Obnoxious

While attending a wedding, I decided to be polite and reintroduce myself to an older woman I've only met once or twice and haven't seen in about 20 years.

"Hello, I'm Kev…"
She cut in immediately. "I remember you, you were such an obnoxious kid."

I froze in panic and checked her face to see if there was a hint of humor in this accusation, but it was genuine contempt. "Uh," I stammered. She either didn't pick up on my discomfort or didn't care.

"You were the most obnoxious kid. I was just thinking about you the other day and how obnoxious you were."

I didn't even know how to respond to this woman. Did she want me to apologize for some unspecified "obnoxious" thing I did in my early childhood? Her adult children seemed mortified but didn't come to my defense, so I just stared back at the woman, my mouth slightly agape, long enough for her to add one more, "Just so obnoxious!" I couldn't decide whether I was more disgusted with the words she was saying, or the fact that she spit when she spoke.

At this point, the woman had called me obnoxious four times in just fifteen seconds. As tempted as I was to call her out, I wasn't about to get in a fight at my friend's wedding.

Instead, I simply said, "I have to go" and walked away. Granted, it was pretty dumb because I obviously had nowhere else in particular to go at a wedding reception that had only just begun, but how much longer did I have to put up with a woman who was insulting my youthful former self? And "obnoxious" four times? Bitch, get a thesaurus.

Whatever, her unpleasantness spared me the trouble of having to make pleasantries with her. I may have been obnoxious as a kid, but at least I'm not an obnoxious adult.