A KitKat That Stopped Calling My Name

There’s a KitKat on my desk. It’s been there longer than I can actually remember — I could go digging through old entries to find out exactly when, but that’s not the bit that’s interesting.

The interesting bit is that it’s stopped calling my name.

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I look at it. I know exactly what it is. I know exactly what it tastes like. And nothing happens. No pull, no little argument with myself, no decision to make. It’s just a KitKat, sitting there, being a KitKat.

That’s not the same as resisting it. Resisting still gives a thing a say. You have to keep telling it no while it keeps asking. This feels like the asking’s stopped altogether.

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Odder still: I still get the want for “something,” and it’s not some faint background itch, it’s a proper problem, the kind that can monopolise my thoughts for a stretch of the day. It just doesn’t land on the KitKat any more. I can be sitting a foot away from chocolate, mind fully occupied with wanting something, and my brain still doesn’t reach for it.

I don’t know what’s supposed to fill the space where arguing with a KitKat used to live. I’m not trying to work that out today. I’m just noting that it happened, because the version of me from a few months ago wouldn’t have believed it.

The KitKat’s still there, for the record. I might eat it next week. I might not. Either way doesn’t feel like a test any more, which is probably the strangest part of all.