‘Removals’
— Joyce Chong
Familiar cats picked their way among the parking spaces, but there were no dogs. Dogs are for people who have settled down. Everyone in these flats was starting out, or on the move – they were restless, temporary residents, in flight or in hiding.
For today I have something unexpected and intricate. Not intricate in the way that small decorative things can be crammed full of detail and pattern, too dizzy to discern, but intricate in its decisiveness. The illustration of the ordinary with enough conviction and breath to make it real. There’s a unique balance between what is given to us, and what isn’t. Everything about the place, the view outside, even her radio listening habits. Everything, almost.
She wondered if there was a headboard in that mirror bedroom, and whether mildew accumulated in the corners of unaired rooms, as it did in hers.
What also stood out to me about this story was its pacing, a steady consistent stride forward. Or outward. Out the windows, into the streets. Slowly the world expands and then we see something strange, something out of the ordinary. Suddenly every hint and indication becomes something more. This is a story that’s always heading somewhere, until it’s not. Until it’s there.