Pie Is the Fore of Life

‎"I straightened my yellow-and-red polka dotted tie and stepped up the couple of cobblestone stairs that led to the wooden door that hid the secret that changed my life."

Earlier in my career as an entrepreneur, I tried selling countless useless objects: self-cutting scissors, an extendable ruler, vacuum cleaners with already-void warranties, toothbrushes with rechargeable batteries, etc.

It was only after almost two full years of partial success that I stumbled upon the door-to-door salesman's greatest tool: food.

It didn't have to be approved by any agencies for safety reasons, and honestly, it was cheap as hell to buy and could be sold as expensive as you fucking wanted it be, to fat, white Americans.

So it was at that point that I became a pie-man. I bought a cheap truck, painted over the "Paul's EXTREME Pest Removal" decal, and wrote, in frilly little letters, "Jack's Pie Service: You want it? Jack's got it."

I would drive out to the suburbs of relatively small, rich communities, and go literally door-to-door, marketing my supplies. And, just like that, I made it. I wasn't making thousands a week or anything, but I was making more than I ever had, and I even got the van a nice scrub down and had the annoying holes in the seats fixed. (There's nothing quite as uncomfortable as having a sharp corkscrewing spring shoved up your ass for hours on end.)

It was about seven months into my newest marketing scheme when I pulled my van into the first urban neighborhood I had ventured into since becoming an entrepreneur. It was an old neighborhood, the kind where the houses are really big, and trees cast shadows on everything. I rolled my van into the winding driveway of what looked to be an ordinary Victorian-era home, and stepped out of my van. Oh, how I miss that van today.

I straightened my yellow-and-red polka dotted tie and stepped up the couple of cobblestone stairs that led to the wooden door that hid the secret that changed my life. Knocking confidently, I fixed my celebrity-smile onto my face and waited. After about a minute, I went to knock again, but before my hand could touch the aged cedar for a second time, it swung open on well-oiled hinges. At first I was startled, because at first I thought that it had opened of its own accord, but then I noticed the crumpled old man standing a good foot and a half below eye level. Laughing, partly in relief, and partly to show that I was acknowledging my own foolishness, I stuck out my hand to grasp the older man's, saying, "Jack Ellis, pleasure to meet you," when I realized the man wasn't moving to shake mine. In fact... He wasn't moving at all. To this day, I'm not sure if he was dead before I got there, or if the strain of opening the door is what killed him. But I guess because of everything that have happened since then, it's the thing that haunts me the least...

Realizing the emergency, and cursing myself for leaving my phone in my van (I never attempted a sale with it on me; it gives customers a sense of importance to not see a cell on you,) I ran into the man's home, and that's when it began. The door slammed shut behind me with a resounding thud, and the man straightened up; he was no longer old, but young, with curly hair and a large nose. And he was smiling. "You've come into my home with the intention of selling me pies.

What if I told you I had an ingredient that could make your pies practically sell themselves?"

By this point, I was shaking. However, being the astute salesman that I was, I nodded my head for the man to go on. Now, why the fuck did I do that?

Anyway, he smiled even broader, and that was when I realized that his mouth hadn't moved during anything he had said. And it definitely didn't move when the voice boomed, "Good! Then follow me to the basement!"

At this point, my survival instincts were kicking in, and I ran for the window to the left of the door (I wasn't going to bother trying the door; I'd seen too many movies to be that dumb.) Only... I wasn't running forward. The window was getting further away. Frantic, I turned around and saw that I was running backwards, down a long hallway. Looking forward, I stopped running and let myself be dragged from where I was to the ashen door. When I stopped moving, the man was suddenly by my side, his smile wider than ever. "He's going to split his face open if he smiles any wider," I joked nervously with myself, but it only scared me more because I realized that might be a real possibility.

The dark-haired, large-nosed man opened the door and moved aside for me to step inside. Now, I've never been afraid of the dark, not even as a kid, but at that moment I would have rather died than go into that room. However, not seeing a viable way to die, I took a step forward, and found that the room wasn't quite as dark as I had imagined. Taking another step, I realized that I was on a staircase, and, curious and not really sure of any other option, I went down the rickety stairs in a quick, albeit shaky, manner. When I reached the bottom, I found myself in a pleasantly warm room, lined with shelves with uniformly sized cubby holes in them. In the center of the room was a single table with one of those old-school pestle and mortars. On the far side of the room there was a furnace, which was the source of the pleasant heat.

Turning to see if my mysterious friend had appeared with me down here, I was completely shocked to find the crumpled body of the old man who first opened the door.

I found out later that the young man was just a figment of my imagination, and that I had been talking to the corpse of a Mr. Jessie Goldburg. More of that later, however.

Walking forward, the voice came back into play. Only this time, it was from inside my head, not a booming outside voice. It said in a silky, rich voice, "I brought you here, and I have not lied; here lies an ingredient that will enhance your wares to the point of being both addicting and irresistible. However, the first batch of pies must be supplied from your own body. Reach beneath the counter, and remove the scalpel there, and all of the ingredients required for a cherry pie. Any attempt at a refusal to comply will be most... unpleasant for you."

Figuring that I've already experienced enough for the day, I did as I was told, and I did so a little more confidently than I had imagined I would. Old habits die hard, I suppose. I started crying at the next instructions I received, though. It had been a full 15 years since I had last cried. "Mix the ingredients as your normally would, and only after the pie has been prepared for cooking, remove your foreskin with the scalpel, crush it to a fine powder with the pestle and mortar in front of you, and place it in the center of the pie."

I begged with the voice, I pleaded with it, but to no avail. Then, after about 20 minutes of slobbering on myself as I prepared the pie, my hand moved of its own accord and cleanly began slicing at my penis. At first, I felt nothing as the initial incisions were made, then I threw up as I felt the tearing sensation ripple along the length of my penis. Sobbing, gagging on my own bile, and bleeding from the last place any man ever wants to bleed, I felt myself place the torn foreskin into the contraption in front of me and crush it until I could only feel the solid of the bowl, and then I actually sprinkled it onto the center of the pie. I then placed it in the furnace. After that, I remember falling down, and I remember nothing for what I guess was a few hours after that.

I woke up in a bedroom with no bed, so I guess I just woke up in a room. Anyway, I rolled over from on my stomach and groaned as bandages crusted over with blood tore the new layer of scabs off of my ruined dick. I laid there for hours, crying silently, not wanting to move, hating the situation I was in. I knew my life was over, that whatever force that had brought me into this sick house was ready to kill me. The thought that brought me off of the floor, however, was that I had left that pie in that furnace and that it was now burnt. I have no fucking idea, not one, as to why that thought was so overwhelmingly important to me, but it was, and I bolted upright and raced down a new flight of stairs, coming out into the foyer where I was originally received by the old man. Stopping long enough to try the still-locked door, I peeked out of the window, noticed my van was gone, and decided that it just wasn't worth it. Remember the pie, I raced down the hallway that I had previously been dragged down, and I yanked open the same ashen door that had once been opened by a ghastly young gentleman by the name of Mr. Jessie Goldburg (who, I later remembered, had been the name of an unorthodox Jewish customer of mine back in Arizona, where I sold the vacuums with expired warranties, who had given me quite the trouble over those warranties. I think the young man and Mr. Jessie Goldburg were one and the same) and I rushed down the decaying staircase into the peculiar room, and found the pie sitting on the table, next to the pestle and mortar. I then did something almost as horrifying as cutting off my foreskin: I ate the pie. I couldn't help it. As soon as the smell of it hit my nose, I couldn't help but dig right in...

Now, I write this narrative, sitting in a room with a bed (so I suppose it's a bedroom) in the same house. I have earned millions from my pie business (yes, business. I was able to do away with the entrepreneurship after the first month of business with my newly refurbished pies) and I live quite comfortably. However, the cubby holes in the peculiar downstairs room with the furnace are running dangerously low on supplies. But I happen to know an unorthodox Jew with a few children who are undoubtedly uncircumcised...

Well, I must be leaving this story now...

My plane for Arizona departs in two hours.