It was three periods after lunch, and the last period of the school day, and it was math class. Lucky for me, I had to spend my last period of “captivity” listening to math problems… and the sound of crunching chips?

I turned to my side, looking for the source of the sound. It was not hard to find: sitting right next to me was a boy snacking on chips. His feet were propped up on the legs of the desk in front of him. He was laid back in a relaxed position. Even more unbelievably, he was eating a bag of chips easily bigger than a stack of laptops.

I turned to the teacher, expecting her to reprimand him on his shameful loud chewing and, even worse, his eating in class. Most of my teachers all had a “no food, no gum, no drink, yes water” policy. But my math teacher just smiled (although not too big), and said, “Jim, can you snack a bit… quieter, please?”

The damage was done already. Now everyone was aware of this kid with a giant bag of chips. But the real problem was that it was the last period, and during this period, it’s the furthest from lunch. Everyone’s hungry for something to chew on.

And since this bag of chips was so large, it wouldn’t hurt to share, would it?

Instantly, whispers began traveling around me.

“Hey, Jim, can I have some chips?” Someone asked. But Jim just turned his head and said no.

“Yo, Jim, mai buddeh! You wouldn’t give your best friend some chips, now would ya?” But Jim said no.

Again and again Jim denied giving any chips to all of us. We begged and begged. It was obvious that we all wanted something to eat. It was the last period of the day, and when you are bored you will do anything to snack on something.

We all watched as the giant bag of chips slowly disappeared. We then fought over the crumbs, lost, and then watched as the bag entered the trash can, completely empty and devoid of all tastiness.

I told myself I was going to bring some food the next day.

But the next day I forgot all about it. And I watched Jim snack on a giant bag of (not chips but) goldfish. And the day after that, he brought fruit rollups and stuck them on his tongue.

I needed food in this class, I thought. But how was I going to get it?

And then it happened to me by accident: one day at lunch I had decided I was full and absentmindedly I put my small bag of chips into my pocket. I had forgotten about it until math class. I sat down, saw Jim with his giant bag of chips, and that was when I remembered.

I had a bag of chips in my pocket.

Grinning like a psychopathic demon I reached into my pocket and grabbed my bag of chips. The bag had been squished but when I ripped it open I was happy to see it was still filled with good chips.

I smiled and grabbed one. Then, seeing the puppy-dog gazes of everyone around me, I gave in and shared all around. Soon, we were all snacking.

The next day I had forgotten to bring a snack and Jim was still snacking. Seeing me without any food, he grinned and passed back a chip.

I smiled.