SIXTY SECOND STORIES

An invitation- If you would like to post a ‘Sixty Second Story’, get in touch on my GET IN TOUCH page and tell me about it. Guidelines : 100- 1000 words, edited and proofread, not offensive. Have a crack!

AH, DAD!

‘Why don’t ants get sick?’ asked Carl, his voice loud over the murmurs of conversation in the restaurant.

               His wife and two children looked at the other tables nearby. They dropped their heads; he’d been heard.

               Because of all their little anti- bodies… haha!’

               ‘Shh! Pass the menu, Carl.’

               The kids shrunk in their seats. Soon it would be over, and they could get home to their Playstations.

               ‘This is nice, the four of us out together,’ said Carl. ‘Did you know that too much Indian food can put you in a Korma?’

               ‘Carl! Enough!’

               Can we go soon, Mum?’

               They looked at their menus. The table went quiet.

               The suited man at the next table caught Carl’s eye and took up the challenge. ‘Did you know a pie costs ten dollars in Barbados?’

               Carl’s family stared, wide-eyed at him. There was nowhere to hide. Please, no, Dad!

               ‘Because that’s the Pie-rates of the Caribbean!’

               Two broad grins connected the men, both armed with their repertoires. Brothers in arms.

~~

PCYC

David Pickard

The kid who hung around the PCYC had finished the afternoon games. They had been fed dinner and polished off the watered down cordial. The volunteer worker collected the bus keys, while the Police liaison officer hunted the children out of the centre and onto the bus. It wasn’t late, only around five-thirty, but it got cold and dark early during winter in that neck of the woods.

A ragtag crew of round a dozen kids were on the bus and after circumnavigating the town, only one girl remained. The bus had already passed where she was staying twice. But she hadn’t got off.

Finally, the vehicle stopped right outside her Nan’s place. The house was not lit up; no interior lights at all. The yard was a mess too. The dogs had clearly scavenged through the bins, as the contents were strewn all over the bare dirt yard. Upwards of two dozen disposable nappies and an indistinguishable cooked animal carcass.

The young girl slowly from the back of the bus to the door. She didn’t appear eager to leave. The driver stopped her. ‘Hey kiddo, is Nan or any other adult at home? We can’t drop you off at an empty house you know.’

‘Yeah, Nan should be there, its not Bingo night at the river. Mum and her brother are staying here too.’

The policewoman suggested, ‘Well, go inside and turn on a light and get someone to give us a wave, then we’ll know you’ll be okay.’

‘No, I can’t,’ she replied.

‘Just ask them! They will understand that we have to see you safely home,’ offered the driver.

‘I can’t turn on a light, cause Nan got rid of all our light bulbs. She said people might be tempted to use them for taking drugs.’

The driver was stunned. ‘How does that work? And how do you see to cook dinner or do things inside?’

‘Nan sends us up the road and we borrow one from somewhere. After we’re done, we run it back to them. Most nights we have a fire out the back too. It warms ya up.’

There was movement in the shadows on the verandah. A man in his twenties was standing in the doorway.

‘It looks like your uncle is here, you should head in.’ said the driver.

‘Could youse drop me at Aunty’s house please? I forgot… my cousins wanted me to sleep over. It’ll be okay with Nan.’

The police officer indicated to go, so they drove and headed back into town to find Aunty’s place.

After a heated discussion between the girl and her aunt, (and a little intervention from the policewoman), the girl was left in her Aunty’s begrudging care.

On the drive back to the PCYC, the officer explained, ‘She didn’t really want her niece staying with her, because she’s on our curfew list. She’s been running away from home at night and hanging around town with other kids until all hours. I have to go there at nine o’clock to make sure she’s stayed indoors. Her aunty doesn’t want police around.’

When the hall was locked up, the driver bid the policewoman a quiet night and headed home to his unit complex. He struggled to get his head around the evening’s events, but he had to be ready for school early the next morning; he was helping with the breakfast club cooking.

~~

IT’S NOT YOU; IT’S ME

Wallace Yeldar

‘It’s not you,’ said Skye, running a finger over the silver piercing above her eye. ‘It’s me.’

   Brian hid his hands under the table. He didn’t want her to see them shaking. ‘You don’t have to say that. Please be honest with me.  Can’t we talk things through?’

   She sucked hard through the straw of a strawberry daiquiri. ‘Okay then; it’s you.’

   Brian took off his glasses and squinted for a moment. He was prepared to fight for her… even if that meant rolling over. ‘I can change, you know.’

   An approaching waiter recognised the situation and swerved to change direction. Skye rolled the tip of her tongue backwards over a silver tongue ring. Brian’s words hung in the air.

   ‘Can we at least stay friends? Maybe catch up sometime for a coffee?’

   She sucked the last of her daiquiri until it made a slurp. ‘Ooo… brain freeze.’

   Brian leaned forward, grasping at straws. ‘So, can we?’

   ‘Friends?’

   He took a deep breath. Maybe he still had a chance.

   Skye slipped her phone out and held it under the table where she could see it with the corner of her eye. She thought of the move she was making with her house mate next weekend, relieved that she hadn’t told Brian the new address. ‘Yeah… friends. Sure.’

   She glanced at her phone, thumbing it with one hand and watching his details disappear.

  ~~

IF I CLOSE MY EYES

G. Erchardt

I was nine when I pretended being sick and Mum let me stay home. Ahmed was waiting at school to get me because I tried to kiss his sister.

   If I could get through Friday, Dad would take me camping at Sofala and nothing else would matter. For two days we’d sink our feet into the sand and fish for bass and Ahmed could get fucked.

   I’m forty now and my wife and daughter are shouting at each other. If I close my eyes I’m not here. There’s Dad next to me, the river is lapping at my ankles, a fish tugs my line and… Ahmed can go and get…

  ~~

 FATIMA

David Pickard

Sometimes a teacher is offered a view through the window of students’ lives. These are precious gifts are only given after establishing absolute trust.  Throughout my career, I was blessed to share moments in the lives of those I taught. I continue to savour the memories.

Teachers are often said to provide a role model in a young person’s life, sometimes applying the right pressure to turn a lump of coal into a diamond. That piece of alchemy works both ways and this lump of coal has had his rough exterior chipped and polished by some wonderful students who added sparkle to my life. More than that, they’ve changed my perspective and added light.

Fatima (not her real name) is a girl who came into my Art-room and took up residence. Let me share a little of her story. She was a refugee from Afghanistan, and when we met, her family had been in Australia for two years. Her English wasn’t strong, but she listened intently to everything in class, determined to improve her learning.

Fatima wore long, loose fitting clothing and a Hijab. Her peers were friendly enough, but still she was ignored around the school. She only had pencils and pens and worked on the cheap art paper we had in class, or in her diary. With these humble resources, she created strong, expressive, graphic drawings that filled her diary.

I made notes in her book and arranged to get her some large scroll paper sheets and some oil sticks, so she could try something on a larger scale. She experimented with oil pastels, and we began discussing her ideas and skills. While the other students worked away, Fatima went through the images she created and told me she wanted to make a body of work about her family’s journey and her heritage.

As her story unfolded, I was astounded that this unassuming, young woman had endured such hardship. She had three younger siblings and she continued to bear much of the responsibility for them.

Fatima found her niche with oil sticks and the larger format. Her use of strong colour, contrasted with intricate Islam inspired border patterns, framed her story panels.

My students were scheduled to give an oral presentations to their peers about their work. During these were ten-minute talks, they referred to diary entries and their works in progress. Through the entire process, they collaborated and offered advice to each other.

Fatima was apprehensive about this; the other students didn’t understand what she was doing, and few had asked her anything about her work. She also lacked confidence speaking to an audience. I tried to reassure her.

When her turn came to address the class, large scroll sheets were rolled down on three easels. Two end panels had the appearance of Persian carpets and Fatima had worked rich reds and strong black designs into their borders. The first scroll showed a dismembered town, reminiscent of Picasso’s ‘Guernica’. Armed tanks dominated the landscape from which people were fleeing.

The scroll on the opposite end, showed an aerial view of a suburban street in Australia. Superimposed was a mother with four young children. The narrative was recognised by the students in the class, but the scroll in between appeared incongruous to them. It was almost entirely white, though Fatima had used a light grey primer to prime the paper. A black pattern bordered the white centre. A single grey line of marks wound up from the bottom, through the top of the border. Splashes of red oil stick were daubed onto the white, parallel to the meandering central line. A tiny pair of animals moved along the grey line.

A male figure pulled the lead animal that carried a woman and a small girl. A female led the rear animal which carried a boy and a girl. Fatima spoke softly, explaining her family’s journey to Australia. ‘We had a life in Kabul. My father was a lawyer there. When the Russians left, political factions fought each other, and the Taliban started killing educated and well-spoken people. My father was a target, so he packed everything we had onto two ponies, and we escaped into the mountains to Pakistan.’ Her words gathered momentum. ‘We were granted asylum and emigrated to Australia.’

One of the girls in the class spoke up. ‘I get the tanks and guns and the Australian one, but what is the white one in the middle about?’

‘We had to cross the pass into Pakistan. It was winter and there was a blizzard. My father took the lead pony with my mother and sister. I led the other horse with my brother and sister, following the hoof prints of Dad’s horse in the snow.’

‘Why the red blobs?’ another student asked.

‘Before the snow blew in, other families had tried to go over the pass. Snipers shot them and their bodies lay on the snow. The snipers couldn’t see us through the snow, so we made it out.’ After some time, she continued her talk. ‘The Australia drawing shows my brother and sisters and my beautiful mother. When we arrived here, Dad went to hospital because he had bad nervous stomach pains. Two months after we got to freedom, he died from stomach cancer. My mother has worked two jobs since, and I look after the family until she gets home at night.’

Fatima finished her talk, nodded to us, and packed up her work. The students in the class were crying. The young man scheduled to present next, approached me and placed his canvas on my desk. With tears in his eyes, he shook his head.

From the moment Fatima finished her talk, she had extended her family. Her peers never dismissed her again, and from her gift, they also learned to pay more attention to one another.

I got to know Fatima’s family well, and in my final year in Sydney, I was honoured to be invited to break the fast with them at the end of Ramadan. Fatima went on to complete a beautifully crafted triptych of oil pastel, ‘Persian Rugs’, for her HSC.  She went on to higher studies, following in her father’s footsteps to pursue a legal career.

For some students, it just takes one significant role model to change their lives. For some teachers, that role model may happen to be a student.

“Off Script”

By Allan Jones

In 1976 teaching at Richmond High School, I was producing the stage musical "The Pajama Game". Richmond Players were very supportive and offered me props and lighting/sound assistance. One scene involved the lead male character trying to fix a sewing machine that was required to short out with a small explosion. I was provided with a bottle of gun powder and a battery with the instruction to half fill a bottle cap with gun powder and the character would create a circuit with the battery causing a small flash. All went well on the first 2 of 3 performances until, after a few pre-show drinks, I thought it could be more dramatic for the finale if I filled the cap. For effect I thought it would add the element of surprise if I didn't tell anyone. At the critical moment when the circuit was made, there was a significant explosion, managing to singe the male character's eyebrows and probably partially deafen him.
What then ensued was absolute chaos. We were the first musical production at the brand-new Windsor Council Theatre and there had been a few gremlins. This night after the explosion a bell started sounding throughout the theatre and a fire curtain started descending in front of the stage. My backstage people started frantically calling the bio box to see what was happening. Before I could explain, fire fighters began emerging from the floor of the stage, carrying axes and hoses and frightening the bejesus out of the cast and crew. The audience were oblivious to this as the fire screen had now descended cutting off their view but not the sounds of their children reacting to all that was happening.
I managed to find the captain and explain what had happened. He was suitably unimpressed and passed some comment on the mental capacities of teachers.
When he left, and the curtain could be raised after he deactivated the mechanism, I fronted the audience to explain that this was one of the problems of being the first users of a new facility and that the fire chief had been very complimentary towards us and how well we had handled what must have been a very difficult situation.
It was then "On With The Show!"