A Life Singular - Part One

Chapter 4 - Breaking News

Breaking News

News was definitely travelling faster with the steady proliferation of mobile telephones.  By the time the anonymous, black Holden arrived at the police station, a huge crowd had gathered.  There were trucks loaded with antennae from every television channel, and people with handheld cameras and microphones were milling around everywhere.  This type of scene was the staple diet of the Diamond family, but today they hadn’t come to launch a new project or to celebrate their latest sporting victory.

Jeff and Gerry sandwiched Kierney between them as they ran through the crowd and up the steps into the building.  The threesome was ushered through the bustling hallway filled with blue shirts and into a large room which was permanently set up for press conferences.  Bart Dyson was already there, and wheeled around on his heels when he heard the others arrive.

‘Thanks for coming,’ Bob Fisher shook the Diamonds’ hands again.  ‘As you can see, we ought to proceed as soon as possible.  We’ve prepared a statement from our side.’

Fisher handed the two tall men a typewritten sheet of paper, which the widower took first and scanned quickly.  Satisfied on the surface, he handed it to his loyal manager, who walked away to read it more carefully.  When Gerry had finished, he handed it to Bart, nodding his approval to the others, and finally, when his father-in-law had digested its contents, Jeff requested that Kierney also be allowed to read it, which she did.  It was a bizarre chain of command, all executed without a word, almost as if they were preparing to make an announcement as to which city had won the right to host the next Olympics.

‘It’s amazing how they make these things sound so dry and empty,’ the youngster lamented, once they broke away from the super-efficient police media team.  ‘I suppose they’re relying on our presence to give it colour.’

Jeff laughed at the young woman’s innate cynicism.  He constantly heard himself in her words.  How much was inbred, he wondered, and how much had she absorbed over the years?  Perhaps he shouldn’t have been quite so forthright with their children.  In situations such as this, the emperor was laid completely naked in his gorgeous daughter’s eyes.

‘You’re spot on,’ he frowned.  ‘Tears sell, baby.  Prime time news tonight.’

The superstar felt sick, thinking of what he would say in front of all those clicking and flashing cameras, and to all the microphones which would soon be banked up along the table.  He didn’t want to stage manage the event by agreeing what each person would say in turn.  This wasn’t the Oscars, after all.

Non-uniformed staff at the district station brought out jugs of water and placed them on the long table at the far end of the room.  There were six chairs behind the table, and another two banks of about eight chairs on each side, stretching back at least ten rows.  What a monstrous circumstance, Jeff thought.  Performing to an audience again.  His family was just one big fairground attraction from start to finish.

Dyson and Diamond fought light-heartedly not to sit in the centre chair, each believing the other deserved it more, although “deserved” was hardly the right word.  Kierney had her father on one side and her grandfather on the other, with her pseudo-Uncle Gerry on the end.  DI Fisher sat next to Jeff with a high-ranking Australian Federal Police media specialist on the other end.  Looking first to his left and then his right, the widower wondered when the cake-cutting ceremony was scheduled to take place.

The doors were opened, and the hordes rushed in, jostling to get as close to the front as possible.  It reminded the performer of the awful concert in Chicago which led to the other two female fatalities he had played a part in, and Miss Irony gleefully donned her athletics spikes and danced once again on his heart.  Any positive karma the world-changer had held in reserve instantly poured out over the floor and was lost.