The Best Australian Stories 2017

by Maxine Beneba Clarke

  They were expecting paradise.

  With a gentle bump against the pier, the ship delivers Rosa into her new life. The dock is curiously deserted. No streamers. No band. Here, they are not known. There is no family. They are new and friendless.

  He is easy to spot. Dark eyes flitting across the deck before they come to rest on her. He’s slimmer than in the photo.

  Through a scudding heartbeat, she smiles. He gives a half-hearted wave in return, his hand dropping quickly as Maria, now standing beside Rosa and smelling of musty wine, starts blowing kisses.

  ‘Smettila!’ Stop it! Rosa hisses.

  ‘What? It’s my husband.’

  It is then Rosa notices the other dark-haired man running down the pier and waving his cap. The husband Maria has not seen in two years.

  ‘Cara, mio. Cara, mio!’ My darling, my darling! he shouts.

  Tears have streaked Maria’s rouge. Her smile is tight.

  Does she cry for what has been, or what is to come?

  Rosa is suddenly aware of an ache in her finger where the cool breeze has settled on the silver of her wedding band. It is slightly too small but he has promised a new one for the ceremony tomorrow, before they leave Hobart for the hydro. There will be a priest and one family member, a cousin who works with him.

  ‘You do this for the children,’ said Mama. ‘They will want the photo.’

  Her wedding dress is in the trunk, wrapped around the dinner setting. Her veil just fitted inside the tureen. There is a small red wine stain on the hem where Papa was too excited. It is not every day your daughter marries, even if the groom is half a world away! But she thinks her husband will not notice the mark.

  The gangplank is lowering.

  ‘Rosa, in bocca a lupo.’ Rosa, good luck! Into the mouth of the wolf. Maria will be living in Hobart, and the hydro is two hours away. Rosa does not expect to see her again.

  The pair embrace. ‘Crepi il lupo, Maria.’ And to you, Maria. May the wolf croak.

  With her bouncing stride, Maria makes the plank wobble to the point where Rosa must cling to the handrail. Her palms are greasy. Clicking heels will be the last she sees of the older girl.

  For the first time in weeks, Rosa steps onto dry land. She sways from the firmness. The solidity. She is not used to such steadiness and he rushes to take her hand.

  ‘I’ve got you’ are the first words she hears from her husband’s mouth, as she stumbles before straightening.

  She drops his hand. ‘I’m sorry.’

  The apology is shrugged away. ‘Is this all?’ He gestures to the small trunk in her hand.

  ‘No, there is another coming. The trousseau.’

  The crew is starting to unload the hold and Rosa and her husband stand together in silence until her case is placed alongside all the others.

  Their hotel is not far and he decides they will walk.

  ‘Battery Point.’ He nods over the pier to a small piece of land jutting into the river. ‘The government.’ A sandstone building. ‘Mount Wellington.’ He lifts his eyes skyward.

  ‘A mountain?’ It is nothing like the ones at home, which are sharp-edged and snow-capped and graze the clouds. This one is squat and fat, with houses dotted into its protective foothills. A nonna, with grandchildren coddled into the folds of her dress.

  As they walk, she is aware of his breathing, laboured by the strain of carrying two trunks. She has never listened so closely to a person’s breath. The way it’s catching in his throat as it constricts with effort. She supposes this is what it is to really notice someone, to be married.

  Their room is up a slender set of stairs, above some kind of public bar. As he fumbles with the key, she is sure he must hear her heart beating. Will he want it now, or will they at least wait until the sun has set? When the door opens and he stands aside to let her through, she can barely walk and her teeth chatter out of control.

  There are two beds. Narrow, but definitely separate. The one-foot gap between them may as well be an ocean and Rosa reaches for the wall to hold her up. He has not spoken since pointing out the bathroom on the landing.

  ‘I have a letter from your mother,’ says Rosa, and she starts busying herself with the trunks that he has placed in the corner. The bed creaks as he sits, frowning.

  ‘She is well, and your father too. Your little brother has a cough but it is nothing to worry about.’ She is babbling but cannot seem to stop. ‘The summer has been terrible. All the village is suffering. There is no water for anything. Since the war, you know. You are so lucky—’

  At that he sighs and Rosa falls silent. She concentrates on the clips, and curses herself. No one is lucky. But here they are, alive.

  Finally, the lid of the trunk is free and she opens it to find great creamy swathes of fabric – the wedding dress she swaddled so carefully about the plates and the tureen. She digs in with archaeological purpose but instead of finding smooth porcelain, her fingers are met with hard, grainy edges that threaten to cut her skin. A vision of her trunk being tilled about by the ocean brings a wave of seasickness that Rosa tries to swallow away.

  The first plate is broken in three. The second is in four pieces. The third is shattered as well. They all are. The trunk is littered with shards. She bows her head and coughs, shamed by her tears. But silently, he kneels beside her and together they begin to arrange the pieces on the floor. They could be children doing a jigsaw puzzle, but to Rosa they are grave robbers, picking through white bone.

  In the trunk, there is one piece left. The tureen. To Rosa’s surprise, it is intact. She splays her hands around the cool base of the round basin and cradles it with the care of a new mother.

  ‘The letter is in here,’ says Rosa. ‘And my veil.’

  He nods and she indicates for him to take it, which he does.

  But the brush of fingertips is so unexpected, so warm, that Rosa lets go of the tureen and it falls to the ground with a great smash.

  For a second, there is silence. Then there is a howl of despair and Rosa is shocked to discover that it is hers. What does it matter? There is nothing left now for her to lose.

  She becomes aware of a hand on her shoulder. She looks at the man she does not know but is expected to love. Gently, he pulls her head towards his chest and smooths her hair as she sobs into him.

  ‘Shhh,’ he croons. ‘We will make it right.’

  And as she feels his heart, beating loud and strong, and sending blood to all corners of his body, she is inclined to believe him.

  Sis Better

  Ellen van Neerven

  1.

  Sis left her belt on the road, curled up like a king brown. She had just a singlet and grey jeans and one bag on her, no shoes.

  She’d woken up to her name outside the bedroom window. Saw that it was a bird making the sound. The cockatoo called over and over again until there wasn’t any doubt what was being said.

  2.

  The bus got her halfway to her grandfather’s country. She said to herself, Sis better make good on this. It’s the only thing that makes sense. Made more sense than ever.

  The sun was hot on the pavement and many of the passengers went straight to the convenience store across the road. She took her bag out of the back and stood in front next to the timetable. A couple and their young son were a few metres away. She heard them talking. Folding the child’s jacket into a small square, the man was travel-nervous, the woman was not. Looking down the row of shops and cafes, the woman was hungry, the man was not. Sis’s ears were alert: the cockatoo had got her listening.

  3.

  She got in the couple’s car next to the child strapped into a booster seat.

  Is Paul Kelly okay? the man asked.

  I’d prefer if you had his older stuff.

  So you’ve come here to climb the mountain? the woman asked.

  Not to climb. To see.

  You’re not climbing?

  The elders forbid it.

  There was another pause in the conversation
.

  Then the man gestured to the turn ahead. If you don’t mind waiting, we’re going to have lunch at the coast first.

  She knew she didn’t look like someone who could wait. She forced a smile, a thanks, to the mirror. She looked at the child. This child would be a white man.

  The road bent through paperbarks, steered through banana plantations.

  You gubs, she thought, I’m going to die on country. You will help me die.

  The girl in the bakery was her cousin. Her uncle was working on the fire they passed on the freeway. She didn’t look in their eyes.

  4.

  Sis had been asked to go in with the child because the parents didn’t swim. She didn’t want to be with them for any longer but held her patience thinking she needed the transport.

  No surprises: no blacks on this beach or any non-whites. Massacre site. Many of the beaches here held that sort of history. Groups had been speared by the whites here, and a few beaches along, flour had been poisoned, killing another hundred local people. Wanted to tell the child when away from the parents. His mother took off his T-shirt and put the rash vest on him. Sis went in with her knickers and crop.

  The water was colder than she remembered. The waves just right. The boy didn’t want to go in until she told him he was a shark.

  5.

  Then of course the boy didn’t want to get out when the mother called. He was having such a good time mixing up his encounter with waves, sometimes ducking under, sometimes flipping on his back, sometimes dunking himself on purpose, the saltwater and drool oozing out of his mouth. Sis was passive, watched until the mother, her yoga pants rolled up, walked in, her face scrunched up, and put her hand on the boy’s shoulder. Told the boy his father was on his way to the pub and ordering chips.

  On the way the woman was telling Sis and the boy that this park was named after her grandfather, the street after her uncle. Her grandfather’s brother had built the pub, the maroon wooden building on the corner. A busy crew of people clustered above on the old balcony. Sis got herself a soda lime.

  Eh, Sis! It was Donna, working behind the counter. You not drinking anymore?

  Sis grabbed Donna’s hand. Still working there, started when she was eighteen, maybe she was thirty-five-ish now. She was a skinny thing, James Baldwin book there next to the taps.

  You okay there, Sis?

  I’m okay. I’m happy to see you.

  Coming tomorrow? I’m dancing.

  You dancing with the troupe now?

  Ceremony tomorrow at the cultural centre there.

  The manager had come over, a tall older man. Bitch, I’m not paying you to talk to your rellos.

  Donna glanced up at the people behind Sis. Men of the same type, waiting for beer.

  Sis glared at the manager and didn’t get out of the way.

  He’d run out of patience. Fuck, it’s not Abo o’clock.

  Sis, enjoy your drink and being in town, Donna said calmly. Hope to catch up later. She winked at her.

  Sis reluctantly walked away. The couple and their child had already finished their chips and were standing outside. They hadn’t seen her and Donna together. She wanted them to go in there, to hear from Donna how many young people had topped themselves in this community just this year. Give them some sort of idea.

  Daddy saw there’s a storm coming, the child said as soon as she reached them.

  A big one, he said. I’ll get the car.

  We should head home, the mother said.

  Home was a fantasy. Long driveway down a dip. Cows in the paddock beside. Farmhouse with aircon and too many bathrooms. Nut trees and a cover of rain starting.

  6.

  Lightning rose like a flower. She would have never described it like this until tonight. This electrical storm had more strikes than she had ever seen: it just went on and on. It was enough to miss the light when it was not there, and she thought about how her mother, terrified of storms, had tried to give her this terror too but she had rejected it.

  Her mind was quivering. They had put the four-year-old in with her, on the other bed, the child sleeping soundly. She couldn’t not know the child was in there with her for a second so she had gone out in the hall to watch the storm – this is where she would sleep if she could sleep at all. She had promised her mind death on country when she got there, it was only just the valley below, down the hill.

  Late that afternoon, when they came in off the coast road, they crossed the northern river and saw the mountain in the image and that’s when she felt close.

  She was moved to excitement. Twitching, wanting to wake the boy and show him how angry she was. Wanting to go into the couple’s bedroom and tell them that this house wasn’t meant to be here, that it was wrong that they were here.

  She felt calm thinking of the taste of the grass on her lips as she found her final resting place back on country, on the foot of the mountain. How does the child sleep? Did he not hear the frogs? Wanting to die at the mountain to show she had been given life and she had given it back for Creation to give it to another.

  She had not made nothing. Sis had made music – two records, more than twenty songs. Made two rooms out of one at her brother’s place so her mum could live there and get away from their stepdad. Her mother missed country most. Missed it more than she did, until now. Her mother wanted to be back to the river, to their freshwater, to her family.

  Her hands in little balls, her feet in falls – they kept sinking the rest of her with them. She saw a stranger walk towards her in a dream and then she shook awake again and the storm was still alive. She was still alive, though she could be broken by tears or breath or by her gut.

  7.

  She was nothing until morning, until the woman came to the breakfast bar and said the storm had killed two people on the summit of the mountain.

  Two fellas, interstate tourists, had climbed, ignored lore. A tree had come down on them and they had been found in the morning.

  Very sad, the woman said as a question.

  I don’t have words, Sis replied.

  We slept right through it. The woman said. Could you sleep well?

  I didn’t sleep, I dreamt.

  The coffee was perfect and her anger had faded so she was zapped and in need of family. She said yes to going into town with the couple instead of heading first thing to the mountain.

  8.

  This town had been named after the palm that flooded the area. The markets were not on. Instead, talk about storm damage. Another coffee in the cafe on the corner and a piece of buttered quinoa bread left on the boy’s plate.

  She said her goodbyes as her mother might, with humour, with a bit of lingo rolled up in there. She moved on quickly.

  There was a bus stop at the servo. Sis sat there – the bus didn’t come for an hour. A woman came past and asked how to get to the community by the mountain.

  The woman was the mother of one of the young men who had died. She had driven in from the Granite Belt. Her son was gay, she said, living in one of the least tolerant towns in the country. He and his partner lived in fear but could not move because their work was there. They had gone on a road trip for the weekend. The mother of the son could not believe it had stormed overnight. The sun was out and the sky was as the sea. Sis told the mother her ancestors would be in mourning.

  9.

  Is it hard? Do your legs shake when you don’t want them to? Sis asked Donna as they sat on the sand they’d brought up from the beach.

  You learn the story for the dance and then it’s not so hard. Donna let the red skirt on her waist come around her and mix with the sand.

  The centre’s doors opened, and the room started filling up. Donna was given her woven band. Other women, young and old, wore these bands around their wrists and ankles.

  She said to Donna, When I was younger, I thought white people couldn’t see black cockatoos, from Mum.

  True?

  Yeah, I thought they were invisible to them. And you know, last nig
ht, I think I was invisible. Last night I wanna die and I scream and cry and the whitefellas didn’t hear me.

  And today? Donna looked up from tying the band around her ankle.

  Sis helped make space. There were didge and possum skin drums coming. The drums bumped together as they were carried through the space and made the start of a sound.

  Today I’m here.

  Publication Details

  Dominic Amerena’s ‘Help Me Harden My Heart’ appeared in Australian Book Review (6 January 2017).

  Madeline Bailey’s ‘The Encyclopaedia of Wild Things’ appeared in Voiceworks (Issue 106, December 2016).

  Tony Birch’s ‘Sissy’ appeared in Westerly (Vol. 62, No. 1, July 2017).

  Verity Borthwick’s ‘Barren Ground’ appeared in And Watch the Whale Explode: UTS Writers’ Anthology 2017 (NewSouth Books, 2017).

  Elizabeth Flux’s ‘One’s Company’ appeared in The Legend of Monga Khan: An Aussie Folk Hero (Peter Drew Arts, 2016).

  Cassie Hamer’s ‘By Proxy’ appeared in Mascara Literary Review (Issue 20, April 2017).

  John Kinsella’s ‘The Telephone’ appeared in Southerly, (Vol. 76, Issue 3, May 2017).

  Julie Koh’s ‘The Wall’ appeared in the Canary Press (Issue 10, August 2016).

  Melissa Lucashenko’s ‘Dreamers’ appeared in The Near and The Far: New Stories from the Asia-Pacific Region (Scribe, 2016).

  Jennifer Mills’s ‘Miracles’ appeared in Meanjin (Vol. 76, Issue 1, Autumn 2017).

  Joshua Mostafa’s ‘The Boat’ appeared in Southerly (Vol. 76, Issue 3, May 2017).

  Ryan O’Neill’s ‘Polly Stepford (1932–1997)’ appeared in Meanjin (Vol. 76, Issue 3, Spring 2016).

  David Oberg’s ‘Nose Bleed’ appeared in the Lifted Brow (Issue 33, March 2017).

  Allee Richards’s ‘Perry Feral’ appeared in Kill Your Darlings (Issue 29, April 2017).

  Mirandi Riwoe’s ‘Growth’ appeared in Review of Australian Fiction (Vol. 21, Issue 3, February 2017).