Chapter 3

When Phil met up with Keely that morning, he immediately told her of his repeated, midnight, hunger attack.

"Phil, this is really serious, now. I don't care what you say, I think its time for you to get some help. Maybe you can stop by and see a doctor after school..."

"No," Phil immediately replied, "I got this situation taken care of myself. We're just gonna stop by, Country Cuisine, again after school and soon this whole thing will be old news."

"Phil, I don't see how going to, Country Cuisine, is going to help you get over your problem, but if you insist, I guess I'll tag along. You just gotta make it through the school day, first and we'll be at the restaurant before you know it."

"I don't know if I'm going to be able to make it through the school day, Keely," Phil replied, looking down at grumbling stomach. "I'm already starting to feel the effects of hunger."

At school, the bell rang for first period, as Keely and a starving Phil, went to class. Phil tried, to the best of his ability, to control his hunger as the time slowly passed by. It seemed as if the clock was moving backwards.

A bell rang again, as Phil ran out the classroom and into the cafeteria. When he got there, he noticed nobody was there. Keely followed him into the cafeteria with some agonizing news.

"Phil...uh, I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but...that was only the bell for second period."

"Ah, scraps!" Phil exclaimed, now more frustrated then ever. "Are you kidding me? I don't believe this..."

Second period began and a painfully, hungry, Phil munched away on pencils, erasers, paper...anything he could get his hands on. Lunch was approaching soon, which would give Phil the chance to slightly relieve his starvation until after school. However, the clock didn't seem to go any faster than before.

"Keely, these cravings are going out of control. I've never been so hungry in my life! I've already chewed through an entire box of pencils and eaten nearly a whole pack of paper. That bell really needs to hurry up soon because my hand is starting to look pretty tasty.

At last, an hour later, which felt like three days, the lunch bell rang. Phil was the first one to shoot out of his seat and burst into the cafeteria, pulling the door off of its hinges! He moved at lightning speed through the halls until he got to the concession stand, ordering the most food anyone had ever seen purchased at lunch.

Keely was waiting at their normal, lunch table, as she saw Phil carrying food stacked up to his head. Again, Phil wasted no time getting down to business, savagely devouring every morsel of food in his presence. Hot dogs, hamburgers, pizza, nachos, burritos, chips, brownies...they all waited in line to be shredded by this human blender.

Keely actually had sympathy toward the food from watching it being man-handled by Phil. The carnivorous display made Keely lose her appetite.

"Hey, Keely," Phil asked with a mouth full of food, "you gonna finish that?"

"N-no Phil...go ahead and take it..."

Phil slashed out toward her food like a lion snatching his prey.

Eventually, Phil was finished eating and ready to get through the rest of the school day. He already knew that he was going to be hungry again, right after school. It was only a matter of time before he felt the grumbling in his stomach.

The final bell rings and Phil couldn't be happier. Just like what he predicted, his savage appetite caught up with him. He kept thinking that this was all going to be over soon, as he headed to Country Cuisine. Just one plate...one meal, has the power to put this overwhelming hunger aside, once and for all.

"It's time to confront this thing, face to...stomach," Phil said, determined. "I'm starving and I'm seein' a, Pickford Gut-Buster, with my name on it..."