Page 43 - The Gluckman Occasional Number Eight

much longer. After all, I was just a reporter, there under false
pretenses perhaps, but still a free agent and I knew my rights as
an American citizen. These petty tyrants couldn’t hold me
against my will and force me to eat toxic sludge! But I lacked the
courage to stand up and declare, like Alice, “You’re nothing but a
pack of cards!” Did that mean I was really a person who needed
to be in this situation in order to attain a necessary catharsis?
Muttering with fork suspended mid-air as a result of this soul-
searching, I soon attracted the attention of Mister Nasty. He
rounded on me and roared, “What are doing there? Don’t play
with your food!”
I snapped. “What is this place?” I shrieked. “Some kind of—”
“Shut up and eat!”
Then I knew what I had to do, infantile cunning welling up
from the darkest recesses of my reptile brain.
“Food fight!” I hollered, and threw my plate of putrefaction at
the people on the other side of the table. They promptly
reciprocated—but I’d had the sense to leap out of my torture
chair and run for the exit before anything landed where I’d been
sitting. I heard pandemonium explode behind me as I tore off my
jumpsuit and decided not to leave a tip. Ingrate indeed!