ERROL PARKER | Editor-at-large | Contact
Daryl Maguire paints a sad picture as he sits on the floor of The Advocate’s Sydney Bureau office in Barangaroo.
The boyish sparkle in his eye isn’t there anymore.
Hunted by the media all day.
It’s almost 4pm as he kicks his boots off and rolls out flat on his back in the telephone room.
He does a few angels on the berber carpet and remarks how nice it feels against his skin.
“God, I’m such an old fool,” he sighed.
Our reporter offered him a plate of Cheds from the bureau’s kitchenette.
“Jesus Christ, man! Are these Cheds? Why are you torturing me like this?”
He let out a big sigh as he sat up. The static electricity making what’s left of his hair stand up on end.
“How many boxes of these have you got?”
Our reporter held out a full hand of fingers.
“You and I are going to eat them all tonight.”
As we started on the first box, it became clear that Old Fool Maguire had accepted his fate.
“Do you think they’ll arrest me tomorrow? Or will that come later?”
Our reporter shrugged.
“Yeah, I don’t know either.”
Maguire turned down a beer, telling our reporter he’s giving ‘that shit’ up.
“These past few months, Errol. I’ve been having the same dream night after night.”
Our reporter nodded and had another Ched.
“I’m posted up at The Riverine Club after some function. I’m drunk as hell but I’m holding it well. It’s after some function and I’m alone at the bar. There’s nobody else there except me, the barman and the ghosts. Smooth, slow jazz is playing softly in the background. I have this sadness I can’t shake but it’s not that bad. It’s more of a melancholy, you know?”
“So I’m sitting there, looking at all the shit on the walls. Playing with the ice in my double Johnny Walker Green. The good shit. And then, she walks in,”
“She looks at me and says, ‘Hello, Daryl. You old fool,’ and then she comes over and sits next to me at the bar. She smiles and lights a cigarette. The barman says she can’t smoke in here and she snaps back something about being the former Premier of New South Wales. And then the penny drops. We can finally get on with our lives.”
Maguire then groaned as he went from prone to standing.
“Where can an old fool take a piss around here?”
More to come.
