**_This food looks so good!” I said, smiling down at the spread—warm rice, seasoned beans, salsas in every shade of red and green, a rainbow of toppings. It felt like something to celebrate, a moment to taste joy.

“Sure, I guess,” Glory replied, barely glancing up. Her voice was sharp around the edges, distant in that way it always got when she didn’t approve but didn’t want to say it outright.

I smiled, but it faltered at the corners. I knew she’d say something like that. I always did.

As I reached for a plate, I noticed how sick she looked. Her skin was pale, almost green-tinged, like the life had been drained out of her. Her eyes were hollow, ringed with a quiet exhaustion. Her collarbones jutted out harshly, and her ribs strained against the thin fabric of her swimsuit. She looked like a ghost of the girl I used to know.

Still, I took a bit of everything. I was hungry. I wanted to enjoy the moment, to feed myself without guilt. But just as I turned to walk toward the cooler, I heard her scoff—low, deliberate, laced with that cold amusement she’d perfected.

Turning, I saw her eyes locked on my plate. “Dang, girl,” she said, her face contorted into something between a smirk and a sneer. “You’re REALLY hungry, huh?”

I froze. My eyes dropped to her plate—barely four chips, a sad smear of salsa—and then back to mine. Full, colorful, alive.

I felt something cave in, somewhere deep and unguarded.

“I am,” I said quietly. And I turned away before she could see my face crack.

I sat with my friends, but I wasn’t really there. Her words clung to me like wet clothes. I stared at my plate and felt shame bloom where hunger had been.

It wasn’t the first time. It wouldn’t be the last.

She’d make more comments after that—soft jabs hidden in laughter, questions phrased like concern.

“You’re going back for more?”

“Wow, I could never eat that much.”

“Must be nice not to care.”

Each one left a bruise no one could see. I started dreading meals around her. I’d shrink a little when I reached for seconds. I stopped saying I was hungry. I stopped laughing so loud. I became quieter, smaller, trying not to give her more to bite into.

But she always found something.

She’d pick at my joy like it was something she had to correct.

And somewhere along the way, I stopped feeling safe with her.

The friendship didn’t break in one moment—it eroded. Slowly. Painfully. The way rivers carve out canyons, one sharp drop at a time.

And four months later, I finally admitted what I’d been avoiding:

She didn’t hate my appetite.

She hated that I was still trying to nourish myself when she had forgotten how.

So I let go. Not out of anger. Not even bitterness.

Just exhaustion.

And finally—finally—hunger for something kinder.

_**