Fresh Boundaries by Rob Johnson
Don’t get fresh with me she said, and so I began to rot. I allowed myself to wilt and curdle, let my flesh sweat down to pulp. I was bubbling and gushing and leaking and oozing; I was fetid and bulbous and rank. One day, a beetle splashed and drowned in my juices, followed by a spider that was lured by the beetle. As I rotted, I began to attract companions I hadn’t considered before. So when she returned and said that’s better!, I turned my swollen face toward her and told her I needed space.
Rob Johnson is a writer and actor from Sydney. His fiction has been published by Overland, The Suburban Review, Aniko Magazine, Underground Writers and Corvus Review; his poetry by Sunday Mornings at the River and Quadrant; and his non-fiction by Aniko Magazine and Audrey Journal. For the stage, he has written The Recidivists (Red Line Productions). He is the winner of numerous awards for short fiction, including the Hal Porter Short Story Prize and the Albury City Short Story Award. Some of his acting credits include The Boomkak Panto (Belvoir), The Torrents (Sydney Theatre Company), and Rosehaven (ABC).