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“Thank you, one and all, for your stay at Pizzaface’s Emporium! We hope to see you here again soon, and have a pizza-tastic rest of your day!”
I never thought hearing the hammed-up & booming voice of Pizzaface- at least, I assume that’s who it was, and everyone else here seemed to agree- was going to feel pleasant after almost a full two and a half hours of having to hear it throughout the entire establishment. The whole mini-city here felt like it was perched on the border between a normal entertainment & food venue and a complete sensory overload, and I was itching to get out as soon as I possibly could. The floor makes a faint squelching noise as I head for the back of the yard-long line for the exit, since two people in Pizzaface mascot costumes were interrogating people about their experience in this indoor cityscape of a labyrinth before they left.
As the people in front of me began to dwindle in number, I mentally prepared my answers to the questions I’ve heard repeated over and over again, especially when I got closer to the front of the line.
Did I have fun here? I’ll admit that I did, though I’ll further admit that it wasn’t from any of the Pizzaface-branded stage shows or arcade games or any of that- it was from the products that weren’t given any sort of huge notoriety or fame, like the arcade racing game they had, or the museum area that showcased the history of how pizza first came about and how it evolved over the years. In order to not have to say all that to the Pizzaface-branded gatekeepers I was slowly approaching minute by minute, though, the answer was simply a yes.
Would I recommend this place to my friends and family? Both of them are in different cities entirely, but the answer is also a yes, and I’ll just hope the employees don’t notice that I’m lying through my teeth.
Is Pizzaface’s Emporium the only pizza-serving establishment worth giving your money to? Another lying “yes” from the back of my molars to my canines. Anything to get me out of here quicker.
After what seemed like an extra half hour, the person in front of me was able to pass through the exit door, and the hour has come for me to have my “cheese-ariffic” time at Pizzaface’s Emporium dissected by the two overalls-wearing, animatedly-moving Pizzahead mascot performers with permanently cheesy smiles on their faces. As far as they needed to know, I had fun, I would recommend this place to others, and I’m definitely coming here again. (Not anytime soon, though.)
I move forward, looking to get out of the establishment and away from the building-sized tourist trap, when two arms come out in front of me, halting my path.
“Uh-uh-uh!” One of the pepperoni-eyed mascot performers says, waving a finger at me. “I’m afraid your stay will have to be a little bit longer!”
“Now, we don’t like to do it,” the second one chimes in, butting their cherry tomato nose towards me. “But sometimes we have to look through the little security cameras that’re all over the place. To make sure visitors are being safe, having fun, and eating our delicious hand-crafted pizza!”
“And we couldn’t help but notice that you didn’t do that third thing at aaaaaany point during your entire visit here,” the first one chides, shaking their head.
“... Uhm,” I start, tugging the hood of my jacket down a bit over my face so that my annoyance doesn't show that well. “I wasn’t that hungry. I had a snack before I came here.” I actually didn’t, but they didn’t need to know that. I just had to hope they’d take it.
“Excuses, excuses!” The first performer cries, making a fanning motion towards me as if they were waving off my words. “No one should be deprived of the joy that is eating pizza from Pizzaface’s Emporium!”
“There’s got to be just a little room in your stomach for some fresh pizza, right?” The second performer asks, tilting their giant circular head in questioning. “You’ve been walking around for a long while, after all.”
“I can eat when I get home-” I try to say, attempting to speed walk past the mascots, only to be pulled back into my spot by them.
“Just one slice of Pizzaface’s Emporium pizza, pleeaaaassseee?” The two ask in unison, in a way where they attempted to be sympathetic and cute, but just came across as unsettling and creepy. And they’re probably going to keep pestering me about it if I keep trying to resist…
“... Fine. Just one slice,” I say in resignation, my arms stuck to my sides as the performers rejoice.
“Of course, of course!” They cheered. “One piping hot slice of pizza coming right your way!” They run off to what I can only assume is the kitchen with the speed of a bullet train, only to come back mere minutes later with… what I assume is supposed to be a slice of pizza.
The cheese has a plastic shine to it, the toppings look like they were stuck onto it after the baking process instead of before, the whole slice is drooping less like an actual pizza slice would- and more like slime.
I can feel my stomach begin to twist just at the sight of it, but I gulp down the building anxiety in my throat and rummage through my jacket pockets. “U-uhm… hey, if it’s not too much to ask, I actually… uh…” I pull out a business card-sized note with a medical stamp on it, and flash it at the mascot performers. “I have ARFID, and… uhm, well, I was wondering if it’d be alright to get a slice of just cheese pizza instead?”
Even though there’s no actual eyes to be seen on the Pizzaface mascot head, it feels like both of them are staring daggers straight at me.
“Oh, silly,” the first one says after an awkward moment of silence. “Plain old cheese pizzas are for nobodies!”
“Nobody wants a pizza with no toppings on it,” the second adds, nodding their head. “You’d have to be some kind of crazy to want a completely plain pizza that doesn’t even have pepperoni on it at least!”
I stand there for a moment, feeling my legs threaten to turn themselves into jelly, and I lower the card and put it back in my pocket, defeated. I would’ve bothered to argue the legality of denying that accommodation for me if I wasn’t dealing with the complete bozos that were this place’s staff members… but here I am, about to be forced to eat a pizza slice I don’t want.
“... One bite. I’ll give it one bite,” I say, slowly taking the slice of pizza(?) from the mascot’s hands as they nod, though I’m unsure whether it’s because they’re actually fine with me only taking one bite, or if that’s just simply in their nature to do whenever anyone is compliant with their demands. The slice sits in my hands for a bit, feeling gross and melty in my bare palms, but I swallow down an attempt to dry heave and raise the food up to my lips, taking a bite of it.
Everything about this is awful. The cheese has the texture of tire rubber, and it does not help that it’s mixed with the pieces of cold and flat pepperoni & the crunchy and bitter bell peppers that have made their purchase on the slice. The sauce is practically nonexistent, as far as I can tell. It’s just a pure hell of rubbery cheese, cold meat, bitter peppers, and slimy bread. I almost want to hack the culinary abomination in my mouth out onto the squishy floor, but the unyielding, unblinking, judgmental stares of the Pizzaface mascots make me take all the power I have to keep myself from throwing up, if only to make sure I get out of here quicker.
“... Okay. I took a bite,” I gasp out, after swallowing the biohazard that was that one single bite of a pizza mockery. “It was… I’m fine with it. It’s nice.” I throw the statements out like my life is on the line, as the cheesy freaks would probably have asked for my opinion on it anyway, and God forbid I be honest. “May I… may I go now.”
“Whaaaaaat? You said you’d have a slice!” The first performer speaks, crossing their arms like they were mad. “That means a whole slice, not one puny bite!”
“You won’t get the full experience from just one bite,” the second one adds, then shakes their head in disapproval. “For shame, thinking you could get away with just one bite.”
“For shame!” The first one repeats, with an exceeding amount of enthusiasm.
I swear to God I’m going to burn this city to the ground. One day- not today, I do not have the necessary energy- but one day.
I want to take this thing they call a pizza slice and violently throw it at one of their faces before booking it. I want to not ruin whatever’s left of my appetite, I want to not have to eat this man-made horror… and yet, I don’t have the energy to fight back.
If I vomit all over the cheesy floor afterwards, it’s their fault.
—--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I have never run out of a restaurant faster.
It’s been two hours. I think. I’ve lost track of time. The dirt roads are much more comfortable than squelching slimy cheese, but it wears me down much quicker. I have no idea how far away I am from the hell in an oven that is Pizzaface’s Emporium, but I hope to God it’s far enough that they’ve given up on pursuing me. Everything is too much right now.
They had put spotlights on me and everything. Sung a stupid little tune about how brave and upstanding I was for eating a slice of the worst pizza known to mankind. There were so many eyeballs staring at me, so many speakers blasting obnoxious music, so much bile building up in my gut- all of it made worse by the stupid mascots rocking me back and forth like I was a two-man saw. All of it was too much then, and it still feels like too much now, even when I’m so far away from it.
I remember throwing up in the nearest trash can I could find as soon as I bolted out of there. I remember running past so many people who were mindlessly making beelines towards the nightmare establishment, and past so many others who had already left, but were still grossly grazing on the rubber pizza slices they had in to-go boxes. They made the most obnoxious and nauseating sounds as they shoveled slice after slice into their mouths- I must’ve thrown up an extra, what, six times because of that? I felt surrounded by pigs at that moment, and I needed to get out. To get somewhere where everything wasn’t too much.
And here I find myself, in a part of town I don’t recognize, near some buildings I can’t read the names of. It’s gotten too dark to read much of anything… or maybe that’s just me. It would probably also explain the blurry vision. Probably.
I need to lie down.
—------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I don’t know how long I’ve been out.
All I know is that I wake up in a seat at some sort of old… diner-looking place- at least, it looks like a diner, with the few tables and chairs strewn about and the bar with its stools- and there’s a cup of water on the table in front of me. The floors were black-and-white checkerboard, the ceiling was a cool purple, and you could look into the kitchen past the bar if you wanted to. The place felt completely empty- the complete opposite of where I had been hours before. At least, I assume it’s been hours. I don’t know how long I’ve been out.
I take the glass of water and sip it cautiously, sighing a little in relief as the water actually tastes like water- let alone drinkable- and I let myself sink into the seat, letting my guard down, letting myself relax…
The sound of someone clearing their throat causes me to jump a little, and I set my cup down before looking in the direction of whoever decided to do that.
A man stood by the bar, stout in physique and dressed in a plain black tee underneath a white tank top, black pants, and a white chef’s hat covering most of the top of his head. He had a small, thick mustache and a good bit of stubble along his jawline. He stares in my direction, and I flinch for a second at that fact, only to realize the gaze was… kinder than what I expected.
“Oh, thank-a goodness, you’re awake,” he says after a moment, Italian accent thick and noticeable in his words. It catches me off-guard for a few seconds, but I shake off the surprise and take another sip of water.
“Y-yeah, I, uh… I guess I passed out, huh… ?” I ask, knowing full well it wasn’t an actual question. “I hope you, uhm, d-didn’t have to go too out of your way t-to bring me here…”
The man shakes his head. “Oh-a no, it was no trouble- you had passed-a out near my pizzeria, not too far of a-” Anything else he said after that tunes out in my mind immediately as I feel my stomach begin to twist again, and I put my head in my hands. God, of all the places I could’ve passed out near, of all the places I could’ve been given peace and rest in, it HAD to be another STUPID-
“Bambino? You are-a shaking like a chili pepper,” the man states, sounding like he’s gotten a little closer. I cautiously look up, and sure enough, he has- and he’s looking a lot more concerned, enough to generate a small, but noticeable stream of sweat on his forehead. “I can-a turn the heat on for you, if that-a will help?”
“... I-it’s not the temp-perature that’s the… the problem,” I reassure, easing slightly but still keeping my shaking hands to my shivering self. Glancing down for a second to note that I did feel a lot colder than I did just a moment ago, I look back up and mumble, “I wouldn’t m-mind the heat thing right ab-bout now, though.”
He nods, and just moments after he runs off to the back of the restaurant, the main dining area begins to become slowly filled with a warmth that makes me slack forward in my chair a bit and sigh. I take another sip of my water before the owner comes back, and I can see his worried body language visibly relax once he sees I’m not shivering like a leaf anymore.
“Would you-a like anything to eat?” He asks, giving a rather nervous smile in what I think is an attempt to relax me further. “I could make you a bit of fresh-a pizza, or some spaghetti.”
I try my best to not sound like the taste of both of those foods sounds like pure crap to me at the moment. “I-I’m good. I’d… I’m not in the, uhm… the mood for pizza. Not after today.” I immediately, internally, regret saying that last part. Because now he’s probably going to start asking questions, like-
“What-a happened today, if I may ask?” He pops the question with a slight bit of hesitancy, as if he had accidentally read my mind and didn’t mean to. I quietly sigh, glance over to the nearest wall, and try to find a way to summarize the hell experience that was trying to leave the cheesiest place on Earth.
“I went to Pizzaface’s Emporium earlier,” I start, leaning an arm on the table and taking another sip of water before continuing. “Ended up staying an extra 15 minutes more than I was hoping to, since the staff thought it’d be funny to disregard my medical diagnosis and feed me the worst pizza known to man. It sucked majorly.”
As I glance back over at the chef, I could’ve sworn I saw one of the guy’s pupils shrink a little.
“... Yes, I’ve-a heard of them,” he tentatively says, his voice becoming a slight bit… peeved, I would say, as he takes a few steps closer to my table- close enough to actually take a seat at it, in fact. Which he did. “Can you elaborate-a?”
I swallow the bundle of nerves in my throat that I didn’t know was there. “Uhm… w-well, they wanted me to have a pizza slice, since I… didn’t eat anything while I was there, and… a-and, uh, I have an… an eating disorder. Simplest way to describe it, I’m averse to eating a lot of specific things, for one reason or another- usually multiple- and I got a card from my doctor recently that I’m, uh, s-supposed to show to employees to let them know I’ll need accommodations. And…”
I groan a little. “... a-and the staff there said that my… my request for a simple cheese pizza was stupid, basically. Said I was crazy and a nobody for it. They made me eat a slice with rubber tire cheese and gooey dough and too many toppings I didn’t like, and they made a big show of it, and it all got heaved up as soon as I could find the trash, and I hadn’t eaten anything before it or since then, and I… … I… …”
… I trail off as I notice the man in front of me getting progressively more angry- I swear to you, I thought I saw the cheap metal of the table begin to warp as he gripped it- and I lean back a little in fear. “... I, uh… I-i”m sorry if I said too mu-”
“Do-a not blame yourself for this!” He shouts, standing up from his seat and causing me to back up a bit in mine. “I cannot-a believe they would have-a the gall to disrespect one of their customers like-a that! You needed a specific type-a pizza, and they denied you that!”
He shoots a finger into the air, a determined look of craze in his eyes. “I will-a do you the honor of serving a great-a cheese pizza, or my name-a isn’t Peppino Spaghetti!” And with that, he runs towards the kitchen with a speed I didn’t expect in the slightest, leaving me a bit dumbfounded by what I just witnessed. In all honesty, I didn’t think he was going to take much of that seriously- from how he looked, I was bracing for a more rage-filled version of what the chuckleheads at Pizzaface’s Emporium had flung at me.
Okay. I guess I’m getting a cheese pizza.
—---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
“I-a take it that you like it?”
I’m not sure what it was about me snarfing down the fresh, real cheesy, heavenly goodness that was this pizza that prompted Mr. Spaghetti to ask that in as lighthearted a tone as he could probably muster. Maybe it was the fact that I had almost eaten the whole medium-sized pie after 30 minutes or so, maybe not. It’ll truly forever be a mystery.
“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” I answer with a teasing smile, bits of pizza still in my mouth. I proceed to stuff the rest of the current slice I was eating into my piehole, no shame present in my expression. This causes Peppino to chuckle a bit, and he comes over to sit across from me once more.
“Just thought-a I’d ask,” he says with a shrug, his grin looking a little less laced with nerves. “If you had gotten a bad-a pizza by my hands, I would not-a have done my job properly.”
I swallow my pizza, looking over at him. “... You’re really passionate about your craft, huh. That’s a sign of a good chef to me, if it helps any.”
“It does. Thank-a you, amico,” he replies, leaning forward a slight bit to pat me on the shoulder. The way it felt, he could clearly put a lot of force into something with potentially little effort, and yet he still chose to be gentle in that little gesture. The concept still baffles me a bit.
“Peppino’s Pizzeria will-a always be safe for you to be-a in. Alright, piccolino? Never forget-a that.”
I look him in the eyes after he says that, patting my hand along the top of my head to check if my hood was still up- it sorta was- and to pull it down in front of my face for a while in order for me to blink away the tears properly. I lift it back up, and give him a smile.
“Sure thing, uh… vecchia scoreggia,” I answer, with uncertainty in my voice. I knew it sounded Italian at least, but I have no clue what it actually means- I just heard it while passing by an old lady on the phone in the park one day.
Given that Peppino’s reaction to my slight butchering of the language was to laugh and pat me on the shoulder some more, I can only assume that means it’s good. I’m gonna call him that every time I see him.
Which I hope doesn’t get old, because I’m dropping by this joint once a week at least.