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by Pete Hautman

  A girl is passing out information pamphlets. I take one and learn that this particular butter cow stands five feet eight inches at the shoulder, weighs six hundred pounds, and contains enough butter for 20,000 slices of toast.

  “What do you suppose they do with all the butter after the fair?” I ask.

  HeyMan, munching on a corn dog, says, “I bet they have a butter-eating contest.”

  “I wouldn’t eat that butter,” Cyn says, reading the pamphlet.

  “Too fattening?” I say.

  “No. It says here that after the fair, they melt it down and freeze it, then use it next year to make another cow. That butter is way past its expiration date.”

  “A butter contest would be cool,” I say as we move on. “Only with fresh butter.”

  “My sister’s cat once ate a whole stick,” HeyMan says. “She wasn’t too happy afterward. Neither of them were.”

  “What next?” I ask Cyn. “Want to go see the giant pig?”

  “I want to see the textile exhibit. The quilts and hooked rugs. You guys don’t have to come. We can meet up at the pizza thing later.” She checks her phone. “It’s in one hour.”

  “I’ll look at quilts with you,” HeyMan says, surprising both of us.

  “Seriously?” Cyn says.

  “Sure, why not?” He eats the last bite of his corn dog and looks at me. “You up for quilts, dude?”

  “I want to check out the Pizza Shack,” I say. “Get a sense for how it’s set up.” Also, I don’t feel like being an extra on The Cyn and Hay Show.

  “Cool. We’ll be there at noon to cheer you on.” HeyMan steers Cyn toward a mini-donut stand.

  Papa’s Pizza Shack is on Walnut Square, between the Giant Slide and the horse-and-cattle barns. Screaming kids on one side, and the powerful smell of manure on the other. Probably not the best location for a food concession, but Papa’s stand has been there for twenty years, and he sells a lot of slices. The Pizza Shack always has a line.

  This year, it’s bigger, like Vito said. They’ve tacked on an addition, doubling its size. The old Papa’s Pizza Shack sign has been replaced by a twenty-foot-long neon sign featuring a new name:

  The sign is festooned with American and Italian flags. In front of the stand, about fifty feet away, right in the middle of Walnut Square, a forty-foot-long table decorated with red, white, and green bunting sits atop a four-foot-high stage. Two men are setting up folding chairs at the table.

  But what is really impressive is the line, hundreds of people long, running from the pizzeria, past the stage, and snaking back and forth across the square. Everywhere I look, people are chowing down on big floppy slices of Pigorino’s pizza. It’s unbelievable. Papa’s pizza is good, but it’s not that good.

  I recognize a girl I know from school — Emily Keller — standing in the middle of the line with a girl I don’t know.

  “Hey Emily, what’s going on?”

  “Hi David,” Emily says. “I hear you’re going to be in the contest.”

  “That’s the plan.”

  “This is my friend Alicia Moreno,” she says. “Alicia just moved to Vacaville.”

  Alicia is shorter than Emily, and she has long black hair pulled back in a ponytail. She smiles and examines me with her shiny dark eyes. “You’re really going to be in the contest?”

  “I’m going to win it,” I say with more confidence than I feel.

  “That is so cool!” She seems genuinely impressed. I’m not used to girls telling me I’m cool.

  “Thanks.” I feel awkward. Maybe she’s shining me on. “Uh . . . what’s with the big line?”

  Emily shows me a coupon. “They were handing these out at the Grandstand.”

  “I guess Papa wants to make sure we get a good crowd,” I say.

  Alicia says, “We’ll be cheering for you, David.”

  I see a flash of white linen over by the serving window. It’s Papa himself, working the crowd. I make my way over to him.

  “Hi Papa,” I say.

  “Dustin!”

  “It’s David.”

  “David! I know you-a David. The big eater from-a Vacaville! You win-a this thing for Papa, hokay?”

  “That’s the plan,” I say. “You sure you’re going to have enough pizzas?”

  “We got-a lots-a pizza. You want-a free slice?”

  “I’ll save myself for the contest.” I swallow. My throat is dry. “Maybe a cup of water?”

  “Hokay, water I get you.” He snaps his fingers and shouts at one of the pizza servers. A moment later she brings me a paper cup full of water. I drink it in one gulp.

  “See?” Papa says. “I take-a care-a my favorite customer. Now you go see Vito and get signed in.”

  Vito is sitting at a small table behind the stage. I head over there. A few other guys are milling around the table. Vito is talking to each of them, crossing their names off a list, and giving out name badges. As I reach the table, Vito is arguing with a scruffy, potbellied man with long blond hair.

  “I don’t see you on the list,” he says.

  “Look harder,” the scruffy man says. He is wearing a neon-yellow-and-orange Hawaiian shirt beneath a loose camouflage pocket vest. A pair of baggy green cargo shorts completes his ensemble. “I won the qualifier in Chicago.”

  Vito runs his finger down the list. “It says here the Chicago event was won by some guy named . . . uh . . . G-U-R —”

  “Gurgitator. El Gurgitator. That’s my stage name, man.” He produces a business card. “See? That’s me. But when you make the check out, you make it out to Virgil B. Schutlebecker.”

  “You have to win before any check gets made out to anybody,” Vito says, plainly irritated.

  “Don’t you worry, guy. I got it in the bag.”

  I am standing a few feet away, paralyzed. The Gurge. My nemesis. What is he doing here? What was he doing eating pizza in Chicago when he was supposed to be at Coney Island eating hot dogs? Then I remember what Cyn told me, that the Gurge had been barred from the Nathan’s Famous contest.

  “So what name do you want on your name tag?” Vito asks.

  “How about El Gurge,” he says. “G-U-R-G-E.”

  Vito writes EL GURGE in black marker on a name tag.

  “Thanks, guy,” the Gurge says, snatching the name tag from Vito’s hand. “You can make out my check anytime.” He laughs, showing his big white teeth, and turns toward me. His close-set pale-blue eyes meet mine, then travel down to my pepperoni T-shirt. “Nice shirt, kid.” He smirks and brushes past me.

  El Gurge. My heart is pounding and I can hardly breathe. I have never hated anyone as intensely as I am hating the Gurge at this moment. I want to run after him and grab him by his greasy hair and pound his stupid face into the ground, but I can’t move. It’s probably just as well — he outweighs me by a hundred pounds.

  How am I going to beat the Gurge? For all his despicableness, he’s one of the top pros on the planet. He holds world records in everything from apple pie to deep-fried zucchini. I feel as if all hope has been sucked out of me.

  “Hey David,” Vito says. “Glad you made it. You see that guy I was just talking to?”

  I nod.

  “I want you to get up there and kick his ass.”

  “Okay.” I take my name tag.

  “Your seat number is on the back. By the way, Papa’s agreed to go with plain cheese pizzas this time — no BLDs. Thanks for the suggestion.”

  “You’re welcome.”

  “I’ll be rooting for you.”

  I nod dully and move off. My only hope now is to win second prize: free pizzas for a year. Or third prize, the pizza cutter, because Egon Belt will probably beat me too.

  I am sitting on the grass hugging my knees on the far side of the square when a shadow falls across me.

  “Bring your appetite, son?” It’s Egon Belt, looking crisp and clean in his overalls and John Deere cap.

  I give him a sickly smile. “I have an appetite; only guess who I just
met. El Gurgitator.”

  “Virgil?” Egon Belt shrugs. “Heard he might show up.”

  “You ever beat him?”

  “Nope. But I aim to give ’er a go. We got a shot, son.”

  “You really think so?”

  “Yep, I do. I knew Virgil when he was a scrawny little kid like you. His mama had to drive him to his first contest. Nice lady. She lives in Galena, just the other side of Dubuque. Pretty town.”

  “Hard to imagine the Gurge having a mother.”

  “We all got a mama, son. Virgil’s just a man with an appetite and an attitude. He can be beat.”

  “Yeah, but he’s fast.”

  “Tortoise and the hare, son. Ten minutes is a long time. Virgil’s got jaws, but he’s got no heart. That boy is gonna crash and burn one day. Maybe this is the day. Keep an eye on him, though. He’s got some tricks up his sleeve, and they ain’t all kosher.”

  Papa’s bullhorn-amplified voice booms across the square. “CONTESTANTS! ALL-A PIGORINO BOWL CONTESTANTS TAKE-A THEIR SEATS!”

  “That’s our call. Good luck, son.” Egon Belt turns and walks across the square toward the stage.

  I stand. My legs feel rubbery, and I’m not in the least bit hungry, even though I haven’t eaten a thing since last night. As I start toward the stage, Cyn and HeyMan find me. HeyMan is slurping a blueberry snow cone.

  “Dude, hurry up! It’s gonna start any second.”

  Several of the contestants are already on the stage.

  “Are you okay?” Cyn asks.

  “No. Guess who’s here.”

  They wait for me to tell them.

  “El Gurgitator,” I say.

  “The Gurge?” HeyMan says.

  “He won the Chicago qualifier. He’s the second- or third-fastest eater on the planet. He even beat Joey Chestnut at the chicken-neck contest.”

  “Yeah, but this is pizza. Pigorino’s pizza — your specialty.”

  I shake my head. “I don’t know.”

  I look at their concerned faces and feel even worse.

  “I’m really sorry,” I say.

  Cyn gets in front of me and forces me to look her in the eyes. Her face is only inches from mine, and I think I’ve never seen her this way, so close.

  “You can do this,” she says, squeezing my hands. “I know you can.” She releases me. I walk slowly up to the stage. I check the back of my ticket. Seat number thirteen. It figures. I climb the six steps and find my chair. I’m right in the middle. Two chairs to my right sits Egon Belt. He catches my eye and winks.

  “Good luck, son,” he says.

  I nod. “You too.”

  Most of the seats are filled when the Gurge thumps into the chair between me and Egon Belt. Great. I have to sit right next to him.

  The Gurge turns to Egon Belt and feigns surprise. “Egon Belt? Aren’t you getting kind of old and decrepit for this?”

  “Can it, Virgil,” Egon Belt says. “I’m old enough not to be psyched out by the likes of you.”

  “Ha! Nobody’s immune to the power of the Gurge! I’m betting you have a Reversal before you finish one pie.” He elbows me. “Am I right, kid?”

  I refuse to look at him.

  “THREE MINUTES!” Papa bellows.

  The crowd is gathering in front of the stage. There must be five hundred people out there. Pigorino’s employees are bringing out the pizzas in boxes. They set two boxes in front of each of us, plus two tall plastic water glasses.

  The Gurge is talking loudly to everybody and nobody. “Yeah, me and Joey Chestnut, we once went mano a mano at a Pizza Hut in Kansas. I put down eighty slices to his seventy. It was epic. We split a bucket of jalapeño poppers for dessert. Yeah, I got this one wrapped and bagged. You all oughta just go home right now.”

  If the Gurge’s trash talk is supposed to make me and everybody else mad, it’s working. I look down the table. A lot of big guys, and only one woman, also on the large side. It doesn’t matter. I just have to do my best and hope to win a pizza cutter and not embarrass myself.

  Papa is pacing back and forth in front of us, going through the rules. They’re the same as before, so I only half listen. One of the contestants asks what happens if we finish the two pizzas in front of us.

  “We got-a lot-a pizzas,” Papa says. “Pizzas keep coming. We no run out.”

  I scan the crowd and pick out Cyn and HeyMan near the front. Standing next to them is Hoover.

  “You go, little David!” Hoover yells.

  A few yards to his left I see Emily and Alicia. Alicia smiles and waves.

  “Two minutes!” Papa yells, forgetting to use his bullhorn.

  “Tell you what,” the Gurge says, standing up. “I’m gonna give you all a five-minute head start, just to make it fair.”

  “Virgil, I do not believe the word fair belongs in your vocabulary,” Egon Belt says in a relaxed drawl.

  “ALL CONTESTANTS MUST BE SEATED FOR CONTEST TO BEGIN!” Papa shouts into his bullhorn, aiming it straight at the Gurge from three feet away. Startled, the Gurge sits back down.

  “That dude is loud,” he mutters.

  Egon Belt smiles.

  “ONE MINUTE!” Papa announces.

  The Gurge leans closer to me. “That BLD thing at the qualifier was the biggest pizza I ever saw. How many slices you eat?”

  I don’t answer him. He shrugs.

  “The competition in Chicago was weak,” he says. “I only had to eat two.”

  “Two slices?” I say.

  “Two pies.”

  Two BLDs? That’s more than double what Egon Belt and I were able to eat. I don’t believe it, but at the same time there’s a small part of me that wonders if it might be true.

  “THIRTY SECONDS!”

  I look at the Gurge, at those little blue eyes and the smirk on his fat cheeks, and suddenly I am sure. He’s lying, just trying to psych me out.

  “TEN!”

  He’s a total scumbag and a cheat and a thief, and I want nothing more than to destroy him.

  “NINE!”

  I think about that phony dried-up half hot dog and my mom’s two thousand dollars, and my heart is going like a trip-hammer.

  “EIGHT!”

  The crowd is still getting bigger — the bullhorn is drawing in fairgoers like hogs to a dinner bell.

  “SEVEN!”

  I look at HeyMan and Cyn. He puts his arm around her.

  “SIX!”

  The Gurge’s fingers are resting on top of his first pizza box. We’re not supposed to touch the boxes until Papa says go, but I’m the only one who notices.

  “FIVE!”

  I take a deep breath and imagine my stomach as an infinite space, big enough to hold the whole world.

  “FOUR!”

  My jaws are made of titanium, powered by an atomic engine. My teeth are blades of diamond.

  “THREE!”

  Emily and her friend Alicia are pressed right up against the front of the stage. Alicia raises her hand and pumps her fist.

  “TWO!”

  I peek at the Gurge. His eyes are drilling into the box. I see beads of sweat gathering on his forehead. He licks his lips. It’s not a hungry lick; it’s a nervous lick. He isn’t sure he’ll win.

  “ONE!”

  Time to focus . . .

  “GO!”

  The Gurge is an animal. He doesn’t hesitate for an instant — his box is open and the first slice disappears down his gullet like a rabbit being chased into its hole. He’s on his second slice before I take my first bite. I fold, bite, bite, bite, and dump the crust in my water while grabbing my second slice with my other hand. The Gurge is on number three.

  Don’t look at him, I tell myself. Focus! I push myself, putting down the second slice in record time, add the crust to the water glass, take out the first crust and slam it down. I’m hitting a rhythm, and my first pizza is down the hatch at just over the two-minute mark.

  I open the second box and glance at the Gurge. He’s two slices ahead of me. E
gon Belt is also into his second pizza. My hands and jaws are working so fast I can’t believe they are ahead of me, but I keep going.

  The crowd is yelling. Papa is shouting into his bullhorn but I can’t understand a word of it except when he calls out the minutes. Another boxed pizza appears in front of me. A couple of the eaters have already given up — the serious action is at the middle of the table: the Gurge, Egon Belt, and me. But as fast as I eat, I can’t quite catch up with either of them. The Gurge is tearing into his pizza like a starving hyena — bits of crust fly, and sauce dribbles down his scruffy chin. He’s making snorting and hacking sounds, but the pizza keeps disappearing into him. Egon Belt is going at it hard, too, but still manages to look relaxed. He’s the Zen master of eating.

  We’re almost done with pizza number three at the five-minute mark when I see something out of the corner of my eye. The Gurge is reaching with his left hand into the side pocket of his vest while shoving a slice into his mouth with his right hand. He comes out with something — his hand almost covers it, but I think it’s a small plastic squeeze bottle. I keep eating. He quickly transfers the bottle to his right hand. Whatever he’s doing, it’s clear that he doesn’t want anybody to notice.

  For the next several seconds, the Gurge eats with only his left hand. It doesn’t slow him down much, if at all. He keeps darting glances at Egon Belt. At one point Egon Belt turns his head to look to his right, and I see a thin jet of liquid arc up from under the edge of the table.

  Whatever’s in the bottle, some of it is now on Egon Belt’s pizza.

  The Gurge returns the bottle to his vest pocket and attacks his pizza with renewed vigor. The two of them are neck and neck, and I’m still trailing by two slices. I take it up a notch, pushing my body to the max. My throat opens, and I find I can swallow with less chewing. Soaking the crusts in water is working — I notice a couple of the other eaters have adopted my technique. The food is moving into my body like a huge oregano-flavored snake.

  I’m starting pizza four when I have to stand and do the Joey Jump to pack down what’s in my stomach. I look up and down the table. Three chairs to my left, a guy wearing a Minnesota Vikings jersey — he looks like he might actually be a Minnesota Viking — is coming from behind. He’s only one or two slices behind me. To my right, I see Egon Belt has stopped eating. His face is red and slick with sweat. He tries to stand up, falls to his knees, turns his head away from the table, and erupts.