The Orange Farmer's Daughter

"The Orange Farmer's Daughter"

Once upon a time, there was an orange.

It wasn't just any orange, but the king of all oranges. Now now, don't be so quick to scoff. This orange grew in a secret grove filled with golden trees. It grew among its peers into a fruit without peer, the most delicious orange to ever live. This amazing orange's tree grew near a brook that babbled like no other brook had ever babbled. If this were a story about a little brook that babbled, you would no doubt be moved to tears in an instant, but it's not. So please hold your kleenex to the end.

One day, a squirrel was leaping through the trees, trying to find a decent meal. It sniffed at each and every orange in the tree, finding none to its liking. He was about to give up when it caught the mouth-watering scent of that most special of oranges.

The squirrel plucked the orange and took a deep whiff, snuffling with its snuffler. Immediately its mouth began to water. If that squirrel did nothing else with the rest of his life, he had to eat that orange. He was about to claw his way into the little fruit's tender flesh when the orange cried out in protest.

"Wait! You musn't eat me! I taste like poo!" It cried in a surprisingly shrill British accent.

The squirrel was convinced that the orange would not taste one bit like poop, but there was something about the orange's voice, the quality of its globular body. The squirrel melted dreamily into the citrus' lack of arms.

"I can't eat her! I just can't do it!" The squirrel cried in his inner monologue. But the allure of her scent was too much for him to bear. At once he knew there was only one to save the little orange's life. He threw her into the brook.

Down the river the orange floated, surprised at this sudden turn of events but happy to be alive. She floated from river to lake to sea and finally all the way to the ocean. The orange lost all track of time as she drifted, making shapes out of the clouds by day, and constellations out of the stars by night.

Finally ocean became sea once more, and sea became lake. Soon the orange was floating down another quiet little river. She drifted right near a farm that had been down on its luck for the past decade. The little farm was mere weeks from foreclosure and ruin.

When the orange saw the state of those dilapidated buildings, scrawny farm animals, and withered orange trees, she knew this was where she belonged. It's important for you to understand this, that the orange had a tongue. Why, you ask? Naturally because this tongue was the only way the orange could control her destiny. She used her tongue to paddle her way right to the shore, where she became trapped amongst the rocks.

The orange's plan was simple. She would give her life to become a tree with beautiful oranges that would save that failing farm. The farmer did not have much help left to him in those days, only his daughter Ruthy.

Ruthy was ambling along the path beside the river with bucket in hand, eager to collect M&Ms from the nearby M&M tree. When she saw that glint of light in the water she stopped, wandering if her eyes were playing tricks on her. There lay the orange, waiting to sacrifice itself.

Ruthy eagerly dropped her pail and ran to the river, snatching up the fruit whose seeds were as valuable as gold. Without hesitation, Ruthy's fingertips ripped the orange's flesh apart, and she ate it in one enormous bite.

The orange screamed all the way down.