Tony Steven Williams

Decisions

faces glint
in handheld phones
thumbing texts
exchanging images
beyond earth’s gravity

But two years after humans first walked the moon, smart phones were a dream, and talking into a watch was confined to Dick Tracy cartoons. And there was this defective public phone box near our barracks . . .
 
Here we are, a single file of rookie soldiers on a frost-bitten spring evening, waiting to call our relatives and friends. We’ve zipped our jackets skin-close, hands deep into deep pockets. But it’s worth it. For the clink of a single coin, we can do interstate linkups for as long as we like. And we’re not about to report this fault any time soon! Today, though, there’s this corporal hogging the phone. He’s lit up in the box like an actor under a spotlight. He throws gestures, talks earnestly, lapses into periods of silence. He never turns his head towards us. How thoughtless. How rude. Our actor’s now a highlighted enemy, ready to be shot.
 
The soldier at the head of our lengthening line hammers on the phone box door and opens it.
 
“Hey, mate, you going to be there all frigging night!”
 
The enemy puts his hand over the phone, looks out. “I’m so sorry, guys. It’s just . . . that I’m proposing to my girlfriend. I’ll wind up real soon.”
 
Silence. Clapping. Hooting. Silence. Suddenly, the enemy is our friend.
 
At last, he hangs up, his face neutral. We all wait for him to say either one or the other expected word. But he comes up with a third.
 
“Tomorrow. Tomorrow, she’ll tell me.”

the finality
of a yes or a no
can change journeys
but sometimes its lack
means waiting for Godot

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About the Author

Tony Steven Williams is a poet and short-fiction author from Canberra, Australia. He writes across many formats and genres, but in all his work the environment and the human condition are very important to him. His two published collections are Sun and Moon, Light and Dark (Ginninderra Press, 2018) and Reimmersion (Ginninderra Press, 2023).

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