I hate cupcakes.

My brother was graduating from college. That’s a big deal, I suppose. We went down, and there was this awards ceremony/party. They were serving cupcakes. I had one. It was okay, nothing very remarkable in its makeup. My brother got a couple acknowledgments, a couple trophies, and then it was time to go home. We walked past the cupcake table on our way out.

The janitorial group had arrived by then. As we walked out, they entreated us to take the last cupcakes, so that they wouldn’t be forced to bother about them. My gaze was drawn down. There were only two cupcakes left. The idea suddenly appealed to me. Why not take them? They were fine desserts, and it would be doing the cleanup crew a favor.

I picked them up as we headed out the door. Behind me, before the door closed, I heard muffled laughter.

I instantly regretted my decision.

We were three floors up. Down all three crowded flights of stairs I carefully held my cupcakes. Always I could feel the curious glances that followed me, here the repressed giggles. At each landing my apprehension and self-consciousness grew; until, by the time we reached the exit, my jaw was trembling, my hands firmly clenched around the cakes.

Of course we had parked two blocks away. It might as well have been one hundred, so embarrassed was I by the end of the trek. I was immeasurably relieved to be safe inside the car. Not that my trials were over. Far from it, indeed.

I had to hold my brother’s plaque, the one he had received at the ceremony, while he drove. In order to do that, I had to set the cupcakes on the floor of the car. The floor by my feet being too crowded with trash and paraphernalia, I had to set it behind the driver’s seat. There I kept my eyes on them in an agony of suspense during the whole stressful ride. At last, we arrived at our destination,  and I breathed a sigh of relief.

Too soon, it was soon made apparent, for as we turned into the driveway of the hotel the far cupcake toppled, rolling on the ground. As soon as we parked, I slipped of my seatbelt, and picked it and it’s mate up. It was covered in dirt and hair, and I was suddenly confronted by the daunting realization that I would need to traverse the entire hotel with two cupcakes, one smashed, in hand the entire way.

We began at once. My original thought had been, that as I had exerted so much effort in getting them his far, I might as well finish the excruciating endeavor; but the further we delved into the hotel, the more fervently I wished I had found a convenient bin, and rid myself of the accursed things.

We made it as far as the elevator. A group of giggling, glamorous, sickening teen girls exited the lift before us. Their blonde leader, so thick were her obnoxiously fake eyelashes, failed to notice me, instead careening into me. She backed away, and I stared in shock at my hands. She had completely demolished the unspoiled cupcake with her elbow, squishing it to a crumbling wreck in my hand.

I was abruptly distasteful of the unbearable situation I had put myself in. I smashed the other cupcake in her face.

I hate cupcakes.