No matter how often you say you don’t like kiwis, you always end up eating one.
They scratch your tongue, you say. They make it bleed, and your taste buds start falling off.
But you eat them. In a tough choice, kiwis are always the easy way out because having a furry brown-green fruit in your hand looks sophisticated. And it’s better than nothing. Never be caught with nothing in your hand, or people will think you want something to do when you really just want to be lazy. Thus you are standing there with a kiwi in your hand—eating it, maybe—pretending you are useful.
In the first few moments of obtaining the kiwi, you like to stare at it. Like it’s special. Different from all the other kiwis you’ve forced down your throat. At the peak of the crescendo of hope, you peel it. It doesn’t taste very good, all sour and scratchy on your tongue.
People see you, often, holding a kiwi, or eating it, or playing tag with it in the hallways. People are beginning to expect you with a kiwi in your hand. You oblige. They claim it’s your favorite fruit because they want to think they know you.
So you take a kiwi. It’s the only thing you know how to do. It hurts your tongue. It still tastes better than rejection.