My Cardboard Balcony

Family Matters by Belinda Roddie The chime of a text message, muffled by denim as I lean back against the bench. Train's late, again, but that doesn't matter; the destination is, as always, no man's land, and I'm not itching to get there on time. I've smoked four cigarettes before realizing that my brother has been trying to contact me. Tells me my father's dead - again. He's been clinically dead twice before, for about two to three hours both times. The ash from my stogies leaves mosaics on my fingers, and I call the hospital to check if they've revived him. No dice. He's dead for real this time. Fifty-six years old, and as dead as Lincoln and Roosevelt. As in brain hemorrhage, fountain of internal bleeding, cerebral supernova and gray matter explosion dead. The howl of a train whistle, unhindered by the fog that's thicker than the carcinogens I've pumped into my lungs, curdling my breath like sour milk. I take a wind...

"I'll give you two candy bars for one of your race cars." "Three, and I'll give you a race car and a Pokémon card." Shelly wrinkled her nose. "Two Pokémon cards." "Deal." Josephine stuck our her hand to shake. Shelly passed her the crunchy toffee chocolate bars, which Josephine munched on happily.

To Outsmart A Dictator by Belinda Roddie I painted a picture of me burning an American flag, and since it's not the same as actually burning an American flag, I didn't get my citizenship yanked away from me like an ice cream cone. Fancy that! I made fun of the president, but I oh, so very slightly, changed his last name - an extra vowel here, a new consonant there - so if I ever got arrested for sedition, I'd shrug and reply, "I don't know why the president thinks it's about him. Is that his name? That's not his name. Not everything is about you, Mister President. Grow a pair and grow up." I bought an aerosol can and sprayed fireworks along the overpass so the fourth of July could feel like mine again. My independence hangs in the balance, traveling through loop holes and seeking shortcuts. If you play the game right, this country's still yours to verbally ream if you feel like it deserves to be. I'm an artist, and hone...

No update on the OneWord website today. Oh, well!

Up In The Sky by Belinda Roddie I stole Wonder Woman's lasso so I could make you tell the truth for once in your goddamn life. You spilled out your guts like confetti on the carpet, and the stain is never coming out. But the tales you told, oh, Lord, I'm saving them in my back pocket in case you wrong me again. Tell me, how did you manage two other wives without breaking a sweat? You're no Superman, that much is obvious. Now the discomfort's turning your face a whole different color. I always questioned if I needed a hero, but I guess you're the joker here, and I'm sure as Hell the fool. That's no bird or plane up in the sky. No, those are the floating hearts you broke with your half-assed lies. You collected them like comic books. They were vintage, but now they're worth less than the "I love you" you snuck past me. I'd like to turn the page on this little saga, please. I'll buy my own Batmobile and take off a...

The movie was less suspenseful than the date was. I simply could not figure out if she was into me or not. One minute, she was squeezing my hand for dear life; the next, she kept her body closed off, scrunched off in the theater chair, eating the last of her popcorn. It wasn't until the film ended and we were walking to her car that I got a peck on the cheek.

I listened to the man's words and felt my own blood freeze in my veins, as if I had been forced inside a massive ice cooler and left to die in an artificial mini-ice age. I hoped, quietly, that his message was one of satire, not of a true agenda. That he did not take his own expressed beliefs seriously. But were it a parody, in all honesty, I don't think it would have been any less frightening.