DARK DAZE.....(part 1).
Is this the real life?
Is this just fantasy?
Caught in a landslide,
No escape from reality.
Our lives were a mixture of fantasy and reality but the landslide came upon us in April of 1987 and from then on the next 6 months would be a slow, unseen slide into the unknown. What I could see coming I tried desperately to hide through denial and drugs.
Betty had always been excessive in her use of pills, but somehow had always managed to keep it together. One Saturday afternoon he arrived at the parlour in a totally psychotic state. Crying, screaming and terrified of god knows what.
After 20 minutes we decided that no amount of calm talking was making any difference and Matty drove Betty to the nearest hospital.
On his return Matty told us that the doctors said that Betty had a pre-existing mental condition and had been on prescription medication for many years. I assume these days it would be similar to being bi-polar. Any the doctors explained that Betty's stopping regular medication and replacing it with an increasing amount of pills and chemicals had triggered a panic attack. They would keep her in hospital for observation for two days.
Satisfied that Betty was receiving supervised medical attention we continued working that night (albeit in a rather shocked state). The following morning Matty and I returned home just after 7am - Colin had come in early to do the Sunday shift to allow us to visit Betty in Hospital. Arriving home we found our elderly neighbour waiting for us outside our gate.
The front door was open, my bedroom windows were open, all the lights were on.....Our neighbour explained that Betty had arrived home in the early hours of the morning in a taxi and had made quite a disturbance. Apparently scaring our neighbour enough that he was too afraid to go near the house but had sat up on his front porch since 4am watching our house as it was open and clearly an easy target for burglars.
After thanking him we went inside, closing doors, windows and turning off lights throughout the house. We found Betty passed out on her bed. I rang the hospital and they said that he had just walked out sometime in the night, refusing any more help. Matty was so annoyed that he demanded we take the day off and go for a drive.
Against my better judgement and my worry for leaving Betty alone, I knew Matty was serious and decided a few hours away wouldn't do anyone any harm. Betty was sleeping like a log, the dog was fed and watered, and it was a beautiful Autumn day - perfect for a drive in the country.
I couldn't have been more wrong. Our short country trist turned into a 3 hour drive to Canberra where we visited all the sites, had a lovely lunch on the lake front and did all the touristy things. It was around 2pm and we decided to head back home when Matty detoured and headed for a beautiful looking pine forest on the outskirts of the city.
We had barely parked the car to get out for a walk when out of nowhere a police car arrived and headed straight for us. I wasn't unduly concerned as for about the only time in years I hadn't even brought a joint with me. The police officer approached us and asked us what were we doing in the forest and then demanded to search the car. I should have realised by the look on Matty's face that something was about to happen.
When the police officer opened the car boot I nearly died. Sitting inside was my leather bag which I knew had all my marijuana inside. I hadn't put the bag there but found out later that Matty had put it inside as he was worried that Betty might leave the house open again while we were away. The police officer asked whose bag it was and when I admitted it was mine he made me turn out the contents, including a plastic bag containing 27 foil sticks of marijuana and 1 block of hash.
These he quickly took and returned to his car where he radioed for back up. Then he handcuffed us both and we were both driven to Canberra Police Headquaters. Separated and interrogated by numerous police officers.
Having lived so long in Sydney and living in a society where drugs were the norm I had no idea of the trouble I was in. I freely admitted to owning the drugs but adamantly denied that I had come specifically to Canberra to sell them. After all the police had told us our every move since entering the city limits so in my mind they knew we had just come as tourists.
I was fairly calm until one of them asked to search me and asked 'is there anything in your pockets that might give me AIDS'? I told him he was an idiot and obviously knew nothing about contracting the disease. This didn't go down very well at all.
Worse was to follow. Other officers arrived and told me that Matty had said in his statement that we had smoked drugs at home before we left and worse still asked me if I knew that Matty was underage! It turned out that even though he told everyone he was nearly 19, and looked it, he was in fact only 17 years old. Even I was shocked (and infuriated)!
After I was interrogated for over 3 hours I was eventually charged and fingerprinted. Possession of illegal drugs, Possession of a Class A drug (the hash), Deem supply of illegal drugs and corruption of a minor! I was thrown into the police holding cells in a state of total shock and left.
The cell was one of 6. I had no idea that Matty was in the furthest cell away from me and spent the night crying and shivering. The cell was unheated and the temperature was about 2 degrees Celsius. It was so cold that I took the vinyl mattress to cover myself and slept on the bare wooden bed rungs.
In the morning the cell doors were unlocked and I fell into Matty's arms. He had spent the night in a heated cell with blankets and been given a meal. When breakfast arrived they gave Matty his - through the security grill. When I stepped forward to take mine I was told to 'stand back poofter' and then the policeman laughingly dropped my tray onto the floor where my breakfast spilled.
An hour later we were taken up to the courtroom and again placed in a holding cell. It couldn't have got worse. That particular weekend was the annual Canberra Drag Car Racing event and the holding cell was full of semi drunk, violent yobbo's (rednecks) who proceeded to torment me verbally, punch me and even kick me - all in full view of the supervising police officer.
When the court defendant finally arrived he immediately demanded that I be released from the communal cell and placed into a separate cell.....I don't think I could have stayed another minute without serious physical injury.
So I was charged with all of the above accounts and thankfully released on bail. My conditions were that I leave Canberra immediately but report 3 times a week to my local police station until my trial.
Matty wasn't charged. The 3 hour drive home to Sydney took us less than 2 hours. Thankfully I had some marijuana hidden in my room where I stayed for the remainder of the night, even refusing to talk with Matty. I didn't care about Betty's condition. I just wanted to die. The final words of the police prosecutor had been 'you are looking at a minimum of two years hard labour in a maximum security prison'! My life of abandon and self pleasure had come crashing down all around me.
MADAME DAZE.....(part 2).
1987 and I was living the dream. Betty and I had turned Brett's Boys into a magical place of fun, friends and financial surplus. Louise was making almost as much from us as she was from her famous Pink Flamingo Parlour in Kings Cross. So much so that she even had Betty and I covering reception shifts there in order to increase her takings.
I was making a name for myself as 'the best brothel manager' in Sydney. Clients would ring from London, New York, Tokyo, San Fransisco... to book boys in advance because they knew I would only select the right boy for them. If their type of boy wasn't rostered on the day they were coming I would make sure that their type was available. To ensure there was no rivalry amongst the workers I charged an extra $10 to the client which went into a kitty which we all shared at the end of the week. I even liaised with our rival parlours and we shared boys if the need arose. This was a system which benefited everyone and stopped the constant rivalry between parlours.
I was earning a fortune. Louise was paying me $500 a week, I would earn at least that selling marijuana, and most weeks would get an extra $100 in tips given to my by grateful clients. I even had a few regular clients who wanted to see me - again I always put $10 from my earnings into the 'kitty' to keep the workers happy. Of course it all went as quickly as I earned it. Taxi fares, dinner out at lavish restaurants, shouting the 'boys' to a night out in Oxford St, clothes, new furnishing for our new rented house, buying speed and cocaine to keep me going through my double and very busy shifts.......
During the short time Matty and I stayed at my parents house while my dad was recovering Betty had found us a beautiful house in a suburb a few kilometres away from Brett's Boys. This was in Haberfield, which was basically the first suburb outside of the 'inner city' heading west. Situated at the bottom of a beautiful part of Sydney Harbour (Iron Cove) it was Sydney's first 'planned' housing estate built largely in the late 1890's and comprised ornate 'Federation style' houses all boasting large blocks of land, tree lined streets and 'no back lanes'. A far cry from the crammed, run-down, narrow and cheap Victorian terrace houses that formed a large part of Inner Sydney at the time.
Our house was gorgeous. I had the front room which had arched windows and overlooked the covered, ornately tiled verandah. Matty had the second bedroom and behind that was a large lounge which led to a smaller dining room with a third bedroom on the side finishing up with a kitchen and back covered verandah. All the rooms were large and had ornately moulded ceiling panels, lead light windows with sash frames and original Edwardian lights complete with hanging cord switches.
Betty and I even hired a landscape gardener to turn our front garden into a lovely English style garden complete with box hedging, topiary rose bushes and an abundance of sweet smelling perennial flowers. Although we didn't spend much time there, we always enjoyed returning and chilling out. Like a regular family, cooking, cleaning, gardening and enjoying the wonderful environment that the suburb offered.
Matty bought me a new dog. Another Cocker Spaniel who I called Toby and who would be with me for the next 15 years. My first dog 'Nelson' had mysteriously vanished one afternoon from Brett's Boys when I had gone out shopping to buy munchies for the boys and Colin was on reception. I returned laden with cakes and pies and Colin told me that Nelson had accidentally run out the back gate when one of the boys had left it open. At the time I was naive enough to believe him. Future events would lead me to believe that Colin had planned it all to get at me. Hours of combing the streets and door knocking brought no luck and after two weeks of posting reward signs around the neighbourhood we realized that he had gone for good.
Matty was working at his customs job, 9- 5 five days a week and on Friday and Saturday nights would earn extra money as our 'second' driver. Kristy McNichols boyfriend was always our 'first driver' taking the workers on out calls. When he was engaged then Matty would do the job. This was much more efficient than using taxis, cheaper for the clients, and ensured that the workers had someone waiting outside in case of any trouble arising.
I was enjoying every moment of the day. Glowing from the praises of our clients and Louise, swamped with friendship from the workers, permanently out of it on one kind of drug or another and money flowing in and out like I'd never seen before. Sex was on hand whenever I wanted. Either from keen, would be employees or the boys themselves, keen to curry my favour. I didn't use my position to gain these gratitudes. In fact I made sure that I was fair in every way. Rotating the boys on slow and busy shifts, but always making sure I had the right combination of boys available for every shift.
Matty and I had a strange kind of relationship. We slept apart, but spent every moment we had together, whether at work or at home. He knew I was having regular sex with boys every day and mostly every night I was at the parlour but didn't seem to mind. Strangely though, if he ever thought I was getting too close to a particular boy, or tried to bring one home with me he would suddenly become affectionate and loving. He used to quietly whisper in my ear that he wanted to have sex with me that night and true to his word it would happen. It was like we had never been apart - until the next morning when he went off to work as if nothing had happened at all.
We had few dramas at our new Parlour. One boy arrived at the front door accompanied by the police. Apparently he had stolen a car and managed to crash it into five parked cars whilst driving it. The police told us that he had given our address as his residential address. Betty, god bless her, always at my side in a crisis, and without hesitation said ' Never seen him in my life before Officer' before abruptly slamming the door in the policeman's face!
Israel got alcoholic poisoning and his liver erupted before our eyes. That was when we called the ambulance and he ended up in a re-hab centre, for which he never forgave me, and left our lives shortly after.
One of the boys I was dallying with started seeing a female prostitute and bringing her back to the parlour to get stoned with us. I didn't mind and was as nice as pie to her. Until the day she came in 'smacked to the eyeballs' on heroin and I told her she was no longer welcome. She tried to attack me but I slapped her to the ground and told her to 'piss off slut'. Little did I know that she then returned to her own parlour and her pimp put a hit call on me.
Luckily Louise got wind of this and (I found out months later) spent hours calming him down and paying him off, but not before we had a drive by shooting which was all a bit of a blur. One moment we were all bonging and laughing in the back room and the next minute there was a squeal of tyres outside and the sound of a gunshot and breaking glass. They had fired a bullet straight through the lounge window which lodged into the back wall, amidst screams of the drag queens and boys who were sitting watching videos inside. Thankfully the windows were well above head height and no injuries occurred....but it was a shock all the same.
One morning we awoke to find that all the boys bags had been ransacked and money and valuables stolen. This was the first time at Brett's that anything like this had occurred. We always had an unwritten code that we never stole from each other. Even though I had my bag full of drugs and nearly $900 in personal cash in the house while I was sleeping, nothing was taken. It didn't take long for us to see that the 'thief' had also raided the fridge and stolen the eggs and vegetables!!!! We only had one vegetarian prostitute working for us! Poor Glenda, he arrived looking as if butter wouldn't melt, and I immediately confronted him with the evidence to which he admitted. He was such a part of our lives that he was forgiven and some of the boys even gave him money, which he desperately needed to cover his debts......that was the wonderful nature of most of the boys I worked with.
Not long after I would see another, conniving and evil side of some of these boys that would leave me virtually penniless, scared and facing a world of uncertainty.......
