My Cardboard Balcony

Trance by Belinda Roddie Look at me: The way the white in the ceiling reflects across my vacant, tunnel eyes. There's no color left to gaze into; see, even the iris has turned to glass. Piece by piece, I've broken away from your touch. Fingernails digging into skin just below the knuckles. Fist aimed for an exposed thigh. The urge to punish myself is reckless. The need to punish myself is addictive. This has to be the end, doesn't it? All the pages I've stitched together, they're out of order, their ink smudged, like I can't focus on the words. Like I'm hypnotized. I've descended into a vortex built out of shallow fears and popcorn plaster, yet every tooth in its mouth is sharpened by something more vexing and more dangerous. Please tell me if I'm bitten - I may not notice.

To find joy in cinema again - to feel laughter press its fingernails deep into your stomach, hurt you but at the same time uplift you - to hold back tears when tragedy strikes. You know, deep down, that it's all fiction - all part of the great screenwriter and director's plans. But now you just stare at a screen, and the people talking in front of you are simply silhouettes of loud static.