My Cardboard Balcony

Wealthy Neighbors by Belinda Roddie The silver fence between you and me gets higher by the day, yet its tempting gleam stops us from breaking it down into shards with hammers. We use the slats between each precious plank to pass notes, birthday cards. I miss when the fence was low enough for me to offer you a cup of tea. My husband, when we bought this house, first wanted the fence to be carved from gold. And he wanted it fifty feet high so we were surrounded by gilded dreams to hide our guilty pleasures. Now that spring is here and the heat waves are impending, I stay in the shade that the silver provides. Yet the metal is hot, so I cannot slide my fingers through to touch your cooler skin on the other side.

"Have you seen my Gamecube controller?" asked Rachel. "That? Oh. Yeah, I threw it away." "WHAT?!" "The dog got a hold of the cord, and, well, let's just say if you plugged that in, either it wouldn't work or we'd have a fire hazard." "Great," groaned Rachel. "Now I'm going to have to drop fifty bucks on an Amazon order just to play Super Smash Bros. freakin' Melee!" Her mom sighed. "Life's hard, isn't it, kid?"