The Sugar Attack

I’d like to preface this story with this: This was a real-life event that happened to me probably 18 or 20 years ago. I am not embellishing anything, but I’m also operating off my memory. It’s too funny, so people tend not to believe that it happened.

It did.

In some form.

Here’s my memory of it. I was hanging out with my friends Brendan, Chris, and Adam. This was a night one summer, like many, where we were trying to figure out what to do, and we also happened to not want to spend what little money we had. We’d gone to restaurants and ordered four waters and one molten chocolate lava cake to share enough times. We’d played enough Mario Kart that we were dreaming of turtle shells and banana peels. We were looking for something else to do. 

And then, as luck would have it, there was a fair happening nearby!

We lived near an Anheuser-Busch place, and I think it might’ve been there in their lot. Again, from my memory, I believe that’s where we were. We showed up and were outside, probably deciding if we truly did want to go into the fair and pay whatever fee there might have been, or we might’ve just been waiting in line. Either way, we were standing outside on this nice summer night, and it was likely around sunset.

There were a ton of people around, entering and exiting through the gated access point. And then suddenly, from out of nowhere… WHAM!

SUGAR ATTACK!

Powdered sugar ALL OVER MY FACE AND HAIR.

Here’s how I remember it. A girl, probably around our age, so late teens or early 20’s, not a large girl by any means, but with a Michael-Clarke-Duncan-fistful of powdered sugar from in the fair… she was exiting with another friend, saw me, and SLAPPED ME with this handful of sugar.

The force and situation was so tremendous and confusing that I was utterly stunned. The most stunned I had ever been. It was the one time in my life I was both slack-jawed and speechless. And I think it kind of hurt, but I couldn’t tell. I was just too surprised to even focus on any possible pain. The girl and her accomplice took a hard turn to the left and marched off past all the onlookers who witnessed my assault. 

Plenty of people were laughing. This included Chris and Brendan, and eventually me, once my brain came back to Earth and I realized how funny it was. Adam was the only one who got pissed… for me. “She can’t do that! Someone should go throw sugar at her!”

Ah, thanks, Adam. We did not retaliate. We just stood there in awe of this unwarranted attack. I swear, to this day, I don’t think I knew the girl. It’s not like I was some player who bounced around from woman to woman and had a list of ladies who might’ve felt slighted by me. I had a list of ladies who stopped returning my phone calls before I ever even got to go on a date with them… so the scenario is quite the opposite of me being someone who deserved this. I suppose, no one is perfect. I did do some soul-searching afterwards. Could I have upset some lady to this degree? I was young, could I have been so careless in… some scenario?

It’s a possibility, of course. But I couldn’t think of anything that would have warranted something like this to have come out of anger. I didn’t get a great look at her, but I got a good enough look to know that I didn’t recognize her. Maybe I don’t remember everyone I meet, but there’s no way that someone who I didn’t remember could have been that mad at me. If I had ever slighted anyone, I’d remember their face.

I think the girl just happened to get some powdered sugar and thought this would be funny to do, and I was the unsuspecting victim. Or had she zeroed in on me before leaving? Was it premeditated? Did she just have fried dough and took all the powdered sugar off of it? Was it the fried dough that she clocked me with… or the plate? Or was it her hand? All I knew was that something hit me, and it was filled with sugar.

That was, until just recently.

My friends and I have brought this up multiple times in our years because we never found out the motive, so the situation remains as an isolated, unprecedented, unwarranted, and unimaginable incident. And it’s a hilarious story. Recently, Chris and Brendan and I were talking about it, and Brendan’s version was that she blew it at me.

Blew it at me? I was struck! Was I not? Brendan was wondering if she had the fried dough and blew the sugar off of it, or if she just blew the sugar off her hand and into my face. I was like, hold on, didn’t she hit me? She Sugar-Slapped me, no?

Chris suggested that maybe she flung it at me. Now, we have three different versions of the story. And because it was my face and hair that got Sugar Attacked, my inclination was that I was right. I was the one accosted, my version was most reliable. Right?

But then I thought, you know, that also means I’m the only one who didn’t have a good vantage point of the whole fiasco. Brendan, Chris, and Adam all saw it happen to me from where they stood. I saw it happen to me… but through my own eyes. I wasn’t expecting anything to happen and was in a completely relaxed state. I never saw it coming. So, suddenly… BOOM!

WHITE!

ALL OVER!

I swear I remember there being an impact, but I also don’t remember pain. I remember being stunned. I thought I didn’t quite feel pain because of the adrenaline from being so surprised. But maybe it was because there was no hand contacting my face. Maybe Chris is right, and it was flung at me. The sugar itself could have made some impact. He also seems to believe the Slap is a strong possibility.

But Brendan said it was blown at me. I did get coated in the powdered sugar. A strong blow from the lips could have done the job.

My first-person account felt like it should be the most reliable one, since it was me. But I also had the worst view of the incident. I realize, in my memory, I don’t recall any sort of lead up. Not like anything my friends would have been able to see. I just remember, suddenly, the girl was there. Also, I should stress again, this girl was small. The amount of sugar that struck me and coated my face and got stuck in my hair… large. It stands to reason that that much sugar shouldn’t have been able to fit in her tiny hand.

Is Brendan right?

For about 18 or 20 years I had one version in my head, and only a few months ago did Brendan throw this other version in the mix when he told us that he told the story to one of his students (hilarious, also). One of us has strayed from the original situation as the years went by. But we all still remember I got attacked with sugar. And we all still remember Adam was the only one to become furious.

Maybe I need Adam’s version.

Ideally, I need this mystery girl’s version. She’d know, because she’s the one who did it.

We never found out what her motive was, or even who she was. As far as I know, I never saw her again. As far as I know, I had never seen her before.

But I could be wrong.

I’ve been wrong before.

All I know is that there was a Sugar Attack many years ago, one summer night in Merrimack, New Hampshire. There was only one minor injury, no deaths. I survived. There were also plenty of other witnesses… strangers to us… other people who have probably had a story to tell from time to time courtesy of this girl. And if I never find out any more about the incident, I’m just happy to know that some other people out there have a funny story to break out every now and again.

But I swear… it was a Sugar Slap!