He’d had one job, in high school, though if he were honest he’d admit that it was his dream. He was an ice cream man. He never really understood how he got the job, but he scooped and drove and rang the bell like no other. On the job, he proudly wore a vintage suit he’d found at Goodwill for five dollars. He felt as though this is a how an ice cream man should be—well dressed, kind, benevolent, and jolly. The kids used to come running down the block to line up for him and he’d play games with them in the baking summer months as the melted cream ran down their sticky faces. He remembered all their birthdays.

Once, he had come down his usual corner and no kids were running toward him.

“Stevie! John! Xander!” he had yelled his favorite’s names and rung his bell.

Xander and Stevie walked out from behind one of the houses and invited him back. It turned out that Stevie’s family from China–her entire family–were visiting and there was a huge party in their backyard.
He’d gone back, eaten way too many crab legs, and just listened to the fast paced Chinese being spoken around him. Of course he couldn’t understand a word, but somehow the jokes were still funny and the stories still sad, and he’d sat there just absorbing the energy and the sounds.

Then he started getting too popular, and kids from the surrounding neighborhoods would come to his route. They told him stories of the other ice cream men, who were cruel and sharp tongued and had once, Billy told him with real tears in his eyes, ran over his cat and laughed. He didn’t believe this, because he believed in ice cream man honor, and he knew that young children sometimes made up stories and forgot that they weren’t real.

However, his views on his fellow ice cream men began changing one morning when he came to the ice cream truck warehouse to unplug his car and get started. Someone had unplugged his electric cord, the one that kept the ice cream cold and hard.

“What the fuck!” he’d yelled.

“Hah, looks like da guys are playing tricks on ya. Did y’do anything to piss ‘em off?” the manager inquired.

He’d brushed it off as a one-time episode but that entire day he couldn’t help noticing the vicious glares from the other ice cream men as they passed each other on the intersections. Images of Billy’s dead cat flashed in his mind.

The next morning as he was pulling out of the warehouse he felt a firm tug on his truck. Upon inspection, he’d found that the electric chord was tied around his tailgate.

“That coulda killed ya!” the manager had exclaimed from the dark shadows. “If that snapped you woulda been fried! The entire trucks metal. Death trap.”

He’d lived his life upon the virtue of ice cream man honor. He’d had faith in the ice cream man honor. But an ice cream man had nearly killed him.

He was almost murdered by an ice cream man.

So he left and never came back.