The Secret Dinner

The Seagull Meat Riddle

Dante is my name. You’ll need to remember that.

Even after you’re halfway through this story, after you find out what happened and decide I’m nothing more than a worthless piece of shit, I’ll need you to remember: My name is Dante and I was once a nice guy.

You’re probably curious how this all began.

If you’re not the type who scares easily, I’ll give you the details.

They had to try to figure out what happened by asking questions, and I could only answer with “yes,” “no,” or “irrelevant.” I’m sure we’ve all played a game like this before.

So, for example: Was the guy already planning to kill himself before eating the seagull?

No. Did he order the dish because he thought it was tasty?

Yes. Had he been to that restaurant before?

Irrelevant. Did he know the seagull used in the dish?

No. Did the seagull remind the guy of something from his past?

Yes. And is that why he killed himself? Yes.

We went on like that for hours, eating pizza, drinking, and playing the game.

Yes, no, irrelevant. Eventually, you find out the man’s a widower; that his wife died in a plane crash; that he was on the plane with her at the time of the crash; that the survivors had been stranded on a desert island with no food; that his wife’s body had disappeared in the crash; that the survivors offered the man seagull meat; that he ate it and liked it; that he survived on seagull meat until their rescue; that he decided to try the dish at the restaurant for old times’ sake; and that when he tasted it, he realized that what he’d actually been eating on that island all those years ago wasn’t seagull meat at all, but his own wife’s flesh.

To this day, I’m fascinated by this riddle.

What I can’t get out of my head isn’t the death of the guy’s wife, or the fact that he thought he was eating a seagull when really it was his poor wife, or even the fact that he killed himself over it.

What fascinates me is that the husband ate human flesh and didn’t know it. And what’s more: He liked it.