Short Stories

Sergeant David Pascoe stared at a jet trail dissolving in to the faint blue skies above Kirkuk as the green fruit of the oleander tree hung heavy over mangy dogs in the dirt. His seven-man patrol rested under the tattered awning of the baker’s shop. Corporal Richard Dawson sat by himself. He hated Iraq and…

The opening of Peninsula Zoo’s new administration wing went off without a hitch. The only black spot CEO Gloria Farnham could find, was the guests had brought their children, who swooped like magpies on the expensive Japanese finger food. The new building was made entirely of glass, using the latest European designs. In the heat…

The whine from the bandsaw finally stopped. Bloody Saturday morning renovators, Helena thought, as she buried her head under the pillow. She got up and checked on Timmy who was fast asleep. How can a 12-year-old boy sleep for so long? She pulled the new wire screen windows closed. Her upstairs neighbor, Roger, a friend…

Tallow Smith swam with a coxswain’s mantra, ‘mind of fire, mind of peace’ beating in his mind. His arms shot past his shoulders with a power that belied his scrawny frame. He struggled to remember a time before being bullied by Fat Gazza at school. He was called a poof, a spaz, a dick and…

Crosswood was always known as ‘the land’ by us Crusaders but it was only five streets with a tramline and a creek running through it. It was a working-class suburb at the end of the world but it was my home. I loved it then and I love it now. The prison shrink, Ms Prius,…

My mother’s funeral was simple. A body in a box surrounded by people she hated. I stood behind the perspex window and watched as the cheap coffin moved slowly on a conveyor to the incinerator. My step-brother, David, stood next to me, wearing an old grey suit, worn at the elbows. Twenty minutes earlier, as…

The helicopter landed with a thump and bounced on its skids. The flight from Kinshasa to Kisangani was hot and noisy. Below lay a vast canopy of jungle, broken only by small villages and ox bow lakes, cut off like a memory from the Congo river. Karl and Briony had been married 20 years but…

The old white Toyota Hilux skidded in to the car park with loud Middle Eastern music pumping from the broken passenger window. A sticker on the rear bumper bar said, “If it’s rockin, don’t come knockin!” Ali got out of the driver’s seat and walked in to the manager’s tin shed. “We come about the…

It’s not my job. Last year Diane in accounts did it. Now little Di-Di is pregnant to her husband Phil, who works in maintenance. But the office girls reckon the real father is Keith, who curates the council ovals. Many a lass from administration has been ploughed by Keith while lying on top of a…

Eddystone Rock juts out of the Great Southern Ocean, like a decayed molar, 30 kilometres south of Tasmania. An island off an island at the end of the world. On a big day like today, seven metre high waves rise quickly, carrying thousands of tons of ice-cold water. A massive swell passes under the jet…