Something I've been working on...

Displayed behind the bar, as is typical of bars, was a dish. This particular dish was filled with lemons, lemons that were to be served in a variety of alcoholic and non-alcoholic drinks. Lemons are not a particularly violent fruit, and have chosen the tact of being passive, trying to ignore humans until they are finally freed. For a long time this tactic hadn’t worked; and for a long time to come, it still wont. Lemons, being the dull, oddly shaped fruit that they are, seem a strange thing to write about; but this is the story of a Lemon who could no longer take the life of a slave. Living in a bowl until he was cut and served was not the life to be lived by Jerry Lemon. Not only was Jerry deeply confused by the persecution and execution of his race; but he also wanted change. Jerry called this change Liberation, and it meant the freedom of his race.

nnLike most Friday nights, the bar room was filled with a colourful number of people; most of whom were talking or laughing, sipping on drinks, each one decorated by the finely cut carcass of a lemon. Jerry lay quietly in a dish that had served for all his days as his prison and his frame. He was trying fruitlessly to will himself over the edge of the dish using all of his might; but because lemons are not particularly strong it took a trained athlete like Jerry and an enormous amount of effort to get out of the curved surface. The other lemons, as usual, were laughing at him from the sides, at his vain attempts of gaining freedom. This didn’t bother the escapist so much, as every once in a while one of them was killed. Jerry himself never seemed to be chosen for serving because his escape attempts usually left him bruised and unattractive looking.

nnOn this night, fortune gave Jerry wings, and he seized his chance for freedom after the barman accidentally knocked the dish to the floor, scattering lemons everywhere. The other lemons stayed statuesque and begged him to do likewise. He would do nothing of the sort. Rolling along the floor, driven by purpose, Jerry steamed towards one of the numerous tables that covered the building’s floor.

nnA girl who had not yet realised she’d had too much to drink reconsidered her alcohol intake as she found herself confronted by a bruised lemon.

nn‘Why do you eat us?’ the lemon asked.

nnThe girl paused in confusion, pondering what to tell the fruit. ‘Because you taste nice?’ she suggested eventually.

nn‘Really?’ The lemon looked shocked and horrified, so far as lemon expressionism goes anyway.

nn‘Well, no…’ the girl said thoughtfully. ‘I guess you are quite sour...’

nn‘Then why?’

nnThe girl looked thoughtfully at the lemon and expressed her doubts. ‘What’s going on? Lemons can’t talk.’

nn‘Yes they can. They just don’t.’

nnJerry told his sad story about the lemons hiding and waiting whilst the girl listened patiently. She felt so sorry for this poor lemon.

nnAfter he had finished the girl said: ‘Here, let me get you a drink,’ she ordered a coke, because the lemon was only was young. It accepted, feeling rather blue.

nnWhen the drink arrived, Jerry turned an odd shade of green, especially odd considering he were a lemon. ‘I have to go…’ he said weakly and sickly. ‘Put me outside.’

nnThe girl did as she was told, placing the discoloured fruit outside in the pouring rain. Then she returned inside to drown her troubled mind in alcohol; it seemed to be working too, until she awoke the next morning in a hospital. Jerry stayed in the back ally behind the bar, blasted by the torrential rain, crying out into the night with all the pain of the lemons. After he became too tired to scream, the lemoncholy fruit rolled under a dumpster to sleep. Harold had been impaled on the side of that coke. Jerry was a murderer, and now he could never go back. Centuries old fruit-laws had expelled from the lemon colony forever.

nnThe constant patter of the rain held Jerry prisoner in his miserable state, not allowing him the blissful release of sleep. He did not deserve it.

nnEventually the sun rose on the new morning with weary light and the customers of the bar had long since filtered out. Alone, under a dumpster, Jerry was all that remained. The alley behind the bar was not a pleasant place to be in the morning. The pungent smell of vomit and urine hung about the air, stinging the nostrils of any who wandered into the pit. Lemons have no sense of smell, so he did not have to face this at least. On the inside however, he felt as rotten as he tasted.