The lunch bell finally rang. Friday was pizza day at Anytown Elementary—served on a warm, robin’s egg blue plastic plate with a carton of cold milk. The kid next to me rolled his pizza up like a flute and jammed it in his mouth whole. Chewing, chewing, more chewing…then he started to choke. Fifth-graders then didn’t know CPR and the lunchroom monitor was MIA. So we did what many adults do in the same situation:
Nothing.
We ignored the kid and hoped he’d stop. He choked to death instead.
The playground was empty that afternoon, and that kid remains in the dark recess of my mind.
aka, The Abject Muse 
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