Short Fiction Slice of Life 1 min Mature Audience

Beanstalk

Holden Sheppard is an award-winning author born and bred in Geraldton, Western Australia. His debut novel Invisible Boys (Fremantle Press, 2019) has won several accolades including the 2019 WA Premier's Prize for an Emerging Writer and the 2018 City of Fremantle Hungerford Award. In 2020, Invisible Boys was shortlisted for the Victorian Premier's Literary Awards and named as a Notable Book by the Children's Book Council of Australia. Holden is also widely published in journals such as Griffith Review and Westerly. Holden currently serves as the Deputy Chair of WritingWA and as an ambassador for Lifeline WA, and was formerly host of the Fremantle Press podcast. He has always been a misfit: a gym junkie who has played Pokémon competitively, a sensitive geek who loves aggressive punk rock, and a bogan who learned to speak French. He lives in Perth’s northern suburbs with his husband.

What was I thinking? A country boy doesn't belong in Perth. I was told the CBD was clean and safe, but as I walk into peak-hour Hay Street gridlock, I'm thrown. The alley beside His Majesty's reeks of urine. Deadlocked cars blare horns and exhale carbon monoxide. This is clean? And these dumpster-divers shouting and asking for cigarettes – this is safe? I've never seen a homeless person before. The bank branch sits inside the gold-rush era Palace Hotel. A glass and steel skyscraper erupts from within it and rises to the clouds, like the fabled beanstalk. This city grew up too fast, but m