Insect Conversations by Marvin Tumbo

Fly: Hey Roach! What the hell are you doing out during the day? I thought you guys were night crawlers.

Roach: First, the name is cockroach. Get it? COCK!-roach And I did not get enough to eat yester night so I need something small to eat or I won’t last until tonight.

Fly: (to his fellow flies) Boys and Girls, this roach is a victim of what humans call Diarrhea. Our friend here can’t hold it in.

Roach: You little f***! I have a high metabolism. That’s all.

Fly: Hey! Hey! Hey! What’s with the insult? I just pointed out what you are too embarrassed to admit. High metabolism my ass! You’ve been hanging around humans for far too long my friend.

Roach: If I get my hands on you, I will clip off your wings and smash in those weird eyes of yours.

Fly: What hands? Look in the mirror, you ain’t human! Oh, and you’ll have to catch me first. (Laughs)

Roach: You think you are unreachable!

Fly: What! Did your genius friends the Wright Roaches invent a plane? I got to admit though, the name fits. I prefer it to the Wright brothers.

Roach: (Proudly.) For your information, some of us can fly.

Fly: Yes you can. Downwards! I think it’s you guys who invented Bungee Jumping (Snickers sarcastically).

Roach: Those are just minor hiccups. We are getting there and when we perfect it, you are going to get it good.

Fly: You better hurry up then because I have a life span of like a week. In a good week, I get to see Monday twice before I die. Mumbles: (I don’t understand what it is that humans have against Mondays.)

Roach: No wonder you are so bitter, you are already old and grumpy, spoiling for a fight.

Fly: Who’s bitter? I just asked you a question and you are the one who got all emotional and started with the insults.

Roach: Is it any of your business whether I eat at night or during the day?

Fly: Now that you mention it, yes it is and you better get with the program. You are the night crawlers and any stash that that is left over at night is yours. But during the day, this place is ours for the taking baby!

Roach: Who the f*** wrote that program?

Fly: Nature dude! And I do not appreciate you entering into our space without permission.

Roach: Well, nature also wrote that you guys eat sh*t while the rest of us superior species eat the real food.

Fly: Now you have started with the stereotypes. Who told you that all flies eat sh*t?

Roach: Why you! You are full of sh*t. As for me, I have just come to eat some real food and go back to sleep.

Fly: Real food? You eat leftovers from the trash and you think that makes you superior?

Roach: At least leftovers refer to the real food that was left over. Sh*t means food that was eaten, digested, and then excreted. How can you eat that?

Fly: Why don’t you ask your relatives? They not only eat it, they have taken over the whole sewerage system.

Roach: I do not know what you are talking about.

Fly: I have heard the humans use that line whenever they are embarrassed by scandal. Did I just reveal a dirty family secret?

Roach: Those are our darker coated cousins from down south, we have no close relations. We do not even speak the same language.

Fly: Human Beings call that racial profiling. But then you mentioned the language thing and now I am thinking it is tribalism which is so rife in this country of ours that even roaches aren’t spared.

Roach: Let it go Fly?

Fly: I knew it, I hit a jackpot. They are the dirty family secret, and the dirty is also literal.

Roach: You Bastard, We have nothing to hide.

Fly: Really! Then what’s up with the coming out at night thing, living in chimneys, fitting into cracks, your relatives in the sewers and so on and so on? I could go on...

Roach: For your information, that is where we have our research institutes.

Fly: I know you guys like hiding in cracks and all but there is one particular crack that I would like you to shove that theory up. Next you are going to tell me that the dirty brown things covering you guys are actually lab coats.

Nnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnn

Roach: Do you hear that?

Fly: Yes. It is my old classmate Mosquito. We graduated from Vision Aviation College at the same time.

Roach: You I understand, but this guy, no! Considering the kind of work this guy does, you’d think he’d be taught the stealth kind of flying.

Mosquito: First of all I am not a guy, my name is anopheles and I am a girl. Talk to me like a lady.

Roach: Yeah, a blood sucking lady.

Fly: What’s your problem roach? You started with me and now you have turned on her.

Roach: Who was your teacher at that aviation school anyway, a bat?

Fly: As a matter of fact yes, so?

Roach: No wonder you guys are so messed up. A blind bastard gave you your flying lessons. He could not see so he made you fly noisily for him to hear you. Mosquito sounds like an Airbus landing. Weren’t there advanced classes or something? Or you just chose the cheap classes you cheap bastards.

Mosquito: I think you are delusional. While I was coming down, I heard him saying that they have research institutes up there in the cracks and chimneys.

Roach: We do. Even humans acknowledge it. They have invented every kind of pesticide known to man and while the rest of you die off, we survive because our researchers have continuously invented just as powerful vaccines that we all get at birth.

Fly: You mean to tell me that all those dead roaches that I have seen in this house died of natural causes?

Mosquito: he he he… Good one fly.

Roach: Show some respect to the dead. Those cockroaches died very painful deaths under the soles of humans.

Fly: That then means you guys die too.

Roach: Yes.

Mosquito: Then what the hell are you flossing about?

Roach: Have you heard the phrase, “they died like flies?” That means him and his people, not me and my kind.

Mosquito: He’s got a point.

Fly: Are you now changing sides now Mosquito?

Mosquito: No. I am just giving Caesar what is Caesar’s.

Fly: Hey Roach! If you guys are so bright, how come we can do all these things that you guys can’t?

Roach: What things? Eat sh*t and Suck blood?

Fly: Stop hating.

Roach: We are the most advanced species here.

Mosquito: Prove it.

Roach: Humans have acknowledged that we are the only species on Earth that can survive a Nuclear Bomb.

Mosquito: You act as if you are the only one with human acknowledged street cred. Who do you think is the biggest Killer in sub-Saharan Africa?

Roach: HIV AIDS?

Mosquito: Wrong! HIV started off well but it fell off somewhere along the way. It is just a virus. Malaria is the real thing. It is not only the number one killer up in this place; it comes with a personality, me and my kind.

Roach: True that. Fly, run your mouth now. What do you have under your wing that’s worth noting? Huh!

Mosquito: Now I am curious too… What fly? What’s your agenda on this planet?

Fly: Shut the f*** up b*tch! I have been watching your back since flight 101 and now you turn against me by siding with this roach bastard?

Roach: Am I sensing suppressed emotions? Fly, do you have a thing for ms anopheles over here?

Fly: What the f*** kind of question is that? We are different species for Gods sake!

Roach: Hey, as you said, you have a week to live, who the f*ck cares with what species you get your freak on? You’ll be dead in a week.

Mosquito: Roach, you are twisted. You are sick in the head. What kind of kids would we have?

Roach: I am winning the Robel Peace prize for this. I wish dad was here. He’d be so proud.

Fly: What the hell are you talking about?

Roach: Dig this… You and her get together and do the nasty and what you will have are the perfect flyquitos. They would have your wings so that they won’t raise suspicions with humans when they go to suck blood. They would also have those big weird eyes of yours that I am not so crazy about for night vision or something. By the way, can you see the future with those eyes?

Mosquito: I do not believe I am doing this but what about me? What of me would they have?

Roach: The blood sucking snout for starters.

Mosquito: Damn you roach! Pigs have snouts. Are you calling me a pig?

Roach: Now that you mention it, I don’t think this would work. Your kids would look like pigs especially when they inherit the shit from their father.

Mosquito: “inherit shit from their father” he he he…

Fly: What are you laughing for? They would inherit shit from me if they survived in the first place. And that would never happen because with all the blood you have been sucking, you probably have HIV.

Roach: Why the hell would you do the nasty with her if you know she has HIV?

Fly: Hello! Lifespan of a week! With or without it, I’m dead in a week. That barely leaves room for worry.

Roach: You guys are f*cked up. I have to go. Happy Valentines!

© Marvin Tumbo 2010

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