The following is based off of true events.

Sweat trickled off my brow as I clasped my hands together, yelling into the overcast sky.

"Boy howdy! What a fun day on set!"

The last of the film equipment had been loaded into the moving vans, a day of illustrious filmmaking come to a swift close. My hair was curly; I didn't shower that day. In fact, I just wanted to go home, run some Head and Shoulders through my curls, and cultivate my bangs furthermore.

I had been on set for a short film, desperate to network and keep myself immersed in my noblest of crafts. I was receiving no monetary reward for my efforts, nor did I quite want it - heck, I was a week out of graduation, dat bling bling would be coming in soon enough. I zipped up my hoodie that my cousin's wife had given me for Christmas two years ago, and turned to make my way towards the J train cause the stupid L wasn't working cause it never works and there were three transfers awaiting me!!

"Oh, one-legged sir! Wait!"

I turned around. The production supervisor, who shall be called Gail for anonymity's sake, beckoned for me. Two strange objects of an Eldritch nature sat in her hand; I grew worried. What had I gotten myself into?

But like the lotus flower native to Tropical Asia and Queensland, Australia, the objects blossomed into something beautiful: she was holding two pineapples. Were those for me?

"We had these lying around set, near the basement. We're not paying you money -

Dang

- but I don't know, take these home."

My face grew alit. I don't know why - surely, these pineapples were no signifier of great wealth or status, nor some invaluable material that would make for a particularly compelling pursuit down the road like when I retire. But I was in utter joy! Perhaps because I did not expect a reward, lest ways a reward that was in the form of Hawaii's newly endemic fruit. Perhaps because all I did was fire watch in a white van, making sure no rogues stole our stuff we had outside. Or perhaps it was the gesture that Gail did not have to make, yet insisted on making. Perhaps.

I rushed to the subway, dreaming of all the pineapple based possibilities. Would I make a smoothie? A platter, with whatever goes with pineapple? Cut the tops off and hang them on my wall? Tweet about it? So cascading was my thought process that I accidentally hit a few innocent bystanders with the crown of my crown jewels, yet they knew the brief discomfort was yet a piece of something greater than themselves. Yet they knew.

The pineapples sat on my counter, gently lain down like tots in a crib by yours truly, ya boi Sweetpete. I didn't want to touch them just yet, as Elvis once said "only fools rush in". He also said "Spider Murphy played the tenor saxophone, Little Joe was blowin' on the slide trombone." I would go to bed, cause I was freakin' exhausted, but I did not shrug off the simple charm of my fruitful gift.

But tomorrow began the end. Don't worry. It's not a tragic end, nor a downer ending, or even a violent bloodbath. It's just an ending.

My dearest friend, Yeon Ju, came to the apartment, for the first time in a while. We convened with the inhabitants of our abode, laughing, giggling, cavorting, all the rest.

"Hey," I said, without even thinking. "Who wants some pineapple??"

Everyone exclaimed "heck yeah!" or "cut it up!" or shook their heads, for pineapples are quite high in sugar, you know. I hastily grabbed a knife, a big butcher knife my meat-eating roommates often knife their meat they eat with, and swiped off the crown of Pina Uno. So ripe! So golden, like waves of grain! I often use the money I earn from film sets to buy food. Now, I was using the food I earned from a film set as food! O, Life and Cyclic Pleasures!

I passed around the pineapple slices, on a floral plate we had which was a really nice convenience cause now we had a Spongebob aesthetic going and stuff. I passed them to Yeon Ju, to myself, to others whom I will not name for anonymity's sake. And soon, it was gone, bubbling in our stomachs like a geyser of satisfaction and fructose.

Hm. And so one of my unexpected rewards had gone on to the great produce aisle in the sky. My delight had not waned internally, but I could not help think that a unique moment in my life was approaching its half life.

Pina Dos remained in solace, next to the microwave, for four days. Four. I worried - what if this piney went rotten? I wanted to put it in the fridge, but then what if it became just a normal fruit to be consumed? Not a reward to be reaped?

I watched the pineapple with wary eyes, as I would heat stuff in the microwave. It looked nice on the countertop. Weirdly fit in the marble. Huh. Confidants told me it must be consumed, but my inner self disagreed. The time must be as ripe as the pineapple itself! But...was I being selfish? Propping this fruit up as a nostalgic reminder, when I had so deliciously consumed its twin not even a day after earning it? (That's right I EARNED THAT PINEAPPLE YA FEEL ME) I grappled with the bludgeoning fruit salad of life's permanence.

Finally, the time would come, when days later, me and my human friends thought the weekend was one for the beach. Coney Island, specifically, which has surprisingly gotten much cleaner.

Of course. The perfect time. For when is a pineapple not synonymous with the ocean, the gentle sea breeze of island paradise? Why, even when the pineapple is covered in chocolate, it brings to mind the image of a coastal honeymoon. And so I acted.

In my knapsack I threw towels, sunscreen, a fifth of Tito's, and gently tucked in top, was Pina Dos. At least this end would be fitting than the last, and help me understand an important aesop: when given something extraordinary, you must continue that bout of extraordinary circumstance. Do not let it dwell ordinarily, for magic exists where we least expect to find it.

The pineapple had a good ride on the hourlong subway commute, I'm sure. I felt like it was down there, waiting for me to take the pain away. It just wanted to go out like a ripened seed, standing up, not like some poor, wasted, rag-assed renegade. Even the ocean wanted it gone, and that's who it really took its orders from anyway.

We stumbled out into the light of South Brooklyn, the ample joy of Bolivar and the Connection's 'Hot Hot Hot' ringing out like sea born drums. I always play that song in a beach setting due to childhood associations with certain songs. Our group scattered around, indulging in the first true sunbeams of summer; we were hungry, but I had saved my appetite for a certain foodstuff in my bag. Nathan's in hand, Snapchats duly taken, our hankering for the skim at a fever high, we proceeded from the concrete jungle to the sandy city.

In our hovel, towels laid out, we sunk into the sand as trees root into the ground. But I could not relax, for a plot point in my great operetta of life neared a close. I yanked the pineapple out of my ancestral knapsack (no kidding, it's been a father to son heirloom in the Carellini clan) and held it to the sun. My god, what imagery! Picasso himself dreamed of heaven, but did he ever see it? What once seemed rotted had rejuvenated life in it, as did I.

I took a breath, and removed a smaller knife from the knapsack. If it were bigger, I would probably be arrested, my Odyssey membership revoked, and who would tell you this story?

I swung into the crown - everything below plummeted, but I caught it in hand to prevent it from becoming encrusted in sand. I dug the knife in again, with mathematical precision, though not without tenderness. All the while I contemplated what would be in my hand if Gail had never so generously extended to me these heavenly fruits? Would I have said "Yo, what this pineapple really needs, is to be eaten at the beach" and thus have come to Coney Island? But you see, that's the beauty of these vignettes we so often encounter. They have no truly lasting impact, but their mark, their tale is felt so very much in the realm of their existence. What leads to them is happenstance, even if I planned to be on that set. I had taken a day off before, but what if I went that day and took the next day off? No pineapple. No hope.

The fruit sat in my hand. Its juice coursed out, inviting me to end our time together. I did, friends. So I did. My teeth sunk into the yellow wonderland with animalistic vigor. Coupled with the melodic rings of the ocean beat and the mighty rays of the sun, I nearly had a sensory overload. How fitting. I ate as much as I could, savoring every morsel of tropical sweet sweetness.

And at long last, when my friends and I were at our stomach's end, I knew just what to do! Like Jean Valjean had done so for Marius Pontmercy, I brought that pineapple home. Down the beach I ran, until my foot and a half breached the skim, sunk into dark, muddy sand. I brought the pineapple to my lips, and whispered words so sweet that I could not share them here, for their power would be diluted if taken out of the moment.

The grip of my hand slackened. The mostly eaten pineapple, my gift that had traveled from set to subway to sea, curved down in a parabolic arc, engraving itself into the beach. With a small, wistful nod, I turned around and rejoined my friends, where we would surely be laughing and relaxing until day's end. Not a care in the world. And MY GOD, that Black Panther trailer looks SO GOOD!!