Pretty Girls Read online

  Pretty Girls

  Copyright © Lisa Portolan & Samantha McDonald

  First published 2020

  Copyright remains the property of the authors and apart from any fair dealing for the purposes of private study, research, criticism or review, as permitted under the Copyright Act, no part may be reproduced by any process without written permission.

  All inquiries should be made to the publishers.

  Big Sky Publishing Pty Ltd

  PO Box 303, Newport, NSW 2106, Australia

  Phone: 1300 364 611

  Fax: (612) 9918 2396

  Email: [email protected]

  Web: www.bigskypublishing.com.au

  Cover design and typesetting: Think Productions

  Proudly printed and bound in China by Jilin GIGO International

  For Cataloguing-in-Publication entry see National Library of Australia.

  Pretty girls

  LISA PORTOLAN &

  SAMANTHA MCDONALD

  This story is based on true events, however, some parts

  have been fictionalised and names, identities and locations

  changed to protect the privacy of individuals.

  This book is for all women.

  Women who have felt like theyve lost their story, and their voice.

  That it has been claimed by someone else.

  This one's for you.

  We want to create a movement. Not to empower women:

  because we never ceded our power.

  A movement of sharing our stories, embracing our past and

  moving forward, fully embodied. Stronger than ever before.

  We would like to thank: Tania Stiles.

  The bird story in this book is yours - and we thank you for sharing it.

  We encourage every woman out there to do the same.

  The character Evie is based on Samantha McDonald, however there is part of every woman in Evie's struggle and triumph.

  Use the hashtag #iamevie and let no woman suffer in silence again.

  This book is set in Redfern: a beautiful place with a rich and colourful history.

  We acknowledge First Nations sovereignty of this land, and that it was never ceded.

  Always was, always will be.

  50 percent of the profits from this book are destined for the Mudgin-Gal "women's place" in the inner city. An Aboriginal women's meeting place in South Sydney.

  Together we are stronger.

  “I’ve known you for years. Everyone says you were beautiful when you were young, but I want to tell you I think you’re more beautiful now than then. Rather than your face as a young woman, I prefer your face as it is now. Ravaged.”

  “Suddenly, all at once, she knows, knows that he doesn’t understand her, that he never will, that he lacks the power to understand such perverseness. And that he can never most fast enough to catch her.”

  “I know it’s not clothes that make women beautiful or otherwise, not beauty care, nor expensive creams, nor the distinction of costliness of their finery. I know the problem lies elsewhere. I don’t know where. I only know it isn’t where women think.”

  “Very early in my life it was too late.”

  – Marguerite Duras, The Lover

  Contents

  1 Returning (2017, Redfern)

  2 The bird (1996, Redfern)

  3 So very pretty (2017, Redfern)

  4 Unremarkable people (2017, Redfern)

  5 Old habits die hard (1997, Redfern)

  6 The cops (1997, Redfern)

  7 The hospice ... and him (2017, Bronte)

  8 The beach (1997, Coogee)

  9 Running (2017, Redfern)

  10 Armageddon (2017, Redfern)

  11 Mum was always sick (1994, Redfern)

  12 Him (2017, Redfern)

  13 Got yourself a job then? (2017, Redfern)

  14 Evie, we should go home (1996, Redfern)

  15 Him, again (2017, Redfern)

  16 Lipstick and violence (1997, Redfern)

  17 The hospital (1997, Redfern)

  18 She just wanted to get to that party (1997, Redfern)

  19 They didn't deserve any better (1997, Redfern)

  20 Normalcy (2017, Redfern)

  21 Your dad was a bad fella? (2017, Redfern)

  22 Words written on ink, on a napkin (2017, Redfern)

  23 Asking questions (2017, Redfern)

  24 Yelling into the dark (1997, Redfern)

  25 Children always surprise you (2017, Redfern)

  26 Finding him (2017, Redfern)

  27 All things take time (2017, Redfern)

  28 Brief and fleeting happiness (2017, Redfern)

  29 Love (2017, Redfern)

  30 I wanted to see you (2017, Redfern)

  31 A fierceness (2017, Redfern)

  32 The good ones (2017, Redfern)

  33 Because he was a bloke just like me (2017, Bronte)

  34 I'm in trouble (Dreamspace)

  35 Another death (2017, Redfern)

  36 Nightmares (Dreamspace)

  37 Nightmares continued (Dreamspace)

  38 Fucking Redfern (2017, Redfern)

  39 Things were always clear in the morning (2017, Redfern)

  40 Running again (2017, Redfern)

  41 Benny's return (Liminal)

  42 Deciding to stay (2017, Redfern)

  43 He was my fucking son (Dreamspace)

  44 Here. Now (2017, Redfern)

  45 The List

  Postscript

  About the Authors

  1

  Returning

  (2017, Redfern)

  Elizabeth Street was bright and busy. A pastel blue sky arched overhead. She scooped a box out of the boot of her tiny red Hyundai. There was a dint in the rear bumper. Someone had hit it in a Melbourne car park during the frenetic lead up to Christmas last year. They hadn’t left a note, she hadn’t bothered getting it fixed. She carried the box over the steel-grey fence of their new home and lowered it slowly to the ground, as though it contained something breakable, something precious. The box was labelled misc. Most of the boxes were labelled misc. Packed tightly in that beaten-up Hyundai (cheery in colour and dire in upkeep), were the remnants of their lives. A series of well-used cardboard crates and plastic tubs purchased at the $2 shop.

  She had driven from Melbourne to Sydney overnight with Tilley. Twelve hours of solid driving with a few coffee and toilet breaks in-between. Tilley had slept the majority of the drive, snoring softly, her mouth drooping open, her face smooth and lineless, a look of absolute calm on her face. Evie had kept the radio off during the drive, unwilling to disturb the perfect slumber of her babe. Instead she was kept awake by the noise in her head and the sound of the boxes as they jostled against each other, clamouring for attention. A strange symphony of tight, squeaking sounds, as they reminded her of their existence. Recollections of her life, snapshots of moments flooded her mind. Trapped within the fabric of her clothes, and heaviness of her dishes were recollections. Interwoven and carefully scattered. Sometimes she wished she could leave it all behind, but then who would she be without it all? A blank slate. An empty vessel. She didn’t quite know how she would fill that up.

  Those memories defined her. They brought her back to this place, to this very street. Familiar, rich with the memories of her childhood. They flashed before her eyes in a kaleidoscope of terrifying forms. Brash, violent in colour and in delivery. They belonged to her, like the skin covering her flesh did. Impossible to erase.

  “Mum!” she heard Tilley’s angry voice from the gate.

  “What?” she responded more tersely than she had intended.

  “I’m hungry. It’s past lunch. Can we go get something to eat?” Tilley’s blonde hair curled in an impr
essive matted mess around her cherubic face. She was a pretty girl like Evie had been. Evie knew she shouldn’t feel proud, that her daughter’s appearance was a product of a genetic lottery, but she felt it. Was being a pretty girl worth what came with it? She wasn’t sure.

  “I’m almost finished and then we can go to lunch,” she gathered the final box from the boot. “Start setting up in your room.”

  “Which one’s my room?” Tilley scrunched up her face endearingly.

  “The one I showed you upstairs.”

  “The roof slopes.”

  “It’s an old house,” Evie said, as though this were enough to describe its dilapidation. "The front door was painted a vivid blue, and the grey gate was new, but this place was an 1896 terrace with a 1970s kitchen. A grotesque clash of styles. Art deco fireplaces set against a linoleum floor, and lemon-yellow kitchen.

  “I hate it,” Tilley said unhelpfully.

  “Go inside and start unpacking,” Evie ignored the comment. In the distance she spotted a group of what she could tell were Aboriginal women heading in their direction. Instantly she felt uncomfortable. It was an irrational sentiment, but one that was tucked within her memories like the other relics that had come to define her. This was Aboriginal country after all, smack bang in the middle of Redfern, the blackest part of Sydney.

  The older woman approached first, she pushed a pram with a toddler in it, her quick steps resounding against the pavement. A rhythmic clap-clapping of thongs against soles. Two younger girls walked behind her, talking.

  “Just moved in then have you?” the older woman said, flashing her a pair of white teeth.

  “Yeah,” Evie continued uneasily.

  “Where you from then?” the woman had a friendly manner. The girls behind her eyed Evie off in a way that made her feel uneasy - she couldn’t help but feel they knew she didn’t belong, she didn’t - this wasn’t her land, this wasn’t her place.

  “Melbourne but I used to live here. I grew up in Redfern,” she added, stating her claim, as superficial as it might be.

  “It’s changed a bit,” the woman laughed.

  “I’m counting on it,” Evie winced with pain, the heavy box weighing on her slender arms.

  “Aren’t we all?” The woman continued past her. “See you round then,” she called over her shoulder. The girls moved past Evie slowly, watching her. Their eyes shifted over her blonde hair and fair complexion — taking stock of everything that wasn’t black, Evie thought. Nothing had changed here at all.

  She dropped the final box and closed it behind her swiftly as though that might keep Redfern out.

  She glanced up at that blue sky again, waiting for its reassurance. A black magpie flew overhead.

  2

  The bird

  (1996, Redfern)

  “ He likes you,” Mirela said to her. Evie blushed as she glanced toward the boys kicking the footie around on Phillip Street. They were still wearing their school uniforms, and they darted in and out of the intermittent traffic with leisurely prowess. The old terraces framed their graceful movements and thin limbs - on the verge of adulthood, their bodies stretched awkwardly, as though pulled by external forces. Not his though, he was perfect even in this gangly teenage stage - his blonde hair fell just so, and his sun-kissed skin glinted like he had been touched by the hand of God. Adam. The name suited him.

  He kicked the ball now out of the other boys’ reach, and the others cheered as though he had scored a goal. He glanced in her direction quickly, a split second, just enough time for her to know he had been looking to impress her.

  “No, he doesn’t,” Evie said, knowing he probably did. She adjusted her grey school uniform ever so slightly so it revealed more of her thin and tanned legs, then turned her face toward the sunshine with a coquettish smile on her face. She knew the role she had to play, just as he knew his. He was the coolest kid in school, and she was the prettiest girl - they belonged together. It was only a matter of time. But she couldn’t let on that she liked him, she had to continue appearing indolent, bored, dispassionate and eventually he would make the first move. She had to prove herself to be not just the pretty girl, but the cool one too.

  “Good one!” one of the boys yelled.

  “What?” she heard Adam respond.

  “We can’t get the ball back now.”

  “Why not?” Adam challenged.

  “You kicked it over the fucking fence.”

  Boys liked to swear, Evie had noticed. It was a symbol, a verbal signal that they were making their way into manhood.

  “So? Go get it," he responded coolly.

  “No way mate - it’s an Abo house.” The racial slur fell out of the boy’s mouth smoothly, as though it meant nothing at all. But it meant everything. In Redfern the lines were drawn, you were either an Aboriginal kid, or a housing commission kid. There wasn’t anything else.

  “You afraid of them?” Adam antagonised.

  “Yeah they’re crazy, like cut snakes mate.”

  “You fag.”

  “You go in and get it then!”

  Evie shifted uncomfortably. She didn’t like Adam being challenged. He had looked at her a few times at school in the tuck-shop line and a couple more times in English and that had been enough for her to construct a future with him in her mind. An imagined love affair. Like Scarlett and Rhett - she had watched Gone with the Wind with her mother weeks ago - she knew what love was about. An epic love that is, not an ordinary one. They were destined for an exceptional love affair because he was cool and she was pretty, and that was all that mattered.

  “Hey check out that bird,” she heard him cleverly change tack. She smiled again, he wasn’t book smart, but he was street smart. He knew not to mess around with the Aboriginal families — in these parts they meant business, they didn’t like the whitefellas. The battle lines had been drawn way back in 1788 but here in Redfern they were sealed in blood, today. A distraction, that’s what he needed.

  “It’s lost a foot,” one of the other boys yelled.

  “Look at it - it can’t even walk properly!”

  They laughed raucously as though it was the funniest thing that had ever been uttered. It was a welcome distraction for all of them. Nobody challenged the Alpha. Ever.

  “I don’t like him,” Mirela said suddenly, cutting through the sound of the afternoon traffic, and the boys’ words.

  “Why not?” Evie glanced across to her friend. Mirela’s face was squished into a grimace, her large Italian nose toppled over her thick lips obscenely and her greasy forehead was marked with acne. Mirela would never be a pretty girl. She had been assigned a face and figure which didn’t fit the stereotype of conventional beauty. She was short and heavy-set, with large breasts and rounded thighs that rubbed together when she walked. She didn’t have to worry about acting cool, because she was ugly and was expected to be grateful to whoever was interested in her.

  “He’s mean. Look, they’re going to kill that bird,” her voice was filled with disgust.

  Evie briefly looked in the boys’ direction, they were throwing stones at the injured bird. She quickly averted her eyes again. Boys did things like that, it turned her stomach — she didn’t want anyone to know that.

  “So what? It’s just a bird,” she muttered.

  “It’s gross. Do they get off killing something that is small and injured? Makes them big, tough men or something?”

  “They just think it’s funny,” she said uneasily, as she heard voices raised in the background and the violence in their tone. There was a blood-letting sound to it which made her feel sick.

  “Whatever. I heard him say that he broke up with Lucy because she wouldn’t shag him," Mirealla continued.

  “Where did you hear that?”

  “Amy told me.”

  “Amy makes shit up all the time.”

  “No, she doesn’t. He only likes you because you’re pretty.”

  So what? Evie thought. She was pretty - and that was important. It wa
s the only thing that was important. The highest value. Mirela just didn’t understand it because she wasn’t pretty. Evie didn’t respond.

  “All I’m saying is, be careful. He’s not a nice guy,” Mirela continued in a softer tone.

  But none of them were. At fifteen years old, Evie knew none of them were nice guys. She knew what Adam wanted, and she knew why he had broken up with Lucy. Things would be different with her. She understood how things worked. The rules. He would lend her his popularity, his infamy in the schoolyard, his protection, and she would lend him something else in return.

  That’s how things were. She was the pretty girl, that’s all she had to offer.

  That was enough.

  The boys had gone conspicuously quiet. She looked over to them now, they were breaking up, heading to their respective homes. The sky was turning a burnt amber colour and there was a chill in the air.

  Adam caught Evie’s eye and headed in their direction. Hands in pockets, school boy swagger.

  He leant over to her, and his green eyes gleamed. Perfection. He smiled.