Fate
Friday – 11:04 AM
Danni Shaw is positive Fate was to blame for the death of Slim Jim McCallister, FUN FM’s enduring breakfast show co-host. An untied shoelace. The fickle foot of Fate (admittedly Danni’s on said shoelace). The rest was down to gravity.
One moment Jim was hungrily pursuing the FUN FM’s PR manager’s nubile assistant amongst the human traffic in the building’s foyer, the next he was hurtling headfirst down the escalator –
‘Oh fuuuuuuuuuuuuuucccccccckkkkk!’
Jim’s last words.
Danni watched Jim’s plight with scarcely hidden delight, until his abrupt, messy faceplant landing on the escalator’s second bottom tread. The crack of bones, the tearing of flesh, the expulsion of blood. Then she’d almost squealed. A crowd had quickly gathered. Women screamed, men screamed. CPR was applied, but Jim was unresponsive. Fate, Danni mused as she headed for the stairs, could be a cruel mistress.
Thursday – 6:15 PM
One week later, Slim Jim’s wake is held in the classic Sydney inner-city hose-out pub around the corner from the FUN FM studios. Attendance isn’t compulsory, but as management are paying for food and some drinks (tap beer, house wine, soft drinks) the event is well attended. Enlarged publicity shots of Jim from his younger, (much) slimmer days – broadcasting from atop the Harbour Bridge, the Opera House steps – are pinned around the bar with R.I.P. scored across them at a forty-five-degree angle.
Suzy Q, Jim’s partner in breakfast crimes against good musical taste, is on the make-shift dance floor, all-but sexually assaulting the young IT technician assigned to upgrade the station’s computers’ security. To Danni, nursing a white wine in a darkened corner, the scene is reminiscent of a randy sow trying to mate with a nervous fox terrier. She can hear the sloppy kisses, Suzy’s guttural moans and the IT kid’s whimpers, the clack of belt buckle on belt buckle.
The station manager, Eric Blainey, late thirties, blond, enduring Prince Valiant haircut, loosened floral tie, eases past Danni, oblivious of Suzy’s soft porn performance, and raises his glass of lemon squash.
‘Ladies and gents,’ he calls. ‘A little shush, please?’ But no one pays him any attention. ‘Ladies and gents? Hello?’ Eventually, dribs and drabs of people stop talking and look Eric’s way. ‘Now then folks, this is the formal part of the evening where we reminisce about Slim Jim.’ He grins at the mourners. ‘So, any fond memories of our fallen comrade?’
A silence descends, the mourners appear dumbstruck. For Danni it would be easier to compliment any of the mid-twentieth century’s fascist rulers, than shower any form of praise on Slim Jim.
‘Anyone?’ asks Eric. ‘At all?’ He points at a female staff member. ‘Ah, Suzanne. Remember he gave a shout out to your mum when she was sick.’
‘He tried to fuck my mum,’ says a voice from the darkness near the pool table.
‘He touched up my sister at an outside broadcast,’ says another.
‘He did the same to my brother. The dirty bastard.’
There was certainly no doubting Jim’s versatility. . .
‘Please! Please!’ says Eric in his shouty-voice. ‘Not quite the reminiscing I had in mind, folks . . .’
Danni has a quiet chuckle to herself but is taken aback when Suzy Q lurches towards her.
‘Hoi, newbie.’ She thrusts her handbag into Danni’s chest. ‘Look after this.’ She drains her red wine. ‘And get us another drink.’
Danni is set to tell Suzy to . . . what? Fuck off? No. She couldn’t say that to her. She’s only been ‘an emergency’ member of the breakfast crew a mere four days. In the previous fourteen months – when Danni had toiled successfully in the torture of FUN FM’s graveyard shift – Suzy had never even spoken to her. Now, when they were so, so close to becoming permanent Breakfast Show co-hosts (if in-house rumours could be believed), Suzy spoke to Danni regularly – barking orders, demanding requests – treating her like a private gofer.
‘Hoi!’ Suzy bounces in front of Danni, snapping her fingers. ‘Any time tonight will be fine.’
I will tell her to fuck off, thinks Danni. I’ll- No. She should get Suzy the drink – immediately. This is the same kind of Fate changing moment that landed in her lap with Slim Jim. ‘Of course, Suzy.’ She smiles. ‘Coming right up.’
Suzy returns to the dance floor, engaging in more bumping and grinding with the increasingly distressed IT technician (‘This wasn’t covered in the induction!’). Danni abandons Eric and his fruitless search for happy Slim Jim stories and threads her way to the bar.
‘Can I have a bucket of your cheapest red wine,’ she says to the barmaid.
‘A bucket?’
‘A big glass.’
The barmaid nods and turns away.
‘Make sure it’s your cheapest!’
Back in her hidey-hole, half litre of red wine with the bouquet of a swaggie’s boots secured, Danni rifles through Suzy’s handbag. The resealable plastic bag she withdraws from the handbag’s zippered section contains enough illicit drugs to kick-start a major music festival. Danni tips about ten white, smiley-face-stamped pills onto the palm of her hand. How many is too many? Two? Three? She tips six into Suzy’s drink
Half an hour later, Suzy, frothing at the mouth, twitching, and writhing, is stretchered from the pub by paramedics. If tales of Slim Jim’s work sexual harassments weren’t enough to kill off the wake, this little episode has done the job. In hindsight Danni figures two pills would have been adequate.
A hand thuds on her shoulder. ‘Danni?’
She spins around. ‘I didn’t do anything!’
Eric frowns at her. ‘Pardon?’
‘Nothing. I just meant- I wish- I wish I knew first aid.’ Ha ha!
‘I think Suzy’s situation is beyond mere first aid.’ Eric holds up both hands. All of his fingers are crossed. ‘Moving forward. Can we have a quick chat, my dear . . .’
***
Cradling a whiskey and ice, Danni shoulders her way onto the footpath outside the pub. Her hands quiver with such alacrity she can barely dial home on her mobile. She turns, blinking at the flashing lights of the ambulance, as its siren blasts into life; grins. When Jason, her husband, answers she gets straight to the point. ‘You’ll never guess who’s FUN FM’s new official breakfast show host!’
***
Official breakfast host at last. On the surface it may appear that Danni’s rise from obscurity to hosting Sydney’s number three rated breakfast radio show was swift. Fourteen months is fast, but good luck, grim persistence, and Fate – a whole lot of Fate – have played their roles.
When marriage, motherhood, and household debt – a woman’s duty – forced her to abandon her musical dreams – singer/rhythm guitarist in a five-piece band, Durango, formed at university – Danni started work as a postie to help pay the mortgage and supplement Jason’s accountant’s wage. The postie work was repetitive, uncomplicated, and afforded her a lot of thinking time. Probably too much. With the green-eyed bird of jealousy perched on her shoulder, she watched her former band sign a record deal with a minor label – less than a year after she had departed – and release a poorly-received EP. She should have been happy to be disassociated from such a car crash, but Durango’s failure only reminded Danni of her failure. But she possessed an X-factor (of this she was certain) and she was wasting her talent working as a postie. The clock was ticking, but the window of opportunity hadn’t closed completely. She needed to be pro-active; to make ‘shit happen’. The identity of that ‘shit’ was, for many years, nothing more than vague ideas, hopes, and daydreams.
And Fate can never be forgotten; cannot be underestimated. In the end, it had played a huge role in Danni’s journey to ‘commercial radio’ discovery. While relief delivering on a neighbouring postie run, she’d learnt a community radio station, POX FM, was seeking deejays. ‘A couple of nights a week, for a few hours,’ explained Brooksy, the station’s manager (and only paid staff member). ‘Bring your own music and entertain and educate.’ For Danni this was kismet and the start of a new musical journey. She’d hoped deejaying at POX could lead to further opportunities. What exactly, she wasn’t sure. Concerts. Free music. Stuff. But what her role at POX ultimately led to surprised everyone – including Danni. Although wasn’t that just like Fate?
Two things happened. The first was a local movie starring ex-pat Hollywood stars breaking all box office records. Top stars and a top soundtrack said the reviewers. The soundtrack. It contained a track from Durango’sdoomed EP – which became a surprise hit. The band reformed, did the rounds of the morning and variety shows, a nationwide tour. Danni’s dream had happened without her. She’d never felt so lacking of talent, so fameless. But Fate hadn’t finished with her . . .
The second thing was an email from Eric Blainey, Manager, FUN FM, Sydney, Australia. It dropped in Danni’s inbox on a Tuesday morning a week after the Durango news, while she was setting up her mail for delivery. She must have cried out in surprise because three neighbouring posties had gathered around her sorting frame, frowning, gawping.
‘Everything all right, Danni?’ Barry, rotund, shiney-domed, jolly, asked.
‘Whaddayado?’ grunted Merrill, rotund, dreadlocked, miserable. ‘Shityaself?’
‘Fuck off, Merrill,’ she scowled; turned to Barry, smiled. ‘Got some good news, Baz.’
‘Yafuckinoffforgoodthen?’ Merrill grunted. He grunted a lot. The other posties called him Neanderthal (most of them knew what it meant).
Danni stepped up so she and Merrill stood safety boot-to-safety boot, grinned. ‘Yeah. I am.’
A fortnight later under the watchful eyes of station manager Eric and fill-in graveyard shift deejay, the ‘rascally Gallic’ Rene-Maurice Pascalle, Danni was given a crash course in deejaying at a major commercial radio station. The graveyard shift – ten PM until five AM – weeknights was to be, according to Eric, ‘Danni’s Domain’. It proved to be her purgatory. The enforced lifestyle was abysmal. Broken sleep. Unnatural sleep. Little sleep. But the financial rewards were more than adequate, the longevity of this high-ish profile gig much longer than Durangocould ever imagine and, once Danni had mastered the intricacies of running the board – loading the music (crap), the adverts (crapper) and promoting the station’s overblown competitions and enigmatic ‘community work’ – on top of dealing with the listeners – outspoken, out of step – the desire for another challenge, further exposure, a wider, but normal audience bubbled within her. In the dead of night while she played sanitised music, fended off phone calls from lunatics, insomniacs and lonely souls, she dreamt of hosting the Breakfast Show, the crème da la crème of radio, punching on against AM shock-jocks and rival – superstar – celebrity brekky crews. And despite the draconian attitude of management and the tried and tested – but outdated – breakfast crew, FUN FM incredibly, managed to snag third ranking in the breakfast ratings month in, month out. They must have been doing something right, but third place was not Number One. There was plenty of scope for improvement. Fresh talent – Danni – was an integral part of this renaissance; along with better, more diverse, modern music and attitude from the presenters (Danni, again).
But, Slim Jim and Suzy Q looked upon breakfast as their kingdom – for life. Eric called the pair ‘an institution’. Judging from the few occasions Danni had associated with their majesties – a Christmas party, a reality TV show launch and three staff meetings – she believed one (if not both) should be institutionalised. Jim had made it his mission to feel up Danni – with extreme prejudice. When she’d cried foul, Eric had called this behaviour ‘Jim’s roguish streak’. End of. Suzy meanwhile, as self-appointed (and senior management backed) Alpha Female, looked upon Danni, younger, slimmer, smarter, as an adversary. She was correct. Danni wanted her job.
In the end, Danni’s deep-rooted ambition, along with her even deeper-rooted desire for fame (and fortune), drove her to look for alternative methods to unseat the immovable pair. ‘It looks like it’s definitely dead man’s boots,’ Jason said over dinner one night. Danni knew he was right. She also knew Sydney’s listening public were the victims of a great disservice. They deserved better. They deserved Danni. When she encountered the dynamic duo at a drinks function celebrating the birthday of the station’s owner, Mr. Bryce, where Jim spoke to Danni in double entendre as his hands wandered and Suzy spat threats of physical harm at her, Danni knew she had to act with extreme prejudice. And Fate? Well, it was its own mistress.
