Erica Williams
Bio
A writery human from Melbourne with a penchant for self indulgent memoir, sad girl poetry, and sometimes the odd bit of off-kilter fiction
Stories (3)
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Cracks
I have a sick dog smell and my head feels barely attached to my neck stump, so when the tram lurches it swings from side to side. It feels like there’s cellophane over my eyes. Everything is filmy. Milky. But I can still see things. Just yesterday I saw Them beating a small woman with yellow hair, right out the front of Myer on Bourke Street. I saw them in their black vans taking children.
By Erica Williams5 years ago in Fiction
Birthing Story
The air in the forest is thick with rain and mosquitoes. Everything hums. Cicadas so loud you feel their vibrations in your chest, rattling your ribcage. You can’t sleep. The heat is a wet blanket over your face, clinging to your body. When your mother calls to you from the other room she sounds like an animal yelping in pain. You already know what is happening. It is past midnight and moonlight casts shadows across the floor. They remind you of ghosts. Rain hammers against the tin roof, pours through the hole in your ceiling, collecting in a pool near the door. She calls again – not words – just the sound of pain. Her voice cuts through the rain and the cicadas and the sound of your own heart pounding in your ears. You gather yourself for a moment – your breath catches like a bug in your throat. You rise, padding barefooted across the room. You step in the puddle. The water is warm. It feels viscous, like mud. You don’t turn the lights on. The kitchen looks two dimensional in the moonlight – a watercolour painting. For a second you stand there to check if you’re dreaming. Count your fingers. One. Two. Three. Four. Five. She calls again. You wonder if there is time to call an ambulance. Count your breath. One. Two. Three. Four. Five. You go to her.
By Erica Williams5 years ago in Viva
