So I call, and they normally answer within three rings. Seven rings, and I'm starting to worry. Is my favourite pizza maker slumped over his dough having a heart attack?
No. An unfamiliar voice answers and tells me to hold. I hold. Then she passes me to someone else. This someone has a very strong Chinese accent, and does not speak good English.
"Yes. I take orders."
I find this hilariously metaphorical but calm myself quickly and make the order. Mine's fairly standard, and my housemate's is the Vegan Special. I, however, want low fat cheese. And we both want caffeinated beverages. He reads back the order, giving the Vegan Special low fat cheese too. After explaining that the Vegan Special doesn't need *any* cheese, he reads it back and it's fine.
This place delivers in twenty minutes. After forty we were getting anxious. At 45 minutes he arrives with two pizzas, but no Cokes. He refuses to take them off the bill, telling us he'll drive back and bring them. Fantastic! say we caffeine addicts.
Then we get the pizza upstairs. Mine's beautiful, perfect, glistening with low fat cheese and covered in lovely vegetables. My housemate's Vegan Special, however, has mutated into a plain cheese pizza. I laugh cruelly at her misfortune while plotting to eat that pizza too.
We call back, and our delivery guy/original order-taker answers. Housemate explains that she ordered a Vegan Special and got a plain cheese. "What's wrong with the pizza?" She tells him again. "So what's wrong with the pizza?" This goes on till she's about to collapse from hunger, lack of caffeine and frustration, seven times by my count.
After an hour and ten minutes he arrives with the right pizza and two Cokes. He demands we give back the old pizza, by now congealed and useless to anyone but the pigeons. He rides up in the lift with her to make sure she gives it to him.
Up to now we've been feeling reasonably justified in being annoyed, although we've been lovely to them. They are, after all, our Favourite Pizza People, and we know better than to offend people who make our food. However, in the lift the delivery guy begins to cry. He keeps apologising, and Housemate tells him mistakes happen and it's fine. He keeps crying, and follows her into our kitchen, where he takes our pizza and our receipt, steals all our napkins to wipe his eyes, and vanishes into the night, leaving us utterly confused.
It was just a mistake that left Housemate hungry until he came in and cried in our kitchen. The taste of guilt tainted the evening long after the aftertaste of pizza was gone.