Glass: The Fiction Edition- 2022

Fiction Edition 2 02 2

QUTGLASS.COM

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ILLUSTRATED BY CLAUDA PILBEAM

1

FRONT COVER ARTWORK BY CLAUDIA PILBEAM THE GLASS EDITORS

Contents Hot Pink Blues by Jaime Colley...................... 7 Going Down by Rory Hawkins........................ 8 Tuned In by Lilian Martin.................................25 Home, Foraged by Sophie Tomassen........58

Why Glass?

Whether you’re a glass half-full or glass half-

This special edition of Glass is a celebration of the practice of fiction writing and the love of

(chauffeured by my ever-patient parents),

fiction among QUT students. We have collated

wiping baby throw-up off my shirts, organising

five stories from current students, as well as

glitter and stickers that were invariably out of

Q&As with each author so that you can have

control in my bright pink craft caddy. These

a peek behind the curtain of their creative

years of babysitting proved fruitful in many

practice.

many people’s homes. A writer’s dream.

students.

Like always, we aim to navigate you through all facets of life that students experience. Glass is QUTGLASS.COM

stories that matter to students, and we hope you enjoy this issue.

Glass Media and the QUT Student Guild

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander readers

acknowledge the Turrbal and Jagera peoples

are warned that the following magazine may

as the First Nations owners of the lands where

contain references to deceased persons.

QUT now stands. We pay respect to their Elders, past, present, and emerging, their lores, customs, and creation spirits. We recognise that these lands have always been places of teaching, research, learning, and storytelling.

Disclaimer Glass Media informs readers that the views, thoughts, and opinions expressed in this issue of Glass belong solely to the author, and do not

Glass Media and the QUT Guild acknowledge

necessarily express the views of Glass Media

the important role Aboriginal and Torres

or the QUT Guild.

Strait Islander peoples play within the Meanjin community.

loneliness, there’s something so magical about seeing someone else read your words and interpret your work in their own artform.

that, to be honest, scared me – were the ones

I hope Grace, Jaime, Rory, Lilian, and Sophie –

where there wasn’t a bookshelf to be found.

our wonderful authors featured in this edition

(There’s an obvious discussion to be had

— enjoy experiencing this magic for themselves

here about the fact that access to books and

(some of them for the very first time!) when

access to the time necessary to read them is

they see the illustrations Claudia Pilbeam has

complicated by socio-economic status. You’ll

created to accompany their stories. I hope you

have to trust me that this was not a material

delight in the playfulness of Claudia’s work as

issue in this case. ) I remember being so

I do.

homes. How could they have houses without

Cultural Warning

Writing can be lonely. Because of this

The only homes I didn’t like – the only homes

confused about the adults who lived in these

Acknowledgement of Country

ELLA BRUMM

in and out of houses around Ashgrove

was having a licence to see the inside of so

stacked with stories for QUT students by QUT

CIARAN GREIG

I spent my teenage years babysitting: flitting

ways, but at the time, one of my favourite parts

empty kind of person; this issue of Glass is

here to be a lens on the issues, successes, and

TOM LOUDON

Editor’s Introduction

Liminal by Grace Harvey................................... 6

books? How did they function? How did they even know who they were? Perhaps more judgementally — what sort of children were these people raising? These are questions that have niggled at my mind ever since.

Like many, I have a deep affection for words and language, and the feeling of holding a hardcopy book or magazine between my fingers. I believe

The thing I love most about all writing, but especially fiction, is the dance the writer and reader do together. Reading is an inherently creative act, to conjure in your mind the images a writer has attempted to paint with mere words. We hope you enjoy reading (and dancing) through this special edition of Glass.

Ciaran Greig Fiction Editor

that through reading and fiction, there is a sort of vital exchange between writer and reader that makes life worth living. I would guess, given that you are reading Glass: The Fiction Edition, you probably feel the same way.

EDITOR’S INTRODUCTION

3

Liminal GRACE HARVEY

Brisbane is a stone and glass monolith,

She fights with the jammed lock on the

That first night she spends long hours awake

back door for a few minutes before giving

listening to the staccato beat of the traffic on

in, dropping to the floor in the centre of the

the walls, the gentle half hum of the next-door

would-be living room, hands and head resting

neighbours playing music on their back deck,

between her knees. The Brisbane humidity has

the occasional cacophony of laughter. It makes

descended on her like a second skin, lingering

her feel less alone, the house less stagnant. But

and heavy. It sits on in her lungs and over top

sleep is still slippery. The air is heavy and warm

of her head. Sweat running down from her

and the light in her room is an odd, unnatural

hairline to the concave space between her

shade. The ceiling fan only serving to move the

shoulder blades.

air in the room around rather than providing her any real relief from the oppressive heat.

spiralling out into a collection of old

August looses a long breath, the unfamiliar

Queenslanders and low, seventies-built, brick

space leaving her prickly and unsettled.

August tosses, one way and then the other, on

bunkers with warped metal balconies. The

She tries to imagine herself cooking in the

the unfamiliar mattress. Pressing her forehead

city is a yawning maw, an unfamiliar predator

kitchen or lingering in a corner during a house

to the cold wall she takes a long slow breath and

waiting to swallow August whole.

party, but the house still feels like a white

lets the weight of the leaving settle over her,

box, unfamiliar and unwelcoming without

acknowledges the ache of missing home behind

the lived-in clutter. It’s just her and the few

her rib cage. In the quiet almost-morning of her

lingering pieces of past tenants: a milk crate

half-unpacked bedroom, August lets herself

on the small landing at the back steps and a few

cry.

The sun is slinking its way over the uneven skyline by the time she pulls into the rental house’s driveway. August stares through her windshield up at the white panelled townhouse with its large, dark oak door. It’s tucked at the

scattered pasta shells in the kitchen cabinets.

***

back of a sleepy suburb a few blocks back from

She tries to picture Beau, happy and day-drunk

a major road. The street is a collection of green

at a concert. Her brazen haired little brother

lawns and weeping jacaranda trees dripping

sweaty from the muggy heat and the closeness

purple flowers onto the hoods of cars.

of other bodies. Maybe he is kissing someone

She works through her boxes methodically,

lazily in a corner or shooting straight tequila off

trying to find homes for her plants, pruning

a sticky bar. Maybe he is damp with salt water,

a scraped leaf off her ficus. She puts her

sunburnt shoulders layered in a thin sheen of

expensive art history textbooks on her

aloe vera and sunscreen.

windowsill, stroking the silky texture of their

Inside it is achingly empty, filled only by the squeak of her boots on the floor, the dry sound of her fingertips skimming the walls. August opens all the doors and forces the windows wide to let in air but somehow the house still

A panic builds like pressure in her chest the

smells dusty and stale.

longer she lingers, a strangling worry. The weight of overthinking bearing down, stomach rolling. August presses one of her own cool palms to her forehead, focusing on the swaying jacaranda through the kitchen window.

August tries to keep herself busy after that first day.

covers, the glossy inside pages with the pads of her fingertips. Buys furniture for her bedroom and uses up an evening and a cheap bottle of wine building it all. Tries to find places for everything she owns, puts it all up and takes it all down again.

***

4

LIMINAL

5

August cleans the settled dust off all the The lights of the city are violent at first, growing surfaces and makes a simmer pot to sit on to winking and distant the further she drives. the stove to fill the house with a smell other August winds the windows down and lets the clothes and irons the wrinkles out of her good its way through her open palm hanging out the

Hot Pink Blues

shirts. She spends long hours reading in the window.

JAIME COLLEY

than closed-up-must. She re-washes all of her cool air run over her sweat slicked skin, lace

back grass on one of her beach towels, in just

From this high up, the city is nothing but a sprawl

Lemon is pregnant, a soft litter of puppies,

of blinking lights and shadows surrounded by an

due in a few weeks. She nuzzles into my hand,

angelic glow. August’s not the only uni student

forcing my love onto herself, so I give in and

She takes herself to get a haircut and while the here. She can spot them, clumped in small

scratch her ears. She pants, her belly round

lady is combing through the damp ends of her groups, a few lingering alone like her. She sits

and full. She wanders away from me and flops

hair, she asks August where she is from.

alone on a small patch of night damp grass, the

down in the grass. The sun filters over her eyes,

air around her is quiet and thin. No one seems to

so she reshuffles, and then lets out a long sigh. I

speak above a whisper, as if trying to maintain

smile, as I realise how alike she is to a pregnant

the simultaneous illusion of quiet away from the

human.

her bra and jeans, in that short time she can almost pretend it’s a holiday.

‘Out west. Is it that obvious?’ August chokes out, embarrassed, staring at the scuffs on the toes of her boots.

city below.

‘No. Well—’ The hairdresser pauses, August watches a few strands of hair drift past her cheek. ‘It’s the ute, mostly. But your accent as well.’ She turns August’s head, then imitates her own apparent drawl to her. August doesn’t say anything else.

I call Mum a few weeks later to see if she has

August tucks her knees up to her chin, wrapping

birthed the puppies. Mum tells me Lemon

her arms around her shins and pressing herself

forced a miscarriage. When I ask why she would

into a hug. In the moment she feels childlike

do that, Mum explains that dogs can reabsorb

again, small, and distantly sad. The feeling creeps

the litter if something isn’t right.

up on her, the dry cough of a cry threatening in the back of her throat. August forces it away. Still,

‘Mothers always know,’ she says. ***

For the first time that afternoon she thinks the city yawns. about going home.

I wake before the world when I find out the ***

Grace Harvey is a third-year creative writing

On her final night alone in the house, August student and Meanjin (Brisbane) based fiction drives to the Mount Coot-Tha Lookout in her writer. Their work can be found at ScratchThat, pyjamas. She shuffles through the cassettes Glass Magazine, Baby Teeth Journal, and most Beau left in the ute’s glovebox and puts one in places online at @graceharveywrites. while she drives, the car speakers tinny and

news. At first, I don’t absorb it. I’m scrolling through Instagram the same way someone functions before coffee, but slowly, I get my fix, and my mind is working. By the time I read the news, the sky is the colour of peaches, clouds like tissue paper. Roe v. Wade is overturned in America. My brain is instantly thinking, thank

quiet.

God I’m in Australia. However, this does not dull the panic that’s smoking in my belly. It is an ignorant thought. Oceans do nothing to protect from sexism. If anything, America has taught it to swim. I climb out of my bed and sit Q&A WITH GRACE

by the fireplace. It provides me no warmth, so I cry hot tears instead. ***

6

HOT PINK BLUES

7

I’m home helping Mum and Dad muster and

I buy a pink dress to wear at a literary salon.

to not think ahead, to wait and see if I care if

scooter, and eat mulberries from trees, and use

mark lambs. Three hundred head. Mum is in the

I make peace with the colour. For years, we

there’s blood between my legs in a month. I feel

curled hibiscus as lipstick. I genuinely had so

yards with the kelpies, pushing sheep up the

blued. I didn’t like its deliberate grandstanding,

sick. My partner sees this and offers to drive me

much to look forward to. I look down at these

race. I needle and drench while Dad brands and

parading purported femininity. For so long,

to the chemist in the morning.

little girls, and I sigh.

tags. It is a routine we mastered years ago when

I thought being feminine should’ve been a

I was a kid. We move accordingly, shift when

secret, like secrecy equalled elegance, and

I think of the conservatives I’ve seen on social

They don’t know yet what it means to be

sheep need pushing up, step away so the dogs

that’s what being a woman came down to. I

media, likening abortions with careless, stupid

a woman. It will be the most exciting and

can get through. Some families rotate around

am not elegant. I’m heavy, with chocolate cake

teenage girls who couldn’t be bothered to use

terrifying time of their lives, but I hope they

kitchen benches to prepare feasts; we rotate

thighs, and like a blister, I hold more anger than

protection (because it’s only her responsibility,

know that every female in every room stands

around yards, sheep, and dogs. At some point,

forgiveness.

right?). I think of my pills, and the broken

with them.

Mum struggles to push a mob of rams into the race. I jump back there with her, a black kelpie at my feet.

‘Push ‘em up,’ I say. The kelpie barks and sweeps across the yard. The rams shift, and they understand they must move forward. I tell the

I was taught where pink was soft, and I was

You can do everything, and it can still be not

calloused. It wasn’t until I became older did I

enough. I cry in the shower for those teenage

realise I could be both. Being a woman means

girls. I see my sixteen-year-old face behind

I am both.

their eyes, and I feel the ache in their hearts as ***

dog to sit, and she does. I look at Mum.‘I think

‘Bitch!’ Some guy hollers as they drive past

I want to go to a protest.’

while I finish my afternoon walk. I didn’t even

‘You can’t.’ That’s all she says. I refrain from saying that I wasn’t asking for her permission.

I climb back over the fence and walk up the race. For the remainder of the afternoon, we are unbalanced, and sheep spill everywhere. ***

know he was trying to talk to me out of his car window. Taylor Swift was blaring through my

I wash myself clean.

(Champagne Problems). There is no guilt. If I had heard him, I would have ignored him, and I would still be a bitch.

morning-after-pills, to drive them to clinic appointments, to pick out their pink dresses.

I will be there, ready to hold their hands, and show them how to move forward.

When I go into the chemist the next morning, I ask for the morning-after-pill in a crisp and

Jaime Colley is a fourth-year creative writing

loud tone. I hope a teenage girl hears me and

and law student at QUT. She has been published

knows this is okay.

in Concrescence Zine, Verses Magazine, Glass,

earphones, and I turn her down for no one. He just happened to scream as a song was finishing

And that I will be there too, to buy them

***

and the Luna Collective, among others. Her writing often swings wildly between the dark

My brother’s wedding is soft. It’s in a garden

potential of thrillers, the subtle delicacy of

nursery, and I can smell early blooming

relationships, and if she’s feeling especially

wattle. Sun filters through poinciana trees,

game, both. Jaime is a proud Taylor Swift fan

and everything glows at the edges. I pick at my

and has somehow survived this far into her

I pull tarot cards every morning in July. A ritual,

In ignorance, accident, or deliberation,

acrylic nails. It’s not often I get dressed up like

degree without drinking any coffee. Psychotic?

for myself. Some of my friends think they’re

I am the bitch. I think of Lemon, and

this, the heels and hair. I feel like a girl. Dad

She’s aware.

a waste of time, but I find comfort in their

her reabsorbed puppies, how her body

gives me a hug and tells me, ‘You look good,

meanings, like every vibration will become a

understood it’s limitations. Maybe a bitch is

mate.’

ripple, like this world is moving through us,

something to aspire to.

rather than with us. I pull the same card for a while: the Ace of Swords. It is a card of great

*

This is his way of saying beautiful. I cling to the words and feel so warm.

force, and means to triumph or conquest,

The condom breaks. Of course it does. I take

My three nieces play with the hem of my dress.

either in love or hatred. For a while, I can’t pair

my pill in a religious fashion, a habit which was

They’re aging, which is such a sad verb to give

the meaning with my life. It isn’t until one frosty

hard to enforce, so the worry doesn’t come

to a child. But it’s the truth. They’re so little,

morning, do I consider that it is not talking of

right away. Any girl would say they’ve used less

and soon they won’t be. I recall being their age.

any of my triumphs.

and have been fine. Hell, I genuinely have used

I was a grotty and feral kid, with cake batter

less and have been fine. Still, there’s something

painting my face and warts on my knees.

in my stomach curling. God, how privileged of

These girls are gentle, with plaited hair and a

me to be like that, to throw caution to the wind,

fresh spray of freckles. I would crash my Bratz

It is after all, a card of great force. ***

8

condom now wrapped in tissues in the bin.

Q&A WITH JAIME

HOT PINK BLUES

9

The chauffeurone exits. The doors close

That it is, with a plaque engraved J. S. Hahn,

behind him and the whole foyer judders. He

Esquire.

struts across the marble. The receptionist is dressed to fit the room, strapped and sequined

Going Down

in 50-year-old fashion. Wrinkled antique mags lie across the desk; she gawks into her computer screen.

There are dozens of plaques on the dozens of identical black doors Kissinger has passed, but polished without names, they are mirrors.

Warm brandy eyes glance back at him.

Kissinger smooths polyester creases. He traces

RORY HAWKINS

The chauffeurone clears his throats. ‘I am here

Elevator doors open to a 2030s revival-deco foyer, complete with black marble floors, vaulted mirror ceilings and chandeliers.

to see Mr Hahn. I am Henry Kissinger.’

The bellhop beckons.

presently. You’ll have to leave and call in later.’

That elevator cost was enough.

This is floor 273, Sandhurst & Stanthorpe Holdings, for which this particular sir has been authorised for. His reproduction suit pockets have been turned out, his bag screened, his various IDs and licenses scrutinised. He is a body worker, a chauffeurone.

‘That can’t be—’

No use continuing to be behind on rent.

‘Mr Hahn is a very busy man,’ sighs the

But that’s it, what he needs to be – men like

receptionist. ‘He only takes appointments.

Hahn always fancy a brandy. In fact, there’s

You’ll have to leave and call in later. Maybe

already a drink in his hand. Ice catches what

then,’ – she brushes back a blonde lock, casts

small light there is in the office.

This explains his size, taught shoulder-span

book you in.’

inside polyester, the contents of his duffel bag. Work-alias too, like the rest. Credits were counted for booking and boarding fees, baggage handling, emergency exit access, elevatorial insurance etc.

‘Thank you again, sir,’ the bellhop drawls. ‘For choosing to travel today with Chrysler Line elevators. We hope to see you in future.’

Stiff, like cheap bourbon.

The receptionist follows something on the screen, to and fro. ‘Mr Hahn is not here,

a thick-lashed look at him – ‘we’ll find time to

Kissinger tries a smile. ‘You misunderstand.’ He holds out his practicing license. ‘Mr Hahn is the one who made the appointment.’

The receptionist takes the card, looks him up and down. ‘Aughta fuckin said, Henry Kissinger.’ She hits a button. ‘Joe, you hear me?

the hipflask in his pocket.

Just a little wouldn’t hurt, would it?

No, get paid first.

‘Ah, just who I was waiting to see,’ Mr Hahn chuckles. ‘Sit.’ He himself reclines in a red velveteen chair, behind an arcing synth-wood desk. The window behind him plays sunsets over 2000s New York cityscapes.

It all begins with familiar pomp.

Joe, get up. The chauffeurone’s here.’ She slides

‘I have a business function tonight,’ motions Mr

the license back. ‘He’ll be in his office.’

Hahn. ‘Upper stratos, Floor 2-kay-somethin.

Kissinger takes it. ‘Thank you.’

Everyone who’s anyone in Even Newer York will be there: Silicons, Moonheads, even the

Crystal chandeliers rattle as the elevator goes

Governor of our fair hive of Connecticut. So,

by.

what happens the day before? My usual throws

Her eyes flicker over him again. Through mascara, they are palest green, like the last sip of chardonnay in the bottle. ‘It’s last on the right,’ she says.

his back out.’ Mr Hahn throws back the rest of his drink. ‘And then the agency wants me to pay property damages.’

The desk whirrs. Another full glass appears, golden in twilight.

10

GOING DOWN

11

Some kind of algal-whisky.

‘Faulty piece o’ shit.’ Mr Hahn reclines further.

Floor 326, The Chinatown Association’s

‘Earlier than expected,’ she sighs. She won’t

‘So, what’s the going rate?’

Buddha’s Chalice Bar & Restaurant.

look at either of them. ‘Just put him on the

Kissinger details them.

It is a liquid lunch.

‘Nice, very nice. Cheaper than agency, of

Algal-whisky does not mix well with cocktails,

course, which’ – Hahn gestures to the room –

or soju, or sake, or even a dessert brandy. After

Mr Hahn thumbs through the photos. ‘This is

‘is why I’m hiring you in the fuckin first place.’

his client is turned out for vomiting more than

good. I like this one. Could work.’ He throws

He presses something under the desk. ‘Did you

he’s spent, and missing the courtesy bucket one

In the office twilight, that jumpsuit spits

one back: Kissinger topless in tie-dye flares.

hear that, Delilah? It’s a done deal. Wire the

too many times, Kissinger cradles his client in

oily technicolours into his eyes. He feels

‘Tell me, where do you get these outfits from?’

credits for, uh—’ He runs his tongue round his

the return elevator.

something on his forehead; hand comes away

Hahn grins. ‘Something on the side?’

mouth.

‘No, sir, I make them in my spare time.’

Henry Kissinger repeats his alias.

‘That’s nice, very nice. You independent types

‘Yeah, Mr Kissinger here. God, these old-timey

always keep things interesting.’ Mr Hahn claps

names you people pick.’

Kissinger blinks through the smell. He unzips his duffel bag and passes a portfolio across the desk. ‘As you can see, sir, I am able to dress to a great number of occasions and themes.’

his hands. ‘Time to strip. Ready to see the goods.’

Kissinger stands to oblige. ‘Of course, sir.

Seeing is believing.’

Hahn downs another mouthful.

Kissinger removes everything, down to jocks and garter belt. He folds it over chair, takes a step back.

Mr Hahn clears his throat. ‘Gimme a light.’

His desk whirrs. A lit cigar appears.

Hahn bangs on the desk. ‘The other kind.’ He

Yes, why would anyone be so fascinated with the past?

But this means pay.

Until he passes out. Lucky bastard.

He could’ve offered one. Just the one, even on duty.

Elevator doors open to that black and silvered foyer. The bellhop readies himself. ‘Thank you

still have time?’

sweaty. ‘What do you mean? I’m on the clock till tomorrow.’

‘For the moment, sweetie.’ She saunters to Hahn’s desk and asks for a cigar. ‘Still, better you get washed down.’ She motions behind Kissinger to the adjoining en-suite. ‘No one wants you like that.’

Kissinger looks at his suit, still folded over the chair, hipflask tucked away.

shorts and waistcoat. ‘Now, would sir first

Hahn retches as urine-streaked Kissinger

When the financier-police bust down the

prefer cradled, across-the-shoulders, or

crosses the threshold. He gurgles, so his head

door halfway through Kissinger’s shower,

piggyback?’

is shifted for safety’s sake. You can’t continue to

it all begins to start making sense. The

be paid if the client chokes on their own vomit.

receptionist’s outfit.

Like a great many clients, Mr Hahn makes a show of the ums and ahs before, like a great many clients, making the same decision.

A synth-wood latch opens on Kissinger’s side. A

Mr Hahn is not a heavy man. His pinstripe suit

deskineer emerges with a hand-torch. Mr Hahn

is oversized, hiding his featherweight. But he

orders the child around as they circle Kissinger,

is difficult in other ways. Cigar smoke billows

who turns and flexes each and every muscle as

forward into every step Kissinger makes; his

they are illuminated.

client’s is an overzealous locomotion. After

the reviewing process has finished, the child

get me all I-’

Kissinger does just that. ‘What do you mean,

No, better not, at least for now.

Piggyback is most preferred.

He throws a half-empty glass and misses. Once

Hahn mumbles. ‘S’not over. Show ‘em. Night’s

time.’

agai—’

Kissinger changes into uniform boots, tuxe-

takes it anyway.

‘I said abs then glutes, not quads,’ barks Hahn.

12

Kissinger glances round the room.

The bellhop wrinkles his nose.

couch and clean yourself up. You still have

You can’t continue to pay rent, or drink it away yourself.

Kissinger blinks through the smell, marches on.

The receptionist is nowhere to be seen. Better just to keep walking back to Hahn’s office, so that he can clear up before his next enterprise, tonight’s supposed ‘function’. Before Kissinger reaches the handle, the office door opens.

a few dim laps around the office and canters

A female figure in an iridescent jumpsuit. She

across the empty black marble hallway, Mr

scowls but steps aside, hoop earrings swinging.

Hahn steers towards the front desk.

She runs a hand back through dark, damp hair.

picks it off the carpet and takes it with them

‘Delilah! Book me the next available elevator!

back into the desk.

I’m going out to lunch!’

It has been teased out of false curls.

Kissinger isn’t going to get paid at all.

Fraud.

Embezzlement.

Bankruptcy.

The unconscious Hahn is cuffed and gurneyed away.

Kissinger sits in the marble hallway, halfdressed and still soaking from the shower, as he is questioned. Without his clothes and IDs, he is ordered to give his private name.

The receptionist.

GOING DOWN

13

‘So, Miguel Velasquez, are you or have you ever been,’ squares a financial officer, ‘a property of one Joseph Spencer Hahn?’

Before time to answer, the receptionist intercedes, waggling a handful of IDs, Kissinger’s among them. ‘This one’s with me. Independent.’ She bundles Kissinger’s belongings into his arms. ‘I’m heading about

Tuned In

70 floors down, promotion,’ the receptionist whispers. ‘After that, blow me or it’s on your own creds.’

LILIAN MARTIN

Kissinger feels for the hipflask’s shape. It’s

Susie’s dark eyelids began to droop, heavy like wet clothes after a downpour. But the burning glow of the television seared the back of her retina and kept her conscious. It might have been an old repeat of a kids show. Or could it have been a commercial? Susie could not tell.

Both tended to look bright, loud, and ridiculous anyway. Drowsy, she lit her second joint for that evening—the paper tip of the joint scratched at her chapped lips. Her long knees were crisscrossed across her lap as she sat on the floor in front of the sofa. She could feel its hard edges jab and prod into her back, but she was too tired to feel like moving from her spot.

Instead, between puffs of smoke, she tried to discern shapes made by the faded colours of the television screen.

there.

Something remains.

He agrees.

In the elevator, the bellhop ignores the dripping chauffeurone and tries complementing her new look. ‘I love your earrings. They really, uhbring out the colour in your-’ ‘Shut it. I’m not paying for small talk.’

Kissinger clears his throat. ‘I should thank you.

Delilah, right?’

‘Yeah.’ She takes out that cigar, lights it and takes a drag. ‘But now it gets to be ‘Alejandra’.

It was a commercial, Susie finally figured out.

Rory Hawkins is an English/Irish-grown & Meanjin/Brisbane-based creative writing

There was a woman applying eyeshadow, lathering the bright powders onto her eyelids, blending them into the smooth sheen of soft skin.

student in his second year. In his work, he loves exploring ideas of expectations, perspective, and the every-day weird. With short stories and sometimes poetry, Rory wants to create pieces you’ll not just reread but reinterpret every time.

Find more of his fiction in Glass from 2021’s Fiction Week, poetry and prose in ScratchThat Magazine, read aloud with QUT’s Literary Salon, and any other random bits through his Instagram @rory_writes_sometimes.

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Q&A WITH RORY

Susie breathed in the dark musk of her joint and felt the urge to touch her own eyelids — she felt her way around their almond shape, her fingers finally pressing into the deep sunken pit beneath them.

She groaned. The smoke she exhaled glowed a gentle yellow from the televisions light. Susie wanted to slip into a deep sleep. It would be so much easier that way. An unconscious dusk settling over her mind, rest and salvation from the bright lights stabbing her eyes. She came closer and closer, eyelids drooping, darkness began to envelop the room and a pleasant quiet buzzing began to fill her ears — ‘Stop that,’ said a voice through a buzzing.

Susie jolted. Her eyeballs could feel that familiar burning sensation return, ‘Huh? Who’s there?’

‘Over here, stupid Susie,’ the voice said again.

Her eyes focused on the television set, the image it was broadcasting was the woman from the make-up commercial, with gleaming white teeth grinning at her from in front of swirling, psychedelic vortex.

‘Do you think you can sleep, Susie?’ the woman sneered.

The colours on the screen behind the woman made Susie’s eyes burn, she wanted to close them, feel the darkness of her eyelids shut off all the colour flooding and overloading her senses, but a strange feeling swelled in her chest pulling her up. She suddenly was sitting upright, her eyes peeled open.

TUNED IN

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‘That’s better,’ the voice said. ‘Your posture is a disgrace.’

The woman sent an electric shot through the sides of the television. Susie howled.

‘Fuck off.’ Susie had no idea what this television woman was playing at.

‘Susie,’ the woman said. ‘That was never going to work now, was it?’

The woman on the television smirked and held back a laugh.

A loud buzzing filled Susie’s ears, and a searing hot hand marked her shoulder. Fingers crawled up her neck and grabbed a fistful of her hair and tugged. All Susie felt was an intense waft of heat greeting her as she was pulled headfirst into the television screen.

Susie could swear she felt fingers clawing at her eyelashes pulling her eyes wider. She tried to look away from the television, but her pupils were trained on the screen, urging her body forward.

The woman beckoned. Susie dropped onto all fours and crawled forward, her knees scraping on the carpet.

‘Sit, Susie,’ the woman commanded.

Susie knelt before the television set and was eye to eye with the woman.

‘You can’t make me do this,’ Susie winced trying to force her eyes shut.

The woman tutted. ‘Oh, Susie. I already have.’

She smiled.

Susie shook her head, defiantly. Susie’s arms felt like lead as she reached around the back of the television set and felt for the power cable.

She tugged. The television screen sputtered to black.

‘Susie, Susie, Susie’, the woman chanted through clenched white teeth, pulling Susie in.

The woman looked down at the lower part of the frame and saw Susie lying on the floor, fast asleep. The woman tutted, and began to pull herself through the edges of the television screen.

When Lilian Martin isn’t studying (a bachelor in creative writing at QUT), she is busy listening to music, talking about music or singing along (badly) to music. She loves to not only make others laugh, but also to make others cry, and she hopes that her writing makes them do both!

You can’t find her work on social media because she has probably forgotten the password...

SOPHIE TOMASSEN

Strictly speaking, Sir Fourpaws wasn’t a stray.

Sure, he was clambering up a downpipe and putting his claws in all the same places as last time, going hup hup hup up to a distant third floor, but he had a home. His mother had had a home. Sir Fourpaws had even had a collar at some point, green with a little buckle that always snagged on wire fences. He wasn’t a stray. He had just… moved around a bit.

On the third floor’s poky balcony, Sir Fourpaws scuffled around the overgrown plants for as many long-cold, crushed cigarette butts as he could find. The taste was less than divine but they were a necessary evil. He moved quickly.

A hop and a well-practiced little jump delivered Fourpaws to the second-floor balcony and he began nosing the butts around on the soil of Mrs Sherman’s hot pink mandevillas.

Mrs Sherman was an angry old cooch, but not all humans were the same.

But a moment later there was a pop — the woman returned to the screen with an exasperated sigh.

‘How in the fuck?’ Susie hissed, grabbing the sides of the boxy television. She whacked the sides, and even tried to shake it, but it was too heavy.

Home, Foraged

Q&A WITH LILIAN

Just outside and to the left of his house’s milk-crate entryway was the back door of a boulangerie. Fourpaws knew the rotations. The biggest worker, with the steps like thunder, would toss nibbly little ends just next to the

dumpster, blame it on bad aim. The girl with shuffly gait would simply leave the bin’s lid open and watch the comings and goings from the bakery’s side window, and the youngest boy could even be convinced to leave a full (full!) cheese croissant on the pavement if Sir Fourpaws did some meowing and wound around his legs.

Recently, Sir Fourpaws had needed to find ways of getting more than just bread. A swath of threadbare cotton had become the first padding for his cardboard pallet bedroom; three days of nipping at cheesecloths hung to dry at the nearby fromagerie had proven immensely successful. He even brought the wooden pegs that had jumped off the line at home as well. They were front-door décor.

Sir Fourpaws had shaken the moist mandevilla dirt out from between his toes and swept it off the balcony’s edge by the time Mrs Sherwood filled her gigantic watering can at the kitchen sink. He took up the usual hiding place behind a pot of rosemary and crouched. Rosemary smelled like the arse-end of a dog, but Fourpaws had learned the hard way that the coriander pot was always first to be watered. He tried not to breathe and waited.

‘Stop that,’ the woman said.

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HOME, FORAGED

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Soon, Mrs Sherman trundled out with the water and spotted the cigarette butts. Her wrinkled, lipsticked lips flattened before slamming open to make way for obscenities that she directed at her upstairs neighbours. She fetched her longhanded trowel to racket against the upper floor for good measure.

Fourpaws considered that the old lady might be distressed by this all, but she didn’t really need the towel.

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But she didn’t notice Sir Fourpaws stealing inside the open door. She didn’t notice the track of paw prints on her memory-foam sofa, either. Nor did she notice her favourite tea towel –sliding off the oven handle and across the carpet and out the door and off the edge of the balcony.

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Fiction Editor Ciaran Greig

Editors Tom Loudon Ella Brumm

Graphic Designer May Lyn Chew

Non Fiction Stories

Illustrator

Interviews

Claudia Pilbeam

Reviews Contributors

Poetry

Grace Harvey

Art

Jaime Colley

Photography

Rory Hawkins Lilian Martin Sophie Tomassen

Your work could be in the pages of Glass Magazine!

We love celebrating and publishing the work of QUT Students and Alumni. Our online submissions are always open and our print edition submissions open as advertised. You can find information about the submission themes and how to submit to Glass on our website, qutglass. com/submit, or our Facebook page @glassmedia.

We accept writing of all genres. We take poetry, opinion pieces, essays, satire, fiction, recipes, reviews and more. We also take illustrations, collages and photography. If you have any questions, feel free to get in touch with the editorial team to discuss.

For more info on how to submit your work, visit qutglass.com/submit

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