Vincenzo's Mistake

Second Place Winner

By Paul Evenson

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Hillary Clinton withdrew her nomination today and everyone's blaming me. The truth is, the fault lies with a careless mushroom-picker. Vincenzo is a 72 year-old stoner who supplies area restaurants with rare and delicious 'shrooms that he forages in the woods surrounding Boston.

Vincenzo's mistake was picking the psychedelic Pluteus salicinus and selling it to Carlo's, a high-end Cambridge eatery, as Bicolor Boletus. His slip-up set off a chain of events that ended in the Clinton Campaign and got me tasered by the secret service. Today I am a hero to a bunch of despicable right-wingers and I've nearly been beaten by several otherwise peaceful and crunchy Cambridge lefties, who blame me for Mrs. Clinton's indiscretion.

It began at Carlo's with a pint of Harpoon IPA and a plate of Wild Mushroom Risotto. When I need to unwind or work out a thorny business problem, I grab a pen and notebook and heat to Carlo's. Busy with my food, beer, and thoughts, I didn't notice the men with suits and earpieces swarming around the bar and restaurant until one of them said, "Sir, would you mind if I checked your coat pockets?" I got as far "What the Fu..." when I saw her in the doorway – Hillary Clinton, looking...regal. And kind of hot. What was I thinking?? Pluteus salicinus had begun to work its magic.

The Secret Service decided that the restaurant was secure and they whisked Hillary right past me into the dining room. As she passed she smiled and I swear she winked; she also left a blue trail that dissolved into sparkles and made me start to giggle. I looked around the bar and noticed other strange behavior: a waitress was sitting on the floor staring at her fingers and sniffing them; a heavy man in the corner was showing his friends how to do a pirouette; and a woman with a pony-tail was using it as a paintbrush, decorating her tables with marinara sauce.

For a while I became engrossed in the 3-d hockey game on the television behind the bar. I felt it would be unsafe to look away from the game, since every hit seemed to come closer and closer to knocking over my beer or knocking me out of my seat. At one point I felt a tap on my shoulder and I turned to see a glassy-eyed Hillary Clinton standing next to me and smiling. "What's the score?" At that moment I knew there was a deep and profound connection between us. We spoke the same language. We agreed on most policy issues. With this kind of connection, I needed to be her chief of staff and told her so. Surprisingly, she agreed! She told me she wanted to introduce me to her campaign team and she took my hand and led me from the bar to the dining room.

All around us, things had unraveled. The head chef – a dead ringer for Charles Bukowski – was in a booth cuddling a whole salmon and murmuring something about a "sickle." I noticed that Hillary was moving strangely; even in my altered state, she seemed a little crazed. She turned to me and fixed those intense, bulging eyes on mine and said, "Isn't this place GREAT? I had two plates of the risotto and it was AMAZING!" Then she got a mischievous look on her face and said "detour!" as she led me down a quiet hallway toward the coatroom. When we were away from the crowd, she pushed me against the wall and planted a fat kiss right on my lips. I remember thinking, "she's a good kisser." Then there were lightning bolt explosions and everything went black until I found myself on the sidewalk outside the restaurant with police and paparazzi surrounding me. Hillary was in the restaurant door screaming, "Bring him back! He's my new friends!" before her people whisked her into her limo and away from the chaos.

The authorities decided not to press charges against me after the coat checker's video of the "assault" appeared on You Tube. That's also the time Hillary threw in the towel.

My only other memory from that night is of Vincenzo, the old mushroom-picker. He was standing at the edge of the crowd smiling and shaking his head. He got onto his old three-speed and as he slowly rode away I noticed the "Obama" sticker on his mushroom sack.