I don’t trust peaches. I never have. There’s something unsettling about their fuzz that makes my stomach curl.

I seem to recall as a child biting into a ripe and beautiful peach only to discover that it had been overcome by rot – starting at the pit and spreading in tendrils outward, festering toward (but never quite reaching) the surface, leaving it looking innocent and unmarred. A disarmingly pleasant disguise for the putrescence that waited just underneath.

A little market materializes, as if out of thin air, in front of the cathedral on Tuesdays and Saturdays. Farmers and merchants from all across the island show up to sell their produce and wares. And one of those farmers this past week attempted to push me into buying his peaches.

“They’re delicious,” he said. “They’re juicy,” he said. I expressed my disinterest and tried to walk away, but he took hold of my wrist. “Everyone loves peaches,” he said. “Buy one for the missus,” he said.

I shook my arm from his grasp, and in a rare fit of anger, I told him exactly how I felt about his peaches. I did not choose my words wisely. It’s possible that I might have also… told him exactly where he should put his peaches. …but that’s hardly the point!

The reason I bring this up is that I saw him again today. I have felt embarrassed and ashamed ever since the incident and had approached him with the intent to apologize.

And now my eye is swollen shut from where his fist collided with my face.