Saturday, May 28, 2005

Russ the Gelato King

In a coffee shop in the heart of Wellington Russ extracts the coffee to make a grumpy customer his venti latte. Russ is having a rough day, like so many of his days have been lately. It seems that the more he works, the harder life becomes for him. He tries his best to be happy, but sometimes it is just too hard. As he begins to steam a jug of milk he starts to day dream. He dreams about all the beautiful things in the world that make him happy. He dreams about what he will do when this tedious shift is over. He thinks of all the wonderful things he could do when he gets to walk out the door, and not think of making anymore coffee and not having to ask "what drink can I get for you there?". He doesn't want to pretend to be happy, he doesn't want to make polite conversation and listen to peoples menial lives. He wonders what would happen if he just tipped a chocolate creme frappacchino all over his next customer. He smiles as he thinks of the satisfaction he would feel watching the chocolate gloop slowly spread down the persons face and neck. He passes the frappacchino over, knowing that the customer doesn't know just how close they had come to a nasty surprise. Russ stared at the door, it looked so far away, He imagined himself walking out the door and walking along the street. There is a parade on the street, people walking along on stilts, jugglers, lions and tigers and bears. Oh my, says Russ realizes that he has put regular instead of decaf into one of the cups. He curses under his breath. He holds the cup in his hand and just stares at it. He imagines it is in fact a waffle cone filled with his secret vice... gelato. He stares at the cup, and once more he is off in the day dream. He stands on the side of the street holding his gelato and watching the parade pass by. He then realized that he knows everyone in the parade. It's not just strangers. All of his friends are shouting out at him. They are asking him to join the parade. Russ is a little scared, he wants to join the parade, but he doesn't think there is any space for him. Then suddenly he sees a float that says "Long Live King Russ". King Russ? He looks at the float and realized that the float is actually a giant ice cream scoop like the one they use to scoop out the gelato. It lowers itself to the ground. Russ steps up onto the scoop and it raises itself. When the scoop reaches the very top he can see all over Wellington. The view is amazing, as he sits up there on his gelato scoop throne, he feels happy. He is the Gelato King. The parade goes all throughout Wellington and finally stops at Oriental Bay where Russ gets lowered at the gelato shop and he receives a free waffle cone of gelato, then he and his friends go and sit on the beach and eat their gelato. Russ the gelato king has never realized that he is loved, even when he doesn't feel like he is. Everyone starts chanting his name over and over "Russ, Russ, Russ, Russ". He then hears a customer say "is this soy, is this soy?" "yes" he replied, he then placed a mug on the sever and said "tall latte at the bar"
- Owen Winter

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