The Riverside Incident

At a normal Saturday night, with my younger sister at a sleepover, me and my parents decided to go see Star Wars: Rouge One, even thought me and my mother have never seen a Star Wars movie in our lives, but since there was nothing else playing and my sister couldn’t back my mom up to see some cheesy drama movie, that’s what we decided on. 

After seeing the movie, and not understanding much of it, we started to head back home to have dinner. My parents asked me for some suggestions and, like the junk-food frenzy child I was, I replied with, “Pizza!”, and that was all the suggestions I could come up with. My parents shrugged and went with it. I mean it was a Saturday night and my sister hated pizza, to this day I still don’t know why, so why not.

Agreeing to going to Riverside Pizza to go ahead and pick it up, we drove all the way from AMC theater to Medlock Bridge St., into the little corner of the wondrous Pizza Heaven, Riverside. My mother hands me a five dollar bill and two singles, and tells me to go inside and order and get the pizza while my dad went to Kroger down the block. I was baffled.

“What?” I questioned her, for you see, I was not exactly the most ‘outgoing’ person at the time, I was still in middle school at the time and most middle schoolers were the most awkward children in the world and no one can tell me otherwise. 

My mother repeated her request and urged me out of the car. I decide against arguing with her because I knew she would cause a scene, and the last thing I need is for people looking at me right now. 

Walking inside of the pizza shop, I get hit with the smell of pizza doe and melted cheese, and the sounds of the oven being opened and closed could be heard behind the door that led to the kitchen. At the counter, a lean woman about in her early 20’s smiled and greeted me. I walk up to the counter, clutching the paper money within my hands.

“Welcome to Riverside Pizza! How may I help you?” She greeted.

“um, hi,” I stuttered out, “can I have a small - uh I mean large—“

She cuts in my sentence, “Would you like the 8 inch pizza with bread sticks? Or would you like the large pizza?”

I never knew I could sweat so much in such little time. “Um, yes? Ill have the 8 inch pizza, please.” I answered, not knowing what kind of pizza that we normally ordered was the large pizza, somehow I could not comprehend that in my socially awkward pre-teen brain. 

she smiled again. “alright then! That will be $3.50.” I handed her the money and immetetly realized that it was the wrong thing I ordered because my mother had handed me $7 total, and if the pizza were three dollars, she could’ve handed me the five and kept the two singles for herself, she never had cash so it would’ve been better for her. But nope it was the wrong thing, crap crap crap crapcrapcrap. I cant tell this lady that I ordered the wrong thing now, I thought 

The woman walks to the back of the kitchen and I wait for her to come back out.

Five minutes pass and still no pizza. Well it does take a long time to make, I assured myself, its not like its going to be instant.

Seven minutes pass, still nothing. People start to walk in and out of the place, picking up pizzas they ordered before.

Ten minutes. I guess my mother got fed up with waiting for me to get the pizza because she walks in and sees me sitting in one of the wooden chairs in the corner, waiting. 

“whats taking so long?” She walks up to me, clearly confused as to why this is taking so long for a 13 year old to get a simple pizza. 

“i think I ordered the wrong thing, but she was already back there and she still hasn’t come back yet.” I explained, my mom sighs.

“Is there anything I can help you with?” A woman at the counter asks, she is plump with dark, beautiful skin. 

My mother strides over to the counter and told her that we wanted a large pizza and that the pizza hadn’t come back yet.

“Well thats no problem!” The woman smiles sweetly, and turns to the small fridge where pizza boxes were kept warm. Then its really not a fridge, more like a heat room or something. And hands us a large box of pizza, the smell of the cheese and crispy crust emitting from the cardboard. “have you already paid for the pizza?” She turns back to me, her eyes slightly wrinkling from smiling.

“Oh, yeah. Yes I did.” I nod. My mom and I exit the pizzeria and head back to the car, where we see my dad walking back from Kroger with three plastic bags in his hands. 

Back inside the car before we turn into the intersection, I hand back the change from the pizza to my dad. He counts it, suspicious at the amount that I handed back to him. “there shouldn’t be this much change. Did you give her more cash?” He turns to my mom, who shakes her head. “then why is there this much change?” He turns to me, expecting me to say something like, ‘i found a coupon on the ground’ or ‘i had extra cash’. But it wasn’t not that.

“oh, my god.” I whisper to myself, “i stole a pizza.” I forgot to tell the other lady that I paid the wrong amount. On one hand, I would be ecstatic that I saved some cash or basically got a free pizza, but in this situation, I was terrified. I had never stolen something, at least not from outside of my family, cause then God would beg to differ, I hadn’t stolen food before and not pay full price when there was no discount, again from outside of my house, my midnight snaking would argue big time, but this was new. At first I was a little scared and on edge but then I laughed it off once I got home and made sure no FBI was following me. I told my parents who laughed their *curse word cause this is pg, kids* off, especially my dad, he found this very funny. 

We drove home and enjoyed the stolen pizza I had attained and had a very eventful night. Though I thought the people at Riverside would always remember that I, a 13 year old pre-teen, had stolen a large cheese pizza for the price of three dollars and fifty cents and they would not ever sell me a pizza again, as long as they worked there for, apparently who worked there forever and always will, the rest of my life.

… yeah I haven’t really gone to Riverside Pizza in person for a while.