County Fair Week Two - Pie Eating Contest

Many things that I've touched over the years have died. An injured bird. A plant. My grandma. It's not always instantaneous, but it's scary to a lot of people. Aside from the time my grandma died, I've always thought it was kinda cool. People tell me it's just a weird coincidence, but I personally believe that a piece of the Grim Reaper lives inside me. Weird, right?

I think it's weird, but I also think it's pretty cool.

Now, here I was at a pie eating contest. Sure, these pies weren't alive, but my hope was that I could still annihilate them just the same. I made sure I was pretty hungry before all of this, and I'd practiced at home a little bit beforehand. I'd paid one of my buddies who's a baker to make a bunch of pies for me back in Eleven so that I could test out my skills. I didn't do so well, but who knows? Maybe today would go a little more smoothly.

Time to kill these pies.

He had mostly come to the fair to help assist with any care the animals might’ve needed. Caleb was in and out of tents all day, looking over this and that, making sure that the folks he knew got what they wanted and the folks he didn’t got what they needed. He admired how well the districts had come together. Years of watching the games had him start to doubt there was any way all of them would ever come together, but somehow, lately, all of that seemed different. It felt as though some of the districts and their leaders were trying to turn the page, to make the world a better place.

His older sister had convinced him to at least take some time and have some fun. He’d earned enough pocket change, slipped to him even when he’d tried three times to refuse by various ranchers and farmers for his work looking after their animals that he should spend some of it. He was always saving – saving for a better life, of some kind, if that ever really made sense. Not for a big house like the victors had but some kind of ranch of his own. With air conditioning and an automatic dishwasher. Big dreams for a small town kid like Caleb.

So he decided that he’d join the pie eating contest. After all, Ten’s pies were as good as any and it meant he’d get to eat for free. Both of those reasons were logic enough for him to sit down and take his chance trying to win. And so he’d gotten a cloth napkin around his neck and readied to dig into the pies on the table before him.

[Caleb eats pies]