The Hissing Watermelon

So, on Thursday night, as Sarah and I were cleaning up in the kitchen after a little soiree, we heard a peculiar sound. At first I thought she was trying to quiet me down by "shushing" me, but after looking at her, I realized that she wasn't doing that at all. In fact, she had stopped dead in her tracks because she had heard the same thing.

"Um, what is that?" I asked.

"I think it's coming from the watermelon," she said.

"Uh, yeeeah, it is." I nodded toward the melon. Not only was it hissing like a banshee, but foamy juice was mildy erupting from its rotting side as well.

Suddenly, eerie flashbacks of this past fall appeared in my mind's eyes. One dreadful October afternoon, I opened the door to my room only to find nasty juice (courtesy of a rotting pumpkin sitting smugly on my armoire) dripping and seeping its ugly stench into my silk scarf and burgundy shag rug.

I shook that awful vision from my mind, and amidst the shrieks and squeals, I managed to maneuver my hands around the squishy, tempered melon and dropped it into the trash can that Sarah brought out from under the sink. We were like brave and valiant warriors. I mean, basically, we were pretty much super-heroes. I think they have TV shows for people like us.

We hissed right on back at that melon. That melon meant nothing to us. It had nothing on us. Nothing. Nothing at all. That melon was hisssstory.