As Green Slime on Nickelodeon’s Kids’ Choice Awards Drenches Her Completely, a Rising Pop Star Considers Her Life Choices
- Aug 12, 2022
- 4 min read
by Maura Yzmore
I knew the slime was coming, of course I knew, I’d seen the show a bunch of times when I was a kid, and it was always hilarious, and I was always shocked that the slimed were somehow unprepared, like, haven’t you seen the show, what the hell? Didn’t your agent and publicist tell you that you would get slimed? OK, I didn’t think this last thing when I was a kid because I didn’t know about having an agent or a publicist, there was just my mom and the talent shows she dragged me to because I was pretty and could sing and dance, but I always liked it when there was free cable in the dingy motel rooms we stayed at because that was all we could afford, yet somehow she knew I would hit it big and she was right and I did, and I hope she’s happy now, but I wouldn’t know for sure because we no longer speak, but I send her money so I hope that’s OK, and it’s enough, because I can’t really give her anything else from myself right now.
I knew the slime was coming and I was sure it wouldn’t surprise me, but it still did, kind of like when you are giving a blow job to your longtime boyfriend, whom you know well so you think you can tell from the sounds he’s making that he’s about to come, but it would still be nice if he gave you a courtesy tap on the shoulder as a warning so you would have the option to swallow or not, only he doesn’t do it, ever, no matter how many times you ask him because he’s kind of a dick, so you’re really attuned to every grunt and moan and feel confident you can predict when he will shoot his load, only you shouldn’t be because his sounds are misleading, as is everything about him, and even though you knew it was coming, it still surprises you, and while you don’t mind the taste or the texture, you mind that he’s a dick, that he keeps being a dick, and you decide that this particular load is the last one he’s going to coat the back of your throat with ever again.
With the slime came a jolt of surprise, but that disappeared quickly, and instead I thought about the ruined dress and the shoes and the hair, and all the money that just went down the drain with this slimy science-experiment goo, thoughts I’ve had ever since I left my town and my mom and my dick boyfriend and tried to make it on my own, and even though I know I’ve made it, I’ve surely made it, I keep telling myself that every morning as I wake up drenched in sweat because all night every night I still dream I am scrambling for money, working multiple waitressing jobs and taking singing lessons and taking a shift or two at the strip club where I give blowjobs under the table for a few extra bucks and the customers are rarely dicks and pay really well, but I always dream I have no money, there is never any money, and every ruined pair of pantyhose let alone shoes leaves me panicked and heaving, and this never stops, it doesn’t stop just because I have a publicist and an agent and plenty of dresses and shoes and enough money to pay anyone to do anything for me.
There is slime in my hair, the hair that was made up in an elaborate Greco-Roman style, which are the words my stylist used and I took to mean I look like the statues I saw at the museum I visited when I was still back in school, maybe it was high school but probably not since I dropped out junior year, so it must’ve been middle school when I still attended more or less every day. There is slime in my cleavage, which is pushed up with a corset that I am pretty sure didn’t exist in the times of Greeks or Romans but my stylist insisted it would show my goods, my plastic-surgery-enhanced goods that make teenage boys jerk off to pics of me and buy my albums, that make preteen girls want to be like me and feel horrible that they don’t have my tits, which makes me feel horrible, too, because, honestly, I don’t have my tits either. And there is green slime all over the wraps around my waist, which the stylist said was totally what Greeks and Romans wore as part of their togas, but also — and this came from my stylist and my publicist and my agent — it would hide the fact that my belly is growing and the corset isn’t doing a great job of hiding it completely, and I am actually excited and terrified to be a mom, even though I have no fucking idea who the father is because it was awards season and there were many parties and many, many bodies that felt warm and welcoming to my touch, and I think how I now miss my mom and how it would be nice to have her with me…
But just as quickly as I get my bearings after the slime dump and remember that this is great exposure and that I am a star and that everyone here is expecting poise and good cheer and laughter so I must give them those, I dismiss any thoughts of my mother and my hometown and I know that I will be better, that I will do better, that I do not need anyone close to me but the life that is within me, and I rub the slime out of my eyes and I raise my arms, because this is a victory, and I give the audience the biggest and brightest smile that anyone has ever given on this show after getting covered in goo.
Maura Yzmore writes short fiction and long equations somewhere in the Midwest. Her flash has appeared in Flash Fiction Online, Bending Genres, Maudlin House, and elsewhere. Find out more at https://maurayzmore.com or on Twitter @MauraYzmore.
