The Split
By Peter Charles


I see now I was foolish to hope happiness might be mine. As I sit here typing, slime and ooze drip from my fingers, and I know I don’t have long. Perhaps, in the end, this is what I deserve.

I’m third generation mutant which makes me half-human, half banana. Sounds mad, sounds terrible if you dwell on it, but unbelievably it works. We work. We Bananamen and Bananawomen.

Not so good for our parents’ generation – too much banana. But this time around we’re mobile, we don’t ripen as fast and, most importantly, we don’t peel. Unless we want to.

I met Bella at a conference two years ago when we both were giving papers for the first time. We bonded initially on nerves but at night in the bar we found real soul partnership when Bella confided her fear of heights since the time early in life when she’d fallen from the family tree. I too had suffered bruising in childhood and bore the marks.

Our first unpeeling occurred soon afterwards at my holiday apartment in Ullapool. Bella’s stiff, greenish skin gave off aromas of spice and lemon when in three deft movements I pulled it from her. My own blotched coat flopped less impressively as she tugged it with sharp little teeth.

‘Oh Billy,’ she said.

‘Oh Bella,’ I said.

Her curve fit perfectly inside mine, and we curved all night. In the morning we kissed and cuddled. We nibbled at one another’s seams, tickling the erogenous, fibrous filaments. It was exquisite, every moment, and I sighed repeatedly as Bella slipped and slid against me. We discovered unerringly what the other enjoyed, so much so that I dared think the unthinkable.

‘Shall we?’ I said that evening.

‘What?’ said Bella, but I could tell she knew. She had the same love of the forbidden as I.

‘The thing,’ I said.

‘Oh yes,’ said Bella. ‘Let’s.’

I went to the kitchen unable to believe my own hopes. I got the stuff, most of which I’d bought from speciality websites, and hauled it through to the bedroom in stages. Outside, beyond the window which made up the west wall of the apartment, the sun dipped towards the surface of a turbulent hebridean sea.

The glass dish had been a real find, with its mass-produced deco style beloved of seaside cafes, only this one was six foot long. I tumbled into it two giant roundels of ice-cream then heaped on piles of synthetic cream using a compressor and a garden hose. It looked like a bed of clouds.

Bella’s eyes gleamed.

‘Let’s get in,’ I said.

I filled her hands and mine with the final ingredient and we clambered into the dish, lying side by side, head and toes touching. Between us were pillowy mounds of dairy product.

‘Ready?’ I said.

‘Yes,’ said Bella.

Together we tossed the contents of our hands high into the air. Bella squealed. I laughed a laugh of release. I don’t suppose I thought I would ever enjoy this moment with another Bananaperson. It seemed too much to believe that life could be so unbearably wonderful.

Like confetti the chocolate flakes descended. Neither of us, we confided in letters afterwards, had known a happier or more complete moment in our lives.

‘You’re a genius.’ said Bella.

‘You’re my brilliant assistant,’ I said.

Drenched in light from a sky-wide sunset we indulged every pleasure known to banana and man. And it was then, at the very height of my ecstasy, that my body split. Three ways, right down the middle.

Those familiar with Bananaperson physiology know that a split is a disaster. A split Bananaman cannot return to his skin. Without a skin he will ripen and rot.

And so I sit here now collapsing, feeling regret and yet no regret, typing these last words.

They’re for you, Bella.

My Love.

Goodbye.


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Peter Charles lives and is learning to write in the depths of south east London. Really, the depths. Actually, an abyss. He lives in an abyss in south east London. And tries to write.