Cocoa Collins Ch. 01-05

“Open it,” she said in delight.

“What’s so special about an enclosed water cooler,” Kelly said. She opened the large cooler and was looking at a next stack of a dozen bottles of quality French champagne.

“Omigod, have you allowed the executive editor to get at your wares?”

“Don’t be silly. With his booze belly, we’d need to be on a bed before he could get a leg over me.”

Laughing, Kelly looked at the bottles and licked her lips.

“When?”

“When we have the right sort of VIPS in here,” Cocoa said, locking her new liquor fridge. Don’t forget we are off to the prison farm in the morning with Sandra.”

“I was supposed to remind you.”

“Perhaps you need to get up earlier.”


Next morning Kelly drove off in Hey Babe’s! marked SUV with Cocoa in the front seat and the photographer Sandra in the rear.

“I’m a big scared that security will be tight, inhibiting us,” Sandra said. “This could be a washout.”

“Nah, only the Governess knows who we are. It’s is a medium correctional facility for young females to the age of 34 who probably don’t know what a newspaper is.”

They arrived outside the correction centre and through the wire security fencing, the newspaper team would see females running toward the fence by them.

Ignoring the 82-deg. heat, Kelly wound down her window and they could hear the females chanting, “Cocoa, Cocoa.”

“That the fuck?” said Cocoa.

Once the visitors were checked out, they were ushered into the office of the Governess, Mrs Wilks.

“Hi ladies, the Minister is tearing out his hair after authorising this visit. We’re told his wife screwed a delicate part of his anatomy until he finally said the visit would be approved. There is no need to tell me which one of you is Cocoa. Hi love, welcome to our home. I saw the huge posters of you in Sydney yesterday. Call me Ruth.”

“Hi Ruth. This is my PA Kelly and our unit’s photographer Sandra. Why are the inmates yelling out my name?”

“I gave them five copies of yesterday’s Jupiter and told them that you people would be visiting us today. They can’t believe you are here, Cocoa. None of us believed a glamour puss like you could bear to come to such a place. Um why have you, I mean exactly, and not just what you stated in your written request received last week?”

“Ruth, we all know some young females go off the rails, but what really happens to the tougher ones. I thought reading something of their story would serve as a salutary lesson to some of our rougher readers who might have a careless attitude to petty crime. And others should know about it too.”

“Wow, worthy sentiments Cocoa. Look, this may scare some of the crap out of you but we will be accompanied by four guards with tasers and I’ll have a stun gun when we go out there, just in case, although my girls are pretty good. This visit appears to have excited them.”

“I’m basically unafraid but that could change if a couple of heavyweights attempt to screw my tits off.”

“Christ, Cocoa please don’t talk like that.”

“Apologies. Look you two, stay here and…”

“No, we’re coming,” they chorused.

“Cocoa, be prepared. Some will want to touch you. Just touch you lightly. There are fifty-eight of them and some are actually shy.”

“Shy?” chorused the visitors.

“Yes, shy. A couple will be included in the 10 who will come inside later for the interviews and to join us for lunch.”

“Omigod,” Ruth cried, as they neared the enclosure. “Most of them have tidied themselves up and a few are even wearing makeshift ribbons. I can’t believe it. I’m calling my deputy to bring her video camera and perhaps she should also film something of the interviews and of lunch that I shall pass on for my chiefs to view.”

The inmates crowed about the visitors and guards and in the slow pushing and shoving Cocoa eventually found herself cut off from the others.

“Cocoa, we’re coming in.”

“No, wait a few seconds Ruth.”

Cocoa pulled a muscular female of at least 6 ft. tall to her.

“Am I safe under your protection?”

“Yeah, I’m signalling to Janice and Midge to join us.”

“What’s your name?”

“Lefty will do.”

“Ruth, everything is fine. Lefty, Janice and Midge are protecting me from the crush.”

“How the fuck did you manage to get those three?”

“Aw, they’re all good girls Ruth, I mean Governess. I’ll get everyone to move back a bit so you guys can keep tabs of what’s going on.”

“You’re a brave and bossy young bitch,” Lefty grinned, revealing she had two teeth missing. She told everyone to fall back a little.

Cocoa looked up to the nearest tower and saw an officer filming the proceedings below.

“Lefty, this crowding is making officers nervous. Could you get the girl sitting in lines of ten to a row facing you and me? Then the Governess can loosen off her corset and begin to breathe normally again.”

The young women hearing that screamed in laughter and they all began sitting in lines of approximately ten persons.

When everyone was settled, Cocoa said, “His Babes. I’m Cocoa, the roving editor of the new insert in the Jupiter Newspaper that most and even perhaps all of you saw overnight our new insert called Hey Babe! I feel enormously responsible about my role. Yesterday I wrote the article aimed at young females telling them, indirectly, it was their right to decide when they should start having sex, not their parents, nor church people, or self-appointed do-goers.”

“Most of you have no knowledge of what having sex is.”

A huge gale of laughter filled the air as Cocoa’s audience rolled from side to side against each other.

“Okay, you are making fun of me, proving that I was wrong. Then here’s a question, those or you 17 years or older, do you wish you were outside thinking about having sex. I bet you do. How many of you really do wish you could be out there having sex?”

Almost everyone put up their hands.

“Hey you,” Cocoa said pointed to a female in her late-twenties. “Why don’t you have your hand up?”

“It’s because I’m getting better sex inside here that I ever got outside.”

Cocoa yelled, “Whoops, I not thinking straight. Please, no further comment.”

She asked more general questions about were they thinking how would they get their lives back together, whether they believed their punishment fitting their offences and what advice, in any, did they have for young women outside who were carelessly drifting a little too close to the borderline of becoming involved in trivial and even severe offences.

The Governess called it was time for the guests and the ten invited women to attend lunch – “And you too, Lefty, for your key role in ensuring Cocoa wasn’t accidentally crushed.”

“Well thanks guys. It’s been a real eye-opener being here today,” Cocoa said. “If you were all tarted up a bit more and there were no security enclosures, I could easily have thought I was at a female summer camp. You just look like normal girls to me and no doubt you are in most ways. I’ve really enjoyed in engaging with you all.”

As she was saying that, a young woman jumped up and ran over to a building and hurried back with a guitar.

“Right everyone,” Lefty called. “Stand and face our chief and visitors. Play ‘Bright Eyes’ Gloria, and everyone sing in tribute to Cocoa.”

The visitors remained standing and facing the large choir until the song finished. They walked off and Lefty leading the detachment who were invited to lunch and engaged in more discussions.

As the gate close, the remaining members of the choir burst into ‘Someone Like You.’


Cocoa’s emotional story appeared next morning as the lead in Hey, Babe! under the heading, ‘My Time in Detention’.

It began:

These 88 young females I visited yesterday are in a NSW Correctional Facility for young women who have fallen to the left of centre in terms of acceptable behaviour.

Well, that’s how I see it. They are serving time for committing medium-level offences earning custodial sentences, such as assault, multiple shoplifting convictions and arson.

Three of us from Hey, Babe! went there yesterday to experience where you could be if you push a little too far, perhaps recklessly and end up being sent to a correction centre, the polite term for prison.

Believe me; it’s not a picnic.

We arrived apprehensively but to our delight someone had fed five copies of yesterday’s Hey, Babe edition to the detainees and when we arrived the young women raced to the steel mesh separating us and chanting, ‘Cocoa, Cocoa’.

That left me practically flabbergasted.

Omigod, they were acknowledging me as some kind of figurehead because in that newspaper I had spoken out on behalf of young females that the final decision when they decided to have lawful sex for the first was theirs and theirs alone.

We then entered into a rather hair-raising roller-coaster experience at times…


The public feedback on that 3-page illustrated presentation was rather heart-warming for those involved. Emailed comments included, ‘What an eye-opener as I’d scarcely realized that we incarcerated women in this country’, ‘Brilliantly portrayed, I almost imagined I was there’, ‘If this doesn’t deter young women from dipping their toes into crime, I can’t think of a deterrent that would’.

Just before the 2.00 pm news conference, management released an all-staff memo that each of 3-member-team that had visited the northern medium correction facility yesterday to produce the illustrated lead article in Hey, Babe! today, had been awarded $500 for their collective initiative, enterprise and fascinating revelations in that compelling article presented to Jupiter readers. Signed: Bert Squires, Executive Editor.

As the three began to celebrate cheerfully on reading the memo, Kelly cried, “I can’t accept.”

Cocoa waited for Sandra to respond.

“Nonsense Kelly, we went there as a team. You drove us there and organized us with refreshments at comfort stops and most importantly, your contributions were vital when Cocoa worked on her article on the way home and had the occasional block that interfered with her usual work-flow.”

“Anyone competent could have helped her,” Kelly said.

Cocoa said, “They were not there but Kelly was, and it was she that set the ball rolling again.”

“Furthermore, Kelly, it was you who made the pre-event phone calls, couriered my letter of request for a journalistic visitation to the correction centre and then handled all other pre-arrangements.”

“Oh, with you two ganging up on my like that I suppose I must concede.”

* * *

Three months after the first edition of Hey, Babe! was published, an editorial/management subcommittee reviewed the success or otherwise of the new insert and in particular accessed its impact on readership trends and its value to the newspaper overall.

‘Hey, Babe! is punching above its weight in making an outstanding contribution to our newspaper’s viability,’ stated the subcommittee’s report ahead of its financial analysis results.

Bert handed Cocoa a copy of the report and said the results were ahead of projections. It’s really an amazing result. I intend to give you a generous productivity bonus.”

“Thanks, but no thanks, Bert. Instead, could we hire the Auxiliary Hamburger Bar with an open bar from 4.00 to 7.00 next Saturday afternoon with two security guys at the doors and invite to the event everyone with their wife or partner, who are directly involved in the compilation and sending to production of Hey, Babe!”

“But your guys are a small team. The cost of that dig won’t come near the bonus I was thinking of authorising for you.”

“No problem, Bert. Then it’s a win for you. What I wish to enjoy is a celebration for my team. You and Trish are invited as my special guests.

The event was an outstanding success.


Chapter 5

A month later, Cocoa came up with a great idea for a lead story and decided to go for it. But she then thought she should choose a reporter to team with her.

But who?

However, she’d first had to get the project approved and walked in on Bert, timing her arrival fortuitously, just as his officious PA disappeared into the photo-copying room.

“Hey, what makes you think you don’t require an appointment for a face-to-face like everyone else,” Bert snorted.

“I need a decision now and not have to wait until Mrs Marks decides what month, what week, what day and what time when I may have 15 minutes with you. Besides, you rather like the sight of me in your spartan office.”

“I’m thinking of getting it redecorated.”

“Go the whole hog and get a complete makeover. Don’t use also-ran consultants, get your girlfriend Elizabeth DeLewis to design the make-over.”

“I don’t have girlfriends as I love my wife. Anyway, we are talking about an office, not a high fashion dress. For your information, Liz is my brother’s stepdaughter from his second marriage.”

“Well, there you go. For your information, Liz worked as a department store window dresser before she branched off into clothing design.”

“Too much information,” Bert grunted. “Well, since you’re here, what do you want?”

“I want to do a 4-page lead on a subject related to sexuality.”

“Christ, Cocoa, I told you to keep away from controversy for a month until the heat over that spread on sex choices that Hey, Babe! tossed into the faces of parents and frontline moralists dies away.”

“Indeed, and I heard you but listen. When I asked maximum possible independence for my new unit and you agreed, I said in disbelief was that a promise and you sighed, rolled your ears, sorry, your eyes to the ceiling and you groaned, ‘Absolutely’. I now ask why?”

“Possibly I had a mental convulsion and a senior moment simultaneously.”

“No, it was because, being away from your chicken-liver advisers, you believed in me and saw me as the modern Joan of Arc for young people.”

“Cocoa, I have been charged with the job of being the Guardian and the Leader of this newspaper and…”

“Please, don’t divert. Do you trust me sufficiently to let me have another shot at an ultimate controversy of great human interest?”

“Err, give me an hour to think about it.”

“The Ultimate Guardian and Leader does not need time to stall. Do you back me one more time to take a shot at confronting our readership heavy-handed? Despite my open mandate, I believe it is polite to consult. I don’t want your approval to proceed. I just wish to know without debate do you trust me enough to let me rip into it?”

“Right, here’s my answer. Go forward with care my young genius and let’s be clear, the outcome will rest on your own head.”

“Thanks boss, beaut decision. It will take at least a week to compile.”



Cocoa had decided to assign the team’s sole male journalist simply because Ralph was the best all-round reporter on the team. But during the night she had a rethink and next day Sheryl Hope was invited to join her (and her ghost-writer) to co-produce the article.

Sheryl was nonplussed.

She knew she was the oldest and, in some respects, the slowest contributor on the team. And yet perhaps she was considered the most powerful writer.

Amazed that she was being handed this plum co-role, she couldn’t help herself and asked, “Why me?”

Cocoa looked at the attractive woman, who like her wore minimum make-up.

“Because you are 32, closer to maturity than any of us.”

“Seriously?”

“Why, are you thinking of laying a charge of age discrimination against me?”

“Are you kidding me?”

“Oh, you know Sheryl that I like tossing a wind-up now and again. Age was a consideration, as were experience and maturity. But what influenced me was something I recalled overhearing during one of our coffee breaks when some of you were chatting about lovers. You mentioned you had experienced three lives-ins over the years.”

“I see, and because of that you think I’m experienced?”

“Exactly.”

Sheryl cried, “Omigod, you think I’m a hooker?”

“Not unless you tell me that you are.”

“Well, I’m not. I’m just… well I’m just socially active.”

“That’s fine. For the record, I would have expected a live-in with guy or two before this but none ever discussed the possibility with me and even Kelly and I would call ourselves mere occasional passionate lovers.”

“But you are not a virgin?”

“Hell, no. And at present I don’t even have a boyfriend. Look, what I’m planning is a 4-page feature that will include only small ads on pages two to four. I want you to find young women aged 18 to 32 who, in the sexual sense, are living-in, say half with females and half with males, perhaps 12 in all. No names and you interview them with their live-in partners and they will be photographed in such a way they cannot be fully recognised.”

“What, just a couple of bare asses on beds?” Sheryl chortled.

“Darling, use of imagination is good but do remember that Jupiter is a family newspaper.”

“While you are doing that, I’ll gather material from landlords, moralists, social workers, a lawyer and parents to provide the other half of the story. As usual, I’ll be looking for an informative and hard-punching story. Oh, and always asked the question about possible thoughts of future marriage.”

While the feature story ‘Living In’ was being prepared, taking longer than anticipated, the week-day production of Hey, Babe! continued as normal, with both Sheryl and Cocoa having to contribute.

A couple of nights after that conversation between Sheryl and Cocoa, the Jupiter’s Annual Media awards were held in Central Sydney. Cocoa paid for three of her team who were interested in attending with their partners and she and partner were invited to join the Jupiter’s VIP table of 12.

She wanted to take Kelly but she declined saying it was unnecessary to make their relationship so obvious, that Cocoa should find a hunk.

Cocoa don’t know of any suitable guy and called Bert to pull out but he said he’d ask Elizabeth DeLewis’ well-known younger brother to escort her as his girlfriend was on holiday in Bali with her girlfriends.

“Well, only if he’s no punk and treats females as equals.”

“Yeah, that describes him well. He often skippers my boat for me and that indicates that I trust him.”

“Yeah, right. Set it up for me. He’s no need to call me; just give him the time to call for me and info to where to go. Thanks pal.”

Three days later a fancy box arrived for Cocoa by courier and she read the card before opening the box.

My brother Harvey is taking you to the media awards. Have this dress with my compliments. It didn’t sell after my spring fashion show and I’ve had it altered to your exact size. Have it with my compliments; I’d like Harvey to be wooed away from the druggie bitch that he’s fucking – Liz DL.

Ugh, Cocoa thought and opened the box before returning the rejected gift with a thanks but no thanks

“Hurry, hurry,” Kelly urged when she’d read the note while Cocoa was carefully unwrapping the perceived unwanted gift.

The two females looked at the scarlet strapless short dress and gasped.

“Omigod,” Cocoa said, toughing it delicately. “I-I can’t accept. It’s magnificent.”

“To you, yes. But to Elizabeth it’s little more than a reworked classical design and she probably is not fussed about the colour because it’s too classical.”

“Really?”

“Yes, really Cocoa, or at least I think so.”

The two females stood admiring the spread-out dress for a few minutes.


One evening the following week, with the air temperature in the high 70s and Kelly had gone out on a date with an old boyfriend, Cocoa answered the door bell.

She looked at the handsome, broad-shouldered guy in a dinner suit and smiled delightedly.

“Oh hi, I was only told you were Harvey, but you are the pin-up Rugby League player Harvey Costello. I’ve seen you play twice in Melbourne.”

“Pardon me?” he said, sounding a little dazed, his gazed transfixed on the body in red in front of him.

“I said…”

“Oh hi. My sister wouldn’t tell me what you looked like and I guessed I was in for a surprise but in body alone you are a magnificent surprise.”

“Is that a compliment?”

“It sure is, babe. Do you have beer, I would like to make a late entrance?”

“Yeah, we only have one type. I’ll have one with you, it’s so damn hot.”