Fruit
Phyllis Ring - United States

The banana peels never had a discarded look.

Bejan Sabet's dark eyes followed their descent from the roof overhead to the dust of the roadside. They landed gently, custard-colored petals spreading open like lotus flowers, an unexpected bloom, soon to be devoured by a passing goat or cow.

From his seat by the window, Bejan watched the shadows cast on the ground outside by the crowd of passengers huddled atop the roof of the bus. His eyes had kept watch on them during the hours that the bus had lumbered out of Allahabad, these figures that gestured in animated debate, bodies swaying with the coach's rough progress.

At times his brown fingers had clenched the seat's peeling vinyl, two urgent vises that seemed to hold the passengers above him in place with each jostle and bump.

Their discussion drifted down to him through the open window. The sounds trickled in, rising and falling. Though he spoke little Hindi, the sound had a pleasing familiarity to his ears.

He was beginning to savor the open way people looked at him here, especially in the small villages to which he traveled. He was hailed as an important visitor now, a respected horticulturist come to oversee their accomplishments.

Somehow, the villagers always made time for him at the end of their long days. In those evenings of simple friendship, they immersed him in the kind of sociability he had never found during his education in America.

The work with the fruit trees progressed slowly, but it did progress, and always, when the people helped decide how things would go. Bejan liked the keen expression their faces wore when they consulted together about the tree-planting project. It showed reverence, almost, as though decision were a sacred act.

The diesel coach, whining louder and louder, had at last ground its arthritic gears to a shuddering halt. Bejan heard the rooftop passengers scrambling for balance overhead as the engine lurched, then quit, in a protest of angry steam.

A host of passengers disembarked behind the turbaned driver, commiserating in a symphony of voices as the hood was wrenched up.

Across the aisle, Stouffer swore softly.

Stouffer's wife investigated the bulging straw bag near her feet. Her small white hands drew forth stacks of sandwiches and a thermos bottle of tea.

Stouffer mopped his face with a yellowed handkerchief. "Godforsaken place." He fixed watery eyes on Bejan. "We'll never get there by dark, now. It's a fruitless task, anyway." He laughed indulgently at his words.

Bejan pretended not to understand the joke as he turned his gaze toward the window. He shifted in his seat in search of comfort, without success.

A quarter of the sandwich in Stouffer's hand disappeared in a single bite. "Could've flown back to the States for all we'll accomplish this week." Crumbs flew from his mouth, accumulating in the folds above his waist. "Some nice university orchards will seem like paradise, after this."

Bejan turned to face him slowly. "We will see."

Stouffer's wife offered Bejan a sandwich.

He declined politely.

"You won't see much." Stouffer helped himself to another sandwich and sucked a glob of mustard from his thumb. "Just thousands of hard-earned American dollars rotting in some place where they can't keep the flies off their children." He belched, then paused to gulp the tea his wife had poured.

"They will surely have begun harvesting the fruit now," Bejan said.

Stouffer waved a hand at him. "Hell, it'll be a miracle if the trees have borne fruit at all." His sniff used most of the muscles in his face as it wrinkled his nose. "Hunger." The word had a discarded sound. "They eat their food like animals. They've got more important things to do than grow trees—like watch their cows starve to death."

Bejan felt hot anger surge like liquid inside him as the hands that rested palm up on his thighs curled. "It is the women's project. They understand that the trees will feed their children's children." His brown stare was unblinking.

Stouffer's wife's pale eyes darted away to where voices were rising in quick bursts near the hood in front.

"Waste of money." Stouffer's headshake was the kind with which he closed conversations firmly. It said, "I am done talking. The conversation is complete." He plucked large crumbs from his lap.

Money seemed to mean a very great deal to the Stouffers. In the days since the Service had teamed him with the Americans, Bejan had watched how eagerly they sought out goods to buy with it; how reluctantly they parted with that money when goods were at hand.

Shortly after dawn, Stouffer had tried in vain for long, impatient minutes to find someone who would break a two-rupee bill when the vendor at the station had been unable to make change. Bejan had figured the difference to be about eight American cents. The vendor's face had sunk with resignation as Stouffer berated him. Bejan had withdrawn nearly twice the purchase price from his pocket and pressed it into the old man's lined hand. Boarding the bus, he had felt disgust churning inside him.

Outside the window now, two small figures had paused to eye the banana peels where they spread their petals upward in the dust.

The girl, perhaps seven or so, wore a ragged sari whose crimson color was bleached pink in spots. The small boy beside her, probably a brother of four or five, was dressed only in an oversize shirt of faded madras.

Beggars, Bejan thought, and watched them through the pitted glass. He reached toward his pocket. His hand froze when he realized their intent.

The girl's back was perfectly straight when she squatted beside the peels and slowly brushed sand from them. She pulled a stained cloth from the tattered folds of her sari. After her precise fingers smoothed out the rumpled square in the dry grass beside the road, she gestured for her companion to sit.

With slow, meticulous effort, she pulled the soft portion of each peel away from its skin and placed it gingerly on the cloth.

The boy's dark eyes followed her progress along with Bejan's until she finished the job and tossed the tough outer skins into the grass.

The driver's turban reappeared inside the bus as the winged jaws of the hood slammed shut with a crunching sound. Triumphant cheers from the makeshift engine crew followed when the engine roared to life on the first try.

Beside the road, the girl scooped up half of the peelings and placed them in front of her brother.

The boy sat cross-legged, the girl, with thin legs folded alongside her as, dark heads bent in the sun, they sampled their meal in small bites.