My Cardboard Balcony

A Pair Of by Belinda Roddie Irish cream to cool a swollen pair of adenoids - a cloth to cool a swollen pair of brain lobes, pulsing back and forth like pong on a jaded game console, which knobs are barely working after twenty years of loneliness. Painkillers to serve as tiny red cherries on the sundae that marks a symptom-free weekend until the next time panic rolls around and I start worrying that the same thing will happen again.

My toy boat was drifting on the waves of Stinson Beach. I had placed it there because the little sailor who steered the toy boat wanted an adventure at sea. I hoped he would not be thirsty or hungry, but the sailor told me he never needed water or food. I wanted to see him tip his hat or salute to me as he disappeared into the foam, but he was just a speck in my vision now and I couldn't see him from where I stood on the sand.