Little Caesar's Crazy Calzony Pepperoni Pizza

I am hanging from a thread. At the very precipice of sanity, my mind and body on the verge of breakdown. I am numb to the extreme pain I am in. I know, somehow, that one more push will send me careening over the brink. And yet, I crave it. What would it be like, to be freed from the shackles of consciousness? I feel l'appel du vide.

Or is it

L'appel du pizza?

Little Caesar's Crazy Calzony Pepperoni Pizza

Like a gambler who bets their last dollar, I navigate to the Little Caesar's website. There is no future for me now. Only the unraveling agony of the present. This will not make me happy. Far from it. This is a tool of destruction wrought from the minds of the spiritually diseased. But I proceed.

The squat prison-like structure that houses my next mistake looms unassumingly on a dark highway. The sign out front flickers. I feel a deep kinship with it. At its characteristic Pizza Drive-Thru Window, I am handed my square box of regret. I am not mad. I chose this.

I arrive home. It is dark and cold, but the box's warmth is not reassuring. It is the heat of infection. Though I can feel it spread, I hold it close. Inside, I hesitate opening the box. It comes with a cup of marinara. That means something to me now. I could turn back. I imagine a better world, one that does not exist. I look to the bag of breadsticks. It has a message for me.

As you wish, Tiny Czar. I let go and gaze upon the error I have made.

The gossamer thread that ties me to reason loosens. Something has gone horribly wrong. My entire life, for one. I find a perverse satisfaction in the parallel. With an iron grip on my gradually decaying resolve, I reach forward to pry off a slice. I encounter a problem. I cannot tell if this had ever been, or had meant to be, sliced. Madness pulling at the edges of my awareness, I grasp an oozing fold and find no purchase.

I lose it. The weight of the absurd strains me to my limit. I cannot figure out how to eat this ridiculous pizza I bought at 10PM after working for twelve goddamn hours. The latest punchline in the interminable joke my life has become. With animalistic fervor I rip a piece from the profane oblong. I hesitate a moment. The poor, atrophied part of my brain concerned with self-preservation delivers a desperate entreaty. I ignore it and take a bite.

It tastes like nothing. Everything. Very salty. I hate it. I need it. In a frenzy all is devoured, the pizza, the sticks, an unhealthy amount of marinara. I distantly note the fervent protests of my digestive tract. The bread is crazy, the pizza is crazy, and I, too, am waving goodbye to bittersweet sanity.

In the condemned house that is my mind, I feel the last support beam give way. But do not worry.

I am the only one inside.