Dating : Orange-cream

Life is like a box of chocolates. That’s what Forrest Gump once said, and damn it if there ever was a wiser man than he, Bill figured he’d eat his own shoes. Not that Bill had any shoes to eat. Or anything to eat all for that matter. To be honest though, if he had any shoes, he wasn’t quite sure if he would eat them, or wear them. His feet were cold, blistered, and almost always bleeding. The New York pavement was not kind to his little tootsies, and though he somehow managed to keep his toes from freezing off that harsh winter, the air that spring was cold. And if that cold air undermined all his hard work that winter, and froze his toes off, well he was gonna have a little word with the groundhog that decided that this winter was gonna last a little longer, the Easter Bunny who couldn’t get his furry ass in New York soon enough, and any other mystical rodents he could find. But he was hungry. Though the word hungry didn’t really do what he felt justice. Hungry implied waiting patiently, but excitedly at a restaurant, while the chef prepared your juicy hamburger in the kitchen, hungry implied that you could satisfy that burning inside of you with a pleasant little picnic, sharing your teensy tiny sandwiches with all your buddies, instead of trying to club them to death with the picnic basket in a desperate attempt to claim their teensy tiny sandwiches as his own.

“Life’s like a box of chocolates” he repeated to himself, trying to not imagine the delicious chocolates that said box held. And so, what if he had managed to pick out those chocolates filled with that weird orange-flavored cream every day, for the last three years? Tomorrow he might manage to pluck himself out a nice nougat or peanut butter filled truffle. His stomach growled at the thought of chocolates, even the orange cream-filled variety.

“Hush now Bertha,” he said, patting his startlingly thin gut. “You’re on a diet remember? We had too many of those cheeseburgers and tasty crab dinners. If we eat too much more, you’re likely to pop!” he said. His stomach growled again, apparently not convinced. A crowd rushed past him, murmuring to each other with emotion that Bill couldn’t quite recognize. He noticed that the street was almost bare and that everyone that was still on it, was quickly making their way to wherever the crowd was going. Bill grumbled something to himself before following the crowd. It seemed like a good hundred people at least had swarmed a little apartment building, though Bill couldn’t see what they were gawking at through the human herd. He started to push his way through the crowd of people, who all seemed transfixed by something. Usually, his smell was enough to get him through most crowds, but whatever had captivated them seemed to be stronger. He was forced to rely on his brute strength to make his way through, but luckily for him, his “hungry strength” was a sight to behold. He shoved statute like people aside, slipping deeper into the crowd like a worm. Well if a worm also happened to be a forty-five-year-old man wearing the same stained Jets T-shirt he was wearing that same day three weeks ago, and every day in between. But then he saw it, and his jaw went slack. Today he hadn’t gotten a chocolate filled with orange cream. It wasn’t filled with nougat, peanut butter, or coconut either. No strawberry filling, or fudge. Hell, he wasn’t even sure if what he was staring at could even be called chocolate.