SHIRLEY BAXTER HAS HER DAY



Do you know, I am 76 years old and I still miss my parents. My older sister and I were the bright, beautiful stars of their lives. They gave us anything we wanted and it seemed as though they would love us forever.

 

They’re dead now, of course. So is my sister.  And both my husbands. And most of our friends. Sometimes I feel like I’m the only one left, like a product stuck at the back of a shelf, long past its use-by date. And I wonder why I’m still here. I don’t seem to serve any purpose. It’s as though I’ve simply been overlooked.

 

My children have their own lives. Mark has settled in Queensland and Peter is working in the United States.  I see Frances and her family a bit more often. They live down the coast, about an hour’s drive away. But, truth is, Frances doesn’t have much time for me. She thinks I’m a stupid old thing most of the time.

 

I was thinking about my life as I sat looking at the drizzling rain through the window of the coffee shop. It was a big bustling place and I usually sat outside on the terrace. But today it was better inside, nice and warm and cosy. I was lulled by the companionable hum of nearby conversations and the smell of freshly ground coffee.

 

My reverie was interrupted when a waitress came and took my empty coffee cup away. This was my signal to leave, to make room for someone else. I picked up my handbag. There it was again – the feeling that I was outstaying my welcome, that I was just in the way, taking up space.  Stubbornly, I decided to stay where I was. I dropped my handbag on the table and relaxed back in my chair.

 

A handsome, flashily dressed young man came out of the office behind the counter, and looked around the shop. As soon as she saw him, the waitress began to bustle about, straightening up the menus, wiping down the counter. He was obviously the manager. He noticed me sitting at the empty table and came over.

 

‘What can we get you, madam?’ he asked smoothly.

 

Embarrassed, I apologised, explaining that I’d had my coffee and was about to leave.

 

‘That’s perfectly alright, madam,’ he responded in a cool voice before sauntering back to the counter.

 

Feeling foolish, I resisted the temptation to grab my bag and hurry away. No, I decided, I would stay a little longer. I wasn’t going to let these people intimidate me. I would leave in my own good time. Let them wait. Fuck them.

 

Shocked, I sat listening to the silence for a moment, not sure if I’d spoken out loud or not. No, of course, I hadn’t. I was as restrained and ladylike as ever, in my pleated skirt and green woolen jumper, sitting up straight with my knees together and my ankles crossed, my new perm looking like a neat, fluffy, white cloud on my head.

 

Of course I hadn’t said it out loud. I had always behaved myself, always been such a good person, so polite, so well-mannered. But I was getting fed up it. I’d been too good for too long, never putting a foot wrong, never disturbing anyone. And where had it got me?

 

Here, all alone in a crowded coffee shop, sitting quietly, doing nobody any harm, while the manager looked down his nose and the waiters and waitresses glared at me, willing me to hurry up and go away. Well, I wasn’t going to budge. I would stay here all day if I felt like it.

 

I was sick and tired of all these young people thinking they owned the world – insolent teenagers with sleepy eyes and bare belly buttons; self-important people in suits, rushing about talking into their mobile phones; smug young grandmothers like my daughter, Frances, showing off with their knitting and their photographs. I hated them. I hated their complacency and their rudeness and their stupidity for thinking they’ll never grow old.

 

As I sat, resisting the compulsion to leave, I felt myself growing angrier and angrier. Why had things turned out this way?  It wasn’t fair. I deserved better than this. I had as much right to a good life as anyone else.

 

And suddenly, like a lightning bolt, I knew what I was going to do. I stood up and closed my handbag with a snap. Without even putting my chair back under the table, I was out of there and heading for the bus stop.

 

‘I’ll show them,’ I said to Billie, my budgie, once I got home. ‘Shirley Baxter will have her day.’

 

I put on a Frank Sinatra CD, and took out the stationery Mark had sent me for my birthday – pale blue with violets in the corner – sat down at the dining table and got to work. Every detail had to be carefully thought out.  There was no room for error. I was planning a robbery.

 

Saturday night would probably be best, I thought. That’s when the takings at the coffee shop would be highest. I wondered what time they closed and supposed about two o’clock in the morning. It was a long time since I’d been up at that hour - maybe when the children were babies, breastfeeding through the night. Or when I was a teenager, jitterbugging the night away at the Trocadero . . .

 

Oops! Had to stay on track. I needed to go back for a closer look at the building, check out the doors and windows, try to see what sort of security there was. But I had to make sure nobody saw me doing it. And, just in case they did, I had to be sure they wouldn’t recognise me.  I would have to wear a disguise.

 

As my violet notepaper filled up with ideas and lists and action plans, I became increasingly confident. I wasn’t sure how I was going to do it, but I knew I would find a way. I didn’t have the strength or the speed to do anything violent and, even if I did, I couldn’t bring myself to actually hurt anybody. So I would have to rely on pure cleverness.

 

I had always been clever as a girl, topping my class at school, doing well at Business College. I was the fastest typist in my year, and I’ll never forget the time the instructor held up my shorthand exercise for the other girls to see how neat it was . . .

 

By the time Saturday came around again, I had been to Goodwill and found the perfect outfit – baggy black cord pants, sweatshirt, anorak and black sneakers. The sneakers had iridescent lightning bolts along each side, but I had gone over these with black paint and I didn’t think they’d show. The final touch was a black knitted hat, what my grandsons call a condom hat, pulled right down to the eyebrows.

 

Billie the budgie was squawking around in his cage.

 

‘Have you got something to say, Billie?’ I asked, peering up at him from under the hat.

 

I looked at myself in the mirror and had to laugh. I looked like a 15-year-old boy who’d led a very, very hard life. I even had the hunched shoulders, but mine were for real. I put some chocolates in my pocket for sustenance and shuffled out, slamming the front door behind me. I was off to do my reconnaissance.

 

The coffee shop was in the town centre about a mile away from my home. Usually I caught the bus, but there were no buses after midnight, so this time I walked. It was close to one o’clock and the streets were deserted. The air was chill and the small, pale moon was high in the sky. Every now and again a dog barked from behind a fence. Slowly, surely, if a little nervously, I made my way through the back streets.

 

When I was about half way there, I noticed someone coming along the footpath towards me. As he came closer, I could see it was young man, large and looming. I had no handbag to clutch, and didn’t know what to do with my hands. I shoved them back into my pockets and kept walking, shoulders hunched, not meeting the man’s eye. He did the same, and then he was gone.

 

My knees almost gave way with relief. Suddenly I was trembling and, for the first time, I felt doubt. Could I really do this? Could I really pull off a robbery or was this just an old lady’s crazy fantasy? Well, a lot would depend on what I found out tonight.

 

When I reached the coffee shop, I discovered that my timing couldn’t have been better. The shop had just closed. Three cars were left in the carpark and the lights were still on at the back of the shop where I presumed people were cleaning up.  I snatched a plastic crate from a stack near the back door and found myself a niche among the bushes in the garden strip next to the corrugated iron fence. I settled on the crate as far back against the fence as I could get and waited for everyone to leave.

 

The shop was on a corner block. The carpark was at the front, facing the main road, with the entrance around the corner in the side street. My hiding spot was just a few feet along from the carpark entrance.

 

Waiting was boring, but I wasn’t worried about falling asleep. I wasn’t tired in the least. I seemed to need less sleep these days than I used to. There were times, when I was younger, when I could have slept forever, given the chance. Especially when my children were teenagers. Then I seemed to be constantly waiting and worrying, eternally weary . . .

 

Oh, oh! Something was happening. The lights had gone off and the shop was in darkness. Two young women came through the front door, got into their cars and drove away. A third person – I recognised him as the manager – came out and locked the door. There seemed to be more than one lock, or was the second one the burglar alarm? I’d have a closer look later, after he’d gone.

 

The man picked up his briefcase and walked over to the last remaining car, a low-slung, sporty looking thing – I was pretty sure it was a Ferrari. It started up with a throaty roar and I watched through the bushes as he drove out of the carpark. But then he stopped. He parked the car at the side of the road, left it running and came back to the carpark. He had one final task. A chain was draped over a hook on a post at one side of the carpark entrance. He unwound it, dragged the end across and attached it to another hook on the other side. Then he closed the padlock with a loud click.

 

Finally he took one last look around, making sure everything was safe and secure. I stayed perfectly still, willing him to get a move on. But then something else caught his attention. With an exasperated sigh, he strode across to the three big rubbish bins at the back of the building and began wheeling one of them across the carpark towards the front footpath. Lord, would the man never leave and let me get on with it?

 

He had wheeled the second bin out to the footpath and was going back for the third before I finally came to my senses. What on earth did I think was I doing? It was all there, laid out for me on a silver platter!

 

With all the speed my stiff old bones could muster, I slipped out of my hiding spot, got into that car, put it into gear, and put my foot to the floor. It was a long time since I had driven a car, but I didn’t have time to reminisce now. I roared away into the night.

 

Oh, it was glorious! I wanted to keep going forever! I hit the freeway and headed for the hills. This car was so powerful, it could probably have taken me to the moon if I’d put my foot down hard enough!

 

But I couldn’t keep going. I had to give it up. A wrinkled 15-year-old in a condom hat speeding through the streets in a Ferrari at three o’clock in the morning would not remain unnoticed for long. I slowed down, pulled over and opened the briefcase lying on the passenger seat. Inside was a canvas bank bag filled with cash. I stuffed it inside my jacket. Then I turned the car around and headed sedately back into town.

 

Leaving the keys in the ignition, I parked the car around the corner from my house and walked home. I let myself in through the back door and, with a quick hello to Billie the budgie, changed into my nightie and climbed into bed.

 

Would there be a next time, I wondered, as I sat up in bed counting my money. Probably not. Too much of what happened had depended on luck. But the real surprise had been the car. What a joy that had been! Yes, I might just try that again.