Tugga's Mob. Stephen Johnson
could fill them with milk chocolate?’
Marianne’s eyes widened and her nostrils flared after a sharp intake of breath. She held the indignant pose for several seconds, but it was a waste of time. She couldn’t outplay her husband’s poker face. She giggled and threw the cushion at him.
‘You selfish bastard.’ Marianne launched herself into Hackett’s lap, almost tipping over the chair. ‘Always thinking of your stomach. I’d make them put soy milk in. At least you might get something healthy for a change.’
Hackett playfully cupped a breast as they cuddled. ‘You know I love you just the way you are, babe. Jacinta is held together by silicone. Give me the real thing any day – and chocolate milk?’ They laughed. Hackett’s gamble had worked and Marianne’s insecurities were tucked away.
‘I reckon Ferdy’s already trawling through his date book for a new dinner companion. And speaking of food, I have a couple of things to check before I fire up the barbie for those steaks.’
That was Marianne’s cue to exit and start dinner preparations. Cucumbers, courgettes, lettuce, broccoli and other healthy options would be chopped, cooked and served. Hackett would brush them aside, as usual. His wife had been trying to change his eating habits from rare steaks and potatoes ever since he turned 50. She would also regularly poke his middle-age paunch. The demands of the television job had restricted his gym visits to a couple of days a month, while the golf games were down to one a fortnight. Hackett believed he was still a healthy man and he would return to a stricter exercise regime once the AFL rights business was sorted.
He had a few minutes until the opening titles of the news, so Hackett listened to O’Malley’s urgent voice mail. To be fair Hackett gave it due diligence, listing the salient points for himself – extra chopper, extra camera, possibly an extra reporter. That was several thousand dollars he saved the company by not answering the phone earlier. And what would be the result if he had granted their wishes? One minute and 20 seconds of breathless reporting by a young Communications Studies graduate on a story that would be forgotten by the first commercial break?
Hackett barely registered the story was about a car crash on the Great Ocean Road. His priority was the cost. Nevertheless, it was almost six o’clock, so he thought he would justify his decision by viewing whatever the news department had scrambled together.
I’ll text O’Malley later, tell him it would’ve been wasted money anyway.
He reached for the remote and switched on the new Samsung 4K television that dominated the wall opposite his desk – paid for by the station, naturally. He swung the chair around and settled in for what he expected to be a few minutes of typical weekend news coverage: another horror road smash.
Hackett nudged up the volume. The first pictures looked like mobile phone video of a vehicle pancaked on rocks. Why are they begging for extra choppers and cameras? Those pictures tell the story.
Any minor pangs of conscience were forgotten as Hackett listened to the story unfold. An Aireys Inlet publican stopped a drunk from driving to his beach house, the idiot waited until the pub closed and used a spare key to resume the journey, but a few kms later drove over a cliff near Lorne. The story looked to be compiled mostly from a mobile phone, the pictures were wobbly and the sound was distorted. The aerials were the steadiest images and better illustrated the driver’s death plunge from the layby. Silly bastard.
Hackett reached for the remote to switch the TV off when a photo of the victim appeared on screen. He froze.
Fuck me! Tugga?
Kevin Tancred. The victim’s name at the top of the story did not ring any bells. Hackett probably never heard him called Kevin in the weeks they spent together all those years ago. He was simply known as Tugga. Hackett paused the TV on the driver’s licence image. Three decades older than the last time Hackett had seen the big fella, and the face was more weathered and carrying heavy bags under the eyes, but there was no doubt: that’s definitely Tugga.
When did you move here and why were you cliff-diving at Lorne?
A personal connection gave Hackett a reason to find out more about the story. He pressed rewind on the remote so that he could listen properly to the script. He learned that Tugga was an expat Kiwi landscaper who moved to Geelong in the late ’80s. He built a thriving business, which enabled him to create a luxurious beach house at Apollo Bay where he spent most weekends. He was well known in most of the bars along the coast – a euphemism for being a heavy drinker – and was occasionally known to be belligerent.
Most of that stacked up with the Tugga that Hackett knew. He loved his booze and could be boisterous if he drank too much. The “famous landscaper” profession was a few steps up from when Tugga and his two mates left New Zealand for their Overseas Experience. Hackett remembered the big fella earned his travel money chopping trees in North Island forests.
Did you make it good Tugga, or is someone using journalistic licence?
Hackett paused the TV again on the photo of Tugga, mentally reconstructing the real-life Tugga that he once knew. Tugga was more than two metres tall, with muscular arms and legs, broad shoulders and a chest that could have stopped a bus. The massive frame was topped by thick dark hair and a drooping moustache which made Tugga Tancred hard to forget. Hackett recalled the man bragging he had been a promising rugby player, a prop, who lost any chance of being an All Black because of a youthful indiscretion. Hackett never learned what that sin was. He also recalled Tugga’s dimples. When employed, they softened the physical impression of a bear in a man’s clothing and helped Tugga portray a boyish charm that made most people comfortable in his presence. Or, at least, that they weren’t going to be torn limb from limb as long as the big fella was smiling. Sadly, Hackett couldn’t find any signs of the younger Tugga, or the dimples, in the photo on his TV.
He looks…haunted?
Hackett found himself, for the first time, wanting more from his station’s news service. Tugga’s demise was a surprise, naturally. He’d lost friends and family over the years to illness and accidents; had experienced all the emotions, or so he thought.
But Tugga’s death was unsettling for some reason. They had known each other for seven weeks in the mid ’80s, meeting as members of a tour group travelling through Europe on a coach/ camping expedition. It was a fun and memorable adventure, literally sowing wild oats as most of the bus group partied from London to Istanbul, and back again.
Hackett had been 25 at the time, a few years out of university and yet to settle properly into an accountancy career. Ferdy, always more focused than Hackett at that age, had pulled out of the Europe tour at the last minute because of a business opportunity that came up in London before the trip began. Hackett had a thirst for excitement and girls, plus it didn’t make sense to travel all the way to Europe and not see the most famous attractions. He met dozens of Aussies and Kiwis in London, mostly working in pubs, who never did more than travel to the running of the bulls in Spain and the Oktoberfest in Munich. Many couldn’t afford much more, Hackett remembered. Pay rates in London were so low and the cost of living was astronomical. Although, even Hackett the fledgling accountant, thought some common sense and planning would have been beneficial for a lot of travellers in those days.
The news program continued, largely ignored now by Hackett as faces, cities and sights filtered through his memory. His eyes drifted from the television to what Marianne called his brag wall. It was filled with pictures of him with famous business people, politicians, sports stars, celebrities and the obligatory family photographs. Mostly the wall was full of people who would not have given him a second glance 30 years ago when he was a carefree tourist in Europe.
More personal mementos from his travels were tucked into a small alcove in the corner. From a distance, a white Major League baseball, signed by a Hall of Fame member, initially caught his attention.
Then there was the plastic cube containing a slim and dark piece of metal: a spent Turkish cartridge from Gallipoli. Hackett hadn’t found it. One of the other passengers, Brian, returned to the camp site with his trophy after their day exploring the famous First World War battle sites: