ARTWORK: Alicia Sun
the jacaranda and the jar WILLIAM SALKELD EDITED BY SISANA LAZARUS All that was left was me and the jar of biccies. In the space of silence, there is so much that a foodstained late primary-schooler could hear. After Dad’s assistant, who had entertained me by asking about the square roots and divisions that I had recently discovered, left to do some copying, all sense of movement drifted out the room with her. The ticktock of the clock bearing from the wall rang through my chest like a dry church bell; always reaching the next tock a moment after I had expected it, yet always jolting. This was the year before I got my first phone. There was no easy distraction. I had already scoured Dad’s bookshelf of faceless leather-bound books so I decided to rest my head in my chubby hands and look out towards the blooming jacaranda tree. Years later, my incoming high-school principal would tell me that the jacaranda represents the time in the Sydney University semester when it is too late to start studying and still expect to pass final exams. I am grateful those trees didn’t follow me to Canberra.
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