My Cardboard Balcony

Cleansing by Belinda Roddie My hands have been in the pot for far too long, yet when I draw them out, they are stripped of blemishes and imperfections. The scalding was at first unbearable, but ultimately, a little went a long way in peeling away the scars of my childhood - the bicycle tumbles, the punches from angry schoolmates, the frozen touch of "Go away" when a flower was crushed beneath a sneaker.

Wappa picked up a red toadstool from a cluster and proceeded to devour it in one bite. I reached out my hand to stop her, only to find the fungus disappearing between her teeth all too late. However, she did not succumb to sickness, nor go green to red to purple to ultimately white in the face. Instead, she burped, sighed with satisfaction, and patted her stomach. "You see poison," she told me, "I see din-din."

No Justice by Belinda Roddie He walks without chains while the boy is dead. He sees freedom while the family sees red. May he languish in guilt while his victims all cope. Michael Brown has no trial: There's no justice, no hope.

"Hello?" "Yes, this is Doctor Andrews from Saint Joan's Hospital. Is this Dani Howard?" I could feel the lump beginning to swell in my throat. I tried to stop my hands from shaking as I held the phone. "Speaking." "We have some news regarding your wife, Claire. It seems that the operation went smoothly." "Oh." That was a relief, but it didn't answer all of my concerns.

"Why won't you tell me anything?" "It's complicated, okay?" Emma threw her hands up in exasperation as Lindsay rubbed the reddening skin between her eyebrows. At this rate, I wasn't expecting either of them breach their erected brick walls. Emma wanted to know who Lindsay was dating, and Lindsay was trying desperately to dissuade Emma from asking for details.

Third update ahoy! As of November 22nd, I have: - Written 37,120 words. This puts me almost five hundred words above the word requirement by this date. I've definitely slowed down a bit since my initial spurt, but I always hit that second act slump in any story. The fact that I'm keeping up despite work, school, friends' visits, and other shenanigans is definitely a good sign. - Still have not thought of a title. This is starting to sound familiar, isn't it? - Carved out a primitive rising action curve, climax, and denouement to the novel. Like I said last week, this novel will be far longer than 50,000 words. It'll be nice to bring in more dimension to the characters' relationships while not allowing the plot to get too convoluted. The people, in my opinion, should be driving the story, not hackneyed plot devices. Until next Saturday, my friends. Cheers, Belinda

They kept us in the embassy and wouldn't let us go home. We sat together in the cell, holding hands, doing our best to pray. But my thoughts were clouded, and I couldn't get any words across to any sort of deity. I just wanted to go home. Finally, after a week, we were allowed to leave.