Author: Doug Jacquier

The Oomebumbum Bird

/ Doug Jacquier / 17 Comments

This piece was written for the weekly Unicorn Challenge, assembling up to 250 words based on a picture prompt.

Australian ornithologists are beside themselves (or at least they are when two or more are gathered together in the name of birds) with excitement over the first authenticated photograph of the fabled Oomebumbum bird. Most adults have long refused to recognise its existence, putting sightings into the realm of other life lessons with which adults imbue children, such as Santa Claus is real, which they later deny, and then wonder why their children grow up to be drug addicts or Tory voters or both.  

Of course, Indigenous Australians have always known of its existence and depictions of its unique shape and habits appear in rock art and cave paintings across Australia. It’s raucous cry has been preserved in oral history by the Elders as most closely resembling Question Time in Parliament after the latest Budget has been handed down.

Little is known about the diet of the Oomebumbum, although the beak indicates a varied diet, probably including witchetty grubs and hot chips. The streamlined body shape would suggest that it it’s preferred hunting strategy is surprising its prey by swooping down from a great height, grabbing it and soaring back to the heavens. Occasionally, as the young birds are still learning their flight skills, they will miscalculate and scrape their backsides along the ground, and fly off into the sky screaming ‘Oomebumbum, oomebumbum’, hence the origin of the name. The PM has placed an immediate protection order on them and they will replace the kangaroo on Qantas livery.

Tunnel vision

/ Doug Jacquier / 9 Comments

This piece was written for the weekly Unicorn Challenge photo prompt.

‘Why are you stopping?’

‘I’m not going in there.’

‘Why?’

‘It doesn’t have proper disability access.’

‘I’m sorry, I didn’t know. What disability do you have?’

‘I was born with eyes, ears, a brain and a heart. And I see dead people.’

‘Where?’

‘Everywhere in there.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘There’s artificially intelligent morons shooting up conspiracies. There’s people who want to steal my identity. There’s people with video goggles bumping into each other as they watch the zombie apocalypse on reality TV. There’s people giving more to their cats than to their neighbours. There’s politicians who want nothing else than to be the politicians in charge of wanting nothing else than their own survival. There’s people who think the only art worthwhile comes in a spray can and it should be shared on Instagram to make them instantly famous for a nanosecond. And there’s people who think they can keep taking until there’s nothing left to give and the oxygen of life runs out.’

‘But it’s the only way to get where we’re going. To the future.’

‘Then I’m not going.’

‘But you have to get there. You can’t stay here in the past.’

‘I can. I like it here.’

‘But ‘here’ doesn’t exist anymore. Can’t you see it rolling up behind us as we walk?’

‘Then it’ll just have to roll me up with it.’

Any Tom, Dick or Harry (or Waiting for Godot at the roundabout)

/ Doug Jacquier / 19 Comments

This piece of surrealism was penned for the weekly Unicorn Challenge to come up with up to 250 words in response to a photo prompt.

He knew they were following him. They knew that he knew they were following him. They thought it was important that he knew they were following him.

He came to a rapid halt at a roundabout. Leaping from the car, he ran off around the corner and into the forest.

They stopped and searched his car but found nothing to add to their knowledge of him or of where it might be. They didn’t try follow on foot because they didn’t know if he was armed this time and waiting to ambush them. They’d never known if he was armed or not or if he would ever ambush them. But they decided not to find out tonight. Besides, they didn’t think that was where it was.

…

They sat in their car and talked about this latest development. Clearly the situation was unsustainable. They couldn’t keep running around the countryside following every Tom, Dick or Harry looking for it. Was it actually important enough to devote their resources to finding it indefinitely? They decided, reluctantly but firmly, ‘No’.

…

When he realised they’d abandoned their chase, he was furious. How dare they do this? What was he supposed to do with it now?

When they’d driven away from the roundabout, he set off in pursuit of them. They knew he would do that. He knew that they would know he would do that.

So they sped up, just to make life interesting.

At the end of the word

/ Doug Jacquier / 11 Comments

This piece has won 3rd place (and some money) in the annual Peter Cowan Writers Centre 600 word Short Story Competition.

At the end of the word

The man had sensed the teenage boy was out there, even before the dog smelled him and hunted him into the clearing, nipping at his heels.

‘Call your bloody dog off!’ the boy snapped.

The man looked at the dog and it sloped off to drink water from a tin bowl.

‘You oughta have him chained up.’

The man turned his back on the boy and went to sit in the old armchair under the lean-to veranda. He took a sip of tea from his enamel mug, picked up a book, opened at it the page marked by a feather and began to read.

‘Can I have something to drink?’

The man didn’t look up but nodded in the direction of the rainwater tank. A tin mug dangled from a rusty chain on the tap.

‘Jesus, mate, I’m not that desperate. What about a coffee?’

The man continued to read.

The boy began to walk towards the house. The dog moved into his path, with its lip curled and emanating a guttural sound. The boy groaned before moving towards the tank.

When he’d finished, he sat on a tree stump and looked around the clearing. Apart from the small house, there was a chook run, a veg patch enclosed by chicken wire, and an outhouse.

At dusk, the man put down his book and entered the house, leaving the door open. Shortly after, a light appeared in the window and wispy smoke began to emerge from the chimney.

The boy ventured as close as the dog would allow him and called out ‘Any chance of a feed?’

Just before dark, the man appeared, dropped a blanket on the armchair and put a plate of steaming stew, with a spoon sticking out of it, on the veranda floor. The dog emerged and settled on a pile of hessian bags between the chair and the door. The man returned inside, closed the door with the thunk of a heavy bolt and the light was extinguished.

The dog allowed the boy to pick up the plate and sit in the chair to eat. After eating, the boy stared briefly into the total darkness. He closed his eyes and wrapped the blanket tightly around his thin frame.

…

The boy woke to the sound of caroling magpies and a vehicle navigating its way up the twisting track to his house. The man was up. He pointed to the bush and the boy took off.

When it arrived, a Police officer stepped out and said ‘G’day. Sergeant Cameron Thomas, Yarra Valley Police. Just wondering if you could help me.’ The man said nothing.

Thomas produced a photo and showed it to the man. ‘Recognise this lad?’ The man’s face remained immobile.

Thomas noticed an ancient and battered Land Rover. ‘Do you have drivers licence?’ The man retrieved a wallet from his back pocket and extracted a plastic card which he proffered to Thomas. He wrote down the details in his notebook, took a photo of the card with his phone and returned the licence to the man.

Thomas climbed into his vehicle and started the engine but before he drove off he said through the open window, ‘If you do come across that young bloke, be careful. I think he could be dangerous.’

After Thomas left, the man returned to his armchair on the veranda, picked up his book and apart from turning the pages, he and his dog sat perfectly still. They knew the boy would not come back.

Rock of ages

/ Doug Jacquier / 18 Comments

This piece of nostalgic nonsense was written for Jenne and CE’s weekly Unicorn Challenge to produce a story of up to 250 words based on a photo prompt.

‘So, you’re just back from Paris and you take me out to this Godforsaken beach in the middle of nowhere to look at a pile of rocks?’

‘Yes. It’s a shrine.’

‘Bugger you shrine. What did you bring me?’

‘Sorry, nothing. But I brought back Jim.’

‘Jim?’

‘Yeah, Jim. I stole his ashes. Because Bon was getting lonely.’

‘Bon?’

‘Yeah, I rescued him from Fremantle last year.’

‘So you’re going around the world stealing the ashes of dead rock stars and burying them here at your tacky little shrine.’

‘They told me they want to rest in peace and not be bothered by nutters crying and taking selfies 24/7. They all did. Not Elvis or Michael of course but the others.’

‘What others?’

‘I brought Janis from LA and Jimi from Washington and Brian from Gloucestershire and Buddy from Texas. I would have got Michael but he’s swimming with the fishes in Sydney Harbour and John’s all over Central Park. Some families are so inconsiderate. Imagine having to put up with jet skiers and joggers for the rest of eternity.’

‘But what about the poor families of these people!’

‘As long as they believe they’re still where they put them, what does it matter? This way everybody wins.’

‘You realise that with global warming and rising sea levels this will all get washed away one day.’

‘Of course. And then we’ll all be together. That will be so cool. Imagine jamming with Syd on the dark side of the moon.’

Cast (in order of appearance): Morrison, Scott, Presley, Jackson, Joplin, Hendrix, Jones, Hutchence, Lennon, Holly, Barrett.)