My Cardboard Balcony

Napkin Engagement Ring by Belinda Roddie Feeling so tender, when a man pushes steel around your knuckle, asks you to love him, and later, he'll get you a "real" ring, made of crystalline constructs of human whims and madness whenever something along the lines of "shiny" pops up in a wisp of imagination.

After we measured out the cocoa and butter and flour and sugar, we took a break because I inconceivably twisted my wrist while pulling the egg whisk out of the cramped drawer of cooking tools and utensils. Now Sadie was sidled up to me at the dining room table, as I applied a bag of frozen meatballs against my arm where the muscle was turning black and blue. "You can say you were in a great cooking accident," she declared with amusement.