life

Some of the following may feel confronting…

… to certain readers, and there is a reason for that. Other readers will not feel confronted or upset at all and see this as perfectly normal. The following is the beginning of a story fully written in March earlier this year, and how I work with character arc — so, depending on how you feel when you read it lets me know whether I’m doing this right. Feedback is welcome. The story has not been edited or worked on properly yet.

Bart Brand had always been an avid reader. His bookshelves were filled with four-wheel-driving, fishing, and do-it-yourself magazines. Every week, he’d pop down to the local newsagent and pick up the latest edition of whatever was available. Theoretically, he’d filled himself to the brim with information about almost any vehicle built for off-road. The fishing was a little different. He loved the colours, and the different sizes, and what was doing what in each season but he’d never been fond of the smell, strangely enough, and had never dropped a line or used a rod in his forty-odd years of being on the planet.

It looked boring.

It didn’t stop him from wishing to fulfill his dream though. Bart Brand, formerly known as Bartholomew Bransson, wanted to be the most famous camping and off-road vlogger ever, and nothing was going to stop him. Nothing. Not even his job as a typesetter.

If Bart knew anything, he knew being a typesetter at the local rag was possibly not a job he’d have in five years time. It might not even be a job he had in twelve months time with the way things were going. Sure, he could take those skills to another section of the industry, but who was going to pay him for it? No one, that’s who. People tended to figure these things out themselves nowadays, or had certificates in this, that or the other, and somehow that seemed to outweigh the years of experience he had. It also made him feel slightly bitter about any future employment prospects.

When Solway Endersans stomped into his local newsagent one Saturday morning, nearly bowling him over as she snatched at one of those gossip mags, he’d seen something that got him to thinking. If he could have someone like her, becoming the most famous vlogger in the history of the universe would be the easiest thing in the world. He’d nearly fallen out of his slides when she’d actually said yes to going out for tea somewhere.

No one ever said yes to Bart Brand. Not like that, anyway. He was five-foot-nine, pot-bellied, and nothing special to look at. He did have ambition, though. He was pretty damn sure that’s what Sol found attractive about him. Therefore, it had been slightly upsetting several weeks later when he realised she would not put herself in front of the camera. She’d mentioned something about “conflicts of interest” and some other ridiculous reasons that had to do with being employed as a swimming instructor. Why that stopped her from getting in front of the camera though, he had no idea. Instead, she’d offered to show him how to set up outside, where to put all the weird things he’d never known were used, where to stand, what cue she’d use to let him know the camera was rolling, and… Bart got the impression Solway had not told him certain things about herself, and when he thought about it and how beautiful she was, there were probably certain things he did not wish to know. 

If Solway had known what he’d been thinking when he’d thought this, he’d probably not have survived that initial two months.

Despite all Bart’s misgivings about her former occupation she seemed sensible enough, so he allowed her to do all the planning, packing and everything else required when she drove him on their weekend trips off into the bush. He’d stand in front of the camera, be entertaining, look like he knew what the hell he was talking about, and do the video-editing later. It was something he was particularly good at, even if he wasn’t quite as polished at everything else as Sol happened to be.

The only real time Bart had remaining to go through the piles and piles of film from the weekend and pick out the best bits happened to be on a Sunday afternoon. It was time-consuming, required an incredible amount of patience (something Sol did not seem to have, at all), and needed an artistic eye.

This particular Sunday afternoon Bart happened to be sitting at the small dining room table, once again surrounded by Solway’s notes and desperately trying to make sense of all the information she’d written for him.

‘What did you want for dinner?’ Her voice echoed through the tiny apartment.

‘Hmm?’ He felt hungry, he knew that. His rather ample little tummy rumbled in response. ‘What’ve you got?’

‘I’ve got some cold chook left from yesterday, and maybe a couple of spuds, if they haven’t gone rotten, and…’ He heard one of the overhead cupboards open and things being moved around. ‘…. I might have some tins of peas or something. Is that alright?’

‘Sounds good.’ They still had things in the esky, he knew, but they hadn’t unpacked everything yet, and it wouldn’t be fair to ask Sol to go all the way back down the stairs when she’d carted half the stuff up by herself. Not to mention she’d done the driving all weekend, and set up camp, and… ‘Do we have any yoghurt?’

Sol’s face popped around the corner of the kitchen like a plastic head on a stick. Bart felt like yelling, ‘Ta daaaa,’ but restrained himself. She didn’t always have a very good sense of humour.

‘Yoghurt? Why the hell do you want yoghurt?’ She stared at him.

‘It’s yummy.’ He grinned and scratched his beard. ‘I like yoghurt. Maybe it’s in my genes or something. Did I tell you about the time Papa first saw yoghurt at the supermarket? He was so excited it had finally come to Australia. “Yoggut” he’d said, and he was so happy and Grandma was happy for him and…’ He stopped. ‘What?’

‘Do you want yoghurt, do you?’ Solway’s fair eyebrows formed an enticing vee over her narrowed blue eyes.

‘Is that… bad? Do I want yoghurt? Maybe I don’t want yoghurt.’ Bart studied her face. It didn’t move. There was not even a twitch of a pouty lip. ‘Okay,’ he said hurriedly. ‘I may very well not want yoghurt at all. No. I don’t want yoghurt. It would have been nice, but no. I’ll survive, I suppose.’

‘Good. It’s not like you need it.’ She retreated back into the kitchen, voice floating back to him over the sound of the pedestal fan. ‘Have you finished that yet?’

Bart glared at the laptop. Finished it? He hadn’t even started. He needed to cut this, add that, make some sense out of the scribbles in the notebook and — he froze, staring at the screen. What the hell was that thing in the mud? Carefully he rewound the video to where the drone had jerked sideways with a sudden gust of wind, and pressed “play” again. About seven seconds in something moved down there under the trees. He almost put a hole through the mouse as he clicked the pause button. It looked like . . . It seemed . . .

No, that couldn’t be right. What was the resolution on this thing? How high had the drone been there? Thirty metres? Could he zoom in on that?

‘Solway?’ Bart squeaked, then raised his eyebrows at his own mouse-like noises. He cleared his throat, took a deep breath, cocked his elbow on the table and rested his chin in his hand. That looked much better. ‘Sol? Could you come here for a minute? I just want your opinion on something.’

‘What is it now.’ A drawer banged and something beeped. ‘I’m busy.’

Bart scowled, glancing back at the shape on the screen. The size of that great golden orb made his chins wobble. ‘It’s important. I found something.’

The tone of his voice must have alerted his partner. She appeared around the corner reasonably quickly, eyes sliding past him to the laptop.

‘What the fuck is that? Stop it. Go back. What are you doing?’

‘What?’ Bart turned, releasing the mouse from his deathlike grip. The video was rewinding at breakneck speed and the mouse didn’t seem to be working anymore. He studied the keyboard. ‘Where is the stop button on this?’

‘Jesus. Get out of the way.’

‘Don’t panic, we’ll find it again. Just…’

‘Get out of the way, you dickhead, Can’t you see what it’s doing?’

‘What’s it doing?’

‘It’s cutting it, Bart. It’s cutting that whole section out. We’re losing it. Get out of the fucking way, for God’s sakes.’

Solway rudely ejected him off the dining chair. He landed on the floor with a thump as she frantically tapped at the keyboard.

‘Fuck,’ she shouted as the video finally stopped doing whatever the hell it had decided to do. ‘For once in your life, do you think you could just get something right?’

‘Sorry?’ He asked from the linoleum.

She glanced over her shoulder. ‘Never mind. I didn’t mean that. Here, let me help you up.’

The Magnet — from her

As they winked out one by one

He laughed and shook his head

It was time to be

Her enemy for she had gone to bed

This could be your time forever

He does not want to go

But when a hero calls my name

I cannot let him know

Why do you wear a red dress

When you should be dressed in white

Why do I wear a turban

When my life becomes your light?

It’s the first time you’ve been down here

And the last time I’ve been up

But somewhere in the middle we forget to say

Make some noise…

Let me go, come back

Hate me, stay away.

For if she does not love me

I will never go astray.

Rufus the Red

Rufus the Red did not have red hair, but where he came from it was prized. Munchie had not seen Rufus in a very long time, which may have been because the last time she’d seen the little bad-word, or heard of him, he’d been nicking money from a safe drop.

He’d actually nicked quite a lot of money over a long period of time, and the man named Sue had noticed it, and watched, also for a long period of time.

He’d been eighteen, old Ru-ru, regretted it ever since, or so we’re told, but it had never really occurred to him he might be called out on it the next time he tried to go back to Australia.

I might ask you if he spoke any languages in particular, wrote Sue to Munchie. Do you remember?

Oddly enough, I do, Munchie replied, for although he came from a country who highly prized those with red hair and his hair was black, and although many people from that country were not Christian, he was, but he still spoke Urdu, and English, very well indeed.

He’d also, before he got married, which Munchie assumed he was now, had managed to bed a few women quite a bit older than he’d been at the time, because he’d looked quite a bit older than he’d been at the time, although none of those women had been Munchie because she’d been his boss and had seen quite a lot of this sorts of carry-on over the years. Plus, it may be because getting Australian women had been a bit of a sport back then, especially when one happened to be living and working in Australia. And he had.

What he had not realised though, at that time, was just how difficult Australian women could be. He had got along quite well with Munchie, for he was rather amusing and intelligent, which was part of his charm, although the stealing four hundred bucks at a time bit was not.

Okay, thought Rufus, I did not realise Munchie knew I’d been stealing, so that completely messed up my idea of re-entering the country.

But had he re-entered the country? That’s what Munchie wanted to know.

Maybe he had, maybe he hadn’t. Maybe he’d thought about what was happening so close to home recently and he’d thought it would be terribly nice to get away for a while (until everything had settled down) and revisit his friends in other countries. Maybe, he’d also got particularly good at being a pain in the arse, despite his legendary status of being very handsome and not particularly wise, and said to himself….

‘Now, if I got hold of old Kate, she might let me go back down there again.’

He was wrong. There were quite a few people who did not know that Munchie actually did know the things and people that she knew, and a few people who had been very unwise in thinking her a good sounding tool to allow them back on to her home turf.

It had happened a few times, quite a few times in fact, people trying to get Australians to allow them back into the country, whether it be through sponsorship or whatnot. Sometimes, they’d simply contact people out of nowhere and say (and I’m rephrasing), ‘Oh hey, remember me, do you have work for me there?’ (The answer, in Munchie’s case, had always been no, and likely always would be).

Sometimes, even though Munchie had been friendly with quite a few people working beside her or for her, those particular people had never actually been friends or workmates, because friends and workmates never steal from each other or the business, and they don’t try to weasel their way out of it at a later date, either, no matter how funny or handsome they may be.

“How many people over the years have you known to be like that,’ someone who was definitely not related, asked Munchie.

‘Not as much as you’d think, but quite a few more than you’d wish for,’ Munchie replied. ‘And, I remember every single one. There have also been many people who think Aussies should be a lot more generous of their time and their wealth (haha) than they are because everyone is rich in Australia, despite the economy, and everyone gets their parents house handed down to them, just like they do in India (they don’t), and none of the women need to work because their husband’s look after them, so they may as well give their jobs to the people coming in to Australia, and “why the hell is this woman turning on me all of a sudden when I simply wanted to get her out of the way so I could give her job to someone else?”‘

Unfortunately, this is a fact in Western Australia and Australia, and possibly in many other places besides. Sometimes, the only way someone gets a job is actually because they’re very experienced, not as run down as people expected (or wanted) them to be, and also very aware of just how much jackshit has been done within a lot of places because some other people simply do not like lifting a finger.

Rufus may be reading this passage in a few hours, or a few days, or in a few years, and he may be saying to himself. ‘Bugger me. She’s not wrong about any of that. I think I might have made a terrible mistake, again.’

He was a nice kid, btw the way, and I genuinely liked him, just as I genuinely liked a lot of the other buggers that worked with me over the years, you included “Terrence”.

What I do not like however, is people trying to take advantage, people stealing, and people trying to get out of working simply because they’re a female. It never really made much sense to me, and it likely never will. I also do not like people telling me they know more about the country than I do, or telling me to clean up blown around leaves in the middle of a rainstorm.

And that is most definitely part of the story.

By the way, I saw a falling star this morning, very clearly over my back fence just after 5am. It was a big one, and maybe they’ll talk about it on the news today.

Have a good one :)

It’s Familiar

Pure Munchie-Superdam smiled. She didn’t grin. She just smiled.

She could have grinned, but that was likely because, despite all odds, she still had the majority of her teeth.

The Apache syndrome had tempted fate one too many times, she wrote, most thoughtfully. It seemed he wasn’t marking any crescent-shaped hooves in any lady’s armour today.

‘Bugger me dead,’ he said, quite loudly. ‘I knew it was you, old haggis.’

Yes indeed, she smiled, and perhaps did grin as well this time. For what he had spoken of was inherent of the bloodline, and it had once made many men laugh because it seemed to be an inherent thing in the Chewy fandom club that one’s parent, or parents, always seem to, without fail, go back to the root case, or cause.

There are two Fremantle Football clubs, but only one Dockers. There are the Sharks, and blue is more my colour, and there are the Bulldogs, the animal of which may have resembled an old staff sergeant due to that bloody square jaw that kept returning generation after generation. I don’t have lockjaw, but I do tend to make sure I have my story straight, and I do not, under any circumstances, let go of facts when it comes to my exact history… Horrible as it may be.

Perhaps, even slightly boring :)

‘I may have married into something, old mate, but let me be quite clear on why they kept referring to The Chapel when they talk about the Capewell Clan. One does not need to go too far back to see why it was changed.’ She smiled again.

‘Good lord, please don’t bring that up again,’ chuckled the extended Capewell Clan, none of whom knew what she actually referred to was a moment in time someone decided they’d be better off in cloaks than croms.

‘Let it be said, old luv, I never strayed too far from the truth,’ muttered the keeper of the gates.

‘Well, you know, when one’s great-great-great grandparent and a bit decided to go to Wiltshire, and realised his surname could mean a number of different things, least of all smelly bottoms, and the other great great great grandad said he thought it was a cheese, and yet another great great great grandparent said, ‘I can’t read that properly. Should I be kneeling down or losing weight? Or both?’, one tends to let things slide,’ said the aforementioned Munchie. ‘So, despite your lack of wisdomness, and apparent like of winsomeness, everything I recorded was actually true. Are you gonna give the bloody thing back now or not?’

He decided, at that very moment, it was lucky he had decided to look up his own shield.

‘Oh dear,’ he cursed. ‘It may have been a dagger after all, and that’s not good is it?’

‘Not really,’ she said. ‘Not one you’d want displayed on a coat of arms. Especially on red.’

Not much else needed to be said after that. For after all, even though things may have “looked cool” at the time, it is often revealed they are not. Not really.

You made a bloody mess of it, boyo. Perhaps you should clean it up.

The Temple

Do you remember the conversation had from a car window to a man?

I do. It was a shared experience. It was personal. Nobody needed to back down, and I may have told him to pick his rubbish up, which may very well have been met with laughter. He did, by the way. Everyone recognises mum’s voice. I also apologised for using the mum voice, which may have made it even funnier.

Do you remember the conversation had outside a little house? ‘They’re getting cleverer,’ she said, and she wasn’t wrong. She didn’t recognise this place anymore. I admired her strength and her courage and told her so. It was meant to be kept private.

Do you know what it means when we go down to the beach and use the salt water to wash it all away? We knew each other then, and we know each other now, but we do not know each other. How does that sound?

Many years ago, when I was young, a priest told his gathering that the church was not a building and it was not a place. It was inside you, and it still is. You look up, inside yourself and you see the ceiling with the exposed beams, even if you’ve never seen anything like it before, and you may wonder where it came from. It’s yours. Perhaps the ceiling has gold leaf, perhaps it’s simply a golden wood, but if you watch carefully you can see the tiny little golden flecks of light coming down from that ceiling and wash its way around you, and help you feel stronger.

Do you remember that? It is your temple. You have the power to choose between what is right, and what is wrong.

— What is morally right, and what is morally wrong.

— What will destroy, and what will live and let live without creating a stain on your soul. This will bring you here, to this present, to your gift, to you, “beau”. Not all of us carry it lightly. Not all of us can walk through the crowd unnoticed, and sometimes it is simply a choice of whether one wishes to be noticed or not.

You can turn it off, if you want to. You can pretend it didn’t happen. You can simply forget we ever existed, if it makes you feel better. Will it make you feel better?

Then walk back down to the water’s edge, and release your little fish into the water. Watch him swim away. He’s not coming back, and you are the one who made that choice.

She’s not coming back, and you made that choice. I did not instigate your behaviour. That choice falls on you, and you alone. Love is not always what you want it to be. It’s not always pretty and unfortunately, it’s not always kind. This is the difference between nature and superstition, and I thank her for my time.

Don’t just read the sections of a book that interest or excite you. Read the whole bloody thing. A fifteen second miracle lasts as long as fifteen seconds. A lasting impression is not a cannon ball run.

Perhaps none of it will make sense to you. Perhaps all of it does. Perhaps that’s the entire point. Perhaps, you should start listening to what really matters, and not just what you think might matter. It’s always your choice. It’s never mine.

“It’s an Oldy but a Goody”

Three people walked into a pub. Or maybe it was a bar. Perhaps it was a saloon, or a salon. Maybe they were just getting their nails done before they went to …

‘Three people?’

Yes, we’re being politically correct. They were going to a fancy dress party.

“A fancy dress party? Is that where everyone wears black ties and pretty gowns and stuff?”

No, it’s where one dresses oneself to resemble something or someone else.

‘Oh, okay, so it’s fake.’

No, it’s not fake. It’s a party.

“Right. So, are we talking political parties, then? Are they going to a political party?”

No, they are going to a fancy dress party, and they’re dressed to resemble emotions.

“Is that like emoticons?”

‘No, it’s like something one feels, right? Are you feeling me up?’

No, I’m talking about feelings.

‘Is that like feelers? So, bugs, right?’

“Does this have a point? I’m kinda getting sick of this joke.”

‘He’s not well. We should take him to the doctor’s.’

Did you want to hear this joke or not?

“I can’t hear the joke. I don’t have any ears. Maybe you should write it down.”

The first person writes the joke down.

“I can’t see that,” says the second person. “Maybe you should whisper it to me.”

‘Oh, that’s funny,’ says the last person. ‘Pity you can’t say that in public.’

Where do we go from here, asked no one. We can’t go to their house. They resemble donkey sit-upons. We can’t go to their house either/either. They’re personally affronted. We can’t go down there either. Everyone is upside down and everyone else knows they don’t exist anyway.

‘What’s personally affronted mean?’

‘It’s wot.’

“Whut?”

No, what.

‘Who?’

What was that joke about again? It’s on you. It’s on you.

“I don’t know what that means? Can you explain it to me?”

Apparently, I can’t. So, that’s the end of the story.

The Sea Eagle.

It had made a nest on top of the antenna — a nest which had been there for many years by the hill near the police station, so the white-bellied Sea Eagle found herself in the perfect position to see the Silver Gull land at the river’s mouth.

It cocked its head. The gull had a larger bird with it, which had just landed, and the eagle could not make out what kind of bird it was. It looked very similar to the seagull (which is the common name for the silver gull that had alighted on the beach) but it seemed, if not half as big again, at least a third as big. Why the sea eagle found this amusing, it did not know.

It flew down a little nearer, landing on one of the many sheoaks closer to the river’s mouth. These trees were coated with shag (cormorant) poop, and smelled awful, but it did not deter the eagle from watching the two birds as they made themselves comfortable by the large piece of driftwood sticking out of the sand.

They seemed to be having quite an animated conversation.

The Sea Eagle had never been particularly good at reading lips and the fact the birds did not have lips but beaks, made it even harder. All she could really hear, from her precarious perch on a tree limb (which was much too fragile to hold a bird her size) was loud and obnoxious squawking.

Perhaps they had found something to eat?

The smaller bird strutted back and forth on the golden sand, arching its neck and glaring down at its orange legs for reasons the eagle could not fathom. She glanced down at her own pale feet where her talons grasped the thickest part of the branch. Those birds did not appear to have talons. In fact they seemed to be wearing flippers, or fins, on their feet which, in her humble opinion, wouldn’t catch any decent food at all.

She’d never really thought about this before. If they couldn’t catch food in those ridiculous shoes, how the heck were they going to be able to eat anything? Perhaps it was the reason why the smaller bird (which seemed to be yelling at the top of its voice while the larger one stood there looking slightly nonplussed) seemed to be so angry?

‘Maybe I should go down to that beach and see what the heck is going on,’ the eagle thought to herself. ‘I can help these two ridiculous birds get some food, and then they can leave.’ 

She had already decided having new strangers in her town, especially birds she had never seen before (the taller one was really very odd-looking) was not something she felt comfortable with, especially if they were going to continue being as loud and as noisy as they currently were.

The silver gull tried to peck the bigger bird.

‘Right, that’s it,’ thought the sea eagle angrily. ‘I’m going in.’

She flapped her strong wings once and then twice as the springy branch underneath her bounced up and down, then let go with her talons and swooped towards the two gulls, scaring the bejebus out of them as she landed on the piece of driftwood.

‘What the by-crikey-Jimmy-Joe-Bobs is going on,’ she asked. ‘And who the heck are you?’

\./   \./   

Pepe, after recovering from the huge bird landing so closely beside them, glanced at his smaller companions. ‘Uh, so this is Aaaargh, and the tiny one is Ambrosia.’

‘Ambrosia? Where?’ The sea eagle glared at him. 

She really was quite large, Pepe thought. He didn’t mean that in a bad way. She was just really big. Her wing span, something he’d noticed as she’d flown in towards them, had been at least two metres across.

‘The ladybird.’ He gulped. ‘The ladybird is Ambrosia. Ambrosia Honeybun Polka Dot, if we’re going to get picky. Which we’re not,’ he added quickly, noticing the hook on the end of the eagle’s beak.

‘A ladybird?’ The eagle cocked its head. ‘I haven’t seen one of those in quite some time. Where is this ladybird?’

‘On my back,’ said Aaaargh loudly.

‘She’s not deaf, you fool,’ hissed Pepe. ‘She’s an eagle. She’s got good eyes.’

‘How does that make you not deaf,’ Aaaargh squawked.

‘I don’t know. How come you’re blind, when you’re also supposed to have good eyes,’ Pepe hissed again ‘This is a sea eagle we’re dealing with, mate. I suggest you be on your best behaviour.’

The eagle ignored their chatter. ‘Where is this ladybird?’

‘I told you where she is. She’s on my back.’ Aaaargh began to jump up and down in a most unsightly manner.

‘Show me,’ the eagle demanded.

Pepe noticed Ambrosia crawl out from under one of Aaaargh’s silver-white feathers.

‘Hello,’ said the ladybird. ‘My name is Ambrosia Honeybun Polka Dot.’ She lifted her bonnets and wiggle-flew over to the eagle’s beak, landing quite carefully right on the end of the hook.

The white-bellied Sea Eagle crossed her great golden eyes slightly as she stared at the tiny beetle. ‘Hello,’ she replied. ‘It is nice to meet someone with good manners. I’m Leucogaster. Your companions are very noisy.’

‘I beg your pardon,’ said Pepe. He was beginning to feel quite cross. ‘I’m Pepe, and I’ve been very polite.’ He glared at Aaaargh. ‘It’s this not-very-nice gull that’s been making all the noise.’

‘I have too,’ said Aaaargh. ‘And, as I said, it’s because there’s weather coming in, and you’re standing around telling me everything’s fine, and everyone’s fine, and they aren’t fine, and we’re not fine, and we have to catch the next stiff breeze if we’re going to be on our way, so why you decided here would be a good place to stop is beyond me, Pepe, because we need to get Ambrosia further north before she falls asleep. You know what happens if she falls asleep, right?’

‘What happens when you fall asleep,’ the sea eagle asked the tiny ladybird sitting on the end of her nose.

‘When I fall asleep in the winter time I go into hibernation,’ the ladybird replied. ‘And when I wake up the world is like new again, which is wonderful, but,’ and Ambrosia wiggle-flew back to Aargh and landed on his head. ‘I forget everyone I’ve ever met, and I just don’t want to do that. Not yet. I’m not ready to forget things.’

‘Sometimes it’s good to forget things,’ the eagle replied quietly. ‘I try to forget all the eggs that didn’t make it, and I try to forget all the people who keep trying to remove my nest from the top of that big aerial back there.’ She glanced back at the hill. ‘And I just try to get on with living my life without being harassed all the time by people who don’t know what they’re doing.’

‘I understand that,’ Ambrosia Honeybun Polka Dot said from Aaaargh’s silvered temple. ‘But I have children, little people, to get back to, and gardens to visit, and aphids to eat, and I just ate my last one. Winter is upon us, and I’m just not far enough north to stay awake yet. I can’t go to sleep. Not yet.’

‘Then why did you stop,’ the sea eagle asked.

‘Aaaargh can’t keep flying, no matter how good a pilot he thinks he is,’ Pepe replied, wincing as Aaaargh pecked him on the shoulder. ‘He needs to rest.’

‘Then I will make sure we get you to where you need to go,’ said the Sea Eagle. ‘I have family, other Sea Eagles, all the way up this coast so we will be able to get you to a warm place, Ambrosia. I promise.’ She would have smiled, but she had a beak not a mouth, so smiling was not possible.

‘Thank you,’ said Ambrosia Honeybun Polka Dot, adventurer extraordinaire. ‘That is all I’ve ever asked for. When it does become springtime, I will try to make it all the way back to my favourite little person, and perhaps I will be able to bring children of my own.’

‘Oh good, I’m glad we’ve got that sorted out,’ said Aargh. ‘Now, where’s the nearest pub? I feel like some hot chips.’

The eagle huffed and fluffed up her feathers. 

‘Typical seagull,’ she said, but it was not unkindly. She turned to look at Pepe once more, her golden eyes narrowing. ‘What kind of bird are you, exactly,’ she asked. ‘I’ve never seen anything like you before.’

‘I don’t really know,’ Pepe replied. ‘I know my mum was a Silver Gull, but I don’t know who my dad was. I’m bigger than normal seagulls, but smaller than the Albatross and bigger than a Pacific Gull. I just can’t figure it out.’

‘Then you must be a very special bird indeed,’ said the eagle as she rose gracefully from the driftwood branch. ‘Come on then. Let’s go.’

Pepe blinked. It was possibly the nicest thing any avian had ever said to him. 

Whether you wear black shorts or sunglasses, have Supernatural tendencies, or like to run around yelling out code words with your cousins while you’re playing a game of pool, whether you like dressing up in skintight red suits, have hands with long scissors, or think you might be Out of Time, there is always a Sea Eagle, and always a Ladybird, and always a few raucous seagulls. You can find these birds in the strangest locations sometimes, and often where they aren’t meant to be.

That is the magic of storytelling.

C.S. Capewell aka Kate Capewell.

P.S. When we got our very first home loan several years ago, we were helped by a wonderful group of individuals from a number of different teams and businesses who helped us realise our dream. I will never be able to thank them enough. I still owe someone some chocolate, and I have never forgotten.

Kate x

For the original story of Ambrosia Honeybun Polka Dot, head over to the wonderful team at https://wildeyedpress.com.au

If you need insurance there is also a wonderful group you can get hold of, but they are pretty good at doing their own advertising. There are also a couple of wonderful banks, health insurers, and TV stations in WA and in the Eastern States you might want to watch if you ever come to Australia. There are decent people in the world, you just need to know what to look out for.

The year I turned Fifteen …

I had to leave home with my sibling and partner as the kids I was hanging out with were “Not the right people to be hanging out with”.

We moved to Perth and lived in Balga, and I did year eleven there. During that time, my sibling split up with their partner and my Dad asked me to move back home. It was a conversation I had with him in a public phone box. I said no, because if I did move back, I would only be going back to the things I had been doing before I left. It made him cry.

So, for a little while I moved in with my second cousin’s family before they said they couldn’t have me either, and then for the rest of the year I was fostered out to a family who also lived in Balga. It was during this time I resolved to rely on my own morals and not expect others to look out for me. It was also during this time I was introduced to a Youth Group run by the Catholic Church.

By the end of that year I was going to do Graphic Design at a Technical College but due to being a disruption to that family I was then moved to another foster family who lived in Heathridge. I got a job working at a newsagent in Whitford City.

One weekend, while I was away at a Youth Group camp, the mother of the Foster Family had a nervous breakdown due to the alarm on my digital alarm clock going off on the Sunday morning. It had not gone off the previous morning when I had not been there, but apparently it had gone off on the Sunday morning while I was also not there. I was blamed for this happening, and for causing the nervous breakdown of the mother — so I was taken to the local social workers house and stayed there for several months.

After a little while, as they really didn’t have enough space to keep me properly, I stayed at a half-way house. The eldest people, the ones renting the house, were twenty three and twenty four. I was sixteen going on seventeen, and the two boys that also lived there were fifteen and sixteen. They had had it worse off than me and had been sleeping under bridges, so this was a big step up for them.

After a short while again I rented a room from a man in Heathridge who was a truck driver and stayed there for a while, and when I had made enough money from working I moved out and lived with a gay guy my age and his sister. The place was a duplex and belonged to their mother. During this time I was retrenched from the Newsagents in Whitford City and got a job at a Newsagents in Perth, on Barrack Street. I was eighteen.

So, there you go. Two or three years in a nutshell. I know the only person I could rely on emotionally or to get things done right was myself as when one asks for help or for people to rely on, it rarely happens. One learns to rely on oneself. This is why I listen to other people when they are in trouble or need to be heard, because I know what it feels like.

It’s also why they probably don’t listen to me when I need to be heard, because I’m supposed to be the one that listens. It’s been proven time and time again over the years to me, and nothing has changed in that regard.

I’m supposed to write something positive at the end of this story. The positive thing is this: I will never regret leaving something or somewhere because being held “accountable” for performing an act of kindness or helping someone is not something I will ever feel sorry for. Some people take advantage of people being kind sometimes though, and some people see kindness as being weak (although that’s pretty much the complete opposite of who I am). I know when I’m being taken advantage of, and I know when others see my life as an opportunity to use people like me as an example of “what not to be when you grow up”.

What I did get into trouble for was;

Sticking up for myself

Not telling lies about who I am and who I’m not

Being kind to people and asking if they were okay

Sticking to the rules that were made to keep people safe

Not being educated enough

Not having enough money

And not giving a shit what people say behind my back

Personally, as I never used heavy drugs, never got locked up or went to prison, never sold my body for money and never injured anyone (that I know of), I think I did okay. I learnt how to do that all by myself, so there ya go. Miracle do happen.

To add emotion to your writing

One needs to be able to express emotion through their writing, not just explain what something looks like.

I have tried, without too much success, to explain this to writing partners over the years because I believe, in order to be successful as a fictional writer, one must be able to connect with their own emotions. If you can’t, then what, exactly, is the point of writing a fictional piece?

For many, this is too much. They may get lost in their own words, or their own thoughts, their own beliefs, or their own lack of foresight. One might get so lost in their writing they don’t have time for the people around them. When they still do not learn anything about other people’s emotions, then the fault lies with them, not the people around them.

This doesn’t need to be simply about writing. It’s a truth in all societies. If you aren’t listening, you aren’t learning. If you haven’t got the guts to let yourself be mentally attacked, or be able to mentally defend yourself, then how are you going to learn to be able to express your own emotions?

Some people seem to think when one does not display emotion on their faces, they are not feeling anything. This is not true. For the most part, when someone isn’t displaying an emotion someone else can read, it’s because the person who is expecting this “display” has no understanding of what, or who, the person they are interacting with is.

So, they try to put their own emotions onto someone else. Do me a favour, don’t do that. If you don’t understand that person or who they are, even after years (or months) of them telling you exactly who they are, then walk away. You haven’t learnt anything.

Of course, if the person you are interacting with does not tell you anything about themselves, or simply repeats the same few words over and over again, with no substance to it, then they do not want you to know them, or anything about them. One begins to question, and very quickly I might add, whether anything that person has said is true. When things don’t add up, the questions may become more and more insistent.

That’s one scenario, anyway. There are several other things you can walk away with from this interaction. This person does not wish to know anyone else. This person does not, or cannot, interact freely. This person does not understand social interactions at all. This person has underdeveloped emotions and thinks everything they read or see is either completely untrue, or completely true. This person has been raised as a single entity without having to care for, nor understand, other people.

It still ends up being the same thing, though. If one is unwilling to even write about one’s emotions, then the interaction with others is unsatisfactory to those others. So, choose your words carefully when you write. Understand the context of a situation when you write. Don’t jumble up words with no meaning, don’t go into extremely long definitions of the shape of a clock, or the shape of a keyboard, or the colour of a cup. Don’t tell me in long, flowing descriptive sentences of what the cup feels like either. Show me why it’s picked up in the first place. Show me the exact moment the person picking up that cup is feeling an emotion. Give me visual cues in your words of where that person is at emotionally, mentally, or physically.

Here is one perfect example; it’s sitting on my desk, staring at me, the bright yellow paper curled up on one corner. The words are scraped onto the page with a very clear hand and the letters of the name have been corrected once or twice to make it obvious whose name it is.

The name itself is not important because it doesn’t pertain to this exercise, but the rest of the words exert such a pain in me for the feelings of the person who wrote it I find it difficult to stop myself from bursting into tears. The reason being is because I know that person so well, I feel a small piece of my heart break off at those three simple words.

“Cheapskate has cancelled.”

Now it’s your turn.

“Listen very carefully …”

‘I will say this only once.’

Too many times I have been approached, and each and every one I have turned down.

The hand I offer you is the right one. This is the hand my brothers and sisters use to help me up, and this is the hand I use to help them up. I am quite capable of using this hand, but don’t ever take it for granted. It’s only a helping hand. Every one that tries to see something in me I am not, will be turned away. That is all there is to it.

Do you understand this now? My playing with you never goes beyond that. I have never gone back on my word. I will not do it now, not for you, not for anyone. If I give you safe harbour, this is what you must understand. Deceit does not go hand in hand with the destination. This is what I have been teaching with my brothers and sisters, and this is what I’m telling you now. I have never taken, nor will I ever take, advantage. I will not seek others either, for that just isn’t my way.

I hope this makes it clear to you. My life is my own, but my left hand is the one I will always be with, because that is also my strong hand and I’m quite attached to it. He is my partner, my life and has always been my destination. He loves me, and I love him, and although this changes over the years, I am not planning on leaving my life partner.

Over the years, when I have had to move my ring to a different finger because that finger was too fat (I am so not kidding, it was being ring-barked) I had far too many come to me and ask things they should not have asked. Even with the ring on the correct finger, I have had far too many come to me and ask things that should not have been asked. When they begin to realise this, they might begin to understand. I can play a part, sure, but you’re not going to get any more than that, and I’m not going to do anything like that for you. It’s highly likely you will be treated as the fool you are, if they think this is possible.

They are not nice people.

My friends are not my enemies. They know me very well, and so they know that here I speak the truth. Not too many can say this, and I have understood their pain. These are my brothers and sisters. They move with me towards something that is a lot more pleasant than what is not us.

So, my last question to you is this;

‘Are you happy?’

You say you are happy. This is good. It’s time for you to go, and be happy, like you said you were.

This is the time for me to say to my son, ‘Lead the way.’

He will learn this, too. And he will lead the way.

Don’t be concerned by that. When he leads, he will not be any of the things that make him bad. Not at all. When he leads, he will have a destination, and that is what is important to all of us.