My Cardboard Balcony

Sweet Charity by Belinda Roddie Hush. Lights out on the second story. The river's lip is plump, but closed off to any echo of previous sound, the ripples lost to the dying whimper of yesterday's traffic. Thousands of feet above the rooftops, a pilot signals for his companion to make a crackling announcement to the sleeping civilians just departing from Washington, D.C. "This is your co-pilot speaking. We ask that you please expect turbulence in the next hour of mutual silence." Everything feels so, goddamn, dead. A thirty-seven-year-old private, raw from her first tour, lights a stogie in the privacy of her hotel room. The door says, "Smoking," so she shouldn't get (m)any complaints. She leaves the television on at half-volume, just enough to hear the eleven o'clock news about another black girl shot to death asking for help at the ATM in the whitest part of town. Half-eaten soldier pumping smoke into her congested ...

The barricade put up in front of the memorial did wonders for the temper of the politician, who ranted and raved and foamed at the mouth as the reporters surrounded him. He whined and whined about the nerve of the government to shut down such a marvelous part of American history, just as an old veteran in a wheelchair squeaked by him and stared thoughtfully into the red-faced representative's eyes. "You're the one who forced us to fence this off," the former soldier murmured, "remember?"

When Gregory cut open the doctor's flesh, he was shocked to find oil oozing from the opened tunnels of veins and arteries, once connected in a vast, golden-gleaming spider web. It was not crude oil, nor olive oil, but it was quite thick and bronzed, and it smelled very, very sweet. Like honeysuckle laced with petrichor.

by Belinda Roddie In the old jack o'lantern lived a family of mice, each of which had a special gift. And when October became November, and the Johnson family decided to throw out the pumpkin, the mice would have to use each gift to find or build a new home. Rodrigo, the father of the family, had excellent strength. So he prepared a little wagon made of tree bark and twigs to pull all of their belongings in one trip, never breaking a sweat. Sally, his wife, was very fast, and she could scurry to a place a mile away and come back in only a second. This way, she managed to find an excellent spot to build a house, away from the noise and tumult of human existence. The eldest, both boys, had somewhat different abilities. Oliver had eyes so sharp that he could see through everything. That way, he managed to stare straight into the earth's core right below where they would build their new house, and he found that the tectonic plates were quite stable, and no risk of an earth...

The patron was wearing denim jeans, a denim jacket, denim boot tops, and a denim knapsack, slung over her shoulder. I looked down at her feet quickly to see if her boots themselves were made of denim, but I snapped my eyes upward quickly as she cleared her throat. "Dry cup for me, barkeep," she rasped, harboring the distinct voice of a twenty-year smoker. "It's been a long drive."

Wow. Lot of stuff to cover, actually, because a lot has changed in my life, for better or for worse. So I better crack my knuckles and get started, shall I? My girlfriend, sister, and I recently moved into our new apartment, which we call The Three Broomsticks (an homage to the Harry Potter series and suggested by my friend Kyle). Let me put this out here right now and say that the place is gorgeous. It's right by the canal in the city, so you get an amazing view of the water and the boats that pass. It's getting more and more decorated and furnished each day, with bookshelves and desks and a coffee table and all that good stuff. While most of the apartment has ungrounded electricity, the surge protectors we have work, so we're not concerned about any sort of blow-out with our stuff. Our apartment manager is fantastic. Our neighbors are respectful. It's really just a good fit. The main concern I have, of course...is money, as the apartment is definitely a little exp...

Sex In The Oven by Belinda Roddie Jesus fucking Christ, I think I need skin grafts. Yes. This was, in fact, a story I wrote for my creative writing workshop class in my final semester of college. Flash fiction, indeed, at its flashiest.  And of course, it has not been edited nor modified since May 12th, 2011.