It was a busy Saturday morning at the Farmer’s market. People meandered through stalls of fresh produce, fast food and artistic handcrafted goods. Tobias stared morosely over the top of a fat, green cabbage at the bustling activity. His nose twitched as the scent of sizzling hamburgers and banana bread wafted past him.
He had been assigned temporary management status over his father’s vegetable stall for the next two hours while his father dealt with a minor family emergency. Their dog, Dog, had tried to test the edibility of a can of boot polish and deciding that it was better out than in, had proceeded to throw up all over the house. And on his great-aunt Mirabel - who’d fainted. Until she was resurrected, Tobias’s taciturn neighbour who sold melancholy woodcuts was asked to kindly watch over him.
Tobias wasn’t particularly happy about this arrangement. He’d rather be partaking of the colourful activity on the other side of the artichokes than exchanging silent nods with a man who hadn’t spoken three words since the continental drift happened. Instead, here he was, organizing a mêlée between the fearless red peppers and the circumspect, yet no less formidable beets. It appeared the brussel sprouts had sided with the peppers and were insidiously infiltrating the beet camp. The beets didn’t really have much of a plan. They just rolled over all opponents. Toby liked beets. He felt this was good enough reason to grant them victory. The peas cheered from the stands.
Giving a carrot one last poke, he sighed. As far as sighs go, this was the sort that indicates that though the sighee has come to grudging terms with the present situation, he is feeling decidedly put upon, and would seriously, honestly, die to be anywhere else, doing homework in his room even, than be here with vegetables for company, Mr. Woodcut included.
“Well, hello there, sweetie, aren’t you a big boy looking after your daddy’s business?” enquired a middle-aged voice, dripping sweetness.
Toby stared. Was she serious? He was ten years old, not some gibbering toddler.
The woman’s mega-wattage smile faltered in the face of Toby’s unimpressed stance, “Uhm, so where is your daddy? I’m having the girlfriends over for supper tomorrow, and Muffy just loves her veggies. Oh, let me tell you, that woman could use a bit more meat in her diet but it’s that husband of hers, always going on about some new diet fad-”
“Peas are 3$ for the pound,” Toby cut in.
Startled at the interruption, she paused.
“For your vegetarian friend, Fluffy. She’ll like them. Very fresh. So are the carrots. You can make her a nice tofu steak to go with it,” Toby said quickly, filling a bag with farm freshness, “Honest, she’ll be surprised it’s not meat, that’s how good they are. You can buy them at Penny’s Organic store. That’ll be 5$ and 53 cents, please.”
Dazed, Muffy’s considerate host accepted the bag shoved into her face and handed Toby the money.
Before she could recover, he desperately grinned at her, “Thank you for your business, please come back next week, oh, I think that lady at Penny’s store might be waving at you…’kay bye!”
Toby felt a tiny pang of guilt as she uncertainly waddled away. Sitting back, he sighed and caught Mr. Woodcut’s gaze.
He had an impressed glint in his eye, and nodded his approval.
Toby wondered what Mr. Woodcut would have done. Just stare people into silence, probably. For all that people wanted to be listened to, with or without the listener’s consent, there was something very unsettling about the yawning receptiveness of the truly unflappable.
Proud of his first sale, Toby surveyed passing customers shrewdly, but not too closely, in case they felt the need to coo over the young proprietor of the fruit and veg stand.
“Toby! Hey! Whatcha doing?”
It was his friend, Wren, trailing behind his mother.
“Hey, Wren. Just watching my dad’s store for a bit,” he said as indifferently as he could, trying to imply that this was minor compared to other important things on his agenda.
“Cool! My dad would never let me do something like that. He says I’m as unmanageable as a sack full of angry cats.”
“Wren!” his mother flushed, “Wren is just joking, as was his father. Isn’t that right, Wren?”
At his mother’s pointed expression, Wren replied slowly, “But you also said-”
Coughing loudly, Wren’s mother took his hand in hers and turned an embarrassed smile at Toby, “Well, these sure do look fresh. How much for the asparagus?”
As Toby completed the transaction, he caught up on the events since the previous afternoon, because everybody knows that an evening is a lifetime of interesting happenings in the life of a ten year old. Virtual villains were slain with gut-spilling gusto, empires were created, and strategies spawned; but only for an hour because too many videogames are bad for the eyes, and you better clean your room right now, young man, or you’re not getting any chocolate fudge ice cream after dinner.
And thus did the time pass, with Toby filling up his father’s cash box using his winning smile and excellent customer service, which largely involved saying, “Yeah, 4.50$ please, thank you, laters.”
Toby saw his father rushing through the crowd, looking frustrated and not a little anxious, “Hey son, how’s it going?”
“Good,” Toby continued proudly, “We made 64$ and 29 cents. Wren’s mom said to keep the change and your friend Alan said to remind you about fishing tomorrow. He said you should pick up bait. Is that worms? Can I see them when you get them?”
Grinning affectionately, his dad ruffled Toby’s hair, “Good job, son. Maybe next time, you can come with me when I go pick these up from the farm. Thanks for watching him,” he said to Mr. Woodcut, who simply nodded amiably.
“Can I go see the stores, now?”
“Sure, ask Mel to go with you. Here’s twenty dollars. Get whatever you want,” he grinned as Toby whooped and gave him a quick hug before dashing off to fulfill his dreams for the day.
All in all, he reflected later, as he chomped on an artery-clogging cheeseburger with one hand and hacked at invisible opponents with his newly purchased wooden samurai sword with the other, market day ruled.
