The History of Pizza

If walls could talk…

Would we say what others want us to, what they write on us, or would we speak our own story?

"The origin of the word ‘pizza’ first appeared in 997 in Medieval Latin. It was in Naples, Italy in the 16th century that a flatbread was referred to as a pizza. Pizza was then only a baker’s tool, simply a dough used to verify the temperature of the oven. The Pizza as we know it today was born in June 1889, to honour the Queen Margherita of Savoy. On her behalf a Neapolitan chef named Raffaele Esposito created the first ‘Pizza Margherita’, a pizza garnished with fresh tomatoes, mozzarella cheese, olive oil and basil, to represent the colours of the Italian flag."

Or at least that’s the story that’s scrawled across me in fanciful cursive font. A story to read while people wait for their boxed up portion of circular sustenance. I see the same faces over and over, they come in and stand awkwardly, never talking to each other except to tell the ones who seem to live here what they want. From then it’s staring at their phones, hushed conversations between those that came together, or looking at me.

Reading my words, are they MY words? Reading the story, the fun and invented prose made up by someone to make use of the space I provide. Faces stare at the story… the fiction I am forced to show, the same faces that have looked and read this story countless times before, for some reason known only to them they stand there and read me all over again.

Why?

If they knew my story, would they read it again, and again? If I could talk, share my story, would I want to? Or would I, like those that sell the pizza in the oven I see all day, every day, make up a more pleasant story? So I too could hide behind a fanciful lie?

There he is again. Carl, a regular customer. For all appearances a decent and kind member of the human society, he’s one of the few customers that talks to other customers and the staff while waiting for his food.

Except one time…

One time, he stood with his back resting against me, it made me feel… dirty. This one time, he pulled out his phone and stared deep into it while he waited. That’s when I saw it, just for a second. His large phone screen illuminated against me and I saw a live video stream of a woman tied up, secured to a chair, gagged and blindfolded. Traces of dry blood on the floor and walls hinted to this having happened before. He was listening through headphones, which reverberated through his body and head as he rested against me, and I could hear, well not so much hear, but rather… feel, her muffled screams.

The shop owner noticed the cracks forming along my once smooth surface, and the flakes and chips of paint that had fallen away. As of yet though he has not organised for them to be fixed, not that any repair job will hold for long, not with the knowledge I now have destroying me from within.

Carl was looking at me now, a fixed gaze on one of the cracks in me, a thin, disturbing smile shot across his face for just an instant. As if he knew I now knew his dark secret, but am unable to tell anyone.

Cra-ck

Another small crack formed in my lower right corner. Carl stepped away suddenly, then tapped at the crack with his boot, a slight dampness to his boot as it knocked and scraped at the exposed plaster… blood, it was blood on the toe cap of his boot.

He gave a soft chuckle as he turned around, and leaned against me as he lifted his phone to his face to look at the live stream of that dark, horrible room. If only I could get a message to the walls there, but I had no way of knowing where they were. Carl laughed out loud, it drew some attention from others in the store. He smiled at them, pointed to his phone, they all nodded and smiled politely back. Thinking he must be watching something funny online, but he wasn't, he was watching a terrified woman struggle and panic, on the screen I could now see she had fallen over, still bound in her chair. Again, I felt the muffled screams and gurgled cries... reverberate through me.

There seemed to be only one thing I could do, one final chance I could take.

I only hope it works…

The shop owner was just about to call Carl’s order ready for him to collect, it’s now or never.

Cr-

Cr-

CRA-CK!

The lower right end of the shop wall suddenly snapped and fell away, starting a chain reaction as the other wall cracks burst open in a violent stream. The wall came crashing down on the customer Carl, who was unable to move in time, he was pinned to the ground, his legs crushed. The shop owner and some nearby customers ran over to help free him from the rubble.

“Quick,” said the Shop Owner as they moved rubble from Carl. “It’s a miracle the whole roof hasn’t come down, move him quickly and someone, call an ambulance!”

The wall had just enough still standing to support the roof above them all, a narrow pillar of wall somehow stopping everything coming down.

“What’s that?” one customer asked, picking up Carl’s phone.

“Is that real?” they asked, confused by what they saw on the screen.

“Oh my god!” said another looking at the phone now, then they all looked down at Carl on the ground in shock.

A month later...

The pizza place had a grand reopening, and it had one of the busiest nights ever thanks to all the media attention of the last month. As the crowds began to thin, and the orders slowed down later in the night, the Shop Owner looked over to the wall that saved his dying business.

Patched together with as much of the old wall as possible, and freshly plastered and decorated with a mural in memory of the three victims of Carl, or ‘The Repairman Killer’ as he has been dubbed by the local paper.

The Shop Owner saw a woman standing and looking intently at the mural, he stepped around the counter and walked towards her.

“If walls could talk, hey?” he said as he approached.

She jumped slightly, startled by him.

“Sorry miss, didn’t mean to frighten you there. You like the mural? Thought it was the right thing to do seeing what happened here-”

He stopped short as he finally caught a better look at her face.

“You’re…” he leaned in close and continued in a hushed tone, “you’re… her… aren’t you? The one that was saved that night?”

She nodded, her eyes beginning to well up with tears at the memories of recent events.

“I’ll leave you be miss,” he said, giving her a gentle smile and starting to head back to the kitchen area, when he stopped.

“Strange thing, if that wall hadn’t come down… you might never have been-” he trailed off, seeing the pain in her face. “Well… you know what I mean.”

The Young Woman moved closer to the wall, and placed her hand gently on the surface. She leaned her face in close and whispered.

“I don’t know if walls can talk, but I know they can listen… thank you.”

She held her hand on the wall for a moment longer, then she walked out of the shop.

You’re welcome.

I would say… You’re welcome… if walls could talk.