My Cardboard Balcony

Abrupt Onset by Belinda Roddie The first time I had a panic attack, I was not in a public space. I was not surrounded by shadows in suits or skirts, their mouths flapping and gumless as the screens of their phones lit up their lips. I was not provoked by a crowd or mob, nor emotionally riveted by a trauma in a scene from a movie. No trigger or content warning, this time, could protect me from the quivering of the volatile telephone wires hooked into my shivering brain. The first time I had a panic attack, it was three o'clock in the morning, and I had just gotten up to take a piss. I didn't care if I disturbed my girlfriend during her deep sleep; I stumbled to that welcoming white basin, and the bathroom lights washed my body in a cleansing glow. Sterilized, I let the cold porcelain hold me up as if I had already nearly achieved rigor mortis. I was still halfway between the lands of the living and the dead. I did my business, wiped, as you should always ...

Charles wanted an order of fries with no salt. But every time he got a basket, those potatoes were grimy from the sodium. He threw a fit then, screaming at the top of his lungs, but the cashier was snot-nosed and bratty, and she had no interest in resolving the situation. "How difficult is it to not pour salt onto French fries?" demanded Charles' father, who was red in the face. "You need me to babysit you behind the counter? Or are you just being a jerk?"