market fresh
A banner strewn across the storefront reads, “Snack Nasty Week. Get it While it’s Rotten!” The sign has been up for over a month now but whatever. I’m not the market slogan patrol. I need a crate of fresh mangoes and I’m willing to deal with nasty snack displays of moldy sourdough slices dipped in expired sesame oil in order to get my fruit. Super Fantastico Mart loves irony.
It’s already ten minutes past the time I’m supposed to meet Horse. She’s got a party plan involving mangoes and I’m required to bring a crate of the ripe yummy to her gathering of the minds, a bi-weekly summit of freelance carpenters. Finding a crate of fresh produce at two in the morning is vexing, but all I can really think about is how I fell in love so hard; so hard, I’m out poaching mangoes at a market whose motto reads, “Live Large – Buy n’ Bulk,” a line tagged across all their radio flyer wagons provided for shoppers in lieu of grocery baskets.
I walk over to the wall of golf carts lined up near the front entrance; they’re for shoppers who want to roll n’ purchase as the buy n’ bulk. I opt for the golf cart. It’s late and I feel like driving drunk. I hand the golf cart attendant my license. He strokes his caterpillar mustache, reminding me that I need to shave my unruly beard. He invites me to enter a contest, “Check out the great wall of grape soda next to the salty mixed-nut isle.” Exuding circus announcer enthusiasm, he gestures with gusto and bellows with grace and exclaims, “Guess the number of grape sodas in the stack and win a trip to Spain.” I thank him for the tip. He pets his mustache with prideful ownership. Maybe I’ll win the vacation package for two and invite Horse along with me to the romantic getaway. We’ll eat paella and exalt fresh seafood. We both need a vacation. Falling in love is exhausting and we’ve been at it non-stop for weeks now.
I put the golf cart in drive and roll past a woman wearing a bloody apron offering expired meatballs. I wave to her and say, “I tried your snack nasty last week. Not so tasty.” She waves back in acknowledgment and scribbles something down on a clipboard. A few weeks ago, I was feeling bold and sexy and ate some moldy pita wedges. I was out on a market-shopping spree, another wild fruit chase for Horse. We’d just met at an urban golf tournament. She used a nine-iron to launch a tennis ball through the passenger side window of my white Ford Escort. It was the launch that won her the game. Horse was a bold player and offered no apologies. She bought me a conciliatory whiskey after the tournament and impressed upon me that if I brought her a flat of perfect strawberries, I’d win her heart. She was beautiful and I could win her over. Horse wasn’t kidding around, so I took her up on the challenge.
When she opened the door to greet me and saw the flat of perfect strawberries that I procured for her, it was as if I’d brought her a basket of baby kittens. She spoke softly to the fruit, admiring their perfectly plump, juicy red bodies with baby-talk admiration. I was quite proud of my berry find. Super Fantastico carries the best produce in the city. Her fruit cooing quickly transferred to me as she gifted me with a trail of wet kisses along my neck and up to my earlobe. She whispered with an adorable lisp, “Stay the night.”
We’ve been inseparable ever since. We skipped past all the formal relationship markers and went straight to the friend introductions on the second night. Horse introduced me to her favorite people as her candied-apple man and licked my hand to prove her point. “He’s candy sweet.” I didn’t mind the public licking. After all, she embraced my abject disdain for store bought herbs. “At the very least, we should be responsible for our own seasonings,” I told her on the first night we met. Horse agreed with me and gave me the biggest strawberry in the bunch.
I place the crate of mangoes in the back of my cart and kick up the speed to the highest setting. I need to get back to her. Horse needs these mangoes and I need her. She loves fruit with zealot like commitment and I know where to buy heart-warming produce. I need her because she forgets to ask me little things like where I grew up and what’s my name. These details are insignificant. These details prove me imperfect and reckless. Love seduces me with rotting imperfection. Super Fantastico Mart wasn’t the first to think of the ironic gesture.