A Christmas Turnip for the Book, Final Stanza

Mariagarita didn’t sleep that night. Instead, before dawn broke, she dressed in her pink bikers leathers, put on her pink crash helmet with the Viking horns and mounted her pizza delivery moped. Revving the two stroke, not once, not twice but three times, she reared up the front wheel in an impressive wheelie and burned rubber all the way to her Domino’s Pizza Factory.

At ten am Christmas Day, Mariagarita emerged from the factory. All night, she had been cooking pizzas. Each pizza she had lovingly and appropriately cooked for those she realised she truly loved and cared about. She placed the three pizzas in the box on the back of her delivery bike and began her rounds.

First stop was Whinny Mouse’s house. Mariagarita knocked on the door. As the door opened, Mariagarita cried, “Merry Christmas!” She held out the pizza box, closed her eyes and awaited the inevitable big hug and kisses from her dear friend. Naturally, there would be lots of “mwah, mwah, mwaaaaaahssssss” and a “LOL” or two, or three. After all, you need to undertake lots of mwahs and LOLs when you greet your chat “sis.”

Instead of Whinny Mouse, MerryManOfPots stood there. “I didn’t order pizza!” he screamed, horrified. He began to sweat and palpitate more than usual at the thought of something that hadn’t come from Lidl or Aldi.

“Well, it’s a present,” said Mariagarita, distracted. Behind him, she could see Whinny Mouse arguing with a pillow. The pillow had a smiley face drawn on it, a fake beard and spectacles.

“If I catch you in someone else’s bed again!” screamed Whinny Mouse at the pillow “I’ll knock the stuffing out of you!”

She took a drunken swing at the pillow, overbalanced and fell flat on the floor. The pillow remained unmoved, seemingly oblivious to her plight. “Typical man!” thought Whinny Mouse as she angrily stumbled to her feet.

Mariagarita smiled. She was pleased for her dear friend. It was so reassuring to finally see that at long last, she was having a lover’s tiff with a tangible object. Rehab at The Friary, it seems, had obviously worked.

“What sort of pizza is it?” demanded MerryManOfPots. Not that it mattered. He’d eat anything and everything, and if it was free, it tasted even better.

“Well,” said Mariagarita, taken aback at his abruptness and the thick foam fermenting from his mouth which was rapidly increasing by the second, “it’s called The Imaginary Surprise.”

“Great!” frothed MerryManOfPots, rudely snatching the box from Mariagarita and slamming the door shut in her face. Ravenous, as always, he flung open the lid, eager to get his salivating chops into something tasty. The box was empty. “Never mind,” he said to himself excitedly, as he ate the box.

Mariagarita mounted her trusty ped, did a wheel spin and accelerated off in the direction of Tin Dice’s house. She was a woman on a mission and not even a strategically placed pile of cardboard boxes in the middle of the road could distract her. She ploughed straight through them. A box got stuck on each of her Viking horns but it did not deter her.

She pulled up, expertly dismounted, and took out Tin Dice’s Christmas Pizza. It was a pizza fit for a King. As she was about to knock on the door, it flew open and she was met by an inflatable and furious Susan Boyle.

She was dressed in the Christmas present Tin Dice had bought her – a bright red basque with matching suspender belt, holding up some bright yellow fishnets.

“That laddie!” Susan exclaimed. “I can handle the little pr1ck but…but! But!” she spat, shaking with rage, “I’m not dancing to that!”

Mariagarita listened as the theme tune to “Tales of the Unexpected” played in Tin’s house.
Jealously took a hold of her. As Susan Boyle turned to walk off, Mariagarita pulled out her plug. As the air gushed out of Susan, and she began to rise up into the sky, Tin Dice appeared in the doorway.

He was naked except for a tinsel thong and some strategically placed baubles. He was wearing a new ten gallon Stetson awarded to him by The Guild of Builders.

“Susan!” he shouted, “Suuuuuuuuuu…..”

Tin Dice looked up in despair and anguish as Susan Boyle gained speed and height and began to soar high up into the air.

“COME BACK, SUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUSANNNNNNNNNNNNNNN!” he shouted, as he ran after her, arms outstretched, trying to catch her.

“I LOVE YOUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU!!!!!!!!” he cried.

It was all in vain. Susan was gone. Her wig fell back down to earth and landed next to him.
Heartbroken and sobbing, Tin picked it up. It was all he had left of her. He held it close to his face, inhaling her smell. Touching it. Touching her. Feeling it. Feeling her. He stroked it. He thought of the time they had shared together. That special moment with the chipolata.

“Oh Susan!” he sobbed. “Oh Susan!” he wailed. Then he blew his nose on the wig before tossing it in the bin.

As he turned to go back into his house, he was confronted by a furious Mariagarita. She narrowed her eyes at him. Tin Dice smiled and cocked his head to one side.

“Mariagarita!” he exclaimed with surprise. “How wonderful to see you! he said, holding out his arms. “Have you come to dance for me?”

Tin Dice, usually so good at dodging the issue, was not fast enough this time as Mariagarita bought the pizza box crashing down on his head. Appropriately, Tin’s head became adorned with the Turkey Crown pizza that Mariagarita had so lovingly cooked for her King.

Tin blinked and then smiled again as Mariagarita pulled the box down so it nested around his neck. Walking behind him, she hoicked up his tinsel thong, not once, not twice but three times giving him a free portion of wedges to go with his pizza. “She loves me!” he said to himself, “but then again who doesn’t?” Then he remembered Martin. Scowling, he scurried off indoors vowing to sell his soul for a new username and password. He didn’t mind what it was. Something old, something new, something borrowed, something blue.

Job done, Mariagarita dusted her hands, straddled her ped and sped off to Bob Scratchitt’s house, the last delivery on her rounds. As she rode, she passed Annette Curtain squeaking along in her wheelchair, wearing Tin’s cardboard crown and towing a huge guillotine. She was laughing manically.

Mariagarita looked in through the window of Bob Scratchitt’s house. A warm glow came from the roaring fire – a Christmas Day treat that Bob had laid on for his family. He’d scavenged the bins for weeks to find old pizza boxes to burn.

He would like to have “dressed in about 666 layers of clothing and under 3 duvets, on the sofa, in front of a log fire where the heat just goes straight up the feckin chimney” to keep warm but he wasn’t as rich as the successful business woman, A.N.C_Two_Homes_But_Can’t Afford_Central_Heating.

Bob, his Chai bride Pandaora and Tiny Neil were seated around the table. Their eyes were closed, their hands together as Bob said Grace. In the middle of the table sat a very small pizza. Next to the meagre meal sat a nice teapot. It was ruby red in colour.

With Grace finished, Mariagarita watched as Bob began to carve. Tiny Neil’s fat face was a sight to behold – his eye’s wide open with excitement as his father placed a small piece of pizza on his plate.

Pandaora thanked her husband with a peck on the cheek and a paw of gratitude on his shoulder as he placed an even smaller piece on her plate. Finally, Bob took the tiniest piece for himself. It was so miniscule; one could just about see it. To Bob though, his wife and child must come first. Besides, Bob had no teeth with which to eat the pizza so he would just have to gum it to death until it was soggy enough to swallow.

Feeling guilty about the way she had treated her faithful servant, Mariagarita walked towards the door. As she was about to enter a curved object flew through the air and hit Mariagarita on the head knocking her stone cold out. She fell to the floor like a dead weight.

It was a boomerang fashioned from a wire coathanger and thrown by a masked, caped crusader. A gloved hand caught the pizza before it too, hit the ground.

It couldn’t be, could it?

Was it? Was it possibly?

Dun! Dun! Dar!

It was!

Super Scribe!

“Caps Locks and Space Bars! Yes, it’s me folks!” declared Super Scribe, standing with feet firmly planted on the floor, legs apart and hands on hips. The cape blew in the breeze of her very own hot air.

Her mask covered her scarlet pimpernelled face. Identity was nothing. Anonymity was everything. It added to the mystique of the enigmatic heroine of the F3 boards.

“I am Coathanger, Super Scribe and Story Teller Extraordinaire!” she declared in a thunderous voice. “I’ll tell you a story, Jackanory!” she added, winking. “But later,” she continued in the same thunderous voice, “I have my fantasy to make come true first!” and with that, Super Scribe burst through Bob Scratchitt’s door.

Startled, Bob rose from the table. He was a gentle soul who disliked confrontation. “Why,
Super Scribe,” he said softly. “What thee doing here?”

“Oh No!” cried Pandaora, “she’s come for you Bob!”

“I have indeed,” declared Super Scribe. She turned to Pandaora “get lost you black eyed, bamboo guzzling, gas bag,” and with that, Super Scribe shot out her super powered typing arm and threw Pandaora head first up the chimney. Her butt stuck fast, Pandaora began to wail and kick her legs as the roaring fire burnt her ass.

“You can’t do that!” protested Bob Scratchitt, “she’s endangered. You’ll not find many of her and besides, she cost me my Green Shield Stamp collection.”

“Silence!” commanded Super Scribe holding up an authoritative hand. Bob looked at her in awe and felt a stir in his pants. It was his pet ferret.

“Here, Tiny Neil, have this pizza for your Christmas dinner,” ordered Super Scribe. Tiny Neil scurried down from his chair, grabbed the pizza and began to munch it contentedly in the corner.

“You, Bob Scratchitt!” declared Super Scribe, “will be Heathcliff to my Coaty.”

“Heathcliff? Me?” said Bob Scratchitt, bemused, “thee is having a laugh.”

Super scribe thought about it for a moment. “Yes, you’re right, Bob. You will be Jokecliffe to my Coaty,” and with that, Super Scribe grabbed Bob in an embrace and began to lead him in the tango.

She sang in a loud, domineering voice:

“Jokecliffe! It’s me! Coaty come home!
Jokecliffe! It’s me! Coaty come home! Woah oh ohhhhhhhhhhhh!”

The wedding took place a week later. Super Scribe wore a meringue, a veil and her Super Scribe mask. Jokecliffe’s outfit was chosen for him by his new bride – a satin jumpsuit from 1974 which she thought he would look good in at a Christmas Party and a twin set and pearls that just finished off nicely the ultimate “look” for her man.

As Coaty looked at her husband to be, now deaf from her singing, she smiled smugly to herself. She had finally got what she had always wanted.

The wedding night was full of surprises. Not least the ferret nibbled turnip which turniped up and left Coaty with a big smile on her masked face as she snuggled up to her dark, brooding Jokecliffe.