Ice Cream

She just wanted ice cream. 

Really, was that such an awful crime? She wanted ice cream, and she knew a place downtown was just the right place to go, with not one, but two ice cream shops for her own choosing, and only a 10 minute drive away. Was it such an awful crime to want ice cream so much that they just had to have a traffic jam, only 5 minutes from the ice cream stores? 

Well, of course it had to happen. Since when has anything gone right this entire week? With all the tests, the failed studying, the fever that she randomly got, and the stomach issues, all she wanted was a good, long break. Of course that didn’t happen. Of course the road to the ice cream stores was blocked by traffic. Of course it was. 

There wasn’t even any use in pounding the horn at this point either. The entire street was filled with the sounds of angry drivers and passerby, who angrily shouted and flipped the bird at others and honked and honked and honked like there was no tomorrow, as if they were a migration of Canadian geese on the way towards the South for warmer temperatures, except the cars were migrating west, and not south. 

And even if there was someplace else to go, it really wasn’t like she could get out of the traffic jam. No one could move out, left or right, up or down. Just enter, inch forward, like an inchworm, and then hope you don’t crash into the person in front of you because you probably don’t have the insurance, or the money to pay for those damages, because the country is awful, and for some reason, doesn’t give anyone the luxury of something like insurance, nor healthcare, because really, in the land of the free and home of the brave, who really needs something so silly and useless like free healthcare. Preposterous. 

Inch by inch the cars moved on, and all she could think about was the fact that it was so damn close, and yet she was so damn far. A second turns into 30 minutes. A minute turns into an hour, and so on and so forth. Maybe walking over there would have been faster, but there was also no way to pull the car over and just leave it without someone biting her head off because she added to the problem. 

To make it even better, many people had already just turned off their engines, opting to sit back and relax, or just play cards in the back. No one had gotten out of their cars yet, but it surely had to happen soon, right?

No. ‘Cause the universe just also has to spite her. Why?

She could almost taste the creamy goodness in her mouth. If she closed her eyes, she’d be right there, the cold blast of AC hitting her right in the face. She’d have free range to pick whatever she wanted—whatever she desired—and man, oh man, was that a great deal. She could almost imagine what flavors she could try and what toppings she’d get. 

Still stuck in her reverie, she almost missed the police sirens come up from behind her, but she snapped awake at the last minute, rolling down her window with all the haste of a 16-year-old boy who just got a license and is trying to pick up a woman with it with all the grace of a newborn deer. She even found herself leaning her head out just like those boys, an arm leaning over the open window, head tilted just a little, shouting at the cop, because really, what sort of woman wouldn’t like to be shouted at?

“What’s going on?” She yelled, waving the cop down. The cop, in a motorcycle, stared at her, before backing up slowly.

“What seems to be the problem ma’am?” The officer questioned. In her opinion, he was quite cute, but she wouldn’t be the one to actually admit it out loud. She pursed her lips, hoping that she didn’t seem annoying, or even worse, that her lips were dry and the cute officer was noticing it. 

She shook her head ever so slightly. “Just wondering what the traffic’s for, you know.” She batted her eyes. “There isn’t much traffic ‘round these parts.”

The officer’s eyebrows rose up in surprise. “Why, ma’am, didn’t you know? They’re blowing up the whale carcass they found in Florence just a few days ago!”