AustLit

'I message Daisy.
8:15am: Pip’s missing.
8:17am: I don’t know where she is.
8: 21am: Any ideas?
She doesn’t reply. I put my phone back in the pocket of my dressing-gown and wipe the damp hair from my face. A slight drizzle grows heavier as I rush past the construction site, the park, Oxley drive then Jalna street. All the time I am screaming: ‘Pip, Pip!’ I ask two, three, four separate people on their morning walks if they’ve seen a long-haired Chihuahua. They haven’t. It starts to hail shortly before I reach Burwood Highway. I can’t hear my voice over the cars and the rain. Still half dressed,
I yell at the traffic.' (Introduction)

'I met Jeanette when she fell from a tram. Well, it was more of a stumble, really. A desperate attempt to stabilise her delicate body as her legs failed to hold her steady, urgently leading her to the curb. I had been watching her for some time now, and by some time,
I mean the nine minutes it took to get from stop 41 to stop 48 at four o’clock on a Tuesday afternoon. Jeanette’s grocery bags sat beside her on the fluorescent green seat of the vehicle, their contents threatening to spill at each screeching halt as we came to the next stop. A soft breeze swept through the window as I, in my own tired daze, unconsciously watched her body sway back and forth to the motion of our ride. It was interesting how, just like the ocean, people let the tram take control of them. As a frequent commuter, I had now almost mastered the way of the tram. It required
a certain positioning and stability of the legs. If they were
not firmly planted, you were sure to be swept away.' (Introduction)

'For Arvid, an absolute desperation defined every
creature of this earth, and meanings they assigned to
their existence were evasive at best. Yet people lived
on, making use of their only treasure and punishment:
memory. He knew that existence without the context of
memory would be an absolute oblivion; as lonely and
weightless as the falling autumn leaves. Dry veined, and
crinkled bodied, the perfect vessel of death and freedom.
Sometimes he would turn a page from a book and
read a random sentence like, ‘Laughter is the strongest
self-defense mechanism’ or ‘I needed some time
to collect my thoughts.’ He would contemplate these for a
while. He would quietly enjoy their contextless existence.' 

(Introduction)

'There is a great big something that lives in my attic.
A shadowed, creeping creature that lurks just out of sight.
I think it followed me here. It makes the same
groaning sound that used to wake me in the middle of
the night. I thought it was just the creaking bones of my
old apartment, but this house is sleek and new, no bones
in sight. But, on the roof of the hallway that connects
my bedroom to the kitchen, there is a trap door. Such
an innocent square that just fails to blend in with the rest
of the ceiling. It is from behind this patch of ceiling that
I sometimes hear thumps and groans. I have not yet had
the courage to open it.' (Introduction)

'Benjamin’s parents passed away years ago, yet
no dust had settled in the house. He was left-handed, yet wrote with his right, and continued to playthe violin despite his hatred for the instrument. For Benjamin, days passed quietly, as he preferred solitude and left the house only to water the gardens or buy groceries for himself and his mother’s old lump of a dog, Chester. Much of his time was spent by the window of the main room with a cup of tea
or the occasional glass of scotch, contemplating the outside world with a hint of philosophical disdain.' (Introduction)

'The woods reclined, disappearing as the mountain staggered towards the sky. The tall, all-knowing trees
had witnessed adult secrets on children’s lips. Workers hacked away memory and monstrosity against hickory pine, axes swinging until devastation fell. The resounding crack snapped through the air, alerting all who lived there. One burden laid to rest, one truth uncovered, misfortune put to the test.' (Introduction)

'At perihelion, a planetary body is at the position in its orbit at which it is closest to its sun.

'There are those who like to think themselves too great for the void of empty space—believing that darkness will never eclipse their pristine lives. They are the kind of people who walk in the light year-round as if it is a privilege granted at birth. But where there is light there must be shadow. At times, the weight of the world or rather, its heavens, seemed all too much for him to bear. Thus he sought to share the load, and in doing so he had fashioned himself the mask of Atlas—outwardly like god, inwardly something bitter and diseased—a creature that enjoyed watching the weight collapse upon the shoulders of those fooled into wearing it.' (Introduction)