Exclamationquestion’s Weblog

The day started in a check out line and ended with a hungry bug’s suicide into my hot chocolate

She stood next to me in line–the Doll girl, I named her. From top to bottom she was impeccable, it was as if my favorite blonde haired, blue eyed, anatomically proportionate Barbie decided to reappear after sixteen years of lost playtime. She didn’t look at me, she couldn’t be bothered. But I couldn’t help but stare at her. I was lost deep in thought about her legs and how they were so long and thin, and her breasts and how they were the perfect size between burdensome and playful. She saw me staring at her and I saw her glance over at me out of the corner of her eye. Quickly, I pretended to be preoccupied with the selection of granola bars, and mints. I listened to her order, her soft voice directed that the cashier deliver a bottled water in return for her dollar and fifty cents. She had the exact amount; No need for change. I watched her long, thin legs step one in front of the other, like grass hopers jumping from one blade of grass to the next. Her legs glided, quickly but gracefully up and down, one in front of the other. She danced when she walked, and just like that she left me. I looked at the cashier, shit, I had forgotten what I needed. I panicked and grabbed the granola bar. “Two dollars and forty-seven cents”, he smiled at me, probably I thought because last week his manager had cornered him, blaming him for the low-customer satisfaction “Jason, Jimmy, whatever your name is, you need to be nice, smile more, stop reading your book when you’re behind the counter and start asking people if you can help them find something” and Jeremy, not Jason or Jimmy, was thinking to himself all the while “Who the fuck needs help finding what they need in a four isle convenient store”. Fuck, the forty-seven cents. I just gave him four dollars, and told him to keep the change. 

The entire day, Doll girl played in my thoughts- I authored the story of her life.  I concluded that Doll girl had been born with those perfect legs- the day she popped out of her mother’s womb, her legs outstretched all of the other newborns in the nursery. Those legs took her places, and she could see the tops of everyone’s head. It irked her to see all of the dandruff, the grease and the dry skin. The issue of hygiene needed to be addressed, and she saw her long legs perfect for the job. Riding the world one flake at a time, Doll girl become a legend. Boys loved to stare up her long legs as she stood overtop of them, wondering to herself if they ever bothered to wash their hair before they came to see her. She had no time for boys, or men, or other women for that matter. She had a mission-to put an end to grim, and dirt, and flakes.

After I had finished my thoughts about Doll Girl, her remarkable long legs, and her beautiful life. And after using a mirror to check if I myself had grease, or annoying flakes in my hair-because those are the sort of things I miss sometimes, sort of like the forty-seven cents-i just say fuck it and go on with my day. I sensed a craving in my stomach or perhaps I scented Greg’s hot chocolate as he passed my cubicle. I walked down the hall to the beautiful, classy vending machine that would spit out my hot luscious chocolate concoction. I pressed the button that read “English, gourmet hot chocolate”  and watched as the gourmet powder fell into a styrafome cup. A pause from the machine, almost as if it was deciding whether or not to finish my drink. Then the hot steaming water poured into the styrafome cup and the powder. And vovli- English gourmet hot chocolate was made. 

I forgot to grab a lid, partially because I was eager to drink the hot chocolate, partially because I was too lazy to search for a lid in the mess of them that were all spread around on the table. I could spot the medium, and large lids easily but my small lid I couldn’t see. Fuck the lid, who needs a lid, you just drink it anyway. 

A lid would have saved him

He, like myself, was simply wishing to drink a sip of the English, gourmet hot chocolate

Perhaps, he would take a dip into the sweet abyss

Swimming in chocolate

sipping a little as he perfected his back stroke. 

A good idea he thought-A great idea

Swimming and chocolate

Beautiful. 

So he dove in from the top of the vending machine,

not just any dive, 

his signature move, 

a front flip into a back pike. 

and he nailed it. 

The chocolate encompassed him, and he opened his mouth 

but he couldn’t taste chocolate

all he tasted and smelled was his burnt body

and he realized he dove into

a styraphome hell. 

I saw his dead body floating in the dark brown water and All i could think was

Why didn’t I put the lid on the hot chocolate.