The Bruised Banana

“How’d you do?” Trevor asked me, as if he didn’t already know. I’d been complaining about the class all semester, so of course he knew. But he meant well, I guess, so I answered honestly.

“The same way I feel—terrible.”

“You sick?” he asked.

“I am now. Why does a math major have to take a computer programming class anyway?” A question I had asked myself all semester.

“No idea,” he shrugged and held open the asylum doors for me. It wasn’t an actual asylum, of course. To others, it was the Computer Sciences and Mathematics building on the campus of Arkansas State University. But me? I called it, “the asylum,” because I often thought a person would have to be out of their mind to want to be a computer programmer. And why did they group us together? I was earning a minor in Chemistry. Why couldn’t the math majors share a building with the actual scientists?

But…it was over. Another semester completed. Unless, of course, I hadn’t passed this final exam…

Ugh. My stomach ached and my head pounded, while I forced my wheelchair over the protruding threshold and escaped the confines of the brick, two-story asylum.

“You don’t look so good,” Trevor said.

“I just need some rest.”

“Well, you’ve got all summer.”

“Huh? Ye–yeah.” He was right. Pass or fail, I was done! No more tests, no more syllabi, no more 8AM classes. Just me, myself, and I for the next three months!

“Have a good one,” he said with a wave.

“You too.” I replied, parting ways with Trevor and my futile worries. The weight lifted and my eyes raised to the clear blue sky.

Taking a deep breath, I could smell it, taste it, feel it. Freedom! Freedom to head home for the summer. Freedom to follow my own schedule. Freedom to never again open a computer programming book—or, so I hoped.

The headache persisted, but I no longer felt nauseous, so I began my daily hustle to the library parking lot. On the ASU campus, the asylum—or rather, the CSM building—neighbors the Library. Between the two is a wide, downhill sidewalk. Steep, might I add? A wide, steep, downhill sidewalk.

So, going to class was always an uphill battle—literally and figuratively. But going home? Woosh! Fun times. Especially at night, when no one was around to block my path, and no “worriers” present to watch in fright as I zoomed to my inevitable, blood-splattering, pavement-eating doom. Which, to this day, has never happened. So stop worrying, please. I use this chair everyday. I know what it can and can’t do.

Regardless, at this time of day, the sidewalk was crowded. Worse yet, everyone was slogging along like zombies, probably depressed and worried about their own final exams. So, I took it slow, waiting for gaps to open between the zombies so as to not disturb them and have my face chewed off. After passing a few, I noticed a human in their midst. A genuine surfer dude—completely out of place in Arkansas—was looking right at me.

“You’re lucky,” surfer dude said. A statement that stopped me in my tracks.

“Who? Me?”

“Yeah,” he said. “You get to cruise down this hill while the rest of us have to walk. You’re lucky."

Wow. My mouth fell agape, and I thought of so many things to tell him. Like, how you must go up before you come down.

Dude should have seen me during freshman year. Out of breath, upper arms burning, yards to climb before reaching the top, and not a single person offering to help. Or maybe, he would’ve preferred something more recent. Like, how lucky I was last week, when I had to roll up this hill in the rain, and just moments before reaching the top, my hand slipped on the wet rims, sending my thumb on a collision course with wheelchair’s metal brake—which, by the way, nearly detached my thumbnail. Fortunately, it was raining or someone may have been concerned by the blood trail leading into the CSM building.

But yeah, if there’s one adjective used to describe me, it’s: lucky. I’m lucky that I’ll never again run, skate, or dance with a girl. And of course, I’m lucky with girls too, right? Lucky that when a girl looks at me, she never sees a potential mate. She sees someone to pity, to avoid, or doesn’t see me at all—because, to some people, I’m not even a person.

Yeah, you nailed it, surfer dude. I’m real lucky! I’m as lucky as the lone, bruised banana in the grocery store. Someone removed it from the others in the bunch and left it behind. It is ignored, pushed aside, and abused until the produce employee tosses it into the trash.

And that’s exactly how his comment made me feel, like I’m a piece of trash. But maybe I was just tired. Or maybe Trevor was right, and I’m actually getting sick. Either way, my head throbbed, and I may have just failed my exam, so…I agreed with him.

“Yeah, I guess so,” I said to him.

Surfer dude grinned and traipsed away, and I carried on down the hill.

Almost immediately, my path was blocked by a couple who were holding hands and walking at a snail’s pace. As I cut left to bypass them, my heart leapt, because a bicycle wheel nearly grated my shoulder.

“Watch it!” the cyclist yelled, attempting to slow his speeding contraption.

“You watch it!” I protested and swerved in front of him. I pushed past the slow couple and looked back at the cyclist. His sour face matched my mood, so I stayed in the middle of the sidewalk and pushed my wheelchair to its limit.

Soon, I was barreling past people at speeds I thought impossible. The wheelchair ferociously vibrated from each and every divot, bump, and crack in the sidewalk. But come what may, I refused to slow.

Near the end of the hill, I checked once more over my shoulder. Pedaling with force, the bicyclist would soon overtake me, but I did it. I beat him to the bottom!

Like always, I grabbed my wheelchair’s right rim to make the turn toward the library’s parking lot, but, instead of turning right, the wheelchair spun uncontrollably, churning me in two or three dizzying circles.

I’m sure the “worriers” thought I was a goner, but there’s a reason I have inclined wheels and always wear my seatbelt. I may have a need for speed, but I have no interest in getting my head split open. Yet…what was that?! “Ow!”

I had briefly closed my eyes to cure the dizzy spell and suddenly felt a whack to the head. Upon opening my eyes, the bicyclist was pedaling away, and I put it together—he slapped me!

“Better luck next time, Quickie!” he yelled, mocking the brand of my wheelchair, and raised his middle finger.

“What a jerk!” A young woman said behind me. “You want me to chase him down and push him over?”

Inside, I screamed, “Yes! Please!” But turning toward her, I stammered, “N–no. I–uh…I…”

The instant I locked eyes with her, I forgot how to speak. There’s a tired old phrase, “she took my breath away,” but in this case, it was absolutely true.

“Are you all right?” she asked.

“I’m…”

Again, I was at a loss for words, because for that brief dizzying moment, I forgot who I was. Yet, once another guy walked by and she looked over at him, I remembered exactly who I was.

“I’m fine,” I told her. “It’s just one of those days.”

I gripped the wheels, readying to continue on and expecting her to do the same, but she didn’t. Even more surprising, when I looked past her dark-rimmed glasses, what I saw wasn’t pity—it was genuine concern. And deeper, past the concern, was…something else. Something…magnetic. Something…spiritual. As if the other old phrase were true, that eyes are windows to the soul, and I was seeing hers—beautiful, vibrant, angelic.

I had to think of something to say. Something to keep her interest. That’s when I saw it. Clutched in her hand was a banana.

“That your dinner?” I asked her.

She didn’t immediately respond, and I wondered if it was because she felt the same magnetism through my eyes. Then I realized how ludicrous that sounded, how I wasn’t in my right mind, and how I wanted more than anything to be on my way home. So I looked past her to my ultimate destination—the library parking lot. And that’s when I almost missed her response.

“It’s just a snack,” she quietly said.

"Huh?" She spoke so softly that I had to replay the sound of the sentence in my mind, over and over, until I figured it out.

Somewhere in the world, “it’s just a snack" translates to “I love you,” right?…Right?

No, I suppose not.

“Well,” I said, “it’s quite bruised. You should probably throw it out.”

“Bruises mean it’s perfectly ripe,” she spoke up.

“The bruises mean it’s inedible mush. You should toss it and get a new one.”

“Don’t insult my banana,” she said, then explained that it was a “rescue.” That she found it laying on the cafeteria floor and picked it up, because: what if someone stepped on it and tripped? Or what if it got kicked under a shelf and rotted? No! She had to rescue it.

“You pitied it,” I told her.

“No.” She shook her head. "I fell in love with it. Or at least the idea of it. Why buy a new flawless banana, when I could have one that’s been on a journey through life? One that’s mature, softened, and sweet.” She began to peel the banana, then offered me a bite.

“Try it,” she said. “Try a bite, and tell me it’s not the best banana you’ve ever had.”

And that was it. Love at first bite.

Two years later, we graduated and married. She works as a physical therapist. And me…I’m a computer programmer. Turns out I didn’t do so terribly on that exam after all. In fact, I aced it. And soon after, I switched majors.

And one other thing…I eventually realized the surfer dude was right. I am lucky.