Nancy couldn't sleep, so she went into the kitchen and opened the refrigerator. She stared at the items contained within but couldn't decide what she wanted. She often wondered why her life was complicated by trivial details. Nancy stared at shelves full of tempting food, even though she wasn't hungry. Eating was one of her favorite pastimes, it made things easier for her to handle. She eyed her mother's apple pie and put it at the top of things she possibly planned to taste before she crawled back into her cozy bed, where she hid when she could.
She had a twin brother named Brad who was two minutes older than she was. Both of them had blonde hair and blue eyes, but only one of them was popular: he was the captain of the soccer team, the senior class president, and he was seeing Kathy. Nancy was always reading a book or writing stories about loners who change the world. She liked David but she didn't ask him out because she didn't know what she'd do if he said no.
Bending, she checked the back shelves for something sweet and found a bowl of strawberry JellO; she added it to her list. There was also a whole container of chocolate milk and some brownies.
Her appetite vanished when she saw a plate covered with tin foil that contained fried chicken, mashed potatoes, and green beans“last night's dinner, the meal he never got the chance to eat. Suddenly, the cold air made her shudder. She wanted to crawl back into bed and never get up, but she couldn't because she would end up thinking about tomorrow, so she closed the refrigerator and opened the freezer. A blast of deathly frigid air assaulted her; she staggered back a few steps and thrust her hand into the lifeless, icefilled realm long enough to seize the pint of Ben & Jerry's Cookie Dough within reach. She slammed the door as though it were a holding tray in the county morgue.
Brad.
Nancy took a clean mug and spoon out of the dishwasher and sat down. She removed the top, removed the last of the cookie dough from the container, and started to eat; not because she was hungry, but because she had to.
The only emperor is the emperor of ice cream!
She had read Wallace Stevens' poem, "The Emperor of Ice Cream," in her Intro to Poetry class last year. It reminded her that life, like ice cream, didn't last long. Her brother hadn't planed to be run off the road by a drunk driver, it just happened. Brad just got his license last month, he didn't know how to react to an oncoming car in his lane, especially since it was raining. He'd swerved into the opposite lane“anyway, that's what the police at the scene said“hoping the driver would stay in the wrong lane, but he didn't...
She plunged the spoon in one last time to claim the last spoonful. She liked Cookie Dough because it lingered: after the vanilla melted, you could keep the dough in your mouth. While she was relishing it, these lines returned:
Call the roller of big cigars,
The muscular one, and bid him whip
In kitchen cups concupiscent curds...
She chewed the cookie dough as slowly as possible, taking time to enjoy every morsel. Nancy stared at the empty mug and smiled: life could never fool her again to have faith in it; now she knew the only emperor was the emperor of ice cream.
Amy Grech is a senior at IC. She is majoring in English, her first language, and minoring in Writing, her first love. This is her second appearance in 14850 Magazine.