The Microcosm of Life

By Melvin Eapen

It had been a long time since Giovanni was expecting something from the tree. "give me at least a melon!", he'd shout at it though he knew what an apple tree would fruit. And that was why he barely had any sleep for few days as it flowered for the first time. He rolled in his bed imagining how it would look like and drew weird sketches on his bedside wall. "Should I give it a name?", he once asked his wife who was complaining about the overgrown lawn. And when the fruit was in full shape, he'd look at it for hours and even thought of sleeping outside lest someone would steal it. He had no idea what to do with it and would’ve died at the thought of him plucking it. How much that would hurt the poor thing! And when his mischievous son snatched it to see what’s so special about this fruit, Giovanni almost threw him over the fence. After calming his nerves he took it inside, sacredly placing the fryit on the dining table and marvelled at its magnificence. But the next morning when he rushed to glimpse his little cupid, he burst at the sight. The color had turned pale and few spots of brown started to show up. He rushed through the streets to find a cure. But nothing helped and in the next two days, the fruit almost turned to a lump of decaying matter. Then the next morning he noticed something strange. Patches of fungi all over the fruit. Many insects going in and out, flying around. 

"aha!" he cried aloud, "more of them!"

He took the boy by the collar and cried "bring me more apples, rotten ones." 

"but daddy, where do I find them?" the boy naively asked. 

"I don’t know, ask them shopkeepers... Go on now!" 

After the boy, he put on his topcoat and dashed to the other end of the street. 

It was by the evening and as Mrs. Giovanni went inside the house, she felt a strong putrid smell annoying her breath. She walked inside and peered into the kitchen. The kitchen table was filled with apples; rotten, smelly ones. The room filled with insects flying across and her husband, Giovanni, dancing with them as if one of them. From behind her son shouted, “Daddy! There’s this shop down the street that sell only rotten fruits! There’s a whole lot of em!” She gazed at Giovanni in disbelief and there, in its unusual strangeness, she feared she saw his eyes glitter.

By Melvin Eapen