By Anonymous
Out of nowhere he is engulfed by the stinging realisation that if he were a tree he would be a tight manicured ball of leaves atop a bare, slender trunk. He would not even have a proper trunk, really, just a perfect wooden stem no higher than a lady’s shoulder. Every second day he would require delicate pruning to ensure not a leaf fell out of place, not even in a strong breeze. At best he would evoke feelings of ambivalence from passers-by. At worst, someone would lop off his foliage - just for fun. He would simply be a naked stick then. Just one of many naked sticks all in a row lining an endless estate driveway.
She would not be an ornamental mimicry of a tree. She would be strong branches drenched in bubbles of amber ale light. She would be supple buds of spring, spongy yellow lichen and nesting birds. A mess of wet earth smells. She would embrace lovers who nestled among her roots and dare children to dart up her trunk, hugging their way to the sky. She would relish in the tickle of ants’ feet marching across her cracked layers. Her insides would echo the plight of a moth trapped in a secret web; but she would not mourn it. She would sing for the spider who had acted with spider habits.
He would ache to stretch his arms towards her, but of course he would only have a trunk. His branches would be circumcised before they even got started. One day he would be over-pruned, revealing a twisted brown fireball of cracked twigs underneath his glossy green outer. His private ugliness carefully stowed behind a perfect façade. Tiny white orbs of fertiliser would lay arranged below him. Hand-watered and hand-fed, his fellow trees would not know or want any different. They would not see her as he did. They would think she was crude. Primitive.
On wild days that threw her branches into the clouds, she would see the mansion down in the valley. Calm waters, still air, cultivated oddities. She would wonder at the foreign trees lining the drive like waxy pompoms suspended in space. She would speculate about the fence — was it to keep things out or in? She would laugh and throw some leaves into the currents above, sending them swirling like red snow. They would land on his plumage, billow the air with warm breath and fall to the ground. Her leaves would colour his world and spell freedom. When they were raked up, he would manage to keep one, his token of her. He would clutch the leaf carefully inside and feel it spread green flames like absinthe through his dry twig mind.
He would burst out overnight while the mansion was in slumber. The glimmer of stars and slim crescent moon would see him explode with strong branches. He would ripple outwards, dive downwards and reel upwards. Roots tunnelling, leaves thrashing, trunk distending. He would lavish himself upon the stifling world inside the fence until he reached the perimeter. With a final push and a whispery nod from her, he would stretch a tentative tendril into the night outside the wire.
Suddenly he wishes he were a tree. But he looks down and sees chocolate brown leather shoes, two legs, a torso, manicured fingernails, not a speck of dirt. His heart falls in disappointment and he looks around. He can’t even see a single tree. His boots shuffle him down the street and a single red leaf follows him, spinning and twirling with laughter until it lands in his satchel. He sees it. Upheaval.
Ion Newcombe is the editor and publisher of AntipodeanSF, Australia’s longest running online speculative fiction magazine, regularly issued since January 1998, and conceived back around November 2007. He has been a zealous reader and occasional writer of SF since his childhood in the 1960s, and even sold a few stories here and there back in the '90s.
Mark Webb's midlife crisis came in the form of attempting to write speculative fiction at a very slow pace. His wife maintains this is a good outcome considering the more expensive and cliched alternatives. Evidence of Mark's attempts to procrastinate in his writing, including general musings and reviews of books he has been reading, can be found at www.markwebb.name.
Pixie is a voice actor, cabaret performer & slam poet From the Blue Mountains in NSW.
Timothy Gwyn is a professional pilot in Canada, where he flies to remote communities. During a lull in his flying career, he was a radio announcer for three years, and he is also an author.
Geraldine Borella writes adult short stories and stories for children and has been published in anthologies for both. In 2018, one of her children’s short stories placed second in The Buzz Words Short Story Prize and she won an ASA Emerging Writer’s Mentorship. She currently works part-time as a hospital pharmacist and as an online creative writing tutor.
Alistair Lloyd is a Melbourne based writer and narrator who has been consuming good quality science fiction and fantasy most of his life.
Ed lives with his wife plus a magical assortment of native animals in tropical North Queensland.
Sarah Pratt is an avid fiction writer and a Marketing Consultant.
Margaret lives the good life on a small piece of rural New South Wales Australia, with an amazing man, a couple of pets, and several rambunctious wombats.
Tim Borella is an Australian author, mainly of short speculative fiction published in anthologies, online and in podcasts.
Laurie Bell lives in Melbourne, Australia. She was that girl you found with her nose always buried in a book. She has been writing ever since she was a little girl and first picked up a pen. From books to short stories, radio plays to snippets of ideas and reading them aloud to anyone who will listen.
Jolie Lindholm grew up in small towns on Long Island, NY, later moving to Florida for college.
You can follow her creative writing journey on Twitter: <
Chris Karageorge is a lover, brother, son, neighbour and a keen observer of all things in sight. 
Bethany Tatman is an aspiring writer who currently resides in one of the more hipster suburbs of Melbourne, Australia.
William Kerr is a self-professed science fiction enthusiast. He was born and raised in Tasmania but now calls Canberra home.
PS Cottier is a poet who lives in Canberra, with a particular interest in speculative poetry.
Old enough to just remember the first manned Moon landing, Kevin was so impressed he made science his life.