No, two thousand

It probably didn't help that I'd just showed James the Tooth Fairy sketch, and we'd spent five minutes trying to stop laughing only to set the other one off again.

Some short amount of time has passed since then. On the mutual understanding that neither James nor Erin have any kind of problem with cooking a full and sumptuous dinner for their guest, we decide to call for pizza. James dials up the pizza place, which shall hereby be known as Pizza Place, and places the order. And then he starts to read out his credit card number. (For tonight's performance, the role of the Credit Card Number will be played by A Number I Just Made Up.)

"Nine five six two... three seven eight four... two thousand... no, two thousand. No, two thousand... thousand."

He is still able to prevent himself from giggling at this point, more or less.

"...Two... two zero zero zero... yes. Eight one nine seven, expiry oh-four, oh-seven."

He hangs up and shakes his head. I nod. "Um, James? You know, you were on hold for a while there at the start--"

"Yes, but it wasn't his fault that--"

"No, I know that, I know that-- the point is, you were on hold because the call centre was jammed with calls, with other people ordering pizza. He's just gone through order after order after order, a routine of calls each just slightly different, so he can't switch his brain off completely. He has to be aware but numb. He has to just type in the numbers as you read them out. You, um... you made him think."

We all look at each other, think about what I've just said, and start laughing. James and Erin's year-old daughter, Vivian, looks at the three of us laughing and decides that this means that she, too, should laugh. So she does.

"And if he starts thinking," I go on, "then he's going to think about what a crappy job he's got, and he's going to start crying..." I pick up an imaginary phone and start sobbing into it, "H-h-hello, w-welcome to P-P-Pizza Place, can I take your or-r-der oh GOD...."

And as we laugh, the phone rings. (I'd like to say now that I had an inkling of what was coming, which is good, because I did, so I can.)

James picks up the phone. "Hello?"

Pause.

"No... nine five two seven..."

At which point he bursts out in a fit of giggling. "I-- I'm s-sorry, you c-caught me in the middle of something..."

Erin and I are holding our sides, Vivian's squealing with delight at the silly adults, and James somehow manages to cough his way through the rest of his credit card number, "t-three seven eight f-f-four... two thousand... no, two thousand!"

He finishes the call. "Yes. Sorry. Sorry about that. Yes." He hangs up.

"James," Erin says, "you broke the pizza man."

Years from now, we're going to be hanging out, maybe workshopping James' or Erin's next best-seller; there's going to be a quiet lull in the conversation, and somebody, probably me, is going to look up and say, "Two thousand," and that's it, no more work will be done for the rest of the day.