An Open Letter to My (VERY REAL) Girlfriend About What Happened to the Gallon of Ice Cream in the Freezer

Dear Realtina,

I am writing this letter before God and everyone so that you can see I have nothing to hide and that my words will ring true, much like the tinnitus rings in my ear after that guy set off a firework right next to me on the 4th of July on Sunset Beach, and this trueness will ring true in the ears of everyone else so that everyone will have tinnitus of truth.

You are probably concluding that I had the means and the motive to consume this ice cream. Yes, I am first to admit that I have committed crimes against ice cream in the past. How could I not? Cold, smooth, sweet, delicious, and this one was no exception — caramel with pieces of brownie. It was one of those fancy rich-people brands that puts a picture of the creamery owner’s family on the label, all laughing and cavorting. It was so rich, it even included a biography of everyone in the family — Sue-Ellen (mom), Randolph (dad), Bridget Lee Swan (child 1), and Baron Igor DaVinci (child 2). Right next to the family tree tracing their lineage to the Merovingians, the label displayed report cards from the children’s Waldorf School, so you know that they're good children and that Bridget Lee Swan excels at pottery and camming, and Baron Igor DaVinci aspires to be a data broker when he gets access to his trust fund. Of course, the lid had a series of intimate photos showing Sue-Ellen and Randolph holding hands and locking eyes. It’s clear that they have rampaging chemistry, and that rampaging chemistry translates to a passion for mixing cream and sugar and freezing it. Or whatever. I don't exactly know how ice cream is made, but I guess they, like, whip it or churn it or something. And you can tell by looking in their eyes, eyes that are mentally undressing each other on that tub label, that they imbue that coital urge to whip and beat and churn into the ice cream.

In any case. I did not eat the ice cream. I had just, like, a spoonful of it. Just a taste. Just to whet my appetite. To cool the sultry burning of my tongue and the roof of my mouth. Burnt by the gallop of impatience. Burnt as I brought forth the bubbling cheese and unfathomable meat of a frozen burrito — no longer frozen, but aflame with the agitated dihydrogen oxides of a microwave oven.

Yes, the burrito, scornful of my appetites. Lamenting of its own fate. Dead animal fragments bemoaning their separation from the living parts. Striking a cruel revenge against my tender mandibles. I, who was guilty of nothing but hunger. I who did naught but nibble the edge, and was condemned to the blistering agony of agitated dihydrogen oxides, jailed with the battered fats and proteins of mammary fluid, which we — proving forever and without counterargument the unseriousness of our civilization — refer to as “cheese.”

So yes, I did have a taste. Would you not, in my circumstances? Yes! We’ve talked about this many times. I recall our conversations. So many long nights and floods of tears over ice cream, and who ate it, and who didn’t save any for the other person, and who then lay on the couch groaning in misery, emitting rude sounds, those cuttings of cheeses, those burblings of angry gut, those swells of captured gas that could if only harnessed to practical purpose, convey one aloft like the balloons that are the unfailing delights of children and morons.

How could I forget these conversations! These ruptures to our relationship, and dawns of sleepless nights, and the embraces of repair. (Forestalled often by the rumbling of guts and winds cackling free of their fetters, like the storm gales foolishly unleashed by those unfaithful and greedy Ithicans, the sailers under Odysseus.)

Shame! Yes, I felt it as the cool succor of sweetened cream touch my heat-scoured tongue. Tears of many natures dribbled from crinkled eyes that had seen uncountable failures and disappointments (such is the lot of an artist; it is the price we pay for our gift). But know as I sought this relief, I thought only of you, Realtina! Only of your love and forgiveness, which shines like a celestial boon on the twisted homunculus of my soulless personage.

Anyway…then, like, a giant bird came in through the window and ate all the ice cream and then threw the container away and covered it in paper towels so you wouldn’t notice but you did and then it flew away before I could take a picture. I was going to go to the store to get more, but then I fell asleep because I haven’t been sleeping well, and, I don’t want to point fingers here, but you kind of toss and turn a lot in the bed and mutter threats in your sleep and so…it’s kind of your fault, like, if we’re going to be taking accountability here. Plus…I don’t really have any…money…so yeah I’m just as torn up about this situation as you are, if not more so because of your totally not cool accusations.

Yeah, that’s what happened to the ice cream and I’m sure my VERY LOYAL followers can corroborate this in the comments and won’t contradict me if they know what’s good for them.

Love ya, babe

Andy Futuro