The years crawled past. Shelly watched that pathetic tree take hold in the desert. Day after day. Week after week. She couldn’t help but notice, walking past her big windows to the kitchen she rarely used. Each time she needed a drink or scrubbed her hands or looked for leftovers in the fridge — there it was.
A sapling, then branches, then fruit.
Until finally one morning she walked outside and pulled one of the limes, bending the branch low until it snapped off in her hand.
She held it like a diamond. Inspecting it. Resenting it. How is it, with no effort, this little shit becomes what it’s supposed to become?
Then a pause.
Then Shelly held it to her nose, she closed her eyes, and she smelled summer and tacos and falling asleep on the beach.
She smelled what life smells like when you pull until it snaps.