Chapter Twenty-Four

The signs appeared long before the spectacle itself.

Tracey went quiet on Slack.

Then louder everywhere else.

Her Instagram captions expanded into scripture-length declarations:

“No workplace has the right to erase your authentic clay-body truth.”

“Safe spaces are built through resistance.”

“We will not be gaslit into silence.”

She posted heavily filtered photos of Mayfield’s roller door until the mural glowed radioactive blue beneath captions reading:

CLAY REMEMBERS.

Sally read them in bed holding the phone at arm’s length, as though proximity itself might infect her.

“She’s unravelling.”

The dog yawned skeptically.

But unravelling was not quite right.

Tracey was constructing something.

A new version of herself stitched from hashtags, grievance and ring-light sincerity.

The performance arrived on a Thursday afternoon.

Ruth was inside handling a furious phone call from a woman insisting she had booked:

“Baby’s First Coil Pot Workshop.”

Outside, a small crowd had gathered.

At the centre stood Tracey.

Fairy lights stretched between bollards.

An Ikea rug covered the footpath like ceremonial flooring.

A bubble-lettered banner declared:

SAFE SPACE = OUR SPACE

Marcus filmed everything on an iPhone attached to a ring light, pivoting dramatically between Tracey and the crowd.

Tracey raised one arm.

“We are here because unsafe workplaces bury truth beneath silence. But clay remembers. Clay holds.”

A few people clapped uncertainly.

A cyclist rang their bell while passing.

No one could tell if it was solidarity or annoyance.

Inside the studio Sally stared through the roller door window with rising nausea.

Ruth barely looked up.

“Don’t engage.”

Tracey continued.

She began reading from something called:

The Truth Telling Circle Charter

It had apparently been typed in Comic Sans and laminated.

“Clause One: Every workplace is safe unless management colonises it.”

“Clause Two: If you are erased, Instagram becomes witness.”

“Clause Three: Law and HR are tools historically used to suppress lived experience.”

Marcus panned solemnly across the crowd.

Most were simply pedestrians who had slowed down out of curiosity.

Two former casual staff stood near the rug looking increasingly uncertain.

Then Tracey revealed her evidence.

Screenshots.

She held laminated pages above her head like sacred documents.

“Here is proof of bullying, gaslighting and erasure.”

The crowd leaned forward.

The screenshots were obvious Canva mock-ups.

One still contained the words:

Insert Text Here

Another referred to “Ruthless” instead of Ruth.

One timestamp read:

32/15/2023

But Tracey pressed on.

“Management tried to silence my pottery therapy vision board.”

Someone near the back yelled:

“Give us a wheel class!”

The crowd laughed.

Tracey placed one hand dramatically against her chest.

Then the journalist arrived.

The same one who had circled Mayfield months earlier searching for workplace scandal.

Notebook ready.

Phone recording.

Tracey brightened instantly.

“Finally,” she announced, “the media will hear the truth.”

The journalist adjusted their glasses.

“Can you clarify whether these screenshots are originals?”

Tracey hesitated.

“They are re-presentations.”

“So… not originals?”

“They are truer than originals. They represent the spirit of what was erased.”

The journalist scribbled silently.

“And the children’s workshop you advertised online — was that an actual scheduled event?”

“It existed emotionally.”

The journalist blinked.

“Right.”

“And the corporate wine-and-wheel sessions?”

“We were in negotiations with the universe.”

Marcus accidentally zoomed too close.

The livestream captured every bead of sweat on Tracey’s forehead.

Comments began flooding upward:

• IS THIS PERFORMANCE ART
• BUNNINGS STOOL SOLIDARITY
• NOT THE COMIC SANS MANIFESTO

The journalist continued calmly.

“You’ve cited section 999 of the Fair Work Act. That section does not exist.”

Tracey swayed slightly.

“It exists spiritually.”

Even Marcus looked alarmed.

“And your evidence of property destruction?”

Tracey triumphantly produced a photograph.

The journalist stared.

“This is a Bunnings stool.”

Something shifted in the crowd then.

Not cruelty exactly.

Recognition.

The performance had tipped beyond conviction into theatre.

Tracey raised her voice higher.

“SAFE SPACE MEANS SAFE SPACE!”

“ERASED! ERASED!”

But the chants now sounded disconnected from the room around them.

A passer-by muttered:

“Mate, I just wanted dumplings.”

The crowd dissolved into laughter.

Inside Mayfield, Sally bit down on her sleeve to stop herself from cackling.

Ruth continued scrolling Fair Work legislation with serene concentration.

“She’s doing our job for us.”

By nightfall the clips had escaped containment completely.

Tracey’s cry of:

“ERASED!”

was auto-tuned into dance remixes.

Memes multiplied.

One screenshot showed Tracey standing beside the Ikea rug with the caption:

Welcome to my TED Talk on unsafe furniture.

Another paired:

SAFE SPACE = OUR SPACE

with toddlers fighting over Lego.

For months Tracey had fought desperately not to disappear.

Instead she became unforgettable for all the wrong reasons.

The article appeared the following morning.

Ruth printed it immediately and pinned it above the staff sink.

Local Pottery Studio Survives Digital Sabotage After Public Protest Unravels

The journalist wrote with devastating restraint:

“Several claims made during the demonstration could not be substantiated. Some supporting materials appeared fabricated or heavily altered.”

Sally read the article three times.

Then suddenly laughter burst out of her so hard she had to lean against the bench.

“She made herself the punchline.”

Ruth sipped tea thoughtfully.

“Reality can be very efficient.”

That night Sally slept all the way through for the first time in months.

No nausea.

No adrenaline.

No 3 a.m. spiral through doctored screenshots.

The dog snored heavily against her feet.

At dinner the teenagers passed phones around the table showing increasingly ridiculous edits of Tracey’s protest.

“Mum,” one of them wheezed, “you’re free. She’s cancelled.”

Sally wiped tears from her eyes.

“Not cancelled. Self-published.”

The table collapsed into laughter.

Over the following weeks Tracey’s slogans detached from her entirely, floating online as jokes disconnected from origin.

Meanwhile Mayfield continued quietly rebuilding itself.

Clay reclaim.

Open studio.

NDIS mornings.

Actual bowls.

Sally realised something slowly:

she had spent months terrified Tracey would destroy Mayfield.

Instead Tracey had destroyed her own credibility.

The studio still stood.

Messy.

Exhausted.

Still imperfect.

But standing.

And in the quiet space left behind by all the shouting, something new finally had room to grow.