Content Warning: Cursing and violence is present.
Johny Dourvers was a brat who always had the short end of the stick.
“You can’t make me eat it. Carrot cake is disgusting,” Johny yelled as he stamped his foot, causing his puffy cheeks to jiggle. With both hands, he shoved the cake. The blue porcelain plate shattered against the floor with a crunch and the cake spattered with it.
His mother, Lita, said nothing as she watched her son wobble off with a hint of laughter as he grabbed his fifth extra large back of chips and a third 2 liter soda from the cabinet.
Making a cake yourself isn’t a simple task. It takes time to bake it and more time to mix and add the icing. With as much junk food as young Johny consumes, he could do with a hint of vegetables for just one hour. That hour should be at his birthday tomorrow afternoon.
She followed Johny, leaning on the kitchen doorway. Watching him squeeze into the old wooden rocking chair with rolls of fat squishing out between the chair arms. He grabs the TV remote, turning the channel to a war show with people shooting at each other. Happily, he cheered, throwing chips everywhere.
Lita picked up his progress report on the counter and studied the straight F’s. At the bottom scribbled in red ink, a note from a teacher stated, ‘Johny doesn’t behave in class and will not do what he’s told.’
At seven, Lita’s boy was beyond help.
She looked at the mess on the floor again, knowing she should clean it up. But what is the point? He’ll just make another mess.
“Need a cake and not sure where to find one,” an ad on the TV blared, catching Lita’s attention. She turned back to the TV, seeing a giant cake with an enormous mouth chasing a person in a party hat. “Try a monster cake today! Just call us at 555-0166. You’ll definitely be running for the best cake with Donkey Express!”
With a hint of a smile as gleeful as her son’s, Lita dialed the number. It’s just some company trying to come up with a fresh theme to market. Still, she can’t help but smile at the thought of her oversized son running for his life from some cake monster.
“Hello,” a monotonous voice of a young woman spoke, “this is Donkey Express. We’re the asses of the industry that bake the best monsters in the state.”
Lita replied, “My son has a birthday tomorrow afternoon. Is there anyway you can bring me one of those cakes?”
“What’s your name?”
“Lita Dourvers.”
The woman on the other end continued, “Your son is Johny Dourvers? My younger sister goes to school with him.”
“Oh,” Lita perked up at the information, “Really? Are they friends?”
“No. Johny put five wads of gum in her hair.”
Lita’s happy joy bubble bursts, her smile fading. “Oh.”
“She had to get it cut short,” the young woman continued, “Upset her a lot. Her long blond hair was so pretty.”
“I-I’m sorry about that. He’s… independent.”
“No worries about it, Ms. Dourvers.” The monotonous voice replied, “Kids will be kids, right?”
“Right,” Lita responded. Changing the subject, she asked, “How much do these cakes cost?”
“Well, normally $20, but since it’s a rush delivery, it will be $40. And that’s for all sizes, too.”
Lita nodded to herself, “I’ll take the largest cake you got then.”
“Great,” the woman perked up, “I’ve got just the cake.”
The next day, Johny sat at the head of the table with a proud smile, holding a fork in one hand and a knife in the other. The yellow room at Gally’s Gallet was the largest Lita could find and the most expensive. Walls lined with decorations and fun party games from pen the tail on the donkey to a pinata waited for the 11 children, but the birthday boy had one thing on his mind.
“Cake. Cake. Cake,” Johny chanted as he tapped the fork and knife on the table.
Ten more kids copied with smiles and giggles. Lita was pretty sure the kids were here for a good time and may not have been his real friends. Her son had very few friends. At least she hoped he had some friends. It was hard to tell sometimes. At least her boy had some kids to enjoy the afternoon with.
Out wheeled a large pink cake the size of all 11 children combined. Seven lit candles sat atop of it with two bright red cherries near the front of the cake staring straight at Johny. Every parent and child, including Lita, stared at it, awestruck. But Johny hated it.
“Pink,” Johny yelled, “I hate pink.”
“Johny, please not today,” Lita stated. She placed a hand on his shoulder, hoping he would not jump out of his chair.
Johny looked up at his mother in anger. “Take it back! I don’t want it.”
Surprised, Lita nervously looked at the Donkey Express employee pushing the cake into the room and the handful of parents watching off to the side. Most frowned, some whispered. She turned back to her son with a forced smile and stated, “Johny, it was the only one they had that I could get today.”
“Take it back. I don’t want it.”
Lita’s gaze glances around the room. Was it just her or was the room a little hot?
“Kid, this will be the best cake you’ve ever had,” the Donkey Express employee stated as he smiled brightly.
Quickly, the employee worked as they set the cake on the table and headed to the door to leave, when Lita pulled them off to the side with the parents. “I’m sorry about my son’s rude behavior. He’s a bit of a handful.”
“Aren’t they all,” said the Donkey Express employee. He wore a bright red shirt and maroon pants with matching maroon shoes, wearing a white name tag with the name ‘Ladan’.
Some parents nodded in understanding, others stared with a smile. It was hard to read the crowd of adults and the room became hotter and hotter to the point sweat formed on Lita’s brow. She turned her focus to the tag on the Donkey Express employee’s shirt.
“Thank you for understanding, Ladan. I need to pay you, right?”
Ladan shook his head. “You already signed the contract, and that’s all we need at the moment. If you don’t mind, I’m going to step out of the room and watch from the glass window behind us.”
There was a bit of confusion between Lita and the parents as they wondered why the employee would want to watch a kids’ party. Though, no one questioned Ladan as he left the room and stood behind the glass window with his bright smile.
Lita pushed the thought aside and turned back to her son. She put on her best smile and grabbed a knife from the table that was way too small for the cake.
“Time to cut the cake,” Lita sang as 10 of the children joined in with cheers. She took a moment to examine the pink cake, wondering how to cut such a large cake that was half the size of her.
“No,” Johny screamed, “I told you to take it back!”
“Johny, I-”
Johny leaped from his chair, grabbing the knife and stabbed the cake. Over and over again, he stabbed. Then he abandoned the knife and punched it. Repeatedly punching it.
The 11 children in the room cry, begging for Johny to stop. Some ran back to their mothers, who quickly exit the room.
Lita does nothing to stop the violence. She watched her son destroy the monstrous cake. Disturbed by the outburst, more children ran to their parents and left until only Lita and Johny were present. Johny continues to pound the cake until he’s able to drag it off the table and send it crashing to the floor. The plate shatters and the cake splatters across the tiled floor. Covered in pink cake from head to toe, Johny smiles in delight at his own creative destruction.
“You should have taken the cake back,” Johny said as he wobbles his way over to the presents neatly stacked on a corner table next to the wall.
While the room felt hot earlier, it was now steaming. Feeling embarrassed, Lita turns her gaze to Ladan, the Donkey Express employee. His bright smile stayed plastered on his face as he waves and gives a thumbs up.
Why did her son have to be so embarrassing? For the first time, Lita turns to her son yelled, “Johny!”
Johny paused, his smile fading as he watched his mother’s face redden. In a quiet voice, he argued, “I didn’t want it.”
“That didn’t mean you had to ruin it for everyone else! Some times I would like t-” Lita trailed off as the cake splatters moved. It dripped from Johny and snaked its way across the floor into a messy cake pile. But the scattered bits of cake don’t stop there. They shape and rearrange, forming an imperfect pink cake with two cherry eyes and seven slightly tilted but still burning candles. The imperfect cake grew even larger until it was nothing but a lump of a thing that oozed with pink frosting. Gurgling and moaning it lumbered about the room towards Lita and Johny.
Lita dashed to the door, trying the handle but unsuccessfully opening. Through the window stands Ladan, holding the door shut by its handle.
“We can’t have that.” Ladan holds up a tablet with his free hand, showing the contract Lita had signed earlier. “Leaving isn’t part of the contract until you eat the cake or it eats you.”
“Please,” Lita yelled, banning on the door. The Donkey Express employee couldn’t leave them in here. “Contract or none, let us out!”
Shaking his head back and forth, Ladan holds his smile. “We’re the asses of the industry, ma’am. Breaking a contract means losing my job.”
She sinks to the floor with tears in her eyes. What can she do?
The monster of a cake continues to lumber, leaving a long cake crumble trail behind it like a slug. Its large gapping cake mouth sucked up the chairs and chomped down onto the tables. It was perfectly content with its options until it spotted the birthday boy hiding beneath the table of neatly stacked presents. Fear froze Johny. His destroyed cake was now an enormous monster, and it was coming right at him for revenge. Slushing over tables and tipping chairs, its cake mouth held agape.
“Buuudy,” it gurgled in a low moan.
Lita gasped and stood watching as the cake monster swallowed the present table, scattering what few presents it didn’t eat. Then its beady cherry eyes fixed on Johny.
“Waant some caaake,” it asked.
Johny shook his head, backing against the wall.
Continuing to amble forward, it moaned, “I have pleeenty to shaaarrrrre.”
With it’s mouth agape, it lumbered towards Johny until Lita couldn’t see him anymore.
“Johny,” she screamed and takes a step towards the cake. There are no panicked cries from her son. No fighting even.
But she hears laughter. Joyful laughter too and not Johny’s normal gleeful laughter of delight.
Lita creeps closer to the cake until she saw Johny smiling happily on the floor with the giant cake nearly covering him. It licked him with a long, sharp tongue.
“Buuudy,” it moans again with a big smile, “Waant some caaake?”
This cake wasn’t going to eat them but lick them to death?
“Can we keep it, mom?”
“Keep it…” Lita looks to the window where Ladan who stood, pointing to the digital contract on his tablet.
“I think we have to eat it.”
“But-”
“No buts, Johny!” Lita lowered her voice to her son, “If you don’t do this, clearly that man will not let us leave.”
Johny huffed but gets up, pushing the giant cake aside, “Alright, let’s eat the stupid pink cake.”
Lita turned away from her son and the cake with a smile. Her stomach was going to hurt after this. “Bring it o-”
The cake lunged and swallowed Lita whole.
Similar to his mother, Johny stood doing nothing. He watched the monster cake chew and heard the crunches of its satisfaction. The more the cake grew satisfied, the more it shrank. Its mouth disappears. The several crooked candles straighten up and go out. It looked like a perfectly normal cake now. Not a monster or a destroyed mess that was rapidly put back together.
The door opened and in stepped Ladan, the Donkey Express employee.
“As per the contract,” he held up the tablet for Johny to read, “you had to either eat the cake or let it eat your mother. And uh, I hope you learned your lesson young man because thing would have been different if you weren’t such a brat.”
“I-”
“No arguing, young man,” Ladan interrupted, as he grabbed Johny’s hand.
Johny jerks his hand away. “I’m not going with you.”
“As per the contract,” Ladan paused as he pushed the tablet into Johny’s face again and pointed to a line at the bottom that read, ‘If the mother, Lita Dourvers, is eaten by the cake, then the boy, Johny Dourvers, shall belong to Donkey Express for future employment.’
“I-”
“No arguing, young man. You're now mine.”
Ladan pulls a hat out from his back pocket with a Donkey Express logo on it and pats it down onto Johny’s head. Then, with a smile, he cheered, “Happy birthday, Mr. Johny Dourvers!”
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