Close to Heaven

Close to Heaven — thirty-three award-winning stories from the Stringybark Short Story Awards

Edited by

David Vernon

Selected by

Ruth Ellison, Eugenie Pusenjak, Graham Miller and David Vernon

Published by Stringybark Publishing

PO Box 464, Hall, ACT 2618, Australia

https://www.stringybarkstories.net

http://www.stringybarkpublishing.com.au

Smashwords Edition

Copyright: This collection, David Vernon, 2020

Copyright: Individual stories, the authors, various.

These stories are works of fiction and do not relate to anyone living or dead unless otherwise indicated.

Smashwords Edition, License Notes

This e-book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This e-book may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of the editor, judges and the author of these stories.

Contents

Introduction

Premises — Tristan Hull

Buxton — Kerry Lown Whalen

On the Fringe — Arlene Taylor

The Secrets that We Keep — Jon Presswell

Sausages for Supper — John Poole

A Favourite Star — Karyn Sepulveda

A Day By the River — Sally Willott

Mechanic in Sepia — J.M. Stevens-Ly

Hey Siri — Danielle Ringrose

World Oyster — Matt Edwards

The Seaview — Fiona Skepper

Rainbow Serpent — Jacqueline Kelly

Busker — P.H. Court

Close to Heaven — Polly Rose

Employee of the Month — Regan Rist

Reaching Out — Victoria Mizen

The Grocer — Renee Switzer

The Memory Keeper — Beverley Lello

The One Most Likely — Janet Moore

Christmas 2019 — Margie Riley

No Beauty Shines Brighter — Andrew Drummond

A Bush Murder Trial — Nyema James

A Long Way from Bondi — Graham D'Elboux

Disposal — Ian Stewart

A Light in the Window — Rosemary Stride

Guppy — Oli Rose

Singing White Lies — Gina Pinto

The Long Paddle Home — Deanne Seigle-Buyat

SCAB — Kendrea Rhodes

Retired — Sharmayne Riseley

Sweet Finish — Doug Hamilton

The Roses — Nicole Kelly

The Ballerina Tree — Sandra Macgregor

The Stringybark Short Story Award 2020

About the Judges

Acknowledgements

Other titles by David Vernon at Smashwords.com:

Introduction

— David Vernon

This book is the thirty-fifth anthology of short stories from Stringybark Publishing’s short story awards. In a year where Australia has been burnt to a crisp, heatwaves and floods have swept the nation, and now the entire country (and much of the world) is in Covid-19 lockdown, it is a joy that creativity cannot be stifled by disasters. Indeed, I suggest that human creativity is the best antidote to the depression and anxiety that seems so prevalent today.

This book of contemporary stories from Australian and international authors covers many different genres that will delight readers. The judges had an enormous field of stories to choose from and this made our task enjoyably difficult. Two-hundred and seventy-seven stories were received and from this our four judges chose the thirty-three stories showcased here. We are sure you will enjoy them.

On behalf of the other judges, Eugenie Pusenjak, Ruth Ellison and Graham Miller, and our wonderful sponsor, Stringybark Publishing, we hope you savour these tales. 

Happy reading!

David Vernon

Judge and Editor

Stringybark Stories

Premises

— Tristan Hull

Three men walk into a bar and are immediately overcome with self-consciousness. The men share glances, an unspoken understanding that they have stumbled into an awfully familiar premise, of which they are no doubt the sole focus. They linger at the door for a moment, unwilling to venture further into the bar and engage with their surroundings lest an occurrence arises from which one might derive humour. Finally, the first man clears his throat.

Hi, excuse me. Sorry. Hi, he says to me, trying to pick out the right words. I apologise for interfering, especially so early in the piece and all, but I – well, we – we were just wondering if you wouldn’t perhaps consider placing us in a different location? We don’t feel very comfortable here.

I ask why, and the man explains that he fears I am setting at least one of them up to be the punchline of a joke, using a worn-out format that rarely elicits more than a snigger from any halfway cultivated audience, rendering the unfortunate party who provides the punchline as being not only a mere joke themselves, but a bad one at that.

It seems a fair request and, having entered this scene without any real plan or story in mind, I have no qualms with changing setting. I ask where the man and his friends would feel more at ease. This question stumps Charles (I have decided to call him Charles), who was obviously not expecting such willing cooperation on my behalf.

Could I have a quick word with the others? he asks, gesturing to his friends. By all means, I tell him, and write a short paragraph where the three men huddle in the corner for an earnest and inaudible discussion, complete with the cartoonish sounds of stage-whispered gibberish.

After a couple of moments, Charles turns back to me with an update.

We’d like to be on an aeroplane, he says.

I shrug. An airplane is fine by me.

No, no, Charles interjects. "An aeroplane."

What’s the difference?

Well, there isn’t technically any difference, he explains. It’s just a variant of spelling which, if nothing else, hints at where you are from and where the story is published, and perhaps even where the narrative is set.

Three men sit on an aeroplane. Charles is an Englishman now, due to his insistence on using the British English dialect. The second man, who we will call Frank, is an Irishman. Bob is Australian.

An Englishman, Irishman, and Australian sit on an aeroplane, and again exchange worried looks. I mistake the trepidation on their faces for boredom. To make things more exciting, I have the plane begin plummeting out of the sky, the captain announcing that each of the men is going to have to throw something of value from the plane if they are to avoid a fatal crash. Amidst the chaos, Frank leans over and speaks in Charles’ ear. Charles nods and addresses me once more.

Hi again, he says. Sorry to be such a pest, but Frank has voiced concerns that you might have removed us from one tired joke premise and placed us in yet another, equally hackneyed joke. Would it be too much to ask for another change of surroundings?

I offer to place them in a different though equally disastrous moment, like aboard a sinking ship, or in a rickshaw stuck high up in an almond tree, or perhaps on the back of a rampaging and possibly suicidal mammoth.

No, no, the plane is fine, Charles says. There’s no need for anything quite so extravagant. We’re actually rather happy on the plane. Our issue is that with the plane going down, and the directive being given to throw things out of the plane to stop if from crashing, we’re setting up the last person to throw away something that’s related to their country of origin, something apparently hilarious in its superfluousness and lack of desirability. Like the Australian throwing the prime minister off the plane, or the Irishman throwing the Englishman out, or the Englishman colonising the plane and slaughtering the other passengers and then enslaving the survivors, plundering the aircraft of its valuable resources.

Right, so a regular plane is what everyone wants?

If possible, yes please. Also, it can have other people on it. There’s no need for us to be the only passengers. And now we’re not throwing stuff out of the plane, we don’t really need to be huddled in the loading bay. Why not just make it an Emirates passenger flight or something? It’ll be like we’re going on holiday.

I’m not sure how I feel about becoming an imaginary travel agent for Emirates, but I can’t see a good reason not to grant the request.

Charles, Frank and Bob are on an Emirates flight from Melbourne to Dubai. Charles passes on a message from Frank and Bob. Frank wants to know if he can have a more interesting name than Frank. Bob also suggest they should depart from Perth, as that would shave about three hours from the flight, and he tends to get stir crazy when stuck in a plane for too long. I offer to have the plane depart from anywhere Bob likes, somewhere only an hour or two from Dubai. Charles thanks me but explains Bob would still like to leave from Australia. If this is going to truly feel like a holiday, he needs to be fly out from his home country.

Charles, the-man-with-a-more-interesting-name-than-Frank, and Bob are on a plane from Perth to Dubai.

Before long the trio are again in conference with one another. This time, they find issue with the fact that they are all middle-aged white men. It’s an all too common problem in my writing, they say, whereby unless stipulated otherwise, one can safely assume that my characters are white, western, and male. They say many other authors are guilty of this, and that it highlights the deep-seated privilege and preference this demographic is still afforded throughout much of the world, a general yardstick for measuring normalcy in western civilised society. They request that I provide some diversity in my writing, and to try and do so organically, rather than as if filling some arbitrarily set quota, an approach that runs the risk of being even more offensive than simple omission. Ashamed as I am to admit it, they are right, and soon enough we are dealing with three unique and culturally diverse individuals on the plane.

Asad sits in business class, resisting the temptation to enjoy his complimentary champagne as he hopes to get some work done during the flight. More-interesting-than-Frank (let’s call him Captain Douglas Offheinster) and Ekemma remain seated next to one another. Ekemma taps Captain Offheinster on the shoulder, and once again the pair confer in secretive tones. Ekemma turns her attention to me.

I know you were previously speaking with Asad, she says. But you made him rich and now he’s in business class. I hope you’ll forgive me for speaking up.

I assure Ekemma it’s fine, I’m more than happy to speak with her. I’ll even speak with the Captain if needs be.

Well, you see, she says. We appreciate what you’ve done for us, we really do. It’s just that, Douglas and I both feel that humans are but one species of this earth – at our core no better or worse than any other. All the species of the world are connected, contributing something to the delicate balance to Earth’s many ecosystems and – in a perfect world, at least – all playing their part in maintaining that balance. Now don’t get us wrong, we love being human, but wouldn’t it be fair to say that by having three humans as the centre of your story, you’re reinforcing an anthropocentric perspective which has contributed to the widespread decimation of mother nature?

I suppose it would be fair to say that. And I see what Ekemma is driving at.

A pot plant, Ekemma, and a Siberian tiger are on a flight from Perth to Dubai.

Pandemonium breaks out. Nobody can understand how a pot plant has found its way into business class. It’s an unprecedented disaster. Meanwhile, a confused and agitated Siberian tiger lashes out at the poor souls in the surrounding seats. Ekemma evades the tiger’s lunges and explains how she is vegetarian, but forgot to specify her dietary requirements on the form when confirming flight details, and was hoping I could find a way to amend this oversight so that she doesn’t have to sit through an eleven hour flight on an empty stomach while facing the very real threat of being mauled to death by an apex predator. While I try and salvage what’s left of my story, the bartender stands alone, perplexed, wondering what happened to the lady, pot plant and Siberian tiger he briefly mistook for three mirthful and familiar men entering his bar.

Tristan Hull is a short fiction writer from Fremantle, Western Australia. He can’t drive and finds writing about himself in the third person difficult but is good at catching the bus and admitting his limitations.

Buxton

— Kerry Lown Whalen

In my final weeks at university, Mum was struck and killed by a car outside Woolworths. Although shocked, I managed to arrange the funeral and resume my studies. I could have applied for compassionate leave but was determined to complete the final weeks of my degree. After the exams, I had time to reflect on both my loss and the past.

I was four years old when Mum packed our bags and left Dad at his farm in Buxton. Since then, we hadn’t heard a word from him. I thought Mum had left Dad because she couldn’t get a job in the country, probably because she’d said, There’ll be plenty of jobs here, when we arrived in Sydney.

She rented a two-bedroom house in the western suburbs where I made heaps of friends. We played cricket in the street and kicked a footy around when we weren’t swimming at the local pool. My best mate, Charlie Parker, lived next door. When Mum started work at Woolworths, his mother minded me after school.

It’s a good arrangement, Mum said. Mrs P could do with the few extra dollars.

As the years passed, I didn’t dwell on my old life and only thought about Dad when someone asked if he was dead.

He’s got a property at Buxton, I’d say.

Why doesn’t he sell it and move here?