Was It a Mistake?

Joni again feels the sting of loneliness as she separates herself from the slowly dispersing line outside Mishy's Ice Cream. Following the notice that shutters the popular shack for good, many of the line-goers turn into a fully dysfunctional crowd, some wailing at the pitiless skies while others see this as an excuse to throw a fit of anger.

Foolish, Joni thinks as she makes her getaway, her head down and her back to the chaos ensuing behind her. Throwing a fit won't get you anywhere. All that baseless, useless anger. It's the world's biggest enemy, and I have no room for all that. Joni gives a firm nod of her head at her own words. As someone who has an ocean’s reserve of sadness, it's natural to lack room for anger.

Suddenly, she hears a large bang and a sudden burst of heat hits her back. It's all met with shouts of surprise and worried voices screaming at others to get back. Someone screams, "Why would you do that?! The shack could have been reopened!" and when Joni turns back to peek, she sees Michelle herself running out from her business, hands holding her head in a show of dismay.

"No! No! NO! My parlor! Who the hell did this?! Who did this?! Show yourself!"

The young boy who had before been banging on the closed parlor window steps up and squares his chest at Michelle, several inches shorter than her average build. He shouts at her, his voice testing out puberty, "I did! What of it? Can't serve ice cream, don't need a shop. It's the end of the world anyway, lady! It's over! For you and your stupid shop! For all of us because you can't do your freaking job!"

Joni shakes her head as Michelle, who has long been the poster girl of calm and happiness, grows an ugly scowl on her face. From this distance, her features seem otherworldly; the image of her unhappy face so foreign it simply doesn't belong to her in this world. She watches as Michelle juts her right hand out with her palm facing upward. In it materializes a fresh, yellow-and-purple glob of what appears to be cake frosting. Michelle says, "You want cake that bad, kid?"

"Not me, you witch. My mom! She's dying at home! She's... ready to let go! But she sent me here for your ice cream cake to help her feel better, but look now! Look what you did! You can't even help yourself. You can't help anyone!"

Michelle sucks her lips inward and produces more of the creamy substance. "Alright, kid. I'm sorry for your mom, but I've had enough of you. This is hard for me too, okay?!" She cries and moves forward on the young boy who responds by filling his right palm with a ball of fire.

Joni thinks Michelle is going to glue the boy to the cement somehow while the boy burns her to a crisp until a few of the nearest people in the crowd step in to mediate the commotion. Only, they're not there to stop a grown woman from fighting a minor. Instead, their voices can be heard shouting, "Don't waste the frosting!! It might still help a little!"

“It’s not ice cream, but I'm sure any of Mishy's sweets would work!" A chorus of agreeing “Yeahs!” urges the crowd to converge on the pair like a swarm of wasps.

And wasps, they are.

From Joni's vantage point, Michelle and the young boy are lost in the swell; however, she can hear the unpleasant events that befall them. The boy is beaten without mercy by men, women, and children alike for attempting to ruin the lives they had left to live, their efforts to extinguish his flame going well beyond the fire ablaze in his hand. In the scuffle, sparks of his flame jump outward and spread among others nearby like an infectious disease. Agonizing screams fill the air as several people are engulfed in flames, shouting for the aid of anyone with the ability to put them out, but to no avail.

Michelle's screams are disturbing. Joni can't see her, but it's simple to hear Michelle bellowing, "Put me down! Stop! It doesn't work this way! No!" to the desperate mob. Joni imagines them prodding and ripping at the lady they had all just been calling their savior, trying to pull trickling remnants of peace and happiness from her body. Joni isn't sure what the mob thinks they'll find, but she isn't interested in sticking around to find out.

She had come for a bite of magic, not to see some woman be ripped apart for it. Besides, I need to get back home, Joni thinks as she turns away from the burning ice cream parlor and makes her way back toward the main streets.

And then, Wow... ‘Home.’ It’s been a while.

Despite the strange goings on at home with her family brought back from the dead, their presence when she opens the front door is rewarding in the most fulfilling way. Like she won best prize at an art fair for crafting replicas of her once living relatives and, instead of a blue ribbon, she got to take her loved ones home.

I’d choose to do this every time. Every single time, Joni thinks while hopping over a bulging black trash bag that has been discarded in the middle of the sidewalk. Her pace picks up to a slow skip, her body feeling feather light, heart aflutter. As she begins jogging, hurdling over a larger assortment of discarded trash, Joni thinks, I can’t wait to see them!

The main street comes into view and the pedestrian cross light has just turned green. Joni rejoices a little for the good timing and speeds up to catch it until she feels herself yanked backwards by a sudden hand on her wrist before she can step off the curb.

“Wah!” She yelps in surprise and stumbles hard into a solid body behind her. She can feel their grip on her shoulders, and she weasels her way out of it then whirls around to face her obstacle.

“Hey!” She shouts and finds herself frozen, stared down by a young man twice her size. His curly brown hair falls over his eyes the way they used to when they were teenagers, his lips parted into that same anxious smile he had when he’d asked for her company to their last school dance.

“Joni.” He says. The way he says it makes Joni’s heart flip in her chest, like it’s the first thing he’s said all morning and it took all his breath to say.

Fin had said her name the same way when she saw him again for the first time in almost ten years, but it didn’t feel this way.

It didn’t make her feel this way.

“Wes,” she whispers and releases a breath so slow, she thinks she might faint.

High school was a long time ago. Nine years ago. She hasn’t said Wes’s name for several years now. While saying Wes’s name like that feels new again, the burn in the pit of her stomach feels as familiar as the sound of her own voice. Something so lost in time shouldn’t feel that comfortable. That good.

I’m sorry, she thinks immediately. She has Fin on her mind.

It pains her to think that after pining all these years for her ex-boyfriend’s return, it excites her more to say Wes’s name than it does to say his.

“I thought that was you! Sorry to pull you back like that, I just—Wow!” Wes exclaims, smiling teeth fully exposed as he takes all of Joni in. He steps back and looks her over before closing the distance again, seemingly a little closer this time. It sets a blaze to Joni’s body hotter than the summer heat. “It’s so good to see you. You look great.”

Joni shakes her head and dips her gaze, trying to hide the blush spreading across her cheeks. “You’re fine.” She says quietly. “It’s okay.” Then, she wants to slap a hand over her mouth when she asks, “H-How are you? How’ve you been?”

Because she really wants to know. She wants to catch up with him, move beyond the teenage years. She wants to explore her desire to get to know this man.

“Well, aside from the world ending?” Wes says, chuckling, “I’ve been decent. Good, even! Been in and outta college—it took me years to finally get serious and get my ass outta there.” He laughs, “Found work as a paralegal. And you? I remember you were super into art?”

“Yeah…” Joni nods, now looking directly into his bright, expressive eyes. She’s overjoyed that he remembers this—anything—about her. “I’m a graphic designer. I also teach courses online.”

Wes is nodding with a satisfied look on his face and Joni has to stifle a laugh. High school is coming back to her all at once. Wes is still Wes, she notes.

“Yup, yup, makes sense.” He says then continues filling her in. “Oh! And then I ended up dating this super nerdy girl who became some newbie at NASA. Wild right?”

Dated? Past tense… Don’t ask, don’t ask, don’t ask. Joni thinks while she smiles politely and nods her head. “Wild!” She agrees.

Wes laughs again while saying, “And then she dumped me, saying we have no time to see each other. No lie there, though. I’m cool with it.”

“Oh? Was this recent?” Joni asks.

Wes nods, “Yeah, a little less than two years ago now?”

“Ah,” Joni says, taking that tidbit in but not knowing what to do it with it. Just as she’s deciding that maybe she can keep that information close for later, Wes continues by saying:

“Yeah… it was a little after my mom and grandparents died, so it hit pretty hard at the time, if I’m telling the truth.”

And the cogs in Joni’s mind go still.

Her eyes find Wes’s slowly, and she sees a pain in there that’s a little too deep and familiar for her to handle. She’s thrust backward in time to when she was a twelve year old little girl, recently orphaned and angry at the whole damned world. She remembers picking up the charcoal pencil at that time sitting before a mirror in a closet at the old kids’ home, staring at herself and being dared by the universe to draw herself back to life, because she felt dead inside.

She had been stronger then. She had listened to her mother’s words of caution, unwilling to dishonor her memory so soon after her untimely demise.

Now, she is stuck under Wes’s sad eyes and his kind smile realizing that he still feels dead inside. He hasn’t escaped and he has no way to. He can’t even commit a taboo like she can.

And he’d probably hate her if he knew she did.

“And you?” His voice comes floating to her ears like a ripple in murky water. “What have you been up to?”

Her mind suddenly yearns for that ice cream cake.

Joni’s eyes are squinted, and her lips are tense with fake smile as she forces herself to reply, “Nothing.

“I’ve been good.”