The Karma Tree

This story first appeared inAurealis #53, August 2012

Artwork by Lynette Watters

Back in ’08 I lived in a share house where this crazy girl pretty much ran things. She’d been there the longest; I know that counts for something, but otherwise she was pretty fucking dumb. She had this plant growing by the front door. A Karma Tree, she told people when they first moved in. It never needed water, apparently, just grew if the housemates did good deeds and withered if we didn’t.

‘How does the plant know?’ I asked on my first day tour of the house.

‘It just, like,knows, you know?’

‘Right.’

‘You’re full of shit, Kerryn,’ yelled the Wizard from his place on the couch. The whole time I lived there he was permanently ensconced between the cushions. We called him the Wiz.

‘Who is the plant to determine what’s right and wrong?’ he continued. ‘What if I did something that hurts one person but saves hundreds?’ He picked up the remote and flicked through channels with blinding rapidity before coming to rest on the gleaming bonce of Dr Phil. ‘Or, I dunno, run naked through the middle of town. I say it’s good, but the cops’d bust me ‘cos the law says it’s bad, and what the hell happens to the fucking tree inthat instance, you stupid hippie?’

‘Shut up, Wiz,’ Kerryn muttered.

‘Hey, let’s smoke the Karma Tree,’ yelled Rebecca from the kitchen. Rebecca was always stoned, as I came to find out.

‘Shut up, Bec,’ Kerryn muttered, then took me by the arm and led me on the rest of the tour.

Kerryn had a cat she called Karma Cat, and explained to me it worked on a similar principle as the Karma Tree.

Do good—happy cat.

Do bad—angry cat.

There must have been an awful lot of evil perpetrated in that house, because that cat was one pissed-off motherfucker. Whenever it saw anyone it would scurry forth and latch onto an ankle, its claws and teeth like needles in the thin flesh. The Wiz must have booted the Karma Cat for all he was worth on a daily basis, but the little fucker never learned.