My Cardboard Balcony

Under The Arch by Belinda Roddie Under the arch, we cried and cried because our poor father had died. He was thrown in a ditch by our mother, that bitch, so we sat in the shade that was black as pitch, and we cried and we cried and we cried and we cried. And we cried and we cried and we cried.

After the party, we regrouped at the bus stop on the edge of town in order to figure out what to do and where to go next. Tripp, our pseudo-leader, had a half-full bottle of vodka that he passed around. "Here's my idea," he said as we shared cold, harsh swigs. "We head up Cross Hill."