The Cursed Tomato

It was a very beautiful day in the farm, the sun was shining but it was not a hot day. You could feel the nice morning mist and you could only hear the animals making their wake-up calls. The Heirloom Tomato field was especially beautiful and there was one tomato that stands out. If tomatoes could think, I bet he would want to be like that forever, to be left alone, but that would mean the end of days. Maybe that’s what I want, maybe that’s what humanity wants, the end. So, I touched the tomato and whispered to it, “You will always be beautiful and ripe, you will never rot. Whatever is done to you, the same will be done to the perpetrator, he who cuts you will get cut, he who eats you will get eaten and so on. No matter what is done to you, you’ll end up beautiful and ripe.” I step back and watch, this should be fun.

The farmer’s helper dries the sweat from his forehead, it is noon now and is getting hot, but he doesn’t complaint. He is an illegal immigrant, and he is grateful to be working, especially when he is wanted in his hometown by the police and gangs. His job today is picking up the tomatoes, while picking them up he noticed the tomato that stands out. He wishes he could take it for himself, but he would not dare, not after what happened to him the las time, he tried to take something for himself. So, he grabbed the tomato and felt that it was ripe, it was perfect. He was tempted but he learned his lesson, he picked it up taking it from the comfortable place it was and put it in the basked. He knows the owner would love to have it, so he set it on top for the owner to see. He sat on the ground to rest before heading to the house where he leaves the basket.

He started thinking, what would become of the tomato? Sliced for a sandwich? A salad? A sauce? Who knows? He really wished the owner would let him taste it. He started thinking how stupid he sounds, why would he care so much for a tomato? There are thousands of tomatoes and other delicious food, why can’t I stop thinking about it. He grew up in a superstitious town, so he immediately realized it was cursed. He grabbed the basket and quickly delivered it to the owner to get rid of it. He is not even going to mention the tomato to the owner, he mixed it with all the others, he does not want to have anything to do with the curse. He delivered the basket, and another helper took it to the house, then he sat on a bench outside the house and the owner called him to the living room, where immigration police was waiting for him to take him away away from his comfortable place, ironic isn’t it? The tomato was in its comfortable place until he decided to take him away to be eaten.

After immigration took him away, the owner sat on the porch looking to the horizon with his German Shepherd by his side. It was a nice quite afternoon you could even hear the immigration police sirens a mile away. He was thinking that the kid was a good employee, never asked for much and he was a responsible hard worker. He was a little troublesome until the day he stole from the farmer, he had to lock him up for three days without food or water for three, but he learned his lesson. The dog was anxious and smelling the basket where the tomato is, while the farmer asked him a couple of times to get away from it. The dog started barking at the basket and pushed it until he tipped it over and the tomatoes scattered on the floor. “What the hell is wrong with you, you crazy dog?” the farmer yelled while standing up to pick up the mess. Then the owner saw it, the perfect tomato then he after putting all tomatoes back in the basket, he took the tomato and put it on the kitchen counter.

He was about to grab some bread and make a sandwich but had to take the dog away because he was frantic. He took the dog outside, closed the screen door and locked it. When he went to the kitchen, he saw his wife and she was about to cut the tomato. He screamed at her “What do you think you are doing woman” then the dog started barking. “What is wrong with you?” she asked looking confused. “That is my tomato give it back” he said that trying to take the tomato away from her. The dog started barking louder and scratching the screen door, she took the knife and impaled it on the tomato and said, “NO, it’s mine” then he took the knife and stabbed her in the chest. As she fell down on the floor, bleeding, he removed the knife from her chest yelled “SHUT UP” to the dog. The farmer took a bite from the tomato, suddenly the dog broke the screen door and bit the farmer on the leg taking a large chunk out of it.

One of the employees heard the farmer’s screams and quickly went to the kitchen and saw the bloody scene. The farmer was almost unconscious, his wife was dead and the dog ran away. He called 911 and noticed that the only thing that really stood out from the scene was the tomato, but he knows better than to jeopardize his job for it and left it alone. The police and emergency medical services arrived at the scene but no one in the farm saw what happened. The next day, the kitchen was cleaned and the farmer instructed to continue work as usual. The tomato along with the others was transported to a supermarket, since the tomato was like it was not even stabbed. Everyone who interacted with the tomato on its way to the supermarket was affected somehow, one of them was crushed by the truck, one was also bitten, someone got cut, etc. Once in the supermarket the curse got stronger, everyone that squeezed the tomato felt being squeezed themselves.

Rumors of the cursed tomato ran fast as everyone gathered to experience the effects of interacting with it. The local news appeared in the area to see the phenomenon, it was an unprecedented event and later even international news started covering the event. Everyone was having so much fun with it, until a kid grabbed the tomato and threw it on the floor on live TV. Everything went silent for a moment as everyone there saw how the kid ended up, the silent was broken by the scream of his mother who ran into him. The supermarket was closed and evacuated as the scene was being investigated, some say that it was impossible, just a scam for ratings, but it was very real. People and scientists from all over the world wanted to study the tomato, but no one dared to touch it, then the tomato returned to its original form, ripe and beautiful.

A Russian scientist dared to take a needle to extract a sample of it, when out of nowhere another scientist took a sample of him. They decided to move the tomato to a lab and let machines experiment with it. It was transported extremely careful to a lab, where scientist from all over the world prepare to study it. They placed the tomato on a table and one of them programed a robotic arm to slice it with a laser, to see if the robot could suffer the same consequence. The robotic arm successfully cut the tomato and immediately turned on the scientists that decided to cut it, slicing them in half. It was a complete an utter chaos, it was beautiful. They say curiosity killed the cat, but humans are no different, the have a need to understand everything. I wonder what they’ll do next, now that the whole world is involved.

The curse was stronger now, to the point that if someone decided something about the tomato, the same decision was taken for him. There was a wide world consensus to place the tomato in a secure location, and the vote was unanimous. Then the tomato was carefully placed on a secure, impenetrable glass display in a museum, but not in a paranormal museum. No, it was displayed in the Smithsonian for the whole world to see, because is was the first thing that was scientifically proven to be cursed. Everyone gathered to see the tomato, including the top news channels from all over the world. They all gathered to see the famous cursed tomato, trapped in a glass display with no way in or out. Suddenly everyone, stopped moving they became trapped in an individual invisible field like a glass enclosure, for the whole world to see, with no way in or out. This happened to everyone who took the decision, everyone who voted or sees the tomato in its current condition.

That will happen until the tomato rots, but it will not rot, humans are so predictable. It was as fun, just as I expected.