narratorAUSTRALIA Volume Three

  * Kiss here *

 

  Friday 2 August 2013

  Ogglebog Is Saved! – The Xing Saga part 4

  Jane Russell

  Mount Barker, SA

  In which we are taken back to the survivor, Oggie, in his abandoned ballroom …

  One sunny cloudless morning, Ogglebog plucked up the courage to leave his abandoned ballroom and venture outside as far as the fence, a good 200 metres away. It was pleasant to feel the warmth of the sun on his metal cheeks. He looked up at the pale blue sky, entranced by the random flitting of summer butterflies, their flashes of red and yellow brightened by the sun’s rays. He absentmindedly swatted at a cloud of gnats that buzzed around his head, but then realised that buzzing was also inside his head. He felt a thrill of excitement: could it be a faint internet signal? Dare he go further to find out? He looked around for puddles or other watery dangers. Finding none he walked towards the wood. Yes, the signal was getting stronger. Could it be radio? No, it was television: he’d intercepted a current affairs program talking to people who were for or against multi-culturalism in Britain.

  He couldn’t believe his receptors! He saw a very smart, red metalbot (unlike his own faded pink), talking candidly about bot life during the ten years since the failed invasion attempt.

  ‘So, Mr. Puggle,’ began John the presenter with false jollity.

  ‘PiggleZit,’ interrupted the bot.

  ‘I beg your pardon?’ John seemed taken aback, unsure whether to take offence or not.

  ‘That’s my name, PiggleZit, but you can call me “Piggie” or “Zit”, if you prefer.’

  ‘Aah, Mr. Piggie then, please tell the audience about your experiences setting up “Xing Town”.’ John had gone quite as red as the bot, and was clearly uncomfortable.

  ‘Well, after the invasion – sorry about that, by the way – quite a number of us were marooned on your planet when our spaceship took off without us. We were in great danger from the wateryness of our surroundings, but thankfully, several humans offered shelter and then assistance. A large piece of land near the forest was made over for our use, and we built our town there.’

  ‘What is the present population of Xing Town?’

  ‘We now number around 70, with 32 of these being children, born on Earth.’

  ‘How have you adapted to living among aliens?’ John inquired.

  ‘Much the same way as you have adapted to us, I expect. Some of us feel uncomfortable, others are welcoming and open-minded. Our kids go to your schools. Apart from reinforced school benches and gym equipment, they have no special treatment. They have many human friends.’

  Oggie listened and watched, his mouth-part agape. Several gnats took this opportunity to swarm inside, but he didn’t notice. He felt odd. Over the past ten years he had come to believe that he was the last bot on Earth. Yet here was a whole town of bots, with many adults he knew from his own Beta Group. He had to go there. His sudden need for companionship and sensible conversation almost overwhelmed him. With one last look at the still clear sky, he set his internal GPS, and marched off at ponderous speed into the depths of the wood, in the general direction of the bot village.

  He ploughed through dense brambles, scratching his legs and lower body; he pushed through vines and received many a knock or a whack across the face from low branches. Insects buzzed in his sound receptors and birds added more runny white dots to his already very spotty arms and head. He came out of the wood at the highest point of a hill, where he could see for kilometres in every direction. His internal GPS was telling him:

  ‘At the next intersection, turn left.’

  He aimed vaguely left, thinking he could see chimney smoke in the valley.

  ‘Turn around where possible!’

  Oggie ignored it and forged ahead. He could hear sounds of industry, metal on metal, laughter: it must be them! However, at that moment, he neglected to watch where he was going and crashed through an old mine shaft, falling several metres into the pit. The ground shook with the force of his landing, registering about 2.1 on the Richter scale. He looked around sheepishly. Then he froze. Beneath his slightly broken body were rivulets of water. He could die here if nobody found him. He shouted. He whistled. He beeped. To no avail. He could feel the water immobilising his nether parts. He couldn’t climb out unassisted. So, this is it, he thought miserably. He was going to die!

  Then the light from the top of the shaft was blocked and he looked up. Several small red faces were looking down.

  ‘Whatcha doing down there?’ queried one little imp.

  ‘Oh, nothing much,’ Oggie replied. ‘But, if you go and get some help to get me out, I can tell you some stories that would make your hair curl!’ (This was a joke, as metalbots don’t actually have any hair).

  ‘Okay, yer’on!’ A couple of heads disappeared. But the others stared down at him, fascinated.

  ‘Why are you such a funny colour?’ asked one, referring to Oggie’s bleached pink body, spattered with white blotches from pigeons and other passing birds.

  ‘Oh, just lucky, I guess.’

  Oggie soon knew all their names, and was hearing about their exploits at school, when some adults finally arrived. They pulled him out in no time, and assured him they could unfreeze the water damage. He was carried upside down to the bot village.

  The first thing he saw was a symmetrical drystone wall, then a large, decorative wrought iron gate proclaiming, ‘Xing Town’. Under this were some hieroglyphs in their own language ‘Alien Empire of Po’. Beyond the wall, woodsmoke was curling up from timber houses with tall chimneys, and several little bots were running towards him, shrieking with excitement.

  ‘Who are you?’ they chimed.

  ‘I’m Ogglebog, I’ve come to join you!’

  ‘You’re a funny colour!’ they giggled, running alongside. Oggie felt content. His GPS proclaimed, pompously:

  ‘You have reached your destination!’

  That day, the adult bots gathered to hear Oggie’s story and they related theirs. There’d been no contact with Xing since the spaceship left. The humans, far from being extinct as the capricious fairy Faye had claimed, had instead become involved in a technological war that brought down the internet for two weeks. After it came back, it was different. It now had built-in anti-hacking programming, which was why Oggie couldn’t tune in any more.

  He explained about the current affairs program he had intercepted, starring PiggleZit. At the sound of his name, Piggie came forward.

  ‘Oggie! I can’t believe it! We thought you were a goner. Where have you been?’

  ‘Fading away as you can see!’ Oggie touched forefingers with his best friend, and they drew apart from the others to bond silently.

  Later, at the evening assembly, Oggie could see and marvel at all the new bot children.

  ‘Are any of these yours?’ he asked Piggie, wistfully.

  ‘No, I’ve been waiting for you.’ And Piggie drew him away to his own little house. During the night they generated twins.

  Saturday 3 August 2013 4 pm

  My Life On The Outside

  Kerry Karamaroudis

  Downer, ACT

  As I emerged from the edifice that had been ruling my life for many previous years, I was struck by a fearsome force that threw me to the pavement – sunlight. It shook me to the core. What it feels to be alive! I began to see animated faces around me; faces that looked strange to me. Sort of, alive. Some were smiling. I learnt of smiling 40 years ago as a child – I saw someone smiling in a book in my kindergarten years. What a strange new world, I thought. I decided that I liked sunlight and smiling people more than petitions, carpet, whiteboard screens, and tables full of cupcakes.

  It took some time to adjust on the outside. Every time I looked at a clock I froze. I just stared and stared. I guess old habits die hard. The biggest shake up was mastering this strange new task that I found myself being asked to do more and more – work. It was tough. I had to move my limbs conti
nually for more than 10 seconds. My body was beginning to break down, and I had to go to physiotherapy a lot. I also had to stop something that was at the very core of my being while I was on the inside – talking. This was tough, too. My new boss nearly gave up. Had he not wrapped my whole head up in sticky tape he would have! One of the most embarrassing adjustments I had to make was learning how to go to the toilet. Boy, I thought I was going to shit my pants! I was expected to leave the toilet just 6o minutes after going in! Then there was time. I always thought I was pretty smart, because I knew what things like time meant. I remember nearly falling over when they told me that taking three hours to start work after coming in was bad!

  I really thought sometimes that I wasn’t going to make it. People thought that there was something wrong with me. I usually got sacked after five minutes, but once I lasted 10. I went to the doctor. He told me I had lots of diseases and there was no hope. What are the names of these diseases? I asked. He said the Department of Education, and the Department of Innovation.

  I heard that doctors sometimes get it wrong. Determined not to let the Department of Innovation and Education disease overcome me, I went on a mission. I was going to learn to work and stop talking.

  I started in town, staring through restaurant windows at people behind counters and kitchens. After a few hours I noticed something strange. People looked busy, and they weren’t talking. I finally got the confidence to apply for another job, but I kept getting knocked back. I didn’t know why, after all I was really qualified. I could stare at a computer for 7.5 hours straight and not have anything at all to show for it, and I could also turn a five minute meeting into a five hour meeting without any trouble at all. Interviews always seemed to end after revealing that I had a past on the inside, the public service.

  I eventually got a break. At first it was easy. I just copied everyone else. I was working and not talking for hours on end, but then something happened. I had to work on my own. That’s when the trouble started. The boss walked in and found me in the middle of heaps of cardboard made to look like petitions, my mouth stuffed with cupcakes, drawing thousands of white boards, and chanting a just audible ‘meeting, meeting, meeting, meeting’. He started yelling but gave up after realising that I could not hear.

  Kicked out into the street, cold, without my business shoes, smartphone, and security pass tag – everything that I ever knew on the inside, I was at my lowest point. Just when I thought I was going to slip away (was dreaming at the time of being at an office morning tea, drinking coffee and eating cupcakes – we were celebrating the new starter’s birthday), a community outreach worker walked by. Apparently it was an all too familiar site. The word on the street was that a really bad batch of voluntary redundancies had hit government departments. Public servants looking for work were dropping everywhere, and community services were stretched to their limits.

  Eventually I woke up at a rehab centre, surrounded by hundreds of recovering public servants. After recognising a few faces, my attention went to the front. There was what looked to be an instructor with a long pointer following a set of phrases written on a blackboard. We all had to say out loud : ‘do-some-work’, ‘work-five-days-straight’, ‘stop-talking’, ‘don’t-hide-in-the-toilet’... so on. I saw myself out there, in the community, working, contributing to society ... the economy ... etc. A sense of excitement came over me, and my voice grew ... ‘DO-SOME-WORK’ ... ‘WORK-FIVE-DA ...’

  Sunday 4 August 2013

  Let Me Clear My Throat Before I Begin …

  Fayroze Lutta

  Randwick, NSW

  Let me clear my throat before I begin ... One of these days it will be with meth. I need my Benzedrine fix. I need some sort of medicated-codeine-high-octane-behind-the-counter-legit-smack-kind-a-shit. And so I found myself walking ... It was still light out, surprisingly, as the days fall away too fast; by 5 pm it’s like midnight out. I happened upon Lisa. I think I could be her some days, sitting next to her begging on a street corner so we could buy a packet of cigarettes together and split the ends.

  Lisa was anxious. She kept telling me she had to go change her coins into a note to make it something more manageable. I imagine it is less embarrassing at the tobacconist than to arrive splaying a mountain of dirty silver coins on to the countertop. Furthermore I imagine it would be to buy those cheap and nasty ones – the Chinese cigarettes that feel like you have smoked asbestos-filled fibreglass through a plastic straw.

  That afternoon was different: an older gentleman was passing by and recognised Lisa. He came and sat in between us on the bench. Purposefully he didn’t say his name and he wasn’t letting me in on it either.

  He was well dressed – a navy blue blazer-white shirt and leather boating shoes. I was confused with what sort of pants he was wearing, until Lisa posed the question, ‘Why did he have blue ski pants on?’ He replied that he ‘slept outside these days’. It was winter so he came cut-corrected in his ski apparel and added that he had made in the passing days, maybe weeks, months or even years, ‘the decision to live in his clothes’. I liked this guy.

  He told us that he had to go into the bottle shop and would be back. Lisa then left to go make other people’s small coined offerings into a note. The gentleman returned; I told him Lisa would be back shortly. He sat down next to me. I asked him what he had bought; he told me it was a bottle of ‘Southern Comfort’. It only seemed apt, all so fitting, living in the city of the South under these southern skies and it was that other word as well that hovered and resonated in the air – comfort. It seemed to spell it all out for me – my mood.

  I guess it is what we all look for, comfort. To fill that void inside us that we no longer fill with the love of god, and he had found his in his glass bottle filled up with amber liqueur-like spirits. The effect temporary, never permanent, always wearing off. Perhaps like returning to his mother’s breast nuzzling into the warm and golden licks. I wish I could do that – give into something completely with disregard for all other things. I have behaved like this on occasion and believe that in addiction there is a relinquishing of living in prescribed modern terms, but it is a love affair or liaison with nihilism that ends in fatalism giving into oblivion, and I argue that we all must die someday.

  I always imagined I would meet my end by being unceremoniously hit by a car. One night in a drunken state I found the location. I recall the lure of the flashing lights of the heavy traffic on the corner of Beauchamp and Oxford Streets. That night on that corner it seemed all so tempting to do such a simple act as to put one foot in front of the other and step into the heavy moving metal.

  It was obvious the gentleman had a gambling problem and was on the drink as well. I imagine blackjack, not the misery of the poker machines with their flashing lights and buzz-cock-high-pitched- ringing-in-your-ears-giving-you-a-headache. He took the large hip flask sized glass bottle out of the paper bag wrapping and slowly unscrewed the lid. He then mentioned if he drank it all in one he would be paralytic. He snarled a laugh. He had enough social graces to say, ‘Cheers,’ to me and made a gesture with the bottle up towards the sky. I said, ‘Santé’. He then usurped me, and one better, and said, ‘Saluté’.

  He placed the bottle to his mouth, his southern comfort, his comfort, his mother’s glass nipple. He titled his head back slightly. He didn’t gulp or swallow; the amber bourbonesque-syrup just flowed down, trickled down his throat. He had mastered this motion, this ritual. His throat didn’t hesitate either – it was waiting for this moment. I felt I was a party to his misdeeds and impending paralysis. I couldn’t stop myself. I had to say something. I said ‘ Woo-oh.’ He stopped and looked at me. I looked at the bottle: he had drunk about one-eighth.

  I felt relieved in that moment that Lisa had returned. They now both felt awkward around me and left together. Lisa hadn’t made enough money for a $5 note. I couldn’t follow them – they were trying to get away from me for fuck’s sake. I knew all too well that I was not low brow enough to beg
with them – too well dressed with my hair still wet from the shower.

  At least they could see till the bottom of the bottle, or until they made enough coins to make that five dollar note in their hand and they would have company. Unlike me they both knew exactly where they were going. I knew as well: the corner of High Street and Belmore Road, just outside the Night Owl. It was obvious that I wasn’t invited. Evidently too much like a tourist in their waking world.

  Monday 5 August 2013

  No Regrets

  Paul Humphreys

  Oxley, ACT

  ‘It is not as clear cut as you would hope, Guv,’ Detective First Officer Riley pointed out with an exasperating sigh.

  ‘How so?’ He wished that Riley would not address him as though they were in a British TV detective series.

  ‘Well he was strangled with a piece of electrical cord, that’s easy. Frank Nelson is his name. But, and here is the bizarre part, he has carved into his chest with a sharp instrument the words “No Regrets”.’

  ‘Who found the body?’

  ‘His sister, Isobel. It appears Frank and her share the house. She works a morning shift and his job was as a prison officer on an afternoon shift. They had an overlap of about one hour each working day. She found him when she came home.’

  ‘Has she been able to give any information that might be helpful?’ He was impatient. Senior Homicide Detective Angus Robertson was always desperate to get investigations moving.

  ‘Not really, but she was extremely upset and strangely angry when we asked her about the “No Regrets” wounds.’

  ‘That might be worth exploring further with her after she has settled a bit. I think that we should explore his work colleagues. Ask whether there were changes in behaviour, whether he had any enemies, that sort of thing.’

  ‘Okay Guv.’ Riley faked a one-finger salute. Angus winced at his response.

  Angus sat opposite the prison officer Samuel, who worked in tandem with Frank and the other prison officer, Ahmed.

  He briefly explained why they were there and as soon as he described the “No Regrets” emblem carved into Frank’s chest, Samuel went white, stood up quickly, held his head against the wall opposite the interview table and shouted ‘No! No!’

  ‘Is there something you need to tell me Samuel?’ Angus’s voice was firm, unemotional, but the tone was of real authority and urgency.

  ‘How could it come to this?’ Samuel was now back in his seat but wringing his hands; a small number of beads of sweat sat on his brow.

  ‘It’s not my doing!’ Samuel yelled across the table at Angus. Riley was a little taken aback at the outburst but tried to keep a poker face.

  ‘Why don’t you tell us Samuel what might have led to this rather brutal murder? I think you know what may have brought this about; isn’t that right?’ Angus yelled back at Samuel.

  Samuel started to whimper and then said, ‘Frank was known around the afternoon shift as “No Regrets Nelson”.’

  ‘Oh! Why?’ Angus was now subdued, trying in subtle tones to coax out the information that almost certainly would be critical to their case.

  ‘Frank would pick out prisoners that he thought needed additional punishment up and above of their sentence.’ Samuel swallowed hard and then continued. ‘He only selected weak individuals and he would beat them, not long or hard, but sufficient for many of them to hate him and at the same time fear him. He got the nickname “No Regrets Nelson” because after each session he would hold the prisoner under the chin stare him in the eyes and say “No regrets”. He said his father did the same to him and his brother when they were young and he boasted that it did him no harm!’

  ‘Who else, other than the prisoners, knew about this?’ Angus was trying to control his temper and keep an even tone in his voice.

  ‘Ahmed knew. ’

  ‘Didn’t you report this to someone?’ Angus was now angry. He loathed people who took advantage of their position and this was obviously a bad situation.

  Samuel was now near tears. ‘Ahmed and I are on 457 visas; we did not want to lose them so we did nothing.’ The explanation seemed to take the wind out of his sails and he slumped in his chair.

  ‘Is there any one prisoner who Frank gave special treatment to?’ Angus was sure that this might be the trail that would lead to a suspect.

  Samuel was quiet for a short time and then muttered, ‘Roger! Roger Whistler. He was beaten often and long. Frank said he hated paedophiles and Roger was the worst.’

  ‘See if we can get to talk with this Roger Whistler, can you Riley?’

  ‘Yes sir.’ This was now serious and Riley had assumed a formal approach to his boss. He left the interview room quickly, nervous in anticipation of a breakthrough.

  Samuel and Angus sat opposite each other in silence, both lost in thoughts concerning their own next best step.

  Riley rushed back into the room. ‘He was released five weeks ago and went into a safe house.’ Riley was elated at just how this investigation appeared to be falling into place.

  ‘Right. Let’s go see him.’ Angus’s voice reflected a strong determination and a little satisfaction that this might be a simple revenge killing and easily solved.

  ‘As for you Samuel, and Ahmed, I think that your superiors and also other police officers will be asking you a whole lot of questions.’ Angus stood up and left Samuel bent over in his chair, his head in his hands, rocking backwards and forwards and muttering in his native tongue.

  Roger Whistler appeared to be expecting the arrival of the police officers. He was calm and spoke very softly as he explained what happened.

  ‘I knew I was in for it. There were rumours around that Nelson was vindictive and relentless in his “punishments” as he called them. Fortunately I found out before the first session otherwise I do not know how I would have handled it.

  ‘He seemed to get a special obscene pleasure by inflicting the pain. I am glad he is dead!’ His voice became raised and shrill. ‘He will rot in hell I am sure, if there is such a place! I am glad I put him there – he was a monster and I have no regrets’.

  There was a brief silence. Angus straightened his shoulders and turned to Riley.

  ‘Book him Riley!’

  ‘Yes, Guv.’

  Tuesday 6 August 2013

  The Bee

  Mark Fowler

  Magill, ACT

  A busy man sits contemplating

  his tiresome load.

  The bee flits wilfully

  from flower to flower.

  The busy man gulps his coffee

  as his schedule harasses his thinking.

  The bee settles contemplatively on the daisy nearby,

  and busy man swats it with half thought.

  The bee accustomed to hassled people in the park

  veers away and fills the moment

  sucking nectar deeply.

  Busy man, aware of his responsibility, but

  unaware of the lesson passed,

  crushes the Styrofoam,

  spilling dregs upon his expensive suit

  and hurries away to another wasted day.

  Tuesday 6 August 2013 4 pm

  Broken Promise

  Bob Edgar

  Wentworth Falls, NSW

  Elmer Fudd crept forward with exaggerated steps, shotgun at his hip and an amusing fur hat perched on his ample head. He suddenly stopped, turned to the camera and placed a finger over his lips.

  ‘Be vewy, vewy quiet ... I’m hunting wabbits.’

  Turning to continue the hunt he was confronted by Bugs Bunny, who planted a sloppy kiss on his mouth, cheerfully enquiring, ‘What’s up Doc?’

  ‘Sshhh ... I’m hunting wabbits.’

  ‘Do you know what a rabbit looks like Doc? Because I’m a duck, and I always ...

  Leon Cole turned the volume to zero as he watched the animated characters cavort on the screen. His smile broadened as he closed his eyes, allowing him to play out his own imagery of insatiable lust a
nd unrequited love.

  Tonight he would again lay in wait, cloaked in darkness...eyeing his prey. Having successfully stalked his next beloved, it was time to fulfil her desires.

  He dressed for her in his favourite shirt, trousers and jacket, in her preferred colour of blue ... light blue.

  He sheathed the knife, closed the front door behind him, and whispered his oft repeated prayer as he walked.

  ‘Oh merciful God, allow this one to understand the love. Have her shun me not, and I will spare your child.’

  Leon lurked in the moonshadow of a myrtle bush as she stepped from the bus.

  ‘Please don’t scorn me Susan,’ he pleaded quietly as he crept behind her with exaggerated steps. His merciless eyes enveloped her as she quickened her pace away from him.

  Everything went quiet. Leon watched the knife float in a spiral, flicking blood from its blade, until it clattered on the sidewalk, spraying globules of blood and viscera through slivers of moonlight.

  ‘Susan it’s me, Leon ... say you are mine, you promised me! Say you love me!’

  Susan couldn’t speak: her throat was open, her abdominal cavity exposed ... her blood cascaded over Leon’s hands as he tried in vain to close the wounds. Her light blue chiffon blouse merged with blood, and ceased to exist in mind.

  Leon Cole closed his front door behind him, methodically removed and laundered his clothing, showered then prepared his favourite meal of baked beans on toast.

  He sat naked on his lounge chair, switched on the television and turned the volume up. Leon smiled sweetly as Daffy and Bugs began another show ...

  ‘... and know what heights we’ll hit, on with the show, this is it!’

  Thursday 8 August 2013

  Out Of This Wood

  David J Keegan

  Paddington, QLD

  ‘Jim, do you know where Mum kept Great Grandma’s lace kerchief?’

  Liz’s hand on my arm shocks me. I react slow, like treacle, I don’t spill my scotch. I am caught in an atmosphere.

  ‘Yes.’

  I know where she kept it. I know where Mum kept everything. but she wasn’t mine and I don’t know what to say about that. I nod and rise out of the burnished leather chair.

  ‘Please? Thanks Jim.’ Liz pauses in front of me. There is concern mapped on her face. A cartography of trauma, worry in malformed continents, apprehension running like rivers through her brow. I brush past her.

  When I was a child in this place it was emptier, engorged with space. Bigger and broader and more secretive than any place I knew. Now it seems tiny. Like an underwater cave and I’m running out of oxygen.

  Too many people are in the living room, stiff and murmuring. I make my way out of the stifled room, through a corridor of closed doors hiding vacant rooms and onto the stairs.

  Creeping up these stairs used to fill my stomach with giddy anxiety. I snuck about in the witching hours when everything was sleeping. Liz in her neat bedroom. Me across the hall in that tiny closet which housed my awkward bed.

  There were other rooms in the house. Huge empty spaces which held only a cabinet displaying the pastel-flowered china or shelves with books which never moved. A museum, still and untouchable, haunted by things unsaid. I used to check to see the coast was clear then erratically launch into the darkness like a tiny bat.

  At the top of the stairs I stop. Dusk is leaking through the wet windows, painting the upstairs in sepia. I feel the air up here. It is thinner, like the altitude of a mountain top. I catch my breath here just under the peak, at the top of the stair case which caused my first broken bones.

  I look left down the tiny hall. There are shadows, wedges of ink in the corners of this thin strip of space. I step out—the final push to the summit. It is only a few steps but a muddy reluctance saturates my muscles. Fear stalls me. Churns my insides. Sweat behind my collar. My hand is wet. The glass is perspiring. I sip at the auburn spirit—it calms me.

  I push the door open, as I used to—slowly, ensuring it doesn’t make a peep. A dusty shade has inhabited this room; it is more still, more bleak and more enchanting than I remember it.

  On the bed her quilt swaddled body would crest and fall gently with her nocturnal rhythm. A night thief, I peeked into her room then stole into that chamber of query, running my small hands along everything—gently absorbing the impression of her things. A quest to learn her, to investigate the woman who had taken me in, who had given me a name. I painstakingly pulled at drawers, opened the doors of cupboards and wardrobes, skinny arms under her bed with fingers outstretched, grasping through dust for hidden boxes or chests.

  Now I stand like an owl. Perched under the lintel and warily eyeing the room. I’m unsure if things could have been different. What if I had been given a different name? Not the one of the man who had left her ages before I arrived, but whom we still mourned the death of at a wake grotesquely reflective of the one unravelling downstairs.

  A drip of condensation lands on the floor by my foot. I look at the glass. I drain it quickly then stoop and place it on the floor outside of the door. Something creaks behind me. I turn half expecting to see Liz, half expecting to see a horror—a shimmering ghost vapid and terrifying. There is nothing there. I toy with the notion that the house itself is asking me not to go into the room, warning me of a quiet doom. But the challenge, perceived as it is, is enough to push me.

  I step forward.

  The moon was full and incandescent that night. I had been sent to bed without dinner again, no reason given and I never asked why. That time I was determined. I needed to find out why or how she hated me so much.

  I don’t remember her adopting me or the first season of our relationship. I remember the closet of my room and I remember the stairs. I remember our electric hostility towards one another. Never harsh words, barely words at all—our quiet disdain a constant, brutal burden.

  The stair felt shorter that night. My desperate need for an answer to a question, to any question, filled me with vigorous determination. The door opened, the room washed in pallor. I crept into the space. She grunted in her sleep. I went straight for the wardrobe, monolithic and staunch in the corner. I had taken the key the day before from her handbag; it clicked in the lock as it turned. The door swung elegantly open. The hanging dresses smelled faintly of dried flowers and faintly of a smell I would come to recognise as alcohol. I ran my hand across them. Beside the hanging dresses were four drawers. Each one labelled with a shaky calligraphy in gold:

  Stockings

  Underclothes

  Etc.

  Then:

  Sprites

  This drawer was the only one with a keyhole. I pulled at it gently though I’d known it would be locked. Something rustled inside. My heart pounded in my bony chest. A light flickered inside the keyhole, something brilliant. I sucked a breath in and pressed my cheek against the cold brass lock plate. A light stung my eye and I smelt the fresh, sharp smell of forest and green places.

  Then a hand clenched on my shoulder.

  ‘How dare you!’ Her voice was full of rough anger. She bellowed as she shook me. ‘What are you ...? How dare you!’ She grabbed me by the neck and with strength I didn’t know she had, she dragged me from the wardrobe, from the room. She stopped at the top of the stairs. Her voice suddenly quiet. ‘I don’t know why I took you in.’

  A realisation shocking to her. An honest and unspoken thought given sudden voice by circumstance, shaken loose by her outrage.

  Then she pushed me.

  I broke my arm and the shin bone of my right leg tumbling down the stairs. Splinters and a puncture wound from breaking through the balustrade at the bottom.

  This memory enrages me. I stomp into the room. She kept the lace kerchief in her vanity with her jewellery. I rip open the drawer and pull the ancient lace from under a tumble of silver and gold. Slamming the drawer I step towards the door. But of course I stop. Of course I turn around. It is standing ominously in the corner. That wardrobe with the drawer
marked ‘Sprites’. The drawer had become the keystone to my torment. Was there an answer to her, to us, to this house and her life and the reasons behind everything? I am pulled towards it. I hope it is locked but it is not. She had died in her room. I tug at the doors and they swing silently and obligingly open. My breathing is haggard, the weight of my obsession like lead in my blood, heavy and noxious. The drawer labelled ‘Sprites’ is open and empty. It hadn’t been shut and it hadn’t been locked.

  I am staring at the drawer when a cough from behind shakes me.

  ‘Jim? What are you ...?’ Liz stops.

  Thursday 8 August 2013

  The Nut

  Evelyn MD

  Newbridge, NSW

  I dig. The cool soil is in my hands and trapped under my fingernails. It smells moist and reminds me of mushrooms. This is where he said I’d find it, in the ground, under a rock, near the apple tree, in the garden. I keep digging. The dirt gives way freely and the hole seems to expand. I feel a freedom of emotion as I grasp something small and warm in the soil. For all appearances it is a walnut but it feels warm in the palm of my hand. I encase it with both my hands and feel its pulse. I tuck it safely in my coat pocket. He said I could keep it and that I should keep it safe. I head back inside our cottage. Wash my hands and take off my coat. It will be safe in the coat hanging behind my bedroom door. It won’t be disturbed there.

  The afternoon light is beginning to rust bringing an end to another day of similarity. The children and my husband are all engrossed in computer games. No one has shifted their pose all afternoon. I think to myself, this is not healthy, nor happy, nor is it a warm family. I think of the warm nut I have just brought inside and wonder if it can help me to turn this family around. Help us to move somewhere warm to live. Become outdoors people. Will the nut get me a job? Will it help the bond with my husband become secure again? Will it lesson my episodes of mental illness? How will it help? The sun is now rusting into grey. I go to my bedroom and get the nut and place it in my jeans pocket. It is cool now but still pulsing and it helps me to feel relaxed. I feel the nut tells me I must work on myself first before helping others. I go to the kitchen and make dinner.

  The next morning when I check on the nut I notice it is no longer pulsing. I start to wonder if I had been imagining that the nut had special qualities. It is strange that I had gone down into the yard to dig up a nut because he said so. I can’t remember who he was. Was I sick with delusions and voices? Perhaps I had imagined that someone like God had told me to find the nut. Perhaps I am getting sick. I decide to talk to my psychiatrist who tells me that some time in hospital would be a good idea.

  Friday 9 August and Saturday 10 August 2013

  Wrong Address

  Shirley Burgess

  Rosebud, VIC

  ‘What’s that din? It’s 2 am for God’s sake.’ Harry sat bolt upright in bed, turning on the light.

  The fire alarm near their door of their flat had woken Harry and Kate, a middle-aged spry couple. There were three floors of flats, theirs being a corner unit on the first floor and they could hear obvious signs of movement outside, as people started the rush downstairs to safety.

  ‘Kate, quickly, I’ll grab a torch. We haven’t a second to spare.’ Both, now wide-awake, shoved on sturdy pants over their nightwear. ‘Grab a coat or something too,’ Harry flung at her as he disappeared down the hall to the front door.

  Fleeing occupants were hurrying to the stairs from every direction. Harry paused, looked quickly up the staircase and could see that the fire was moving down from the floor above them.

  Through the noise he asked someone rushing past where the fire had originated. ‘The whole of the third floor is alight! Move man!’ Harry heard the obvious alarm in the man’s voice jolting him into action again.

  ‘Well, we only have the one flight to go down, so we won’t panic,’ Harry called to Kate, trying to sound calm.

  Just as they reached the top of the stairs, the lights went out.

  ‘Wait on, Harry, shine your torch back over there to the left,’ shouted Kate. ‘I thought I saw something.’ In the eerie smoky light they could just make out the outline of a small girl about three or four years old. She stood stiffly, waiting for someone to help her – obviously in shock.

  Kate ran over, ‘Where are your Mummy and Daddy?’

  ‘I don’t know. I went back for Bunny. Then they were gone. I don’t know where they went.’ The little girl was now whimpering with distress at all the noise, and clutched her toy.

  ‘You’re Debbie, aren’t you?’ Kate asked, as cheerfully as she could muster.

  ‘Yes,’ she whispered.

  ‘We’ll take you to them, dear,’ said Kate as she swept her up on to her shoulder.

  ‘Hang on tight, Debbie. Here we go.’ Kate hoped it sounded as though they were going on an adventure.

  Smoke, now everywhere, became thicker, and the heat was very uncomfortable through their thick coats. This time as they came to the top of the stairs they could only see a vague shape of the steps from the torchlight.

  ‘You’d better hang on to my waist,’ Harry shouted above all the alarming noise. ‘We can’t afford to lose each other.’ He guided Kate carefully down each step hanging on to the banister with his other hand. Progress would be painfully slow with their extra burden.

  As they progressed, two or three fire escapees pushed past them, in each case knocking Kate and her heavy burden aside, squeezing past the generous girths of Kate and Harry.

  ‘Careful!’ shouted Kate to the retreating figures. Probably normally polite, careful people, but just as panic-stricken as we are, I suppose.

  Suddenly, they heard a couple of explosions above them, and as Harry looked back up the stairs he could see a reflective orange glow from the floor they had just left. In the very few minutes since they had been woken by the alarm, the fire had progressed down two flights. Now becoming even noisier, the smoke was beginning to sting their eyes.

  ‘We must be careful,’ Harry urged, as the smoke intensified and they could only feel each step as they came to it. With so many steps to go, Harry knew they couldn’t afford to slip or fall.

  No-one is pushing past us anymore, so we must be the last out, thought Harry, trying to think calmly. The smoke is thicker, and soon it will turn into a blaze. Frustratingly, they were trying to hurry, yet couldn’t, just as though they were in a bad dream sequence.

  The fire began a slow drip down the lift well beside them, and although they could see a little better and so go a bit faster, the fact that the fire was now beside them, feeding hungrily on the oily walls, scared them all. They could hear more small explosions from the floor above them.

  Debbie started whimpering again. She was getting heavier to carry, and Kate prayed she would not lose her footing. Would they ever get to the bottom of these awful stairs? On they struggled feeling their way, step by step, the heat now becoming sickening.

  She worried as Debbie coughed. ‘Put your head into my shoulder, dear, and breathe through this hanky, that will help.’ Their eyes were now really stinging, as the smoke coming from the stairwell became much thicker.

  ‘At last,’ Harry announced, ‘we’re at the bottom – over here to the front door.’ He guided her through thick smoke, but instead of an open door, they found a knot of desperate people.

  Apparently someone trying to get in had caused a jam. Everyone behind simply pushed more and more frantically as they could see a fireball was about to burst through the ceiling, and join up with the stairwell cauldron.

  Black smoke swirled around them all, and the smell of burning oil and materials was terrible, the noise mounting by the second. Their throats were stinging from the smoke, and they were coughing non-stop now, fighting to breathe.

  Harry had a hanky to his nose. ‘We’re not going to get out this way. We’ll have to try and get to a ground floor window from one of the flats here,’ he roared.

  The torch had not been much use in the thick
smoke, as it just gave back a blank reflection, but Harry knew the layout of the flats and had been relying on remembering where the walls were, and exactly where the doors to the flats must be.

  ‘Here’s the door to No. 2.’ It was locked. ‘Oh no!’ he muttered under his breath. ‘How is Debbie doing?’

  ‘Okay so far.’ Kate was still firmly attached to him, and was not going to let go under any circumstances, because visibility was now down to zero.

  Harry followed the wall quickly. ‘Ah, here’s No. 1.’ Directly under their own flat, the layout would be familiar. Thankfully the door opened and they tumbled inside. At that moment a big explosion of flame came from behind them. That means the fire has broken through to the ground floor now, Harry thought with alarm.

  The flames seemed intent on catching them as they slammed the door shut. Little tongues of flame started to creep under the door, seeming to be searching for them, and the room started filling quickly with smoke.

  At least here the torchlight became more useful. ‘There’s the window,’ said Harry pointing with the torch. A glint of reflection from the big window helped them orientate themselves in the room.

  At the window, they found a desk in the way.

  ‘Damnation!’ shouted Harry. Coughing all the time he pulled it aside. ‘Be ready, Kate, because I’m going to smash the window with this chair, and glass’ll go everywhere. So watch out. Ready?’

  ‘Yes, ready.’ She turned her back to the window, shielding Debbie as much as she could. Kate’s air supply was just about out, and she knew that she would faint soon. She also knew she must stay alert to ensure the child would be delivered to someone, through that window at all cost.

  Debbie was still coughing and crying, and finally went limp on Kate’s shoulder.

  With a break in her voice, Kate called to him: ‘She’s collapsed Harry.’

  ‘Bang’ went the chair into the window, and ‘bang’ went a new explosion just outside their door. Kate felt herself sagging, but the outline of some firemen appeared at the window frame, and she threw Debbie to the nearest of them shouting, ‘Her name’s Debbie Masters.’

  Harry had become a limp pile on the floor, with the flames greedily hurrying to him, so she shouted and pointed to him, when she too, ran out of air at that point, and collapsed.

  ~~~

  The three policemen were watching a young, dark-haired man in a grey hooded jacket. He had been noticed at the scene as soon as they arrived. As they watched, they saw that, strangely, he was uninterested in the fire, but hung around one particular area watching as each body arrived from the stricken building. He told them he was looking for a friend.