Hellsite – by Jane O’Sullivan
Fiction Jane O'Sullivan Fiction Jane O'Sullivan

Hellsite – by Jane O’Sullivan

Eva fusses with the burner and when it doesn’t ignite, she gets the lighter and rasps it hard. The flames go up with a whoosh. Orange and blue. What colour is that, I wonder? Smauglust, maybe. Glimmertod. She sets down the frypan and I think the conversation must be over because she just stands there with her hand over the pan, feeling it warming up.

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La Moustache – by Howard McKenzie-Murray
Fiction Howard McKenzie-Murray Fiction Howard McKenzie-Murray

La Moustache – by Howard McKenzie-Murray

Although the babysitter hadn’t budged on the sunlounge in 30 minutes, a singularly shitty mood radiated visibly off her. She lay supine by the pool way beyond Cancer Council recommendations under a double coat of SPF 50+. 

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333532 – by Ouyang Yu
Fiction Ouyang Yu Fiction Ouyang Yu

333532 – by Ouyang Yu

When a writer is reaching his year of never-never, do you know what goes through his mind on a daily basis? Even after he has lived for more than thirty years in a country that is a cultural, linguistic, political, philosophical, poetical and pathological antithesis to his home country, these things that come to haunt him remain an antithesis in themselves.

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The humming – by Meisha Simpson
Fiction Meisha Simpson Fiction Meisha Simpson

The humming – by Meisha Simpson

In the sea, a wolfish grin. The oily head of a seal, whiskers dripping and twitching. The wave, curling the seal with it, one body in motion. Flex, release, and slide with the wave like a seed from a pod. Rolling water, shattering, splintering.

On the shore, a boy and a girl. The boy is on his knees, digging a hole. The girl is brushing sand from her wet purple tights. There’s a dark shape to the left of them, a lump of brown, scaly with sand, a golden strand of seaweed like a wreath on its head.

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The colour of perception – by Tony Barrett
Fiction Tony Barrett Fiction Tony Barrett

The colour of perception – by Tony Barrett

Robbie was a volunteer driver. His first pick-up was in Warrane, a largely public housing suburb on Hobart’s eastern shore. Reno, a cancer patient, was in his mid-seventies, though the disease made him look older. He had far more reason than Robbie to think his day had begun badly, but he didn’t. He’d been a concreter for over fifty years, so he knew about structural weakness and had recognised it in himself long before the specialist delivered his dismal sentence.

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Fish inside a birdcage – by Samuel O'Neil Hamad
Fiction Samuel O'Neil-Hamad Fiction Samuel O'Neil-Hamad

Fish inside a birdcage – by Samuel O'Neil Hamad

‘Winkle-dink, there’s been another one.’

Winkle-dink is an unsightly albatross in his forties with a crooked foot and a mucked-up eye. He’s been off the field for ten years, but he’s still the best detective the Bureau of Investigative Research and Detection (BIRD) has. Mr. Hamburger would trust Winkle-dink with his life and then some.

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The sobber – by Oliver Johns
Fiction Oliver Johns Fiction Oliver Johns

The sobber – by Oliver Johns

Crying is a skill, and I do it exceptionally well. So well, it’s scary. I can’t exactly remember when I first shed a tear. There’s a collection of abstract images: a dropped Cornetto, an overly aggressive peacock, gravelly skinned kneecaps. But they fade in and out. All these memories have melded into a crystallised mound of bad days, something I would need to hack at with a pickaxe – or therapy – but who needs that?

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Gravity – by Morgan Kelly
Fiction Morgan Kelly Fiction Morgan Kelly

Gravity – by Morgan Kelly

He finished his fourth Coke and slumped onto an elbow and a palm. There was nothing new to look at on Countenance – he’d checked. Six times. In the last half hour. Anyone he might have complained to was in bed, go figure. The guys who had dragged him out here had long ago vanished into different corners of the bar. He called them his ‘mates’ in the same sense you might say ‘thanks, mate’ to a stranger. They were the people he saw most often, certainly, but they weren’t his friends.

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Once inside – by Maddie Goss
Fiction Maddie Goss Fiction Maddie Goss

Once inside – by Maddie Goss

He sits in front of a fire, almost life, in a house, a patchwork of frayed could-haves and has-beens. The anger that was once inside is now outside, and the man that was once out there is now in here.

So is the dog, waiting inside to go out.

Once, when the man was boy, he ran and played, small hands tugged, pulled, patted fur and ears with fingers always salty. Now, man smells like something that is not life, pours it down his throat and throws it into the fire. No little hands, no salty fingers.

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Parasites make red pearls – by Lucy Haughton
Fiction Lucy Haughton Fiction Lucy Haughton

Parasites make red pearls – by Lucy Haughton

It was their sixth year at school and the first person in their class, Strillia, had started to Bleed. Conversations erupted in every corner as the children debated when and where they were going to Bleed. Luna took it upon herself to bring her mother’s nail polish in and paint Strillia’s nails all the shades of blood. Crimson red, magenta, deep brown, and baby pink proudly covered Strillia’s fingers for the entire week.

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Flotsam on the drift – by Lonnie Dalton
Fiction Lonnie Dalton Fiction Lonnie Dalton

Flotsam on the drift – by Lonnie Dalton

Upon the frothing current rode splintered ships, barnacled barrels, and one wayward soul.

Crengston lounged on his makeshift raft, whistling out of tune. To be on the drift was a marvellous thing – to be truly detached, basking in nothingness. These waters were strange, but peaceful. The brown, fragrant sea gave the sensation of spiralling down, down towards some unseen centre.

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Why Benjamin Stork broke the ribbit glass – by Angus Macdonald
Fiction Angus Macdonald Fiction Angus Macdonald

Why Benjamin Stork broke the ribbit glass – by Angus Macdonald

Benjamin Stork sent his final email of the day with Kindest Regards, switched his computer to Standby mode, gave the account executive in the adjoining cubicle a small, apologetic nod, passed Zeke the janitor in the kitchenette, smiled, received a radiant beam of teeth in return, stopped, talked to Zeke about the lobby’s malfunctioning automatic door, looked dumbly at his smart watch, learned from Zeke that a special infrared-sensor part was being shipped in from Portugal, finally took his leave, used his ID card to swipe out and expressionlessly looked at the reflection of his reflection in the lift’s mirror…

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Ishbel – by Claire Aman
Fiction Claire Aman Fiction Claire Aman

Ishbel – by Claire Aman

There was a body in the park one afternoon, back when we were kids. Martin and I sprinted home to tell Dad, our schoolbags bumping against our backs. I could hear my blood pounding in my eardrums like footsteps. Dad walked back with us, but there was nothing. Martin and I took turns to lie down in the man’s cold imprint on the grass.

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New purpose – by Alex Bennetts
Fiction Alex Bennetts Fiction Alex Bennetts

New purpose – by Alex Bennetts

She tried her hand at pottery, indoor rock climbing, bonsai. Her palms showed the work of these dalliances, but they always, in tangential ways, recalled the honeymoon. The smashed vase on the bathroom tiles. The unnaturally-biceped man inviting the newlyweds to his room; her husband’s fury. The fronds of the trees that she stood under, waiting for a bus that never arrived. Stems of island ferns cracking in the storm.

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Improving the area – by Keith Goh Johnson
Fiction Keith Goh Johnson Fiction Keith Goh Johnson

Improving the area – by Keith Goh Johnson

Nerys sent another jewelled fruit cake this year with an invitation to spend the holidays with her in Ullapool. Kind of her to remember me and who knows? One day I might go. They’re tearing down all the tenements in Caledonia Road to build high-rise flats. If they continue with all the other streets there might not be anywhere else to go. Improving the area. One can but laugh.

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Good for nothing – by Winnie Dunn
Fiction Winnie Dunn Fiction Winnie Dunn

Good for nothing – by Winnie Dunn

Powerlines hum as heat and dusk swirl together. Gah-gah-gah go the galahs. Pick bits of twigs, grains of dirt and fragments of gum leaves out of the underside of my calves. Problems. Wipe sweat off my upper lip. Problems. Jumping at the clash of fly screen back door, I can’t help but think: No money, all problems. Shadow of an afro carrying a loaded basket floats under a rusty Hills Hoist. Sirens sound in the distance like cicadas. Flash of a red ‘overdue’ stamp searing in my mind’s eye.

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Myer is Our Store – by Gillian Hagenus
Fiction Gillian Hagenus Fiction Gillian Hagenus

Myer is Our Store – by Gillian Hagenus

They call it the long sleep. But it felt more like a micro-nap. Like closing your eyes for a second on a long stretch of highway in the flattest part of the bush, wondering, was it a second, or hours? Wondering, how long would your body autopilot the car in a straight line before your hands slipped off the wheel? That’s what it felt like. Though that’s not how we died. Not all of us.

We woke up in a Myer. Not all of us, just some. We couldn’t fathom how the selection process worked.

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Generation optimisation – by EL Weber
Fiction EL Weber Fiction EL Weber

Generation optimisation – by EL Weber

Camille shivers, exposed. A sterile overhead light buzzes and sends spots into her left eye. Faces peer down to examine her, but it’s the older man with hard eyes and a grim mouth she knows she should focus on. The trouble is she can’t quite place him. Murmurs simmer around her as he leans in. Her heart rate jumps, hands scrabble, splay out and touch something coarse and synthetic. It’s carpet, worn thin from years of overuse; she’s on the floor, in her classroom. She’s blacked out again. Fainted, shutdown, collapsed, experienced an unexpected power loss – whatever you want to call it.

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Afterbirth – by Payton Hogan
Fiction Payton Hogan Fiction Payton Hogan

Afterbirth – by Payton Hogan

It comes out writhing and smelling like meat. It abuses the midwives with its surprisingly strong fists, fighting against the ejection.

I know, I know, we all coo to it.

Our nostrils widen to capture more of that pure animal stench. I lean towards the baby, inhaling greedily of the odour. A familiar pang of jealousy and mourning strikes me momentarily senseless. I've turned the scissors around in my hand, the points facing my own skin. The other midwife is busy, but the anaesthetist recaptures my attention, brings me back to the present.

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The miracle – by Nadia Mahjouri
Fiction Nadia Mahjouri Fiction Nadia Mahjouri

The miracle – by Nadia Mahjouri

Lori believed in miracles. But not the sort them God-botherers bang on about – Dad told her they were all just a bunch of hippa–critts, all fancy hats and hell fire. And anyways, Lori didn’t want their sort of miracles - the type you had to beg for, and wait for, and hope for, and deserve. No, the miracles Lori believed in were the ones she saw every day: the pink soft blossom that swelled and swelled until it was a red ripe apple, the insides of the egg that turned from breakfast to a fluffy chick simply by waiting warm under its mother’s wings.

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