of fruits and headless men
There is a town in California filled with headless men. I drove past it, once, on a move from South to North, and saw a strawberry field where farmers worked without their heads. They stood in lines of tens and twenties, backs pressed against the sun, and knelt down in synchrony to pick ripe fruit from ripe plants.
I pulled my car over to buy their fruit; one carton for $6 was steep, but the price was one that reflected novelty, and so I was willing to scrape together the coins and dollar bills which littered my center console.
There was a small, unmanned stand crooked in the ground in front of the place where the headless farmers worked. A money box sat next to three cartons of strawberries, an indicator that I was in a town where honesty was a given and not a commodity.
I cast careful eyes over the cartons, picking up each to examine their contents. The first one was half-rotten, baked to inedibility by the heat and the hours, and I returned it with haste to its resting place. The second carton was filled with albino strawberries, unrecognizable from its species, and so I returned it, too, to its resting place. The last carton held the plumpest and most vibrant fruit I’d ever seen and so I did not return this one to its resting place, but instead slid my $6 and a 25 cent gratuity into the money box, and returned with my fruit to the car.
I made room for the strawberries in the passenger’s seat, where the bulk of my books lay, and nestled the carton between Dostoevsky’s Notes from the Underground and Andre Breton’s Nadja. Here, these impossible fruit would feel at ease.
I looked up at the field before I pulled my car into drive, and found the rows of farmers now facing me, paused in their work. Facing seems like an inappropriate description in this case, so I will say that the torsos of each farmer were turned not toward the plants but toward my car, and I felt as though I were being watched in spite of the lack of eyes perceiving me.
In unison, as this was how they seemed to do everything that they did, the rows of headless farm workers bowed a shallow bow in my direction and then returned to picking fruit.
I shuddered and entered back onto the highway, switching my eyes between the passenger’s seat and the road should the fruit realize they did not belong with me and decide to leave.
I arrived at my new home with the strawberry carton still in my possession. It was late now; my pitstop and the three hundred miles between old and new homes meant i didn’t arrive until near 11, and so I opted to only move in the necessities and carry in the rest the following morning.
My bed for the time being was a thick blanket on hardwood floor with a slightly less thick blanket to lay beneath. It was colder here than I was accustomed to and I was unable to sleep, checking my phone in intervals until 2 AM found me wide awake in the kitchen with the carton of strawberries.
I sat on the tiled floor and, with no one else to talk to in my new empty home, indulged the fruit with light conversation. Just trivial niceties: how do you do, what’s your name, are you mad at me for taking you away from your rotting family? All to no avail. The fruit remained lifeless.
And so, coming to, an almost, certain realization that the strawberries were incapable of sentient thought, I ate them. First, only one, bloody and carnal in its indulgence. It felt like sex, eating those strawberries, and, as with most things that feel good, I chose to overindulge until my mouth dripped red and my fingers were stained with pleasure.
I fell asleep on the tiles, before I could rinse myself of the rapture, and woke to find myself alone in the kitchen — no carton remained as testament to my pleasure. I checked the countertops, the bathroom, the trashcan, to find nothing but more empty.
I ruled the whole thing down to the driftings of the mind that long drives lend themselves to. I was not known for an inclination toward reality, spending long hours talking aloud to myself, writing stories about irrational speculations, so on and so forth. I found ways to make up for the things I needed, and so maybe I made up the strawberries because I really needed Vitamin A.
Thoughts of the town with the headless men left my mind as I settled into my new home, filling its emptiness with unnecessary wall decor and a couch I couldn’t afford, but fuck, it looked good.
I met a man the week after I moved. He worked at the coffee shop two blocks down, and he remembered my order by the second time I came in. That meant, of course, that he was in love with me.
Charlie was a normal man, in every respect of the word. Slightly above average in appearance, but not so attractive that he was intimidating. Smart, but not about the things I was smart about, so he wasn’t a threat. Enough friends to not make him a recluse, but not too many so as to be overwhelming. Funny when appropriate, reserved when need be.
He moved in with me three months later; as with most things in my life, my romances were fast-paced and impulsive, and not given to rationale. I loved Charlie, but I wasn’t in love with Charlie, and that’s what I wanted. There was no chance for heartbreak, because I knew I would be the one to end things. And that was good, and that was fine, and that was how these things always went.
On the fourth month of us living together, we took a road trip to visit my family down south. Charlie was nervous, and I reassured him that little to no attention would be thrown his way, as my family dynamics were composed entirely of internal dramatics — he would not be their target.
Our drive was calm and easy, as all things with Charlie were, and we listened to true crime podcasts, a niche of overlap in our interests. As we listened to stories of brutalized women with unfound perpetrators, I found myself not loving him anymore. It always happened like this, with something wholly unrelated to the man I was with making me realize things would not work out.
Just as I was settling into this new development, accepting the conversation I’d start when we got back home, Charlie spoke.
“Should we stop for some strawberries?” He motioned to the side of the road, smiling.
I looked up from my trance to see I had arrived back to the town of headless men. I nodded a slow ‘yes’. Yes, we should stop for strawberries.
We pulled over, and I asked Charlie if I could stay in the car while he bought the fruit. Of course, and he kissed my cheek. I shuddered.
I watched as he, oblivious to the headless men watching us, approached the stand and selected the fruit. First basket, no. Second basket, no. Third basket, ah, yes, just right. He came back to the car smiles and sweets and handed me the carton.
“Oh, I forgot to pay! I’ll be right back.”
I watched as he hustled back over to the stand, fumbling in his pocket for change. I turned the key in the ignition and pulled back onto the highway. Looking back in my rearview window, I watched Charlie wave his arms, motioning for me to come back. I kept driving. I then watched as he knelt over, suddenly, in apparent pain. I stopped the car but didn’t turn around. Still just observing from the rearview, I saw him come back up, missing his head.
He turned and walked toward the field, finding an empty spot in the line of headless men. The herd of them faced me, and bowed their shallow bows in my direction, before returning to their work. Charlie worked with them now, picking the impossible fruit from their impossible plants.
I kept driving until I reached my parent’s home, telling them that things with Charlie hadn’t panned out, to which they shrugged and resumed the argument I’d interrupted. I gave them the strawberries before I left. My mom called me a few days later to say they were inedible, hard and dry, nothing like the strawberries at their farmer’s market.
As the years passed, and more men like and unlike Charlie came into my life, I took the drive down south with each of them. Some, I’d leave behind, watching as they joined the headless men. Others, I’d refuse to stop with at the strawberry stand. That’s how I knew when it was real. If I wanted the man with his head still intact.