Life After Coffee

by Virginia Franken

  Luckily, this rain only started after I picked up my new samples of Yayu this morning. There’s no way I’d have been able to identify any kind of plant varietal in this downpour. I’m right about the rain letting up; a few seconds more and it slows to a patter. And then it’s gone as quickly as it began. Within thirty seconds the humidity and the heat are back, and my drenched clothes start gently steaming. So now you see why I’ve never had much use for mascara. The birds start their singsong again, the crickets their chirping, and the forest is alive once more. The forest is an extremely noisy place. You’d be disappointed if you’d come all this way looking for silent solitude. A swarm of flying insects rushes through the canopy above. The way the sunlight catches them makes them look like enlivened particles of dust. I suddenly remember that I forgot to renew my yellow fever vaccination before I left. Oops.

  “Hey, Getu,” I say, and he stops. “Wait a second. I’ve spotted something.”

  He doesn’t say a word. He’s used to these frequent stops by now. Sometimes it takes us half a day to get back to the farm. The coffee trees in this forest grow wild, and there’s just an explosion of varietals all mixed in and growing together. This forest has the biogenetic diversity of central London at rush hour. Every time we come out, I see a coffee tree with a leaf size and color that I’ve never seen before. I take a clipping from the new tree, zip it into a plastic bag, and put it in my satchel next to my recent haul of Yayu beans. I’m cataloging all the new varietals I’m finding to try and get an understanding of the range of diversity in this forest. It’s astounding. I’ve counted thirty-seven new coffee trees so far. And I’ve only been here three weeks!

  My MO from Roth is to find Getu’s Yayu and confirm that it’s rust resistant, which I’ve done. But I’ve also been digging a little bit into why it’s rust resistant. I’ve been driving to Jimma University most days to do a deeper dive into the molecular structure of the bean and see what makes it so different from the other trees. The lab there is pretty basic, but I don’t need much more than a microscope, storage, and some enzymes. The research is going well so far. Slow, but well. I’ve identified seven polymorphic markers that seem to make this thing more inclined than the other trees to be disease resistant. I haven’t quite figured out the special DNA sequencing that makes it completely immune. But I’m getting there. And why am I doing this research? Because it’s important. And because this is my discovery. And because no one else seems to be doing much about the problem, and because this could potentially save a whole industry. It’s vital work in every sense. I must say, I don’t much like driving back and forth on that crazy rutted road to Jimma. However, having said that, the drive’s been getting a bit livelier recently due to my growing number of carpool buddies. Every time I see a woman loaded up like a packhorse—schlepping grain, firewood, et cetera.—if there’s room in the back, she gets a ride. After I stopped the first time, word spread, and now I’m something of a community bus service. They’re all pretty grateful for the ride in Getu’s old VW, and don’t seem remotely bothered by the lack of a working radio or air-conditioning.

  It feels good to be back in Africa. I’ve missed it. Life’s more real out here. Even the air’s alive. Charged. There are just fewer barriers between you and reality. There’s always a lightness to the scent of the forest just after it has rained. The air is soft and it smells fresh, green, pure, natural. Everything is lush and dripping with liquid: me, the trees, the vines. On our way out to find the Yayu this morning, a gorilla crossed our path and that seemed as normal as walking past a tomcat back home. I’m about as up close and personal as you can get with Mother Nature right now. And I love it.

  As we leave the cover of the trees and head back to Getu’s farm, I see there’s still a heavy layer of mist lying over the valley, even though it’s getting on toward noon. The hills are covered in trees for as far as I can see. I’ve never known a place to be so green. It’s not so far from here that the earliest fossils of modern humans were found. Some say that Ethiopia is the cradle of all humanity. The place on earth where our story began. As if God touched his hand down on Ethiopia’s red soil and said, “Begin. Flourish.”

  You’d think that now that I’m hanging out in this Garden of Eden, I wouldn’t have much trouble forgetting about the life I left behind in Pasadena. Or at least pushing it to the back of my mind most of the time. Not the case. That hard good-bye has haunted me for the last three weeks. I didn’t even stop crying till we touched down in Addis Ababa. That was like a day later! I miss them. Life has a bleak hole at its center without them. But sometimes—not that it’s in the cards—I do wonder what I would do if, out of nowhere, Peter figured out a way to make enough money so I didn’t have to do this anymore. Finding the best coffee in the world, bringing it to “civilization,” and working with these farmers to try and drag them and their families out of poverty—that’s what I do. As I discovered, without this job I’m just a clueless mother who’s still wearing Old Navy when she should clearly have moved on to Banana Republic at this stage of her life. Could I really ditch all this for a part-time job in a coffee shop and sincere conversations about junior soccer leagues? And now, of course, there’s the research. I’ve been searching for this rust-resistant varietal all of my career. And now that I’ve found it, there’s work to be done. Big work. As it is, I have to leave the coffee forest next week to go down to Colombia and it’s just too soon. I need more time here.

  As we approach the farm, I breathe in the scent of eucalyptus and charred coffee beans that permeates the air around Getu’s house. The beautiful brown-and-white chickens are running free and wild, and the family goat is standing nearby, seeming to await our return. Getu’s wife, Hanna, is working in the vegetable garden alongside their three sons and two of their daughters. She’s beautiful, like so many of Ethiopia’s women are. Her whole body is elegant and elongated; her cheekbones are high and wide, her nose looks like it’s made from the same fine porcelain she serves her coffee in, her eyes huge and clear, her hair naturally wild. If she lived in New York City, she’d have been model scouted by now. Maybe when the scouts get tired of exploiting eastern European women, they’ll find their way over here.

  I watch them all digging and weeding in their garden; they work so naturally together. I envy Hanna with all my heart. Here she is, working alongside her children in nature’s paradise, while mine are thousands of miles west doing goodness knows what—days of travel away should they need me urgently. This “uncivilized” woman is a much better, closer parent than I could ever hope to be. And her kids are just fine. They learn everything they need to know about their world by working right at her side. They’re always clean, fed, cared for, loved. They’re happy. Their whole family is happy. They’re together. Why can’t I have this?

  Rahel, Hanna’s youngest daughter, comes racing out of the house toward her mother. They both look at me and start waving. Rahel sprints over.

  “Ilmo,” she says, out of breath. That translates as “son.” Somehow without another word spoken I know that Billy’s on the phone. I dash back to the house and grab Getu’s cell. The thing’s supersized, complete with a pointy antenna on the top. But it works.

  “Billy?”

  “Mommy!” He sounds excited and distressed all at once, and my heart immediately breaks in two.

  Screw it. I know in that instant, from that one word, that I’d give it all up in half a heartbeat to be with him. I’d condemn the whole world to never drink another cup of coffee again if I could only hug him tight right now.

  “Billy, my lovely. Why are you calling?” He knows he’s only supposed to call outside of our weekly calls in an emergency. Calls from the United States to a cell phone in rural Ethiopia are not cheap.

  “Mommy, I miss you,” he says. And my devastation is complete. How can I do this? “When are you coming home?”

  “Not for a while yet, sweetheart.” I thought I might have time to stop home before Colombia, but it’s not going to happen. />
  “Mommy, I have to tell you something bad that I did.”

  The mind boggles. What’s he done? Set the neighbors’ tree house on fire? Given all of Violet’s dolls a crew cut? Snuck onto a cargo ship headed for Nigeria?

  “What is it, sweetie?” I’d forgive him more or less anything right now.

  “The reason Daddy’s writing career is over. It’s my fault.”

  “What did you do?”

  “I e-mailed Daddy’s script to that man he didn’t want to see it. And then the man was mad, and now Daddy can’t make money writing anymore.” So that’s how Nico got Draker’s Dark.

  “Sweetheart, you sending an e-mail is not the reason that Daddy can’t make any money writing.”

  “But I wanted him to stop so that he’d look after us again and you’d go back to work.” Um, jeez, thanks, Billy. “But now you’ve gone and I wish I hadn’t done it, ’cause now Daddy can never make any money and you can never come home. And it’s all my fault. I’m sorry, Mommy.” Billy starts crying, and whatever remnants of my heart are left crumble away to dust.

  And then I decide: I’m not doing this anymore. I’m not living another day without my children by my side. This stops. Now.

  “Billy, where’s your father?”

  “He’s out. We’re at Lizzie’s.” Oh my God. He’s making this call from my unemployed neighbor’s house!

  “As soon as he comes back, tell him you called me and tell him what you told me about Nico.”

  “Okay.”

  “And then you can tell him that I’m coming home.”

  CHAPTER 26

  I’m woken by a gentle but firm touch on the shoulder. I pull up my eye mask to see the Air France flight attendant smiling down at me. She’s perfect. How is it possible to look so pulled together and immaculate toward the end of a long-haul flight? Maybe there’s a secret flight attendants’ lounge on the plane where they all go to get restful massages and have their red lipstick flawlessly reapplied by an in-flight makeup artist. Otherwise, how could it be possible?

  “Madam, we are approaching our descent. Please fasten your seat belt.”

  I oblige her and she moves on. Or should I say, floats on. I can only imagine the bedlam that would ensue if a bolt of Freaky Friday lightning were to hit the plane and she and I swapped lives. God knows how a woman accustomed to living a life of calm within the clouds would cope when thrown into the utter insanity that I’m sure is going to greet me as soon as I touch down at LAX.

  My mouth feels vile. That last glass of airplane white wine was not a good idea. I’m not the kind of woman to keep a compact mirror handy, but if I were, and if I were to look in it, I’m sure I’d look a state. It’s been a hell of a journey. I’ve been moving infinitesimally in the right direction with each flight for about two days now. And this is my final one. It’s no quick feat to spontaneously travel to the States from the depths of Africa. I flew from Jimma to Addis Ababa to Saudi Arabia to Berlin to Paris (don’t ask) before finally getting on this flight to Los Angeles. As well as not looking good, I’m pretty confident I don’t smell that great either. Both my clothes and I are still covered in a layer of dried sweat and forest rain. After I hung up from talking to Billy, I started moving and I didn’t stop. I was worried that if I paused to take a shower or change clothes, my impetus—fueled by nothing more than my crazy—might have been lost.

  And maybe a pause in the impetus wouldn’t have been such a bad idea. The fewer miles between Los Angeles and me, the more excited I’ve become at seeing the kids, but the more frantic I’m getting about what the hell our family is going to do. Roth was furious, of course. He’d pretty much staked the survival of his company on locating that bean. I still can’t believe I did it. And I can’t believe I stood my ground and didn’t tell him Getu’s location. It’s still my find of the century. It’s about all I’ve got standing between my family and their starvation. The information’s valuable, though I’m not quite sure how I can make it pay. Especially now that I’ve decided never to be parted from my children again. I honestly don’t know what we’re going to do in the immediate future. We’ll have to sell the house straightaway. Luckily, the market’s come back and I bought that house before prices went insane, so if we make a quick sale, we can live off the equity for a while. A few months anyway. But then what? Should we move to Oregon and grow pot for cash? Start a commune? Should I try to persuade Peter to take a Chippendales job after all? I wonder if I could go back to college and finish off my botany degree. Not that the world is crying out with a need for botanists right now. I could always take my research on the Yayu to Monsanto or one of the other evil conglomerates. The money they’d drop for the DNA sequencing to a rust-resistant Arabica! But could I do that? Realistically? I’d feel about as comfortable handing Violet over to Woody Allen for the afternoon so I could go for a spot of light shopping in downtown Manhattan. In other words: it’d probably work out okay, but why on earth would you take the risk with something so dear to you?

  We land. Through the haze of jet lag and shitty plane sleep, I make my way through passport control and then customs. The minute I step out into arrivals, I see Peter. He’s alone. I’m immediately all-over cold with nerves. I don’t know which reaction I’m more terrified of: a furious tirade or him dismissing my whole flight from paid employment with a distracted “It’ll be fine.” Because I’m pretty certain it won’t be fine. I’ve burnt my bridges with Roth. And the coffee world is tiny. Everyone will have heard what I’ve done by now. Some of the more enterprising among them will be on the next plane to Ethiopia, combing the coffee forests for the discovery. They won’t find it. I’ve known Getu for eight years and I’m the only buyer he trusts. He’s been burned before, and badly. He’ll keep the whole thing secret until I tell him otherwise. He knows I’ll handpick someone to work with him.

  Peter doesn’t see me at first. He looks bored. And then he spots me. And his reaction tells me exactly how he’s going to take this: he’s over the moon. He somehow looks younger, infused with the good stuff. He pushes his way through the chic French tourists and sweeps me up off the ground, squeezing me till I think I’m going to break, or at least pee myself. And then we’re kissing. And it’s the kind of kiss that has my fellow passengers rolling their eyes at the girl with the oversized backpack being greeted by her boyfriend at the airport. No one would take us for lukewarm married-with-children right now. We look young and in love. And I feel young too, despite the two nights of airport sleep. I feel like I could do anything if I’ve got him on my side. Maybe this was the right choice.

  “You’ve really gone and screwed it up this time, haven’t you?” he says, that dopey grin still on his face.

  “Kinda,” I say. “Where are the kids?”

  “With Lizzie. I wanted you all to myself for a moment,” he says and goes in for a second, more thorough, kiss. Good Lord. It’s beginning to dawn on me that his deliriously joyful reaction may not entirely be owing to me bailing on my job and crossing two continents to be reunited with him. I pull out of his second rib-crusher. “What’s going on? Why are you so happy? Aren’t you concerned that we’re going to have to sell the house and move to a hippie commune in Big Sur?”

  “Will they have weed at the commune?”

  “Yes, they farm it. That’s how the whole thing’s funded.”

  “Awesome. Will we be partaking in free love too?”

  “No.”

  “Damn,” he says, looking genuinely bummed. I punch him in the chest. I can pack a pretty good punch when I want to and he’s winded for a second.

  “Jesus, Amy.”

  “Sorry,” I say. I’m not sorry. He’s keeping something from me. I didn’t call Peter from any of the airports. And believe me, I had plenty of opportunity. I was afraid talking to him would be like jumping into an icy-cold plunge pool of reality. But seeing his reaction to all this, I wish I had called; I might have saved myself a whole heap of anxiety. “Spill.”

  “I think I’ve
sold Draker’s Dark.”

  “What! How can that be possible?”

  “Nothing’s confirmed yet,” he adds quickly.

  “What happened?”

  “You remember how you told me that you’d purposefully withheld the information that your ex-lover had been pestering you for sex?”

  “That’s not quite how I put it, but yes, I remember.”

  “Well, after you told me about it, I sat on the info and did nothing.”

  “Why are you telling me this?”

  “I thought you’d be pleased?”

  “I am. Kind of.”

  “I did nothing until I saw that they’d decided to show a rerun of Real World Vampires on Fox last week at eight p.m. Prime time for a rerun of something that was as interesting as a bunch of chewed-up cardboard the first time around. I was incensed! I did the Turtle for like two hours straight, but it didn’t work because I was just so mad that something as trashy as Real World Vampires gets to be broadcast to the nation. And the man who created that shit gets to approach my wife for sexual favors when I never get to have sex with her. It’s not cool.”

  “So you were mostly mad because Matt’s trashy-but-successful show was getting a prime-time rerun.”

  “And because he’d been coming on to you.” I give Peter a doubtful look. “Honestly, I was mostly mad at him for being a sex pest. Really—eighty percent of the anger was because of that.”