Aphrodisiac
This is Dessert After Dark, a special collab edition of the Nightlife Review from Dirt and Cake Zine.
Aphrodisiac
M&M Fan Fiction.
By Puloma Ghosh
What is it about the green ones?
I routinely slipped off my shell for the cameras, to remind everyone that I was only chocolate underneath, entirely edible. Men found it striking, a revelation, even though we all knew Red, Yellow, and Orange were the same.
I liked it. While Brown went to work, Orange wore silly disguises, Yellow delivered stupid lines, and Red made a spectacle of himself, I drove a convertible, scarf trailing. I sipped an elaborate drink by the pool, legs draped over the side of a lounge chair. They gave me stilettos to strut around beautiful houses, showered with petals of mint, dribbles of molten chocolate everywhere. I rolled around in satin sheets. The others were my accessories, there to stare dumbly as I arched my back and stretched my legs into the air.
The more I performed, the more people clamored for green, green. They wanted whole handfuls, fed to each other until their clothes came off. Valentine’s Day, 2008, they primped me up for television interviews. Forget pink and red, they were selling whole bags of just green. I transcended myself, became mythical before the lens. Green was “love and fertility,” the story of femininity that existed before I did. I said those words over and over, then winked, stuck to the script. “It doesn’t hurt that I look so good in these white hot go-go boots.” A shimmy, a shake. “Just look at me, baby.”
Flirtatious emerald-colored sweet seductress. The ultimate aphrodisiac. The anchor men and women cooed at me from their desks, and all I could look at were their pearly teeth. I crawled on the beach for them. I splashed my boots through sea water and posed with my arms in the air. I undulated under colored lights and slid down a pole, pulled the zipper to yank off the green, reveal the sweet center. Put me in your mouth, I begged, and they did.
One morning I woke up to find my heels replaced with sneakers. I thought maybe there had been a mistake, that they gave me Red’s shoes by accident. They looked about the same—blunt, flat, laced. But they fit my feet like they were made for me. I took some experimental paces. They were more comfortable, sure, but each step was soundless, like I should make no impression. I twirled the dial on my little green phone and called up The Powers That Be to ask for my old shoes back.
“I’m afraid we can’t do that,” TPTB sighed through the receiver. “It’s just not right, how you’ve been acting so far.”
“I don’t understand.” I stared at my bare calves, grotesquely exposed.
“The consumers don’t want to see women reduced to that image anymore.”
I didn’t know how they could call my work a reduction. I had acted right. Perfectly, even. From the first day they raised my chin and placed each eyelash, plumped my lips with green gloss. They told me I was different from the others. Good enough to eat. They gave me my boots, white, jeweled buckle. I pulled them on and felt like more than I was. They told me, all you have to do is walk down that street and the men will do the rest. The world will open for you. I set those feet down one step after another, the satisfying clack of white heel on concrete and all around me, eyes turned. Yes. That had its own power.
I walked my flat feet to Brown’s as soon as TPTB hung up on me. It was early morning. She opened the door, still putting her glasses on. Brown and I never spent much time together; sure we both had heels, but I was obviously on another level, not the one left unwanted at the bottom of the bag. Her eyes went straight to my feet. I bowed my legs, wishing I could hide them. She sighed and let me in.
“Did they take yours too?” I asked tentatively, following her into her place.
She pulled her heels from under the bed. “No.”
“Why did they take mine?”
“I can’t pretend to know what TPTB think.” She started making her bed as though I wasn’t there. “But I think you overdid it.”
I thought of the poses I struck. How everyone around me gawked and hollered. “I did everything they wanted.”
Brown didn’t answer, just gave me a pitying expression.
We had breakfast together in front of the TV. A man cried out in my defense and I pointed. “See!”
Brown rolled her eyes. “You’re so obsessed with being eaten, but you don’t even know what it means.”
“Of course I know.” To be consumed. Disappear into mouths so they’ll make more. “Isn’t that the whole point?”
“You don’t have to try so hard.” Brown shook her head. “Trust me, they’ll eat you anyway.”
I was only half listening, my eyes drawn to her shoes.
“Do you want to put them on?” Brown asked. She sounded disappointed. I nodded.
Brown sat on her bed and watched me walk the length of her room, heels clacking. It didn’t feel right. I kicked them off and collapsed onto the bed beside her, groaning. I glanced mournfully at my new sneakers. “What am I supposed to do with those? Without my boots, I’m no different from Red or Yellow.”
“That’s not true. You can be more than that.” Brown placed a hand on my shell.
I shook my head. All of us had the same narrow legs, little feet. I had built my life around those shoes. I placed my bare feet on the cold floor and stood up. I wanted to leave.
Brown caught my arm before I could walk away. “You’ve never wondered what it feels like?”
I half-turned toward her. “What?”
“To be eaten.” She yanked me closer, and I had no choice but to turn my body to face hers.
“Sometimes.” I’d seen people on set, grabbing handfuls from the snack table. The way their jaws moved up and down, up and down. “Have you?”
“All the time.” She placed her gloved fingers on my chest.
“Should we try it?” I asked, voice trembling.
“It’ll be over if we do this,” Brown whispered.
I put my hands on her knees. “It’s already over.”
Brown pushed down until my hard green shell cracked into spiderwebs. I shuddered. The color that slid on like silk came off in violent shards. She tore away a piece and I cried out. She lay me on my back, sank her hand into my exposed center, and the chocolate gave. “All of those teeth, they do this over and over. To every other green. To all of us.” She ground me into her bed, smeared me on the sheets.
“Am I ruined?” I asked in a whisper, afraid of the answer.
“You’re beautiful,” Brown said.
I didn’t know whether to be upset or relieved, only that I wanted to try it. I inched closer. “Can I?”
Brown nodded. I broke her apart, too.
We spent the night tumbling wet and creamy, chewed and disintegrated. Each time Brown cut through the shell, I imagined an ivory molar and gasped. We pressed together until the fissures spread over us both. She sank her face into me and we melted together, a single brown glob in someone’s throat.
Puloma Ghosh is the author of the story collection Mouth and writes best late at night with a cherry lollipop.
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