The table, piled with clock radios, bakes in the afternoon sun. It lies just beyond the shade of the verandah, where two women, with matching black ponytails, sit and slowly peel and eat lychees. I ask them how much the clock radios are...  [more]  

He could be under the wheels of a bus, the passengers inside it fighting with their curiosity whether or not to look out the window. There are grim-faced emergency service people...  [more]  

If we were shipwrecked, I know I’d be the one to get eaten so the rest of the group could survive. Looking around the tea room, it was obvious. I am the fattest, and although I’m the youngest, I can’t imagine any of the others offering themselves as a sacrifice.  [more]  

I open my mail after coming home from work and the first envelope holds a letter that begins with: “This is not a chain letter…”  [more]  

Frightening how the rest of the world floats away when we drive around the suburbs, and how it’s always night. Night makes us timeless, dissolves our histories so all we have are words.
“You’re so funny,” he says. “The funniest girl I’ve ever met.”...  [more]  

In the doctor’s waiting room, I read the spine of a National Geographic: Pandas. US Coasts. Rome’s Basement. Dance across America. Human Body. Blackbeard...  [more]  

I knew the ceiling as I knew a body that lay beside me constantly, pressed close so I could feel its every contour. I watched the light pass over the cracks in the plaster so often that I could determine the time by the shadows...  [more]  

Lights flash amber and the cars don’t stop. For the first time in her life she wishes the police were around: an officer planted in the centre of the intersection, cars obediently halting at the flick of a white glove...  [more]