'Tangerine' by Daniel Shooter

The behaviour of the man opposite is fascinating. He looked harmless when I chose him in the half-full carriage: normal-looking, thirties, clean-shaven, smart yet casual, sat at a table for four by himself. The risk with wanting a table is getting a talker, table-hogger, legroom monopoliser, or even worse a fidget or incontinent constantly needing me to move. Nice thirties guy had a book, bottle of water, phone, and a tangerine. When I motioned to the seat to ask if it was free, he nodded, eyes glued to his paperback, and moved his feet behind his half of the table. Courteous.

I had chosen well. I plugged in my laptop for the forty-minute email frenzy. As I hit send on the first message, he inserted a bookmark, and lined up the book with his phone, water bottle and the edge of the table. All right-angles. Precise.

When he prised open the tangerine it erupted with a fizz. Peeling it in one go, he carefully placed the skin on the table, and then wiped the juice with a travel-pack tissue from his pocket. Methodical. Clean.

I couldn’t concentrate; my stomach gurgled at the sharp citrus aroma, and when he ate the segments he didn’t remove any pith. He picked up the book with fingertips on opposite corners, carefully avoiding the bottle and phone, then popped pieces into his mouth, ignoring the thick white tendrils on the outside. Odd, I thought, doesn’t everyone remove excess pith? When every segment of tangerine was gone, he repeated the delicate book-phone-bottle geometry, then tore the tangerine skin into tiny pieces and placed them on the table in a grid. Seven by seven. A trellis of forty-nine almost identically sized bits of fruit peel. Obsessive.

Re-opening his book he proceeded to eat the rind one piece at a time, as if it was the most normal thing in the world. A long tongue stretched from his mouth, (I had a split-second vision of it being put to proper use), and each morsel was placed ceremoniously on the end. He chewed deliberately before swallowing, jaw slowly circling, grinding. Meticulous.

I stopped typing, unable to wrench my eyes away, embarrassed that he must have noticed me staring. By the time I had to get my things together there was one row of shredded peel left. Time to make up my mind.

‘Hey’, I say as coolly as I can, ‘nice trick with the fruit’. He looks up. Have I misjudged? My feel for these things is usually spot-on. ‘This is my stop, here’s my number if you fancy a drink’. He looks at my business card, then back up at me as I bag my laptop and stand.

‘Patrick’, he says, extending his hand, cool to the touch.

‘Tom’, I say.

His eyes are deep black pools. Dizzying. Inviting.


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'Tangerine' was first published by Lunate on 2 March 2020.