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House of Sighs One
ONEThe town was never the same.Funerals were conducted two at a time, and once the dead were buried in either Railway Street or Bowen Road cemeteries, a candlelit vigil was held on the town’s Catholic School grounds. Memorial flames illuminated thousands of faces, and among them were the families of the victims, the media, and those who came out of curiosity and respect. Articles and books were written about what happened, each speculating about how the dominoes fell. No answers.Michael didn’t accept a single interview, despite handsome offers from both print and television tabloids. He moved away with his parents to a beachside town of similar proportions and prejudices as James Bridge. In their new house, a letter of sympathy from the newly elected prime minister, John Howard, and his wife, Janette, tucked away in a filing cabinet collecting dust.A year after the James Bridge massacre, 28-year-old Martin Bryant murdered 35 people and injured a further 21 at the historic Port
House of Sighs Zero
ZEROMichael came to a road at the top of the hill.Exhausted, he looked to the left. No cars coming in that direction. Nothing on the right either, just an endless stretch of black bitumen surrounded by fields and dancing flowers. On the horizon, James Bridge sat in a quicksilver haze. Helicopters swarmed above the town, their thudding blades lost on his ears. All Michael could hear was his pulse.He wouldn’t be found for another thirty-seven minutes. In that time, flies laid eggs in his wounds, in the corners of his eyes.Michael Delaney felt a shadow on his face. He watched the crow swoop down to land upon a metal rectangle silhouetted against the sun. The bird spread its wings, claws scratching at the dented sign. Michael cupped a palm to his brow and read the words printed across its surface.BUS STOPS HERE
House of Sighs THE SOUND OF HIS BONES BREAKING
PART ZEROFORTY-EIGHTNot all worlds end in a crash of buildings and airplanes, in smoke and ruins and meteor showers. Some worlds come apart one humiliating crack at a time. And no matter how hard you fight, nothing can stop it. So, at the almost-end, you’re left helpless, more exhausted than you’ve ever been, questioning how it came to this. These thoughts tightened the knot in Adrian Bonner’s stomach. Some things he didn’t want answered. He studied his reflection in the blank computer screen instead, and the sigh that followed came with an almost resigned expectancy. This was his new normal.Christ, I look like death.Looking back, the cracks were obvious. The unsealed medication bottle. That pulp of vomit in the toilet bowl the flush missed. Things which looked like they were flying but were falling in secret.The smile that lasted too long. A touch that carried no weight.None of it mattered anymore. Why would it, when
House of Sighs Forty-seven
FORTY-SEVENScratch-scratch-scratch.Danny Fletcher dragged himself into the shower—not because he wanted to be clean but on account of Aiden’s impending return. He’d soon be exposed, and the shower, as best he knew, was the only place a man could cry without being noticed.Naked. Footfalls against the tiles, a sad clap for one.He came here to be alone. To beat off without his partner knowing. To laugh at jokes nobody else found amusing. To wrestle memories of the prick who bullied him at school thirty years ago, all those painful twinges he couldn’t quite untie; and then, after this, to weep like the pussy everyone made him out to be. The shower was where men of Danny’s breed haunted themselves.Over the thrum of water, he heard skeletal branches clattering at the window trying to get in and toy with his animosity and hurt. He knew what must be done. Oh, the freedom blame brings.Blood pooled pink between his toes.Scratch-scratch-scratch.
House of Sighs Forty-six
FORTY-SIXThe ferry.Some of the people around Aiden stood, some sat, but all watched the water and the fish snatching low-flying dragonflies from the air. They swam amid the bags, those plastic river ghosts. Next to him a boy wore headphones; the two of them swayed with the ebb and flow of the Chao Phraya’s current. Aiden broke down against this young man’s shoulder, buckling, despite this being his weight to carry. After all, Bangkok hadn’t called to Aiden alone, though it may have seemed that way at first. Aiden came to Thailand for his boyfriend.Even after all he’s done, I still love the bastard.What a crime it is to think Danny’s worth saving. Well, fuck me then. Fuck it all.No stop, mate. Thinking that way will do you in, too.The boy with the headphones was, of course, awkward about Aiden’s tears but relented. He patted the older man’s arm, kind and tender and non-judgmental. In English, the boy lied and said everything would be okay. “Tell me what is wrong.”They drew
House of Sighs PART ONE - Forty-five
PART ONEFORTY-FIVEDecember 29, 2017The taxi screeched into a U-turn as today teetered into tomorrow, slowing at the last possible second. It mounted the curb in a scrape of metal against cement. The two men in the pub’s open bar across the street glanced up from the matching pints of ale they were downing.Neither Aiden nor Danny realized how drunk he was until they leapt from their stools. The small Australian city spun around them.“Woah. What’s going on over there, you reckon?” Aiden said.“No idea, babe.”It was unusual for them to have imbibed quite so much—they were lightweights, after all. Hangovers in your early forties were harder to wrestle than those in your early twenties. “But it’s Christmas,” they said, a free-for-all excuse if there ever was one. They didn’t have to show their faces at their respective workplaces until after the New Year shutdown period. As far as they were concerned, whatever hangovers
House of Sighs Forty-four
FORTY-FOURFebruary 30, 2018“You okay in there?” called Sue, the receptionist, over torrents of pounding rain.Her voice filtered from the door leading to the men’s bathroom. Danny didn’t think she would come any further but she did. He lifted his head from the toilet bowl, listening to her tip-toe approach, reminded then of the billy goats Gruff in the old tale from his childhood, as one by one, they journeyed up the hillside to make themselves fat, disrupting a troll in the process. Clip-clop. Clip-clop. Clip-clop. Who’s that trapping over my bridge?“I’m f-f-f-fine,” he said.Only Danny wasn’t fine. Sue’s shoes emerged under his door; flats, sensible and comfortable looking. Perfume crept into the cubicle with him. Such a foreign smell in this place.“Maybe it was too soon to come back to work, Danny.”He shifted around to sit on the porcelain seat, face in hands that refused to stop shaking. Danny contemplated using one of the mindfulness apps on his phone, breathing prompt
House of Sighs Forty-three
FORTY-THREEThey were in bed together that afternoon, still wearing their work shirts, trousers intertwined on the carpet. Aiden spooned Danny this time. He exhaled, soft tummy pressing against his partner’s spine. Summer sun on his back from the window as he studied the rear of Danny’s head—heat from behind, chill in front—wondering what it must be like to exist within it.That thought retreated, a little afraid.Squeezed. “Endolphins,” Aiden said, coy and cutesy. Their old joke. A play on endorphins, the rush their touch once evoked. No laugh this time.A thick sludge of hush.“I’ve got something to tell you,” Aiden said. Lips against Danny’s neck now, stubble scratching skin. “Well, something I want to run by you, more like it.”“Y-yeah?”“I’ve been offered a posting. An embassy consulate position.”“O-o-o-okay.”Danny’s stutter was awful today. He hated seeing him trip over words that used to come with ease. It was hard to listen to and even harder to watch, sentences turn
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