Some of the stars.
Primary classes have just 18 minutes to write their story. Secondary class around 22 minutes, and adults start with 30 mins, and beg for more.
Daniel Iera. Commenced in 2013, and still attends when studies allow. Adult class.
Paper, faded yellow. Dog-eared corners. Creases like it had been folded and then unfolded, and then folded again.
“This is my confession” The letter said.
Who had written this to him? My grandfather had been a private man. At his funeral there were only a handful in attendance. One of them was his lawyer.
Who was confessing to him? What were they confessing to?
He had taken a long time to die. When he was in the hospital, his house was repossessed by the bank. He had little possessions. They were all given to me, after the service.
Nine years old, fishing on Lake Oswald. Him teaching me how to thread the line. Calloused hands gently over mine, up and down and over, and through the loop. The sun over the water, the lake ablaze in dusky orange-yellow. The smell of reeds.
One of these few possessions was a leather-bound copy of Dr Jekyl and Mr Hyde. It was red, the lettering gold and elegant. I had settled in on the arm chair, and opened it, and an envelope had fallen out.
It was blank, and sealed. I could feel a slight weight within it - a thickness around the edges.
There was a letter inside. I let the envelope fall to the floor.
“This is my confession” The letter said.
It said this at the top of the page, on the left.
The paper was extraordinarily thin. I was worried I would tear it. The writing was handwritten.
There was a wall of words, on the front and the back. Small, tight, packed into the margins.
I smiled, just a little. Love letters, maybe? The confession of a secret romance?
It took me just over five minutes to read. I had to take a break more than once. At one point I got up and paced around the room, hands on my head.
The letter was the most horrifying thing I have ever read.
It was a confession to murder. It described in graphic, surgical detail how the author had done it.
“Arms, legs... torso.”
“Eyes... lips.”
“...hacksaw”
Horrible things. Terrible, awful, sickening things.
Who had written this? Who had written this to him?
Surely it’s a joke. I told myself. Just a joke.
But I swore I had seen the name before, the name of the girl. I swore I had seen it on the news.
Why had he kept it? Who had wrote to him such a thing?
My grandfather in the hospital, six months before he died. Looking up, and not recognising me. His eyes grey, a rain-storm over the sea rolling in his pupils, thunder and lightning and salt-spray, a strangers eyes. A hawks eyes.
The envelope, still on the carpet where it had fell. It had no stamp.
No one had mailed it, I realised, then.
“This is my confession.” The letter said
No one had written to him.
The envelope had still been sealed.
No one had confessed anything to him. He had written it himself.
Daniel Iera. Commenced in 2013, and still attends when studies allow. Adult class.
Paper, faded yellow. Dog-eared corners. Creases like it had been folded and then unfolded, and then folded again.
“This is my confession” The letter said.
Who had written this to him? My grandfather had been a private man. At his funeral there were only a handful in attendance. One of them was his lawyer.
Who was confessing to him? What were they confessing to?
He had taken a long time to die. When he was in the hospital, his house was repossessed by the bank. He had little possessions. They were all given to me, after the service.
Nine years old, fishing on Lake Oswald. Him teaching me how to thread the line. Calloused hands gently over mine, up and down and over, and through the loop. The sun over the water, the lake ablaze in dusky orange-yellow. The smell of reeds.
One of these few possessions was a leather-bound copy of Dr Jekyl and Mr Hyde. It was red, the lettering gold and elegant. I had settled in on the arm chair, and opened it, and an envelope had fallen out.
It was blank, and sealed. I could feel a slight weight within it - a thickness around the edges.
There was a letter inside. I let the envelope fall to the floor.
“This is my confession” The letter said.
It said this at the top of the page, on the left.
The paper was extraordinarily thin. I was worried I would tear it. The writing was handwritten.
There was a wall of words, on the front and the back. Small, tight, packed into the margins.
I smiled, just a little. Love letters, maybe? The confession of a secret romance?
It took me just over five minutes to read. I had to take a break more than once. At one point I got up and paced around the room, hands on my head.
The letter was the most horrifying thing I have ever read.
It was a confession to murder. It described in graphic, surgical detail how the author had done it.
“Arms, legs... torso.”
“Eyes... lips.”
“...hacksaw”
Horrible things. Terrible, awful, sickening things.
Who had written this? Who had written this to him?
Surely it’s a joke. I told myself. Just a joke.
But I swore I had seen the name before, the name of the girl. I swore I had seen it on the news.
Why had he kept it? Who had wrote to him such a thing?
My grandfather in the hospital, six months before he died. Looking up, and not recognising me. His eyes grey, a rain-storm over the sea rolling in his pupils, thunder and lightning and salt-spray, a strangers eyes. A hawks eyes.
The envelope, still on the carpet where it had fell. It had no stamp.
No one had mailed it, I realised, then.
“This is my confession.” The letter said
No one had written to him.
The envelope had still been sealed.
No one had confessed anything to him. He had written it himself.
Lonely hearts club. Lisa Essler. Lisa is currently working on her manuscript, The Maze. She also does freelance editing.
“Hi Marge,” said Brian as I walked into the office this morning.
“Hi,” I said and took my rain coat off to hang on the rack. “Have they put the heating on yet,” I asked.
“Yeah, I rang maintenance and they’ve had it up and running for a couple of hours. It just doesn’t feel like it yet.”
“Maybe we’ll get proper electric heating down here one day.”
“We’re not as important as the journos and others upstairs.”
“Yeah, not all flashy but we bring in the revenue with the classifieds etc.”
“Well, let’s get on with it,” said Brian.
I sat at my desk with loaded in trays. I organised them into subjects and began with Garage sales. It was an easy one to organise and place on the boards in printing order by suburb and town.
Next came pet sales.
“Are you doing the items for sale, Brian?”
“Yeah, got it here.”
“I’ve got some pet sales here. Do you want them?”
“I’ll swap with you.”
Brian walked over smirking and handed me the lonely-hearts files he had.
“Oh God, did you have to give me these?”
“Yep.”
I sighed, it would be a long day and it was only Monday morning.
I began reading them. You had to because some were rather inappropriate in their suggestions. Others, well they had black marks against their names. I thought, I’ll make a game of this and suggested it to Brian.
I went through and weeded out the inappropriate and other ones. I was left with a pile of 37 that could be published.
I gave half to Brian and then I read one out loud.
“65 year old retired but active gentleman looks for a mature, active lady for companionship. P.O. Box 68 Mooney ponds.”
I looked at the post box number and moaned.
“Uncle Julian, the only things that are active about you are how often you bend your elbow and how you chase women, any woman will do.”
Brian laughed.
“Fit and slim, 30-year-old single mother seeks friendship with a kind, responsible man, aged 35-50, who likes children and dogs,” read Brian.
“She wants someone rich to support her kids,” said Brian. “Why doesn’t she get out and work.”
I gave him a long-suffering look and he said, “I know, it’s not always that easy.”
“38-year-old hard working single man, with the body of an Adonis, seeks a woman between the ages of 18-25 for companionship. She must be fit and attractive. Intelligent, caring, responsible and a good cook,” I read.
“After a wife come servant are you honey,” I say. “Pity the girl that gets you.”
Brian laughs. We pass the morning that way.
Natasha Grant. Started weeping with mean Year 9 and is now in her third years of university. My dearest Penelope,
I hope this is the last letter I will ever have to write you.
I’m on the ship home. At last, it will be a few short weeks until I see you again, my love. And I know that I also cannot send this letter, so I shall deliver it to you myself in person. I write this, not because I think I will forget what I have to say but because I know I will not have the courage to say it to you aloud.
I have kept my promise to you. I have come home.
My battalion was originally twenty men, all from our home state. You will recognise the name of Henry Callahan, we went to school together. The others I got to know quickly.
The jungles were hot and wet, that is why I rarely wrote, most of our paper was ruined by the rain. Each day was a slog through mud and mosquitoes and a terrible foreigners’ forest, all to get to some damned remote village.
But the men kept my spirits high. Just as in school, Henry played the harmonica; he played every song he could recall - and then started making them up.
We had a man with us, George, who fancied himself a playwrite, and in the evenings would direct us through scenes he had dreamed up on our marches.
We told stories and joked and fought each other. I could tell you a tale about every man there, Penelope, but I can’t force myself to. And I hope you will do me the mercy of never asking.
Our journey was easy, really, compared to the stories the other men on the boat have told me. We saw no one, for days, so we stopped being weary.
The day I’m thinking of - the day I’m writing to you about, happens after a strong rain.
The ground was pure mud and with every step I had to pull my boot out of its sucking grip. I kept losing ahold of my rifle and dropping it in the mud. I was in sour spirits, so my eyes were on the ground, because that was what we were told; if you feel like giving up, watch each step, and see how easy it is.
Well, Penelope, I felt like giving up.
But the others were chatting and laughing and Henry was playing his harmonica. You always said not to make a fool of myself and I knew that if I threw my bag down then and sat in the mud - like I wanted to - I would have been the laughing stock of the battalion.
So I didn’t.
I was in the midst of these sour thoughts when I heard a wet sucking sound, like my boots pulling free of the mud but magnified ten fold. There was a screech from somewhere on the cliff above me, and then a rumble.
I thought at first we were being bombed but no, it was the mountains - an avalanche. I think I was the first to realise, and I just started running for the trees.
The others followed me belatedly but they were too late. The ones at the end of the line were swept up, and their bodies will never be found. The others were crushed and pummelled by slews of mud, mountainous rocks, and trees.
I turned around just as I was hit by a log at the head of the flow. Somehow I held on. I remember little else of this miraculous survival.
I woke up at midday, stuck to the ground, my whole battalion gone. Penelope, my love, this was not the worst of it.
I pulled myself free of the debris and searched for survivors. I searched for hours, calling out names that I later had to recite to the officer who rescued me.
I found only one: Henry. He had somehow held on to his harmonica and that was how I found him, by the sound of that playing.
His legs were crushed, completely useless. Whatever had hit him was gone now, so I slung him over my should - like we were taught - and carried him to a better spot, where he could be comfortable.
I set a fire and we ate from our packs.
By then it was night so we sat and talked and occasionally he would play a song. I remember the entirety of our conversation. I shan’t recite it for you, Penelope, except for one part, when he told me, “I promised my fiancé I would come home and marry her. She won’t want a cripple now.”
He said this while lying back and looking up at the stars. It reminded me of you, and my promise to come home. I wondered if every man of our battalion had made the same promise.
I was looking at the stars, too, ones I didn’t recognise. And under their light I renewed my promise to you.
At some point in the night Henry fell asleep. I couldn’t bring myself to rest so I renewed our fire and went for a walk.
It was as I neared the end of my walk that I heard Henry’s yelling.
I ran for him and in the firelight I saw six of the enemy standing over him, guns raised. I had my rifle. I could have shot some. Maybe I could have shot all of them. Maybe. But I didn’t. I remembered my promise to come home.
I lowered my rifle and snuck away, before they could see me. Henry’s pleading chased after me just as your final words do to me now. He begged for his life until they shot him, lying there like a dog.
So I kept my promise to you, Penelope, and I hope that you will not hold it against me when I ask you now - when I beg you now - to never ask me to make you another promise ever again.
I will see you soon.
Yours forever,
Andrew