Bad Fruit

I’ve been in here for ages.

I was perfectly comfortable sitting in the aisle of the grocery store.

But they just had to buy me, didn’t they?

Their party would have been incomplete without me!

Thanks guys.

There’s just one problem with your logical process there.

Nobody eats fruit anymore!

Yeah, you all loved us at first, but why eat us anymore with all that processed goodness you taught yourselves to make lying around?

I’m just a set dressing for your awkward dinner party where nervous words will be exchanged between strangers while you, the host wring your hands and wonder if this was all worth it.

After you chop me up in to little bits and rearrange me into a cute little pattern on a fancy china plate you got from your mother-in-law, I’ll sit in the middle of the table and watch all the other finger foods go to those great big fabled mouths in the sky.

And the party will go on for hours as hands hover over me, and consider the healthier option, then move on to pigs in a blanket or fondue.

When the last of the party stragglers, the ones who don’t want to go back to their own homes, finally leave, you’ll clean everything up, wiping up the empty plates that once were covered in little bite-size quiches and placing them in the left hand side of the sink.

Then you’ll notice me again, you’ll see the hacked up pieces of my once solid body, and feel bad about going to all that work to dismantle me and arrange me in whatever fashion you pleased at the time.

Something like pity rises up in your conscience though and you can’t just throw me away like any other sort of food.

What if you do decide to eat me someday?

You won’t, but it’s the thought that counts really.

Wrap me up in plastic, suffocate me, preserve me, and press me up against the cold china plate, then stick me in the fridge, and never think of me again.

That’s perfectly all right. I understand when you inevitably forget. You’ve got too many things to think about. How could you remember something silly like a plate of disembodied fruit?

If I were a human, I’d do the same thing.

But all actions have consequences.

You’re going to forget about me, but I’ll still be there in the dark of the fridge, only seeing the light of day when you open up the door to grab something that isn’t me.

Plastic can only preserve me for so long.

That shallow plastic and china prison is going to start to smell.

It’s going to start in the fridge. You’ll only get a whiff when the door opens, and you’ll think nothing of it. But eventually, it’ll be all over the kitchen, and slowly creep through the rest of your house until you have no choice but to give the pieces of my body a proper burial.

I really do feel bad about the smell, but it really isn’t my fault. In all honesty, this is all your fault, and the lesson here is to remember to finish what you start.