Out of her fear of getting fat, Miss America found every box stenciled “Desserts” and used Chef Assassin's carving knife to poke holes in every bag.
Just to speed up our suffering. Fast-track us to enlightenment.
One hole, and the nitrogen would leak out. Bacteria and air would leak in. All the mold spores that were killing Miss Sneezy, carried on the warm damp air, they'd be eating and breeding in each silver pocket of sweet-and-sour pork, breaded halibut, pasta salad.
Before Agent Tattletale snuck into the lobby to ruin every crêpe Suzette, he'd make sure no one was around.
Before Countess Foresight crept into the lobby to stab every silver bag that might contain even trace amounts of cilantro, she made sure Agent Tattletale was gone.
We each only ruined the food we hated.
Cross-legged in the Arabian Nights gallery, among the plaster pillars carved to look like elephants standing on their back legs, rearing up to support the ceiling with their front feet, his teeth crunching another handful of dried sticks and rocks, Mr. Whittier would say, “In our secret heart's heart, we love to root against the home team.”
Against humanity. It's us against us. You, the victim of yourself.
We love war because it's the only way we'll finish our work here. The only way we'll finish our souls, here on earth: The big processing station. The rock tumbler. Through pain and anger and conflict, it's the only path. To what, we don't know.
“But we forget so much when we're born,” he says.
Being born, it's as if you go inside a building. You lock yourself inside a building with no windows to see out. And after you're inside any building long enough, you forget how the outside looked. Without a mirror, you'd forget your own face.
He never seemed to notice how one of us was always missing from the gallery. No, Mr. Whittier just talked and talked, while somebody was always sneaking downstairs to destroy any Mylar bag that listed green peppers as an ingredient.
That's how it happened. How no one knew everyone else had the same plan. We each just wanted to raise the stakes a little. To make sure our rescue team wouldn't find us pillowed in silver bags of rich food, suffering from nothing but boredom and gout. Each suffering survivor, fifty pounds heavier than when Mr. Whittier took us hostage.
Of course, we each wanted to leave enough food to last until we were almost rescued. Those last couple days, when we were really fasting, hungry and suffering—we could stretch that to a couple weeks in the retelling.
The book. The movie. The television miniseries.
We'd starve just long enough to get what Comrade Snarky called “Death Camp Cheekbones.” The more ins and outs your face has, the better Miss America says you'll look on television.
Those vermin-proof bags were so tough, we'd each begged to borrow a knife from Chef Assassin, from his beautiful set of paring knives, chef's knives, cleavers, filleting knives and kitchen shears. Except for the Missing Link with his bear-trap jaw; he'd just use his teeth.
“You are permanent, but this life is not,” Mr. Whittier would say. “You don't expect to visit an amusement park, then stay forever.”
No, we're only visiting, and Mr. Whittier knows that. And we're born here to suffer.
“If you can accept that,” he says, “you can accept anything that happens in the world.”
The irony is, if you can accept that—you'll never again suffer.
Instead, you'll run toward torture. You'll enjoy pain.
Mr. Whittier had no idea he was so right.
At one point, that evening, Chef Assassin walked into the salon, still holding a boning knife in one hand. He looked at Whittier and said, “The washing machine is broke. Now you have to let us go . . .”
Mr. Whittier looked up, still crunching a mouthful of dried turkey Tetrazzini, he said, “What's wrong with the washer?”
And Chef Assassin held up something in his other hand, not the knife, something loose and dangling. He said, “Some desperate, hostage cook cut off the plug-in . . .”
The object dangling from his hand.
It's after that we couldn't wash clothes, another plot point for the story that would be our cash cow.
At that point, Mr. Whittier groaned and slipped the fingers of one hand inside the top of his pants. He said, “Mrs. Clark?” His fingers pressed the spot inside his belt, and he said, “Now, that hurts . . .”
Watching him, twirling his rope of cut-off plug-in, Chef Assassin said, “I hope it's cancer.”
His fingers still in his pants, sunk in his Arabian cushions, Mr. Whittier bends double to put his head between his knees.
Mrs. Clark steps forward, saying, “Brandon?”
And Mr. Whittier slips to the floor, his knees pulled to his chest, moaning.
In our heads, for the scene in the movie, this scene only with a movie star twisting in fake pain on the red-and-blue Oriental carpet, in our heads, we're all writing down: “Brandon!”
Mrs. Clark squats down to lift the empty Mylar bag from where he's dropped it among the silk cushions. Her eyes twitch across the words stenciled there, and she says, “Oh, Brandon.”
All of us trying to be the camera behind the camera behind the camera. The last story in line. The truth.
In the future movie and TV miniseries version of this scene, we're all coaching a famous beauty-queen actress to say: “Oh my God, Brandon! Oh, dear sweet suffering Jesus!”
Mrs. Clark holds the bag for him to see, and she says, “You just ate the equivalent of ten turkey dinners . . .” She says, “Why?”
And Mr. Whittier moans. “Because,” he says, “I'm still a growing boy . . .”
In the future version, the beauty queen cries: “You're splitting apart inside! You're going to explode like a burst appendix!”
In
