Saturday's Storyteller: "My knee was so swollen that I couldn't walk."
by Belinda Roddie My knee was so swollen that I couldn't walk. Then again, that's what happens when you end the night with a boat tail lodged in your patella. The circle of cars had dissipated from the abandoned parking lot, and I craned my head to look at my reflection in a fragment of windshield glass left for me on the pavement. Under the dim street lamp, I could see dark purple bruises forming under my eyes, the flecks of blood and marrow decorating the corners of my mouth and giving my teeth a light brown crust. I smiled and waved meekly. Hello, friend. You come here often? Feebly tugging at my sleeves, I managed to pull my sweatshirt off my shaking frame and apply it to the wound, tying it like a lousy tourniquet. I thought it would be able to stop the blood from continuously streaming down my torn jeans, the red turning into a complex spider web on the denim. Instead, it simply soaked up red bubbles like a lump, and soon the thing was dripping with my own lifeline...