She closes the distance as she sees the car slow. She moves quickly, brightly coloured cottons against cocoa skin. Her smile curls up her face, but stops short of eyes glittering with calculation.

They follow standard roadside protocol - her lips caress each syllable as her hands move slowly over rounded flesh.

"Is firm, you know, Sah," she croons. "And sweet like you like it."

My father nods, gesturing with the money. "In the back."

I reach through the window and take the bag of oranges from her. I've never been to the same fruitstand twice, never had a different experience.

At first, I thought the last line was contradictory, but I think I understand now. I like it.

Thanks.

I'm awed by all the fruit this week's topic is producing. Heh.

And Kristin's poem is thought-provoking.

ita obviously has a future in fruit porn.

Here's a fruit drabble:

At each meal they sat there, next to the plates, grinning their evil orange smiles. I picked up my spoon and slowly scooped up smaller orange sneers. In my mouth, the tiny scoops grew larger and larger as I struggled to swallow each one. The smell was sickly, almost like something that was just starting to decompose.

"Do we have to have cantaloupe at every meal?"

"The cantaloupe is very good here."

That statement was true enough. It was also irrelevant. There was, however, no reasoning with my father's parents.

"Can I go now?"

"Not until you've finished your lunch."

Oh Ginger, I just remembered. Poor wee Ginger.

It had been a banner year for murder in Fruitopia. Twenty-seven stiffs a week. The latest victim was one Herbert Maypole, found on the sidewalk in front of a video store.

Detective Apple surveyed the body.

Two minutes was all it took. Precinct record.

Someone had clearly modified the old "sack of oranges" trick with a sack of strawberries. But upon finding that fruit less efficacious, he had shot Maypole. Once in each limb, to immobilize him. Then he had poured the strawberry mush over Maypole's helpless head, leaving the poor sap to suffocate.

Death by strawberries, thought Red. What a way to go.

P-C -- HEE!

Gram drabble:

I can feel the sweat dripping down my face and can only imagine how much more uncomfortable it is for her. She has eighty pounds and 61 years on me, and she has never loved the heat. Couldn't tell by looking at her though. Her wrinkled hand is resting on the raised bed, the green sweet pea vines climbing up plastic stakes behind her, her cane pointing me toward the rhubarb on the other side. Then she is in motion, swooping toward the earth. Her hand snakes out, snags a strawberry I haven't even noticed. "This one's mine!" she laughs, triumphant as she pops it in her mouth. Juices dribble from the corners of her lips and she sighs, ecstatic. "Not like those things you buy in the store."

She is selfish in her fruit, generous in her genes.

You mean the grandmother did it? Wow, Red didn't see that coming.

Herbert Maypole

MuHAHAHA! That's an Edmund Crispin or Margery Allingham-level character name. Beeyooteeful.

Kristin, that was a lovely piece. This has turned into a damned evocative theme. And if Nic gets that job today, I am making Hot Fruit (which is actually called Peach and Strawberry Cobbler with Lemon-Infused Shortcrust) to celebrate.