Australia
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The heat came early in the morning from nowhere, and by the afternoon it was pressing down on all sides. The first day of summer, I called it. Roddy said it was just a phantom. We closed the curtains and sat around without clothes. My back was slick with sweat, and the backs of my
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‘He stopped swimming, and floated. Just held himself there, in the middle of the pool. His body was very long. I watched him closely, just a long thin line of body in the middle of the pool, broken by the blue of his bathers. Then I imagined the bathers gone. It was easy, really, but
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Although he hadn’t been asleep, Michael felt rested and much calmer. The room was still and peaceful, and lit by a bleed of sunlight around the edges of the curtains. He was lying on his front, and he turned his head and looked across the bed, into the mirror in the wardrobe door. Just behind
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‘What if someone sees?’ I said. He told me not to worry. ‘No one here cares,’ he said. I wasn’t convinced. A man with a dog was walking at the water’s edge, headed in our direction. I sat up. ‘Can we wait?’ I said. ‘Just till he’s passed?’ ‘It’s okay,’ he said. ‘I recognise him.
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The night before I travelled home, you asked me if I’d confirmed the taxi to pick me up and take me to the airport in the morning. ‘No. I’d better check,’ I said. You watched as I dialled the cab company. The call was very confusing to me. They were too quick to say that
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