Chapter Text
The pop of someone’s tongue as they spoke. The smack of someone’s lips as they finished their lemonade. The slurp of someone’s spit as they sucked up spaghetti. The squish of someone’s disgusting fucking mouth as they bit down on a piece of shrimp.
I felt my fists clench and teeth grit as rage coursed through my body. Didn’t they know what a bunch of slobs they all looked like while eating? How unnecessarily loud they were chewing? Couldn’t they have a family reunion without dinner? The imagery of slamming all of their faces in with a dumbbell didn’t help as much as it usually did.
Rage.
Escape.
Just chew louder and block their voices out.
Disgust.
Pent up.
Cover your ears, ignore the sounds.
Anger.
Panic.
Don’t let the sounds repeat in your head. Think of something else. Don’t embarrass yourself.
Explode.
I stood up abruptly, my chair scraping loudly against the floor, “GOD, COULD YOU JUST SHUT UP AND STOP BEING SO FUCKING DISGUSTING?!”
I ignored everyone’s shocked and horrified faces and briskly stomped out of the house, making sure to slam the door extra hard to release the build up of tension in my body. The silence of the night was beautiful, no gross sounds at all. No gross sounds at all. No gross sounds. Gross Sounds.
Pop.
Smack.
Crunch.
I bared my teeth and tugged at my hair, “no, no, shut up, shut up, shut up, fucking shut up, please.”
I curled up into a ball on the cool grass, letting tears escape my eyes. Punching the ground and screaming into the night released some anger, but it didn’t mean I couldn’t still hear the sounds. I couldn’t hear them physically, but I knew the sounds were being made, just a couple feet away from me in the dining room of my Grandmother’s house. They were being made shamelessly, openly, loudly.
“Oh God, help me,” I muttered as I heard the front door open and an angry family member coming over to lecture me.
I curled in on myself even more to hide the tears, urging myself to calm down.
“Hey… are you, like, okay?”
“Uh,”