Homeland Security

It was a crisp cool summer evening when Marcella and her mother JoJo set out to drive to the Kansas City airport to pick up Marcella’s sister Desireé.  Marcella had thought that they would stop in Lawrence and have some dinner because she had been too busy to eat anything all day.  But, JoJo was running late and had already eaten so Marcella thought she’d just forget eating.

            “Maybe there will be something open at the airport,” said Marcella.

            “You know that airport food is terrible,” said JoJo.  “We can pick something up if you’re really hungry.”

            But they were running late, they hurried so they wouldn’t miss Desireé’s flight.

            Of course when they arrived at Kansas City International airport they discovered the flight was running 30 minutes late and Marcella was getting light headed and queasy from hunger.

            “Mother, I don’t care what I eat, I’m starved,” said Marcella.

            The only restaurant open was Burger King.  The dreaded “fast food” garbage her mother had always warned her about.  The poison she had attempted to avoid her whole adult life. It no longer mattered; if Marcella was going to drive home from the airport she needed sustenance.

            Marcella ordered a hamburger and orange juice from the mentally challenged cashier and gladly paid her five bucks for the treat of eating the slop.

            As she paid the dim-witted slug behind the counter, she noticed a haze lofting near the kitchen and suddenly realized it was smoke.

            Another highly intelligent goof-ball came out of the kitchen with his backpack on.  Lights overhead began to flicker.

            “Uh…I think the alarm is going to go off,” said the goof-ball.

            Sure enough, the terminal was alive with a sirens screeching.

            “What about my food?” cried Marcella over the sound of the blaring siren.

            “We have to leave the building,” said the dim-wit. And he did, along with the goof-ball.

Marcella and JoJo weren’t about to leave.  They had $5 invested and Marcella was starving. 

            A security guard ran up to them panting and yelling, “Evacuate the building.”

            “Good God,” said JoJo.  “It’s just a grease fire.”

            Marcella and JoJo stood outside the terminal anxiously waiting for the grease fire to be extinguished when they saw goof-ball and dim-wit racing past them with their back packs.    “They are not coming back,” said Marcella.  “I want my burger.”

            When the all clear sounded, Marcella and JoJo returned inside the terminal to Burger King, hoping against hope that the goof-ball and dim-wit would come back and fry a hamburger.  Only a rotund security guard with a walkie-talkie remained in the kitchen.  JoJo took matters into her own hands, marched up to the security guard and told him she would fry the hamburger because her daughter was hungry.

            “And, I think we should get a free piece of pie for all our trouble,” said JoJo.

            It was against airport security rules to allow customers to fry their own burgers so the security guard fried the burger and gave them a piece of pie, just to shut them up.

            It was the worst meal they ever ate.