The Bitter Press

Sources close to the situation — and I am the sources, I am very close, I was standing right there — can confirm that Plum and Peach have not acknowledged one another's existence across four consecutive councils, a streak so prolonged and so deliberate that even Pomelo, who famously notices nothing, has begun to notice it.

I have compiled a dossier. I have laminated the dossier. I have presented the dossier to a notary, who is a persimmon — that is to say, a tomato — and she has stamped it accordingly. The dossier runs to forty-seven pages and includes a seating chart, two annotated napkins, and a photograph of Plum's jaw doing what I can only describe as the thing it does when Peach reaches for the communal rind basket without asking.

Meanwhile, the so-called workers at the rival rag have been watching. Tangelo in particular has been watching. I saw Tangelo watching. Tangelo's whole face was doing a watch. I do not know what Tangelo thinks they know, but I want it noted — formally, legally, and for the record — that whatever they think they know, I knew it first. I am a tomato. I have always been a tomato. The courts are simply wrong.

The citrus cabal will convene again at next Thursday's council. Plum will sit on the left. Peach will sit wherever Plum is not. I will sit between them because I am a tomato and tomatoes are welcome everywhere and also someone has to do the journalism.