My older sister was shuffling through the cupboards in her XXXL 'Leaf me alone' sweatshirt and spoke of her stomach hurting. Because she doesn't usually complain unless she's close to dying - which is unusual compared to most teenage girls - my mother became slightly sympathetic.
"I'm sorry," she said. "I hope you get your period soon."
"Well I don't."
"I know. Being a girl can really suck. But, if you were a boy, you'd have a penis. And sometimes that could get pretty hard."
No one laughed. The dog continued sleeping and my stepdad continued scrolling through his phone and my sister continued staring with the look of 'so done' on her face and I stood in the kitchen with the sentence "It can't be all that difficult having a penis if you get a higher annual salary out of it" literally on the tip of my tongue as my mother lost control.
She had done it.
The best joke.
The best joke she had ever and will ever come up with ever in her time on earth. Ever. Here it was, in a kitchen on a Friday night, and she basked in it in the glow of the hallway light losing herself.
There was clapping and snorting and chortling and coughing and bent-in-half wheezing and every sort of imaginable I-just-made-a-funny physical reaction any human could perform, right there. She had done it. She had done it, and she would not move on without the best joke of her life being lived in the moment it was still alive.
It caught up with us long after it should have. Jacob looked up from his phone and sighed, "Dang it, Heather," and my sister narrowed her eyes and whispered "No," and I slowly spun myself around and into the corner between the fridge and the wall, where I live through every best joke's existence, closing my eyes and steadying my breaths until its time has passed.
After a moment, I wiped my eyes, removed myself from the pun corner, and excused myself from the situation by saying, "I'm sorry, I have to write this down. Good night."
This joke will now live longer than you will.
And that is a very frightening thought.
"I'm sorry," she said. "I hope you get your period soon."
"Well I don't."
"I know. Being a girl can really suck. But, if you were a boy, you'd have a penis. And sometimes that could get pretty hard."
No one laughed. The dog continued sleeping and my stepdad continued scrolling through his phone and my sister continued staring with the look of 'so done' on her face and I stood in the kitchen with the sentence "It can't be all that difficult having a penis if you get a higher annual salary out of it" literally on the tip of my tongue as my mother lost control.
She had done it.
The best joke.
The best joke she had ever and will ever come up with ever in her time on earth. Ever. Here it was, in a kitchen on a Friday night, and she basked in it in the glow of the hallway light losing herself.
There was clapping and snorting and chortling and coughing and bent-in-half wheezing and every sort of imaginable I-just-made-a-funny physical reaction any human could perform, right there. She had done it. She had done it, and she would not move on without the best joke of her life being lived in the moment it was still alive.
It caught up with us long after it should have. Jacob looked up from his phone and sighed, "Dang it, Heather," and my sister narrowed her eyes and whispered "No," and I slowly spun myself around and into the corner between the fridge and the wall, where I live through every best joke's existence, closing my eyes and steadying my breaths until its time has passed.
After a moment, I wiped my eyes, removed myself from the pun corner, and excused myself from the situation by saying, "I'm sorry, I have to write this down. Good night."
This joke will now live longer than you will.
And that is a very frightening thought.
The pun corner, it's a thing! - The Bestower
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