My Cardboard Balcony

Driver's License by Belinda Roddie On the bent plastic card from six years ago, the name Rowena Gregor stuck out garishly to him. He had changed his name to Rowan Gregor some time back, when at last he felt like a true Scotsman, and all he needed was the feel of the kilt between his ragged thighs and hair-capped knees. He had gone to the DMV to pick up a new license, and the woman who changed the gender mark scowled at him but said nothing. To him, that hurt more than the backed up cinders of should-be-kind words and idioms, presumably clogged against her epiglottis, which was presumably hidden behind her ugly ass wattle. Somehow, however, he had kept this old driver's license - the hologram presenting a hairless jawline, pursed lips, but still the thick eyebrows that Rowan had always had. Thick, red eyebrows - the ones his girlfriend adored so much, reminding him every time she removed her necktie and tossed her suit jacket onto the mantel so

I had to flee from Russia after my family decided I shouldn't exist. After all, the politicians had agreed that homosexuals should be in the same category as unicorns, wizards, and Jedi. And as much as I would have appreciated being a Jedi at this point in time, it made no sense to stay within a household that now gave me the silent treatment whenever my younger cousins were around. I got to the airport to fly to England when lo and behold, I found my uncle and my cousin. My cousin was wearing a rainbow unicorn shirt.