My Cardboard Balcony

The Alternative by Belinda Roddie When the pressure runs deep, and the fever pinches both sides of my head like raw dough in summer heat, there's the urge to ignore the endearing tone of a loved one, who urges me to remember the sun shaving its upper lip with the cold, silver razor of the horizon. It's easy for people, who stand where the breeze hits them at an angle that warms their bones rather than freezes them, to tell me that things will get better. But I retort that taking it one day  at a time doesn't help much when every hour feels like an eon on my brow, and every minute laces its fingers around my heart and squeezes the arteries so that all reason is backed up in my lungs and spine like excess fluid, every second takes another inch off my height, another week off my life. You view the shore ahead of me and what appears to be a clear, blue sea, but the foam is sticky, steeped, heavy like molasses. ...

I stopped by Paul's Crimson Oasis for a tall glass of black coffee. He told me all they had was water, and suddenly, I really was in a desert of my feelings. Still, a little lemon and licorice was enough to make even H2O pleasing, and I hopped back in my T-Bird with a full thermos and practically pedaled my way to Ferris's Foyer for a glass of sherry and an espresso.