Revenge Is A Dish Best Served Hot

 

     This is a true story:

     He, arrogant and loud, drives cargo trucks for a living, while she sells banana and camote cues for a living.

     Her husband works for him as a helper. Both—the driver and the helper— are rumored to be drug users. And then one day, a few days before Christmas last year, tragedy strikes: he figures in an accident, killing his helper, who is her husband. Another helper is killed in the accident.

     They agree on a monetary settlement.

     A few days after New Year’s Day, she and the driver are seen talking animatedly to each other, she laughs as he cracks a joke while she fries her bananas and camotes, which she overloads with cheap sugar. Her children, now paternal orphans, play beside them. A diabetic customer approaches and buys two sticks of banana cues. She attends to her and then, she laughs at his jokes again.

     People around them are aghast.

     This is real life.

     Now, if it’s a movie, this is what will probably happen:

     The tragedy strikes, killing her husband. The driver is reportedly high when the accident occurs. She grieves, and then, accepts the monetary assistance, which she uses to buy a 9mm gun and two knives, and to pay a former CIA agent to train her and give her fighting skills. And on one of her apartment walls, she devises a plan, tracking the driver’s itinerary, and posting photos of him which she takes furtively.

     Until one night, while he is driving, again, high on drugs, she jumps into the back of his truck, hops into the roof of the truck, and hangs upside down at the windshield, glaring at him, shocking him.

     “You killed my husband!” she screams abhorrently. “Now, you will die!”

     He tries to maneuver the vehicle to throw her off, but she brings out her gun and shoots him twice while still hanging upside down, the windshield and his skull smashing simultaneously. The two helpers attack her, but she takes her two knives out and stabs them simultaneously, one at the neck, the other one, in his heart.

     She jumps from the truck and somersaults in the air as it careens towards a cliff.

     The truck explodes as it hits the bottom of the cliff.

     The next morning, while she fries her bananas and camotes, she remembers her husband and wipes her tears and smiles.

     Revenge is a dish best served cold, they say.

     But it is also best served hot—like a banana cue.