Finally managed to upload this chapter at last! And maybe I should have called it "Frank's Story"! ;o) I'll get back to Sally, Carly, Kane, Lance etc in later chapters.
chapter 11
Frank Morgan dropped the car keys into Donald "Flathead" Fisher's outstretched palm and spoke with considerable importance.
"And if you'd just like to check out your car and sign for me, please, Mr Fisher..." He narrowly stopped himself from saying Donald. That'd be pushing his luck. But still it felt good to be giving instructions.
Frank rarely got a chance to be someone. He had made himself out to be, especially to Steven, such a skilled mechanic that the staff at Dawson's Garage must have breathed a collective sigh of relief the moment he set foot in the door. Well, it was true he got on well with the guys who worked there and was well liked. But he had also earned himself the nickname of Trigger (a pun on Frank not being very quick off the mark) on his very first day, when one of the mechanics thought it would be funny to send him out for a "tub of elbow grease" and Frank had fallen for the joke hook, line and sinker.
A typical Saturday, he made tea for the other blokes, was sent out for their pies and sangers, did sweeping up or other menial jobs as and when required and was occasionally asked to do filing in the cramped, airless "office". Since its expansion of a few years ago, Dawson's had gained a newly-built annex which enclosed a state-of-the-art modern office, but this was used exclusively by bosses and administrative staff and, unless he happened to be delivering post or running an errand, the only office that Frank was ever allowed to grace was a tiny room, hidden away at the very back of the original garage, with a phone, chair, cluttered desk, and window that overlooked indoors.
Steven would have been very surprised too had he known that Frank's main duty was car washing. Although these days there was of course a mechanical car wash, Tommy, Bruce and Ray Dawson had started up Dawson's Garages as a car valeting service many years ago and they prided themselves on still providing hand car washes for any old-fashioned customers who believed a mechanical car wash never did get a car quite as gleaming.
Dawson's - Where the Customer Matters was the slogan advertised on posters and coasters and the end of the TV commercial when a very annoying TV family finally drove off with their bratty-turned-angelic kids. Yeh, well, fine, bully for the customer. Weekends, it was Frank who got the task of cleaning their bloody cars!
Okay, now and again he got to do some very basic tinkering on a car engine and a few times, when there was no one else, he'd been asked to ring a customer. Never having been through college themselves and belonging to a far earlier generation, the Dawsons fondly believed all college students would have excellent telephone manners and so they never got to hear Frank's laid back conversations like "G'day, mate! If you wanna get your butt down here, your car's waiting." as he swung back on his chair, feet on the desk, twirling a pencil round his fingers.
A couple of times he had swung so far back that he actually fell off the chair but, fortunately, had just finished each call before crashing ignobly to the ground and, perhaps even more fortunately, because the Dawson brothers were constantly stressing to their employees the importance of "professionalism", no customer had yet thought his very informal phone calls worth commenting on.
Because Frank would crash and die if he lost his Saturday job. Apart from a dream, it was all he had left now to hold his head up high.
He hadn't found the courage to tell anyone yet, but he was hanging by a thread to life as a student. It had even been tactfully suggested that he try a less academic career. Jeez, though, he couldn't let Pip and Tom down! Knowing their eldest kid lacked the old grey matter, his foster parents were proud as punch the day he'd got the letter telling him his application for a place at TAFE had been successful. Even Steven had punched him on the arm and said, "Congrats, mate!" It was one helluva moment for Frank. The first time he'd felt he was going to be someone since...
Eight. It was old enough to know what to do. Frank's Dad was downstairs making out with a new chick. Jeez, he was gonna be stoked when he found out what Frank had done!
Frank grinned to himself as he pulled open the bottom drawer of the chest, sucking in a breath when he saw the rolls of banknotes. They never went without, him and Dad. There was always plenty of cash in the Morgan home. Once they'd even played a mad game of "catch the bankroll" - it had to touch the ceiling to count - and one of Dad's girlfriends had found two rolls, $2000 dollars in each, that they hadn't even missed, under the bed a week or so later.
Tanya, Dad's girlfriend, had been real impressed and had been hugging Dad and saying over and over in a silly sing-song voice "Frankie, Frankie, Frankie, I can't believe you didn't even notice it was gone, gone, gone" which got on Frank's nerves after a bit, but she'd been drinking and anyway Frank thought it was heaps cool, the way his Dad just smiled like it was no big deal and disentangled her arms from his lipstick-stained neck.
Dad always had his pick of chicks. That was something else money did for you, Frank thought, as he rummaged his way past banknotes, under neatly-folded towels, face flannels and sachets of shampoo and shower gel - Dad's new girlfriend liked to keep things tidy - until his fingers touched the cold steel he'd been searching for.
He drew out the sawn-off shotgun, his heart pumping nineteen to the dozen, and an electric shock of anticipation running through his whole body. Yessir, he was gonna be just like his Dad Frankie Morgan and get folks' respect! No b---s---! All he had to do now was pull this bank job. Frank put the gun in his school sports bag and fastened it up.
You know, some days will stay in your memory forever. And yet, strangely, not the whole of the day, not even all the most important parts, but often random moments that don't even matter.
So Frank remembered getting the gun. Even what was running through his mind when he was looking for it. But not crashing into Mrs Marshall, an elderly neighbour. Years later, when he was reading about the case, he learnt he'd been running and had winded her and she'd said, "Hey, where's the fire?" and he'd replied, "My Dad gave me money to buy lollies."
He remembered seeing his shadow cast on the wall as he turned into the High Street and he remembered a woman wearing a green jacket and black trousers sighing with impatience as she waited to cross at the lights. He remembered a cop car pulling up just before he reached the bank and how he was convinced he'd been rumbled but it turned out one of the cops was only jumping out to buy a couple of burgers. He could even recollect that the cop who bought the burgers called his mate Tony and said something about fries and tomato relish.
But try as he might Frank had no recollection of going into the bank and yelling, as apparently he'd yelled, "Everyone freeze!"
Though he could still recall, and describe in minute detail if it were ever required of him to do so, a forgotten black brolly leaning against the bank counter.
Maybe because the brolly was what he fixed on when first there was someone laughing, then a bang and blinding flash of light and screaming, and he wouldn't look, he couldn't look, sick with fear because the gun he hadn't expected to go off might have killed someone.
God, he was so scared. The gun had dropped by his foot and he was frightened it might go off again and his hand was hot and the pit of his stomach was churning and he was sure he was gonna be sick and he didn't wanna chuck up in front of all these people he knew were staring down at him. Worst of all, he began to cry. Not even a little bit either, but great shuddering sobs and tears that ran with snot down his nose.
"I want my Dad," he sobbed. "You gotta get my Dad."
But nobody did. Oh, they were real nice to him at the cop station. They asked him his favourite milkshake and when he said strawberry they got him one and even some chocolate biscuits, though he was too sick to eat them. They kept saying it wasn't his fault and he wasn't in trouble but Frank knew he was or his Dad would've been there by now.
Frank told them firmly, when they started asking about her, that he DIDN'T want his Mum there. His Dad was the greatest, but his Mum was an alko who had walked out on his Dad, for another guy she met at a drying out clinic, when Frank was just a bub.
She was always going to drying out clinics and then having parties and drinking herself stupid soon as she got out, Frank said disdainfully. She visited now and again, always with the alko boyfriend, but each time she was blotto and it scared him because she always yelled and sometimes, when Dad wasn't looking, she smacked him. Last time she'd gone to make them all a cup of tea but the water splashed, nearly scalding him, and Frank's Dad, Frank told them proudly, threw her out in the street and punched and kicked Mum's drunken boyfriend because he tried to argue. But Frank's Dad, now he could hold his liquor, Frank said. He never worried when Dad came home blotto.
The people asking the questions sure must have been impressed because they looked at each other without saying anything, the cop who'd ordered the milkshake and the nice lady with the curly blonde hair and red lipstick, who sat in the chair opposite drinking coffee out of a paper cup. The lady put the cup down on the little coffee table, leaned forward and said, "Does your Dad go out drinking a lot, Francis?"
He pulled a face because nobody but nobody ever called him Francis and answered, "Yeh, heaps. But I don't ever get scared 'cos he makes sure everywhere's locked up and the alarm's on and I know I'm never to answer the door. When's my Dad gonna get here?"
But it was very, very late before Frank's Dad arrived. Just before they pulled down the blinds in the little office where they took him to after a middle-aged woman in a nurse's uniform gently woke him from a deep sleep, he could see that the moon and stars had begun to glimmer in a pool-black sky.
Frank's head was fuzzy from a disjointed dream and he was trying to figure where he was. Then he remembered. It wasn't the cop station anymore. He had been driven a long, long way, stopping only for lunch and breaks, to a red-brick building with nursery rhyme characters on frosted windows, where he was given sandwiches and a hot milky drink and told it might be best if he tried to sleep for a while.
Although the sun was shining brightly and he could hear very young kids playing a noisy game in a nearby room, he was exhausted from the long journey and long day and had fallen asleep the moment he crawled between the crisp white sheets, waking in what seemed like a hospital ward to the hushed tones of night.
Seeing his father standing there flanked by two cops he flung himself at him. "I didn't tell 'em, Dad, I didn't tell 'em, I swear!"
"I know, mate, I know. It's okay." Frankie Morgan's voice cracked as he ruffled Frank's hair. Frankie knew he was going down for a long, long time and, for all his faults, he did, in his own way, love the son who hero-worshipped him so much that he'd even kept newspaper clippings of his criminal activities pasted in a large red scrapbook.
Frankie (named Franco after his Italian immigrant grandfather by his half-Italian mother, but preferring Frankie and, in turn, choosing the English version of the name for his son) wasn't at heart an evil man, but he was quick-tempered and workshy and had slipped into crime after the deaths of his hard-working parents and subsequent failure of the family business.
Dark and handsome, he had never had any problems getting the girls, but a ready supply of cash and element of danger had made him even more attractive. Frank had been the result of one of those liaisons and, despite Paula's heavy drinking, the only good thing to ever come out of his life. And in just a few hours Frank would be taken to the foster home that had been arranged for him and Frankie to await serious charges on a series of armed robberies. These last few minutes together were precious.
"Look, son, fair and square, I done the crime, I gotta do the time. They're gonna take you somewhere you'll be looked after, fostered it's called, by some nice people..."
Frank clung desperately to his father. "Nooo! I'm not leavin' you, Dad, and the pigs can't make me! I'll kill 'em first!" Frank backed up his claim by viciously kicking the nearest police officer's ankle.
Frankie gave an apologetic smile. These two cops had hearts and families of their own and had pulled strings they should never have pulled to make this unscheduled fleeting visit. If it ever came out, their careers would be in tatters and the media would chew them up and spit them out.
"Frank. Son, listen to what I say. That's loser talk and I don't want you being no loser. I want you to do me proud like you always done. I want folk to say "Yeh, Frank Morgan, he was never a loser, never a crim like his old man." You stay outta trouble and you do what these foster people say. Can you promise you'll do that for me?"
Frank nodded, tears raining down his cheeks. Over his head, one of the cops coughed and tapped his watch.
"I gotta go," Frankie said, his voice thick with his own tears. "You make sure you always remember, Frank, you walk tall 'cos I'm proud of you. Love you, son." He gave him a last tight hug and kissed the top of his head and the cuffs were clicked back into place.
Frank clenched his small fists with helpless rage, sobbing as his father was led away, but not caring who saw him cry now. He'd do his Dad proud like he promised, he would, he would.
It wasn't easy. Frank had come a long, long way since his first night under the Fletcher's roof when he'd smashed every single plate he could lay his hands on. Dad had told him to do what the foster people said and, okay, they hadn't told him to smash the plates. But, he justified his actions to himself, they hadn't told him he couldn't smash the plates either. He sat in the middle of the broken crockery and spoilt food, confused and angry and missing his Dad so much, and waited for them to do their block. But nothing happened.
The mess was cleared up, supper was dished out again, and when Frank, realising how hungry he was, got up and sat back in his chair, Pippa served up some more casserole. It was like they understood it was nothing 'gainst them, but sometimes a guy had so many mixed-up feelings and no words to explain.
It took Frank quite a while longer to learn that when he behaved badly he'd be totally ignored and when he didn't he got their undivided attention, but, by the time Steven, Carly, Lynn and Sally had joined the family, he was considered the most responsible of the Fletcher kids. He never shared with his foster brother and sisters that in the early days he'd done stuff like thrown bricks at the windows or that he once put a fish down the back of the couch to stink the place out or that some days he'd argued with Tom and Pippa almost non-stop or that he'd called his foster parents names he didn't even want to remember now. Nope, he was Frank, the eldest, the one everyone looked up to. Sure, he was no A-student but no one minded and Frank was Tom's right-hand man whenever there was any practical work to be done.
The day he received the TAFE letter was long before Lynn and Sally joined the Fletcher clan so there was only Pippa, Tom, Steven and Carly to wait with baited breath for Frank to tear open the envelope.
"I'm in," he whispered, his hands shaking as held the letter and feeling choked when he saw everyone's obvious delight. Steven punched his arm and Carly yelled "Whooo-hooo!" and then, remembering she and Frank were still in the middle of an who-drank-all-the-OJ argument, tried to pretend she just happened to be singing.
But sadly for Frank the grades he'd hoped for in vain in his school days didn't suddenly dust themselves down and lean comfortably against his college work. The lectures went so far over his head that in the end he stopped listening and then he stopped bothering to turn up for them. His books were covered in notes that didn't make sense and then idle doodles and finally blank sheets of paper. Frank knew his college days were numbered; it was just a matter of who was going to crack first, him or the education authorities.
But TAFE wasn't all bad. He'd made some good mates there, the chicks liked him and the social scene rocked. And his dream of being a rock star had been born at TAFE too.
Frank had been chilling in the bar when a band a few of the guys had recently started up announced one of their guitarists had had to drop out for personal reasons and asked could anyone help out. A huge music fan, he stepped up without thinking too much about it. Although he played as though he'd been jamming with the group all his life, nobody was more stunned than Frank at the enthusiastic reception and by the audience yelling his name for an encore.
"Jeez, mate, you can ------- play!" Dez, the lead singer, said, the mic picking up his comment and echoing it round the crowded bar to join the whistling and roaring that greeted the end of Frank's guitar solo. It was a Friday, the bar's most popular night, and many of the students had been up on their feet and singing the chorus along with him.
Frank grinned, high on the adrenaline of applause, breathless with exhaustion, sweeping back his black hair to wipe beads of sweat off his forehead. Layla may have been an ambitious choice for a guitar solo but Frank had played it often enough before; it was one of his Dad's favourites. While other kids were reciting nursery rhymes, he had grown up listening to solid rock and could have told you the entire words to songs by Queen or Meatloaf.
But though he'd always enjoyed music, ever since when he was two or three and his Dad had pulled him on his lap to show him how to strum guitar, he hadn't realised exactly how good he was. The only success Frank had ever known in his life before was, thanks to Tom's patient tutoring, passing his driving test, but now Frank "Trigger" Morgan, failed TAFE student, failed bank robber, failed mechanic intended to be somebody. Somebody who'd make his Dad and Pippa and Tom proud.
His first wages from Dawson's Garage had immediately gone on paying a deposit to secure his own guitar, which he was still paying for in instalments. Steven knew exactly how much Frank's dreams meant to him. He had listened to Frank practising songs in their room often enough. But it still hadn't stopped him taking the guitar. Well, it should have. It really should have.
Frank's thoughts were grim as he entered Summer Bay Town Hall. He noticed the curvy, pretty girl talking to Kathy Murray looking across at him and he was flattered. Yup, Frank was definitely interested and he was a free agent now Lisa had dumped him. But he had other things on his mind. Things that needed sorting first.
Tommy Dawson had asked him - there being no one else available - to deliver Fisher's car and Frank had been stoked when some very impressed mates stopped him for a chat. Until one of them mentioned he'd seen Steven heading for the beach. Carrying a guitar.
And a love of good music wasn't the only thing that Frank had inherited from Frankie Morgan. He'd also inherited his father's violent temper.
