Snack Time Confessional

Sometimes money actually can buy happiness. Peter pushed three quarters into the vending machine coin slot and studied his options. He’d just endured a tense meeting with the boss.

“Peter, I’m not sure what’s going on with you, but you haven’t given me a single reason to rank you even average,” said Mr. Cornwell. “All your numbers are low, and these clock-ins are concerning, if I’m being completely honest. Consider yourself on probation until I see some improvement over the next three months. But if it continues like this, we’ll be talking again much sooner than that. Understood?”

A subpar performance review meant no raise this year. He considered the reasoning wildly subjective—excessive tardiness, low sales, and negative customer feedback. It wasn’t his fault the economy was in shambles and nobody wants to spend money on their overpriced security alarm systems. One more write-up and he’d be out the door. Depressed and edgy, Peter stood alone in the break area staring at the tall display of scrumptious carbs, mumbling his thoughts. Carbs had become his drug of choice. His imagination ran extra wild when he was emotional, and everything seemed to remind him of his failures these days. Food was a reliable therapist, and the co-pay was much cheaper than the ones covered by insurance.

Peter looked at the three-pack of cinnamon rolls wishing he had one more quarter. Lucy, the cute library aide who he’d been trying to score a date with for months, popped into his mind. The thought of her eased his anxiety temporarily. She was the star of his daydreams of late. The icing on those rolls was her long blonde hair cascading over her curvaceous chest. He broke the ice by asking her for book recommendations. Her reading tastes made him cringe, but he checked out rom-com and paranormal romance titles anyway, just for a chance to make conversation with her. After three months of consuming those torturous tales, all he got was a few words on the books then strictly business at the circulation desk. “Oh, Lucy. I’ll have you someday, just not today, baby.” Peter whispered to the cinnamon rolls and touched the tip of his tongue on the glass.

He formed an X with his forefingers at the next option. “Oh, no. Not you. Stop lookin’ at me, killer,” said Peter to the bag of peanuts. He’d been terrified of them since he was six. He and his best friend Henry swapped a tuna fish for his first peanut butter and jelly sandwich to appease a sweet tooth, and he ended up leaving school in an ambulance with a severely swollen face, constricted airway, and a hysterical mom who never let him hear the end of it to this day.

He considered a bag of pretzels. As his finger hovered over the button, the twisty treats reminded him of his yoga-teacher ex-wife, twisted and salty. Just two months prior, he’d signed divorce papers, and away went half his savings, time with his toddler twin daughters, his house, and a grand piano she didn’t even know how to play but claimed was an emotional support instrument that would bring her and the children grief relief as they started a new life. All that because she fell in love with a local pharmacy tech. A killer headache sent Peter home early from work one afternoon. He didn’t alert Wendy and arrived home just in time to witness that her Zoloft prescription wasn’t the only thing the tech was filling. Peter had hoped her infidelity would cost her, not him. The courts felt otherwise because she was now a single mom with a fat bank account and a new, younger boyfriend who was also a great piano player. “You lost the privilege of getting in my mouth, Bendy Wendy.” He shot the middle finger at the pretzels and gritted his teeth.

The crunchy honey oats granola bar called his name. Then he remembered its annoying avalanche of crumbs and decided his life was already too crummy. “No offense, but I’ve got enough messes to clean up right now, so nope, not you. Some other time, okay?” He tapped on the glass in front of the granola bars.

Now he stood leaning on the machine with both palms, his belly, and forehead on the glass, peering desperately. He eyeballed the cheese puffs and decided it would be the most filling. Before pressing the button, he pulled back, recalling that this is what he ate for dinner as he cried himself to sleep last Saturday night after an equally cheesy pick-up line got him a shiner at a bar. One too many Old Fashions gave him liquid confidence. “Hey, beautiful. You got a name, or can I just call you Mine Tonight?” She had grimaced and moved away. Out of nowhere, an iron fist collided with his left eye, and a voice like Zeus said, “How ‘bout I call you Smash Face!” Peter got up and ran out of the joint with a tide of laughter rippling behind him. Cheese puffs and alcohol lost their appeal since then, and he had been compensating with fudge pops. Why isn’t there an ice cream machine in this madhouse, he thought.

He zoned in on the corn chips. No bad memory there. “Oh, yeah, you’re the one. Come to Papa.” He looked at its code, A5, and as he was about to hit the button, a voice called out from behind him.

“Peter, you watchin’ a peep show or pickin’ a snack?” A crowd of laughter erupted, just like the bar incident. Peter cringed. In his stupor, he hadn’t noticed a line had formed behind him. Embarrassed, not knowing how long they’d been listening to his pity-party performance, he quickly hit the button. A pack of peanuts landed at the bottom, and a quarter rolled into the change dispenser.

Peter banged his fist on the machine. He left the peanuts, the quarter, and the job, and marched out the door for a perpetual lunch break.