Any Way You Slice It (5 page)

George smiled at the crowd. He pushed the smiley face on his shirt. A computer chip inside the shirt made a laughing sound.

Some of the photographers leaped in front of George and began snapping his picture. Other people cheered. George was definitely the center of attention.

But not for long. Just then, somebody blew a loud horn. Everyone turned toward the door. There stood Suzanne, holding a plastic horn. She smiled as the attention focused on her.

“Forget that Joker,” she told the crowd. “Here’s your true champion! Kevin ‘Tomato Man’ Camilleri!”

Kevin walked in. Unlike George, he seemed embarrassed by all the attention. Maybe that was because of the outfit Suzanne had forced him to wear. He had on red shorts, a red shirt, red knee-socks, and a red hat with a small green felt stem sticking up on the top. He looked like a walking tomato!

Cameras flashed in Kevin’s face. His face blushed redder than any tomato.

“Hey, Louie, aren’t you going to start the contest?” Ian Camilleri shouted out. “My brother looks awfully hungry.”

“So does George,” Becky assured Ian. She waved her pom-poms in the air. “Jeremy didn’t let him eat a thing for breakfast. Wasn’t that smart?” She smiled at Jeremy.

“Can we start the contest, Louie?” Jeremy asked, turning away from Becky.

Katie walked over to the oven, opened the door, and carefully slipped one of the giant pies onto a huge metal spatula, just the way she’d seen Louie do it.

The pizza was heavier than she’d expected. It was big, too. Katie had never held a whole pie before. Whoa! The pizza was sliding off the spatula. Katie shifted her weight and quickly slid it onto one of the big metal pizza trays on the counter.

“That was a close one, Louie,” one of the kids in the audience said, laughing.

Katie blushed.

“Boy, that oven must be extra hot today,” one of the adults said aloud. “Look how red Louie’s face is.”

“Come on, Louie, let’s get going!” Suzanne pleaded. “Kevin is so ready.”

“So’s George,” Jeremy added.

Working near the big hot pizza oven made Katie very nervous. She wasn’t supposed to use any oven without a grown-up. Her mother had made that rule very clear. But she had to break her mother’s rule—just this one time.

Katie used a pizza cutter to divide each of the four cooked pies into slices. The ten runners grabbed slices and raced them over to the contestants. As they ate, Katie slid four more of Louie’s pre-made pies into the oven.

The contest had begun!

“Send another one this way, Louie,” Jake Lawrence, a teenager who was one of the contestants, called out. Jake had ten empty plates stacked beside him. That meant he’d eaten ten whole slices of pizza. So far, he’d eaten the most.

But Carolyn Evans, a tall thin blond woman, wasn’t far behind. She’d eaten nine slices. And Neal Flemming and Bryan Sander had each eaten seven.

“Another slice for my man Kevin, please,” Suzanne called out as she patted Tomato Man on the back, and counted the empty plates beside him. Wow! Kevin had eaten six slices.

“Suzanne, I don’t think I can eat any more,” Kevin groaned.

Suzanne looked at the next table, where George was scarfing down his seventh slice of pizza. “Yes, you can,” she said. “You don’t want Jeremy . . . I mean, George to beat us, do you?”

“Us?” Kevin asked. “Just how much pizza have you eaten?”

“You know what I mean,” Suzanne told him.

“All I know is that if I eat another bite, I’m going to explode.” He turned toward where Katie was standing. “Count me out, Louie,” he told her.

Katie nodded. She reached over and took away his plates.

The contest had been going on for a while now. Kevin was the fifth contestant to drop out. Jeremy smiled as Kevin waddled away from the table. “Another one down, George,” he happily told his client.

George didn’t answer. He just kept chewing. But he was slowing down. Finally, he looked up at Jeremy. “I’m sorry,” he said, his face turning green. “I think I’m going to be sick!” He jumped up and ran toward the bathroom.

“I’m not feeling too well, either,” Bryan Sander added, after taking just one bite of his eighth slice. “I’m done.”

“It’s down to three!” someone in the crowd shouted out.

Katie looked over toward the counter. There was only one of Louie’s pre-made pizzas left, and the three remaining contestants showed no signs of slowing down.

Someone’s going to have to make some more pizzas
, Katie thought to herself. Then she realized that “someone” was her.

This can’t be too hard
, Katie tried to convince herself, as she picked up a ball of dough.
I’ve seen Louie do this a thousand times
.

Katie floured the cooking board, and threw down a ball of dough. She pounded the dough just the way Louie did. Then she stretched out the dough, and tossed it gently in the air. Phew! She caught it.

Katie threw the dough up in the air again. “Wow, this is fun!” she exclaimed as she caught it once again.

Whee! Katie tossed the dough, higher this time, and twirled her body around in circles, just like Louie often did. But Katie wasn’t Louie. She had no practice in tossing pizzas. It wasn’t so easy to catch the dough as you twirled around.

Plop!
The pizza dough landed right on top of Katie’s head!

Katie shivered as the thick, damp, raw dough stretched down slowly over her face. It felt all gooey and disgusting—like some sort of weird, edible Halloween mask.

Suddenly, people started applauding. They thought it was a show—like the clowns outside Olives and Oregano.

But Katie knew it wasn’t a show. It was a big mistake.

Katie pulled the thick, gooey pizza dough from her head, and threw it in the trash. Then she reached into the refrigerator and pulled out a ball of dough. She floured the counter, and pounded the ball flat. Then she tossed the dough, ever so slightly—she wasn’t taking any chances this time.

“Hey, Louie, how ’bout a song?” one of the audience members asked.

Katie gulped. Louie always sang Italian songs while he made pizzas. Katie didn’t know any.

“Yeah, come on, Louie!” Ian Camilleri called out.

Katie racked her brain, trying to remember the words to one of Louie’s songs. But his songs were always in Italian. The words never meant anything to her.

Finally, Katie sang the only song she knew that might work. She changed the words a little bit, just to make it seem more like something Louie might sing.

“On top of pizza, all covered with cheese,” she began. “I lost my poor meatball while somebody sneezed.”

The crowd started laughing.

“Boy, Louie’s in a funny mood today,” Katie heard one teenage boy comment.

“It rolled off the table,” Katie continued singing as she carefully ladled tomato sauce on the circle of dough. “And under a bush. And then my poor meatball was nothing but mush.” She sprinkled cheese on the pie.

Katie looked at the finished pizza. It was kind of lopsided, more like an oval than a circle. But there was plenty of sauce and cheese on it. It didn’t seem too bad. She opened the oven door.

“Hey, Louie, don’t forget your secret spices!” Ian Camilleri shouted out.

A wave of panic washed over Katie. The secret spices! She had no idea what they were. Louie didn’t tell anyone what spices he used to make his pizzas different from the rest. That’s why they were called
secret
.

But Katie had to do something. Everyone was staring at her. Frantically, she reached out and grabbed the first spice shaker she saw. She sprinkled a brown spice on top of the cheese and sauce, and slid the pizza in the oven.

“That’s it for me,” a teenager named Jake Lawrence announced as he got up from the table and handed Katie his plate. “I give in.”

The crowd applauded for Jake. Katie joined in. He’d eaten ten slices of pizza. That was a pretty good try.

Now there were only two contestants left—Neal Flemming and Carolyn Evans. Katie placed more pizza slices on their plates, and watched nervously as the two competitors chowed down. Those were the last slices Louie had made himself. The next pie was the one Katie had thrown together.

And judging from the strange, unfamiliar smell coming from the oven, that pie was not going to be as good as the real thing.

Katie opened the oven door and slid the pizza onto a tray. It looked very strange. There was a brown coating on top of the cheese. It looked kind of like melted caramel. Katie hoped the last two contestants wouldn’t notice.

But they did. As soon as she placed the fresh slices in front of her, Carolyn sniffed at the air. “Trying something different this time, Louie?” she asked.

Katie just shrugged.

Neal took a bite. “Hey, this is different. It’s sweet . . . kind of sugary.”

Carolyn bit into her pizza. “I think I taste some cinnamon,” she noted.