Mark's diary

5Nov

The Card Beneath the Card

I found the copied blue card inside the white one, and the first thought in my head was not who had done it. It was how badly I had missed it. That is the part…

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4Nov

The Fault I Invented

I keep thinking about the yellow grease. A clamp can fail. A line can split. But Dean’s note made it personal, and the part of me that wants a straight enemy is…

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3Nov

What the Shove Proved

The ugliest part was not the impact. It was how quickly I turned pain into proof. Dean put me against the pump cabinet, my ribs shouted, and I began arranging t…

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2Nov

Trust Is an Unsafe Tool

I said I was staying three days for the job. That was true enough to keep saying, but not true enough to satisfy the part of me still looking for the ute keys.…

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1Nov

Staying Means Something Here

My ute died in the middle of the forecourt like a cheap joke, and I hated every second of it. The noise made the truckers look, and I felt exposed in a way I ha…

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31Oct

What I Still Cannot Take Back

I wanted Ben to turn around when Ellis finished confessing. I wanted the truth to be enough to move him, even though I know that is not how forgiveness works. H…

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30Oct

The Fight I Keep Replaying

The body blow landed before I was ready. I remember thinking that Dain was cleaner than me, faster, and that I had wasted too many years being afraid of what my…

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29Oct

What the Town Saw Tonight

The part I cannot shake is not the rescue. It is how quickly everyone looked away again once the danger had a shape. Fear can make a crowd useless, but it can a…

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28Oct

The Truth Put on Speaker

I did not trust Narelle’s tears. Tears come easily when the damage is finally visible, and I have seen people use them like a clean rag over what they did. She…

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27Oct

No Absolution in the Rain

I keep waiting for the part where I feel clean. I do not. We got the men out, and that matters, but doing the right thing does not wash the blood from my hands…

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26Oct

Keeping the Record Out of Reach

The hardest part was not stopping Dain from taking the gear. It was making sure that when he tried, he would find witnesses already looking at it. I kept thinki…

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25Oct

The flare I did not throw

The hardest part was not firing the orange flare. It was standing there afterward with the tin still in my hand while Tully’s launch took the towing line and Da…

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24Oct

The Route I Did Not Call

Dain caught me before I could say it. That was the part I kept circling after. I could have named the barge’s route and let the evidence do the ugly work, but t…

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23Oct

Cold Fish, Warm Meal

The tray gave way under me, and for one stupid second I was more angry at the ice than at my back. Fish and brine across my boots felt like the kind of humiliat…

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22Oct

The Voice I Refused

I wanted Ellis’s breathing more than I wanted to admit. For one second, the radio gave me something solid, and I nearly stepped back toward the wharf without th…

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21Oct

The Radio Stayed Silent

I am still thinking about the empty boots on the seat. It was cheap, theatrical, and it worked. I am ashamed that I enjoyed Rhys turning around, even briefly. S…

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20Oct

The Part I Stopped

I gave up the fight before my body did. That is the part I keep turning over. Dain had me by the collar, and I could still feel the old choice rising in me: mak…

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19Oct

What the Crate Remembered

Three sets of initials should not have been enough to bother me. The names themselves mean nothing, but someone painted them neatly beneath the ramp, expecting…

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18Oct

What I Kept From Bellwether

I hate losing by a hand’s width. Worse, I hate being told the win bought me nothing while the rain was still in my eyes. I could have put Silas down harder. May…

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16Oct

The answer I still refuse

Ellis is alive. That changes the shape of everything, even if I cannot say what the shape is yet. The men who built this lie needed bodies to make silence look…

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15Oct

Hands Off the Wheel

I hate when someone uses my gear to make a threat feel more official. The blue float was childish, but it was mine, and someone thought that gave them permissio…

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14Oct

Facts Sitting in the Rain

I keep returning to the moment the watcher dropped his binoculars. He did not startle me; that would have been cleaner. He decided. There was a calculation in i…

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13Oct

The Nails Kept Holding

I keep thinking about the space between the pallet and my body. Inches. That is such a stupidly small number for a life to survive by. I was frightened, but I w…

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12Oct

Keeping the torn corner

The first thing I felt wasn’t triumph. It was the sick little drop in my stomach when I recognised the compound code. For a second I wanted to put the docket ba…

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11Oct

The thing I didn't stop

The ute smells like takeaway grease and cold air. Counter meal at the Southport pub, two minutes of chewing, then the records. I keep the receipt because it say…

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10Oct

Third place and a wave-off

Jules counted nine hundred on their feet. I didn't look up until the last ten seconds because looking up meant looking at the banner and looking at the banner m…

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9Oct

The thing I didn't do

The video is already up. Three phones, two hands flat on my chest, me staggering two steps into the ropes. I didn't throw back. That's the part I keep seeing —…

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8Oct

The shoulder knows first

“Hayes shoulder giving up?” Four words, and suddenly every quiet catch feels like evidence. I can call it clickbait, but my body took it personally. That hitch…

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7Oct

Gifted

Four extra rounds. That's what the blog bought me. Reno Mathers sits at home with a hand infection telling some sad nobody that I got the main event because the…

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6Oct

Five minutes in a corridor

The shoulder clicked. Actually clicked, in front of the two clerks at the tribunal desk. Lacey heard it or didn't hear it — I don't know which is worse. "Broke…

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