Agatha returned home from work. It was her first day as a waitress at Pirate Dan's Fish and Chips, and she was completely exhausted. As if it wasn't bad enough to be walking around all day, waiting on people who refused to tip, but she had to do it in this ridiculous pirate costume, with a sash tied around her head and her pants rolled up above her knees. It wasn't the sort of job she ever imagined having. She should at least be going to college, but she hadn't won the scholarships she would have needed to attend even the most ordinary school. Agatha took off her belt with the shiny plastic cutlass, and tossed it on the table. This was her life now: spending the day saying "Arrr, garlic shrimp be our special today." She swore to herself at the memory. She had felt like such a moron, and she wanted to simply close her eyes and forget the day. She was too exhausted even to get undressed: she simply fell into bed, and was quickly asleep.
In the middle of the night, she awoke. The air in her tiny apartment was moist with humidity. She sniffed the air. Oregano. Agatha sat up in bed, trying to process the scent. Had she spilled oregano on herself at work? She smelled her shirt. She had a little meatsauce stain, but nothing to produce an aroma of that strength. She stretched her arms over her head, still sleepy, and stood. She wandered to the kitchen, but the smell was less intense there. Deciding that it must just be her imagination, Agatha resolved to return to bed and to sleep.
But upon returning to her bedroom, she saw Him. She screamed. It was a natural reaction to seeing an enormous pile of spaghetti and meatballs on her bed. She screamed louder when she noticed the two enormous eyes on noodly tentacles sprouting from the mass. But she was aware that her screams were in vain: it was as though the very nature of space had been changed, and her voice fell away when it traveled only a few feet from her. She turned to run, but a one of the noodly appendages, as thick as her own arms, swung forth and bound around her ankles. Agatha tripped and fell, forward. She instinctively shot her hands out to brace herself against the fall, but just as she was about to hit the hardwood floor, more tentacles swung beneath her and caught her.
They were warm and moist, and left her skin wet wherever they touched. Agatha reached for something to hold onto, but the table, only a foot away a moment ago, now seemed to as though it was a million miles away. She closed her eyes, and reminded herself how she must, obviously, be still asleep, dreaming. She would open her eyes, and be alone, safe, in bed.
She took a deep breath, counted to three, then opened her eyes. She was face to face with Him, His eyes looking back into hers, and it was as though she could see all the universe within each of those black, glassy orbs. She looked down to the writhing mass of noodles and the two enormous meatballs, each of them the size of a beachball. The appendages still held her tightly, keeping her elevated off the floor. Something about it looked familiar. Then it hit her: she had seen a drawing of this on the news: something to do with the Kansas School Board debates on intelligent design.
"You're the Flying Spaghetti Monster!" She exclaimed.
"Yes." His voice was deep and low, and it did not seem to come from His body. It was more that when He spoke, all of existence echoed to produce the sound waves. And yet Agatha knew that she was the only one who could hear.
"But you're not real!" she exclaimed. "Some guy just made you up to show how intelligent design was nonsensical. You don't really exist!"
"My ways are complicated, and I will not explain them all to you. But it my will, at this point, to appear as though I was concocted by one man."
Agatha shook her head, unwilling to believe that she was having a conversation with Him.
"Can you put me down?" she asked.
The Flying Spaghetti Monster paused, as though reluctant to let go. Then the appendages slackened somewhat, and He lowered her to the floor.
