Lydia
stood in her white-walled kitchen, working a knife back and forth like a saw.
As her knife connected with her cutting board, two halves of fruit fell away from
each other exposing a nest of seeds in their center – the two halves of an
apple.
“There!”
Lydia exclaimed to herself. “No celebration without a proper fruit salad.”
Lydia picked up another whole fruit, dewed with water droplets.
Love
is an apple.
As
she turned the fruit about and about in her hands, Lydia knew this; she felt
the glass like texture that provided a clean sheen – mirror reflecting her smile
back at her. She could see the red, a color of passion, singing with the heat
of lust, the romance of love. It was like looking into the feral flames of an
inferno, ready to eat her alive. She brought the apple up to her nose. A smell
sweeter than nectar filled her, a smell that, to her, equated to the mix of
sweat and cologne on a man’s skin.
Love
is an apple.
Lydia
brought her lips to the fruit, grazed them with its glossy coat; a kiss made
sweeter when she sank her teeth in. The juices danced on her tongue, wetting
the back of her throat – all in a kiss.
More
chopping was conducted. Apple, cantaloupe and watermelon sliced and diced to
perfection. Dappled in the sun beams penetrating the kitchen window, Lydia’s
hair fell like a golden shawl over her head; her work done, Lydia swiped a hand
across her forehead to remove a few strands hanging hazardously close to her
eyes. A smile lit her lips.
“All
done,” she proclaimed, gazing down at her masterpiece.
In
a glass bowl, on a silver platter, Lydia carried her fruit salad into her
bedroom. Red drapes descended from the bedroom windows; a white lacy bed skirt
played in the shadows on the floor and in the center of the bed laid a man.
Lydia stepped lightly to the bed, laying the tray on the man’s bare stomach.
Even with the cold tray on his sensitive flesh, the man didn’t move.
“Bona
petite,” Lydia says, forking a slice of watermelon into her mouth. Good, but
nothing topped the apples. She laughed as she took an apple wedge from the mix
and began crunch, crunch, crunching on it. “Who says that a single girl has to
spend Valentine’s alone? And you’re such great company.” She compliments the
man, but he can’t hear her.
The
man – Dan – can’t hear; he can’t move or feel . . . or breathe.
Lydia,
devoid of chocolates and large teddies and roses for years, saw a golden
opportunity in her co-worker, Dan, leaving work as late as she last night. With
no observers, a whack to the head in the parking garage went unnoticed. She
hadn’t meant to hit him so hard, had only wanted to get him to her apartment
unconscious; perhaps the hammer she carried around for protection had been too
heavy a tool for the operation, but regardless, she was happy. Now she wouldn’t
have only a moment of bliss, a day in a whirlpool of disappointments. Now, she
had something permanent.
“Happy
Valentine’s Day,” Lydia whispered, planting a kiss on Dan’s still brow.
Love
is an apple.
Too
sweet to be sinful, too bitter to be pure.
