He arrived at the house, and briefly plopped his ass down on the sofa. He was still in a state of awe at Mitch's words. Between that and his blatant concern for Marissa, he was at a loss with what to do with himself. He settled on getting to Marissa as his immediate priority, and went up to his room to go and get changed. He threw on his favorite pair of faded blue jeans and his pinstripe button-up, and pulled his necklace out from under his fresh shirt. But only after he was ready to go did he realize that there was a parcel on the top of his bed that his mom must have brought up.
The box was about the size of a football, and had no sender address from what he could tell. What Mitch had said rumbled through his mind like a firecracker, erupting in separate, disorganized thoughts. Was this the catalyst? With great anxiety he tore the box open, and could barely believe what he saw lay inside. It was a fruit, he guessed. He didn't know what else it could be. It had a stem. It looked… fruity. Marissa did say that it lacked any seeds, perhaps this is why. But he couldn't comprehend it. All this over some stupid fruit, he pondered. He couldn't even accept it, a reality too dumbfounding. What on earth would a prominent world power want with food? Not only that, but why was it there? What possible significance could he possibly have? Perhaps he had just as much significance as Marissa, perhaps less. Whatever the case, it was a fruit, and somebody had sent him one. How kind of them.
And coincidentally at that precise moment a bizarre hunger overtook him immediately. Whether it was a hunger for food or a hunger for something else entirely, he had no clue. He just wanted it in that second more than anything else. He picked up the fruit in haste and noticed that there was a note placed cleverly underneath the item.
It read: "Show me what you're made of.
Yours truly, The World."
Loren chuckled a bit. It appeared someone had a sense of humor. He peeled off the bizarre light-tan exterior with a spiraled, squiggly pattern off the fruit, very similar to how one peels the skin off of a banana, and consumed the contents greedily. The fruit lacked any flavor at all, it was as if he were eating plain yogurt with the complexion and texture of a banana as well. But there was something else to it, something he couldn't quite place. And there were no seeds to be had. Funny, a fruit with no seeds, he thought as he swallowed.
What he couldn't place then he could place in a couple of seconds. It was dry. So very, very, dry. It was as dry as the desert itself. And soon his mouth became completely dry; his spit disappeared in his mouth in an instant, but still he ate. He took bite after bit, holding it from the bottom, until there was nothing left of it.
Soon everything felt like it began to dry up. His face first, then his torso, and then his limbs succumbed to what seemed to be an immediate desiccation, as if the moisture had left his body entirely. He looked down at his hands, and despite having lost feeling they looked quite the same. His body continued into a paralyzing numbness for several minutes. His body had become a dry prison for his screaming mind; he couldn't move at all now. It was like in his dream, when had turned to stone, but he looked fine this time, for which he thanked in the back of his head.
After sitting on his bed for several, enduring minutes he slowly regained feeling in his limbs, and returned back to normal in due time. But he quickly collapsed backwards, to lie down on his bed for at least a couple of minutes. He didn't know what had happened, or if anything else would for that matter. For a second he even considered that it was a prank. Perhaps some sort of drug was inside the genetically altered fruit made for him to trip, as with acid he surmised. He just wanted to make sense of the situation where there was none to be had.
Sooner than later he remembered that he had somewhere to be, and that was at Marissa's house. He got up in a hurry, and shot her a quick text saying that he was coming. He didn't get an immediate reply, but didn't fear the worst. He ran over in a hurry. He found for whatever reason that it didn't take much energy at all to run as he went the numerous blocks to Marissa's. She was in the neighboring suburb community. So he had quite the jog ahead of him. He put off the event in his mind as meaningless, just some sort of weird, non-consequential experience. He wasn't positive after all that it was what she was talking about, her and Lauren, whom he could not wait to tell this about.
He also failed to notice the slight trail of sand he left as he sprinted to save his would-be lady-love.