Artichoke Basille's Pizza
A bandana-wearing pizzaman swings huge pies in and out of the oven. His apron, shirt, and pants are all blue. His eyes are calm, almost bored, as he leans on a stainless steel prep table. Behind him is more empty space than a pizza shop should be able to afford, but we're in a bar. It was made this way. To the left is the bar, $8 drafts and a modest cabinet of liquors sloshing underneath three televisions. The middle one shows professional tag. It seems harder to be the evader than the chaser. On the left, Elvira smiles and smolders into the camera. Such hair. On the right, it's the X Files. I'm old enough to recognize these faces, but I grew up without cable. I've never seen them move. There's a full-blown DJ setup on its own table, laptop open, DJ absent. Laid back hip hop beats make a good vibe for getting too much pizza. I was gonna take it to go, head home for cheaper beer, but my buddy's brew is on tap (Temescal Pils) and I'm not in a hurry. It's too early on a Friday night. I get three slices, enough for any man.
The Staten Island. Heavy beef and thick cheese, cheese so structured it helps hold the slice together. The crust is a fine-crumbed slab with a grabbable puff, knuckled and warped from the pizzaman's thumb turns. Red onion and a sprinkle of shredded mozz are baked into the top. That beef is straight. No fennel, none of the grease or heat of italian sausage. Who needs all that. This is meatball.
Elvira hides her face and squirms on the couch, a reaction to something I didn't see. Hers is the hair so many millenials settled for half of. Speaking of, the guy at the table in front of me folds his slice for a bite. His mullet is short, tasteful even, neck fluff balanced by a rich mustache. He wears three rings and two chains, all thin and cheap. He is engrossed in conversation with his girlfriend. Meanwhile Scully stares off camera, cold and grim.
90s TV is better with this backing track. Subtitles tell just as much of a story, but you only catch it when you're looking. Here your eye never settles, your mind never settles, your fingers want to tap in rhythm to the lazy throb of looping kick drums, an endless rap with chromatic synths beeping insistently over the top. A lot to take in, but it's all at a distance. The only thing that feels close is the slice. The slice could be getting cold, but summer never gets hot here anyway. A lean season, where hunger comes reluctantly. Why couldn't my earlier meal be enough? I feel driveless, heart a little too quick in my chest, warm in the afterglow of a slow-paced crush recently resumed. The sun's still up but the buzz in the bar is rising. Mulder's making progress, less happy with every step towards truth. This might be the last time I see David Duchovny smile for another twenty years.
The onions are working for me. Crisp edges curled, not quite browned, sweet and bitter. They are the sarcastic remark that saves my sluggish slice from casserole heaviness, investing it with neighborhood grit. This slice is not a typical Cali cut. It's got character, but it's not trying to impress. It's just doing its job, another grind in the service industry, sweaty but unstressed. Carry on, brother.
The crust edge whispers with char, plain and chewy, demanding half a beer to knock it back. The roll of the crust wants to separate from the slice, a crease underneath breaking upward. Ambitions toward independence, maybe, or a sacrificial line of defense. Despite the crack, it holds together. None of this is flimsy, none of it is half baked. It's a recipe that's good enough, and it comes out huge on an XL platter. I'll take it and I'll take it again.
Two slices of margarita underneath. Whoever Margarita was, she wouldn't recognize any of this. We all owe her an apology. I offer her a beat of silence before removing her veil of red checkered paper. I get my hands into that floury mass. Big leafy basil is half submerged, blots of fresh mozz relax into a marbled coat to drown them, marinara frothing between perimeters. Shredded cheese on top, a trademark look. Though it's lighter, it looks even more too-big than the sausage slice. A single errant strand of red onion lays on top.
One bite, all cheese, too mild. I shower it with dried basil, all over everywhere, littering the slices and the box and a little on the table too. As I bite again, knowing I won't finish it all, I look for Elvira. Instead I catch the tail end of a message from the California Egg Advisory Board. Still doing work 30 years on. I miss the message but I remember the brand. This pizza is the opposite. Not a brand, just something you do. Be here, eat, and leave full.
Duchovny draws his gun.
I chew and swallow.
End credits roll.
