One True Thing
Authors: Nicole Hayes
When is a secret not a secret?
When your whole life is public
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Frankie is used to being a politician's daughter, but with her mum now running for Premier, life's a whole lot crazier than usual. All Frankie wants is to lose herself in her music. So when her best friend, Kessie, invites a student journo to interview the band, Frankie is less than thrilled.
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But Jake's easy to talk to, and he seems to really like Frankie. That doesn't stop her from wondering if he's just after the ultimate scoop, especially when photos surface of Frankie's mum having a secret rendezvous with a younger man. With her family falling apart around her, Frankie is determined to find out the truth â even if it means losing Jake.
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âA truly unputdownable read ⦠smart, original and compelling. I loved Frankie.'
â Melissa Keil, author of
Life in Outer Space
For Hannah and Emily â
Again. Always.
THE MAIDEN SPEECH
Most sixteen-year-olds get woken up by their parents because they're late for school, or the dog needs walking, or there's a maths test in first period. My mum drags me out of bed with reminders that she has to fight for international peace or solve world hunger.
âStarving children in East Timor need me today, Frankie,' she says, poking her head around my bedroom door. âThe Foreign Aid bill won't write itself.'
Still groggy from a late night rehearsing with Van and Tyler, I can't resist snapping back. âYou don't deal with starving kids in East Timor, Mum!' I drag myself into a sitting position, resigned to my fate. âThat's Federal Government,' I add wearily.
Mum stands in the doorway wearing that maddening smile saved for parental victories. âSee, Brant?' she calls over her shoulder to my dad, who is probably only half-listening, his nose buried in Beckett or Proust or some other obscure novelist that normal people don't understand but Dad thinks is genius personified. âYou're right. It does get in.'
âAnyone with half a brain knows that, Mum,' I snort.
She rolls her eyes, then turns on her âthis is serious' face and says, âIt's all connected, Frankie. Another piece in the puzzle. Another dot on the canvas â¦'
I glare at her, biting back suggestions about what she can do with her canvas and her dots, and resort instead to diving back under my doona.
âCome on, love.' The humour is back in her voice, but it's softer, and she's moved to the end of my bed. âYou don't want to miss band practice.'
I groan. She knows me too well. âYeah, yeah,' I say through clenched teeth.
She pats my head like I'm a little kid â or a cocker spaniel â and leaves me to it.
I sit up, yawn and, once the world stops spinning, I do what I always do first thing in the morning: I reach for my guitar, a second-hand Martin acoustic that Harry gave me for my thirteenth birthday, one year after he started teaching me to play. It used to be his guitar, but he said he hated seeing it collect dust all day;
that it deserved to be played by someone who would do it justice.
I run my hand along its cool, smooth edges, already feeling better just knowing I have it. I pluck the first bars of Pearl Jam's âJust Breathe' with my stiff fingers. Eddie Vedder can always motivate me to get moving, even on my slowest days. I make it halfway through but get caught on the walk-down to G. I'm still learning it and haven't nailed the chorus yet. I fiddle around for another minute or two, but it just isn't happening and the noise from the rest of the house eventually eclipses even Eddie. Besides, Mum was right. I don't want to be late.
I rest the Martin against the foot of my bed and head for the bathroom.
Twenty minutes later, I'm scrubbed, dressed and looking something close to respectable. Or, at the very least, like me: Frankie Mulvaney-Webb. (Mulvaney from Mum. Webb from Dad. The Frankie part is all me. But what else can you do with a name like Francesca?) Long dark-brown hair so straight it might have been ironed; Mum's aquiline nose that looks regal on her while mine just looks long; and an oval face that I describe as âghostly' but Mum says is âclassical', which is really just code for âplain' or nothing special â nothing like her.
I turn my mind to breakfast, bracing myself for the chaos that awaits. The landline rings, and I know who it will be before anyone answers. Or before everyone
ignores it, more precisely. Gran's the only one who calls the landline anymore, but no one is able to deal with her before breakfast. Still, she's my grandmother, and it sucks that she's such hard work.
Not enough that I'm prepared to answer, though.
I wait for Gran to leave her barely audible, abrupt Irish-accented reminder that someone owes her a phone call and that phone charges from Ireland are not to be sneezed at. Then the answering machine beeps and I open the kitchen door.
Most people I know don't have multiple visitors in their house before breakfast. But we're not most people. It's not even 7 am and already there are three faces that can't lay claim to either Webb or Mulvaney genes.
Fortunately, only Harry notices I'm here.
â
Kids, in the room, in the hall, where they're not meant to be â¦
' Harrison Norfolk â Harry â my mum's media secretary, sings to the tune of Nirvana's âCome as You Are' when he sees me. He's perched on the kitchen bench with his laptop balanced on his knees, looking for all purposes like he lives here, which, since Mum took over as Premier, is almost true.
â
As a dag, as a dork, as an old man geeeeeek â¦
' I sing back, earning a clap from Harry. This is a thing we used to do a lot. Basically, he sings some parody of a song we both love and I have to come back with the next line â my own lyrics â on the spot. It usually takes me a few seconds
to reply, and with varying degrees of success, but I've had that one saved up for a while. Harry was always heavy on Soundgarden and Stone Temple Pilots, but Nirvana is his fallback option. (We don't do Pearl Jam. They are untouchable.) I know it's lame, but I kind of like that he's resurrected this old game. It reminds me that some things never change, even when everything else does â often seventeen times before breakfast.
Despite the fact that Harry is the reason Mum's been up since 5 am, her ear glued to the phone and her head already at Parliament â The Zoo, Dad calls it â he's actually all right. Apart from giving me my beautiful Martin, he also introduced me to grunge rock, which is probably what inspired me to form my band. Harry and I don't hang out like we used to â he's always busy with Mum nowadays. But it's not like I have huge amounts of time to myself now either. Life, et cetera.
âTen days,' he says. He's already back at work, typing madly like he's cracking the code to disarm a bomb and humming Nirvana as he types.
Incredibly, Mum hears his words and winks at me without skipping a beat in her conversation. âRight, right. And there
will
be,' she says into the phone. âWe're polling high forties there. That has to mean something.'
I share a grin with Harry. Mum thinks he's talking about the launch of the election campaign, because that's what
she's
talking about â a reasonable mistake as it's also
ten days away. But what he meant was that it's ten days until Pearl Jam tickets go on sale. It will be my first time seeing them live and I can't wait.
âHey, Frank,' Christie calls out from the pantry. She's been part of Mum's campaign for a couple of years and has virtually taken up residence here. Technically, she's Mum's personal assistant, but most PA's aren't intimate with the contents of their boss's kitchen cupboards. She walks out of the pantry holding a packet of Nutri-Grain above her head like it's a hard-won trophy. âYes!' she cries, earning a frown from Mum, who's got one finger pressed up against her free ear, the other still stuck to her phone. Christie mouths an apology but holds the cereal up for my approval.
Mum waves a hand at Harry in one of their many silent communications, and next thing I know they've both left the room, Mum's phone conversation trilling along uninterrupted. Now it's just me, Christie and Sarah, Mum's chief of staff and oldest friend, who Mum claims talked her into âthis madness' â aka politics â all those years ago. Sarah has a slice of toast in one hand and is scrolling through emails on her smartphone with the other.
âHey, Sarah,' I say.
She looks up, bleary-eyed. âHey, kid.' Then returns her gaze to her phone, squinting. I spot her glasses on the bench near the kettle and pass them to her. She smiles, slips them on. âTa.'
âHow'd that get past the low-GI police?' I ask Christie, nodding at the Nutri-Grain.
âNo idea,' she says, grinning, âbut all hail the sugar gods.'
âA bowl of Nutri-Grain has the same nutritional value as a bowl of jellybeans,' my ten-year-old brother, Luke, says from the doorway. Luke is as obsessed with nutrition and health as Mum is, but for very different reasons. He believes he's going to be an Olympic swimmer one day. Despite having asthmatic lungs and being a head shorter than most ten-year-olds, he's unwavering in his ambition. I'm convinced he gets it from Mum. He definitely doesn't get it from reality.
âHow do you
know
that?' Christie asks Luke, even as she pours herself a huge bowl and drowns them in full-cream milk â another of Mum's concessions to compensate her staff for the late nights and early mornings. They're in full campaign mode, even though the real campaign hasn't been launched yet. Dawn meetings and all-night brainstorms; it's like camping but without the camp fire â or the fun.
â
BTN
,' Luke says.
Luke watches way more TV than he should, but just like his fixation on fitness and nutrition, he will always choose the Discovery Channel over Disney, and
Behind The News
over
House of Anubis
.
Dad appears behind him and swoops in to drop a kiss on my forehead. âMorning, sunshine,' he declares, and grabs Luke in a hug.
âReally?' I say. âOn an empty stomach?'
Dad feigns hurt, then shoves a piece of Sarah's toast in my mouth. And kisses me again.
âWe have company!' I snap, extracting the toast from my teeth.
Dad winks at Christie and Sarah. âWe always have company. Besides, they don't count.'
Christie shrugs, fair enough, while Sarah doesn't even look up. Dad's joking, but it's kind of true. In a way, they
don't
count. They're almost part of the furniture. At the start it was weird â never alone, never free to wander around in your PJs. But I hardly even notice it anymore. I wonder what it will be like after the election. Will things go back to normal, or is this the way it is?
What
is
normal, anyway?
âRadio,' Sarah announces suddenly.
Christie leaps up and switches it on. Despite my politics-free strategy, I find myself listening â and I instantly regret it. Seamus Hale is doing his bit on air and, as usual, he's spraying the government with his signature poison. For the moment he's focusing on policy â Mum's spanking new Northlink project â but we all know that won't last.
âAnd soon enough, if the polls are correct, she'll be the first female Premier of Victoria â¦' Hale says.
âElected, you idiot!' Sarah yells at the radio. âThe first
elected
female Premier,' she sighs. âThey always forget Joan Kirner.'
âAre we sure we want that?' Hale asks his invisible audience. âWe know plenty about her shoddy politics, but what do we know about the woman herself?'
Sarah and Dad share a look, and Dad immediately places an arm around Luke. âHey, mate, better pack your swimming gear.' I get the nod I knew was coming.
âI'll help you find your goggles,' I say, already out of my seat, and even though Luke's barely halfway through what looks like a bowl of milky rabbit pellets â All-Bran, not Nutri-Grain, for an Olympian in training â he lets me lead him out of the kitchen.
As I close the door behind us, the strains of Seamus Hale's brutal tirade seep through. I pull Luke in, pretending to hug him while we walk, trying to discreetly cover his ears in the process.
âWitch with a capital B ⦠should be drowned at sea â¦' That hateful voice is drawing on some of his old favourites with more venom than ever, determined to destroy his target â a woman, naturally. He hardly ever attacks men the same way. Sarah says the media will always treat female politicians differently as long as it's run by men. I don't see that changing any time soon.
I try to blow it off, to stop the echoes of Seamus Hale's words reverberating around my head. I remind myself of what Mum always says: it's not personal. But that's easier said than done when the woman he thinks should be âburnt at the stake' is your own mother.
Later, on the way out, Mum stops me at the front door. Luke is jiggling on the spot, in a hurry as always.
âHey,' she says, after she's planted one on Luke's forehead. âNo goodbye?'
âSure. Bye,' I say, almost out the door.
She reaches out to me and I stop. Fine creases line her hand which covers mine. âThey're just words, Frankie.'
âI know.'
âDon't let him get to you,' she says, smiling. âI don't.'
I take a deep breath. She's right. It's not like there's anything I can do. I manage a smile, wave at Luke, who's leaping down the front steps, then climbing back up again. âI'd better go.'
Mum squeezes my shoulder. âGo.' She follows me out and calls after us both, loudly enough for the bolting Luke to hear. âWhatever you do, make it yours!'
I shake my head at this old farewell she's been offering us ever since we were little. All I want to do is get through each day, doing what I love most, with the people who matter most, as inconspicuously as possible. I have no idea what
mine
looks like. Anonymous, maybe? Nondescript?
But when your mother is Rowena Kate Mulvaney, the Premier of Victoria, soon to be the first
elected
female Premier of Victoria, the chances of anonymity are slim to nil. And it feels like nothing is
really
all mine, anyway.