The Everyday Anarchist
By Terrence Oblong
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"Dignity, dignity, dignity, dignity: Then the custard pie in the face, that's how you do funny," The Everyday Anarchist said.
The Everyday Anarchist was a girl in my clowning class. The best clown in the class by a country mile. When she took a pie she did it with, well, dignity, class, it was graceful, well-timed and funny.
She wasn't just funny, she was pretty, beautiful in fact. Her pretty face covered in pie was a sight to behold.
I'd fancied her at first sight, but to date she'd ignored me, we'd barely spoken, even when, during lessons, we'd had to pie each other.
And there she was, alone at a table in the cafeteria. And there I was, with a tray of food, looking for a table.
"Do you mind if I sit here?", I said, sitting there.
She looked up at me briefly from her phone, but said nothing.
"It's The Everyday Anarchist isn't it?" I said. "We're on the same course."
"Oh," she said, I could see her mind desperately trawling her database of people she'd met yet but had taken absolutely no interest in. "Yes, you're Wavey Davey aren't you."
"No," I said. "Wavey Davey's over there," I pointed to a nearby table. "The guy with the purple clown's wig. I'm Steve The Splatterer Sterling."
"Oh," she said. And that was it, she went back to her phone. If I didn't speak now I'd have blown my chance.
"I think you're really funny," I said. "The funniest clown on the course."
She looked at me again, with something like contempt this time.
"Clowning isn't funny," she said. "It's pathetic. Stupidly dressed idiots throwing pies at each other for no reason."
It was then that she outlined her dignity - pie-in-the-face theory. "I hate traditional clowning," she added. "It's just not funny. It's not believable."
"Oh, there are some funny clowns."
"Name one," she snapped.
"Well, there's Hamish McPieface."
"Hamish McPieface. Don't make me laugh. Correction, doesn't make me laugh. He's just a waste of pieface."
"You must like some clowns. Else why would be training to join the profession."
"So that I can destroy it."
She spat the words so forthrightly that I dropped my spoon into the soup I was eating, causing a small dollop to splutter out of my bowl and onto The Everyday Anarchist .
She looked at me with anger bordering on genuine hatred. Without saying a word she took a full spoon of soup from her bowl and flung it at my face, with a look that could scald, even if the soup itself was lukewarm.
Her intention hadn't been comedic, though to be fair, with The Everyday Anarchist you can never be sure. But here she was, a girl clown, a very pretty girl clown, flicking soup at a boy clown. There was only one thing the boy clown could do.
I slowly and deliberately dipped a slice of bread into my soup until it was soaking wet and soggy, then flung it at The Everyday Anarchist and her pretty dress.
Game on.
With a beauty and dignity impossible to describe with the mere written word, she brushed the soggy bread aside, stood up, picked up her bowl of soup and poured it slowly, deliberately and wonderfully over my head.
I let the main cascade of dripping cease, then, in turn, I did the same to her, at which point she picked up her cheesecake, which had been sitting on the table beside her as if waiting for an opportunity like this, then splatted it in my face. I had no cheesecake with which to respond, just a banana, which I hastily and awkwardly undressed, then squashed up a handful which I pushed into her still-soupy face.
By this time some of the clowns from our course, Wavey Davey included, had noticed what we were doing and took the opportunity to come over and pie The Everyday Anarchist in her face. She have such a pretty face, who could resist.
Other people joined in, thinking it was a food fight. It became a food fight. From all around the canteen, rolls were lobbed, chicken drumsticks tossed, even plates laden with food were hurled hither and thither.
For a brief but furious time, the entire universe focussed on flinging food at me and The Everyday Anarchist.
Eventually, of course, the food ran out, the food-fight stopped and normality returned. The Everyday Anarchist sat there bathed in a veritable buffet of foodstuffs, real blood dripping from her cheek from a carelessly-flung plate. Then she leant over and kissed me.
Like the food-fight itself, the kiss was messy, short-lived, furious and perfect.
"We should go," she said, as she released me from the kiss. "Someone's going to try and find out who started this and it could get messy if we're still here."
We got up, picked up our bags and left the cafeteria, a couple of our fellow clowns applauding us as we exited.
"I need to go home, shower and change," she said. She paused to look at me, as if for the first time. "Do you want to join me?"
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Comments
Brilliantly written. What a
Brilliantly written. What a humerous picture you portray here in this story. I can just imagine the whole scenario playing out as I read.
All the best for Christmas and the New Year.
Jenny.
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