Like a Kid in an Ice Cream Store

I took the baseball cap off of Dave’s head and put it back on with the bill facing backwards. He immediately adjusted the cap back to his preferred position, as he always did. “Dave, you’re a dorky little kid,” I told him with genuine affection, “you need to wear your baseball cap backwards. It’s the law.”

The “little” part was an understatement. Though nearly twelve years old, Dave stood as tall as average fourth grader. I thought that always explained his moments of mousy shyness, but his mother assured me that he was among the most popular kids in his class, which reminded me of how the smallest kids always had their stalwart defenders.

“It looks stupid backwards,” Dave explained to me for the hundredth time as I parked the car. We got out and went inside the Dairy Queen, a small bell pleasantly heralding our arrival. It was a tiny franchise, awash in fluorescent light and splattered with white tiles.

“Get anything your heart desires, Mr. Dave,” I commanded. His eyes went alight when faced with the array of items suggested by the framed posters on the wall, most probably older than he was.

The collection of frozen treats to savor seemed staggering in their variety. Ice cream of flavors ranging from vanilla to peach, ready to be served in both cups and cones, eaten with a spoon or without. Banana splits coated in a variety of delicious chocolate and strawberry toppings. Dishes that contained brownies smothered with ice cream with peanuts sprinkled on top, assuming you weren’t allergic.

Dave and I moved closer to the counter. A couple of minutes had passed, but Dave still stared at the menu. “What’re you thinking of, partner?” I asked. He slowly swiveled his head to the left as if shaking his head “no” in slow motion.

“I don’t know,” he said. But how could he not know? The menu was vast, but contained nothing unappealing to even the most discerning palate! Milk shakes and malts, flavored with vanilla, chocolate, strawberry, raspberry, peach, cherry, pineapple, marshmallow, butterscotch, or caramel. Blizzards with his choice of Butterfinger, M&M’s, Oreo, Peanut Butter, Nerds, Whoppers, Nestle Crunch, Reese’s Pieces, cookie dough, cheesecake, gummy bears, Twix, and about a hundred other things that are absolutely terrible for us.

We got to the front of the line. A 15 year old girl looked to me to take the order, Dave’s small size not alerting her to the fact that he was several years closer to her in age than I was.

“What’ll it be?” I ask him.

“Uhhhhh…” he responds, and I can tell he is no closer to deciding on his treat now than he was when we were in the car. But how? He could order chocolate ice cream frozen on a stick. A bar of ice cream shaped like a star and coated with a green shell. Two cookies sandwiched between a portion of vanilla. An entire chocolate cake made of ice cream. He could even get a cup of ice creamed drenched with cold coffee, the world is his oyster! If ice cream isn’t his cup of tea, then he can order a cup of frozen ice in a cup with artificial flavoring poured into it, or if he finds himself a bit parched, a delicious Coke with a 500% mark-up. What more could a kid ask for?

He finally looked at the girl. “Uhhhh, can I get an Oreo crunch?” The girl looked at me when she spoke.

“We don’t have that.”

I shook my head a bit, just enough not to be a jerk in front of my favorite little cousin. “Can we get a medium Oreo Blizzard?” I stated in the form of a question. She jotted the order down on a pad and got to work. Dave looked way, way up at me.

“I wanted an Oreo crunch,” he said, repeating the name of the phantom treat. I put my hands together and popped my wrists.

“Don’t worry, you’ll like the Oreo Blizzard,” I said.

“What are you getting?” he asked. I shrugged my shoulders.

“I don’t really care for ice cream,” I confessed as I took off his baseball cap and put it back on his head, the bill reversed.