She is Movement

Erin Johnson

12/07/2025

She is movement. A constant blur of motion shifting from one task to the next. Bursts of energy radiating out. Her family, two sons and a husband.

Her mass impacts and shifts the space around her. Bending time. Creating a gravitational force that pulls objects, mostly people, into her orbit. They spend their time, feel better for it, and are then flung off, returning to their regular course.

For her family, two sons and a husband, she is always there. They are bound by the science of motion and acceleration. They are bound, constantly falling toward each other. They are unaware of the force she commands. Each day, every day, a constant blur of motion and acceleration. Working. Cleaning. Hugging. Listening. Cooking. Preparing. Packing. Unpacking. Gardening. Talking. Working. Working. Working.

They are invisible forces. Unseen by the naked eye. She is herself invisible at times. More times than not. The movement of her mass, swirling through space, leaves a dust tail, but no one sees her.

She just keeps moving. The constant blur.

She is movement. Until she is not.

*

The thunk thunk swoosh of the basketball bounce and it sinking through the net, father and son shooting hoops on the gravel driveway after dinner. The only sound filling the empty night. The dog perks up its ears and then looks toward the father. He holds the ball still, looks toward the dog and turns his head. Both man and dog angle their ears into the night and note the absence of the four-wheeler’s low drone. It was the other sound, the constant for the last few minutes, as his wife drove out to close a gate on the cow paddock as the sun set on their farm. The dog takes off. He seems to ripple time himself, parting the space before him. Carving out a path across the paddock.
The husband drops the basketball at his feet and sets off behind the dog. Following in the dog’s wake, where the air has all but disappeared. The husband doesn’t breathe. He just runs. With his young son trailing behind in his slipstream.

The dog reaches her first, and his bark breaks the night open. The husband comes over the small crest and can see the four-wheeler, tipped on its side. He makes out a shape in the grass. A solid mass. No motion. No acceleration.

Go back to the house and get my mobile and your brother. Hurry. Now.

The little boy spins on his heels and heads back.

There is still a distance between the husband and the wife. He can see her shape in the dwindling light. He can see that she is not moving. His stomach drops. The feared lurch when all the possibilities that lay ahead rest at the bottom of your stomach like rocks. The rocks suddenly rush upward, and he tastes vomit in the back of his throat.

She is movement. Until she is not.

As he gets closer, he sees smaller shapes nestled around her. Her arms and legs spread like a snow angel. Except that the snow is objects from the back of the four-wheeler. He can make out the shape of the spare battery lying next to her head. A crowbar resting alongside her thigh. A sledgehammer resting by her shoulder. Tools are splayed around her like an aura. A violent and menacing aura.

He reaches her.

I’m here. I’m here.

Her eyes are open; she blinks. The rest doesn’t matter in this moment.

I can’t move. I can’t feel anything.

He hears her words, exhales and then starts to breathe again. He sees the panic in her eyes.

He looks across the paddock and makes out his two sons racing toward them. The eldest in the lead. The youngest way behind, navigating the paddock on his short legs.
It’s ok. I’ll call an ambulance. It’s ok. You’ll be ok. I promise. You’ll be ok. Nothing hit you? Did anything hit you?

He looks around at the debris.

I saw it all coming towards me.

The husband looks around at the multitude of objects that wielded a deadly impact. The force of motion casting her, along with every loose object, off in the same direction. The object with the greatest mass, his wife, landing first. Just as celestial bodies orbit the sun, each object stayed its course.

The boys reach their mother. The eldest is hysterical. Unable to catch his breath, he is hyperventilating and screaming. The youngest comes and sits next to his Mum’s head and places his fingertips on her cheek.

It’s ok, Mum. We are here now. We’ll look after you.

Like a large tree, swaying, his gentle voice shifts the energy around him. He has his own gravitational pull. Sometimes, mother and son sit together on the grass in the paddock. Feeling, not thinking. Orbiting each other in a delicate astronomical dance.
He brings calm. He feels her suffering and moves through it. Mother and son’s eyes meet, and her fear shifts.

She’s going to be ok. Have you got the phone?

The words penetrate the eldest boy’s panic, and he regains focus, handing over the phone.

Boys, I need you to go back to the house. Turn all the lights on and bring the ambulance here when they arrive. Take the dog and chain him up.

The husband, kneeling, sees her lack of motion and acceleration. Witnessing her halo of debris. Impossible not to notice, not to stare. She is visible in her stationary form.

She’s not moving. He says to the voice on the other end of the line.

She is movement. Until she is not.

***

Third Prize: Erin Johnson

Erin lives on Bunurong land on the coast. She works across Inner Gippsland with a focus on community building and therapeutic creative groupwork. Erin loves stories and thinks the local library service is a gift; however, she has absolutely no discipline, so writing has often fallen off the agenda. Drinking coffee, op shopping and hugging her dogs do not fall off the agenda.