Just a little bit more to the left...

Using a wrench, Caleb twisted the Swirly's ice cream machine lever until it was just loose enough to barely hang on. The second Danny grabbed it, the lever would fall off in his hand and ice cream would spray everywhere. Exactly how Caleb planned it.

It wasn't the most admirable example of friendly behavior, but neither was stealing Caleb's waffle face from its rightful place. Danny said it himself. He wasn't an ice cream maker. Caleb, on the other hand, was and he loved every minute of working at the Swirly Go Round. It wasn't fair for Danny to just swoop in and snatch everything away. Hogging all of the deliveries was the last straw. No one messed with Caleb's carts.

Oblivious to Caleb's scheme, Danny stood at the counter refilling the sprinkle shaker when a man came up to the window and scrutinized him, unblinkingly. Danny stared back, more than a little creeped out. "Uh...Can I help you?"

"Yes." The man nodded slowly while studying Danny's face from top to bottom. "You can. You have the exact face I've been looking for."

"Sorry." Danny pointed to his face. "Not on the menu."

The man chuckled. "No, I need a young man to act in my Cream Pop commercial. Here's a sample." He handed Danny a bottle of Cream Pop.

Danny took a sip and seemed to enjoy it. "Hey, it's creamy, yet fizzy."

"Exactly! How would you like to be the face of the ad?"

"That would be awesome!" Danny quickly composed himself and played cool. "I just have to, you know, call my agent. This face is pretty popular."

The man gave him his card. "Have your agent contact me personally." He stared at Danny a moment longer then chuckled and walked away shaking his head.

Danny turned to Caleb, who quickly hid his incriminating evidence down his shirt. "Did you hear that? I just got an acting gig."

Caleb bit his lip to keep from screaming with joy. "Dude, that's awesome. You might want to go ahead and call your agent. I bet tons of guys with faces are just waiting to snag that part."

"Thanks, man. I owe you one. Who knew that learning how to be a dork would actually do some good?"

Caleb swallowed the insult. "Anything for a friend."

Danny grabbed his bottle of Cream Pop and took his final steps out of the Swirly while repeating, "Creamy, yet fizzy" in different inflections.

"Who's ready for the Swirly ceremony?" Lance entered the other side of the truck wearing his celebratory gold bow tie. "Where's Danny?"

"He went back to acting, sir. Turns out he wasn't cut out for the ice cream biz."

"And he was doing such a great job." Lance shrugged. "Oh well. Congratulations, Caleb. You are the new Swirler of the Month." He handed Caleb his very own waffle cone face.

"Thank you, sir." Caleb tried not to choke up. The burnt image looked..nothing like him, but that didn't matter. It was about what it symbolized. His dedication and hard work had paid off, and now he was officially one of the best. "This is a dream come true."

"Let's celebrate with some ice cream on the house, huh?" Lance grabbed two cones and moved over to the machine.

"No, wait!" Caleb shouted, but it was too late.

Lance pulled off the lever and ice cream splashed all over his face. He glared at Caleb through vanilla coated eyelashes. Caleb shrugged innocently and the wrench fell from his shirt, clanging to the floor. Lance held out his palm. Caleb clung onto his waffle face one last time to absorb the fleeting seconds of that honorable moment then handed it back. Lance used it to wipe the ice cream off his forehead and took a huge bite out of it.

Caleb winced. Maybe next month?

***

Header photo by Evan Kirby

Thanks for reading!

-Love, Charly