The Buckhannon-Upshur High School cafeteria, a place usually reserved for the controlled chaos of teenage lunch periods, had been decorated with red, white, and blue streamers that drooped from the acoustic-tiled ceiling. Long cafeteria tables were covered in plastic tablecloths. The air, which normally smelled of tater tots and cleaning solutions, was now filled with the cheerful buzz of a community gathering.
Mayoral candidate Skip Jenkins was in his element. Dressed in a clean pair of jeans and a button-down shirt, he moved through the crowd with the affable grace of a man who had spent his entire life being liked. He shook hands with local farmers, patted the heads of small children, and listened intently to the concerns of elderly women. He was a genuinely likable man, and the atmosphere in the room was a reflection of his charm. This was his flagship campaign event: a "Pizza and Policy" town hall, a promise of common-sense solutions and, more importantly to the many families in attendance, a free dinner.
Okay, Skip, just be yourself, he thought, clapping a fellow farmer on the back. These are your neighbors. Talk to them like you'd talk to anyone over a fence. No fancy words. Just common sense. He felt confident. This was his town. These were his people. How hard could it be?
The event, however, had hit its first snag. The large, fifty-pizza order from Pizza Palace, the cornerstone of the entire evening, was late. The crowd, which had been cheerful and optimistic, was growing restless, their attention shifting from the nuances of municipal policy to the more pressing urge of hunger.
Skip tried to begin his speech, to get ahead of the growing impatience. "Folks," he started, his friendly drawl echoing slightly in the large room, "I want to talk about property tax reform..."
He was interrupted by the audible, rumbling grumble of a stomach from the front row. A few anxious questions began to ripple through the crowd.
"I'm starving," a young boy whined to his mother.
"Did they forget to order the pizza?" a man whispered to his wife. "If this is how he runs a pizza party, how's he gonna run the town?"
Skip's smile tightened just a fraction. He saw his campaign manager in the corner, a stressed-out college student named Kevin, frantically texting on his phone. Come on, where is that pizza? Skip thought, his own stomach starting to nervously churn. I can't talk about property tax reform to a room full of hungry people. That's political suicide.
The Pizza Palace delivery driver finally arrived forty-five minutes late, a harried-looking teenager who looked like he had just survived a war zone. Volunteers began to set out the stacks of warm, fragrant pizza boxes, and a collective relief washed over the room.
With a proud, "man-of-the-people" flourish, Skip Jenkins grabbed a box from the top of the stack. "Alright, folks, let's eat!" he boomed, flipping open the lid to serve the first slice himself.
Confused silence fell over the immediate area.
Instead of the comforting sight of melted cheese and savory pepperoni, the pizza was a chaotic mosaic of pineapple, anchovies, and jalapeños. A pungent aroma of hot, fishy salt and sweet, overcooked fruit wafted from the box.
What... is that?Are those... fish? On a pizza? Who does that? His friendly, folksy smile froze on his face. He frantically opened another box. This one was covered in black olives and green peppers. He opened another. Feta cheese and spinach. He opened another, and another, and another, his movements growing more desperate with each new revelation. The entire multi-hundred-dollar order was wrong. It was a bizarre assortment of the least popular, most divisive toppings imaginable.
The smell of hot anchovies began to fill the cafeteria, a scent that seemed to suck the very oxygen from the room. The mood shifted from hopeful to a mixture of disappointment and mild disgust. Skip Jenkins's attempt to pivot back to his speech about property taxes was derailed.
The Q&A session was a disaster. The first question was not about the town budget. It was from a large, angry-looking man in a flannel shirt.
"Mr. Jenkins," the man asked, his voice accusatory, his arms crossed over his chest. "If you can't be trusted to order pizza for fifty people, how can you be trusted with the town budget?"
Skip fumbled for a response, his mind a blank slate of pure, panicked humiliation. "Well, there seems to have been a... a mix-up with the order..."
"Is this some kind of new, healthy pizza initiative?" another woman asked, a note of confusion in her voice. "Because my kids won't eat anything with green stuff on it."
A tech-savvy teenager at the event, a young man who understood the lightning-fast economy of internet humor, snapped a picture of a particularly unappetizing slice of the pineapple-and-anchovy pizza. He posted it to the Upshur County Community Forum. The caption was simple, and catchy.
"Looks like the Skip Jenkins campaign is having a Big Cheese Crisis."
The name stuck. Instantly. The hashtag #BigCheeseCrisis went viral in the small world of Buckhannon social media. The forum was flooded with pictures of the inedible, bizarre pizzas.
While Skip Jenkins's political career was dissolving into a puddle of pineapple-flavored, anchovy-scented grease, the scene in Christopher Day's bedroom was one of contentment.
He had just finished the last slice of his delicious, and, most importantly, pepperoni-and-extra-cheese pizza. He leaned back in his gaming chair, a feeling of sated contentment washing over him. He had successfully, and with minimal effort, avoided the soul-crushing task of writing his resume for the time-being. As a reward for his own cleverness, he was now settling in to watch a new episode of his favorite anime. He was a man at peace with his small, well-ordered world. This is the life, he thought, a happy sigh escaping his lips. Solved my resume problem for the day, got my favorite food, no cosmic crises to deal with.
After the show, a pleasant, two-hours of distraction from his real-world responsibilities, he logged onto the community forum to catch up on the local drama. He saw the "Big Cheese Crisis" thread at the top of the feed and started laughing uncontrollably. He scrolled through the pictures of the awful pizzas, the mocking comments, the sheer schadenfreude of it all. It was the most entertaining political disaster he had ever witnessed.
Then, he read a comment from the owner of Pizza Palace, a man who was trying, and failing, to do some damage control.
"We are so, so sorry about the mix-up with the Jenkins campaign order! We had a sudden, unexpected, and completely unprecedented rush right before their big order came in, and we completely ran out of pepperoni and our standard mozzarella cheese! We had to use the only toppings we had left! We are investigating what happened and will be offering the Jenkins campaign a full refund and our sincerest apologies."
Chris froze.
He looked at the greasy, empty pizza box on his floor.
He thought about the red banner on the app. He thought about his selfish little Nudge. He thought about his order, #257, jumping to the front of the line.
The smug smile vanished from his face, replaced by a look of dawning apprehension.
Was he the system hitch at Pizza Palace?
Was he the reason an entire political campaign had just been brought to its knees by a plague of bad pizza?