THE TALE OF POOR THOMAS
BY LEN SOUSA
Originally Published:
Gangsters In Concrete (Spring 2003)
No one ever thinks all that much about pumpkins unless it’s Halloween. It’s the fruit of the festival and they go hand in hand. But what would you say to Thomas? Poor Thomas lives with pumpkins every day of his life. For, you see, he has the head of a pumpkin—orange, grooved, and smelling of autumn.
Now, would you think of Thomas as less than human? Would he be what you might consider a “freak”? Would you imagine him sitting on a stool in a striped tent, ignoring the people walking by to have a look? Would Thomas even have a name? Or would he be remembered by some cruel moniker such as The Amazing Pumpkin-Headed Boy?
Thomas was truly a kind soul. I suppose in remarking on the memory of any person some creative license is taken, and certain embellishments to the truth tend to occur, but by all accounts, no one could have asked for a more kind-hearted individual than Thomas. Day in and day out, he would continually be asked the same questions. And much like the Elephant Man before him, he understood everyone’s questions and took the time to answer them all. He didn’t like pumpkin pie. He didn’t dream about pumpkin patches. And he never had the temptation to carve his face.
As with any tale worth its weight in Dickens, it begins with a birth. When Thomas was born, he looked like any other child might. They say he was born with eyes bluer than any moon glow and the thin strands of hair atop his head were an angelic sort of yellow. His skin was described as fair, and whenever the child laughed, he made the entire room flush with envy at his tiny joy.
The story goes that on Thomas’s first birthday, his mother noticed his skin beginning to darken—not a darkening of the sun, but more in an unsightly hue of orange. It was some months later when small orange patches began to erupt all over the child’s face. Horrified, Thomas’s young mother rushed her boy to the local doctor who instantly pronounced his condition:
“Ma’am, I’m afraid your child’s beautiful head is turning into a pumpkin,” he stated plainly. He smiled with the addition of, “But thankfully, Halloween has come and gone this year.”
At once, poor Thomas’s mother went limp and collapsed to the floor. She had died of shock and the thought of having conceived of a pumpkin-headed child.
Thomas’s father was thus left to care for his only son, and it was no doubt with care that he scribbled the infant’s name on a scrap of paper and left him on the steps of a cathedral in the hopes the church would care for his orange-fruited child. Unfortunately, the church, which traditionally has not cared for fruits of any kind, gave the child to a blind couple living in the small town of Exeter.
These kind, blind souls had been without sight since birth and hadn’t the slightest conception of what a pumpkin might look like. Fittingly, Thomas the newborn didn’t have a conception of anything, and the match made was a happy one.
Years went on and Thomas lived with his blind parents in their small New England cottage, helping with chores and reading the letters the family received. By the time Thomas was fifteen years old, his head had erupted into a complete pumpkin. There was no longer any mistake that the boy’s head was that of a gourd. It was shaped rather nicely, and had the diameter of some eight or nine inches. And the stem atop his pumpkin head was always neatly trimmed so as not to attract any unsightly stares.
Most of Thomas’s childhood was spent in the small town his loving parents raised him in, and after years of acquaintance no one, aside from a curious visitor or two, questioned Thomas about his pumpkin top. They rather liked having Thomas in the neighborhood and accepted him as he was. He was kind to children and animals; and even enjoyed doing yard work around the little house.
It was an unseasonably warm October day when the first of them began to arrive in Exeter. And like everyone else, Thomas accepted them with open arms and a warm welcome. He was always pleased to meet visitors in town and accepted their questions graciously. Thomas found some of their questions odd and wondered why they cared so much about his childhood and other things they had no business to know about. Yet he was happy to speak to them and tell all about his pumpkin head and his pumpkin-headed childhood.
Soon, newspapers from the major cities began to write about Thomas. They were amazed by him. Not that poor Thomas believed he had done anything to warrant such attention. His parents were pleased with Thomas’s fame, though wary of all the visitors. They called Thomas’s house too often, asking more and more questions. Thomas was tired of answering questions. He wanted to be left alone.
Then Halloween of that fateful year arrived. Suddenly, hundreds of visitors surrounded poor Thomas’s home. All with questions, pencils, and pads. Do you eat pumpkins? Have you ever tasted your head? What do you think of Halloween? What do you think of being called ‘The Pumpkin Boy’? How does it feel to be adopted and have a pumpkin head?
“Please, please,” Thomas finally pleaded. “I just want to be left alone, and go back to the way things were. I’ve already answered all of your questions and I don’t think I can answer them anymore.”
Thomas then broke down and began sobbing into his hands. The crowd grew quiet. Perhaps they realized what they were doing. After all, Thomas was only a boy. He didn’t need all this attention, nor did he ask for any of it. Wasn’t it wrong to constantly bother the boy about his uncommon head?
As the silence continued and the scribbling of pencils stopped, a boy of no more than eight years who was standing behind the crowd emerged at its front. He walked up to Thomas quietly and Thomas lifted his head to meet the boy’s eyes expecting him to say something.
“I like pumpkins,” the boy finally said. “And you seem like the nicest.”
“Thank you,” Thomas replied, his weeping having stopped. “You seem nice, too.”
And before Thomas could continue, the small boy removed a spoon from his pocket and dug it into Thomas’s pumpkin skull removing some inner pumpkin pulp and shoving it into his mouth. Thomas, in response, did nothing. His body slumped down and the boy continued to dig into the pumpkin mass with greater ferocity.
The crowd watched the boy’s movements without a word. Soon they approached Thomas themselves, each plunging into the mass of his pumpkin innards and shoving them into their hungry mouths. Most dove after the soft interior while others broke off portions of the orange top, crunching as they ate up all they could. The hungry visitors devoured all of Thomas’s head until there was nothing left. And poor Thomas, poor Thomas with the pumpkin head, lay still, silent, and dead.
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