It was Thanksgiving, which meant my aunt and uncle would be coming to town again. This year would be different because my chili-head of an uncle wanted to try the spiciest food we could find in Atlanta. I’m not one to back down from a challenge and rather looked forward to my impending torture as a way to prove myself. As Thanksgiving rounded the corner, I could be found at the local hot-wing restaurant preparing for the battle ahead. Thanksgiving dinner was good, but not the meal I had been looking forward to. After we awoke from our food comas, we piled in the car and headed to Atlanta. We knew that it would be spicy, but we had no idea what we had gotten ourselves into.
The cracks in the restaurant parking lot gave the Grand Canyon a run
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We laid the pizza on the counter and stared at it, not knowing where to start or who would take the first bite. We cut it into slivers instead of slices and each took one, delicately resting on our fingertips. The first bite came from my uncle, who at first provided little to no reaction before his eyes widened and looked around the room as if to find an exit. I gave a nervous giggle because yes, it was funny and because I knew that it was about to be me. I brought it to my lips and inhaled slightly in preparation, but inhaling the pungent air surrounding the pizza burned my throat and lungs and I started to cough. After calming myself down I placed a shamefully humble corner of pizza between my lips and bit down. At first there was nothing. There was no iconic taste of tomato sauce or stringy cheese, but a bland taste of overdone crust. Before I could react to the first bite, I crammed a second into my mouth and bit down. I swallowed and instantly knew I had made a mistake. As the heat of the first bite was catching up to me, the ghost chili paste oozed out onto my lips and filled my mouth. It felt as if someone has lit a firecracker and dipped it in magma before placing it in my mouth and sewing it shut. I tried to focus on the cheese and soon realized that it was not cheese at all, but juicy yellow Habanero shavings. At this point I gazed around the room through my tears and saw my family rushing to the refrigerator to get the milk. My uncle sucked in through his teeth and said, “Michael, do you feel the endorphins?”. I shook my head and laid it down in my hands submissively and felt the sweat cover my palms. I sat at the kitchen table sucking on ice for the next hour. There was nothing pleasurable about that pain, but my uncle was right, it was quite the