Page 49 - The Woven Tale Press Vol. IV #5

tania hershman
Golden Sweet
You woke me in the middle of the night. I think you screamed. It’s just a dream, I said, holding your hand. No no, you said. It was terrible, one whole aisle full, all of them shouting at me. It’s not real, I said, stroking your sweating forehead, watching the way your eyes skittered. Tomatoes, you said, and you were staring at a corner of the room. Just tomatoes, as far as I could see, on each side, shout- ing at me.
Then you stood up, paced around in your pajamas: But I don’t understand, how could they all be tomatoes – plum, cherry, vine and beef, but more, so many more, a purple one called Cherokee, and this one which was almost black, Ku- mato, and there were green ones and the Great White, and all of them singing, calling me, and I don’t understand, how are they tomatoes when they’re small and large and round and squat and long....
I stood up, got off the bed, tried to take your hand, but you would not be calmed. Brandywine, you muttered as you headed for the stairs, and Early Girl, and Golden Sweet and Oxheart and San Marzano. After a few minutes, I heard you in the kitchen and I knew our crisper would be cleared out and for the next month there would be none in our salads.
I lay down, listening to you rummage. Then quiet. The back door squeaked. I got out of bed and went to the window. There you were, watched by an amused moon, pulling out each one, a small pile of them already on the grass. I nodded to the moon, who nodded back, I pulled the curtains, hoping you would wash your hands, knowing you’d be tired again after your exertions. I got into my side of the bed and waited.
Hershman’s first collection, The White Road and Other Stories (Salt, 2008), was com- mended by the judges of the 2009 Orange Award for New Writers, and contains flash fiction and short stories inspired by science. Her second story collection, My Mother Was An Upright Piano: Fictions, was published in May 2012. Her first book of poetry, Nothing Here Is Wild, Everything Is Open, won 2nd prize in the Fool For Poetry chapbook contest and was published by Southword Editions in Feb 2016. Her debut poetry collection is due to be published by Arches Press in July 2017.
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