My Cardboard Balcony

I Cannot Hate Her by Belinda Roddie I cannot hate her for her face - her looks are as irrelevant as the blue sky when you are in the wrong mood to smile. Books should not be judged by covers, but what lies beneath the folds of paper, where the print leaks out from eyelids, narrow noses, ears or broad foreheads and faces oddly pinched. I could perhaps dislike her for her jeers at boy or girl who she perhaps perceives as lower than her. I could abhor that she breaks poor hearts, or cruelly steals, or cheats, or lies to people whose souls are left cracked and broken, pieces all over the place - but I could never hate her for her face.

"I have a minimal hearing loss," said Gary, hanging his head in shame. "That's why I talk so funny." He didn't talk that funny. I knew him from Mrs. Lowe's second grade class and all he did was spit a bit when he said s's. I knew when I talked to him, he'd have to ask me to repeat myself because he couldn't hear me right. But I never minded. Not even five years later.