My Cardboard Balcony

Cleansing by Belinda Roddie My hands have been in the pot for far too long, yet when I draw them out, they are stripped of blemishes and imperfections. The scalding was at first unbearable, but ultimately, a little went a long way in peeling away the scars of my childhood - the bicycle tumbles, the punches from angry schoolmates, the frozen touch of "Go away" when a flower was crushed beneath a sneaker.

Wappa picked up a red toadstool from a cluster and proceeded to devour it in one bite. I reached out my hand to stop her, only to find the fungus disappearing between her teeth all too late. However, she did not succumb to sickness, nor go green to red to purple to ultimately white in the face. Instead, she burped, sighed with satisfaction, and patted her stomach. "You see poison," she told me, "I see din-din."