Attention, history buffs! Now that we’ve completed our tour of the site of the St. Valentine’s Day Massacre of 1929—the garage on Chicago’s Northside where seven men were brutally murdered in an alleged mob hit ordered by Al Capone—our next stop is the site of the lesser-known but equally horrifying Galentine’s Day Massacre of 2018, which took place just a few blocks away at this Le Pain Quotidien.
Much like the bloody ambush of ‘29, the Galentine’s Day Massacre began as a simple gathering of associates, in this case: five college girl friends, three gal pals from a study abroad program in Rome, and six work wives. The group all shared a connection to a woman named Allison, who unfortunately could not attend herself because it had been just, like, a crazy week with work stuff and her French bulldog Chartreuse contracting Munchausen syndrome and whatnot.
In any case, the women arrived at this Le Pain Quotidien at 1pm—the hour at which the sun’s light best hits all Le Pain Quotidiens. As the flattering photos in this exhibit show, many of the women were decked out in thematically appropriate pink and red ensembles because why not have a little fun with it?!
But there was more than a little fun on the menu that doomed afternoon.
The women settled at the long table you see here. This was technically designated as the communal table, but the manager let them have it because they just seemed like a nice lil group! After they put in a simultaneous order of fourteen avocado toasts and hot teas with lemon, Denise—who had known Allison the longest—announced it was time to begin the gift exchange. She reminded them of the rules: everyone was to have brought some little treat or surprise to share with the group (even Jessica). No one was prepared for what was to come.
Denise got the ball rolling by handing out adorable personalized silhouette chocolates she had specially made for everyone. She had, of course, remembered to procure a dairy-free version for the 65% of the group that was self-diagnosed lactose intolerant. Denise gave Caitlin, the Type 1 diabetic, a gorgeous insulin pump which she’d had encrusted with rubies, Caitlin’s birthstone. After all, as Denise said, “just because you can’t have sweets doesn’t mean you don’t deserve something sweet, sweetie!” Overcome with gratitude for this thoughtfulness, Caitlin’s heart exploded into a thousand tiny chocolate hearts, which her diabetes could not handle.
It was the first death of the grisly massacre.
The next give came from Becca: enormous oil portraits she had painted of everyone, posing with their favorite iteration of Beyoncé. The women wept with glee as they saw themselves immortalized next to Destiny’s Child Beyoncé, Super Bowl Halftime Show Beyoncé, Pregnant Flower Goddess Beyoncé, and more beautiful dreamscapes. When she saw the image of herself dancing joyously alongside Single Ladies Beyoncé, Jessica—just thrilled to be included at all—collapsed of sheer overstimulation.
Towards this end of the table, you can see the remnants of Vanessa’s contribution, which at first appeared to be an especially basic batch of gluten-free, double chocolate, molten caramel cupcakes decorated with gold foil candy hearts.
I know, it’s like, was she even trying?
But it turns out she was, like, even trying, because a bite into each cupcake revealed that Vanessa had baked in replicas of the earrings in which each girl’s maternal great-grandmother was buried. Scream-crying that these look just like the ones Gigi smuggled out of Nazi-occupied Poland, Francine disintegrated into that pile of glitter you see on the floor.
Disturbed but unable to contain her excitement over her gifts any longer, Alexis ripped off her clothes to reveal the tattoos she’d gotten of each woman’s most-liked Instagram post. She twirled around to display them before disappearing in a poof of sugary sweet smoke, the smell of which lingers in the air to this day. Yep, you’re breathing her in right now!
Kennedy frantically flung boxes of conversation hearts at the waitstaff, wailing that they deserved them because they were basically part of the crew now before ascending to her true, winged, serpentine form and bursting out of the roof, flying straight into the sun.
Finally, standing amongst the remains of her supportive gals, Chloe brought forth an all-female choir to sing an a capella rendition of “You’ve Got A Friend In Me,” which you can hear on the speakers now. Chloe had personally put together the choir with singers who appeared to be perfect genetic cross between each friend at the Galentine's date and Idris Elba. As the angelic chorus sang “And as the years go by/Our friendship will never die,” the remaining attendees melted into a collective puddle of nostalgia and organic hand cream.
Authorities surveying the emotional carnage claimed they had never before seen such an outpouring of weaponized kindness and aggressive friendship. If you listen closely, you can still hear the echoes of the women apologizing to one another for kind of making their gifts about themselves.
Well, that does it for our tour! Don’t forget to stop by the gift shop and pick up a little something for the Galentines in your life! All sales are final and extremely perilous.