Still Riding on the Storm Read online

  ‘Is that what it is. It looks like some hairy Mexican chopped his toe off while he was bottling it.’

  Warren smiled and took the two bottles to his bedroom, leaving Norton staring numbly at the kitchen table. His mind was still ticking over from lack of sleep, yet something else kept nagging at him, but he couldn’t quite figure out what it was.

  ‘Anyway,’ said Warren, returning to the kitchen door. ‘I’d better get cracking. I’ll see you tonight.’

  ‘Yeah, righto,’ replied Norton absently. ‘You know, Warren, I just can’t figure you taking all those Serepax like that. It just doesn’t seem right.’

  ‘Yeah, well you know how it is, Les. The pressures of advertising and all that. I’ll see you when I get home.’

  ‘Yeah, righto.’

  As he went to leave, Warren turned to Les, gave him an absolutely diabolical grin and pointed to his Daily Telegraph still on the kitchen table. ‘I’ll tell you what, mate,’ he said. ‘Seeing as it’s raining outside, you can have my paper. Save you a walk down to the newsagency.’

  Norton muttered a thanks as Warren’s grin seemed to increase.

  ‘And I’ll guarantee you something, Les. You’ll have absolutely no trouble reading it. There’s not a mark on it. See you later, mate.’

  Norton continued to stare numbly at the paper. The front door opened just as his eyes lit up. ‘Hey, Warren. Hold on a minute, you little bastard.’

  THE BAKER’S DOZEN

  ‘Well I reckon it’s all right. What do you reckon?’ Wayne Nolan turned to his girlfriend, Jill Riley, waving one arm around the empty home unit. ‘You can’t say it’s not big enough,’ he added.

  ‘It suits me. I’m easy,’ said Jill with a slight shrug of her shoulders.

  Behind them Mr Lewkovitz, the estate agent, stood with a bored smile on his face. Lean and losing his grey hair, Mr Lewkovitz looked almost the opposite of dark-haired Wayne and blonde Jill; both of whom had happy, well-fed personalities and a weight problem to go with it. Lettings never did turn him on. ‘For the money this unit is very good value,’ he said.

  ‘You reckon the owner will shout us some new carpet,’ said Wayne, ‘and if I paint the loungeroom he’ll shout the paint too.’

  ‘Certainly,’ said Mr Lewkovitz, making a magnanimous gesture with his hands.

  ‘Righto, we’ll take it,’ said Wayne. He turned to Jill. ‘We’ll get your brother up here on Saturday, attack it with a bit of paint and we can be in by Monday.’

  Wayne shook hands with Mr Lewkovitz and they went to his agency in Bondi Road to sign the lease.

  Trying to find a decent flat in Bondi is about as easy as trying to find Lasseter’s lost reef. Wayne had been looking every day for over two weeks, getting the usual shuffle from the local estate agents. Most were either too dirty, too small or too expensive; some had cockroaches in them as big as lobsters and some you wouldn’t let to a prehistoric man.

  Having to search for a new flat couldn’t have come at a more inconvenient time for Wayne and Jill. In six months time they were going to Coffs Harbour to get married. Jill’s uncle had a bakery there; he was retiring and Wayne had arranged to take over the business for next to nothing. But the owner of the unit where they lived had decided to sell and they had to move out. It was a real pain.

  However, as luck would have it, Wayne knew an old Jewish tailor in Bondi who used to do his alterations for him. He had a cousin who knew a man who had a brother whose wife worked in an estate agency in Bondi Road and if he went up there they might be able to help him. Which is how Wayne came across this particular flat in Denham Street, just behind the Royal Hotel.

  For a flat in Bondi it wasn’t too bad. It was fairly new, bright, roomy, had a garage and if you stretched your neck on the verandah like a giraffe you almost had an ocean view. All it needed was new carpet and a coat of paint in the lounge and at $140.00 a week it wasn’t cheap but it was reasonable value. Besides, it was only for six months.

  The following Saturday Wayne and Jill’s brother Bob were in the loungeroom, rollers in their hands and paint all over them going for their lives on the walls and ceiling. They didn’t bother about putting a tarpaulin on the floor as the old carpet was going anyway. On one side of the room was an esky containing a case of iced twist-tops; on the other side was a transistor radio sitting on an empty grocery carton. Jill was in the kitchen making a pot of tea and sorting out some fish and chips.

  ‘Hey Bob, stick the radio on 2KY, will ya,’ said Wayne. ‘It’s time for the first leg of the extra double.’

  ‘Righto,’ replied Bob. ‘You got something in this, have ya?’

  ‘Yeah, Tassy Lady. It’s 12/1.’

  They stopped painting to listen to the race; Tassy Lady got up.

  ‘You bloody little beauty,’ called out Wayne. ‘I had ten units on it.’

  ‘Good on you,’ said Bob, ‘you can buy some more beer.’

  Jill appeared from the kitchen holding a tray with the tea and fish and chips on it. ‘Here you are,’ she said, ‘eat this before it gets cold.’ As she put the tray on the floor there was a rapid knocking at the door. ‘I’ll get it,’ she said.

  She grabbed a chip from one of the plates, walked over and opened the door.

  Standing there was a sour-faced, dumpy, foreign-looking woman in her late forties. She had a figure like a sack of potatoes and that many double chins she would’ve needed a bookmark to find her collar. Before Jill could get a chance to ask her what she wanted the woman opened up.

  ‘You will have to turn the radio down,’ she said. ‘You are making too much noise. My husband is a sick man. He will not stand noise.’

  Jill stood there for a moment, eyes blinking and her mouth slightly open. ‘Who are you?’ she finally said.

  ‘I am Mrs Daffasana,’ she said. ‘I live across the hall. This is a very quiet block. You will not make noise. The radio is too loud.’

  ‘Who is it?’ Wayne called out from the lounge.

  ‘It’s some woman from across the hall,’ said Jill. ‘She reckons the radio’s too loud.’

  ‘Ohh, tell her to get stuffed.’

  Jill turned to the woman. ‘My husband said to tell you to get stuffed.’

  The woman went red, gave a stifled cry and ran back inside her unit, slamming the door behind her.

  Wayne was standing there, the roller in one hand dripping paint on the old carpet when Jill walked back into the lounge.

  ‘What was that all about?’ he said incredulously.

  ‘That old tart reckoned the radio was too loud.’

  ‘Too loud,’ cried Bob. ‘Christ, you can hardly hear the bloody thing in here.’ He pointed to the radio; it wasn’t much bigger than a book.

  ‘It’s gonna be nice living here if they’re all like her,’ said Wayne shaking his head. ‘Come on, let’s have a cup of tea.’

  The following Monday afternoon Wayne and Jill were moving their belongings into the flat. The parking area was out the back; to get there you drove up a short narrow driveway. However as they were just going to be a short while moving their stuff Wayne parked his old Holden panel-van outside the front door. It wasn’t really blocking anyone’s way, just a bit of an inconvenience for a short time. But sure enough, down came Mrs Daffasana.

  ‘You cannot park here. You are blocking the entrance. There are parking places out the back.’ She pointed to the rear of the flats.

  Wayne stood there dripping sweat, trying to manhandle a TV set from out of the panel-van.

  ‘For Christ’s sake, lady,’ he said, gritting his teeth, ‘I’m only going to be a few more minutes.’

  ‘That is no excuse. You are blocking the door. I cannot get in or out.’

  ‘If your arse wasn’t so big, you’d get in all right, you fat heap,’ replied Wayne.

  Mrs Daffasana was horrified. ‘You cannot talk to me like that. I will see my husband. I will ring the agent.’

  ‘Ring who you bloody like.’

  She turned and wen
t inside, wiggling her ample backside between the front door and the panel-van. There was room enough to drive a horse and dray but for Mrs Daffasana it was a bit of a battle.

  About a half an hour later Wayne had moved his car and was in the flat unpacking a carton of cutlery when the phone rang. It was Mr Lewkovitz, the agent.

  ‘Mr Nolan,’ he said, ‘did you have an argument with Mrs Daffasana over your car? She says you insulted her.’

  Wayne explained to him exactly what happened, but Mr Lewkovitz wasn’t really impressed.

  ‘We will forget about it this time, Mr Nolan,’ he said slowly, ‘but you must be quiet and keep your car out the back. Is that understood?’

  ‘Yeah, righto,’ replied Wayne glumly and hung up.

  Jill appeared at the door with an armful of coat hangers. ‘That the agent?’

  Wayne nodded his head. ‘Yeah.’

  ‘Mrs Daffasana?’

  ‘How did you guess.’

  Over the next week Wayne got to meet some of the other people in the block of units. There was a family of Russians who lived upstairs — the Efremoffs. Wayne got to meet the father, Sergei, and his wife, Rossana. He lost count of the sons and daughters; every time he walked up the stairs he seemed to meet another. There must be two hundred of them, he thought; I don’t know how they all fit in the one unit.

  Some Asian students lived opposite them, Wayne guessed them to be Vietnamese. But they were a friendly lot, very polite, forever smiling and they would always make sure they said hello if you happened to pass them somewhere.

  An English disc-jockey lived underneath with his good-looking New Zealand girlfriend. He wasn’t a bad bloke, always said hello if he passed by. He worked in a disco somewhere.

  Wayne didn’t get to meet many of the people in the front block of units, just most of those in their block. However one old bloke he did get friendly with was the caretaker, Mr Percival Gatterskill. But everybody called him Sir Percy; everybody but Otto and Frieda Daffasana of course.

  Sir Percy was a lovely old bloke, he was just on ninety and he’d been in Australia over seventy years, having come out from England when he was a young man. He’d lived in the units since they were built and originally owned the house the block was built on.

  Sir Percy had the grounds and the gardens around the units in immaculate condition. He took his time doing it, but it was his main little interest in life and it kept him active. He used to sport an English gentleman’s cap and liked to wear a collar and tie with his overalls and while this might have looked slightly incongruous on anybody else, on Sir Percy it looked quite pukka. He was only a little over five feet tall with a completely bald head and the biggest pair of ears Wayne had ever seen on anyone; Wayne reckoned they were big enough to swat flies with. But they had a good rapport, Sir Percy liked a flutter on the gee-gees, Wayne didn’t mind a punt now and again and between them they used to pick a few winners.

  About a week after they moved in, Wayne got the amplifier for his stereo back from the repair shop. Wayne and Jill were pretty careful with their money but Wayne didn’t mind splurging a little on a good stereo and a few records now and again. He liked a bit of rock ’n’ roll, especially groups like AC/DC and Cold Chisel.

  They’d just eaten tea this night. Jill was in the kitchen washing up; she put the last dish away and stood in the doorway drying her hands on a tea-towel, watching silently as Wayne finished putting his stereo together in the loungeroom.

  ‘There you go,’ he said, rubbing his hands together, a satisfied smile on his face. ‘All finished.’

  Jill didn’t say anything. She just stood there watching as Wayne went through a stack of albums till he picked out the one he wanted, took the record out of its cover and placed it on the turntable. He moved the needle across onto the record and turned slowly to Jill, a strange smile on his face.

  ‘I wonder if Otto and Frieda like Rose Tattoo,’ he said.

  Jill threw her hands over her face. ‘Oh, no,’ she cried and ran into the bedroom, closing the door behind her.

  Wayne turned the volume control nearly all the way up. ‘Righto, Mr Spock,’ he said, ‘take us out of earth orbit, all ahead warp factor nine.’

  Angry Anderson had got no further than three bars of ‘Bad Boy for Love’ when there was a furious pounding on the door.

  ‘I wonder who this can be,’ said Wayne as he got up and walked over to open the door.

  There stood Otto and Frieda. It was the first time Wayne had seen Mr Daffasana up close; he was just as fat and ugly as his wife, only with more grey hair. He was fuming, his eyes were rolling around in his head, his face looked like an Italian flag, he was so worked up he could hardly get the words out.

  ‘What do you think you are doing,’ he finally screamed out. ‘Are you a mad man? Do you wish to kill us with this noise?’

  Then she started up. ‘You cannot make this noise. We will not stand for it. This is a respectable block of units.’

  Wayne stood there impassively, the music blaring out behind him loud enough to wake the dead. He put his finger up as if to say, ‘Hold on a moment’, then went into the kitchen. He came back with a pen and a piece of paper, wrote something on it and handed it to Mr Daffasana.

  Otto tore it out of Wayne’s hand and read it. It said, ‘You will have to speak up. I can’t hear you.’ He went another shade of green and flung the piece of paper at Wayne’s feet.

  ‘You will hear from the agent,’ he screamed, ‘and my solicitor.’ Then they both scurried back to their unit, slamming the door behind them.

  Wayne went back inside and turned the stereo down. Jill appeared from the bedroom.

  ‘What’d they say?’ she asked.

  ‘They said they don’t like Rose Tattoo. Anyway, I’d say Lewkovitz should be round here by no later than six tomorrow night.’

  At fifteen minutes to six the following evening there was a knock at the door. Wayne opened it and there stood Mr Lewkovitz, his face looked like Jed Clampett’s dog.

  ‘Hello, Mr Lewkovitz,’ said Wayne pleasantly. ‘What’s doing? Would you like a cup of coffee?’

  ‘Not at this instant, Mr Nolan, thank you,’ said the estate agent tiredly. ‘Mr Nolan, I’ve had another complaint from Mr and Mrs Daffasana.’

  ‘Really,’ said Wayne sounding surprised. ‘What is it this time?’

  ‘Did you have a band in here the other night?’

  Wayne couldn’t help it; he threw back his head and roared out laughing.

  ‘A band?’ he said. ‘How would I get a band in here? You couldn’t fit a flea circus in here, let alone a band.’

  Wayne went on to explain to Mr Lewkovitz how he was a baker and, having to start work at 4.30 a.m., he was in bed at 9 p.m. every night; that Jill was a nurse who worked long, hard hours and needed her sleep also, so there wasn’t much chance that they’d be up all night playing records.

  ‘When it’s all boiled down,’ said Wayne, ‘Jill and I would probably be the quietest people in the block. Besides, I’m entitled to play a bit of music now and again, I mean we’re not actually living in a monastery, are we?’

  ‘Very well,’ said Mr Lewkovitz, ‘but please, please try not to antagonise Mr Daffasana; he is a sick man and has a heart condition.’

  ‘No worries, Mr Lewkovitz. She’ll be sweet.’

  Over the next few weeks Otto and Frieda Daffasana’s area of musical appreciation opened up considerably. They got to hear groups like Moving Pictures, Status Quo, Dragon, The Sex Pistols plus a few concerts live on 2JJJ. And if 2MMM and Channel Ten had a rock simulcast they got to hear that too.

  It wasn’t long before Otto’s nerves were twanging like rubber bands and the ulcer in his ample stomach was consuming about a gallon of Mylanta a week.

  One Saturday afternoon Jill was in the bathroom washing her hair and shaving her legs, and Wayne was in the lounge taping some tracks off some albums. As that particular track finished Wayne hit the pause button on the tape deck and was about to get anot
her record out when he heard this strange sound coming from outside the flats. At first it sounded like the Salvation Army was playing in the parking area. He opened the sliding glass door and stepped out onto the verandah. At first, he couldn’t believe his eyes. He ran back into the bathroom and got Jill.

  ‘Quick, come and have a look at this,’ he said. ‘You’re not gonna believe it.’

  Jill managed to wrap her dressing-gown around her and throw a towel over her head as Wayne dragged her out onto the verandah.

  ‘Look,’ he said excitedly, pointing towards the Daffasanas’ unit. ‘Can you believe that?’

  On the balcony of his unit Otto Daffasana had rigged up a public address system and blaring out of the two old metal speakers with an awful crackling sound was Chopin’s Waltz No 11 in G Flat Major followed by Chopin’s Revolutionary Etude. It sounded dreadful.

  Wayne and Jill stood there shaking their heads and laughing.

  ‘What is it?’ she asked.

  ‘I dunno,’ replied Wayne, shrugging his shoulders. ‘It sounds a bit like Hooked on Classics. You know what this means though, don’t you.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘War. Come on, let’s go back inside.’

  Once inside with the doors closed and either the stereo or the TV on, you couldn’t hear a thing. Wayne and Jill couldn’t but every flat and house in a radius of nearly half a mile could, and they were quick to voice their disapproval.

  Over the next few weeks, whenever Otto would try to upset Wayne with a burst of Tchaikovsky or Wagner, a barrage of rubbish bottles and abuse would rain on his balcony. But Otto wouldn’t give up. Finally, one night, a dead cat tied to half a house brick crashed straight through the sliding plate-glass door of his unit. Otto dismantled the PA system after that.

  But Wayne still had his stereo. One of his favourite tricks was to play the last three tracks of an album just before Jill and he would go out of a night on the weekend. Wayne would leave the record playing and they’d be halfway to the hotel by the time it would cut out. Otto wouldn’t know this and he’d just be left there banging on the door and seething with frustration.