Relationships can change in an instant, your feelings about someone morphing from love to hate or hate to love in a matter of seconds. It happened to me during a casual hang: a dear friend whom I love and respect and who has always been there for me made audible chewing noises in my presence.
To their credit, they weren’t eating something overly crunchy or, god forbid, chewing with their mouth open. But it didn’t matter, the damage was done.
Immediately, I could feel my blood pressure rising, my mood shifting from amiable to irritated to furious, my love for them quickly becoming overshadowed by something much darker and more sinister: my hatred of mastication.
While it wasn’t something they had done to hurt me – or had even been intentional – reason had long ago vacated my body.
My thoughts spiraled from “Holy shit this person is annoying” to “Wait, why are they in my house?” to “Wait, why are they in my life?” and finally culminating with “I will kill this motherfucker, I swear to the gods, old and new.”
I tried to ground myself in memories of this person — reasons why I had grown so fond of them and, without really even noticing it, they had become one of the most cherished individuals in my life. Unfortunately those memories were drowned out by the goddamn munching and crunching sounds emanating from their side of the couch.
In the end, I was only able to stop myself from blowing up and launching myself at their throat by abruptly standing and, without a word, leaving my apartment to go for an extended walk.
My friend called me multiple times in what I had to assume were attempts to continue chewing over the phone line. I couldn’t take that risk. Instead, I texted them, “Sorry, had to go to my…uh…dentist (?) appointment.”
Looking back, the text was definitely suspect and I could’ve opted for something more vague and nuanced like “brb :)”. But, like I said, I wasn’t thinking correctly.
Ultimately, my friend was so weirded out by my behavior, they presented me an ultimatum via text, saying that if I cared about them at all, I would go to an apple orchard with them this weekend and eat a bunch of crunchy, juicy honey crisps.
I have no choice but to go, I can’t lose the friend that donated their kidney to me in my time of need. I only hope there aren’t any sharp objects at the orchard, lest I lose the battle to my primal urge to destroy them for chewing.
