My Cardboard Balcony

After She Moved Out by Belinda Roddie You wouldn't recognize her these days, when she leaves dents on the streets. She's taller now, and thinner, all the artificial divots glowing from beneath her white, tattered T-shirt. Scars are hard to hide. She smokes two cigarettes at a time before she takes the bus to nowhere, the only place where she feels safe, her very short hair bristling, such a stark contrast from the Beauty and the Beast curls knotted up behind her head. Most noticeable is the change in her eyes, which you could catch even when she was walking toward you from two blocks away, as well as her smile. But she doesn't smile anymore under the bruises, and her eyes just aren't what they used to be.

Two jerkwads, in one day, decided to tailgate me while I was on the freeway. Never mind the fact that there were three other lanes, barely filled with vehicles. Never mind the fact that I specifially had a bumper sticker practically shouting, "God Bless Those Tailgaters!" Never mind the fact that I was never going to go above the speed limit, not since the accident my father had gotten us into. I pumped the brake three times for both of them, and when they got off my tail, I ignored their blaring middle fingers.