Karla attended four human anatomy classes every week. She drove the 80 km stretch into town along a country road lined with gums. She knew the rule—after dawn and before dusk, before kangaroos reclaimed the road. She witnessed which roos hadn’t backed down, ones that had stared down drunk monsters in four-wheel drives. Majestic gray tripods now bitumen mounds. The abattoir sent kangaroo hearts for student dissection that morning. Karla’s tears slid down the red organ placed before her. It wasn’t right. The kangaroo heart is smooth and strong. The heart closest to a human heart is a pig’s.

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LINDA MARTIN lives in Perth, Western Australia. She teaches creative writing at the School of Indigenous Studies, UWA, and is an editor and PhD student writing a creative nonfiction publishing history. In her spare time, she loves to read and write flash fiction.