Page 7 of Power Moves
Her voice is too quiet, slightly too high-pitched, and I suddenly feel horribly guilty. I shouldn’t have boasted about being a workaholic. It was meant to be a humblebrag, not a cry for help. This always happens, and I do it without realising.I make my family worry.
Dad and Maxy are silent on the screen. Jessie’s expression is so earnest, her stupid bum is so bony. I don’t know how she always manages to get her own way.
‘Okay,’ I relent. ‘I’ll go to the bloody festival.’
CHAPTER 3
The halls of Parliament House are buzzing with anticipation. It feels like State of Origin night at a border town’s RSL. Sure, there will be fewer mullets and less overt rum-drinking, but it’ll be just as rowdy. This is cold-blooded war and our every move from this moment must be geared towards victory.
‘I can’t do it,’ Petria wails, bending over the wide wood-look desk that wraps around one half of Boss’s office. She sounds like a woman in labour, but it’s not contractions causing her pain; just loose-leaf paper. There are A4 pages scattered across every available surface—the desk, the floor, the leather Eames chair that’s parked next to the fiddle-leaf fig in its terracotta pot.
‘Don’t worry,’ I say, even though the sight is giving me mild heart palpitations. I scoop up a wad of notes that are teetering dangerously close to the shredding bin. ‘I’ll help. It’s not that confusing once you get used to it.’
I start collating the briefing notes into piles: slightly contentious, contentious, highly contentious and CFs (which stands for clusterfucks).
‘This is stupid anyway!’ declares Petria, with the type of emotional gear-shift I’m quickly becoming used to. The woman can go from zero to a hundred in less than a second, which I anticipate will be an advantage in this career where surges of energy are often required at strange times of the day.
Petria grabs a briefing note titled ‘Digital Revolution Funding Blowout’ and waves it in my direction. ‘How are we supposed to know every single thing happening across the whole portfolio, at every single minute of every single day?’
‘Uh …’ I don’t have an answer for this. ‘We just … do?’
I quickly neaten the piles of paper into sharp rectangular stacks and slide them into binders. The motion is therapeutic.
‘Boss will be here in five,’ I say as I snap the last binder shut. ‘You wanna hang around or head straight to the chamber?’
‘I’ll go!’ says Petria, before realising how that sounded. ‘Sorry, it’s just—’
I chuckle. ‘Don’t stress, I used to be a bit scared of Boss too. He’s a legend though,’ I assure her. ‘I wouldn’t understand anything in this place if it wasn’t for him. He’s taught me everything I know.’
‘Which is basically,Trust no one?’
I laugh. ‘Spot on. Especially on the crossbench. Those independents be cray. But you’ll love Boss once you get to know him.’ I pass her the binder. ‘Here. We’ll meet you down there.’
Petria’s smile is grateful. ‘Thanks, Mill.’
I wave her off with a grin. Petria has been working with me for four weeks now. She came on board to help fill a gap after our last two media advisors fell in love and resigned so they could go backpacking through Europe. We’re also down a chief of staff—he’s on stress leave—so that leaves me as the most senior person in the office. We’re woefully understaffed going into an election campaign, but I don’t mind at all. It gives me more control.
Boss walks through the door two minutes later and dumps his laptop bag on the now-tidy desk.
‘Allegra’s just told me the pool house roof won’t be fixed until next week,’ he announces by way of greeting.
I look up from my phone. Allegra is Boss’s wife. ‘Contractor issues?’ (If eavesdropping in Parliament House over the past six years has taught me anything, it’s that tradesmen can besounreliable.)
Boss nods as he begins rifling through a drawer. ‘Cricket nets are done though,’ he says.
‘Rory stoked?’
‘Over the moon.’
‘Awesome,’ I trill. Boss’s nine-year-old son, Rory, has been looking forward to the nets being installed for months. ‘And is that a new suit?’
Boss looks up. ‘Yep. New skirt?’
I smile. ‘Old skirt.’
Boss closes his drawer. ‘Well, it may be old, but you wear it well.’
Our conversations often follow this rhythm; each of us lobbing easy shots for the other to return.
