My Cardboard Balcony

by Belinda Roddie "Don't go near there!" Jeremy stiffened. He raised his hand slightly from where he was going to turn the knob of the closet. He stared at his friend with a questioning look glued to his eyebrows. "Um...why?" His friend twitched a little. "There are some...things in there that I don't like people seeing." "O...kay..." Jeremy drew out the word slowly, separating the syllables with wispy strands of air. "So whatcha got to hide? Cheap booze? Cigarettes? Bad porn?" "It's not that...kind of thing." "C'mon, Roger, what kind of skeletons do you have in your closet, huh?" The high-pitched shriek that seemed to rupture Roger's throat was certainly alarming in Jeremy's ears, almost forcing him to clap his hands over his lobes. The dilating pupils radiating from his friend's bulging eyes told one story - and it all seemed like a very, very bad joke. "Roger......

The letter was not signed. The envelope was not stamped. Yet it had arrived at the house without the assistance of the United States Postal Service. It had been sneaked through the mail slot, as it were, dropped into the cluster of gathered dog hair reassembling into into a strange silhouette against the hallway carpet. As the recipient stooped down to retrieve the mail, the unsigned letter poked upward, its red sheen most alarming. It was not a Valentine's Day message. It was something much worse.