Picky Eater - A short story

Chapter 3 - School Lunch

The sound of chattering could be heard from students all across the cafeteria, while there was dead silence between the two friends for about 10 seconds. Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock. Time was passing by, Abby looking over at Claudia to see if she was alright. Thankfully, the brunette eventually spoke. "That's it?" Claudia asked with a raised eyebrow, expecting much more from the cafeteria. After all, she was expecting meals like pasta with cream sauce and chicken, or even something like a hamburger and fries. She liked food that had more... meat in them. And it was pretty obvious, telling from her disappointed expression she had on her face as she expected more.

"Uh, yeah! These 3 meals are the meals we can choose from for today for lunch!" Abby explained, slightly confused about what Claudia meant by 'that's it'. Perhaps she forgot about Claudia's preferred food choices and the fact that she loves meat a lot. Basically, Claudia was a meat lover and it was obvious. "Well, none of these look good to me." Claudia stated, folding her arms in annoyance that the food was not her preferred dishes. "But they may still be tasty!" Abby exclaimed, trying to sound optimistic. "I'm going to go for the tomato and egg rice. Maybe you want that too?" Abby started. "I mean, the egg could potentially taste nice!" The girl with the black hair guessed, although it was a bold assumption that the egg tasted good. School food is unpredictable sometimes, with some food being absolutely delicious, others being horrible and utterly disgusting.

"Yeah yeah. Okay. I'll get whatever thing you're getting." Claudia said with a roll of her eyeballs, and Abby walked over to the end of the line, her friend following closely behind. In fact, right behind her in line. "How about you go first! I don't mind at all." The black haired asian girl exclaimed, stepping back while gently pushing the brunette on the shoulder, gesturing for her to go forward. "Whatever, thanks I guess." Claudia exclaimed, shrugging as she swapped positions with her friend by moving forward, contrasting her friend's movements.

The line slowly got shorter and shorter gradually as every minute passed. Finally, the two girls reached the front of the line, and it was Claudia's turn. "Egg rice thing, please." Claudia said, and handed twenty five dollars for the lunch price to the lady at the counter, who took the money and gave her the plate of rice in return. Claudia took her plate and walked to the side, waiting for her friend Abby to finish getting her plate of rice as well. "Same as my friend just now please!" She exclaimed, and handed the same amount of money to the same lady, who handed her another plate of rice identical to the one Claudia was having. How about the cutlery? A spoon and fork was already on the plate as well, how convenient.

"Cmon, let's sit over there!" Abby exclaimed, using her head to gesture at the empty 2 person table that was just at the end of the cafeteria. The two girls walked towards the table, and settled down, placing their plates of food down on the rectangular table before sitting on the two chairs. "Alright, let's eat! Bon Appetit!" The asian girl exclaimed, taking her fork in her left hand and her spoon in her right hand. She scooped up some rice with her spoon and placed it in her mouth, chewing on it as she savoured it for its flavour. "It's not too bad, Claudia!" She encouraged her friend, who seemed to still be unconvinced with eating the food in front of her. The brunette was staring at her food for what seemed like forever, before finally scooping up a small portion of the egg with her spoon, bringing it closer towards her mouth. She bit on it, and her eyes expanded wide, to the point where they are as big as the moon. But it wasn't because the food was extremely delicious or anything, it was because it was horrible. Utterly disgusting, one of the worst food the cafeteria could have offered to its students. To Claudia, at least. She spat out the scoop of egg that was caught in her mouth. "Ew! Gross. It's so mushy, and not sweet at all like how I like it." She argued, pushing the plate away from her ever so slightly.

Abby looked worried for a while. She was worried for her friend that she'd be hungry later on if she didn't eat lunch. So being the good friend she was, she tried to encourage Claudia to eat her lunch. "I mean, maybe it's just the first bite! Maybe try mixing the tomato sauce with the egg, and eat it with the rice?" She suggested, to which Claudia instantly took her advice and tried doing so, scooping up some rice along with the egg covered in tomato sauce, putting it to her mouth. The same outcome happened, with Claudia spitting out the bite she had. "This is ridiculous! Utterly ridiculous, I am not eating any more of this garbage!" The brunette exclaimed loudly, clearly angry that the meal in front of her did not reach her standards. What she wasn't aware of was the small crowd she had generated by her actions.

"The school is serving us garbage! There is no meat in any single one of these meals today, this is ridiculous!" She exclaimed loudly, snatching her plate with still all the food laying there, turning towards the direction of the exit. "But then you'll get hungry if you don't eat your food!" Abby reminded her of how important it was to eat her lunch, even if it weren't something she liked. Claudia scoffed and ignored her friend's words, before she marched over to it, her footsteps heavy as if she were an elephant.

The walk to the exit took a while thanks to the huge cafeteria they were in, but Claudia finally found the thing she was looking for. In her view, her eyes were only fixated on one thing: the trash can. She walked over to it, continuing her heavy footsteps, the people nearby stopping their conversations abruptly to watch the brunette. When she reached the trash can, she put her plate over it, and turned it over. The food slid chunk by chunk into the trash can, the nearby students watching, not believing their eyes at how much food this girl just wasted. Chattering began, whispers also happening with points at the girl occasionally, about how she just threw away her whole lunch.

That one meal that could have been given to someone who desperately needed it, but ended up in the trash.