My Cardboard Balcony

Clinic by Belinda Roddie   She stood against the railing, knuckles white, marble glaring outward at the white bed with white sheets. Her lover was speaking with a masked medic who nodded and scratched at binder paper with a jaunty pen that had no ink. She didn't know whether to cry or scream but this whole thing felt like a dream and either way, she would walk into that room very soon and hold her lover to her chest as the tears mingled into the deep IV.

There's something about Autumn in autumn. She blends in with the leaves, painting her face in reds and golds and oranges. Her hair branches out in roots. She drinks hot coffee under the shade of a large oak tree that has the words "Save Me" spray-painted on its stomach. And she giggles as the cold air kicks up around her shoes and carries her about the city.