by Reggi Allder
Still munching on toast and jam, in the hall way she stopped and threw on a jean jacket and pulled on her work boots.
It wasn’t until she opened the back door that she realized it had rained in the early morning hours. She relaxed, aware there hadn’t been a storm since the contractor put on a roof, months earlier. It was needed moisture, but not enough to break the possible drought, still, every drop of water was precious.
On the way to the spot where the where the trees would be planted, a breeze caressed her face. She breathed in the fresh aroma of the wet soil, perfume to any farmer.
She texted Wyatt reminding him Manny Gordon was coming to look over the trees and check out the field.
***
Manny was standing at the top of the orchard on a slight knoll when she arrived. His black hair glistened in the sunlight as grinned at her. A red plaid shirt stretched across his expansive shoulders and well-fitting blue jeans covered his strong legs. No wonder Vanna was attracted to him, the epitome of Latin sensuality.
“Morning, Amy.”
“Hey. I didn’t hear your car drive up.”
“I rode here. Left my horse in the corral. Hope you don’t mind.”
“Of course not.” Amy stood next to him and surveyed the land. “Wyatt’s riding with Bobby. They should be back soon.”
“It’s all right.” He hesitated. “I’m glad we have a chance to talk.”
“Okay,” she said to encourage him to continue.
His large hand scraped across his chin as he thought.
She was about to speak when he said, “It’s about Vanna.”
His dark eyes flashed and then narrowed when he said her name.
Amy waited.
“I asked her to dinner a couple of weeks ago; we were going to meet at Mel’s. I had a table in the corner all picked out. You know, so we wouldn’t cause a fuss going out when the whole town knows our families don’t like each other since the death of her dad.” He closed his eyes as if in pain. “She didn’t show. Maybe I should’ve suggested a place out of town.” Hurt and confusion marked his handsome face as he kicked a dirt clod with his leather boot, sending it hurling and breaking into pieces.
“I don’t know what to say.” Vanna had mentioned the possible date with Manny. Even said his father had been accused of manslaughter in the accidental death of her papa, and had admitted she was conflicted about seeing Manny. Amy recalled the way her friend had gazed at him with longing when they saw him at the bakery.
“What do you want me to do?”
“You and Wyatt are the only people who might understand how families can be. You, Wes, and Wyatt’s dad…”
He looked off to the horizon, probably hadn’t talked this much about his feeling since… When? She empathized with him. Sharing feelings was difficult and dealing with families sometimes near impossible.
“I just want to know if there’s a possibility—a point in asking her out again. I’m not going to keep butting my head against a wall if there’s no chance.”
“You’re both such important friends to Wyatt and me.” She paused. Would anything she said make it better or worse and for whom, her best friend or Wyatt’s close buddy?
“There you guys are.” Wyatt walked toward them with Bobby close behind him.
“Hi, honey.” She waved and wondered if there’d be a moment to answer Manny out of Wyatt’s hearing.
Chapter 12
After touring the vacant land and the older orchards, they stopped near the corral where Manny had his horse.
“I never realized you had so much land. If you wanted to, you could expand the apple trees even beyond what we talked about. Let me get a number for you.”
“Thanks, Manny.” She watched him calculate on his smart phone. Presumably getting the number of trees for an increased planting.
He showed her the number.
“It’s a bit more than I can handle right now. I guess I never thought about doing anything but what’s planned. Still, if this farming idea takes off who knows. Anyway, it’s nice to have options,” she added.
“If more trees are needed, how much do you think it will add to the budget?” Wyatt asked.
He’d stood silent most of the tour as they’d walked the property, letting her take the lead. She was grateful he’d understood it was her project. Unlike many men, he hadn’t forced his opinion to the forefront of the discussion.
“Let me see,” Manny responded.
Bobby appeared to ignore them and took a small metal car he always carried in his pocket and had drove it over the dirt. Then he busied himself using twigs he found to make a garage for the little vehicle.
“Of course, you don’t have to plant the whole new field.” Manny scratched his head. “If you wanted to, I’d say about twenty percent more money. We’re talking about a third more than I’ve ordered, plus the labor to put in the extra trees.”
“That’s probably more than I have in my budget,” Amy answered.
“Like I said, you can wait until next season. I’ll get the soil ready and you can increase the planting the following year.”
“That sounds good. Is there any way to cut down on the cost so we could buy the trees this year?”
“Well, labor is always the biggest expense, so anything you can do to cut down on that…” He paused. “You could weed the current orchards and put mulch around the trees to cut down on my men doing it and decrease the weeding you’ll need next year. It’s hard work and time consuming, but…”
“I’ll help, Mommy” Bobby took her hand.
“Thank you, Big Guy.” She hugged him. “We’ll do it.”
“Okay, I’ll get on with the order. You just tell me the kind of apples you want,” Manny agreed.
After some discussion, she decided on planting half the field in Red Delicious and the rest in McIntosh trees.
“Hey, you’re going to be here tonight for the barbeque, right?” Wyatt asked. “We’re having a few friends and neighbors over.”
“Will Vanna be there?” Manny said hopefully.
“I don’t know. Is she coming, Amy?”
She hesitated. The answer was yes, but there was a complication. Should she mention Sophie would be there too? That was sure to cause trouble and make his decision difficult. She understood he wanted to see her friend, but how would Sophie react to him? “Yeah, Vanna will, but so will her mother.” She looked Manny in the eye and he turned away.
An awkward silence continued until Bobby said, “I’m thirsty, Mommy.”
“Guys, why don’t we all go to the house and get something to drink?” She started to walk toward the farmhouse, but stopped when Manny cleared his throat.
“I better go. I remembered another appointment. I’m not going to make dinner tonight. I’ll order the trees ASAP,” he said quickly, obviously ready to leave the area to make sure he didn’t run into Sophie.
“Thanks for the help,” she yelled after him.
“No problem.”
“Hey, buddy, we’ll do the weeding and mulching,” Wyatt shouted. “Take it easy.”
He glanced at her and shrugged, his eyes filled with concern for his close friend.
After Manny left she said, “Do you think he had an appointment?”
“I know he didn’t. He told me he was free tonight.”
***
Early in the morning after Manny left, many hours of works spread in front of Amy before she had to think of entertaining her friends. Wyatt had stacked piles of mulch around the orchard. She admired his strength as he, with ease, used a pitch fork to heave organic matter from the back of Grandpa’s old fifties GMC. She didn’t know it was running. It hadn’t been driven for years. She guessed, without mentioning it to her, Wyatt had tuned up “Old Betsy” as Grandpa had called the vehicle. It ran a little rough, but did the job.
Manny would bring in the big equipment for the new planting, but to preserve the old trees, tilling and weeding had to be done by small gardening tools and by hand.
She picked out a hoe for the weeding. She’d have to pull out the stubborn weeds, yet the hoe would deal with many of them.
Wyatt stripped off his shirt and dropped it in the cab, then hopped into the truck bed, his muscles flexing as if he were mounting a stallion. His full six pack tightened with the effort and she wondered if he’d need a rub down tonight. The thought of applying cream to his body and allowing his muscles to relax, all but one, brought a smile to her lips. Fascinated with the image of him and his power and stamina, she didn’t realize she was staring until he stopped and asked, “Did you need something?”
“Uh, no. I’m good.” Her cheeks burned. Could he read her mind? She did have needs, but if he fulfilled them, they’d never get the work done. Anyway, Bobby was here, so it wasn’t as if she could let Wyatt slowly undress her and take her to new heights under an apple tree as she fanaticized.
Perspiration shimmered as it slithered down Wyatt’s flexed back. He stood tall and wiped sweat from his forehead with the palm of his hand, then breathed deeply expanding his muscled chest. He emptied the last of the peat and said, “I’m going to head to the barn and get another load of mulch. You good here?”
“Yeah,” she said breathlessly, still staring. “I’ll see if I can get the trees done so we can move up to another part of the field.”
“Sounds good.” He catapulted from the truck bed, entered the cab and the engine turned over on the first try.
For a second she stood and wondered how anyone that magnificent loved her, scrawny, flat chested, and four eyed as she was.
While he was gone, she weeded with a hoe working around as many trees possible. Her hands began to ache from the overuse. This was the most physical work she’d done, but compared to the job Wyatt was doing… She’d never complain.
She yanked on a stubborn weed and a thorn pierced her finger and drew blood. “Ouch,” she shouted glad he wasn’t there to see she was a sissy. With a quick swipe on her jeans, she bent down to grab another weed, first making sure to avoid the thorns.
Her finger began to bleed again and she sat down in the dirt for a moment and found a tissue in her pocket and wrapped it around the small wound. If it were Bobby, she’d have sent him to get antibiotic cream and a band-aid. She’d be fine for now, because when Wyatt got back she wanted show him most of the trees in the area had been taken care off. They could move further down the orchard.
After she shouted “Ouch,” Bobby didn’t react, but now he asked. “You okay, Mommy?”
“Fine, honey.” She resisted the urge to put her finger in her mouth, not a good example to set.
“Is it okay if a play?” Her son had given up working on the weeds and had taken out his car again.
“Sure. You’ve done a good day’s work.”
Later, Bobby said he was hungry and she gave him an apple she had taken from the basement cold storage room. He might never realize how lucky he was to have as many fresh organic apples as he wanted without ever wondering if he could afford to buy them. When she and Bobby lived in the city, her first choice was not the fruit she wanted, but the lowest priced apples. Not the organic ones. Too costly.
In the coming spring and summer, her son would wander Granny’s farm and if he wanted to, he could eat berries or apples until he was full. He’d never consider the price of fruit. She pulled another weed. Every bit of hard work was worth it if she could give Bobby that life.
A drop of rain, landed on her glasses. She pushed the rimmed spectacles up and surveyed the sky. She’d been looking down most of the day and hadn’t seen the change. The blue was gone replaced by gray. Angry clouds threatened to spew rain on to the thirsty soil.
She needed to get this job done, and hoped it wouldn’t rain anymore for a couple of days. She zipped her pale blue sweatshirt, wishing she’d chosen to wear the one with a hood. After the first drop of rain, nothing.
Maybe her luck would hold. With her aching hands, she grabbed the hoe and weeded the grounds of nearby trees, forcing a faster pace to beat the coming weather.
The old GMC rumbled up the dirt road, the back of it piled high with peat. Again, Wyatt unloaded small mounds of organic matter, moving the vehicle up the path as he did. He was almost on top of the hill when he emptied the bed, reversed the truck, and drove back to where she was working.
He turned off the engine and yelled as he opened the driver side door and got out. “I don’t like those clouds. Rains on the way.”
“Let’s hope we can finish before it starts.”
“I’m willing to try if you are,” he agreed.
Silently they worked together. A sense of a family on a mission kept her working long after exhaustion had her breathing hard and her muscles shaking.
Wyatt completed two trees for everyone she did, but she focused and tried to speed up to stay with him.
A raindrop and then another fell. She ignored them. Slowly at first, later it turned into a continuous drizzle, not bad enough stop the work or give the parched earth the moisture it needed, just enough to make it miserable for all who toiled in it. Though Bobby wanted to stay in the field, she sent him home to get warm.
Frozen to the bone, she shivered inside, but did her best not to let Wyatt know. He would’ve demanded she go in and warm herself too. But farmers ignored the weather, be it hot or cold, wet or dry. She was proud to say she was the owner of one of the best organic apple farms in California. At least that’s how she thought of it. All she had to do was prove it by doing what was required. Her teeth chattered, But she smiled with satisfaction at the thought.
“It’s getting dark and you’re soaked. We better go in,” Wyatt finally said.
She’d wanted to quit for a while, but didn’t want to be the one who gave in first. “Okay, I should probably take a shower and prepare a meal. Our friends will be here at six thirty.” At that moment, all she wanted to do was lay down for a nap. Dinner had been planned for weeks; exhausted or not, she wouldn’t call it off.
Farming wasn’t glamourous, she knew it, but seeing the result was startling. Dirty face, wet straggly hair and tired eyes, a drowned waif stared back at her in the bathroom mirror. A quick shower and a shampoo would help, even so, she’d still be who she was, no beauty.
The many cuts on her hands wouldn’t be so easily fixed. She’d tried to use gloves, but the thick leather made it hard to grab the weeds and yank them out with the root. She hadn’t been worried. Now after a day of pulling them out and using the heavy hoe to chop them, her hands we’re a mess. Determined to finish the job, she didn’t plan on mentioning it to Wyatt.
Rain or shine, she’d be in the orchard weeding early tomorrow. He’d probably want her to leave it until later if he saw her cuts. She’d told him she could run the farm on her own if need be. Time to prove it by getting back to work and finishing the job in the morning. Like a man, she’d do it. She laughed. Well, like a powerful woman anyway.
Funny how a bath can revive a person, a little make-up, new contacts, and dry hair helped too. She twisted to view her backside. In ballet slippers, black leggings and a lime color sweater, she didn’t seem as plain. Her hair was curly and a bit messy just the way Wyatt liked it. The last touch was to find the silver chain with Granny’s heart shaped crystal. Fixing the clasp, the stone sparkled. Then she slid the engagement ring Wyatt had designed for her onto the ring finger of her left hand.
OMG, she hadn’t shown Wyatt the ring she’d had designed for him. Where had she put it? Panic was about to set in when she remembered it was tucked away in the top draw of her nightstand. Tonight, after everyone left and Bobby was in bed, she’d show it to him.
She rushed to the kitchen to make sure everything was on track and found Wyatt was on his way out to the back patio.
“Honey, look at you. Sexy as can be.” He hugged her, nibbling on her earlobe as he held her close. She leaned against him wishing, no matter how much she cared about her friends, that the dinner was next week and they could be alone this evening. Reluctantly, she
released him.
“I’ll start the fire. When they all get here, the grill will be ready for the steaks and hot dogs,” he said.
“Great. I’ve got the carrot and raisin salad ready. I made it this morning. Just need to put the cornbread in the oven. The rice is ready too.” She pulled out the blue and white willow ware her grandmother had used every day and counted the plates she’d need. “Vanna’s bringing a vegetable tray and Sophie has dessert for us.”
“Sounds like a feast. After the workout, today, I’m ready for one.”
“Yeah, me too.” She admired his backside as he disappeared out the kitchen door.
***
The nice thing about friends is you can trust them. If you’re tired you don’t have to pretend you’re not. If you look like shit they may notice, but won’t tell you because they know you have a mirror and have gazed into it and made a similar conclusion.
When Amy opened the door to her friends, she did so with the joy that comes from seeing people who have your back. There’s nothing to prove to them and they have zero to demonstrate to you. They’re only with you because they want to share your company. She grinned.
Her only regret was Manny couldn’t be there too. Maybe someday…
After dinner Wyatt said, “Okay ladies, you go in the living room and the men will do the dishes. Right guys?”
Johnny didn’t look convinced, but Bobby nodded.
Wyatt waved Amy, Vanna, and Sophie out of the room. “Go on you gals. We got it under control.”
“You want to wash or dry, Wyatt?” Johnny asked.
“You’re the guest. You pick.”
“Well, my wife used to say I could dry a mean dish.”
“You got it and Bobby grab the stool and you can put away the silverware.”
“Okay, Daddy.”
“Have fun guys.” Vanna laughed. She winked at them and slowly exited the kitchen with Amy.
***
In the living room, Sophie sat in the overstuffed chair that had been Granny’s favorite. “Are you okay, Amy?”
