Lemon-Yellow Sun
(for Mona)
How did I get here? An hour ago, I was sitting comfortably in a row with all of my "friends". Luscious Lime, Chokeberry Cherry, Raspberry Rainbow. Raspberry said that no one was interested in me. I was nobody. Lemon flavored nothing in a sea of flavors that guaranteed to stain your tongue the color of a thousand rainbows. I thought about that. Raspberry had a point. They were what every kid wanted. Not me! Just because I’m the color of sunshine doesn’t mean I’m capable of making your day any brighter. So maybe yellow isn’t quite as exciting as the other colors– I couldn’t stain your mouth in an explosion of rainbows for example. I was beginning to feel like a real loser. That’s when she walked through the door.
La la la la la. Shiny black pigtails bouncing. White tea shirt smeared with the evidence of a decedent breakfast. Eggs benedict, orange juice, toast with marmalade. You know the type. The kind of girl that knows what she likes, and takes the task of choosing her edible fuel quite seriously. She pawed through a jar of multicolored jawbreakers before making her way over to me. ME! Finally, a kid who appreciates yellow. Life is good...or so I thought.
I can still feel my tiny, white leg pop when I think of the way she snatched me out of the rack with her dirty, sticky fingers. All hurt legs aside, she chose me. Me! Not Luscious Lime, not Chokeberry Cheery, and especially not that asshole Raspberry Rainbow. She wanted me, Lemon-Yellow-Sun.
Seconds later I was waiting patiently on the counter while she counted her nickels and dimes. I remember glancing over at Raspberry Rainbow with a shit-eating grin on my face. "Take your rainbow and..." before I could finish, I was carried away. Out the door we went, into the bright morning sun. She (black, pigtailed girl) jumped onto her bicycle and tore up School Street. Before turning left onto Grove, she stopped. With the grace of a ballerina on crack and carbs, she tore off my beautiful, crinkly, white, plastic dress...and tossed it to the ground where it landed in a puddle of last nights pale ale. Sweet. Thanks. Oh, it gets better. I said a quick goodbye to the blue, blue sky before her chubby, little hand jammed me into her juice-stained mouth.
We proceeded to ride up Grove Street. That’s when it happened. I was just getting used to being sucked into non-existence when suddenly, I was ripped from her lips and tossed, recklessly I might add, onto the sidewalk. I looked up at her, in shock. She looked back at me with her eyebrows furrowed. Her fat, little face distorted into the most unbecoming expression. "Yuck" was her famous last word before she sped off. The nasty, little, pigtailed, witch just threw me out like yesterdays paper.
Cars and trucks screamed past my tiny, little, half-sucked face.. A bicycle passed and crushed my only toe. As if it couldn’t get any more pathetic, a woman popped out of door from the house in front of me, led by a little, black dog in-a-hurry-to-pee...yeah, that’s right, lemon-yellow-sun was really living up to her name that day. Disgusting. Kill me now please!
As I lay there, wallowing in a mixture of misery and dog urine, I heard a bicycle approaching. It got closer and closer. A shadow suddenly blocked out all evidence of a sky. I lifted my little, yellow head. Starring back at me, was a girl. With shiny, black, pigtails. She was sucking on a lollipop. As she pulled it out of her mouth, she smiled. Her mouth was the color of a thousand rainbows. I thought, "That little bitch raspberry is gonna..."
To be Continued....
