The Last Papaya

The papaya sat on the kitchen counter, its mottled yellow-green skin a reproachful reminder of the breakfast she'd promised to make him. Three days now it had waited. Three days since Marcus walked out with nothing but his iPhone and the clothes he'd worn to work—black slacks, white shirt, the blue tie she'd given him for his thirty-fifth birthday.

Clara pressed her palm against the fruit's surface, feeling the slight give that meant it was perfectly ripe. Too ripe now, like something left unattended too long. She sliced it open, revealing the shocking orange flesh and black seeds that looked like tiny eyes staring back at her.

Her phone buzzed on the counter—Marcus's name lighting up the screen for the third time that morning. She let it ring.

She'd bought the papaya the day after he left, some desperate attempt at normalcy. At forty-two, she was too old to believe that tropical fruit could fix a marriage, but she'd stood in the produce section anyway, weighing papayas like they were decision matrices, calculating ripeness and redemption.

"Clara, please." His voicemail, when she finally listened. "I'm at the hotel. My phone died—I didn't have your number memorized, isn't that pathetic? Had to call my own phone from the front desk just to get it."

She bit into the papaya, standing over the sink. The taste was nothing like she expected—musky and sweet, with a strange peppery finish that made her mouth tingle. How had she gone forty years without trying this? Without knowing this particular flavor existed in the world?

"Your mother always said we'd end up like this," he'd said during the fight. She couldn't even remember what started it anymore, only the way his palm had slapped the kitchen counter when he shouted, how the sound had vibrated through her chest.

She looked at her phone again. Marcus had sent a photo: the hotel view, some pathetic attempt at romance. The message below it: "I don't want a divorce. I don't know what I want."

Clara finished the papaya, dripping juice down her chin and onto her silk pajama top. She wiped her face with the back of her hand and picked up her iPhone. Her thumb hovered over his name, the screen casting a blue glow across her face in the darkening kitchen.

The papaya seeds lay exposed in the fruit's hollow, like a hundred tiny possibilities. She'd never planted anything in her life. She didn't know if you could plant them, if they'd grow, if they needed special soil or patience or forgiveness.

She typed: "Come home. We can try the papaya together."

Then she deleted it and typed: "I ate the papaya. It was terrible. I love you anyway."

She pressed send.