Nipped

I had wanted an apple tree when I was little. I'd imagined sitting under it, with all the red apples hanging low just waiting for me to pick them. Or I could just wait for them to fall and roll next to me, and the world would be wonderful.

I don't know but, every time I saw someone on TV munch on an apple, I had always wished I had had one, though I know it was supposed to be a big sin, considering what happened to Eve and Adam. I thought it an amazing fruit that one can have without having to peel it off. Having a garden with just apple trees was better than a chocolate house.

One day, many years ago, my godmother came to visit. It was already late in the afternoon after her office hours, and my mother had gone to the market to buy fish and vegetables- food I wished would have totally disappeared from the earth. My godmother rarely visited our house, and when she did, she would always have treats for us- cakes, fancy bread, mangoes, and sometimes, when I prayed hard enough, toys. That afternoon, however, I knew it was going to be great, for I had not missed Sunday masses for months.

My sister and I paused from playing marbles with the kids from the other side of the river and ran to meet Ninang. Ninang asked for my mother, but mother had just left, so that would mean waiting for her for another hour or two. Ninang couldn't wait she said, so she left us with a box and said, "I hope you like it". I had wished for it to be a toy truck inside, and rushed to open it. By this time, the other kids were already around us, as curious.

They were the reddest and the smoothest apples I had seen. They also smelled like Christmas. I took one out so proud that finally, I got not just to touch an apple but own one. A real apple! So I showed this to everybody, and asked, do you know what this is? Of course everybody knew what it was. I could see how envious the other kids were, muttering how the apples looked delicious. One smug kid even said how it could be eaten straight like how people do it on TV. But this was my moment, so I didn't let him talk some more by distributing the apples to everyone around. I caught the hesitation on my sister before she took the first bite, and then I realized something. By then, it was already too late.

I could not finish the one I was eating and I could not really make out what they were all saying over the excitement. I gave mine to somebody I could not remember. I felt like I was going to be sick. What am I going to tell mother? Should I still tell her? Would she be mad? I was deep in these thoughts when mother arrived. My sister came to greet her while I stood there frozen.

She asked why all the kids were still there that late (6pm was late, then). The smug kid said I had given them some apples! I swear I could have smashed that kid's face. But let's just say that something else got smashed that night. Oh, and it was worse than the stick broom on my butt. Mother did not mind me giving the kids the apples, smug kid included. It was the why that she didn't like. And for the rest of the night, I was the topic at home, and at the dinner table, schooling me about humility, modesty and how I should shun ostentation, especially since, there was nothing to be ostentatious about. This was not fun, and so traumatizing that I would probably remember this forever, clear as daylight.

Before I turned in for the night, I asked my sister why she hadn't stopped me. The apples looked yummy, she said. Even if I thought so, too, I would remember to wait for mother before opening boxes ever again.