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a Mad Escape
cc&d (v255) (the May/June 2015 22 year anniversary issue)




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She Kissed a Tomato

Thomas Gannon

    I lost my English class yesterday. I was walking down the second-floor corridor, about five minutes late as usual, and first noticed something was wrong when I found myself looking out a window at the end of the hall. I turned and looked back at the rows of closed doors. They all looked the same. I knew my English class wasn’t behind any of them.
    At first I thought I might be in the wrong building. The stairs seemed not quite in the right place. A plaque on the door was strange to me. But then I remembered seeing the familiar gray-haired secretary huddled over her typewriter as I came in. All right. I walked down the stairs to the first landing, then climbed back up, pretending it was for the first time that day and my English class was right around the corner, three doors down. I walked along nonchalantly, not focusing my eyes, pushed through the third door and found myself face to face with a urinal.
    Take a piss, I thought, and try to think what day it is. I tried but I couldn’t begin to remember what happened the day before, much less what day it had been. The foolishness of my attempt made me laugh out loud. How could I remember what I’d done if I didn’t know what day is was? I laughed again and thought I heard a pair of shoes shifting nervously in one of the stalls.
    Back in the corridor, it came to me. Tomorrow I’d be going to Jacob’s for stuffed peppers. Jacob’s always had stuffed peppers on Wednesday, so today had to be Tuesday. My first conclusion had been incorrect. I hadn’t lost my English class; it had disappeared.
    On an impulse I decided to check out the third floor. All the rooms were quiet and empty like a Friday afternoon. Little families of dust balls strolled the corridor. Cardinal Cushing’s here, I thought. I left the building and walked to my car. The secretary was no longer there when I left. Outside, students with books crisscrossed around me. Who needs it. It wasn’t the first time a class had disappeared on me.
    I drove immediately to the supermarket. My supermarket. It lies, like a petrified bird in its nest, at the intersection of two busy thoroughfares. A traffic signal determines who enters when.
    The building is of pale green cement with a black façade, glass and aluminum trimming, and measures 40 x 80 yards. I am not sure if that is important.
    What is important is that I have fallen in love in this supermarket several times. The first was the most memorable. I’d been inside the store for about ten minutes, working my way through the aisles gathering my supper, when something caught the corner of my eye in the fruit and vegetable section.
    The girl had bent over without warning and had kissed a tomato. It might as well have been me. She turned and walked down the aisle, leaving a smile that said, “Sure, you can come over some time and we’ll make French fries.” I moved over to the tomato bin. They all looked alike. A sign said: “Tomatoes 79 cents lb.”
    I looked for her in the canned goods section without hope. No doubt she checked out and drove away while I wandered among the neat, captive rows of cans. If you came here at precisely five o’clock every day, the faces of the customers would be new and soon forgotten. Usually there is a red-haired girl at one of the checkout counters, but she has never spoken. The canned meats, though, will always be found locked in formation. And the vegetables.
    One Halloween when I was alone, a thousand miles from here, I gave out only clumps of peas to all who came to my door. Sometimes I cheated and stuck my hand deep into the bags before the beggars could see they weren’t getting a Tootsie Roll or Hershey’s. Other times I let my offering be seen. The next morning out front I found peas, crushed on the walk and scattered in the grass like tiny abandoned eggs. I forgot about it until a year or so later when Halloween came again. This time I was prepared and gave out popcorn and malted milk balls until I felt a little sick. Then, after 10 when no one had come for awhile, a girl about 19 with short brown hair came by herself and closed her bag to the popcorn and candy. A boy’s shirt on her and frozen waterfalls for eyes.
    I went to the refrigerator and found a single pea stuck in the ice. We took a knife and unstuck it together, and each of us ate half. I felt better immediately. We made love for several hours, and in the morning skipped breakfast and had peas for lunch. We ate peas for a week – fresh peas and peas with butter, giant ones and baby ones, peas with small onions. We made love. Sunday night, the peas were gone, and while she combed her short brown hair in the bathroom mirror, I boiled some rice. She looked sad when she came out, and we ate together sadly.
    A month later I received a card from Florida that said “Hi.” Once again from Texas and then no more.



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