Free Strictly Confidential by Roxy Jacenko Page A

again. ‘How do you know that? I only met Matt five seconds ago.’
    The pap laughed. ‘You’ve never been worked over by a paparazzo before, have you, Flunkey? I’ve walked past you and the target five times already tonight and you still haven’t got face recognition.’
    The pap looked smug but the only word I heard in all that was ‘target’. Matt was his target. ‘You’re after Matt Ashley tonight?’ I asked excitedly. ‘Fab!’
    The pap looked mildly amused. ‘Don’t you even want to know why, Flunkey?’
    I thought for a split second. ‘No,’ I said. ‘Just make sure you get his left arm and his watch in all your shots.’
    He shook his head. ‘Shameless.’
    I paused to ponder for a minute what it meant to be called shameless by a paparazzo. There is no tick-box for this on the ‘What I want to be when I grow up’ questionnaire they give you in careers guidance classes at high school. Nor can you enrol in ‘Selling your soul 101’ in your communications degree at Sydney Uni. An oversight, surely. Because it was at moments like these that I wanted to whip out a camera of my own, take a quick Polaroid, inscribe the back with Career-defining moment #66 and add it to a montage on a cork board in my office at work. If only I had an office, that is.
    Remembering I was meant to be tracking down Sports Daily , I swapped business cards with the pap and pushed inside. But not before I offered him some nice ‘natural’ shots with Matt during the evening. This, we both knew, was a promise to tip off this guy and his Canon just as soon as Matt was away from the crowds and in a position to be snapped unwittingly. After all, what self-respecting magazine runs a posed celebrity shot when there are paparazzi-style snaps on the table? As a PR, if you jump into bed with the paparazzi your product is guaranteed to be in print the next day.
    ‘I’ll be ready and waiting to get those shots. You just say the word, Flunkey,’ he said as I left.
    ‘Done, my paparazzi pal, done.’ And I headed into the scrum of the media room.

    Later, back at the bar, two media interviews and three champagnes down, I was beginning to think the evening might actually be a success. Matt had provided the press with several column-inches’ worth of sound bites. ‘It was a team effort, we all gave a hundred and ten per cent and cricket was the winner on the day. By the way, have you got the time? Oh wait, let me check my new Lacoste watch.’ Yada yada. But it was enough to keep me on the payroll for another day.
    Plus, Matt and his teammates had waited till the end of the speeches before getting totally rollicking drunk. Some sort of record, I’m sure. In fact, the night was already winding to a close and their chants of ‘Aussie, Aussie, Aussie, oi, oi, oi’ had only been going relentlessly for, oh, about an hour or so now, much to the delight of the suits all around us.
    Matt was just introducing me to yet another green-and-gold-clad bloke, this one roughly the height of a Harbour Bridge pylon, when I decided it was time to make a break for it.
    ‘J, this is Brad, the other fast bowler,’ Matt said.
    ‘Nice to meet you, Brad, but I –’
    ‘Hi there, Jay is it? Why are you PR chicks all so hot? Is it in your job description or something?’ Brad asked.
    Spare me. ‘Actually, Brad, I’m afraid I was just leaving,’ I said. I turned to Matt. ‘Want a lift back to your hotel room, Matty?’
    I hadn’t meant for this to sound suggestive but Matt’s face lit up like a tween at a Blue Light Disco. And I’m ashamed to say I didn’t disabuse him of his delusion. Whatever gets you out of here and in front of the lens of the paparazzi, bud.
    Grabbing Matt’s hand for a speedy exit, I dragged him through the crowd of greying private-school boys and down the long flight of stairs towards the gates out the front. In my spare hand I clutched the paparazzo’s business card and dexterously punched his number into my