Vegans Don’t Get Cheetos Fingers

I cranked the elliptical up a couple notches. In sharp contrast to all the hopping gym bunnies, I moved in super slow motion. My heart pounded out my chest, 170 times a minute. Perspiration drenched my bathing suit to the point it looked like I peed myself. A wet ring of sweat encircled the machine when I left.

I opened the window and the fresh air permeated through the stale cavern of my basement abode. Roly Poly perked up, inhaled deeply. Invigorated as a man’s armpit in an Irish Spring commercial, he sprinted around the apartment like a jackrabbit. Rewilded, feral-again, he bit my foot and made it bleed. Drunk on spring air, he then curled up beside me and went to sleep.

I waited on four young women on a Friday night. Emboldened by a kombucha ripe with living bacteria, I flirted with them using the complex signaling of drink toys. A differently colored, large naked mermaid in each of their cocktails. These toys aren’t for kids. One of the girls asked me, “Do you ever play Marry, Fuck, Kill?” I said we sometimes play “Would you rather?” in our restaurant. She asked if I’d rather go out with her very pretty friend or the very pretty hostess, or the male food runner. I said no to the male, and that the hostess had a boyfriend. She has a boyfriend too, the girl said, about her friend. You lose, she said.

She asked me would you rather have permanent Cheetos fingers or lifelong body odor? I’ll take the body odor, I answered confidently. I reasoned that in some countries body odor was a good thing, a status symbol. The girls laughed at me. They said they would all take Cheetos fingers. The food runner came over and said he would choose Cheetos fingers too. You could just wear gloves, he said. Plus Cheetos are so damn tasty. He licked his fingers. They loved it. “It ain’t easy bein’ cheesy,” I retorted.