Two Scoops
on letting yourself deserve things
Once there was a man who had an ice cream. He holds it in his left hand and uses the fingers of his right to catch the melting, falling scoop. Opposite him sits a woman. She doesn’t have an ice cream because she doesn’t deserve one. She watches his vanilla pearls roll down the side of his cone and imagines catching them before they’re lost.
There are a myriad of ways to eat an ice cream. The stiff peak of a Mr Whippy asks one thing of a mouth, a gelato moon another. This is two scoops, rolled into submission by the cold, hard metal of a special spoon.
The man talks about a position at work he is thinking of applying for. Every time she asks a question about it he leans towards his ice cream and reshapes the scoops with his tongue. Every time she agrees that he sounds like the best candidate for the role he holds the cone a little firmer with his hand. The warmth of his palm softens into it. Ice cream threatens to ooze through the sides.
The woman is hungry. She craves validation too. All she wants is parts of her to feel like rainbow coloured sprinkles to the soul of someone else.
Can we talk about us? she says and he fills his mouth with damp wafer and he chokes on it.
Do you like me? she asks and his cone quietly collapses.
She reaches to wipe a smear of ice cream away from his chin with her finger. It tastes like if no one knows, then she can get away with it.
On her way home she buys a full size bar of Tony Chocoloney Dark Chocolate, Almond and Sea Salt and eats it on her own. It feels good until it feels like a devastating self-betrayal. The salt lingers but when she touches her fingers against her lips and nose she can still taste him.
Two scoops was enough for everyone but he didn’t have to share. She could have eaten that on her own. Let him wipe flecks of vanilla from her mouth, instead. Show him all her rainbow coloured sprinkles that she gifts herself because she deserves them. Tell him she doesn’t need his Mr Whippy. Let him, if he’s lucky, try a bit of her gelato moon.
Painting by Arantzazu Martinez
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to find your erotic voice and give yourself permission to deserve
Talk Dirty To Me, every Thursday in November!