap up on the remote. It was more than obvious that he wasn't open to the idea.
            ‘So we’re doing like a documentary and we need to be able to film it. We’ve got someone important lined up to interview.’
            ‘I don’t know Wayne,’ Mr Grimwood still wouldn't give way. ‘You know it’s my own personal camera. I never lend it out. I don’t even let your mother use it.’
            ‘But I promise I’ll be really careful with it,’ Wayne pleaded. ‘It’s for school. Don’t you want me to pass?’
            ‘Don’t be facetious,’ Mr Grimwood said impatiently. ‘You’ll get nowhere by being flippant. Of course you know I want you to pass.’
            ‘Alright then, now can I borrow it?’
            ‘We’ll only use it for an hour or two, then bring it right back,’ Guthrie ventured.
            Noel Grimwood gave Guthrie a dirty look, as though he’d just farted. Guthrie immediately regretted speaking up.
            ‘If I lend it to you and it comes back with one little mark on it,’ Wayne’s father wagged a warning finger, ‘then you will be held entirely responsible for its replacement. Are we understood? I don't care if you have to get an afterschool job, a paper round. Whatever. You are one hundred percent responsible for it.’
            Wayne nodded enthusiastically. He gave a surreptitious thumbs up to Guthrie.
            When the camcorder was handed over later that night in a ceremonious like atmosphere, Wayne was given blow by blow instructions on its use and maintenance. Noel Grimwood would explain a function on the camera, then illustrate himself. When Wayne’s two eager hands reached over to have a go himself his fingers were quickly snapped away. He had to first gain the knowledge of how to use the thing, it was stressed. Wayne was sure his father was trying to sap every bit of fun out of the camera by continually stressing rules, regulations and accompanying responsibilities. At last Wayne was given permission to hold the camera. Studying the outside of it he noticed that there was a video tape in the machine, something Noel Grimwood had overlooked during his over zealous instruction giving.
            ‘Hey, what’s on this tape dad?’ Wayne asked, with casual interest. ‘Can I look at it on the play back function?’
            Mr Grimwood suddenly went as white as a sheet. He whisked the camcorder out of his son’s hands.
            ‘Let me see that.’ He hit the eject button and took out the tape. ‘No. That’s my tape. That’s mine. You shouldn’t be looking at tapes that aren’t yours.’
            ‘I didn’t look at it though.’
            Noel Grimwood clutched the tape. Wayne and Guthrie both thought this really weird behaviour. It seemed obvious that he was hiding something, something of an obviously suspect nature. Why otherwise would he be so protective? Wayne didn’t want to think about it too intensively. The thought of his father doing pervy things with a video camera – things that could well involve his mother too– was too much to contemplate.
            Noel Grimwood huffed and puffed like an innocent, yet proud person wronged. ‘Look, just make sure you take care with it. Okay? That camera is a very important piece of equipment.’
            Just exactly why would remain a mystery.

Chapter Five

2004-07-29T05:53:00.000-07:00

            Walter and Marigold Steele liked to make much of meal times. They prided themselves on being old fashioned believers in meals as being a time of civilised get together, not a mad stampeding towards the feeding trough. They especially disdained the practice of watching television during dinner. Good families, they insisted, talked together. Like many critics of the age, they blamed television for a host of social ills, and prided themselves on a very limited weekly dosage. (Mrs Steele secretly watched a daytime soapie, unbeknownst to her family, whereas Mr Steele openly watched what he insisted was a 'quality' British detective show. Nothing was allowed to obstruct that one hour per week.)
            Kirsten lived in her own apartment and ate out most of the time. There was a tradition at the Steele household that every Friday was family dinner night. This of course meant that lovers and friends were also welcome. Walter and Marigold Steele liked Brad Payne. He was well mannered, handsome and polite. He was ambitious, optimistic, opportunistic and liked to talk incessantly about himself – all proof of a vigorous and healthy ego. (If there was one thing the Steele’s frowned on, that was the type of character prone to depression and to being too inward looking.) He was also wise enough to wear sleeves that covered his trendy tattoos and never discuss or allude to the fact that he was having sex with their daughter. The Steeles relationship with Brad Payne was a happy and productive one.
            As mentioned before, Marigold Steele was a tireless worker. She set up a table as though it was going to entertain top level international diplomats. Anything less she considered ‘sloppy’. Fresh white linen was put on the table, wineglasses were polished and carefully placed and enough silver cutlery was set out in descending order that it looked like a preparation for a surgical operation. How Marigold Steele managed to whisk one course after another to the table and then whisk out the debris of the previous course, and still keep ahead of all the conversation, constantly amazed her family. She was forever being described as a miracle, a marvel and an angel from heaven (the latter mostly from her husband). Walter Steele, in his romantic moments after a port or two, liked to embrace his wife in front of all and declare that he could not live without his lady wife. While he proclaimed this dramatically, with an over the top flourish, it was in essence true.
            As the Steele family’s Friday night dinner was in progress, the week’s events were discussed and picked over.
            ‘And how are your prospects going?’ Mr Steele asked Brad whilst he smoothed out a linen napkin on his lap. He liked to have constant career updates.
            It was the sort of question that Brad had come to dread. He always seemed to have things on the boil, but nothing ever eventuated. All he had was his commercial work.
            ‘I saw your naughty ad the other day,’ Mrs Steele giggled, shaking both salt and pepper shakers simultaneously over her steak, as though she were a voodoo priestess preparing a sacrifice.
            ‘Oh, which one was that?’ Kirsten said excitedly.
            ‘The one that shows Brad’s – how can I put this delicately? – rather cute behind,’ Mrs Steele's eyes lit up as she brought a piece of steak to her mouth.
            ‘That could be any number of ads,’ Kirsten said. ‘His butt is in three ads.’
            ‘I’ve got auditions happening at the moment too,’ Brad said, growing a little sensitive.
            ‘That was for one of those hair removal products,’ Mrs Steele recalled. ‘It’s really a very clever ad.’
            ‘And the product is doing very well,’ Kirsten added.
            ‘I’m sure it is!’ Mrs Steele tittered.
            ‘Have I ever seen this advertisement?’ Mr Steele asked, feeling as though he’d missed something.
            ‘Oh, you don’t watch enough television,’ Mrs Steele informed her husband. ‘Are you doing any new advertisements?’ she asked Brad. ‘It really is a delight being able to turn on the television and see you there. I tell all my friends that Kirsten’s boyfriend is a model.’
            ‘Actor,’ Brad corrected.
            ‘Yes, of course,’ Mrs Steele readily agreed. ‘There really is a lot of interpretive skills required, even if it is only your behind that is being featured. They do have to have a certain quality. Correct?’
            Brad desperately tried to steer a different course. ‘I’m doing a new ad. We’re filming next week.’
            ‘What’s the product?’ Mr Steele asked.
            ‘It’s going to be a chewing gum ad,’ Brad explained.
            ‘And what will be your role in this?’ Mrs Steele inquired.
            ‘Well, what’s going to happen in the ad is I’m going to play this jogger. I jog past a city building and there are these two office girls outside and they whistle at me. You’ll get to see my face this time.’
            ‘How wonderful. You have such a lovely face,’ Mrs Steele said. ‘It’s a shame to hide it.’
            ‘But surely, as an actor, you don’t want to be doing ads for the rest of your life,’ Mr Steele said. ‘It can’t be very rewarding to someone who wants to follow in the footsteps of Olivier and the like.’
            ‘Olivier?’ Brad looked lost.
            ‘He’s a very famous stage and film actor,’ Mr Steele looked incredulously at Brad. He couldn't believe that he didn't know who Laurence Olivier was.
            ‘I only do the ads to pay the rent really,' Brad said. .'But it does give you some real hands on experience.’
            ‘Brad wants to break into Hollywood,’ Kirsten informed her parents.
            There were ooohs and aaaahs of admiration from the Steeles.
            ‘They’re making a Hollywood film in Sydney and I’m auditioning for a part,’ Brad talked of his real dreams, hopes and ambitions. ‘It’s much cheaper to make films in Australia and employ Australian actors.’
            ‘That sounds very promising,’ Mr Steele opined, growing bored with the subject. He thought acting rather frivolous, a fact that Brad perceived. It was in politics that things really happened, Mr Steele thought. ‘And what about the week in politics?’ he turned to his daughter.
            ‘Nothing much to report,’ Kirsten said matter of factly, chewing and talking at the same time. ‘It’s been a slow week, although something a bit out of the ordinary did come up. I received a phone call from these kids who want to profile me for a school media studies project. At first I said I couldn’t do it, but then Brad talked me around.’
            Brad’s chest inflated, as though he had done something useful and important in the sphere of politics.
            ‘I thought I might be able to use it in some other way. You know, it could look good that I’m willing to get involved with young kids and what they’re doing in their lives. Afterall, I have been trying to build a profile as someone interested in youth issues.’
            ‘It can’t hurt I suppose,’ Mr Steele said, not exactly enthusiastic. ‘The public like to see their politicians out doing community work.’
            ‘It could look endearing,’ Mrs Steele weighed in. ‘We’ll have to try and get it exposure elsewhere. You’ll soon get bored sitting on the backbench, filing your nails. A cabinet position is where you can get real influence and exposure.’
            ‘You could be the first female prime minister,’ Mr Steele said.
            ‘Dad, I wouldn’t go that far,’ Kirsten said with more than a dash of false modesty. Kirsten didn’t really think much about politics. She had more fallen into her position than aspired to it. Yet the idea of being Prime Minister really appealed to her, and somehow didn’t seem such an unreasonable ambition. She was on the backbench now. It was only a hop, step and jump to a position as a cabinet minister. Then the Prime Ministership she would be close enough to reach out and at least touch. Why not think that she could fulfil that role? Of course Kirsten wanted it for all the wrong reasons. She didn’t care much for the great mass of humanity. As a people’s representative in parliament she didn’t think of being there as a friend or advocate for her electorate. She was there because she wanted to be famous in some way and thought of as important. Politics was a by-product of her quest for self-fulfilment; and self-fulfilment could be achieved by anything that gave her self gratification.
            ‘When are you going to be interviewed by the school boys?’ Mr Steele asked.
            ‘I have a date set for next Wednesday. They’re going to video me while they ask a few questions. No big deal. It should only take an hour or so, at least I hope.’
            ‘They’ll be of voting age in a couple of years,’ Mr Steele said. ‘You could have some real influence on them. We need to start recruiting Middle of the Road voters as young as possible.’
            ‘We’ll be expecting updates on how it goes,’ Mrs Steele insisted.
            All of this talk about politics made Brad feel like he was sinking into the background. It only helped to further cement his inferiority complex. He knew he shouldn’t feel this way, but he was jealous of his girlfriend. She was really going places in her career, whereas he was stagnant. She was going to be interviewed by some school kids, whereas he was only known, and that amongst his inner circle, for his butt appearing on television commercials. It was a situation he was determined to reverse. He would get his face on the television. He would get into the movies. He would get self validation by getting his image seen in as many public places as possible.
            As Brad sat morbidly withdrawing into himself, considering these issues, another member family of the Steele family turned up to dinner. This was Tom Steele, the young son of the family. He was in his early twenties and studying journalism. If ever a family spawned a black sheep, this was it. He dressed shabbily, in clothes from an opportunity shop, and rarely paid attention to his hair. It was his mantra that what came from within was important, not what we looked like. For the superbly groomed Steele family this was bad enough. Marigold Steele could barely stand to be seen with him when they went out as a family. Walter thought he should grow up and stop being reactionary. But there was worse to come, for Tom’s insistence that clothes meant nothing was a bit of a lie (you only had to read one of his sloganed t-shirts). The reality was that this attention to detail in down dressing was all part and parcel of his world view. To his parents, it was a menacing and constant reminder of their son’s strident left wing politics. To Walter and Marigold Steele the Middle of the Road party was the scourge of any type of extremism, the everyman of politics. Yet in reality it had been slowly and imperceptivity floating to the right for years. And Tom, without a regard for the feelings of his family, was a committed critic of his parent's party. While in public Walter Steele, in his role as party treasurer, said that debate was good for democracy, and that even a good political war of words was good for clearing out the cobwebs, in private both Marigold and Walter Steele were completely embarrassed by their son’s shenanigans.
            Tom could also be hypocritical. He was just as publicity seeking as his parents. He was, due to his high profile family, a well-known member of an extreme left environmental and democracy group. This made his relationship with his family extremely difficult, and it could be argued that most of the problems arose from Tom’s side. He was combative, damning and almost seemed to take delight in the friction he caused. Yet Walter and Marigold Steele didn’t help matters particularly either. They refused to take their son or the party that he belonged to seriously. They pooh-poohed all of the party's ideas and policies. During their late night conversations in bed they denounced it as a gang of rat bags determined to bring down all civilised values.
            Tom made a point of not observing the regular Friday night dinners. He openly said he had no time for so called family values. He claimed family values were a load of rubbish, without giving further explanation, and rather talked in favour of collectives, or ‘the group’.
            ‘Look what the cat dragged in!’ Mrs Steele said in a chirpy voice. She always tried to get things off to a good start when she saw her son, hoping he would not ruin things by his outspoken views and rash criticisms.
            ‘Decided to visit the oldies for a family dinner?’ Mr Steele reached over and pulled back a chair.
            ‘I’ve run out of money,’ Tom started complaining without further ado. ‘That government allowance they give you barely covers the price of a train ticket.’
            ‘Perhaps you should get a job at McDonalds,’ Mr Steele suggested. ‘Lots of students have part-time jobs to get a bit of extra cash.’
            ‘Come off it dad,' Tom rolled his eyes. 'I’m not going to work for that bunch of environmental rapists.’
            Marigold leaped off her chair. ‘Darling, can I get you something to eat?’
            ‘Don’t worry, I’ll get it. I don’t expect you to slave over me like you do over dad,’ Tom said, in a nod to his feminist sympathies.
            ‘No, I’ll get it. I know where everything is,’ Mrs Steele said cheerily, determined to diffuse a potentially hostile situation. Sometimes she wished her son would stay away from the family dinners if he wasn’t going to try and be civil. He always had an axe to grind. He never had anything nice to say.
            ‘You’re not still on that funny vegetarian diet are you?’ Mrs Steele called from the kitchen, preparing a plate.
            Tom rolled his eyes. ‘Mum, you know I’ve been a vegetarian since I was sixteen.’
            ‘Hey, be nice,’ Mr Steele said sharply, wagging a finger at his son. ‘Your mother is only trying to help.’
            Mrs Steele soon emerged with a plate piled with mashed potatoes, boiled peas and carrots, topped up with gravy. ‘There you go, dear. I don’t know how you hold up eating that bird food. You need something more substantial, like a good steak.’
            ‘Aren’t you going to say hello to Brad and me,’ Kirsten said, impatient with her brother’s rudeness.
            ‘How-are-you-Brad-and-Kirsten……….’ Tom parroted.
            Neither bothered to respond to such sarcasm.
            ‘I saw your splash in the Women’s Weekly magazine,’ Tom said, shovelling mashed potatoes into his mouth at breakneck speed.
            ‘Really?’ Kirsten lighted up. ‘What did you think?’
            ‘My friends at the uni lounge were in fits of laughter over it,’ Tom didn’t spare in his cruelty. ‘I mean, it really was a masterpiece of political kitsch. The photos of you in that power suit. Talk about bargain basement Margaret Thatcher. And some of the lines in it. Do you have a special adviser in cliches or something?’
            ‘Tom, stop it!’ Mr Steele demanded. ‘I won’t have you talk to your sister in my house like this. You're only trying to pick a fight..’
            ‘That’s right,’ Brad followed suit. ‘Leave off. Just because she’s done something with her life and you’re still a loser, still at university.’
            Tom laughed out loud. ‘I’m being given a dressing down by the wonder butt, who’s at this very moment sitting on one of his greatest assets!’
            ‘I get paid very well for my acting jobs,’ Brad defended his work.
            ‘Big deal. Money is shit,' Tom said dismissively. 'And for your information, besides getting an education, which you seem to think is for losers, I happen to edit the school newspaper. But that wouldn't interest you, would it? Models aren't exactly renowned for their brains.’
            Kirsten continued to eat her meal. She tried to ignore her obnoxious brother. She grinded her teeth and hardened within.
            'I'm an actor!' Brad exclaimed.
            'Don't take any notice of him, Brad,' Kirsten said.
            ‘Yeah, well Kirsten is going to be interviewed for a school project,’ Brad announced. 'And it was my idea.'
            Tom stopped eating for a moment. ‘I don’t believe it. Kirsten, doing something for the good of the community.’
            ‘I’ve been approached by some students to sit for an interview,’ Kirsten explained.
            ‘What’s in it for you?’
            ‘Do you have to be so cynical about everything? I have no motive, besides wanting to help. Plus it will give me some insight into what it’s like for kids at school these days. What’s wrong with that?’ Kirsten asked.
            ‘Nothing. I just can’t imagine you doing anything for free.’
            ‘You’ve got a bad attitude, Tom. You’re one of those people who gloat over bad things that happen so you can cluck your tongue and say I was right, I knew things were rotten right from the beginning. People like you have nothing positive to contribute.’
            ‘And what’s your big plan for the future? What are your brilliant policies? What do you believe in?’
            ‘You know I can’t answer that,' Kirsten said. 'I’ve only been in office a short while. Policies take a while to shape and hone. I’m hardly going to just rush out any old statement.’
            ‘I don’t think you really listened to my question. I said: what do you believe in, Kirsten Steele?’ Tom held out a make-believe microphone, as though he were interviewing her.
            This pointed question had Kirsten stumped. It hung heavily in the air. Walter and Marigold – who really did believe in the Middle of the Road party – looked on with interest. Even Brad thought it a noteworthy question, and waited patiently alone with the others for an answer.
            Kirsten felt all eyes boring into her. She did not like the scrutiny, just as she did not like questions that seemingly came out of nowhere. In all situations she liked to be prepared.
            'Well, I,' Kirsten stammered, mentally constipated. 'I……I believe the Middle of the Road party has all the answers to this country's problems, and I believe (Kirsten was now gaining confidence) that we will win a landmark third term in office come the elections later this year.'
            Walter and Marigold Steele thought this deserved a round of applause. Their daughter would turn into a good fighter for the party. Even though Brad didn't understand this impromptu speech, it sounded good to his ears. In fact, he wished he could say such clever things. But for Tom it was frustrating proof of nothing. He thought Kirsten didn't deserve to be in parliament. She was supposed to represent the people, but really she represented nothing.

Chapter Six

2004-07-29T05:52:00.000-07:00

            Right up to the night before their interview with Kirsten Steele Wayne and Guthrie were feverously researching. They sat in Wayne's lounge watching the nightly news, studying its interview techniques. Guthrie sat with a huge bag of Doritos on his lap and a yellow pad, untouched, on the armrest. Wayne too had a pad sprawled out, but he was making more headway. There were a few notes scrawled across his pad. His big discovery was that the interviewer could be included in the interview, nodding seriously and so forth. He thought it would make their project look more professional were this trick to be used. If only he could figure out how it was done with one camera.
            Wayne's parents, Noel and Thelma Grimwood, thought all of this nonsense. To their mind it was just a way of avoiding real study, which meant opening a book and reading. Watching Guthrie slouch in his chair munching on Doritos didn't help matters. Noel Grimwood thought the boy should take up some sort of contact sport. Thelma Grimwood couldn't keep his eyes off Guthrie's grubby fingers, which kept brushing against the armrest. She didn’t fancy having a Dorito flavoured lounge setting, and she had only had the whole lot steam cleaned a month ago. It seemed impossible to keep the place clean.
            'You can't call this study,' Noel Grimwood said, impatiently looking at the two boys staring at the idiot box.
            'We are Dad,' Wayne insisted. 'It's a media age now. Watching TV can be studying. Surfing the Internet is educational. We're studying how they put the news together on TV. We want to get some ideas for our media studies project. We're interviewing Kirsten Steele tomorrow.'
            'Stop going on about this mythical Kirsten Steele interview,' Mrs Grimwood insisted. 'I was there, remember?'
            'But it's true,' Guthrie said. 'Look, we've got a list of questions we're going to ask her, like what kind of bands she listens to and what her favourite TV show is.'
            'I'll believe it when I see it,' Mr Grimwood shook his head.
            'Have you started reading your book for English yet?' Mrs Grimwood asked. 'We're already one month into the term. I expect you should have at least got through the first few chapters.'
            'We're going to get Pride and Prejudice on video,' Wayne said.
            'You can't just watch it on TV and expect to pass your English,' Mrs Grimwood grew alarmed at her son's suggestion. 'That's cheating.'
            Guthrie stopped eating, as he did at all guilty moments. He looked on at the unfolding argument ominously.
            Wayne sighed impatiently. Didn't his parents trust him at all, about anything?? 'We're going to use it as a study aid only. It's all perfectly acceptable. You can ask my English teacher. It's helped us to understand the plot.'
            'Well, I will ask at the next parent teacher night.'
            Now that this difficulty seemed to have been cleared up Guthrie continued on with his bag of Doritos.
            Despite their obvious concerns Noel and Thelma Grimwood weren't entirely dismissive of Wayne and Guthrie's watching of the nightly news. They thought, somewhere at the back of their mind, that there must be something in it for them, because the boys never watched the news at all. The half hour news report was always something for the adults only at the Grimwood house
            'Look, Wayne, it's Kirsten Steele!' Guthrie suddenly pointed at the television.
            'Shit!' Wayne exclaimed.
            Both parents looked at each other confused. 'Hey, keep down the language,' Mr Grimwood warned.
            'That's who we're going to be interviewing tomorrow,' Wayne pointed excitedly at the television. 'She's a politician.'
            'Turn up the volume!' Guthrie insisted.
            Wayne grabbed the remote and zapped the volume button. Everyone sat paying attention.
            The news report announced that relative newcomer and backbencher Kirsten Steele had been fast tracked into the government's cabinet. In a surprise move there had been a reshuffle over the weekend. Kirsten Steele had been given the portfolio of Education and Youth Affairs. There was a soundbite from Kirsten Steele, promising that she would give the portfolio her full energy, describing how she was a hard worker and committed to positive outcomes.
            'Hadn't we better video all of this?' Guthrie said. 'Aren't we going to need it for our project?'
            'Shit!'
            'Wayne! Stop that language,' Mr Grimwood again upbraided his son.
            'Where's a video cassette we can use?'
            'How should I know?' Mr Grimwood said impatiently.
            Wayne started going through a pile of videos that were sitting on top of the television. Meanwhile, they missed important footage. There was a following interview with a political commentator, who said that the out-of-the-blue appointment came as no surprise to him. 'The government,' he said. 'was widely perceived in the community to be old and out of touch. Giving this portfolio to Kirsten Steele, who has only recently turned thirty, is a smart move. It will make the government look more in touch, giving it a breath of fresh air. I'm sure the Prime Minister has his eyes on the votes of the younger people in the electorate too. His vote amongst the young has been falling over past years.'
            At last Wayne found a videocassette that he could tape over, but just as he rammed it in the news item was over. They had missed it.
            'No!' Wayne cried frustrated. 'We've missed it.’
            'And that was really important,' Guthrie lamented. 'We needed that.'
            'From now on, we're going to have to make sure we tape the news everynight. We can't miss anything.'
            'Right,' Guthrie agreed.
            The media studies project was turning into something a bit more exciting. They were seeing their subject on the TV. It was almost like a detective game, they had to keep track of Kirsten Steele.
            'We should maybe start reading the newspapers too?' Wayne suggested. This of course was a novelty for the boys. They had never bought a newspaper in their lives.
            'Yeah, we can take cuttings, and keep a book of them or something,' Guthrie said.
            ‘I’m starting to think we could really be onto something good here,’ Wayne said. ‘I just wish we’d got to video the news.’
            ‘We can ask Kirsten about it tomorrow,’ Guthrie said.
            ‘You’re right. We better write that down as a question before we forget it.’
            ‘I’ll do it,’ Guthrie volunteered. He was feeling a bit guilty because he hadn’t written a thing down on his yellow pad. He started licking the savoury Dorito seasoning off his fingers and picked up a pen.
            Noel Grimwood got up and turned off the television. He stood in front of it with his arms crossed.
            ‘Dad, what are you doing?’ Wayne complained. ‘We’re watching the news for school.’
            ‘I’m sick of this,’ the father said. ‘I don’t know what you two are on about. It’s a joke, sitting here in front of the television saying you’re doing your study. In my day study meant reading your school books, which I never seem to see you do. You’re always slouching around on this couch, doing nothing. From here on in, until your marks improve, there’s going to be a ban on watching television.’
            ‘Dad! You’ve got to be joking.’
            ‘You heard your father,’ Mrs Grimwood defended her husband. ‘He pays the bills in this house, he sets the rules.’
            Wayne continued to kick at the carpet. What had been a happy moment for Wayne and Guthrie was now spoilt.
            ‘Guthrie, I think you should go home,’ Mrs Grimwood said. ‘And Wayne, I want you to take that sour look off your face and march upstairs to your bedroom, close the door and study. You don’t want to be a shit kicker all your life, do you?’
            Guthrie reluctantly picked up his back pack. ‘I guess I’ll see you later.’
            ‘Yeah, I’ll see you at school tomorrow,’ Wayne said.
            The friends parted. Wayne, being stared down by his parents, went off to his bedroom.
            Noel and Thelma Grimwood then let out a sigh of exhaustion. It was hard work raising kids. Then there was the stress of Wayne not performing well at school. Their’s was a very real worry: they didn’t want him to end his days a bum. And that’s how they saw things, if he didn’t improve his marks at school. In this the Grimwoods were like most other parents. They were hard working, under the constant pressure of daily life and knew that doing well at school would pave the way for a comfortable life for their son. They wanted Wayne to do well for his own sake. They wanted to raise a young man who was responsible, independent and not a burden on others. But things seemed to be going in the opposite direction.
            As for this supposed media studies project, they didn’t take it seriously at all. They thought it was just a way out of serious study. The Kirsten Steele business seemed totally far fetched. Since when did a cabinet minister talk to two teenage boys for a school project? Wayne didn’t even know how to properly use the camcorder he was borrowing from his father. Noel Grimwood had only agreed to lend it to his son just so he would stop bugging him about it.
            In his bedroom Wayne glumly sat down to the tedious, dull, boring business of opening up his school books. He sat at his desk, cleared it of all its junk (he’d been given a special lecture on study tips at school. Rule number one was a clean desk) and opened up his copy of Pride and Prejudice at page one. He felt slightly uncomfortable and hemmed in at his desk. No matter how he wiggled he just couldn’t feel right. So he decided he may as well read on his bed. It was a story he was reading, so why not lay back and get comfortable? He took with him a yellow highlighter pen, so he could underline anything that he thought was interesting or noteworthy. Who knows, he thought in an odd fit of vanity, I might find something that no one else has thought of.
            As he struggled through the first page, the highlighter fell from his hand. There went that thought. His eyes started to slide over the words. They all started to jangle together and make him feel almost nauseous, like he had car sickness. He closed his eyes tightly then opened them again, trying to realign his eyeballs, or at least freshen them up. But this didn’t really help much. He was soon feeling tired again. He presumed that if he felt tired he must indeed be tired. I’ll just take a little break, Wayne thought. Just close my eyes for a few minutes and then start again. He left the book opened at the page he was reading, spread it out over his chest and gently closed his eyes.
            He soon fell asleep. Later that night, seeing Wayne’s light on, Noel and Thelma Grimwood knocked on his door. When Wayne didn’t answer they gently pushed the door open. There before them lay Wayne, both hands neatly folded over his copy of Pride and Prejudice. They felt sympathy, looking at their son sleeping. He looked helpless and innocent.
            ‘At least he’s trying,’ Mrs Grimwood said. ‘It’s eleven o’clock. He’s obviously been up reading the book for as long as he could, then fell asleep.’
            ‘Should we wake him?’ Mr Grimwood asked.
            ‘No. Let him sleep. Just take the book away from him.’
            Wayne’s father carefully slipped the book out of his hands, placed it on his desk and folded out a blanket. He covered his son, looked briefly at his face, patted him lightly on the head (a funny, awkward thing he liked to do during his odd affectionate moments) and went to the lightswitch near the doorway.
            Mr Grimwood took one last look at his son, sighed, grimaced worryingly, clicked off the light and then closed the door.

Chapter Seven

2004-07-29T05:49:00.000-07:00

            Although the majority of politicians enter public office with the sole desire of the bettering of society and the serving of the public, there are nonetheless rats in the ranks. It would be tempting to classify Kirsten Steele as just such a rat. She was selfish, vain and her sole motivation was the furtherance of her career, or rather blatant self-promotion. When it came to politics she had no real values. In a media celebrity age, she had mistaken exposure as a politician for fame. She took more interest in publicity than policy. But she was not really a rat. She wasn't vindictive or malicious, more vain and irresponsible. She didn't want to hurt anyone, by and large. Although during her brief political career she would do some things - in moments of frustration and desperation - that would make her for a time a rat.
            Wayne and Guthrie had never conducted a formal interview before. If they had they might have thought of wearing something more appropriate than baggy jeans and t-shirts. Nor were they particularly interested in the other niceties of grooming. With hair flying in all directions, they looked like they'd just tumbled out of bed.
            They came lightly prepared. All they took with them was a hand written sheet of questions and the camcorder. Both were full of nerves and trepidation. When they entered Kirsten's office they felt very much like they were in foreign territory. It felt so adult. The office's corporate facade gave a very imposing vibe to the place. Just as Wayne and Guthrie were craning their necks about in what they presumed was the reception area, a bubbly and super energetic Kirsten appeared. Her sharp golden bob looked like it had just been prepared for a multi million-dollar hair campaign. She was wearing an immaculate grey suit and the huge heart shaped brooch that featured in her Women's Weekly photo shoot. She smelt of expensive fragrance, which hit the boys like a tidal wave as soon as she entered the reception area.
            'The media are here already!' Kirsten Steele said buoyantly.
            Wayne and Guthrie looked behind them, not realising that Kirsten Steele was talking to them. She extended a hand to shake.
            'Now which one would be Wayne Grimwood?'
            Guthrie pointed sheepishly. 'That's Wayne.'
            'Well, I'm pleased to be finally meeting you,' she pumped Wayne's hand generously. Wayne was mesmerised, shaking hands with someone he'd only weeks ago held in his hands as an image in a magazine. 'And you are Wayne's assistant?' Kirsten offered her hand to Guthrie.
            'Guthrie is actually my partner in the project,' Wayne explained.
            Kirsten smiled and shook Guthrie's hand. 'Pleased to meet you.'
            Guthrie was too gobsmacked to say anything. He stood with a glazed over look on his face.
            'So, where do you want me then?' Kirsten clapped her hands and rubbed them together, signalling that she wanted to move things along.
            Wayne and Guthrie looked at each other, their faces question marks. 'I don't know,' Wayne said.
            Kirsten found all this amateurishness amusing. She thought the afternoon was soon going to turn into a bit of a joke. She'd be surprised if the pimply kid holding the camera could figure out how to turn it on. And as for the questions that the fat one would ask, she couldn't imagine them rising above the most mundane and stupid topics.
            'How about we shoot the interview in my office. You could get some nice shots of me behind my desk,' Kirsten suggested, quickly taking over as director.
            Wayne and Guthrie readily nodded in agreement. 'That sounds good.'
            'Good! This way then.' Kirsten turned one hundred and eighty degrees on her heels.
            She showed them into her office and went over to a small kitchen area. 'Can I get you boys a hot drink while you set up? Tea? Coffee?'
            Kirsten was good with people. She had an uncanny knack at making them feel comfortable. When the mood took her, she could really turn on the charm. The boys especially felt this effect. The simple offer of a cup of tea or coffee made them feel welcome. They dropped some of their anxieties.
            'Yeah, that sounds good,' Guthrie agreed.
            'Thanks,' Wayne seconded.
            'What'll it be then?' Kirsten asked, wanting a specific request.
            'Do you have any Milo?' Guthrie asked. 'I can't really drink tea or coffee. It makes me puke. I must be allergic to it or something.'
            Kirsten paused briefly. She sensed that neither Wayne or Guthrie probably drank tea or coffee. 'No,' she said.
            'I might have to give it a miss then,' Guthrie said.
            After a moment's pause - Wayne really did want to accept, out of courtesy - Wayne declined too. He was no fan of either caffeine drink. 'Same here. I can't drink it,' he admitted.
            'That's okay. It's just that Milo isn't the sort of thing I keep in the office. I usually have some biscuits,' Kirsten went through the cupboards, opening one door and when finding it bare slamming it shut again. 'But it looks like I'm all out.'
            Kirsten made herself a coffee - extra strong and with plenty of sugar - and made herself at home. She sat down at her desk, crossed her legs and relaxed in her chair.
            'What year did you say you boys were in?'
            'Year ten,' Guthrie said.
            'How are you finding it?'
            Neither boy really knew how to respond to this. They sensed that it was an intellectual question, like they were being asked to sum up the curriculum and make comments on areas which they had misgivings about. If they could have just blurted out the truth, they would have said that they hated school and found it really boring. But they didn't want to come across to Kirsten as pathetic whingers who were no good at school.
            'Oh, it's okay so far,' Wayne offered.
            'Yeah, can't complain,' Guthrie agreed.
            'What are your favourite subjects?' Kirsten sipped on her coffee.
            This was another question that Wayne and Guthrie couldn't really answer. There wasn’t much they liked about school. They went with what was still considered the slackest subject at school.
            'I'd probably have to say media studies,' Wayne said, fiddling around with his dad's camcorder.
            Guthrie nodded in agreement. 'You get to watch a lot of videos and stuff. It's pretty cool.'
            Kirsten was soon getting the impression that the boys' geekiness was not their only set back. She thought there may have been some type of intelligence behind the awkwardness, but now realised that they were not too bright either. They didn't have much to say for themselves and Kirsten felt like she was doing most of the work, asking all the questions to avoid the embarrassing silences.
            'Do you hope to go on to university?' she persisted.
            'I haven't really thought that far ahead,' Guthrie said.
            'At the moment I'd be happy just to pass year twelve,' Wayne said. 'After that, who knows? Maybe I'll get a job.'
            'What type of career are you interested in?' Kirsten looked deep into her coffee mug, swirling around the remains.
            Career seemed a very elaborate word to Wayne. To be frank, he'd be happy if someone would give him a go. Quickly realising after Kirsten's line of questioning that he didn't know much about himself, his potential and aspirations, he tried to weave some type of philosophical answer. He stopped fiddling with the camera for a moment. 'Well, at sixteen I think you're probably too young, not mature enough, to make a big decision like that. Right? What I think now will be different in ten years from now, so I reckon it's best to take your time thinking about career decisions. Right?'
            'That's a good point,' Kirsten said.
            'Did you know that you wanted to be a politician when you were sixteen?' Guthrie asked, suddenly realising that he was in all likelihood asking a proper question. He wished the camera was rolling.
            Now Kirsten had to stop and think. 'Well, I'd always grown up with politics of course,' she said, not wanting to admit that a political career had never entered her head until it fell in her lap. 'My father has been the treasurer of the Middle of the Road party for as long as I can remember. There was always talk of politics at home. We lived and breathed it. I used to help my mother make lamingtons to raise money for the party fund raisers.' This was a quaint little story that Kirsten thought would be nice to throw in. 'So I guess it was inevitable that I would always end up in politics,' Kirsten smiled warmly, but also somehow coldly.
            This of course didn't answer the question at all, but appeared to do so. Wayne and Guthrie sensed this. It didn't seem like a straightforward answer, but they presumed it was meant to be taken as a yes.
            'Have you both been interested in politics for long?' Kirsten asked her interviewers. 'Or was it a stipulation of your project that you interview someone in politics?'
            'We could interview anyone we liked, as long as they were in the media,' Guthrie said.
            'We don't really know anything at all about politics,' Wayne confessed. 'I don't get it at all.'
            'I'd like to learn,' Guthrie quickly added. 'It's just that it seems too boring. But I'm sure it's not, once you learn what it's all about.'
            'Maybe we'll learn something from doing this project,' Wayne said hopefully. 'They say that's the best way to learn anything is from experience. Right?'
            'If you could choose anyone, then why me?' Kirsten was suddenly concerned. It seemed totally bizarre that two dumb kids who found politics so completely boring and incomprehensible should choose her, a politician, to profile. Were they weirdos or something?
            Wayne and Guthrie could hardly tell the truth, that they were mesmerised by what they considered her insistent, relentless beauty. It would seem like the lamest reason ever. Kirsten would probably want to end the interview, convinced that they were wasting her time. But they had to give an answer nonetheless.
            'We found your picture in the Women's Weekly magazine,' Guthrie confessed.
            Kirsten's eyebrows shot up.
            'We were looking through all of these magazines for someone interesting to do our project on,' Wayne explained further, 'and we found you. We thought you looked like an interesting person to interview.'
            'We read the article too,' Guthrie hastened to add. 'You said that you were interested in youth issues, so we thought you'd probably agree to an interview.'
            This was a good answer. Wayne felt relieved - they could have really stuffed up - but were now on sure ground saying that they were impressed with Kirsten's professed interest in youth affairs.
            'Well, that was certainly true what I said about being interested in youth issues,' Kirsten said. 'I don't know if you boys follow the news, but I have just been promoted to Minister for Youth and Education.'
            'We saw you on the television last night,' Guthrie said excitedly.
            'Yeah, we tried to video tape it, for our project,' Wayne said. 'We saw you interviewed.'
            'That was really interesting,' Guthrie said, not knowing at all what was so interesting about it. He just presumed because it was politics and it was reported on the television that it must be interesting.
            'I wish I'd been able to tape it,' Wayne lamented.
            'Oh, I'm sure I could get you a copy,' Kirsten said, flicking open a pad and making a note. 'What news service did you see it on?'
            'Pardon?' Wayne asked.
            'What channel?'
            'Um, I can't remember. Guthrie?'
            Guthrie shrugged, just as much in the dark as his friend. 'Don't know.'
            'Anyway, I'll get you a copy from somewhere,' Kirsten assured the boys. She felt like she was handing out a signed autograph.
            To Wayne and Guthrie it seemed like she had a magic wand that she could wave at the drop of a hat. Real power.
            'Wow, that would be great,' Guthrie said. 'It'd really be a help with our project.'
            'How are you going with that camera?' Kirsten asked Wayne, tired of the small talk and now wanting to move on. 'Can we start soon?'
            'Yeah,' Wayne said, quickly bringing the viewfinder up to his eye and attempting to focus. 'We're ready to go.'
            Unfortunately the boys didn't have a tripod, so the camera would have to be hand held for the duration of the interview. At first Wayne and Guthrie had fretted over this. They thought that a still frame would be more professional and looked to find someone who could lend them a tripod. No one could help them out. At the last minute they were told that it was possible to hire a tripod from a camera shop, but they had no finances to speak of. Eventually they came around to the opinion that perhaps a hand held 'look' might be better, giving their profile a more urgent and 'cutting edge' look. They'd seen the style many times on the television, and understood it to be quite legitimate.
            'Okay then,' Kirsten said in a big voice, trying to get proceedings moving along. 'I'm ready when you are. Shoot your questions.'
            Guthrie assumed a more formal pose, held his piece of paper in two hands, as though it were an official government statement about to be released, and asked, 'What did you have for breakfast this morning?'
            Kirsten thought this was some kind of quaint introductory-joke question. 'What?' she said, not sure she had heard right
            Wayne jumped around the desk and honed in closer on his subject, as though he were some inspired avant garde director, getting a good shot.
            Guthrie cleared his throat to try and achieve the best intonation. He thought maybe Kirsten hadn't heard him right. 'What did you have for breakfast?'
            'Breakfast?' Kirsten double-checked the question. Now she was convinced these two kids were crazy. This was the sort of question you asked a teenage pop star.
            'Yes.' Guthrie waited patiently for an answer.
            'Well, nothing really. A cup of coffee. I never have breakfast.'
            'Really?' Guthrie was amazed. 'I could never not have breakfast. Don't you get hungry?'
            'No,' Kirsten shook her head.
            'Who's your favourite pop star?'
            Kirsten had to think for a moment. She thought if this was going to be for a school project she might as well give answers that she thought young people would relate to. 'Michael Jackson.'
            'I love Michael Jackson too. Favourite album?' Guthrie threw in his own unscripted question. He was surprised to find himself taking so easily to interviewing.
            Kirsten Steele now felt a bit uncomfortable. She wasn't into pop music much at all. She probably bought a CD every year, and that was for background, easy listening purposes, or when she was entertaining. Put on the spot, she couldn't for the life of her think of an album title.
            'Heal the world,' Kirsten took a stab in the dark.
            Guthrie felt something was wrong. How could Michael Jackson be her favourite pop star and not know that the King of Pop never had an album called Heal the World? Wayne took a step back with his camera and put the politician more in perspective with her office.
            'You mean Dangerous?' Guthrie suggested. 'Heal the World was a single. It came from the album Dangerous.'
            'Dangerous, of course! I never remember the titles of these CDs. There were some great songs on that album.'
            'What do you think was the best song, besides Heal the world?' Guthrie asked.
            'How about we go to the next question,' Kirsten suggested. 'I don't want to rush things, but I do have a lot of work to get through after this interview.'
            'Sorry,' Guthrie became apologetic. 'Sometimes when I get going I can talk too much.'
            Wayne, hovering behind the camera, worried that Guthrie was about to lose it and blow the interview. He wished he had a good memory, he would have memorised the questions and asked them himself.
            'There's no need to be sorry,' Kirsten smiled. ‘If anyone should apologise, it should be me for my hellish schedule. I really would like to be able to spend more time doing these projects with young students.'
            'Okay then,' Guthrie took a deep breath. 'What's your favourite TV program?'
            'That's easy. The Sunday Current Affairs program. Some of the reports they have on are fascinating, plus their political coverage is the best there is.' Kirsten knew she had one over the boys here. Surely they never in a million years would watch The Sunday Show.
            'I've never heard of that show. When's it on?' Guthrie asked.
            'Sunday morning.'
            'I always watch video hits Sunday morning.'
            'Maybe both of you should switch to the Sunday program. It could help you with your media studies project,' Kirsten suggested, not seriously thinking the boys would take her advice.
            'I suppose we should have a look into it,' Guthrie said to Wayne, who nodded in agreement. 'Next question. Do you watch the Simpsons?'
            Kirsten had briefly watched an episode or two of the Simpsons, so it was not strictly stretching the truth to answer yes, although she was by no means a dedicated viewer. 'Yes, I have - I do watch the Simpsons.'
            Guthrie was tempted to ask who Kirsten's favourite character was, but censored himself from going further. They had to promptly get though the questions.
            'And now the last question, and probably the most important question, how did you become a politician?'
            For this question Wayne thought it most appropriate that he get in for another close up on Kirsten's face. She tilted her head back, drew in a good deal of breath - as if to show that she was giving this question a lot of thought - and launched into her answer, fully conscious that a camera was recording every word.
            'As everyone knows, I grew up in a very political family. Our family evenings were always spent around the dinner table discussing what was happening in politics. Sometimes the debates could get very heated when we discussed some controversial issue, but in the end we always agreed to disagree. I consider myself very lucky to have parents who instilled in me early on an interest in and passion for politics. They were always very supportive of my ambitions, and so when the opportunity arose to take a leadership position in the community they were behind me one hundred percent. Now that I've been promoted to a cabinet position and received the portfolio for Youth Affairs and Education, I hope to make a real impact in these crucial areas.'
            What Kirsten had said seemed impressive enough to the boys, although they didn't grasp what she was really saying, which was nothing at all. Both Wayne and Guthrie immediately assumed, from the key words they picked up like 'leadership', 'impact' and 'promotion' that Kirsten must be even more important than they had first presumed. From the way she talked it sounded like she expected to be Prime Minister within the next six months.
            'What are the sort of things that you're going to do for youth?' Guthrie asked, sensing that he may be able to pick up a scoop here. 'Are you going to try and organise more concerts and stuff?'
            'That would be cool,' Wayne murmured from behind the camera, then cursed himself for talking on camera. They could cut it out later, he thought.
            'Politicians don't organise rock concerts,' Kirsten smiled at Guthrie. 'We look more at issues affecting young people, like the influence of drugs, things like that. At the moment we're looking at a wide range of policies that we hope will benefit young people. Of course poor literacy is at the top of the agenda.'
            The subject of poor literacy was enough for Wayne and Guthrie to bring the interview screeching to a halt. It was something they weren’t at all keen to discuss. Their poor reading skills and inability to rouse themselves to try and improve matters only gave the boys a headache. Three hundred or so pages of Pride and Prejudice still loomed before them.
            'Well, that's the end of our questions,' Guthrie said looking at his sheet of paper and folding it up.
            Kirsten threw back her hair and smiled warmly and broadly. 'Well, that wasn't so bad, was it? I tell you, it's not like being dragged over the hot coals by the real media.'
            'You were great Kirsten,' Wayne said, dropping the camera and holding it in both hands. 'You look amazing on camera.'
            'That's very nice of you. Thankyou. Although I hope my answers are taken more seriously than my looks.'
            'Oh, sure, of course,' Wayne eagerly nodded, followed by Guthrie. 'Your answers were really interesting. We got a lot of good material for our project. I reckon we're going to do really well.'
            'I bet no one else is doing a politician for their project,' Guthrie said. 'Everyone else is doing soapie stars or sporting heroes.'
            'Then you should get an A for originality.'
            'An A would be fantastic. We've never got one before,' Wayne said.
            Kirsten suspected as much. Now that the interview was over she was eager to stop all the small talk and send the boys on their way. 'I'm sure if you put the work into your project you'll get an A+,' she said.
            'Really?' Wayne said. It almost seemed within the realm of the possible now that Kirsten had suggested it.
            'Of course. All you need is dedication and a one hundred percent belief in what you're doing. Then you can achieve anything. That's how I got into my position, through hard work and focusing on my goals. You can achieve your goals too. I can see both of you have the drive and ambition.'
            Wayne and Guthrie were heartened by this pep talk. It filled them with optimism about their bleak futures.
            'Now I'm sorry guys, but I'm going to have to excuse myself. I have a lot of work that I want to get through this evening.' (Kirsten actually had a dinner appointment with her boyfriend Brad.)
            This had the desired effect. Wayne and Guthrie felt like they had overstayed their welcome.
            'Thanks for giving us your time,' Wayne said a little more formally. 'It was really cool of you to help.'
            'Yeah,' Guthrie agreed, picking up his backpack that he'd dropped nearby. 'It's been fantastic.'
            Kirsten got up from her chair and escorted Wayne and Guthrie to the front door. 'Now let me thank you for the opportunity to be interviewed. It's been a learning experience for me too.' Arriving at the office entrance Kirsten then pulled open the door. 'Please, don't hesitate to get in contact with me if you need any more help with your project, although I'm sure you'll have more than enough material on your video camera.'
            At the open door, with no other way to go, Wayne and Guthrie stepped into the street.
            'Thanks Kirsten.'
            'Bye now.'
            As Kirsten Steele let the door swing shut after her interviewers, she thought to herself, 'That should be the last of them'. The fat kid who constantly wheezed for breath gave her the creeps. And the pimply kid - his face was a mess - she found hard to look at. She shivered a little at the revulsion. 'At least I've done my good deed,' she thought, then put Wayne and Guthrie completely out of her head.

Chapter Eight

2004-07-29T05:48:00.000-07:00

            On the train trip home Wayne and Guthrie couldn't stop raving about their subject.
            'I can't believe how nice she was,' Wayne marvelled.
            'She's even more totally beautiful in person,' Guthrie said. 'I wonder if she has a boyfriend.'
            'Maybe she's married.'
            'Lucky bugger.'
            'I got lots of good close ups.'
            'I was so happy when she said she'd be happy to let us interview her again if we needed to. That was really nice of her.'
            'She didn't even have to do that,' Wayne agreed. 'And I really liked how she said that we could get an A+ if we put in the hard work.'
            'Do you really think we could get an A+?' Guthrie said doubtfully, taking out a bag of potato chips from his back pack and opening them.
            Wayne looked at Guthrie incredulously, as though he had missed the very obvious. 'You heard what Kirsten said,' he reminded Guthrie, as though the politician were some type of oracle. 'She said we could do it if we believed in ourselves and went for it. Now to begin with we thought that Kirsten wouldn't want to be interviewed, but then when we asked she agreed to do it. What's to stop us getting an A+?'
            Guthrie looked into his bag of crisps as he spoke. 'It could have been a fluke.'
            Wayne threw his hands up in exasperation. 'It was no fluke! It couldn’t be a fluke. A fluke is an accident. This was no accident. Kirsten wouldn't have given us an interview if she didn't want to. You heard her, politicians are very important and busy people.'
            'Maybe there's something else behind it,' Guthrie munched away.
            'Do you always have to be so down on everything? How are we ever going to get anywhere unless we have a dream?'
            'But dreams aren't reality,' Guthrie said, who now held the empty bag of chips to his mouth and was tapping the bottom to get the last remnants out. 'Remember that.'
            'If I remembered that every time I went to do something I wouldn't do anything. I'd never get out of bed in the morning. C'mon, this is our stop.'
            Wayne and Guthrie got out of the train and started walking to Wayne's house.
            'We'll look at what we've shot on the big television screen,' Wayne said. 'You can't see anything properly on this tiny playback.'
            The boys had played some of their footage back whilst on the tram, but because it was so exciting they decided they should leave it until they got home and could scrutinise it properly. It was a pleasure they really wanted to savour. When they arrived at Wayne’s house there wasn’t exactly a warm welcome waiting. Both parents had their eyes glued to an American cop drama.
            ‘Where have you two been?’ Wayne's father demanded.
            ‘I told you we were doing our interview tonight,’ Wayne said indignantly.
            ‘We met Kirsten Steele,’ Guthrie added coyly.
            ‘Not that business again,’ Mr Grimwood said doubtfully.
            ‘We’ve got the footage here on camera,’ Wayne said. ‘We could show it to you here,’ he nodded to the television.
            ‘Come off it,’ Mrs Grimwood baulked. ‘Be fair. You know this is our favourite show. You kids get to watch television all the time. Use the TV in the spare room.’
            ‘Okay, okay,’ Wayne mumbled. ‘Don’t get your knickers in a knot.’
            ‘You don’t have to speak to your mother like that,’ Mr Grimwood threw an accusing finger at his son. ‘Just watch yourself.’
            It was obvious that the Grimwoods were not overwhelmingly interested in what the boys had been up to. Wayne would have preferred to use the big family TV to premiere his interview with Kirsten Steele, but had to settle for the half broken down television in the spare room. The colour was lousy on that set, and frequently the picture would just disappear into thin air. It required the usual clenched fist banged on top and at the sides to bring it back to its senses.
            Wayne rewinded the tape on the camcorder and plugged in the connecting leads into the television. He hit the play button. Nothing happened.
            'Where's Kirsten?' Guthrie looked worried
            'Hang on,' Wayne said. 'I might have the cords in wrong.'
            Wayne stopped the tape, looked behind the television at the line in / line out sockets and rearranged them. He rewinded the tape and started again. There was relief as the first images popped on the screen. Wayne and Guthrie were very impressed with the results. Just the fact that their work was there on the screen they deemed to be a success in itself. Wayne felt he was quickly mastering the technology.
            ‘Whoa!’ Wayne whooped.
            ‘It looks totally professional,’ Guthrie's face undulated in amazement.
            The truth of the matter was different. In reality, if they were serious about their project, they would have to consider re-shooting. The quality of the camera work made it look like it had been concealed in a sports bag for one of those secret camera capers that are frequently shown on current affairs programs. More than a dozen times Kirsten’s head was chopped in half, or only the right side of her face showed. Once she was completely decapitated. It was lucky that the camera had automatic focus, but unlucky that Wayne managed to focus on the wrong things. In one shot, ostensibly of Kirsten, a plant got in the way and was automatically pulled into focus. Its real subject became a blur. On the up side the microphone had worked well and all the conversation had been faithfully captured. All in all the footage ran for about seven minutes. After they had viewed the material several times the filmmakers wondered what they should do next.
            ‘We’ve got some good footage here,’ Guthrie said. ‘But not a lot.’
            ‘I don’t think we’ll be editing much out,’ Wayne said.
            ‘I don’t think we’ll be editing anything out.’
            ‘Do you think we needed to ask more questions?’
            Guthrie shrugged. ‘Like what?’
            ‘I don’t know. Maybe something more – political. Or even controversial.’
            ‘You don’t know anything about politics. I don't know anything about politics. How could we?’
            ‘Oh well, I reckon we’ve got enough,’ Wayne said cheerily. ‘They don’t expect us to ask indepth political questions. This is a media studies project, not a politics project.’
            ‘They might have wanted us to do a bit of research though,’ Guthrie suggested.
            Wayne brushed these concerns away with a contemptuous hand gesture. ‘We did research. We read that magazine article. Right?’
            ‘I guess so. But was that enough?’
            ‘It doesn’t matter. We’ve got the goods now. We can just pad out the rest. That’s all that television really is anyway. Padding. It’s the secret ingredient, the bubbles of nothing that make it really something,’ he giggled.
            ‘Padding?’ Guthrie mouthed the word, trying it out for a hypothetical fit.
            ‘Yes, padding,’ Wayne announced proudly, as though he’d discovered the secret ingredient to Coke.
            ‘What are we going to pad it out with?’
            This had Wayne stumped. Even padding could prove an intellectual hurdle for the boys.
            ‘Couldn’t we introduce the project ourselves? We could be at the start of it, talking about Kirsten and what she was like to interview,’ Wayne suggested. 'I've seen them do that.'
            Guthrie had little confidence in the idea. ‘Wouldn’t everyone think we were up ourselves, introducing our own video?’
            ‘You’re right,’ Wayne admitted instant defeat. The last thing he wanted was further ridicule from his classmates, although he was sure it was the type of stunt Brett Austin would pull off to thundering applause. ‘I’m sure we’ll come up with something in the end.’
            ‘We’ll have to start thinking about it as soon as possible. We can’t just leave it to the last minute, like we always do. We’ve got to turn over a new leaf this year and start doing things differently.’
            ‘Right. And we will.’
            ‘Good. As long as we agree on that. Do you want to watch it again?’
            ‘I reckon!’
            Wayne rewound the tape immediately.
            For the further technical work to be done on the tape – the transferring of it to VHS videotape – Wayne and Guthrie had to ask, beg is probably more the case, Mr Grimwood. He was the only one with the know how. Wayne wanted to be taught this skill for himself – he thought he would no doubt want to use it later down the track, when he was cranking out the documentaries by the dozen – but his father, who was not a patient man, said it was all too much fuss to teach him and that it would be quicker all round if he just did it himself.
            The camera, with its valuable cargo, was left in Mr Grimwood’s capable hands. Wayne reminded his father that they would need the copy for an upcoming media studies class where students would showcase the work they had done already. It was important stuff. Confident that they really had this one in the bag, the boys breathed easy.

Chapter Nine

2004-07-29T05:46:00.000-07:00

            When Wayne asked a week later for the tape recording containing the media studies interview with Kirsten Steele it sent Noel Grimwood into a panic. He impatiently went through a whole bunch of tapes that he'd recently made, searching for what he thought must have contained the interview. As his search proved more and more futile he tried to move responsibility away from himself.
            'Why are you asking now all of a sudden?' Mr Grimwood fumed. 'You've had weeks to get this organised.'
            'I didn't think it would be such a hassle,' his son said.
            Mr Grimwood huffed childishly. 'Well, it is turning into quite a hassle now, isn't it?'
            'We have to have that tape dad. It's important.'
            'Yes, I know it's important.'
            Wayne thought it wisest not to press the point any further. It could backfire and his father could give up trying to locate the tape. He knew his rages could turn nasty.
            'It's for media studies you said?' Mr Grimwood triumphantly seized a video from the messy pile he kept near the television.
            'Yeah,' Wayne said, hopeful that the tape had been found.
            'Here,' Mr Grimwood thrust it in his son's hands. 'I've titled it MS, that must be it.'
            'Thanks,' Wayne was relieved.
            'Now stop pestering me,' Mr Grimwood insisted.
            Wayne took his father's advice and kept out of his way for the rest of the evening.
            Early next morning Wayne and Guthrie met at their school lockers. Media studies was their first class for the day and they were proud and eager to show off what they'd achieved so far.
            'You've got the tape?' Guthrie asked
            Wayne took off his backpack and patted it. 'Safe and sound.'
            'How did the quality hold up on the transfer?
            'I haven't got to see it yet,' Wayne said.
            'How come?'
            'Dad was in one of his moods. He had trouble finding the video copy and wanted to blame me for it. Then he wanted to hog the television all night, so I couldn’t look at it.'
            'It'll be okay,' Guthrie said. 'You probably can't even notice the difference.'
            'Exactly,' Wayne agreed.
            The boys entered their class and took their seats. It was in its usual state of chaos. Everyone was talking at the top of their voices, making it impossible to speak at a normal volume. Some students were showing off what they'd done already. Wayne and Guthrie felt an inner glow of pride: they were sure their footage of a real politician, of someone who they at least thought was sexy, would blow everyone out of the water.
            Mr Allcock strutted into the classroom. He was wearing a trendy T-shirt that featured an alien figure embossed in plastic, a pair of baggy jeans and his signature thick rectangular black rimmed glasses.
            'Okay, everyone, quieten down,' he motioned his hands in a levelling gesture.
            Everyone shut up, except Poppy Vacuse-Best. She continued to talk to her neighbour, oblivious to all around her.
            'Poppy!' Mr Allcock raised his voice.
            Poppy snapped to attention. 'What?' she said insolently.
            'Can you please be quiet, I'm trying to start a class here.'
            'Don't let me stop you,' Poppy said sarcastically, turning in her seat.
            'Right, as I told you last week, I wanted you all to bring in what you had done so far for the semester project. I trust you have all remembered to bring in some examples of your work?'
            Mr Allcock searched the class for hands raised ready with excuses. He was surprised to see none.
            'Wayne and Guthrie?' Mr Allcock walked over to the boys' desks and lent on them a little. 'Have you two got something to show?'
            Mr Allcock was singling them out, a little unfairly. It was true they had a terrible reputation amongst all the teachers for never having their homework ready on time, and for making last minute extension negotiations. Yet to humiliate them like this in class, insinuating that they were hopeless, and that not much could be expected from them, was a little mean.
            The videotape containing the interview sat on Wayne's desk. Wayne pointed at it, a smirk of triumph curling on his lips. 'Me and Guthrie have got an interview with Kirsten Steele that we did at her office.'
            'Who is Kirsten Steele?' Mr Allcock asked, unimpressed.
            'She's the new Minister for Youth,' Guthrie was proud to announce. He felt smart, especially since Mr Allcock didn't know who Kirsten Steele was, and obviously should have.
            'Really?' Mr Allcock doubted. 'I've never heard of her.'
            'She was only elected recently,' Wayne said, trying to explain his teacher's ignorance on the subject.
            'Okay,' Mr Allcock tapped his finger on the videotape. 'I'm sure we'll all be very interested in seeing your interview.'
            Mr Allcock returned to the front of the class and tried to rouse his students, who all looked listless and ready to drop off to sleep even though it was only nine in the morning.
            'Who's up first?'
            Poppy's arm immediately shot up in the air. She went to the front of the class with her partner in the project, a frizzy haired girl named Cleo.
            'I'm going to be the spokesperson for our project. Okay?' Poppy turned to Mr Allcock.
            Mr Allcock shrugged. 'Alright.'
            'So okay, we've chosen to do a profile on soapie star Rick Strickland. Me and Cleo have met him already, in real person, and he is so sweet.'
            Cleo nodded in total agreement.
            'We've chosen to do our profile in a magazine format. There's going to be an interview, facts page, 'did you know about' section, career history and a Rick Strickland crossword. Oh, and not forgetting a sexy pinup. So far Rick has been sweet enough to pose for some photos, which we are now going to pass around the class.'
            This was a job for Cleo, as non-speaker and general lackey. She started handing out the photos for everyone's perusal.
            'Please be careful with them,' Poppy warned. 'Just because we have double prints and negatives does not mean that these photos can be treated like crap. As you can see Rick was really very cooperative with us, especially when we told him we were working for a new teen magazine, soon to be launched. He didn't have a problem at all with taking off his top. Please note everyone, Rick told us those pecs were developed over an intensive two year programme.'
            'You shouldn’t be misleading your subject,' Mr Allcock said. 'He may have cooperated because he thought he was going to appear in a legitimate magazine. I don't want you grappling with ethical issues yet.'
            Poppy got very snitchy at the suggestion. 'I am not misleading Rick. I take this project very seriously. As far as I'm concerned, this will be a real magazine. Please notice the photo quality everyone,' Poppy returned her attention to the class. 'The skin tones are so real. Rick even offered to strip right down to the buff. But we had to say no. I mean, we're not making a porno here. Rick said he would sign individual copies upon request, so now's the chance girls. I can take orders right here if you like.'
            This caused a commotion. No wonder Poppy's popularity was never in dispute. Suddenly every female voice in Mr Allcock's media studies class was calling out that they wanted a signed copy. Pleased with the response Poppy took out a pen and paper.
            'Okay ladies, okay,' Poppy tried to quell the excitement, 'just one at a time, please. Don't worry. I will personally make sure that everyone in the class gets a chance to place an order.'
            Mr Allcock grabbed Poppy's notebook and sent her back to her seat. 'Poppy will be taking all orders on her own time' he told everyone. 'You can speak to her after class if you want a signed copy of her magazine, but not during my class. Now who's next?'
            To this Wayne and Guthrie immediately thrust up their hands. Mr Allcock either ignored or didn't notice them.
            'Brett. You look like you've got a lot of interesting stuff there. Tell us about it.'
            The boys felt passed over and resented Brett, who had been chosen because he was the most popular boy. His popularity even had the power to unconsciously work on Mr Allcock.
            Brett got up from his seat, cheered by his coterie of mates, and swaggered up to the front of the class with a bag full of promotional gear. He stood before everyone with his hands on his hips, then rubbed a long finger under his nose and waited for everyone's attention.
            'I'm doing something on Matt Stone for my project,' Brett announced.
            Mr Allcock nodded, waiting for more. There was a murmur of excitement through the class. Everyone knew that he was a famous footballer, and that Brett's dad being a sports presenter it was obvious he would get easy access to his subject.
            'He's the undisputed best player in football today,' Brett asserted.
            'Will you be able to meet and set up an interview with him?'
            'Oh yeah, easy. He's a friend of the family.'
            'That's good,' Mr Allcock said. 'You'll have lots of access to your subject. Have you got an example of what you've been working so far?'
            'I've been getting some corporate sponsorship happening,' Brett said, even though this really had nothing to do with his media studies project. He started dragging freebies and give aways out of a huge sporting bag and flinging them at the class. 'I got stickers, sporting socks, sweat bands, watches, caps. I even got some trainers here. Anyone size 7?'
            A lot of hands went up and the trainers were thrown out. Mr Allcock looked on, impressed.
            'It seems like you've been learning a lot of negotiating skills here. I see a definite career ahead as a sporting entrepreneur.'
            'Yeah,' Brett couldn't resist the opportunity to gloat. 'I've been talking to a lot of the big people at the big companies. When you explain what you're doing, and how you can promote the people and products they represent, they all want to come on board. I'm meeting a top representative from Nike this week.'
            There was much ooohing and ahhhing from the students in the class. Brett still hadn't explained what his project would actually involve.
            'That's really well done,' Mr Allcock commended Brett. 'You've really been getting out there and seeing how the media works at grass roots level. Excellent.'
            Guthrie knew that Brett would be a hard act to follow. He had the whole class practically at his feet. He even said that he would probably be able to get Matt Stone to give the class a talk. Guthrie was in no hurry to follow. Not so Wayne. When Mr Allcock asked for another volunteer, his arm shot up in the air.
            'No!' Guthrie muttered desperately, having suddenly lost confidence in their material. 'Wait until later.'
            'Why? What we've got is better than that. He was just giving away stuff.'
            Mr Allcock knew he couldn't avoid the boys a second time, especially with Wayne's arm almost being dislodged from its socket with enthusiasm.
            'Alright Wayne and Guthrie. You can have your turn. Come on up here.'
            The class barely stirred. It was obvious there was little interest in what Wayne and Guthrie had done. Being the class geeks everyone assumed it must be either boring or stupid.
            Guthrie stood staring at the ground, ready for humiliation. Wayne proudly handed the tape to Mr Allcock. The TV and video was already positioned in front of the class.
            'Is it cued?' Mr Allcock looked dubiously at the tape.
            'Sorry?' Wayne asked, confused. He didn't know what it meant to have a tape 'cued'
            'Is it ready to go?'
            'Oh, yeah.'
            Mr Allcock pushed the tape in and leaned languidly on the TV.
            'Would you like to introduce it, or shall I just press the play button?'
            'I'll introduce it,' Wayne said. Guthrie continued to look at his feet. 'As I said before, we're doing our project on Kirsten Steele, who is a politician. She is now a member for youth in the government and so is really quite relevant to young people. Me and Guthrie are going to make a sort of documentary on her, we think. What we're about to show is an interview we did with her a few weeks ago in which we ask her some questions about herself.' Wayne paused briefly. He felt like he had come to a dead end and had nothing more to say. Rather than continue to warble on - which is what he wanted to do in one sense, for he found that he quite liked talking things up - he decided to get the show on the road. 'That's about it really. We're ready to go now.'
            'You can go back to your seats while we watch the tape,' Mr Allcock instructed. He pressed the play button, turned off the lights, crossed his arms and looked at the TV screen.
            All sat waiting for the images to flicker on. Wayne and Guthrie felt their hearts beating a hundred miles an hour. An image popped up on the screen, with its accompanying soundtrack. It was not what the boys had expected. A cheesy title came up in pink and blue that said, Malibu Sunshine and a fake sophisticated American voice over started to talk. 'Welcome to Malibu Sunshine,' the voice intoned cheerily, 'where America's sexiest kittens come out to play.' A group of three young blonde females came running along the sand arm in arm, and completely topless. The camera then closed in on them, tightly cropping their breasts and heads into the one shot. If they could have done away with the heads the filmmakers certainly would have done so. 'But it's not all play for these beauties,' the voice over cautioned. 'No. These girls have got work to do.' The next shot showed the same three girls, again topless but wearing different bikinis, washing a car. Soapsuds covered a hot red sports number. As the girls put some elbow grease into their scrubbing their breasts playfully jangled over the red paintwork. As if on cue, the girls then started throwing sponges at each other. They laughed and giggled. 'Now girls,' the voice over said. 'Be nice.' Soon buckets of hot soapy water were being thrown and the girls were drenched. The footage slowed down and the film makers zoomed in on the soaped up bodies with glee.
            Wayne and Guthrie were both aroused and horrified. They wanted the tape to stop, they wanted to keep watching, and they wanted to know where their own footage was. Had Wayne's dad put it somewhere at the end of the tape? Why had he given them this tape in the first place? The whole class was in an uproar. The boys were whooping with excitement, whereas the girls were turning away, squealing 'gross!'.
            'I think we've seen more than enough,' Mr Allcock eventually pressed the stop button. He too wanted to watch more, but knew his career could be over if he had left it on a minute longer. 'Guthrie, turn on the lights.'
            Guthrie did as requested.
            'Is this some type of sick joke?' he demanded. 'I should confiscate this.'
            'My dad gave it to me!' Wayne pleaded desperately, trying to get himself out of hot water.
            'Don't be ridiculous.'
            'He did. I asked him to make me a copy off the camcorder and onto a VHS tape. When I asked him for the tape last night, that's the one he gave me. Can't we look through the rest of the tape? It must be on there somewhere.'
            'I hardly think we're going to subject the class to more trauma,' Mr Allcock said.
            At least half the class didn't think this way. A chant had started up amongst the boys. 'More tape! More tape!'
            'Will you all be quiet!' Mr Allcock demanded. He then returned his attention to Wayne and Guthrie. 'This tape has caused enough disruption in the class. It wouldn't surprise me if everyone in this class has to undergo some type of counselling because of this little stunt that the two of you have pulled. Do you know you could even be charged with sexual harassment? It's not entirely impossible.'
            At first Wayne and Guthrie had thought Mr Allcock's reaction a little out of hand. It was only some breasts afterall, not some major crime against humanity. But now that he had mentioned sexual harassment it seemed much more serious, like they could be up for criminal prosecution. Yet the boys knew they were innocent. It was Mr Grimwood's tape. He must have taped the show for his own viewing pleasure.
            Mr Allcock pulled the tape out of the video machine and thrust it at Wayne. 'Here,' he said. 'I don't ever want to see this again. You're lucky we didn't see much, otherwise I may have been tempted to report this. Is that understood?'
            Wayne's natural impulse was to plead his innocence. His lips experienced an immediate spasm, but Mr Allcock raised an admonishing finger. He knew it was no use. He would have to take the tape home and ask his father about it.
            Out by the lockers after class there were mixed reactions from their fellow students. The boys seemed to think it was a bit of a lark. They were still laughing as they talked about it. Although this didn't mean that the boys had been accepted.
            'You two really are pathetic little geeks,' Brett Austen laughed as he walked past them. 'Didn't you think that you could get yourself expelled? If you weren't such jerks I'd almost say I liked what you did.'
            As Brett's coterie of friends sashayed past they all pointed accusing fingers at Wayne and Guthrie, warning them to watch it in the future. It was the usual type of aggressive behaviour that they copped, determined to keep them in their place.
            It was Poppy who was risibly angry. She approached Wayne and Guthrie directly.
            'The both of you are filthy perverts,' she openly denounced them, making sure everyone around her heard. 'Haven't you ever heard of feminism? Women's rights? What you showed in there was demeaning to women.'
            Wayne was pissed off in turn. He thought she was a hypocrite. 'What about those topless photos you were passing around to everyone? What if I found that demeaning to men?'
            'Yeah!' Guthrie eagerly agreed. He just realised the a double standard being applied here.
            Poppy scoffed at the idea. 'Please!' she said. 'I think there is a difference between pornography and a serious portraiture study. Yes, maybe there was a tinge of the erotic in my photos. Am I to blame if Rick Strickland is totally hot? But it certainly wasn't some smutty porn. It's for a girl's magazine, afterall!'
            'You just said Rick Strickland was hot, and you asked him to take his top off,' Wayne shot back. 'Your pictures were just as bad as the video.'
            Poppy flicked her hair back. It was obvious she felt she was right and Wayne and Guthrie were wrong. She wasn't going to argue the point any further. She started to walk off. 'I have a good mind to report you,' she said over her shoulder as she marched down the corridor.
            'Well, then we can report you too!' Wayne called after her.
            'It wasn't even our fault,' Guthrie hollered down the hallway. 'It was an accident. We're innocent.'

Chaper Ten

2004-07-29T05:44:00.000-07:00

            After school, Wayne and Guthrie went to their favourite pizza parlour. They were both depressed, and when Guthrie was depressed he always wanted to eat. He knew it was bad to eat more just because he was feeling down, but when he was that down he just couldn't be bothered worrying about anything.
            The day had gone from bad to worse. It seemed like they forgot to do most of their homework, so for every class they were coming up with lame excuses, excuses their teachers had heard a million times before. For their English class they were expected to have read the first three chapters of Pride and Prejudice. When their English teacher asked if they had read chapters one to three they automatically lied. It came naturally to them. Then when they were quizzed on plot and character their response was inevitably a big fat blank. They had to back track and admit that they had lied in the first place. Their original plan of watching Pride and Prejudice on video had come to nothing. They had hired out a BBC version from the video library. It came in a daunting double package. Even the cover, with its heroine prettily done up, twirling a parasol, made Wayne and Guthrie yawn. The running time of some six hours was another hurdle to be gotten over. They had the two video set for a week to watch, but it just sat collecting dust until Wayne's mother brought his attention to the fact that it was more than likely overdue. They had not attempted to watch it again since.
            Sitting with the day's gloomy memories replaying dully over in their minds, Wayne and Guthrie munched on their Hawaiian pizza and guzzled their coke. They sat silent for a while, barely saying anything to each other. Whatever hopes and dreams they had for their media studies project seemed to have been strangled and put in a coffin, then buried six feet under.
            Guthrie sat morosely studying the last piece of pizza. His face had a very empty look on it. He took another gulp of his coke.
            'Have it, it's yours,' Wayne urged.
            'No, you have it if you want it,' Guthrie said.
            'I'm full. I think I'd be sick if I had another piece.'
            'You don't mind?'
            Wayne vigorously shook his head, looked like he was trying to hold something in, then let out a full throttled belch. 'Go for it.'
            Guthrie shrugged as if he didn't really care one way or the other and took up the piece of pizza.
            Wayne took the video out of his backpack and studied it.
            'We're going to have to ask your dad about it,' Guthie said.
            'I know,' Wayne said dolefully. 'He's going to be pissed off.'
            'Why should he? It's his fault, isn't it?'
            'It must be, but you know what he's like.'
            Guthrie asked the question that they were both dreading. 'Do you think he's still got the original video we recorded? Because if we haven't got that anymore we're stuffed.'
            'I don’t know. I hope like hell he has.'
            Neither Wayne nor Guthrie were confident of a favourable outcome.
            'What are we going to do if the tape's gone?' Guthrie asked.
            Wayne had started crunching the ice from his glass of coke between his teeth. 'Stuffed if I know.'
            That night Wayne and Guthrie went home their separate ways. Wayne decided it would be best if he approached his father alone. He knew that he didn't particularly like Guthrie, and that his presence under questioning might only irk him further.
            Luckily that night Mrs Grimwood had one of her Weight Watchers meetings to attend. She would be out of the house after six. Wayne's older sister, Erin, was housesitting a friend's joint, which cleared her out of the way. It would be just father and son. Mrs Grimwood had left two prepared dinners in the fridge. They were sausages and boiled vegetables, covered in cling wrap. They just had to be heated up in the oven.
            Wayne and his father sat together on the couch and watched the news, shovelling the food in. At the end of the news service some crappy show came on that Mr Grimwood wasn’t at all keen on. He picked up the remote control, zapped the TV off and threw it to his side. Mr Grimwood couldn’t be bothered moving, even though he knew there were things he should do. As father and son sat together they both started to feel a tinge uncomfortable, even though they saw each other every day around the house and there was no reason to feel this way.
            ‘How was your day?’ Mr Grimwood said for form’s sake. He didn’t like to feel awkward, especially in his own house and around his own son.
            This was just the sort of opening that Wayne needed.
            ‘Ah, pretty bad dad,’ Wayne said.
            ‘Pretty bad? What does that mean? You’re not in any sort of trouble are you?’
            ‘I almost did today.’
            Mr Grimwood crossed his arms, having made his judgement already. ‘Okay, what did you do?’
            ‘You know how you dubbed that tape for me, of the school interview me and Guthrie made?’
            Mr Grimwood tensed up a little. ‘Yes.’
            ‘I took that tape to school today and showed it to my media studies class, but the interview wasn’t on it. Something else was on it.’
            ‘Which was?’
            ‘Here, let me get the tape.’
            Wayne picked up his backpack from a nearby chair and took out the tape. He slipped it in the video machine and handed over the remote. Mr Grimwood pressed play. As the tape picked up from where it had left off in class, his face dropped to the floor. His eyes seemed like balloons being slowly filled with hot air, ready to explode.
            ‘This was shown to the whole class,’ Wayne said. ‘Mr Allcock said I could be up on charges of sexual assault. One of the girls in the class said I was a pervert.’
            As Mr Grimwood slowly turned to his son his face had lost all of its colour. ‘Jesus, Joseph and Mary!’ he exclaimed. ‘You showed this to the whole class?’
            Wayne felt so angry at his father, blaming him when he should be blaming himself, that he almost started to cry. ‘It’s not my fault!’ he could barely control his voice. ‘You gave me the tape!’
            ‘I suppose everyone knows that it’s my tape?’ Mr Grimwood asked, expecting he was going to have some explaining to do in the principal’s office.
            ‘I tried to tell Mr Allcock,’ Wayne said. ‘But I didn’t really get a chance. I think he thought me and Guthrie were trying to make a practical joke or something.’
            ‘And what’s going to happen now?’ Mr Grimwood asked.
            ‘Nothing. We were both just given a warning.’
            Mr Grimwood felt relieved somewhat. At least he wouldn’t have to go through the gruelling embarrassment of explaining how he came to give his son such a tape to show at school. He thought briefly about seeing Mr Allcock and trying to white wash in some way what had happened, giving himself some kind of indirect blame. His conscience said he shouldn’t let his son take responsibility for what had happened. But then it seemed he might be taking it all too seriously. It had all blown over, hadn't it? By now it had probably all been forgotten. Why bring it up again? There was no major to do about it really. And besides, it had been an innocent mistake.
            ‘Well, I suppose there’s been no harm done,’ Mr Grimwood said, as though he were forgiving an offence done against him. 'As long as your mother doesn't find out about it. We'll have to keep it between us.'
            It was funny how his father could twist the words around so he felt guilty, Wayne thought.
            ‘But what about the interview? Where is it if it’s not on this tape?’
            ‘Sorry, what’s that?’ Mr Grimwood had drifted away watching the topless women on the video.
            ‘The interview with Kirsten Steele?’ Wayne urged.
            ‘Oh, right. The school project. Yes. Okay. Well, it must still be on a tape somewhere, I suppose.’
            ‘Can we find it then?’ Wayne almost had to prick his father to action. He picked up the remote and turned off the Malibu Sunshine video to get his father’s attention.
            The next two hours were spent in frustration trying to track down the seven minutes of interview. They fast forwarded through tape after tape and could find nothing. Wayne's initial anxiety over the missing footage gradually turned to a numb acceptance that his father had taped over the interview with Kirsten Steele. He saw the future unravel before him, in which he would fail his media studies class. The cruel irony was that his father would be there looking at his abysmal report card and asking why he had not done better.
            As they came to the end of the last tape, the bad news was there for all to see. 'If it's not on this tape then I don't know where it is,' Mr Grimwood said, grimly.
            'Don't you have any other tapes that you might not have looked at?' Wayne said hopefully.
            'No, that's it. I don't have any other tapes hidden anywhere.'
            'What am I going to do now?' Wayne groaned.
            'Like my father always said, if at first you don't succeed then try again,' Mr Grimwood offered up a cliché for consolation. 'Quitters don't inherit the world. Winners are those who persevere through great hardship. They're not wimps.'
            Wayne thought his father could have at least apologised for his incompetence. The last thing he needed was a motivational talk. He had been motivated before, but now he felt like he couldn't care less about anything
            'Can I at least borrow your camcorder again?' Wayne asked. 'And this time I'll buy my own tape and mark it specifically. I'll even get it transferred somewhere, so you won't have to worry about it.'
            It was natural to Mr Grimwood to hesitate when asked for a favour or just to perform some kind of minuscule kindness. If he saw someone rattling a tin for charity on a sidewalk, he crossed the street, even though all that would be required was a few small coins. He hesitated now, then blurted out, trying to seem spontaneous (he did feel some guilt afterall and wanted Wayne to do his project well), 'Of course you can. But we'll discuss it later.'
            The next thing Wayne had to do was call Guthrie and give him the bad news. Guthrie's mother answered the phone. Wayne politely asked how Mrs Dulwich was and then asked for Guthrie. Mrs Dulwich hollered Guthrie's name through the house and Wayne could hear his friend holler in return that he was coming.
            'What's up?' Guthrie asked breathlessly, finally getting to the phone.
            'The news is bad.'
            'Augh, don't say it!'
            'Dad can't find the interview.'
            'But it must be somewhere.'
            'We've gone through all the tapes. I'm sick of looking at them.'
            'Then where’s our interview?'
            'Dad must have taped over it.'
            'Well that's great,' Guthrie was exasperated. 'What are we going to do now?'
            'I don’t know.'
            There was a desperate silence over the phone for a few moments as both tried to figure a way out.
            'I suppose we'll have to find someone else to do the project on,' Guthrie said.
            'I can't believe we've wasted all that time already,' Wayne said mournfully.
            'Nothing good ever happens to us,' Guthrie moaned, feeling sorry for himself. 'We're jinxed. We may as well give up now. I'm going to give up the diet mum's trying to put me on too. What's the use?'
            'There must be something we can do,' Wayne said, not wanting to give up, despite the overall gloom.
            'Yeah, like what? There's no use anyway - something will just go wrong. Like it always does.'
            'I wish we could interview Kirsten again.'
            'Ha! I doubt she's going to want to waste her time twice. She'll ask why we're doing it again and then we'll have to tell her the truth. She'll think we're hopeless. She wouldn't trust us to not lose the tape again.'
            Wayne thought hard about all of this. He wanted to interview Kirsten again, but agreed with Guthrie that they had blown it. It didn't look too professional to ask for a second interview because they lost the first tape. Both were too cowardly to call Kirsten again. Nevertheless, Wayne was hell bent on coming up with a solution.
            'Maybe we could film her secretly, coming and going from her office, and mix it in with some television footage?' Wayne suggested. 'We could do research at the library and do a voice over.'
            It was obviously a silly plan. 'That's a dumb idea,' Guthrie said flatly.
            'At least I'm trying to come up with something.'
            'We wouldn't have to come up with something if your stupid dad hadn't lost our interview.'
            'Tell me about it.'
            'I better go,' Guthrie said. 'Mum's looking at me and pointing her finger at her watch. I should be studying.'
            'Okay then. I'll try to think of some more ideas tonight.'
            'I'll see you tomorrow.'
            Wayne hung up the phone and stared into space. He snapped out of his trance, realising that a state of nothingness would get him nowhere, and slipped off the barstool he'd been sitting on. 'Better try and get something done,' he thought to himself and went to his bedroom.

Chapter Eleven

2004-07-29T05:42:00.000-07:00

            At her apartment Kirsten Steele was sorting though some written material that was to go into a fifty-page pamphlet, or booklet, that the government was putting out to promote its policies on youth and education. It was all a bit of propaganda really, but was the first serious thing that Kirsten had had to overlook. She was to write a short one-page introduction to the booklet herself. That was indeed a task in itself, because Kirsten didn't know a lot about the government's policies and initiatives in that area. She was new to her portfolio and had to spend a lot of time reading up and mastering the material involved.
            She had come up with a rough draft of the introduction. It was only about four hundred words, but Kirsten was quite proud of it. She would later give it to a series of advisers who would go over it with a fine toothcomb. The only thing that frustrated her about the booklet was its lacklustre cover. It just had the drab title, with the name of the government attached to it and that was it. Kirsten thought she could do better. It needed more pizzazz if people were to be interested in it.
            As Kirsten studied this material under a desk lamp, her boyfriend Brad lifted weights in the corner of the room in a pair of shorts and singlet.
            'I don't know who comes up with these boring covers,' Kirsten said, frustrated, 'but something’s got to change.'
            'Show me,' Brad said, putting down his weights.
            'Here,' Kirsten held up the cover of the booklet. 'What do you think when you look at it?'
            'What do I think?' Brad said confused. 'I don't think anything.'
            'I mean, what does it impress upon you - if anything? What's your opinion of it, aesthetically?'
            'Nothing.'
            ‘Exactly.’
            Brad then said something dumb, which actually turned out to be quite clever. ‘It needs some pictures on it, to liven it up a bit.’
            It seemed such an obvious thing to say. You didn’t just put pictures on government publications in order to jazz them up. But then Brad said something which turned Kirsten’s mind around.
            ‘You should put your picture on the front of it,’ he suggested. ‘It’s your book, isn’t it?’
            Kirsten gave her boyfriend a brittle you-are-a-dummy put down smile. ‘No, it’s not my book. It’s a government book, although it does have my name on the introduction.’
            ‘I've got an idea!’ Brad said suddenly. He held his hands out like he was a movie director framing a masterpiece shot. His hands panned slightly for dramatic effect. ‘You should do some photos with some young kids, like showing that you’re helping them. You could do stuff like sit at a computer with them and pretend to be showing them things. They always do stuff like that on those boring government books. What do you reckon?’
            At first the idea had seemed silly to Kirsten. She couldn’t star on the front of the booklet. She'd look like she was right up herself. It just wasn’t her place to do so. But the idea of putting her there with a chorus of youngsters, now that could work.
            ‘It could be a series of photos,’ Kirsten said, rolling the idea over in her mind. ‘Showing different aspects of the Middle of the Road party’s various policies.’
            ‘Problem solved,’ Brad said, happy with himself. He returned to his weights and started lifting again.
            ‘I’ve got it!’ Kirsten announced, excited. ‘I’ll get those two geeky kids to be in it, the ones who interviewed me for their school media studies project. Perfect! They’ll give it that realistic look, and I mean realistic. They look like your typical high school students. It’s lucky that I met them when I think about it. They're going to come in handy.’
            Brad smiled from his exercise corner, happy with himself. He felt he could now almost call himself Kirsten's political adviser.
            ‘But hang on, I don’t even have any contact details for them!’ Kirsten remembered.
            The dopey smile dropped from Brad’s lips.
            ‘Shit! What am I going to do?’
            Brad shrugged, lost again. 'I don't know.'
            ‘Think, think, think,’ Kirsten muttered to herself, pacing the room. ‘What school did they say they went to? It must have been a local state school. I know, I'll check it up in the phone directory. It can't be that hard to find. How many Guthrie and Wayne's can there be? Looks like I might have to pay a visit and get the boys on board my project.'
            'Do you reckon they'll want to be in it?' Brad asked.
            'Of course they will,' Kirsten brushed aside all doubts. 'And besides, they owe me one.'

Chapter Twelve

2004-07-29T05:38:00.000-07:00

            When Kirsten had a project on the boil she went in boots and all. She didn't waste a second dilly-dallying. The next morning she went about calling all the schools in the area. Luckily, during this process she had remembered Wayne's surname Grimwood and now had something real to go on. After making inquiries at a dozen or more schools she finally located her quarry. The boys, she discovered, went to Breezedale high school. Kirsten phoned the principal, a Mr Davies. She explained her situation, informed the principal she was a politician, waffled on a bit, said she was in the middle of doing a project with Wayne and Guthrie and had lost their phone numbers. Could she come in and visit the boys in person? The principal could hardly disagree. 'Yes, by all means,' he said. 'When would you like to pay a visit?'
            'How about within the hour?' Kirsten said.
            'It's that urgent?' the principal was a little taken aback.
            'Not urgent really,' Kirsten replied. 'I just like to get things done.'
            Half an hour later Kirsten was sitting in Principal Davies' office, sipping tea from one of his dainty cup and saucer sets and nibbling on a biscuit. Mr Davies had been amazed to learn that Kirsten Steele was not just a run of the mill politician, she was the newly appointed Minister for Education and Youth Affairs. He could hardly believe his luck.
            'Well, I must say that it's quite extraordinary to have the Minister for Education…….'
            'And Youth Affairs,' Kirsten jumped ahead of the principal.
            '……and Youth Affairs sit in my office like this,' the principal smiled. 'I know a lot of other educators who would give their right arm for the chance to sit down and discuss all the relevant issues with you. It’s a chance that doesn't come by every day. There's so many issues that I'd love to ask you about myself, like what's your opinion on the influence of the Internet on students? Will it have a bigger impact than television did on our generation? Of course there's a lot of bad stuff out there, but access to such an infinitesimal range of information is amazing.'
            'Well, the Internet is huge,' Kirsten tried to formulate an answer, although this was not what she had come for. 'How it will transform the next generation? It's anyone's guess.'
            'Too early to call?' Mr Davies proposed.
            'Too early to call,' Kirsten confirmed.
            'What about the diminishing influence of Shakepeare?' It seemed the principal had a battery of questions he was ready to fire off. 'The study of Shakespeare is something that's quite close to my heart. Do you think it important that we keep the bard alive and well in schools?'
            Kirsten, to be frank, couldn't care less about the bard. She was more directly interested at the moment in enlisting the help of Wayne and Guthrie, not all of this flim flam.
            'Mr Davies, it's a tough question, a question I would need a bit of time to think over,' Kirsten said. 'And I thank you for your interest in discussing educational matters and theories, but at the moment my time really is pressed. I'm sorry, but how soon could I see Wayne and Guthrie?'
            Mr Davies was flummoxed by Kirsten's fly by night style. It was obvious she didn't want to discuss education in any way, shape or form. In fact, she came across as being quite an impatient young woman. All she wanted to do was see Wayne and Guthrie for whatever reason she had and then move on. It didn't leave the principal with a very good impression of the new Minister for Education and Youth Affairs. Nevertheless, he looked on the bright side that he had made a contact, albeit unwittingly, with a government minister. That had to be a good thing, one way or another. Although he couldn't imagine approaching this woman if he had any concerns about the way education was being managed in the country.
            'Of course,' Mr Davies pushed back his chair and stood up. 'I've been babbling away and completely forgot your prime reason for coming here.'
            'I understand,' Kirsten said. 'You're passionate about education and you want to discuss it twenty four hours a day. You're exactly what we need in our schools, people who are passionate about educating our young. They are the next generation of leaders, afterall.'
            Mr Davies smiled grimly. The more he heard Kirsten Steele talk, the more he got to know her, the more distant he felt from her. She said all the right words, but nothing of what she said resonated in any way. Rather, her utterances were loud and strident but hollow. 'Wayne and Guthrie are in their history class at the moment,' the principal said. 'I'll only be a few minutes.'
            Kirsten smiled sweetly.
            Mr Davies knocked on room 15B's door and entered. Mrs Marchant was in the middle of conducting her class. Upon hearing the knock at the door she stopped talking and all her students looked eagerly to see who it was. Wayne and Guthrie had been drifting off. They were only half way through the class and they felt like they'd been sitting there an eternity. The novelty of having someone knock on the door broke up the monotony. As the principal entered the room fell quiet with expectation. Something serious was up if the principal had to interrupt.
            'I'm sorry to be interrupting your class,' Mr Davies said.
            'Not at all,' Mrs Marchant smiled, standing with a marker in her hand. 'What can I do for you?'
            'I need to see Wayne Grimwood and Guthrie Dulwich in my office, straightaway,' the principal said.
            Wayne and Guthrie suddenly felt sick to the stomach. More properly they were shitting bricks. They thought they must be in real, dire trouble. They raced through their minds trying to think of some heinous crime they had recently committed. Maybe they were being expelled, or sent to another school for dumb kids. Most likely Mr Allcock had squealed on them about the video. Either way they presumed something terrible was afoot.
            'Wayne, Guthrie,' Mrs Marchant prompted the boys. 'Up you get.'
            Wayne and Guthrie rose to their feet. They felt like they were being marched off to their execution. Everyone in the class looked at them with a sense of awe and pity. They were obviously in for it, one way or another. But for what no one had a clue.
            'Thankyou Mrs Marchant, and once again I apologise for disrupting your class,' the principal said.
            Mrs Marchant bowed her head ever so slightly, accepting the apology. 'I have some notes that I will give the boys next class that will help them catch up with whatever they miss.'
            Mr Davies left the class with Wayne and Guthrie in tow. As soon as the principal closed the door behind the class rippled with murmurs. Everyone tried to imagine what the boys had done that had caused them to be called away, mid class.
            'Alright, a bit of shush everyone,' Mrs Marchant tried to whip everyone back into line. 'This has nothing to do with us and we shouldn't be sticking our noses in. Now, please return to your books. We were reading about…….'
            Yet even though everyone tried to return to their books, no one could take their minds off the intrigue.
            'Why have we been called to your office?' Wayne meekly asked the principal, unable to bare the suspense any further.
            'We haven't done something wrong, have we?' Guthrie asked.
            Mr Davies gave a little chuckle. He regularly forgot that he was an authority figure, and that a summons to his office was filled with fear and trepidation.
            'Not at all,' the principal said, coming to his office door. He then chuckled some more. 'Why, have you been planning something that I should know about?'
            Wayne and Guthrie didn't get that this was a joke.
            'No! No!' they both protested.
            Mr Davies swung open his office door and held out a hand, indicating that Wayne and Guthrie were to enter ahead of him. Hearing the door open Kirsten Steele swung her head around - she had been staring at an antiquated picture of the queen on the wall - and smiled. She immediately stood and energetically rushed towards the boys. Wayne and Guthrie felt as many emotions in the space of a few seconds as they were ever likely to feel. They were happy, dazed, relieved, confused and totally besotted with Kirsten Steele. They were expecting the worst and now here was the beautiful Kirsten, waiting to receive them. It was like something out of a dream. They suddenly felt very special, and they instinctively knew - they couldn't figure out why - that something good was about to happen to them.
            'Boy, am I happy to see you two,' Kirsten said. 'I thought I'd never find you.'
            Wayne and Guthrie were too mesmerised to say anything. They still had to take it all in. Their mouths couldn't move to formulate any words, like our bodies become impotent in dreams when trying to flee danger.
            'Shall we all take a seat?' Mr Davies said. 'Then we can explain to Wayne and Guthrie what's going on.'
            'Of course,' Kirsten said, resuming her seat.
            'What are you doing here?' Guthrie finally asked.
            'Well, it goes something like this,' Kirsten said vivaciously. 'I did a favour for you, and now I need you to do a favour for me.'
            'Us?' Wayne said, not knowing what on earth the two of them could do for Kirsten, who surely must have every resource at her fingertips.
            'That's right,' she beamed, as though it were some great adventure they were all about to embark upon. 'I am preparing a booklet at the moment, and I need to put some faces on the front of it, to give it the human touch. It's a very important job. Do you think you'd be able to handle it?'
            Without at all thinking Wayne and Guthrie pledged their support to whatever it was Kirsten was doing, whether it be for good or evil. They just nodded and said, 'Sure, sure.'
            'Terrific!' she exclaimed somewhat like a TV infomercial presenter. 'That's fixed then.'
            Wayne and Guthrie now realised that there had been a turnaround in their fortunes. They were now back in contact with Kirsten. They had a relationship with her. And if they had a relationship with her then surely they should be able to ask her if they could interview her again - maybe somewhere down the track.
            'How should we dress for the photos?' Wayne asked, trying to show an intellectual concern for the whole process.
            'Just come as you are,' Kirsten smiled. 'We want to have two very normal school boys, that's all. Just two average boys. You don't have to come looking special or out of the ordinary.'
            'What's going to be in the booklet?' Guthrie asked, interested.
            'Statistics. Initiatives. Talk. Boring stuff,' Kirsten assured the boys. 'Nothing that'd interest two normal sixteen year olds. Hey, I almost forgot to ask. How did the interview go? Are you going to be using it for your project?'
            Wayne and Guthrie gulped. A window of opportunity was opening up before them. They had better jump through, both instinctively knew, or miss out.
            'Um, er, no,' Wayne said uncomfortably. 'Unfortunately,' he slowly said the word. 'There was an accident.'
            'We think the tape got scrubbed,' Guthrie blurted out, the tension killing him. 'We can't find it anywhere!'
            'It was my dad who did it,' Wayne readily blamed his father. 'It was an accident, but he lost the tape.'
            'You have to be more careful with important material,' Kirsten warned, her former chirpy tone of voice hardening a little. 'You have to put it in a secure place, and you can't blame your father for the lost tape. That's not taking responsibility.'
            'Oh, I don't blame him,' Wayne rushed to now take responsibility himself, seeing that passing the buck was being frowned upon. 'I guess it was just an accident all round.'
            Guthrie nodded in vigorous agreement with his friend, not wanting to dissent from Kirsten's tough personal responsibility line. Kirsten's attitude was becoming tricky, and they were going to have to be careful about how they responded.
            'So what are you going to do now?' she asked, offering no solutions to the problem herself.
            'I think I have a good idea, just listening in to what's been said here,' the principal intervened with what he hoped was a solution. 'Can't Wayne and Guthrie do another interview with you, perhaps on the day the photo shoot is scheduled? You could then kill two birds with the one stone. I'm sure the boys won't make the same mistake with the videotape a second time around. And as I understand it, this is a very important school project. A major part of the term's assessment hinges on it. As the Minister for Education, you could hardly disagree!' the principal said buoyantly.
            'Thankyou Mr Davies,' Wayne cheered to himself.
            'Yes!' Guthrie thought too.
            Kirsten was trapped. If left to her own devices, she may have put off a second interview indefinitely. Maybe she would have grudgingly said yes. But Mr Davies' intervention had clinched the deal. She would have to say yes, especially with a school principal overlooking matters.
            'I think that's a very good suggestion, Mr Davies,' Kirsten said in a rather wooden voice, despite trying to be upbeat. 'We could indeed kill two birds with the one stone.' She turned to Wayne and Guthrie. 'Bring your camera along, by all means. We can shoot a second interview after the photo shoot. It'll only take ten minutes anyway.'
            'We could probably do it in five,' Guthrie said brightly, eager to please.
            'Good,' Kirsten said, getting up. 'It looks like we've made all parties happy.' She extended a hand to Mr Davies. 'Principal, I must thank you for all the effort you've gone to. I won't take up any more of your time.' To Wayne and Guthrie she smiled and said, 'I'll be in contact', then sailed out of the office. As she whooshed past the scent of her perfume lingered. It was a pleasant memory that the boys would carry around with them for the rest of the day.
            'You can go back to your history class now,' Mr Davies said.
            'Thankyou Mr Davies,' Wayne said, jumping to his feet.
            'Thanks Mr Davies,' Guthrie followed.
When Wayne and Guthrie re-entered their history class everyone's eyes bored into the two friends. Here was a way to become the centre of attention. Mrs Marchant told them to return to their seats and tried to go on as normal. But everyone around them was desperate to know what had gone on. They hissed questions, and when either Wayne or Guthrie motioned to give some kind of explanation, Mrs Marchant hollered that there were to be no questions, and that it was not a matter for class.
            Out in the play yard during recess Wayne and Guthrie soon learned that a little mystery could drive people mad. It was a power they enjoyed. They determined not to tell anyone anything. It was no one's business. This drove determination to know to a climax and Wayne and Guthrie were both seized by Brad Austen and his mates and dragged mercilessly into the boys dunnies. Wayne and Guthrie whelped that they were now ready to tell, but it was too late. All of a sudden they realised their former strategy had been a mistake. They wanted to backpedal, and fast. Inside the toilets Wayne was held down and made to watch as Guthrie's head was stuck down a toilet. Happily it didn't seemed to have been used recently. As Brad hit the flush button Wayne blurted out absolutely every detail about their meeting with Mr Davies, and tried to explain who Kirsten Steele was. But it was too late. Even with the answers, which was soon deemed to be useless intelligence, Brett Austen and his mates were actually enjoying torturing Guthrie. After they had drenched Guthrie in the s bend it was Wayne’s turn for humiliation. His head was plunged in the toilet bowl and it was flushed several times, to the laughter and merriment of all.
            To add insult to injury, the boys had to use toilet paper to dry out their hair. By the time they returned to their next class, the news of what had happened had got out, and the boys were continually teased as to why their hair was so wet, and why it smelled so bad.

Chapter Thirteen

2004-07-29T05:34:00.000-07:00

            Despite the hard times Wayne and Guthrie were experiencing at school, they looked forward to their second interview with Kirsten Steele, eager to make up lost ground. Neither knew what to expect with regards to the photo shoot they were to sit for. Kirsten had been on the phone to Wayne the evening after she had visited them at school, eager to set a time as soon as possible. It was all moving very fast, Wayne thought. He almost felt himself being swept up in events, like he had little control over what was happening. 'I'm sure Saturday will be fine,' Wayne told Kirsten. 'Guthrie doesn't have anything regular that he does on the weekends, so I'm sure it won't be a problem with him either.' And so the date was fixed.
            When Wayne and Guthrie turned up to Kirsten's office at the appointed time that Saturday there was a great commotion of activity. There was a huge important looking camera that stood on a tri-pod and flashes set up with silver umbrellas on tripods. It all looked very involved and complex. With their tiny hand held camcorder Wayne and Guthrie felt like small time operators. Sitting at her desk, swung around to the side, Kirsten was in the middle of being attended to by a professional make up artist. Wayne and Guthrie lingered around the doorway, looking lost, until Kirsten caught sight of them.
            'Hi guys!' Kirsten said. 'You're a bit early. I wasn't expecting you here yet.'
            'We caught an earlier train,' Guthrie said.
            'To make sure we weren't late,' Wayne added.
            'I know what public transport can be like from my uni days,' Kirsten commiserated. 'Now don't get put off by all the equipment. This is all going to be very straightforward.'
            The make up artist help a mirror for Kirsten to study herself. Kirsten moved her head from side to side, scrutinising her face. 'I like that,' she said approvingly.
            'It gives you a fresher, lighter look,' the make up artist agreed. 'Almost like you're wearing no make up at all.'
            'What about the boys?' Kirsten pointed to Wayne and Guthrie, talking about them as though they weren't in the room. 'Will you do them?'
            Wayne and Guthrie stood plastered to the spot. Were they going to have to wear make up? They hoped not. If word got out they'd be laughed out of school and out of town.
            The make up artist walked up close and scrutinised the boys' faces, as though she were a restorationist studying the flaking surface of an old Renaissance master. 'Oh yes, definitely,' she shook her head pityingly. 'We'll have to do a major overhaul here, especially on this one's face. I have just the stuff to cover up all that acne. We'll have you looking like Clark Gable within minutes,' the make up artist said good naturedly to Wayne.
            Sensing the boys nervousness about wearing make up, even if it was just a bit of foundation, Kirsten said, 'You guys don't mind wearing a bit of the old war paint, do you? Even the most blokey sports presenters wouldn't be seen dead on TV without something on.'
            The make up artist backed up this statement by nodding vigorously and knowingly. 'They are the biggest girls,' she insisted, putting her hands on her hips.
            'But I don't need it, right?' Guthrie saw a loophole for himself.
            The make up artist grimly shook her head. 'Sorry sweetheart. We all need a little lift now and again.'
            'As long as the make up comes off straight after,' Wayne insisted. 'Does it come off easily?'
            The make up artist nodded eagerly then shook her right arm out and clicked her fingers. 'We'll have it off you in seconds flat.'
            Wayne and Guthrie sighed heavily. They knew they didn't really have a choice. They had to do what they were told, especially if they wanted to keep Kirsten happy and get that interview for the media studies project. Although they felt like they were now doing a fair amount of compromising themselves.
            When the boys had been 'done' Kirsten commented on how good they looked. Underneath the foundation their faces were burning red, especially Wayne, whose chronic acne had been much under discussion during the session. Once they were all ready for the camera the photographer started to arrange his models.
            'Now Kirsten should sit at her desk, looking important,' the photographer said. 'You and you,' he referred to Wayne and Guthrie, 'I want you to be leaning over the desk on either side of her.'
            Wayne and Guthrie negotiated the limited space and got into position. It was more than a bit awkward, as they were told they were crowding Kirsten too much one moment, then instructed to place an arm this way, then told to tilt their heads another way. At one point the photographer became frustrated with Wayne and Guthrie's apparent lack of ability to follow what seemed, to the man giving the orders, simple, straightforward instructions. He walked over to the desk, forcefully grabbed Wayne's elbow and twisted it into position. Next he placed an outstretched hand on Guthrie's head and physically rotated it. He stepped back to study his work.
            On the desk in front of Kirsten she had a copy of the booklet opened out, with a pen in hand. Both boys were instructed to look at the book, as though Kirsten was trying to show them something. It was propaganda in the making.
            'Now look natural!' the photographer exhorted them.
            Kirsten had no trouble, being in a fairly comfortable position, but Wayne and Guthrie were clearly experiencing difficulties.
            'How are things going?' Brad Payne waltzed into the office. He told Kirsten that he would pop along to see how things were going after gym. He was wearing a pair of tracksuit pants and a t-shirt.
            This was the last thing Wayne and Guthrie needed, a stranger, staring at them while they felt most vulnerable.
            'Hello darling,' Kirsten said from her desk. 'I can't get up to give you a kiss. You understand.'
            'It looks good,' Brad said approvingly, looking at all the photographic equipment.
            'Shall we get on with it?' the photographer said to Kirsten, wanting to move things along.
            'Okay, back to work,' Kirsten said. 'Sorry darling, you'll have to merge into the background while we do this.'
            Brad pouted. He didn't like being pushed into the background, especially since he thought this was his brainchild.
            'Now the three of you have to look like you're discussing youth issues,' the photographer emphasised. 'We have to at least convey that mood. Got it?'
            'How should we act?' Wayne asked, trying to do the right thing.
            'We want this thing to look as real and natural as possible,' the photographer explained. 'You don't have to do any acting. All that we ask is you be yourselves. That shouldn't be too hard?'
            Wayne and Guthrie nodded and shrugged, vaguely agreeing.
            'Alright,' the photographer said firmly, returning to his camera.
            Brad and the make up artist looked on eagerly. It was all very exciting, like they were on a movie set and the director was about to yell, action!
            'Okay, I want you to pose like you were before, as instructed.' The photographer looked in his viewfinder.
            Kirsten, Wayne and Guthrie tried to do what the photographer wanted. Clearly disappointed, the photographer sighed melodramatically, put his hands on his hips in a fit then ran his hands through his hair in exasperation. Wayne and Guthrie sensed that they were the problem, even though Wayne thought he was giving a very good go at the 'natural look'.
            'No, no, no,' the photographer stomped impatiently over to the desk. Kirsten slumped back in her chair, tired and bored of the whole procedure. Wayne and Guthrie's eyes widened, like two helpless animals preyed upon and about to be devoured. 'You two,' he pointed at the culprits. 'I don't know how you do it, but you do it. You both look so stiff and wooden. Can't you try and relax a bit more. Gee, all we want you to do is be yourself. Is that so impossible?'
            This in itself was a paradoxical request. It was natural for the boys to be stiff and uncomfortable when stuck under lights and placed at the centre of attention. If they looked freaked out and weird, then that was because they were being themselves – feeling freaked out and weird. It didn't help to have what was obviously Kirsten's boyfriend - handsome, physically in good shape and frankly intimidating on those grounds alone - rubbing his chin and trying to figure out why the shoot (more to the point Wayne and Guthrie) was such a disaster.
            'Just relax guys,' Kirsten said. 'You're turning this into too big a deal. It's just going to be one photo and probably a small one at that.'
            'You should take the photo when they're not expecting it,' Brad said, munching on a health bar, unable to stop himself making a comment. The solution seemed so obvious to him. 'Telling them to pose is making them uncomfortable. It's giving the boys performance anxiety,' Brad said knowingly. 'As soon as you say the words 'act natural' they stiffen up.'
            'Who is this guy?' the photographer snapped, as though the village idiot had just wandered in off the street. 'Giving me advice?'
            Kirsten rushed to diffuse the situation. 'This is my partner, Bradley Payne. I'm sorry, he can get a bit vocal sometimes. Sweetheart, I know you mean well, but he is a professional.'
            'I work in photography too,' Brad protested. 'I've done hundreds of shoots.'
            'Well, this is my shoot now, so if you'll please keep quiet,' the photographer said dismissively.
            'Listen to what he says, please,' Kirsten smiled sweetly.
            'I was only trying to help,' Brad sulked.
            It was obvious to the boys now that Brad was Kirsten's boyfriend. They felt a pang of jealousy. Of course they knew this was ridiculous. Neither of them realistically hoped to one day be Kirsten Steele's boyfriend, yet a bit of fantasy was nice to keep for yourself. They just wished that Brad didn't have to be so good looking. It made them feel smaller and smaller by the minute.
            The photographer walked back behind the camera and looked through the viewfinder.
            'Right. Let's start again. Poses please,' he authoritatively snapped his fingers.
            'Talk about being up yourself,' Kirsten muttered to herself, forgetting the boys were next to her.
            Immediately Wayne and Guthrie were delighted to have the tension relieved. They didn't feel so picked on and scrutinised. They laughed, as did Kirsten.
            'That's it!' the photographer exclaimed. 'That's what I was after! Exactly! Hold that pose.’
            While the three were sharing in this little joke, the photographer rapidly shot frame after frame. He was soon satisfied that he had got the image he was after.
            ‘Good,’ he pronounced. ‘I think that wraps it up.’ No sooner had he said this than he was fussing about with his camera, taking it off its tripod and rewinding the film. It was obvious that he was more interested in the technology than his subjects. ‘I think we got some shots there that we’ll be able to use.’
            Wayne and Guthrie relaxed. They stood up and stretched out a little. Their legs had gone almost numb crouching in the one position for so long.
            Kirsten got up to thank the photographer. She put out a hand to shake. ‘Thanks a lot for all your patience,’ she said. ‘Wasn’t it W.C Fields that said never work with animals or children?’ she joked.
            The photographer didn't find this funny. In fact, he appeared to be totally humourless. He grunted. 'Whatever,' he said bluntly.
            Kirsten got along better with the make up artist. When she approached her with a diplomatic thankyou, there was good will on both sides.
            'Not a problem,' the make up artist smiled, whacking shut her war chest of cosmetics. 'You've got classic cheekbones,' she said. 'Don't hide them too much behind your hair.'
            'Thanks,' Kirsten accepted the compliment without demur.
            'Can I get some help here with all of this equipment?' the photographer said, almost as a demand. 'What about you two?' he pointed at Wayne and Guthrie. 'You don't look like you're doing anything.'
            'I thought we were going to get this make up off first,' Guthrie said.
            'Guys, you don't mind?' Kirsten turned on the charm. 'I'm sure it'll only take a minute.'
            'It only takes a few seconds to get all that gunk off your dial,' the make up artist assured them. 'We'll do it straight after you put the equipment away. Trust me.'
            Wayne and Guthrie felt like they were being used. If it wasn't bad enough being pushed around by the obnoxious photographer, to have to be his lackey as well was too much. But Kirsten had smiled so sweetly at them, she really had a way of doing that. They picked up the equipment that was pointed out to them and followed the photographer to his car.
            'Be careful with that,' he nodded his head at an electronic flash system that Wayne was carrying. 'It's worth a fortune.'
            Wayne let the photographer get ahead of him and then muttered to Guthrie, 'God, what a wanker.'
            'I hate him,' Guthrie agreed.
            With everything taking care of itself around her, Kirsten could relax for a few moments. Brad took the initiative to embrace and kiss her. She giggled. He then stole one, two, three intimate kisses.
            'You look awesome,' he whispered, but loud enough for Wayne and Guthrie to hear, who had just walked back into the office.
            'Those black cases are the last of it,' the photographer pointed.
            Wayne and Guthrie tried to keep their eyes off this intimate embrace, but found it next to impossible. Brad caught Guthrie looking as he lumbered a big black case, and Guthrie quickly averted his gaze. He was embarrassed and ashamed at having been caught out staring. Brad understood what this meant, that Guthrie fancied his girlfriend. He felt a mixture of pity and contempt, and was frankly put off by having a fat, ugly kid look at Kirsten in that way, even if it was a harmless crush.
            When the last of the photographer’s equipment was dropped off at his car, the boys were dismissed. They wandered back into the office. Kirsten, noticing them enter, introduced Brad.
            'Wayne, Guthrie, I'd like you to meet my partner Brad Payne.'
            'Pleased to meet you guys,' Brad extended a hand to both boys, who in turn accepted the greeting with wry, uncertain smiles.
            'These are the students who are interviewing me for a media studies project for their school,' Kirsten explained.
            'She's a pretty cool subject,' Brad grabbed Kirsten around the waist and pulled her close. Kirsten resisted. It wasn't professional to be pawing each other during what was, after all, a professional engagement. But Brad refused to understand this. He was sure there was nothing serious about politics. 'And she's smart. She knows a lot of stuff.'
            'You don't mind if Brad stays for the interview?' Kirsten asked. 'He works in the media. He'll keep really quiet while you work. He might have some interesting suggestions.'
            Brad nodded in earnest. 'It'd be really interesting for me to watch. I want to get into TV presenting myself.'
            Wayne and Brad felt like a patient who has gone to the doctor's for an intimate examination, and then is told by the doctor that he has a medical student with him who would like to sit back and observe, and would you mind? Wayne and Brad did mind, they minded terribly, but felt they couldn't say no.
            Guthrie nodded, looking at Brad.
            'Sure,' Wayne said, without much conviction.
            'Alright,' Kirsten clapped her hands energetically. 'Let's get that make up off you and we'll do the interview.'
            The make up artist cleaned Wayne and Guthrie's faces, then pronounced them cosmetic free. She picked up her bags, farewelled all, and made for the door.
            Wayne retrieved his father's camera from the top of a filing cabinet where he had placed it for safe keeping and removed its leather pouch. During the interview, which was just a rehash of the first one, with nothing new added, they tried their best to forget that Kirsten's boyfriend was sitting in a deep black leather chair in the corner, looking very comfortable indeed, with one leg cocked up on the seat and a thoughtful hand continually rubbing his chin. As Kirsten gave her last answer, Guthrie declared that it was a wrap.
            'What a gruelling list of questions!' Kirsten joked.
            'Oh, they were just the same as last time,' Guthrie said.
            'I know, I was just having some fun,' Kirsten said. 'Hey, what time is it? I am starving.'
            All three males looked at their watch, but Brad was first to answer. 'Twelve thirty.'
            'No wonder I'm so hungry,' Kirsten said. 'What about you guys?' Kirsten looked at Wayne and Guthrie. 'Do you feel like something to eat?'
            Guthrie always had food on his mind, and Wayne was genuinely hungry. They looked at each other and nodded to Kirsten.
            'Good,' Kirsten said, grabbing her purse and taking out a fifty-dollar note. 'There's a great deli just down the street. Could you grab me something? And buy yourselves whatever you want.'
            'Sure!' Guthrie said, following the note with his eyes as it was waved in the air.
            'Here then,' she said, thrusting the fifty dollar note at Guthrie, who seemed most responsive. 'Now, I want you to get me a salad sandwich on rye, no butter, with salt and pepper, and definitely no onions. There's nothing worse than onion breath. And a diet coke. Brad, sweetheart?'
            'Get me a chicken roll, with lettuce, but not too much lettuce. I want sesame seeds on the roll if they have them. No butter. Salt and pepper. And I'll have a diet coke too.'
            'Can you remember all of that?' Kirsten asked.
            Guthrie was desperately trying to memorise it all now.
            'Sure,' Wayne said. 'A chicken roll for Brad, with lettuce.'
            'Sesame seeds on the roll,' Brad reminded. 'And salt and pepper.'
            'Right,' Wayne confirmed. 'And a salad sandwich, salt and pepper - and no onion.'
            'Don't forget no butter. That's the most important of all,' Kirsten said. 'We have to look after our figures.'
            They were about to leave for the shops when Wayne realised he still had his camera with him. 'Can I just leave the camera here on the desk?' he asked, setting it down.
            'Sure,' Kirsten said.
            'We'll see you in ten minutes then,' Wayne said.
            Guthrie continued to hold the fifty-dollar note out in front of him, as though it were leading the way. Once out in the street Wayne told him to put it away.
            'You're asking to be mugged by waving that fifty bucks everywhere.'
            'Shit, sorry,' Guthrie said, realising his mistake. He carefully folded it and put it in his pocket. 'I can't believe how generous Kirsten is, buying us lunch. Isn't it amazing?'
            'We're not going to go overboard with it,' Wayne cautioned. 'It'd be rude.'
            'Sure,' Guthrie agreed, secretly disappointed. He thought they were about to go on a free for all.
            Brad sat in Kirsten's chair. Sometimes he liked to imagine himself doing Kirsten's job, it seemed so important. Kirsten sat on his lap, her legs dangling over the armrest. Brad had both his arms wrapped around her waist.
            'How's it going with the two bubble heads?' Brad asked.
            'They're both thick as two bricks,' Kirsten said exactly what she thought, now that the boys were out of earshot. 'Real geeky kids. Total goofballs. Hopefully today will be the last I see of them. This is the second interview I've had to endure. Can you believe they lost the tape to the original? Talk about dumb and dumber.'
            'I think the chubby one has a crush on you,' Brad said, pulling Kirsten's hair back and kissing her neck.
            Kirsten shuddered at the thought. 'Don't say that. It gives me the creeps.'
            'Just an observation. He can't keep his eyes off you.'
            'Scary thing is, I think they both fancy me.'
            'That's understandable,' Brad continued kissing Kirsten.
            'I can't imagine any girl in their right mind looking at them,' Kirsten said. 'They're not exactly easy on the eye.'
            'As long as you've got the photos you wanted. That's the important thing.'
            'That's right. They've served their purpose, haven't they? That's what we're all here for in this life, really, when you look at it,' Kirsten said philosophically. 'We do favours for each other, in return for favours done. We use each other, but in a positive way, to help each person get somewhere.'
            Brad briefly wondered if he was being used for Kirsten to get somewhere, and whether he was in turn using Kirsten, in this positive way, to advance his own career. He became fixated with a mental balance sheet of favours done and favours pending.
            Kirsten hoisted herself off Brad's lap and went to look for something in her filing cabinet.
            'Hey, what are you doing?' Brad protested.
            'They'll be back any minute. I don't think this is an appropriate way to be seen. Besides,' she giggled. 'It'd only get them excited.'
            Brad let out a whoop of laughter, but then felt bound to moralise. 'We probably shouldn't laugh at them,' he said. 'We should really feel sorry for them.'
            'Let's stop talking about them,' Kirsten said. 'It depresses me.'
            No sooner had she said this than Kirsten heard the front door opening.
            'We're back,' Guthrie sang out from the reception area, as though he'd just arrived home after a day at school.
            'Back so quick?' Kirsten said as Wayne and Guthrie entered her office.
            'There was no one in the deli,' Wayne said. 'A chicken roll for you, and a salad sandwich for you,' Wayne handed the lunches out. 'And a can of diet coke each.'
            'Well done,' Kirsten said. 'And what did you guys get?'
            'Oh, I got a salad sandwich too,' Wayne said. He never usually ate them.
            'Where's yours?' Kirsten asked Guthrie.
            'I ate it on the way,' he explained. 'I had a pie.'
            Guthrie then took a can of coke out his pocket and cracked it open.
            Wayne took up a spare seat at Kirsten's desk and went about unwrapping his sandwich. Guthrie took a seat too and slurped on his can, apparently unaware that he was making a lot of noise. Wayne started to chew with his mouth open. Kirsten hated piggy noises while eating, it was a real thing with her. She had no intention of eating with the boys anyway.
            'Boys, I'm really sorry, but I'm going to have to blow you out here,' Kirsten said, looking at them both with big apologetic eyes.
            Wayne and Guthrie looked up in the middle of their munching and slurping. They had assumed they were all going to eat together, almost like friends or family.
            'This is going to have to be a working lunch for me,' she said. 'I've got so much to do here, and as much as I’d love to just sit and chat with you guys, I really must get on top of it. I hope that's alright. I'm sure we'll catch up at some other date, probably at the premiere of your video project.'
            'Sure, we understand,' Wayne nodded, re-wrapping his sandwich and sliding it back into its bag. Bits of lettuce and crumbs were left on the desk, which he immediately swept onto the carpet. Without realising it, this was another one of Kirsten's pet hates, dumping food scraps on the floor.
            'We've got lots of stuff to do as well, haven't we Wayne?' Guthrie said, standing up.
            'Yeah, there's all that film to look at,' Wayne said.
            'Just make sure you don't lose it this time,' Kirsten kindly warned them. 'It'll only make more work for yourselves, and when you're at school you can't waste a minute.'
            'We're going to get the tape transfer done ourselves this time. I wouldn't leave it to dad again.'
            'Good for you,' Kirsten said.
            Brad stood up and made a point of shaking hands with the boys hands. 'It's been nice to meet you,' he said. 'Good luck with the project. I'm sure you'll get an A+ for it.'
            'Thanks again for doing the photos,' Kirsten said. 'You've been a real help.'
            'No, thankyou,' Guthrie said.
            'Well, I guess we'll see you later,' Wayne said.
            The boys said 'bye' for the last time and made for the door.
            'Hey! Guys!' Kirsten suddenly called out.
            Wayne and Guthrie ran back.
            'What is it?' Wayne asked, hopeful that she might want to use them for some other project, even if it was cleaning up the office.
            Kirsten pointed to the video camera that was still sitting on the corner of her desk, lying on its side.
            Wayne laughed nervously. 'That was pretty stupid of me!' He felt like a real idiot, especially after he had said he would personally make sure he didn't lose the tape. He quickly picked up the camcorder, shoved it in its leather pouch and buried it in his backpack.
            Guthrie didn't say anything, but smiled stupidly.
            'Bye guys,' Kirsten said. 'Take care of that tape!'
            There was another brief round of goodbyes and then Wayne and Guthrie left Kirsten's office.

Chapter Fourteen

2004-07-29T05:21:00.000-07:00

            On the train home Wayne and Guthrie declared themselves still to be number one fans of Kirsten Steele, despite the humiliations of the photo shoot.
            'That was really good of her to buy us lunch,' Wayne said. 'She didn't have to do that.'
            'Maybe she gets to write if off somehow,' Guthrie conjectured.
            'Either way, we got a free lunch out of it.'
            'I think we did better with the interview this time.'
            'Yeah, we were a bit more confident. You could tell we knew what we were doing.'
            'I just wish that snotty boyfriend hadn't been there. What was his name?'
            'Can't remember,' Wayne said staring out the window.
            'Neither can I. I don't know why he had to be there. He was giving us the eye all the time.'
            'He's a jerk.'
            'I don't like him either. Too up himself. What do you reckon Kirsten sees in him?'
            Wayne shrugged. 'Let's not talk about him.'
            The boys remained silent for the rest of the journey. They didn't even bother to take out the camcorder and look at the footage they'd taped, so wrapped up were they in morbid thoughts of how goodlooking Brad was. Rather they left the camcorder in Wayne's backpack.
            When the train came to their stop they went to Guthrie's house. Wayne knew his house would be crawling with parents, plus his father would want to take the camera off him again as soon as he saw it. Wayne had recently discovered the instruction manual amongst his father's stuff and felt confident that he would be able to make a copy of the small camcorder tape onto VHS himself. He wanted to keep everything away from his father as much as possible. His negligence and interfering could well cause another disaster.
            Guthrie's mother was home, preparing dinner in the kitchen. She was in the midst of stuffing a chook.
            'Anyone home?' Guthrie hollered as he and Wayne walked through the house. 'Anyone home?'
            'I'm in the kitchen,' Mrs Dulwich called.
            Wayne and Guthrie dumped their bags in the loungeroom and made for the kitchen.
            'Hi mum,' Guthrie said. 'What's for dinner?'
            'This chook,' she said, almost sticking her entire fist up it.
            'Hi Mrs D,' Wayne greeted.
            'Hello Wayne. How are you today?'
            'I'm great. Me and Guthrie have just been to a photo shoot. We're going to be on the front of a book.'
            'Yes, Guthrie said something about going to have a photo taken,' Mrs Dulwich recalled.
            'It's very important,' Guthrie said. 'It's something to do with the government.'
            'I'm sure it's important,' Mrs Dulwich said, still concentrating on the job at hand, ramming another fistful of stuffing up the chook.
            'Plus we were shooting an interview today.' Wayne patted the video camera. 'We're going to have a look at it now.'
            'I thought you had already done that?'
            'This is a follow up interview,' Guthrie said. 'Is dad home? I want him to have a look at what we've done.'
            'He's at the tip.'
            'When will he be home?'
            'Who knows? You know how he likes to fossick through everyone else's rubbish. He goes to dump all of our crap, then comes home with someone else’s crap,' Mrs Dulwich shook her head. 'He's a bloody hoarder.'
            'I suppose I can show him the tape later,' Guthrie said.
            'I'll go and set it up,' Wayne said, leaving the kitchen.
            'Come and watch the tape mum. Please,' Guthrie begged, proud of what they'd done.
            'Okay, but only for a few minutes,' she said. 'I can't afford to be sitting around all day.'
            'Don't worry,' Guthrie said. 'You just keep on working. When we're ready we'll call you in to have a look. Okay?'
            'Okay, but it'll only be for five minutes.'
            In the loungeroom Wayne was on his knees in front of the television, plugging in the cords and leads. When he had finished this intricate business he took a few small steps back.
            'There,' he said. 'All ready to go.'
            'Mum,' Guthrie yelled. 'We're ready.'
            Guthrie slumped into his favourite chair while Wayne stood near the video camera, ready to hit the play button. The premiere was about to begin.
            Mrs Dulwich walked into the loungeroom and stood in the doorway. Both her grubby hands were held upwards, trying not to touch anything.
            'Alright, I'm here,' she announced.
            Wayne looked over his shoulder to make sure Mrs Dulwich could see the screen properly, then pressed play. He sat looking on, in a sort of rapture. A shot of an indoor plant came into view - this was more or less a test shot - which then panned over to Kirsten. A distant sounding voice (the boys hadn't really mastered the sound yet) was heard.
            'Is that your voice, Guthrie?' Mrs Dulwich asked.
            'Yeah. I'm the interviewer.'
            'And who's the attractive woman?'
            'That is Kirsten Steele. She's our project,' Guthrie explained.
            'She's really important,' Wayne said. 'She works in politics.'
            Mrs Dulwich stood watching for several minutes, until she felt she had seen enough. The camera work was amateur, and the subject didn't seem to be saying anything earth shattering. Kirsten Steele may have worked in politics, but she seemed pretty ordinary to Mrs Dulwich. In fact the only really interesting thing about the tape was that it was a piece of homemade television. It was the novelty of the TV medium and style that counted here, not the content.
            It was obvious the boys were up to something though. They had been taking their homework seriously for once. Kirsten Steele couldn't have been plucked out of thin air; they must have put in the work to get her to agree to be filmed. That alone was worth applauding.
            'It looks good,' Mrs Dulwich said, a little peremptorily. 'You should at least get some good marks for this. Now, if you'll excuse me I better get back to stuffing that chook.'
            Mrs Dulwich returned to her work, leaving Wayne and Guthrie staring at the television. They hung on every frame. Kirsten talked nonchalantly through the interview. Even though she did her best to appear polite, it was obvious she was going through the motions.
            'She looks even more beautiful on video,' Guthrie said dreamily.
            'Tell me about it,' Wayne agreed, also in a dream.
            'If this doesn't get us an A, then I don’t know what will.'
            'If this doesn't get us an A+, then I give up.'
            The interview came to an end.
            'What happens next?' Guthrie asked.
            'We make a VHS copy of it, then we'll have to think about adding some more stuff to it. You know, padding.'
            'Why is the tape still rolling?' Guthrie pointed to the television screen, pictures of Kirsten's office still appearing on the screen. 'Listen, you can hear the both of us talking still.'
            'Shit. I must have forgotten to turn off the camcorder. What a dickhead I am.'
            Both laughed.
            'Sssh! Can you hear?' Guthrie whispered, trying to suppress his giggles. 'This was when we went out to get lunch.'
            'And this is when I'm about to put the camcorder on Kirsten's desk. I can't believe I left it on. I was wondering why the tape was already at the start. It must have automatically rewound itself.'
            'Hey, this is hidden camera stuff,' Guthrie said, seeing potential. 'We could get some extra footage out of this.'
            'Yeah, but we couldn't use it if it was taken secretly.'
            'Not secretly, accidentally.'
            'Here we go,' Wayne said as the camera was placed on the corner of Kirsten's desk.
            Wayne and Guthrie turned their heads on their side. They could see Kirsten's desk chair tightly framed and heard some conversation. Brad sat on Kirsten's chair. Neither Wayne nor Guthrie could bring themselves to say anything. They were hanging on the edge of their seats in suspense. Half of Brad's head was cut off. The shot seemed to focus more on his crotch area, especially when he scratched himself. He asked Kirsten to sit on his lap. Soon Kirsten was in frame, then came the dialogue.
            Their conversation was both real and unreal to Wayne and Guthrie. They couldn't believe what they were hearing. It didn't make sense. They had been at Kirsten's office only a few hours ago and she had been so nice to them. This couldn't possibly be Kirsten now. It just couldn't. But it was all captured on tape. She was calling them both losers, 'total goofballs'. Worst of all, considering their feelings of inferiority with regards to Brad, she also said they were ugly.
            'Turn it off,' Guthrie muttered.
            Wayne pressed the stop button. They sat speechless, devastated. How could Kirsten do this to them?, they wondered. Was she such a liar? Such a back stabber? Such a two faced so and so? They felt that the whole media studies project had been killed off in one swoop. A dagger had been thrust into its heart. Wayne and Guthrie couldn’t possibly go on with the project now, after seeing this.
            'I don't understand why she'd do that,' Wayne said. 'I thought she liked us.'
            'I want to scrub that tape,' Guthrie said. He had never felt lower. He wanted to erase everything to do with Kirsten Steele. 'Let's just get rid of it. What if someone found it? People would think that we're the biggest losers ever, using someone for our project who slagged us off behind our backs.'
            Wayne didn't know what to say. He felt that the tape should be scrubbed too. It would only be evidence of their all round lack of popularity, and status as universally ridiculed. Even the Minister for Youth Affairs thought they were a waste of space.
            Wayne pushed the eject button on the tape and took it out. He had only bought the fresh tape a few days ago and had proudly put a label on it, even before taping. He dug a finger in and dragged out the tape, pulling hard until there were masses of tight ribboned curls.
            'Say goodbye to all of that work,' Wayne said mournfully.
            'Thanks for nothing, Kirsten Steele,' Guthrie said, moving in his confusion from remorse to anger.
            'I wish I'd never let the tape keep running,' Wayne said. 'Sometimes it's better not to know what people think of you.'
            Guthrie gathered up the tape and casing and took it to the kitchen. In full view of his mother he threw it in the bin.
            'What are you doing that for?' Mrs Dulwich was shocked.
            'We can't use it anymore,' Guthrie said. 'There's a big mistake on it.'
            'But I thought you were so proud of what you'd done,' Mrs Dulwich said, obviously worried at this sudden turnaround. 'You and Wayne were so excited about the school project.'
            'We've changed our minds,' Guthrie said sourly. 'We're going to have to do something else.'
            Mrs Dulwich looked in the bin at the entangled mess of tape. She thought of retrieving it - Guthrie might change his mind later and regret this rash act - but the tape now seemed unusable. She sensed that something very strange and mysterious had happened in the few minutes since she had left the loungeroom, but couldn't for the life of her figure out what. The boys had seemed so gung ho. Now they had trashed all that they had done.
            Guthrie walked out of the kitchen, obviously not caring less what happened to the tape. That evening Mrs Dulwich tied up the garbage bag and dropped it into the council wheelie bin. She hoped Guthrie hadn't lost his mind.

Chapter Fifteen

2004-07-29T05:19:00.000-07:00

            It was no fun for the boys turning up to their next media studies class. They were firmly back at square one. Worse still, they had wasted several weeks putting all their energy into the Kirsten Steele interview. They were sure this was going to give them their first A. Now they were full of confusion and anger.
            They couldn't be bothered thinking about anything, so low were they. They muttered to each other that they didn't care if they had to repeat a year - they just didn't care about anything. This was made clear by their lack of protest when the other kids in the class hassled and teased them. Brett Austen threw paper planes at them. When these projectiles hit them the boys just sat numb, like dummies. Poppy made her bitchy remarks - asking whether they had brought any pornos in today - but could get no response out of Wayne and Guthrie.
            Mr Allcock entered the class with a huge folder tucked under his arm. The room quietened down considerably. A friend of Brett Austen's who had just left his seat, hoping to whack either Wayne or Guthrie over the back of the head, quickly scurried back.
            'Because I know you are all positively sick and tired of listening to my voice,' Mr Allcock said, addressing the class. 'I have brought in something different for you today. We're going to be watching a video,' he picked up a videocassette off his desk and waved it in the air. 'It's about the role the media has to play in politics,' he continued. 'And how sometimes the media can actually bring down a government.'
            Hearing this dull precis, little realising how much it applied to them, Wayne and Guthrie duly prepared to go to sleep.
            'Has anyone here ever heard of Richard Nixon?' Mr Allcock scouted the room for a show of hands. None were raised.
            'This really is the post MTV generation,' Mr Allcock said. 'No? What about John F. Kennedy?'
            A few hands were raised.
            'Who was he?' Mr Allcock asked one of the raised hands.
            'Um, he was a famous American?'
            'That's right, he was a famous American president who was assassinated. On this documentary you'll see him perform in a presidential debate with Richard Nixon. Now politics, as you know, is not usually interesting, but what is interesting about this debate is the fact that TV really changed the way people were informed about the world around them. It began the primacy of the image over the word. Richard Nixon lost the debate because he looked bad. He refused to wear make up, which he thought was only for gays. Big mistake. He was in poor health. Not his fault, but another big mistake nonetheless. He had recently come close to having his leg amputated after an injury. He had lost ten pounds and his clothes hung off him. In short, he looked a mess. His opponent, on the other hand, was tanned, fit and well tailored. A lot of his admirers said he looked like a 'young Adonis', which of course has a touch of the homoerotic about it.'
            There were confused looks on everyone's faces at this, especially the boys. Any word with homo in it gave rise to suspicion and hysteria. It had even been rumoured that Mr Allcock himself was gay, although there was little or no evidence for this.
            'Due to Richard Nixon's poor preparation as a media performer,' Mr Allcock went on, 'he was thought to have lost this important debate. Although interestingly, those who were listening in on the radio to the debate thought that Richard Nixon, not John F. Kennedy, was the better debater. There is also some interesting stuff in this documentary about a scandal called Watergate that ultimately forced Richard Nixon to resign. This was the result of two investigative reporters named Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein. The video goes for about forty minutes. Don't think you can all just drift off either. I'm going to be asking you all some questions after the documentary, so please, take notes.'
            Mr Allcock wheeled the trolley that had the TV and video set on it to the front of the class. He slipped in the video tape and pressed play. The documentary started and Wayne and Guthrie tried to pay attention, although they felt fairly sure that it would contain nothing that interested them. They saw lots of boring looking men in black and white footage, wearing out of date suits. Then there was the footage of the 1960 presidential debate. It seemed utterly meaningless to Wayne and Guthrie. They couldn't figure out its import at all. The old TV footage just looked like two faded figures from the past that didn't relate at all to the present.
            The documentary moved into the material covering the Watergate scandal. With all of its wire tapping, intrigue and scandal, Wayne and Guthrie felt themselves come out of their torpor a little. Some of it was interesting, especially the fact that someone who was so important could be involved in such shady secret dealings. Minute by minute Wayne and Guthrie felt themselves being more and more drawn into the documentary. It was the rest of the class who was now almost falling asleep. When the bits about deep throat and the Washington Post's journalists appeared, the boys felt like they were experiencing an ephipany. A voice out of nowhere seemed to be speaking to them. It was uncanny. They were being given a message, and they had to take it. When they came to the footage of President Nixon resigning, they could hardly contain themselves.
            'This is totally amazing,' Wayne turned to his friend.
            'We could be onto something,' Guthrie said, quickly reassessing all they had been through over the past weeks.
            'We have to be investigators. This thing could be more important than we thought. This could be really big.'
            'What are we going to do then?' Guthrie asked, bamboozled as to a plan of action.
            'I don't know,' Wayne said. 'But we'll think of something. We have to.'
            The documentary ended. Mr Allcock pressed the stop button and turned on the lights. He crossed his arms and looked thoughtful. The entire class stretched and yawned, generally looking like they were coming out of a long sleep. No one had taken any notes.
            'Does anyone have any comments they'd like to make about the video?' Mr Allcock asked.
            Wayne and Guthrie put their hands up, but Mr Allcock either didn't see or ignored them.
            'Brett, what do you think President Nixon's major mistake was?' Mr Allcock asked.
            'He should have learned to lie better,' Brett joked half seriously.
            'Close, but no cigar,' Mr Allcock said, surprising everyone by giving this answer at least some legitimacy.
            'Obviously, he should have worn make up for that debate,' Poppy broke in, exasperated by everyone's narrowmindedness. 'He looked like crap.'
            'Poppy's onto something here,' Mr Allcock said. 'Nixon had terrible judgement when it came to that pivotal debate.'
            Wayne and Guthrie put their hands up again. They were desperate to say something. Brett Austen and his gang continued to hiss at them to put down their hands - no one wanted to hear what they had to say.
            'Wasn't the big thing that brought Richard Nixon down the two reporters?' Wayne could contain himself no longer.
            Mr Allcock looked over his shoulder, as if a strange noise had come out of nowhere. His eyes darted over the room, trying to sniff out the source of these comments.
            'What have I said about calling out in the middle of a class,' Mr Allcock said. 'We all have to wait our turn. Now, what was it you wanted to share with the class?'
            'I said,' Wayne repeated, sure his answer was the right one, 'didn’t those two newspaper reporters bring down Richard Nixon?'
            'You mean Carl Bernstein and Bob Woodward?' Mr Allcock looked at Wayne in disbelief.
            Wayne would not be intimidated. 'Yeah!'
            'I think there's a bit more to it than the so called Deep Throat source,' Mr Allcock said dismissively. 'I think we can do better than such an obvious answer. Anyone else?'
            There was a ripple of titters that ran through the class. Wayne and Guthrie were being laughed at again. Yet they were so fired up with a sense of purpose that everything around them seemed totally unimportant.
            'We have to save the tape,' Guthrie suddenly urged Wayne. 'If we can't get that tape back then we've got nothing.'
            'Let's get out of here now,' Wayne insisted.
            'Shouldn't we wait 'til the end of class?'
            'No way. This is more important than Mr Allcock's stupid media studies class. What day is your rubbish day?'
            'I don't know. I never put it out.'
            'Shit!' Wayne swore. 'We are totally stuffed if we've lost that tape. How could we be so stupid and just throw it out like that?'
            'Because we were pissed off.'
            'Could Wayne Grimwood and Guthrie Dulwich please stop talking while I'm trying to conduct a class here,' Mr Allcock abruptly stopped. He had been in the middle of giving his spin on the Nixon years and the role the media played in it. 'If you have anything to say, put up your hand.'
            'Come on,' Wayne said.
            To the amazement of all Wayne and Guthrie quickly gathered up their books and walked out of the class. Everyone's jaws dropped to the ground. The class had never seen them behave in this quietly determined way. Usually Wayne and Guthrie sat docile, saying nothing.
            'Where do the two of you think you're going?' Mr Allcock demanded, rushing to the door after them and calling down the corridor. 'I am definitely going to report you now. You can't just leave a class like that.'
            Mr Allcock returned to the class and shook his head. 'Those two are almost certainly sure to fail. What's wrong with those guys anyway?' he asked his students.
            Some shrugged that they didn't know. Some said they were complete idiots. Brett Austen said they were retarded. Poppy Vacuse-Best said they were more likely than not gay. Overall, the problem was most said, they were not popular with their class mates.

Chapter Sixteen

2004-07-29T05:17:00.000-07:00

            Wayne and Guthrie rushed home to Gurthrie's house, hoping and praying that all the week's garbage was still intact. They cursed themselves continually for being so stupid in ruining the tape and then throwing it in the bin. Once at Guthrie's they hit the wheelie bin that was kept behind the shed in the backyard. They flipped open the top and a swarm of mozzies flew out. Relief came instantly: the bin was stuffed right to the top with five to six garbage bags. As they pulled them out one by one they felt things looked promising.
            'Everything seems to be intact,' Guthrie said, trying to avert his nose from the smell. 'Let's just hope it's in here somewhere.'
            Wayne wasn't keen on the task ahead of them. 'That's a lot of rubbish to go through,' he said.
            'No use complaining,' Guthrie ripped one of the plastic bags apart. The smell hit them like a truck.
            'Phew!!' Wayne cried. 'What do you put in there?'
            'What do you mean?' Guthrie was offended. 'It's garbage. Gee, what do you expect, Calvin Klein's Obsession?'
            'We're really up to our eyeballs in crap here,' Wayne complained, gingerly picking amongst the garbage as it was strewn across the backyard. 'Haven't you got some plastic gloves or something? This is putrid.'
            Guthrie was searching so feverishly that he hadn't given it a second thought. Wayne seemed to be being a bit precious, Guthrie thought. He stopped his fossicking for a moment. 'Okay,' he said. 'I'll see what I can come up with.'
            A few minutes later he was back with a pair of kitchen rubber gloves and some old gardening gloves that he'd found in the shed. They returned to their garbage sorting. Bag after foul bag was pulled apart, layed out in all it's appalling detail and combed over, until the smell started to seep into their clothes, skin and hair. Eventually all six bags were opened. The stench and mess got worse and worse. When they took a break an hour and a half later they had still found nothing. The grass in the backyard couldn't be seen for all the rubbish. Gusts of wind were catching the lighter items - plastic bags and bits of paper stained with rotted food - and blowing it all over the place. Guthrie looked despondently at the filthy mess.
            'If mum sees any of this she's going to flip,' he said.
            'We have to keep looking,' Wayne asserted, almost desperately. 'It has to be here somewhere. It's too important.'
            Guthrie surveyed the back yard that was now was a sea of rubbish. He was tired and fed up. 'I don't like our chances. This is like trying to find a needle in a haystack.'
            'Come on, get up,' Wayne insisted. 'It has to be here somewhere.'
            Reluctantly Guthrie dragged himself up and resumed the effort. They had been kicking through the garbage in a desultory fashion when Guthrie heard his mother's car pull up the driveway.
            'Great,' Guthrie said cynically, looking at his watch. 'That must be mum. I don't know how I'm going to explain all of this. She's going to be really pissed off.'
            'We'll just have to explain that we're looking for something,' Wayne said. 'It's simple as that.'
            Guthrie shook his head. 'She's not going to be happy.'
            'What in God's name is going on here?' Mrs Dulwich almost dropped her grocery shopping. 'Have you completely lost your mind? Guthrie, you're black with filth. Wayne, you're not much better. What's your mother going to think? I bet your clothes stink to high heaven.'
            'Mum, we'll clean everything up I promise,' Guthrie said breathlessly. 'We have to find that video I threw out the other day. It's an emergency.'
            'You should have thought about that before you turfed it in the first place,' Mrs Dulwich said. 'Why did you throw it in the bin if you were only going to need it in a couple of days?'
            'There have been a few developments since then,' Wayne explained vaguely. 'The tape is worth a lot more now.'
            'What happened to make the tape so valuable all of a sudden?' Mrs Dulwich inquired.
            'Er, we came across some information,' Wayne continued.
            'It looks like our media studies project will be going in a completely different direction,' Guthrie said, explaining nothing. Neither really knew exactly in what direction the project would now be travelling, if at all. All they knew was that they were emboldened by the documentary they had seen, and now wanted some answers from Kirsten Steele. 'A lot can happen in politics in twenty four hours,' Guthrie parroted something he'd heard on the news recently.
            Mrs Dulwich shook her head. It was clear she was going to get no sensible answer. 'I don't care what turn your project has taken,' she said. 'I want this whole mess cleaned up straightaway, and I mean everything. I don't want to find one bit of rubbish left out here, am I understood?'
            'Yes mum,' Guthrie said.
            Wayne nodded in agreement.
            Mrs Dulwich kicked at an item of rubbish with the toe of her shoe to show her displeasure. She then turned and left, but the toe of her shoe had caught something that was buried under the general detritus. Videotape spool was dragged half way across the yard.
            Seeing the tape Wayne and Guthrie went crazy. 'Stop! Stop!' they urged, running after her.
            Mrs Dulwich stopped to see what was impeding her progress. Seeing the tape wound around her leg she instinctively went about freeing herself, kicking and stomping with little regard for the tape.
            'Aaaggh!!' Guthrie cried.
            'Don't do that! Don't do that!!' Wayne fell to his knees and delicately tried to disentangle the tape. 'It's the videocassette. That's what we're after.'
            'Just get it off me,' Mrs Dulwich demanded, now entirely out of patience.
            Wayne managed to free Mrs Dulwich, while Guthrie made a point of hugging his mother.
            'You found it!' he said overjoyed.
            'Eeeeugh! Get off me!' Guthrie's mother pushed him off. 'I don't want to smell of garbage. The first thing I want you to do when you're finished here is to have a shower and change those clothes. You pong, big time. Wayne, you should go home and clean up.'
            Although Wayne and Guthrie were exhilarated to have the tape back, they still had other bridges to cross. The tape was a mess and they couldn't be sure that all the material they wanted was still on it. Maybe the tape was completely ruined. That was the nightmare possibility. They sat down on a patch of grass and studied the spools of tape. It wasn't in such bad shape. There were a few sharp creases here and there, but nothing major. They carefully started winding the tape back into its case. Wayne did the winding and Guthrie straightened out the tape before it was pulled back into the cassette. After a few minutes the job was done.
            Wayne sighed heavily. 'There. Now it's all back together.'
            'Let's just hope there's something left on it,' Guthrie said grimly.
            Wayne's forehead creased in seriousness. 'I think there will be,' he said solemnly and optimistically. 'There has to be. I feel like something's destined to happen with this.'
            'Do you reckon?'
            'Yep, I do.'
            Guthrie looked around him at all the rubbish to be cleared up. 'What are we going to do next?'
            'First, let's clear up all this stuff. Your mum will go ballistic if we don't get that done. Then I'll ride straight home and see that the tape's alright. If it is, then……..then we'll have to talk about what we should do next. We'll have to think about it.'
            Wayne put the tape in a safe place in his back pack and the two friends went about the unpleasant job of clearing up a backyard full of garbage and putting it into new bags. Yet time didn't drag as they thought it would. Their minds were too full of what they should do, what course to take. They really had no idea of what to do next, should the tape still be okay.
            Wayne made it home just in time for dinner. While making a mess of Guthrie's backyard had only taken a few minutes, cleaning it up again had taken hours. Adding to the delays was Mrs Dulwich's frequent inspections. The boys had said that the job was done, but Guthrie's mother insisted on checking for herself. She would then find a plastic bag attached to a tree somewhere, or some used tea bags sitting on a favourite plant, and the boys would have to comb the yard again.
            Wayne didn't realise that he smelt atrocious. He sat down at the dinner table without giving a second thought to matters of hygiene.
            'Whew!!' Mrs Grimwood cried. 'You smell high. What have you been up to?'
            Wayne's father winced and gave him a dirty look.
            'I've been going through Guthrie's garbage,' Wayne said nonchalantly.
            'Excuse me?' Mr Grimwood said in disbelief.
            'We threw something out in the garbage that we needed back,' Wayne explained. 'What's for dinner, I'm starving?'
            'Don't think you're going to sit down to dinner like that,' Mrs Grimwood insisted. 'Go and have a shower. And put those clothes in the dirty clothes basket.'
            Wayne got up from his seat. He knew the quicker he got clean the sooner he would eat.
            'What was it you threw in the garbage that you needed back anyway?' Mr Grimwood asked.
            'A video tape,' Wayne called from the hallway.
            Mr and Mrs Grimwood gave each other quizzical looks.
            'Nothing he does makes any sense,' Mrs Grimwood said.
            Mr Grimwood took up his paper and continued reading a gloomy article on the state of the economy. 'God knows what he'll make of himself.'
            After his shower and dinner Wayne managed to talk his father into letting him use his camcorder for a few minutes, under supervision. He had wanted to check the salvaged tape straight away, but his father wouldn't let him use the camera with dirty hands, and his mother insisted he eat first, like all civilised people (Mrs Grimwood was always concerned with civilised behaviour.) He linked the camera up to the television in the spare room and prepared for the moment of truth. If there was nothing on the tape, or if it didn't play at all, then they were up shit creek without a paddle. Wayne dropped the cassette into the holder and clicked it shut. He crossed his fingers for good luck, then pressed play. He waited, and waited. The tape looked a bit wobbly to start with, but he was pretty sure it had been wobbly anyway. An image of Kirsten flickered onto the screen. So far so good, but the real test would be to sit through all the material. He felt sure anything could go wrong at any moment. Suddenly Kirsten could be drowned out in snow, or more critically the sound could drop out. About two minutes into the tape there was some major disturbance. Wayne felt his heart knock at his ribs. He braced himself. Things might yet get worse. The video image flickered violently, it started rolling over and over, a heavy, thick green strip wrapped itself over the top of the screen. Then it disappeared. Wayne settled back into himself. He breathed a bit more easily. This must have been the section where the tape was violently ripped out. The rest of the tape continued to play without much drama. There was the odd flicker, but nothing dramatic. The tape then moved into the accidentally taped material. Wayne reacted emotionally and forgot all the dramas of the past few hours that were involved in retrieving the tape. There was Kirsten again, saying that he and his friend were hopeless and ugly. It hurt, and he felt like throwing the tape back in the garbage again. She had no right to say that, Wayne sulked to himself. She was supposed to be all for young people. She was supposed to be their friend.
            Wayne pulled himself together. He put his feelings as much as possible to the side. There were larger events, he felt, now overtaking him. They had controversial material on Kirsten Steele. What to do? Wayne rewound the tape and called Guthrie.
            As soon as Guthrie heard the phone ring he demanded that all clear the way for him. 'It's Wayne,' he assured his mother and father, making a beeline for the wall phone.
            'What's happened? Is it okay?' Guthrie asked straight off the bat.
            'The tape is fine.'
            'There's nothing wrong with it at all?'
            'There's a bit of a hiccup two minutes in, but that's none of the stuff we need. It's just of Kirsten talking on the record.'
            'But when she talks off the record?'
            'It's pretty much in perfect condition. There's one or two blips on it, but that's all.'
            'It's a bloody miracle,' Guthrie marvelled.
            'So now we have the tape back again. What do we do now?'
            'Er, I don't really know,' Guthrie confessed. 'What can we do?'
            They sat silent for a few moments on the phone, trying to figure out what course to take.
            'Maybe we should hand it over to a current affairs program or something?' Guthrie suggested.
            Wayne wasn’t happy with the idea. It didn't seem to offer much scope. Plus it would take everything out of their hands. Then he thought of something that hadn't yet crossed his mind.
            'We'll have to confront Kirsten with it first,' Wayne said. 'If we hand it over to the media without letting Kirsten know we have the tape she might say we set her up or something. Maybe she wasn't talking about us.'
            'Not likely,' Guthrie said.
            'Yeah, but the point is we have to give her a chance to explain herself, otherwise it'll look like we’re just two vicious kids with chips on our shoulders. We have to be professional about this,' Wayne cautioned.
            'I still think we should ring up some TV station with our story.'
            'Then it wouldn't be our project anymore, we couldn't use it. We should at least wait until later.'
            'Oh, yeah!' Guthrie suddenly realised the sense of this.
            'So you agree?'
            'Yeah. Let's see what Kirsten has to say for herself. I've sure got some questions I'd like to ask her.'
            'Okay. I'm going to make a few copies of the tape for safekeeping. I'll give one to you, and another I'll hide here. Then we'll have a tape that we take to see Kirsten with.'
            'Shall we call her to let her know we’re coming?'
            'Na. We'll just turn up at her office, catch her off guard,' Wayne said. 'Then maybe we'll be able to talk to the real Kirsten Steele.

Chapter Seventeen

2004-07-29T05:13:00.000-07:00

            When Wayne and Guthrie arrived unannounced at Kirsten's office the next day it threw the politician completely off guard. The boys had usually seemed uncomfortable and awkward and socially inept. Now they were confident and knew what they wanted - at least in a round about way.
            Kirsten now had a round the clock assistant, or rather political adviser, on the payroll. Like his boss, Newton Claire was confident that all unforseen difficulties could be 'managed'. Always with an eye towards exploiting an opportunity he had taken the position as Kirsten's assistant with a view to entering politics later down the track, 'when the time was right', as he liked to say. He was very young (barely out of university), handsome, always well groomed and very fussy in selecting his suits. When Wayne and Guthrie stood patiently at the reception desk and told him that they wanted to see Kirsten Steele his first impulse was to laugh out loud, but he checked himself. The last thing he intended to do was waste Kirsten's time because two spotty teenagers were demanding they see her.
            'Do you have an appointment?' Newton Claire looked at his nails, then picked a bit of lint off his sleeve. 'Is Kirsten expecting you?'
            'No,' Guthrie said.
            'But that doesn't matter,' Wayne said arrogantly. 'It's a free country, and if we want to see Kirsten Steele then we can see her.'
            This gave Newton Claire good reason to titter. 'I'm afraid that does matter,' he said, adjusting his tie. 'Now if you'll just go, I will pass on any messages you might want to leave for Kirsten.'
            Wayne crossed his arms. Seeing this Guthrie followed suit.
            'Where is she?' Wayne demanded.
            'She's in the middle of a meeting,' Newton Claire said, growing impatient. He felt he had humoured the boys enough. Now it was time for them to move on.
            'Well, if you can tell her that we're here we'll wait,' Wayne said. 'Kirsten knows us. She'll want to talk to us when she knows we're here.'
            'Look, boys, I think we've played our little game here long enough,' the adviser said. 'If you'd like to leave a message, I can pass it on. But otherwise I will have to ask you to leave. It's as simple as that. I don't know who you are, I don't know how - or if - you know Kirsten, but it's out of the question that she will be able to see you.'
            Wayne looked behind him and saw a very comfy looking sofa and some matching chairs, which were provided for visitors. There were a few magazines fanned out on a table as well, to help visitors pass the time. Wayne went and plopped himself down on the sofa and sprawled out.
            'We can wait here 'til Kirsten's out of her meeting,' Wayne said. 'Take a seat Guthrie. May as well make yourself comfy.'
            Newton Clair felt ridiculous arguing with two teenagers. It was stupid beyond belief. Whatever authority he had was being eroded, fast.
            'Okay,' the assistant tried a final gambit. 'I've tried being reasonable. I've given you a choice. If you don't leave now I'm going to have to call the police.'
            Hearing this Guthrie's immediately jerked up, getting ready to run. He presumed that they were now going to bolt.
            'Sit down Guthrie,' Wayne said calmly.
            'But he said he's going to call the police,' Guthrie threw out his arms in a panic. 'Let's get out of here!'
            'You can't call the police just because we want to see Kirsten,' Wayne said. 'She's a politician, she's elected by the people. We have a right to see her.'
            'Not when there's a security issue,' Newton Claire said ominously.
            The assistant took a mobile phone out of his breast pocket and started to tab a few numbers, hoping to startle the boys into a hasty retreat.
            Wayne grew bolder and bolder by the minute. He was sick of being pushed around, whereas Guthrie was getting ready to make a run for it.
            'Good, call the police,' Wayne said, crossing his arms defiantly. 'I'd like to talk to them myself and see if it's legal for you to do this.'
            Newton Claire had never really intended to call the police. He was just sure that it would be enough to scare the boys off. Now the bluff had failed. He stopped tabbing the numbers and put the phone back. Wayne and Guthrie had won.
            'Okay,' he said angrily. 'Alright. What did you say your names were?'
            'I am Wayne Grimwood, and this is my associate Guthrie Dulwich,' Wayne made the introductions, enjoying his victory.
            'I'll tell Kirsten you're here, but she still won't be able to see you.'
            'As long as she knows we're here,' Wayne smiled. 'Tell her it's very important. We have a video here we'd like to discuss with her.'
            The assistant momentarily paused, tried to think of another way to get rid of the boys, then sniggered and left the reception area.
            'Sit down Guthrie,' Wayne said.
            Dazed and amazed, Guthrie obeyed orders.
            'They might be calling the police now,' Guthrie worried. 'They usually do it in secret.'
            'Don't worry. Relax. We know Kirsten. He can't push us around like that.'
            Guthrie did worry though, sure that trouble was afoot. Wayne crossed his legs, picked up a magazine, then seeing that it was an incomprehensible finance journal, tossed it back onto the table. Moments later Kirsten emerged, with her assistant in tow.
            'Wayne, Guthrie,' she tried to hide her impatience. 'This is a surprise. What are you doing here? I wasn't expecting you. We didn't have an appointment organised.'
            Newton Claire crossed his arms archly.
            'Yeah, I know. And I'm sorry,' Wayne did all the talking, while Guthrie tried to stay in the background as much as possible. 'But we have something really important we want to discuss with you.'
            'Well, it's impossible for me to talk to you now,' Kirsten said, tossing her hair back. 'I mean, I have to find room for you on my schedule first. And that's looking pretty full for the next few months. I'm really sorry, guys,' she apologised unconvincingly.
            There was another arch look from the assistant. His eyebrows cocked in triumph.
            'C'mon, we should go,' Guthrie whispered, feeling defeated.
            Wayne didn't even hear his friend. 'It'll only take ten minutes,' Wayne pressed on, undeterred.
            Kirsten tried to be diplomatic, but it was clear she was losing her patience. 'I'm in the middle of a meeting at the moment. You've really no idea how inconvenient this is.'
            'That's okay,' Wayne said. 'We don't mind waiting for you, especially seeing what we've got to show you is so important.' Wayne took the videocassette out of his backpack and held it up.
            Kirsten suddenly felt like she'd clicked onto what the boys wanted to show her. 'Oh, I see. You've finished your project. Well, that's great. Sure I'd love to see it. You can just leave it with Newton and I'll look at it later. I'm sure it's really good.'
            'No, it's not the project,' Wayne said. 'It's something else. When we interviewed you the camera was accidentally left on and some other stuff was recorded. We just wanted to see what you thought of it. If it was true what you said.'
            Kirsten suddenly knew something very bad had happened. She suspected that the boys had secretly filmed her, and now might be trying to blackmail her. Every worst possible scenario entered her head. She cursed herself for being so stupid as to be trapped by two teenage boys in some potential scandal.
            'Perhaps I better look at this new material then,' Kirsten's manner became very cool. 'And we can iron out any misunderstandings. Take a seat. I'll be about fifteen to twenty minutes.'
            Kirsten disappeared while Wayne and Guthrie sat down again, Wayne firmly holding the videocassette. While the boys waited Newton Claire hovered about, keeping a sharp eye on them, while pretending to be busy. When Kirsten's meeting ended she walked four men in navy business suits into the reception area, shook hands, thanked them for their 'input' and 'time' and said farewell. No one watching her could have guessed at what she was thinking.
            With the four businessmen gone Kirsten turned to the boys. Her manner was very businesslike and matter of fact.
            'Okay, let's see what you've got to show me,' she nodded in the direction of her office. This was a very different Kirsten from the one they had originally interviewed.
            Wayne and Guthrie picked themselves up and followed. In Kirsten's office there was a TV and video that she had for presentations. She held out an insistent hand for the video and Wayne passed it over.
            'I suppose it's cued?' she said without looking at Wayne or Guthrie, slipping it into the machine.
            'It's ready to go,' Wayne said.
            'Let's see what little present you two have for me,' Kirsten said sharply, now glaring at both Wayne and Guthrie. She pressed the play button without looking at it, holding her intimidating gaze on the boys. Guthrie felt his legs go to jelly.
            The tape rolled. Kirsten crossed her arms and remained standing. If her plan was to scare the boys and let them know she was a tough customer who couldn't be pushed around, then it worked. Even Wayne, who had shown quite a bit of bravery, felt his nerves being worn down. Nevertheless, he was now determined to see justice done.
            Kirsten watched with evident disinterest the interview footage proper. It was obvious she found it dull and lacklustre. Then there came the part in the tape where Wayne and Guthrie went to buy lunch. The camera was placed on the corner of the desk. Kirsten looked on as nothing happened, waiting for things to get worse. She knew this would be a sort of lull before the storm. They soon did. She saw herself sitting on Brad's lap, kissing him. These were very intimate scenes, but Kirsten showed no uneasiness. Her face tightened and went harder as she concentrated. The gold love heart brooch that Kirsten always wore glistened under the office lights. What she had been waiting for finally happened. The material that had offended Wayne and Guthrie. It was the terrible conversation between Kirsten and Brad, a private conversation that never should have been recorded. Nonetheless, the accident had happened. A truth was revealed. Wayne and Guthrie were now out for answers.
            Kirsten watched to the end. When she was sure there was no more to come she pressed the stop button, obviously pissed off. Neither Wayne nor Guthrie felt like they had to ask anything. The tape had spoken for itself. Kirsten didn't think to apologise for her remarks, rather she went into damage control.
            There were several moments of uncomfortable silence. Wayne and Guthrie didn't know which way to look. They felt like they had unleashed a power greater than themselves. The tension in the room made them feel like all hell was about to break loose. Finally Kirsten spoke.
            'So this is what you were planning all along?' Kirsten pointed an accusing finger. 'You know this is entrapment? It's a dirty trick!'
            'No!' both immediately protested.
            'Let me guess, your next move is to blackmail me?'
            Again the boys cried no!
            'It was an accident,' Wayne protested. 'I didn't even know it was left on.'
            'That's right,' Guthrie said. 'We hardly knew how to use the camera in the first place. It was a real mistake. We never meant to do anything like that. Never.'
            'We only came here to show it to you because we wanted to know if you meant what you said.'
            'I don’t believe that for a second,' Kirsten said, remaining tight-lipped about her unguarded comments. During the whole conversation she never said a thing about the subject matter and substance of the tape.
            'Well it's true,' Wayne said, getting sick of Kirsten's stonewalling. In fact, he was starting to sense a strategy in the way Kirsten was dealing with the tape. She was trying to switch blame. Worse, she was trying to turn Wayne and Guthrie into two petty blackmailers, an idea that had never entered their heads.
            'Do you know I could call in the police for this kind of thing,' Kirsten continued. 'I have the evidence right here. I have a witness too. My assistant has seen and heard everything. He has a photographic memory. He could testify in court.'
            'We're not trying to blackmail you,' Wayne repeated.
            'We just want to know why you said what you said on the tape,' Guthrie said. 'You were all nice to our face, but then you stab us in the back!'
            Kirsten remained deaf to all talk about the subject matter of the tape. This may not have been a ploy. She seemed extremely focused on resolving what she liked to call an 'issue', and maybe what was on the tape really was meaningless to her. She ejected the cassette and held it with both hands.
            'I guess you weren't so stupid as to make this the only copy,' Kirsten said, tapping one end of the tape with a long, reinforced nail.
            'We've got other copies,' a frustrated Guthrie blurted out. 'But they're hidden.'
            'I thought as much,' Kirsten said, pausing.
            Wayne waited for Kirsten's next move, seeing he had no move himself planned. He had made other copies for insurance purposes, but in preparation for what contingency he wasn't sure.
            'You must hand over all the copies you have in your possession,' Kirsten demanded, after a few moments quick thinking. 'Then we'll just drop the whole episode, alright? I won't say anything about your attempting to blackmail me. Otherwise, I'll have no choice but to ask my solicitors for advice on how to handle this situation.'
            Now who was doing the blackmailing?, Guthrie thought.
            'Well then, we'll just have to talk to our solicitors,' Wayne gave tit for tat. It was a pathetic bluff, more desperate reflex than strategy, but backed into a corner it had come out of Wayne's mouth without much of a thought.
            Kirsten thought this laughable. And from Wayne's quick response and scared look she knew she had won - or thought so anyway. She continued to drive home her advantage.
            'If you persist in being stubborn,' she continued. 'this could get very serious. Blackmail carries heavy prison sentences, especially blackmailing a politician. A jury wouldn't look very favourably on two nasty little pieces of work like you, putting a democratically elected official through the wringer.'
            Wayne and Guthrie would have been lying if they said that this little episode with Kirsten Steele hadn't scared the bejesus out of them. It seemed all too possible, Kirsten calling down the wrath of the law to deal with them. But deep down, beyond the fear of drowning in a sea of troubles, they sensed that Kirsten was really putting them on. How could she do anything to them? They knew they hadn't done anything wrong. They most certainly weren't blackmailing Kirsten - the only thing they had asked of her was an explanation. The boys continued to defy Kirsten, trusting that their innocence and faith in the truth would protect them.
            'I don’t believe you!' Wayne's voice rose with indignation. 'You're just trying to bluff us, because you know you're in the wrong.'
            'You know,' Guthrie said. 'At first we thought you were really nice, helping us out with our project and buying us lunch. But it's obvious that was all just a load of crap. I wish we'd never let you take our photos for that stupid book of your's. You just wanted to use us so you could look like you really liked young people. Now we know all of that was just a lie. You're just an opp…opp…' Guthrie searched for a word he only half knew but sensed was right in this situation.
            'Opportunist,' Wayne finished.
            'That's right,' Guthrie nodded in agreement. 'You're an opportunist. You know what, I sure wish I was old enough to vote, 'cause I sure wouldn't vote for you.'
            Kirsten looked visibly bored. She had no time for bleeding hearts, for the over sensitive feelings of teenage boys. She just wanted to 'keep a lid' on things.
            'Give me back that tape,' Wayne reached an arm out in Kirsten's direction.
            Clenching her teeth she flipped open the cassette's protective lid and started pulling out the tape, destroying it dramatically. Once she had well and truly pulled out all the offending tape, she took a pair of scissors and cut and cut and cut in what soon turned out to be nothing more than impotent rage. She might be able to obliterate one tape, but not all. When she had finished she handed back the cassette and kept the tape for herself. 'There,' she said. 'Now, tomorrow you bring me the remaining tapes, or other wise I'll have the police visiting your houses so fast your brainless little heads will be spinning. This is serious! Those tapes, here, by 9.00 am tomorrow. I don't care if you have to cut class or whatever. Just be here.'
            Wayne took the tape and placed it in his backpack. It would make a good souvenir he thought, or evidence.
            'C'mon Guthrie, let's go,' Wayne said.
            Guthrie picked up his backpack. 'Yeah, this joint is starting to make me feel sick.'
            Without saying anything more Wayne and Guthrie made their way out.
            'Don't think you can just leave like that,' Kirsten crossed her arms. 'I want you to tell me that you will be here with the rest of the tapes. I want confirmation.'
            Neither Wayne nor Guthrie paid her any attention. They didn't really care what she said anymore. Kirsten was gradually losing control. She followed the boys as they tried to leave. In the reception area Newton Claire looked on alarmed. He had never seen Kirsten in such a state.
            'Stop them from leaving,' she instructed her assistant. 'They have no right to be leaving until I say so.'
            The good and faithful assistant reached for the door, just as Wayne was about to push it open. He then stepped in front of the boys, blocking their way. Wayne crossed his arms defiantly. Guthrie looked behind him at Kirsten.
            'Are you going to bring those tapes or do I call the police?' Kirsten threatened.
            'Tell him to get out of my way,' Wayne insisted, staring straight ahead at Newton Claire's expensive silk tie, ignoring what Kirsten had said.
            'The choice is yours,' Kirsten said. 'Promise me the tapes tomorrow and you can go.'
            'Get him out of my way,' Wayne repeated calmly. He was more resolved than ever now not to be pushed around. He'd had enough of being pushed around. It was time to stand up to the bullies.
            Guthrie continued to glare at Kirsten.
            'I'll call the police,' Kirsten's voice repeated her threat.
            'Well, either call the police or let us go,' Wayne said. 'Just make a decision.'
            Kirsten huffed and puffed. She had by now lost all reason. 'Get out of here!' her voice became shrill. 'Both of you. You're both stupid little idiots who are going to get yourselves in a lot of serious trouble over this,' she threatened.
            Wayne and Guthrie felt relieved. It was a victory for them. It was more than obvious that Kirsten had been bluffing. Newton Claire stepped back and allowed the boys to pass. Wayne couldn't resist offering a fake pleasantry.
            'Thankyou,' he said.
            Guthrie followed. He smiled broadly and sarcastically.
            Newton Claire's face burned red to his ears with rage. His usually rosy lips turned sour with defeat.
            As Wayne and Guthrie stepped out into the street, they could feel Kirsten's eyes boring into the back of them through the glass door. They were relieved nonetheless that their ordeal was over. There had been one point during their interview where they almost gave in, Kirsten's threats had seemed so genuine. But they had trusted that they had nothing to fear, and they were right. It was Kirsten who now had everything to lose.
            The boys walked in a daze down the street. The whole experience had been so unreal. The last thing they had expected when they went to confront Kirsten was that they would be made to feel guilty.
            'I'm hungry after all of that,' Guthrie said. 'She really freaked me out calling us blackmailers. Do you think she'll really call the police?'
            Wayne was in a philosophical mood. 'Kirsten might be totally gorgeous looking,' he said. 'But she's one hell of a creep. How did she get such an important job?'
            'I can't think when I'm hungry,' Guthrie complained. 'I need to eat something. Quick. Let's get some pizza.'
            'Alright, alright. We'll hold a war meeting over pizza. We've got to figure out what to do next, and at the moment I don't have a clue.'

Chapter Eighteen

2004-07-29T05:11:00.000-07:00

            At their favourite pizza parlour Guthrie rioted on his favourite, Hawaiian pizza, chasing it down with lots of cola. Wayne was also happy to eat, and ordered a cappuccino to go with his food. There was an air of excitement. Wayne and Guthrie had exposed Kirsten Steele as a phoney. Now they only had to decide on what they should do next.
            'What do you think Kirsten will do?' Guthrie asked, bringing his cup of cola to his lips and guzzling away. 'There's nothing she can do, right? She's trying to scare us, isn't she?'
            Wayne sipped thoughtfully on his coffee, leaving a frothy moustache. 'I reckon she's shit scared,' Wayne opined. 'Why else would she have let us leave her office without calling the police? She's got nothing on us, and she knows it.'
            'Shouldn't we put the tapes in safe keeping somewhere? She might get some thugs to rob our house to get the evidence. Like in that documentary on the American President.'
            'I never thought of that. She probably would try a dirty trick like that. She must be desperate enough.'
            Guthrie's greasy fingers separated off another wedge of pizza. 'Kirsten's got a lot of powerful people behind her. Who knows what the government could do? There might be spies watching us now.' Guthrie eagerly took a huge bite of his pizza slice. 'We could even be bugged,' he muffled through a full mouth.
            'I never thought of that either,' Wayne said, his suspicions now mounting.
            'We have to get smart. We could be in the line of fire.'
            'But we couldn’t be bugged at the moment. Kirsten's hardly had enough time.'
            Guthrie looked suspiciously out the windows. 'It can't hurt to keep an eye out for anything unusual. Maybe Kirsten's assistant followed us here.'
            'Well, they’re not going to get hold of the tapes. From now on we're going to carry a copy on us each, all the time. Plus we'll keep copies in our school lockers.'
            'That's a good idea.'
            'Straight after we're finished here we'll go home and get the tapes.'
            'We'll even sleep with them.'
            'Exactly.'
            Suddenly Wayne saw a newspaper on a nearby table. Seeing that it didn’t appear to belong to anyone else he jumped up and grabbed it. Pushing aside the plates and glasses he made room for the paper.
            'What's that?' Guthrie asked, still working his way through a slice of pizza.
            'We have to keep more up to date with the news,' Wayne asserted. 'Stuff might be happening that we need to know about.'
            'Right,' Guthrie agreed, not sure about this. Neither of them read newspapers, nor properly understood their function. On the rare occasions in the past where Guthrie had opened a newspaper, it was to read the Garfield cartoon strip, a favourite of his, at the back.
            Wayne spread the newspaper out before him and tried to look studious. 'Right. Let's see what's happening in the world. One thousand jobs to be cut,' he read the headline. 'Hmmmm. That's not good.'
            Guthrie sucked hard on his straw, staring into the last remnants of his glass of cola. 'I guess there'll be more unemployment,' he sagely remarked.
            Wayne tried to read the following article, but was unsuccessful. There was all this detail about one company being bought out by another, suggestion that the company director was corrupt, calls for the government to do more to help the business out. Wayne couldn't make head nor tail of it. It seemed like a complete jumble of facts and figures and concepts he just plain didn’t understand. After briefly scanning the rest of the front page, and commenting on tomorrow’s weather forecast, Wayne licked his finger and turned the page. There was a story about a murder, which didn't really grab his attention. They were always being reported on television every other day. Soon Wayne was flicking through page after page, thinking that newspapers were not really for him afterall. Eventually he flicked over the section on national politics in his race to get to the comics, but stopped. There had been a picture of a face that he was sure he recognised. He turned the page back and there was a caption underneath the photograph: Kirsten Steele, Minister for Youth Affairs and Education. The article header ran: Government Launches Youth Policy.
            'Guthrie, look!!' Wayne exclaimed.
            Guthrie almost choked on the last piece of pizza that he was working down. 'Wh…What? What is it?'
            'It's a photo of Kirsten. Look.' He held up the paper.
            'What's she doing in there?'
            Wayne read the article slowly, digesting every single word. 'Kirsten Steele, Minister for Youth Affairs and Education, will be this Friday launching the Middle of the Road party's policy booklet on youth issues. Ms. Steele will be introduced by the Prime Minister and will give a short speech, outlining youth projects and initiatives, which will be followed by a short promotional video highlighting the governments achievements to date in this area. The policy launch will be held at the Regent hotel function room. Many of the party's leading lights, past and present, are expected to attend.'
            'That's the booklet that has our photo on the front!' Guthrie said.
            'Well, duh!'
            'I wish I could be there for that launch. There's a few things I'd like to say.'
            Wayne suddenly grabbed Guthrie excitedly by the forearm. 'That's it!'
            'What's it?' Guthrie looked around, uncertain of what he'd said.
            'We're going to go to that launch,' Wayne's eyes widened wildly.
            'You're joking? Can you imagine what would happen to us if we got caught? It'd be like trespassing, wouldn't it?'
            'It's a free country,' Wayne said indignantly. 'Anyone should be able to go.'
            'Yeah, but it sounds like a private function,' Guthrie cautioned.
            Wayne shook his head, ignoring what he saw as Guthrie's excuses and stalling. 'It's not a matter of if we can go, but that we have to go,' Wayne insisted. 'We're going to take our video along and show it at that Middle of the Road party function, then they can all see what sort of person they really have for a youth minister. It says here that they're going to be showing some sort of promotional video for the party, right? Well, we're going to find out where the video player is and replace it with our tape. Okay? This is our big chance. Everyone in the Middle of the Road party will be there to see it. The media will be there too. After that Kirsten will be in deep shit.'
            'How are we going to get to play the video?' Guthrie asked. 'We won't even know where it is.'
            Wayne thought momentarily. It was a real problem. He didn't actually have a clue about how they were to infiltrate the video presentation. In fact, he didn't even know where the Regent hotel actually was.
            'I don't know about that yet,' Wayne admitted. 'That's somewhere in the future. We might just have to find out when we get there. The important thing at the moment is just to do it, to be there. This is our chance to show up Kirsten for what she really is, and to her own political party.' Wayne paused, caught his breath, then said ominously: 'We don't have a choice, we have to go.'
            Hearing these words Guthrie felt like he'd just swallowed a brick. His natural timidity made him wary of undertaking anything remotely risky. Desperately, he felt events overtaking him. He knew he was in the middle of something big, something even bigger than himself. He also knew too much about Kirsten. They couldn't just sit back and do nothing. They would be selling themselves out. An opportunity to make their mark had arrived. They had to take it, despite the risks.
            'What if it backfires?' Guthrie continued to raise objections, despite the feeling in his gut that he would be doing whatever Wayne asked. 'There'll probably be security at the function, and lots of it.'
            'What can really go wrong? We have this,' Wayne took the butchered tape out of his backpack and waved it around. 'We've got the truth about Kirsten here. They can't do anything to us. Either way we've got the goods. People will listen to us, they'll want to see this.'
            Guthrie sighed heavily. 'Okay. If that's what you reckon. If you don't think we'll get dragged off in a police wagon.'
            'We are going to turn their night upside down,' Wayne said triumphantly. 'I can't wait to see their eyes pop out when they see that video. Kirsten Steele, your days are numbered!'
            Guthrie looked uneasy, he held his belly. 'I think I'll order some desert,' he said. 'What do they have here?'

Chapter Nineteen

2004-07-29T04:51:00.000-07:00

            All was far from well in the Kirsten Steele camp. From the moment the boys had marched defiantly out of her office she had been desperately trying to come up with ways of 'containing', as she like to call it, 'the situation'. That night she lay on her bed, constantly rubbing her temples, trying to hit on some strategy to put the genie back in its bottle.
            Brad Payne, Kirsten's boyfriend, had just heard of all that had transpired only hours before. He, too, now tried to figure a way out for Kirsten. He sat on a nearby chair, with both legs crossed, his elbows resting on his knees and his head supported by two semi clenched fists. He looked like a young child trying to think.
            'I don't know how all of this has happened,' Kirsten said, herself confused by events she had played a key part in. She may have been able to diffuse the situation, despite her unfortunate remarks being captured, by offering some sort of apology to the boys. She could have tried to play down what she had said on the tape, maybe pleaded that she was really very tired that day, was not entirely herself etc. etc. Wayne and Guthrie's ill feeling may have been in some way appeased. If she had followed a more temperate path she may not have been experiencing her present troubles. Instead she had been tough and hard line. In essence, she had tried to use fear as a deterrent. By accusing them of blackmail, by talking up the possibility of criminal sentences, she had hoped to fill them with such dread that they would hand over the copies of the tapes. Now this had backfired, and backfired badly. Wayne and Guthrie had called her bluff. They knew she could do nothing. They knew they had done nothing wrong. It was an accident, some absent mindedness on Wayne's part, that the camcorder had been left on.
            'There's got to be something you can do,' Brad said. 'Those creepy little blackmailers. How could they secretly tape us? I thought they were just some dumb kids doing their school project. Goes to show, you can't trust anyone these days. Even stupid people have tricks up their sleeves.'
            'Welcome to the real world,' Kirsten said, reaching over to her bedside table and breaking open a headache tablet. She popped it on the end of her tongue, took a mouthful of water and threw her head back. 'You can bet I won't be doing anything else to help rotten school kids.'
            'Can't you bring the police in on this?' Brad suggested.
            'I told you already. No,' Kirsten fumed impatiently. 'I can't let anyone see what's on that damn tape. It would damage my political career. This could really create one mother of a scandal.'
            'What do they want off you then if they're blackmailing you?' Brad asked. 'Is it money?'
            'I don't know!' Kirsten exclaimed shrilly. 'I really don't know. At the moment they are just toying with me. They are obviously trying to fuck with my mind. When they marched out of my office with those smug little fat and pimply faces they wouldn't say a thing.'
            Brad sighed sympathetically. He shook his head in despondency. 'I wish this hadn't happened to you.'
            'Well, you and me both,' Kirsten rolled her eyes cynically.
            'You said they had other copies of the tapes stashed?'
            'That's right. God knows how many.'
            'I've got an idea,' Brad said brightly. 'Couldn't we get someone to break into their houses and try and find the tapes? I know some people who could help us. There are professionals who do jobs like this, ex army. It wouldn't be a problem to organise.'
            Kirsten was of course tempted by the idea. She was completely desperate to find a solution, and to the desperate this seemed feasible. But giving it closer thought she knew it was a stupid idea. Who was to say that the tapes were actually at their houses? They could have been in safe keeping in any number of places. She also knew that an operation of its kind could soon get out of control, and the boys would definitely know who was behind it.
            'The last thing I need is a Watergate type scandal on my hands,' Kirsten said. 'Things like that have backfired on too many politicians in the past.'
            'Watergate?' Brad said, not understanding what the expression meant. 'What's Watergate?'
            Kirsten often forgot how limited Brad's political knowledge was. She usually went along assuming that he knew what she was talking about, and it was in moments like these that she wondered why she was going out with someone who knew next to nothing about politics. 'Haven't you ever heard of Richard Nixon?' Kirsten said, obviously holding Brad's limited political knowledge in contempt.
            'No,' Brad admitted blankly. 'Should I?'
            'He was a very famous American president,' Kirsten explained impatiently. 'Everyone knows who Richard Nixon was. Everyone knows what Watergate was about. Tell me, do you know who Margaret Thatcher was?'
            Brad rolled his eyes. 'Well, obviously she was an American president. I'm not that stupid.'
            'She was a British Prime Minister,' Kirsten corrected.
            'Yeah, the leader of a big country. What's the difference? You don't have to look at me like I'm a complete idiot. I'm an actor. I don't follow world affairs.'
            'Do you have any idea who Australia's current Prime Minister is?' Kirsten asked, preparing herself for the worst.
            'Now let me think,' Brad tapped a finger against his forehead and indeed did start to think. 'I know the answer to this. I know………Let me guess. I saw him on the television the other day.'
            'For God's sake, Brad,' Kirsten cried. 'You met him only a couple of weeks ago.'
            'Exactly, I've met him. Why do I have to remember his name? You know I'm hopeless at remembering people's names.'
            'My headache just got worse,' Kirsten said, turning over in her bed. 'I think you better leave. I need some time alone to clear my head. You're not helping.'
            'Do you want me to give you a massage?' Brad sprang up from his chair. 'That might help.'
            'No. I don't want a massage. This is the sort of headache that's going to need a lot more than a massage to cure.'
            'Oh,' Brad murmured. He didn't know how to take not being wanted around. 'So you want me to go then?'
            'That's what I said before,' Kirsten said coldly. She turned off her bedside lamp.
            'Alright then,' Brad said, hurt at Kirsten's manner. 'I'll go.'
            Kirsten didn't say anything. She wanted Brad to go as soon as possible. Making a response would only lead to further useless conversation.
            Brad went around to Kirsten's side of the bed and kissed her on the cheek. She didn't move, but just lay there. 'Bye then,' Brad said rather glumly, then left the apartment.
            Kirsten continued to lay still. A deep depression had gripped her - unusual for Kirsten - and she couldn't move. She lay there in bed, replaying her troubles over and over in her mind, until it almost made her feel nauseous.