Pizza rage

My girlfriend hates pizzas, not dislike or would choose something else given the choice, hates. They are forbidden in the house. She used to live with a chap who was an extremely fussy eater so all they could ever have for supper was a margarita, that’s every night, for months.

I would have broken before her, but she put up with this chap for quite a while and as a result despises pizza. I can’t even mention it in front of her. But I am a simple man, a man with yearnings.

It started off fairly innocently; I was looking at a cookery website and found myself drifting towards the Italian food section. One evening when she was out I secretly downloaded recipes and a few pictures into a hidden folder on my computer that was tucked away in a subfolder of a subfolder labelled ‘invoices’.

Now it’s become an obsession, I’d like go to secret places with hut in the title and gorge myself,constantly checking over my shoulder like a gazelle at a watering hole in case she spots me, but then I’d have to lie in the evenings about how my appetite has mysteriously disappeared while wiping the sweet red juice off the corners of my mouth.

I keep pamphlets under the bed, ones full of salubrious offers of free garlic bread or extra toppings if I would only just place an order. I’ve thought about it. Whole afternoons have been spent day dreaming of ways of getting her out of the house for just a few hours so I can enjoy something deep pan with extra cheese. Sometimes I think even placing an order would be enough, just to get me through the day.

The pamphlets are laced with numbers, manned by people who can’t wait to talk to me about crusts and pepperoni. Perhaps I could just place an order and then cancel it, just to feel what it would be like to be able to eat but I worry my girlfriend would see the numbers on the phone bill and then I’d be in trouble.

I’ve tried sating my habit in other ways; slyly adding a tomato or two to cheese on toast or ordering a Bloody Mary with some mozzarella on top but it’s not the same. I want the subtle layers of flavour on top of a circular, crisp base. It’s spreading to other food now, I only want ice cream on a round wafer, of it has to be strawberry ice cream with a good dollop of custard on top.

I even dress like a pizza, brown trousers, red t-shirt with a yellow shirt on top. If I could get away with it I’d have green earrings for the seasoning and little sausage coloured epaulettes, perhaps with a spare pair shaped like an anchovies for when I want a change.

So I’m trapped in a breadless relationship and all I want is to bite into the soft dough covered in the intoxicating mix of fresh vegetables and cheese. It’s strange; before I met her I wasn’t much of a fan.