Morning all and Happy Wednesday. I hope you are having a fab morning. I woke up with my todo list scrolling through my mental view screen and know it is going to be a very busy day. So let’s wake up the brain and get it started with the morning writing prompt. Timers set and off we go.
This is one of those scenes that needs to be fluffed out a bit more before I decide to do something with it. But I like the pepper prank.
Wednesday, November 20th: The peppers were hotter than he thought.
The peppers were hotter than he thought. He crunched down tasting the green vegetal heat thinking, ‘This isn’t so bad.’ Then he continued chewing. His eyes watered, his mouth burned and then suspiciously went numb while his nostrils seemed seared.
He sniffed and felt like he was a dragon stifling back a snort of fire and scorching his insides instead of the townsfolk. He looked around. No one else seemed to notice him. No one was paying attention. She spotted a pitcher of milk. It was out and meant to be part of the children’s fare. It was sitting in a bowl of ice and he shuffled towards it. He took his solo cup and filled it with milk instead of reaching for the pitcher of beer.
He moved away from the bottle by a few steps. No one was looking at him. She lifted the cup to his lips and downed half of the cup in one swig. He wiped his lips so that no tell tale white mustache would give his drink away. He looked around. Again no one noticed him.
He finished his cup, wiped his mouth and refilled the cup with another of milk. This two he downed. He felt the fire quench and the need for milk pass. He tossed his cup in the trash and retrieved another, this time filling it from the beer pitcher before sauntering away from the table. He looked around him. His reaction had not been noticed. No one, in fact was reacting to the heat of the peppers. He had not thought this lot would have been so stoic about the spice.
He didn’t know them well but he couldn’t recall any of them mentioning they had a penchant for spicy foods. Yet here they were, knocking back things laden with the peppers that nearly did him in.
Then he heard the scream. He was on the other side of the room by this point, far from both the peppers and the milk. One of the others was clutching his throat. “Water,” he gasped out.
Water was brought and there was a cackle of boyish glee from the section of the room where a pack of young teenage boys gathered. The pack was flashed a dark look and as the gasping man consumed the water given, his plate was inspected. It looked quite familiar. He was relieved as the scene unfolded.
The boys placed extra hot peppers randomly around the room to surprise the guests and delight themselves. They snorted in amusement as the hot peppers took effect and reduced several of the adults to tears.
He was relieved not to be in the spotlight, gasping from the heat. He was also relieved that he was not the only one to be bothered by the untamed heat the others seemed to take pleasure in. Parent’s made apologies and the party started to break up. He set his beer down and made his way to the door. He came because it was expected. He was polite, made conversation and was not a part of the scene. It was all he could hope for. He could still feel some of the burn in his belly and suspected he was going to have a rough night of it, but in a way he was glad of the prank. He had enough of socializing before he had the pepper and if the pepper was going to have any after effects, he would prefer to have them after he reached home.
Ten til Midnight 