An Apple A Day

Douglas entered the apartment, his backpack slung over his shoulder by one strap. He brushed his blonde, scraggly hair out of his eyes and surveyed the room.

The young woman who had entered the apartment ahead of him, clicked on a large twisted-iron sculpture lamp, began adjusting throw pillows on the small couch, and straightened prefectly straight magazines on the coffee table, in an attempt to make the already tidy apartment even more tidy.

‘Wow.”, he said, “This place is way bigger than mine.” he chuckled and lightly pointed, “Heh. Great lamp!”

“Thank you! I made it. Do you live on campus?” she asked with an oddly seductive tone.

“Yeah. My folks wouldn’t spring for anything better. Or a car.”, he said as he sat himself on the couch. He unslung his backpack, plopped it on his lap, and took his phone out of the front pocket.

“I see you riding all over campus. You look like you wreck a lot. It's kinda hot.”, she said as she sat down directly next to him.

Without any apparent regard for her compliment he said, “Oh shit! I missed a bunch of calls from my mom. Do you mind if I call her back?”

“Uh. Yeah. Of course. Of course!”, the young woman’s voice demeanor went from mildly insulted to apologetic and impressed. The notion of a guy who has such a good relationship with his mom is something you just don’t toss aside.

Douglas had already initiated the call, “Sorry. Cool. Thank you!” His attention turned to an unintelligible voice from his phone. “Mom! Sorry, I was with a friend…” He walked into what he assumed was his hosts's bedroom so he could continue his call in moderate privacy.

“Yes.” he sounded a bit annoyed.

"I know."

"I know!"

"No. I was literally just about to…"

The voice cut him off.

Outside the room, Victoria was sitting and doing her best to evesdrop. She yelled to the room, “Is everything ok?”

An arm popped out the door and gave her a thumbs up.

In the room, Douglas was trying to take a calmer tone with his mother. “I’m sorry. I just lost track of time, Mom. I will go eat it right now. You know that I take this more seriously than anyone else.”

He nodded to no-one as the voice on the phone made some less panicked tones.

“Ok. I’m going right now."

"Ok. I love you, too. I’ll see you this weekend."

"Ok."

"Ok."

"Bye.”

He ended the call with his thumb, continued to glance at the rest of his messages, and headed back to the couch. He sat down, lifted his backpack to his lap, unzipped the main pocket and pulled the bag open.

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A confused look crossed his face. He began shuffling the few items around in his bag. An empty water bottle, a mostly-used stick of deodorant, and a couple of mountain biking magazines. His head popped up from the bag.

“Is everything okay?” Victoria asked. She was now curious and concerned.

“Uh.”, Douglas said and then paused, “I uh. Lost my apple.” He glanced around the floor and couch to see if he had somehow dropped it.

Victoria’s face scrunched, “Your apple?”

“Yeah. My apple. It was in my bag.”, he said as he checked his bag again, this time carefully pulling everything out and laying it out on the coffee table.

“Was it a special apple…or something?” she asked, still confused by the situation.

He was becoming more anxious. “Uh. Well…no. Kinda.”, he said.

“Kinda?”

He got up from the couch, bent over, and started looking under furniture, “So, ah…you know the old saying, ‘An apple a day keeps the doctor away?’”

Her eyes squinted a tiny bit as if preparing for a punchline, “Uh. Yeah?”

“Well”, he said as his head popped up from behind the couch, “my family takes it very literally.”

Her eyes shifted as she contemplated what he had said, “So…you eat an apple a day…to keep…”

He interrupted, “To keep the doctor away. Yes. That’s why I need my apple.” The anxiousness in his voice was growing.

Victoria was starting to feel a bit exasperated by the situation. She was definitely growing bored of it, and now only mildly curious. Had she invited yet another insane person to her home? Her body language changed to reflect her souring opinion of the night. “And you need to eat your apple…right now?”

He began pulling off couch cushions and frantically feeling around in the dark crevases. “Yes! If I don’t eat one every day…who knows what could happen?”

She stared at him with a concerned look and then gave a nervous chuckle, “I can’t tell if you’re joking right now.”

“I’m not joking.”, he stopped his search momentarily to look straight at her. “Listen. I have eaten an apple a day, every day of my life except for one day. And that one day I didn’t eat an apple, something bad happened.

"Something bad?", she asked.

"I was hit by a truck.”

“Seriously?”, she still wasn’t sure if this was a joke.

“Seriously.” He said, and returned to his search. He swung open the apartment door and looked up and down the hall, hoping to see his apple patiently waiting for him. It wasn't.

“God. That’s horrible.”, she said. “But...you… I mean…you don’t think it was just coincidence?”

His head was still sticking out the door. “It fell from the sky.”

“What?”, she said, thinking she surely misheard what she thought came out of his mouth.

“It fell from the sky. The truck.”, he said as he re-entered the room. “It fell out of a cargo plane. They were filming a movie near by. Something went wrong, they dropped a truck from the plane at the wrong time. It landed on my house. On my room. It crushed my legs. I couldn't walk for two years. That's kinda how I got into bike riding...and how I got the scars on my legs”.

“Jesus! You’re not joking?” she was becoming more alarmed, herself.

“No! I never joke…”, he stopped. His eyes locked onto something across the room. Victoria followed his gaze.

“Did you eat my apple?”, he said, almost in a whisper.

“What? No!”, she said.

“Did you eat…my fucking apple?”, Douglas said, seething this time.

“No! I didn’t eat your fucking apple!”, she shot back.

“Then why is there an apple core sitting right there?”, he pointed sharply to the apple core that was sitting on the little island that separated the living room from the kitchen.

“I didn’t eat your apple.”, she stood up from the couch and put some distance between them.

“Oh my god! Why are you lying? It’s right there! You clearly ate it while I was on the phone!”, he said frantically. He couldn’t believe she was defending such an obvious lie.

Her arms stiffened straight down and she put on her best “I'm-gonna-sock-you-in-the-face” face. “You come to my place, show no interest in me at all, have a private conversation with…god know’s who? You CLAIM it was your mother, you ramble about some stupid apple and a truck falling on you, AND then you have the nerve to say I ate your goddamned apple? And you call me a liar!? Get out!” Her pointed her arm straight towards the door.

His face twisted into anger. “You! You ate my apple and you won’t admit it! It's so obvious that you did!" He slapped his head in deeper realization. "You went through my stuff! You opened my bag and took my stuff, while I was on the phone with MY MOTHER! What kind of crazy are you?”

“DO NOT FUCKING CALL ME CRAZY!”, she said. Her left eye began to twitch.

“Well, you ate my goddamned apple and won’t even admit it! And what was with all the cat pillows in your room? Seems pretty crazy to me!”, he was now paying more attention to the apartment decorations. A lot of cat decorations. Seriously. Way too many cat decorations.

“I’m not crazy.”, her voice was low and calm, now. “And you know what? You’re the crazy one. You think some fucking apple keeps you safe from from what? Dying? Getting hit by more flying trucks? Well, you’d better watch the skies, asshole, because you’re already too late! It’s 12:16. You missed your day!”. She began to shift between chuckling and sobbing.

Douglas’s eyes grew big. He glanced at his phone. 12:16. Boop. 12:17. “Fuck! Fuck fuck fuck!” He quickly scrambled to the couch and began replacing the few items from his backpack. “Goddamnit! You crazy-ass bitch! You don't know what you've..."

There was a dull thunk and Douglas’s head hit the floor, quickly followed by the rest of him. Blood began to pool rapidly around his head and face. Above him stood Victoria, holding a large iron-sculpture lamp.

It was in the shape of an apple