A Dumb Blonde as Mayor

"Oh yes, I hadn't thought of that. Anything else?"

"Yes he had I had been get use to the idea of living in town because you'd have to get a secondary job and in holding down two jobs you would not find it attractive driving around twenty-five miles out to the ranch every evening and driving back to the town each morning."

"And?" Andrea asked nervously.

"I said I'd already decided I'd have to do that and we better start on doing up 37 Main Street. But he said he had another property in mind – closer to the ranch for me and a more prestigious address for you."

"Oh, you will live in town or on the fringe to be with me. Oh your darling boy... look what I have spread open for you."

"Oh Andrea, give it a rest. I've just worked my butt off plowing you. You have no idea how strenuously long distance travel and all-day fishing is."

Andrea flopped over and said angrily, "Good night."

"Oh crap, sorry Andrea."

There was no reply.

Staring in the darkness wide-eyed Andrea thought oh what a dull marriage it would be. She would be better off marrying an exciting guy like a police sergeant. Yeah and... oh-oh, and being brought home with a bullet through his chest. Oh god!

She flopped over. "Jefferson, kiss me and cuddle me to sleep," she wailed. "I love you. Hold me tight."

CHAPTER 4

Andrea's knowledge and obvious practical experience in basic accounting exceeded Geoff's expectations, but out in the boat when he learned of her lack of understanding of how City Hall was funded, how it was bound by laws and procedures and how it operated and its various divisions and responsibilities, he threatened to jump overboard. It was similar to her knowledge about fishing..."As I understand it fish are something you catch on a hook and you eat them fresh."

"Don't you think Andrea you should have had at least two terms as a councilor before biting the big bullet?"

"Well yes, perhaps. But the call at the meeting was for someone to stand to successfully end the James' Dynasty. No one put up his or her hand, so I did. Anyway my opponent is as thick as a fence post, so what are you worried about? At least I'll be an improvement and my previous schools were really big and were politically administered with work plans, reporting systems and all that kind of stuff."

"All that kind of stuff, Geoff groaned as Andrea's lure that had only gone out a pathetic 20-feet was stuck and her reel screamed and she screamed, "Help, help, oh what do I do?"

"Andrea, this is going to be very much like it will be for our as the greenest mayor in this town's history," Geoff smiled kindly, as he adjusted the drag on the reel. Now keep the rod tip up at between the angle on the clock face of 10:00 and 11:00 and wind in slowly or fast if necessary or let the fish run line out but at all times keep tension on the line – er, keep it tight. Let it go loose and you'll probably lose the fish."

"Shit, it's pulling out more line."

"Good, good. Let it go – the more line it takes out the heavier will be the natural drag of the line in the water, tiring the fish out."

"What if I get tired first?"

"You don't, not if you are a fisherman."

"You mean the non-sexist fisher?"

"Oh do I? Well I never."

"Oh fuck, there is goes again."

"Keep calm. Lower the tip of the rod to about 8 o'clock. That's it. Keep your thumb lightly on the line in the spool."

"Why?"

"Because you'll feel the line slowing and even stop before you see that and that allows speedier reaction."

"And then what? Does the tip go something back to 11 o'clock and I wind and keep the tension?"

"Are you sure you're not a fisherman."

"Geoff please...call me a fisher. Oh fuck there is goes again."

"Steady, that's it. Um Andrea..."

"Why are you using that sexy tone?"

"Cut the crap. Just hand me your rod for a minute will you. Hmmm." The rod bowed violently. "Jesus."

"You swore."

"That's nothing compared with what you've been saying, you foul-mouthed fisher."

"Give me my rod back. It's my fish."

"No way, you may loose it. It's a biggie, a real biggie. Probably a Chinook salmon."

"Geoff, do you want me to slap you around?"

Grinning, Geoff handed back the rod. "Sandra reckoned you were a laugh a minute. I didn't believe it until we came out on to the water. You're a scream."

"You're not too bad yourself. A good tutor I'd say. That road haulage business will prosper under your direction."

"Thank you Your Honor."

"Sucking up to me will get you nowhere."

"Now that's a thought."

"For fuck sake Geoff, cut it out. You're old enough to be my grandfather."

He cackled away, keeping an eye on the rod tip.

Almost an hour later Geoff, ready with the net, said, "Holy shit. It is a Chinook...at least 20 pounds, probably a bit more. You better turn away as I'll have to gaff it. It's too big for the net."

"No way, it's my fish and don't mess up. If you do I'll gaff you and nail..."

"Yes, yes... to the school gate. The whole town knows about stroppy Miss Finn. Now shut up and let me concentrate."

Just on dusk Geoff drove up the street tooting, the half-exhausted Andrea beside him. Geoff's wife Billie came running from the house, looking terrified until she saw his smile. Neighbors gathered.

"Someone grab a camera and decent scales. We've landed a biggie."

Everyone oohed when Geoff opened the trunk and pulled out the monster fish.

Scales were produced. "Twenty-three pounds, seven ounces" read the owner of the scales.

"I want two more independent people to confirm that reading," Geoff said. "Jean."

"Confirmed."

"Melvin."

"Confirmed."

"Right everyone listen up. Tall blondie here who caught this fish – the first time she's ever caught a fish and hooked it on one of the most ineffectual casts even seen on this inlet – is Andrea Finn who is running for the post of mayor."

People clapped and said congratulations.

A guy called Peter got Andrea and Geoff to stand close, half side-on, holding up the big fish together.

"Thanks guys – I'm off to download the image and will email it to the Gazette. You phone in details Geoff.

"Oh right, could someone run Andrea back to the arena when her pick-up is parked?"

Melvin was the first to volunteer and his wife said she'd go with them.

Andrea introduced herself to Billie, thanking Mrs Perkins for allowing Geoff to stay out so late with her.

"Oh you are so sweet darling. Sandra told me I'd love you. It's so nice to meet you. Geoff says you're the best accounts person we've had and you haven't even started work yet. I understand he's briefing you about City Hall."

"Oh yes, and he's such a marvelous tutor."

"Oh that's nice. Look darling, we'll be having a street cook-out tomorrow to dine on this salmon. Please come with your husband and bring Sandra and her boyfriend. I'll give her a call."

Back at her vehicle Andrea called the reporter's room at the Gazette and spoke to the chief reporter. She put her on to the guy handling the story.

"It can't be the first time you've ever caught a fish?"

"Yes it's true. I thought we tied a hook to a line but Mr Perkins taught me to chuck something he called a lure tied to the rod, er to the line. I caught him by his cap and caught the side of the boat behind me twice and after almost an hour I finally got everything working more or less right."

"Then I made my first real cast. He growled that I duffed it, that it only went 20-feet but it must have fallen on to that salmon because it was hooked. I'm calling to ask you to please say I'm over the moon about my first fish being a real beauty but I'm so much over the moon because Mr Perkins was so patient with me and when the fucker began running out line I shrieked help and Mr Perkins just kept me calm, telling me to keep the rod tip up and not to let the line go slack otherwise the fucker could get away."

The reporter asked, "Did Mr Perkins teach you to say the word fucker?"

"No, who used that word? He's too much of a gentleman to use such language."

When Andrea told Jefferson about catching a fish he laughed disbelievingly and said, "What, you caught a fish? But you don't fish, or do you?"

"Well I started today."

"Did you throw it back?"

"No, it was too big to throw back."

"Oh yeah, pull my other leg."

"We have been invited to a street cookout tomorrow evening to help eat it."

"Andrea, have you been drinking. Look darling, get into the shower. Tonight I take you out to dinner."

Andrea yawned and suggested they have take-outs.

"It is to propose and to become engaged to you, remember."

"Oh fuck, I've forgotten that. Oh darling, kisses. I'll need an hour to get ready."

"I guessed that. Probably it will take you one and a half hours, as you're so exhausted throwing that tiddler back into the water. Heh-heh-heh."

They sat in booth in Mason & Boon's Traditional American Restaurant.

"Andrea, I'm beautifully in love with you and think of you when away from you even when not masturbating. I wish to share my life with you darling and will stand by you through thick and thin. Will you please become my wife?"

A little stunned at the mention of masturbation and a graphic image, Andrea blinked and said, "Oooh yes darling, ooh yes. I have so much wanted to hear this proposal from you. I accept and will stand by you through thick and thin and bear your children if all goes well for us in that direction."

"Thank you darling," Jefferson said, sliding a small black box across the table to her and turned and beckoned over a waiter and ordered a bottle of Mumm's non-vintage champagne. Andrea waited patiently to open the box. When Jefferson turned back to her she allowed him to see her excited and he appeared well pleased. From the box she withdrew a solitaire 18k diamond engagement ring in a white gold six-prong platinum setting.

Andrea cried out in pleasure and said it was very beautiful and she couldn't have made a better selection had she chosen the ring herself. She looked at him quizzically and said it fitted perfectly.

"I took in one of your rings to the jeweler and told him what finger you wore that ring on and took him the photo of your hand I sneaked when you were wearing that ring, using my phone camera."

"Oh darling, you clever man."

Jefferson, weary from all the sex the previous night, unrolled the newspaper at the gate for a quick read before heading out to the ranch.

He gaped. "I fucking cannot believe it; I truly can't," he gasped, gazing at the photograph under the front-page heading, 'Hot Mayoral Candidate Lands Old Man of the Sea'.

'Hot favorite to become Pike's Point new mayor, Andrea Finn went fishing for the first time ever yesterday afternoon. It took her an hour to learn to cast and then another hour to land this Chinook salmon. Weighing in at twenty-three pounds, seven ounces it is the largest Chinook recorded as being caught in Charlotte Inlet since a 32lb monster was caught in the inlet fifteen years ago.'

Jefferson went racing in and shook Andrea awake.

"What is it, am I pregnant," she asked, and giggled at the look on Jefferson's face.

With trembled hands he held out the newspaper and croaked, "Look."

"Ah yes, my tiddler. I guess we didn't throw it away after all."

"T-the biggest s-s-salmon I-I've landed was a shade over ten pounds. I've fished since I was three years old."

"Perhaps you'll get better as you get older darling?"

Jefferson kissed Andrea and left, still looking somewhat dazed.

"Oh why do men think they have to be best at everything," she yawned.

Andrea read the story and beamed when she came to the bit, "Mr Perkins, with a distinguished career in local government and an elder in the Presbyterian Church, said it was absolutely true Andrea hooked the fish a mere 20-feet from the 10ft boat and played it for almost an hour, following his instructions and at times being on the verge of panic. He had to gaff it because his landing net was too small. "When Andrea hooked the fish she screamed in near terror and yelled what should she do. Towards the end, tiring, she was pumping the rod like a pro. I was so proud of her. She's a real goer and will be a great mayor – I suppose I'm allowed to say that?"

* * *

Jake James, home late after another night on the beer, awoke with his mom hitting him across the face with a folded newspaper. "Read the front page," she grinned.

Jake looked at the photo and the big heading and howled, "Why isn't all that space devoted to me?"

"When were you last out fishing?" she jeered.

That cut into Jake and he thought he'd show them; he'd get front page.

He called three of his mates, one of whom lived in a ranch. That guy checked pastures and found a dead cow that had bogged at a watering hole. He used the front-end loader of a tractor to load it on to his pickup.

Jake took his father's fishing boat, without authority, from the West's mariner at Mornington and backed it alongside a wharf. He and his three mates lifted the stinking carcass off the pickup and dropped it ten feet down into the cockpit of the 25ft boat. They then went down the inlet to the area known as Shark's hole, threaded a thick steel trace in and out of the carcass and attached a huge hook and pushed it in out of sight. They then complaining, and feeling nauseated, dropped the carcass overboard, only then remembering they hadn't attached the line to the other end of the trace. There was a shark feeding frenzy as the carcass began its freefall descent. The guys stared at each other in dismay, knowing they wouldn't be hauling up the biggest shark ever caught in Charlotte's Inlet.

Just then there was a tremendous noise of a blasting siren and they looked up to see a huge tanker loaded deep and carrying motor vehicle gas bearing down on them; It would take a couple of miles to stop and at that draught couldn't leave the shipping channel.

"Your fucking moron," Jake yelled to no one in particular. "You have parked us in the shipping channel."

"You parked us here Jake," yelled Austin.

Freddie yelled, "Yeah, get us out of here."

Jake grabbed the controls and after three false starts just cleared out fifty yards ahead of the arrival of the tanker at the spot they were anchored. Freddie had cut their anchor rope.

They sped back to Mornington where a photographer from the Gazette dutifully photographed them being arrested by Wharf Police and the boat being impounded pending a potential murder investigation with skin, hair and old blood being found in the cockpit and the unlikely explanation being that the young men had gone fishing with a dead cow as bait.

Freddie said to the photographer, "Don't submit this little incident for publication please pal."

The female photographer jeered, "Enjoy jail you jerk."

After the fisher's story checked out, a forensic investigation confirming it was cow and not human remains in the cockpit, the hapless guys were charged with being anchored in the shipping channel illegally, putting a fuel tanker at risk and wasting police time. They were remanded to appear in court in a month. That was a relief to Jake because that would be two weeks after the election.

Next morning Jake awoke with his dad the mayor hitting him across the face with a folded newspaper. "Read the front page," he yelled. "You steal my boat to commit political suicide."

Jake looked at horror at the screaming front-page headline. 'Pike Point Mayor's Son Baits with Cow to Catch Huge 48,000-ton Tanker'.

The story began, 'Wharf police suspected murder when four men in a blood-splattered small craft...'

"Dad, I can explain..."

"I'm not listening. You're brainless... a moron. A family disaster."

Jake's mother wouldn't talk to him and ordered him out of her kitchen, cackling in laughter. He slunk out and going into the CBD to buy breakfast experienced an amazing time. People – mostly young or adult lay-abouts – appeared in all directions hooting with laughter and slapping his back.

Completely unintentionally, Jake had become a cult hero. The proprietor of the hamburger store, usually inclined to throw Jake and his drunken mates out of the premises, saw the potential of a financial harvest, greeted Jake like a long-lost buddy and gave him a free breakfast, but charged Jake's entourage full prices.

Meanwhile at his opponent's house, Jefferson who'd snatched a look at the Gazette before setting off to the farm, raced back to the bedroom with the newspaper story of Jake's misadventure. They rolled about the bed in near hysterics; Jefferson found a bare breast in his hand and as a consequence arrived at the ranch late for work. But he had an excuse: "Dad I become engaged to Andrea last night."

"Oh good, I'll tell your mother. Move your ass as join the boys – we're weighing and grading steers today."

Priscilla was over the moon with the news. She called Andrea to congratulate her and after the usual stuff women share in such moments of emotional tenderness invited Andrea to the ranch at 7:00 that night and suggested she dress up. Andrea assumed that meant she and Jefferson would be taken out to dinner, probably to Nancy's Dine-in and Take-outs between the tractor service center and the veterinary clinic.

* * *

As Andrea approached the road turnoff into the ranch she spotted a huge marquee to one side of the house and in the 'home' pasture were at least forty vehicles. A young woman waiting at the gate waved her down and got into the pickup.

"Hi I'm Jane Ferguson, a near neighbor from eleven miles east of here. Congratulations."

"Thanks Jane. My what a pretty dress."

"Yeah but I'm uncomfortable in it. I live in jeans and checked shirts. I need to make a call but you can drive us in."

"Hi Mrs Robbins, we're on our way in."

Andrea saw people spilling from the marquee, drinks in hand.

"This is your welcome to the district darling. You are soon to become one of us."

"One of us?"

"A country girl," smiled Jane, "although we do know we have to share you with the city. On your wedding day Tim and Priscilla hand over the ranch to Jefferson."

"What! He hasn't told me that."

"Oh darling you'll get use to that. Men usually will tell you about things important to them, like first progeny from a newly purchased bull, or the result of a football match, or how the Yankees in New York at doing, or the price of gas and the size of a fish they caught."

"Are you sure?"

"Very sure darling and in twenty years or so you'll be telling your imminent daughter-in-law the same thing."

"But I'm confused..."

"For Christ-sake Andrea, don't let any male hear you say that. If they hear such a confession they'll claim everything they've ever alleged about women is true."

"Oooh, I wouldn't want to do that. What I was going to say I don't know many of these people."

"It's why they are all here dear... to meet you. And you'll meet them all again at your wedding at the events center."

"Events center? Jefferson and I plan a small wedding in the town's coffee gardens."

"Sorry darling. It's nothing to do with you. Priscilla and her cronies have taken over but you will be consulted on important things such as the color of flowers and the hem length of your dress."

"But we wanted a quiet wedding..."

"It will be quiet darling, during the actual service. Priscilla will talk to you about your side... her guest list is approaching 120 and you'll be expected to match that. But you'll have to hurry because the wedding is in eighteen days."

"Is it?"

"Yes, confusing isn't it?"

"You're obviously married.

"Yes and I hope we'll become great friends and become pregnant together."

"Won't we need a man?"

Jane opened her mouth and then caught the sly look. She almost fell out of the pickup laughing.

People ahead of them began cheering and the 11-piece band began playing 'Here Comes the Bride'.