Avocado

          Late at night and I stand in a supermarket, avocado in hand. Beneath fingertips, the green-black fruit feels soft, gives a little with my grasp. Perfect for peeling. Perfect for eating. Opposite me, on the other side of an avocado hill, stands Billy Bob Thornton.

          “Do you like avocado?” asks Billy Bob.

          “Yes,” I say. “And you?”

          “Yes,” says Billy Bob.

          I return my avocado to the top of the hill, but Billy Bob picks up another, tosses his to me. I swing my left arm up, feel avocado slap my palm, let fingers curl over as if I am a seasoned pro. In truth, this is my first time catching an avocado. I am a natural. Billy Bob smiles, whistles high and long. I lob the avocado back, high and hard, but Billy Bob misses, then runs back to retrieve it from a row of eggplants.

          We continue playing catch, the husk of the avocado breaking off in jagged pieces until we are throwing at each other this silky soft fruit, green smearing our hands and spattering our clothes. I hold the slick pit, feel in my gut a sudden deep hunger, move to devour what bits of green flesh remain. Billy Bob watches, the corners of his mouth creeping up into a grin that could be the beginning of laughter or of disgust.

          Soon, we are falling down together, laughter unrestrained. A moment of quiet, my eyes find his face, the whole of it. Billy Bob. Utterly beautiful. My breath catches, my hand rises to touch his rough cheek. “You are beautiful,” I hear my voice say. And I know that in those three words I reveal everything about me and speak to everything that is him. Everything that goes deeper than avocado-smeared skin.

          Billy Bob looks away, his gaze settling in a forest of artichokes. My fingers move to rearrange my wayward bangs, feel a sudden stiffness in avocado that has begun to dry. At the back of Billy Bob’s neck, the green of new avocado has gone gray.

          We are quiet now, the space between us unsettled by the words I have spoken, words impossible to take back. Still, truth remains truth and settles in the center, like the smooth brown pit of an avocado.






Click here to listen to Dawn Comer reading "Avocado"






Dawn Comer holds an MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Notre Dame. She has twice won the Paul Somers Prize for Creative Prose from the Society for the Study of Midwestern Literature, both for fiction ("Raised in a Corn Palace") and memoir ("Fella With an Umbrella:  Finding Joy on the Autism Spectrum").  Her creative work has appeared in MidAmerica, Vellum Relic, The Cafe Irreal, and The Dream People, and she is a freelance writer for Defiance College - The Magazine. Dawn teaches Creative Writing at Defiance and eats avocados when she can.