On the floor by the back door were two large cardboard boxes stuffed with a hundred blueberry tie-dyed T-shirts of various sizes, another favorite with festival-goers. She had made those herself too, with pastel-colored T-shirts she had ordered wholesale from a company in upstate New York.
Next to those was a smaller box filled with bars of blueberry soap, also a hot seller. Then there were the empty baskets she still had to fill with a variety of carefully arranged homemade products — the Blueberry Acres gift baskets were her most profitable items.
She also had a few dozen pints of fresh blueberries ready to go, though there would be so many of those available at the festival tomorrow that she wasn’t counting on selling too many of them. Most tourists preferred something a little more exotic than the pure and simple fruit itself.
And, of course, there was the last batch of pies, still warming on the stovetop. And the chocolate-covered blueberries, which had to be packed into small cellophane packages and tied up with blue and green ribbons. Some of the items still had to be labeled. She had to pack everything up for transport into town in the morning.
And she still had to finish the booth...
She felt exhausted just looking at it all. She had spent the better part of three weeks getting it all together, and there was still so much to do.
“You’ve done a heck of a job, that’s for sure,” Doc said, hitching up his trousers, “but it should get easier for you this afternoon. Ray’s coming over to help out with the booth.”
It was like someone had set off a bomb. Candy looked up at her father, thunderstruck. “What?”
“I saw him at the diner,” Doc continued, unaware of the reaction he had just drawn from his daughter. “He said he’d be glad to help out. He wasn’t doing much this afternoon anyway.”
“Ray? But... no, Dad, tell me you didn’t.”
“Didn’t what?” Doc looked confused.
“You didn’t invite Ray over.”
For a moment, Doc hesitated. “Sure I did. We can use his help with the booth, can’t we?”
Candy groaned. “No, Dad, not Ray. Not today. He gets in the way more than he helps.” Her shoulders dropped as she leaned back against the counter, crossing her arms in frustration. “Besides, I thought you were going to help me.”
“Me?” Doc didn’t seem to know how to respond to his daughter’s disappointment. “I’m a scholar. You know that. I’m no good with a hammer. I’d just screw things up. Ray’s the guy you need. He’ll do a good job.”
“But Dad...”
“Oh, don’t worry, it’ll be okay. Ray’ll build you a fine booth,” Doc said, and he winked and gave her a smile. “Besides, he’s got a thing for you, you know.”
“Dad! Don’t you dare...”
But Doc went on, sensing a way out of the doghouse. “Well, he does. Anyone can tell that. I realize he might not be the right fellow for you, but you can’t stay single forever, pumpkin. It’s been how long — three years — since the divorce? Time to get back into the scene.”
Candy glowered at him and lowered her voice to a threatening level. “It’s only been two and a half years, thank you very much. And I’ll decide when it’s time to get back into the scene, as you call it.” She gave him a solid harrumph. “And don’t call me pumpkin. You know how much I hate that name.”
A twinkle came to Doc’s eyes. “What else do you want me to call my favorite Halloween-born daughter?”
“Dad, I’m your only Halloween-born daughter. And my actual name would be nice for a change.”
He chuckled. “Sure thing, pumpkin,” he said, checking his watch. “Oops. Got to go. I should be home by dinner. I’ll bring something. Chinese okay?” He started for the door.
“What? Where are you going?”
But before Doc could answer, the phone rang. It was Maggie, calling to talk about Jock. “Candy! It’s me. Have you heard? It’s unbelievable, isn’t it? There are rumors flying around town like bats on Halloween night.”
“Hang on,” Candy told Maggie, putting her hand over the phone as she called after her father. “Dad!”
Doc paused at the door. His eyes looked contrite, but his body was ready to go. “Sorry, honey, but I promised the right reverend I’d help the church folks with some of the setup. They’re putting up three booths, you know. We’ll pack everything up when I get back, okay?” He gave her a wave, and then he was gone.
A few moments later, Candy heard the old Ford pickup truck sputter to life and watched out the window as her father drove down the dirt lane toward town.
“Ohh,” she muttered to herself as she lifted the phone back to her ear, “I’m gonna kill him.”
“Kill who?” Maggie said. “What did I miss? Tell me everything — and don’t leave out a single word.”
Four
Half an hour later Candy was out in the rickety old barn, cursing loudly as she struggled with a four-by-eight sheet of plywood, when she heard a truck in the driveway.
“Dad, you’re back!” she blurted as she poked her head out the barn door.
But it wasn’t her father.
“Oh, Ray, it’s you,” she said as the local handyman climbed out of his tan Toyota pickup, which was nearly as old and beat up as her father’s Ford.
“Howdy, Miss Candy.” Ray Hutchins greeted her with a tip of his well-worn Red Sox baseball cap, revealing a mop of uncombed dark hair that was starting to go gray. “Doc said I should stop by to help you out.” He pronounced it hep. “Says yer building somethin’. What are ya up to?”
Trying hard to hide her disappointment, Candy waved him into the barn. “It’s a new booth for the festival tomorrow. Might as well come on in, long as you’re here.”
Ray’s head bobbed happily. “Sure, Miss Candy, be glad to,” and he grabbed his toolbox from the back of the truck and ambled over to the barn with that odd gait of his. It was as if the bones in his shoulders and legs had been fitted together all wrong, making his body seem disjointed. The way he walked reminded Candy of a marionette.
Ray was about ten years older than she was, tall and lean, with an innocent smile and droopy eyes that seemed ready to slide off the sides of his face. Thirty years ago he would have been called something cruel and unfortunate, but these days when folks around town talked about Ray, they often referred to him as being “special” or “mentally challenged.” Even that was hardly accurate, though. Ray would never be considered an intellectual giant, true, but he’d finished high school, and he had more common sense and life knowledge than many gave him credit for. More important, he was a gentle, kind soul who made his living with his hands as a talented carpenter, capable plumber and electrician, and overall handyman.
Doc had him out to Blueberry Acres every few weeks or so, fixing one thing or another — building shelves in the den or putting in a few extra electrical outlets in the basement or repairing some of the outbuildings. Ray didn’t seem to have a problem doing any of those things when he was working for Doc. But when he got around Candy, all his carefully honed skills seemed to leach right out of him, and he often was reduced to the level of a shy, awkward schoolboy.
Which was one problem Candy didn’t need today.
“Have you heard about Jock?” Ray asked as he followed her into the barn.
Perhaps a bit too distractedly, she said, “I’ve heard. It’s a terrible tragedy, really.”
“Sure is. Terrible, terrible.” Ray pronounced it turrible.
He shook his head sadly. “Jock and me was related, you know.”
Candy stopped and looked at him curiously. “No, I didn’t know that. Were you two cousins?”
Ray blinked shyly and his face reddened just a bit. “Sort of. His mama’s husband was my mama’s second cousin.”
“Oh. I see.” Candy had to think about that a moment. “So he was, what, your second or third cousin-in-law?”
“Um, yeah, I guess.”
“So did you and Jock see each other much? You guys talk a lot?”
“I bet you’re going to miss him.”
“Yup. Yup I am. He was a real good man.”
“He sure was.” Candy fought an urge to glance at her watch. “So, you ready to get started?”
“Yup, sure am.”
Candy clapped her hands together. “Okay, here’s what we’ve got,” she said as she walked farther into the barn, pointing to a pile of wood near the back. “It’s a simple project — a three-sided booth with a wide counter in the front for displaying items for sale. I thought I’d hinge the sides so I can fold them in and load the whole thing into Doc’s truck.” She picked up the brass hinges that sat on a swaybacked bench along the back wall, then indicated a pile of raw wood nearby.
“Doc’s already got all the wood we need. There are extra two-by-fours to use as crossbeams across the top of the booth to stabilize it. And I’m working on the banner I’ll hang across the front.”
She pointed to the five-foot-long swath of canvas nearby, with the words HOLLIDAY’S BLUEBERRY ACRES, CAPE WILLINGTON, MAINE sketched out in pencil along its length.
“I’d also like to build some shelves into the back side of the front display section,” Candy continued, “and maybe we can put some hooks in the crossbeams so I can hang up a few of the gift baskets for show.”
Ray listened to her carefully, surveyed the materials and what she’d done so far, and set to work without a word. Doc had already cut some of the two-by-fours and marked the quarter-inch sheets of plywood for cutting. Ray walked back to his truck to get a cordless circular saw, and for the next half hour or so the summer air was filled with the smells of sawdust and the shriek of metal teeth cutting into raw wood, mixing in with the buzzing of honeybees, the chirps and trills of sparrows and terns, and the earthy smells coming off the blueberry barrens and surrounding woods.
For the most part Ray worked silently, his mouth drawn into a tight thoughtful line, his hands fumbling about a bit more than usual. Candy regularly caught him glancing her way. She was used to glances like that. She knew that, at thirty-six, she still looked pretty good in a pair of jeans — not because she exercised a lot (which she hated to do) but because she did lots of farmwork. (“Who needs a gym,” Doc often said, “when you’ve got a blueberry farm?”) The sun had added some color to her high, full cheekbones this summer and a touch of rosemary honey to the tips of her hair. It contrasted nicely with her eyes, which were a light shade of blue but bright — “the color of forget-me-nots in the spring,” her mother used to tell her. And that morning she’d slipped on a faded red T-shirt, which clung to her a little more than she would have liked on this hot, humid July afternoon.
Thank God she’d remembered to wear a bra.
After awhile Ray settled down to business, his eyes focused on the work in front of him more than on Candy’s figure, and the booth began to take shape.
At around three thirty they took a break. Candy invited Ray into the kitchen for some fresh-baked blueberry pie. Ray’s nervousness made him fidgety and restless. In a moment of carelessness he knocked his water glass to the floor, shattering it, and tipped over a chair when he turned around too fast. Sweat began to break out on his forehead. He mumbled a lot, shifted his eyes this way and that, and even had to ask directions to the bathroom.
“Ray, you’ve been here plenty of times before. You know where it’s at,” Candy said, a note of frustration creeping into her voice. Struggling to hold back a sigh, she pointed him to the proper door. She didn’t want to hurt his feelings but she had too much to do today, and didn’t have time to deal with these kinds of delays.
Chastised, Ray dropped his head as he walked down the hall and closed the bathroom door behind him.
Once they were back outside, Candy decided Ray needed a few minutes alone to settle down, so she left him in the barn while she went out back to check on her chickens.
Ray had helped her build the chicken coop last fall, right after she purchased the “girls,” as she called them. She’d opted for bantam hens — mostly because she had been so taken with the small, squat black and white birds as she walked past them in the poultry shed at the Common Ground Country Fair up in Unity. She’d bought six hens on impulse that very day. Doc had grumbled a bit as he loaded the cage into the back of the truck, but he soon warmed to the idea.
Back home, Candy had been surprised to find that in short order she developed a strange affection for her little flock. She discovered that each hen had a distinctive personality and a little routine, and they seemed to listen to her when she talked to them, which amused her to no end. They were also surprisingly good egg producers. She had quickly increased her flock to a baker’s dozen and since then added two more — perhaps because having thirteen hens seemed to be tempting fate. Now they had more than enough eggs, which Candy gave away to friends or dropped off at a local bakery where she worked part-time. Lord knew Herr Georg, the baker, went through plenty of eggs, and he clucked over them almost as much as the chickens did.
The girls chattered and gathered curiously about her as she fed and watered them and collected their eggs in a wire basket — seven today so far.
Before she headed back to the barn to check on Ray, she walked out past the chicken coop and looked out over the blueberry fields that rolled like a choppy blue green sea back to a ridge of trees in the distance. A few years ago she would have been greatly amused to see herself standing here on a farm holding a basketful of eggs. She had been an urban girl, an up-and-comer working for a busy marketing firm that served the top high-tech companies in Boston. She’d had a killer wardrobe, a tight group of friends, a solid, happy marriage with a smart, handsome guy... And then it unraveled so fast she’d barely had time to come to grips with it all. Clark, her husband, lost his lucrative job as a software engineer when the company he worked for lost its financing and had to make cutbacks. When he had trouble finding another job, he invested a big chunk of their savings in a start-up venture, which went under in six months, making household finances even tighter. After that he became despondent, which seemed natural to Candy, who assumed it was because of his work situation. But she had the whole thing all wrong. He left her shortly after that, telling her he had fallen in love with someone else. He was out in California now, remarried with a child and a second one on the way. Even the thought of that still gave Candy pain; she and Clark tried for years to have children but had never been successful.
But that was not the worst of it. A few weeks after Clark left her, she had gone out to dinner with her best friend Zoe. They’d met in college, dated some of the same boys, and stayed friends after Candy and Clark married. Zoe married also, but it hadn’t lasted long; she’d been divorced for years. The dinner had been a time for them to commiserate with each other, and they even shared a tiramisu. They parted on what Candy thought was a positive note. But not more than a few hours later Zoe committed suicide, alone in her apartment. According to police reports, she had taken an overdose of pills.
Candy was devastated, not only because she’d lost her best friend but also because she, Candy, hadn’t even been aware of Zoe’s depression and had done nothing to save her friend.
After that the bottom fell out of her life. She became physically ill, took to bed for weeks, neglected her work, and stopped eating. She turned away from her other friends, unable to face them. She started drinking heavily. She wound up in the hospital and eventually lost her job. Officially she’d been fired, but in her heart she never had any intention of going back. She simply gave up on her old life.
That’s when Doc called, one dreary morning when she was feeling particularly down. He told her he was at the coffee shop around the corner and was coming by to pick her up and take her up to Blueberry Acres for the weekend. Five minutes later he knocked on her front door. She tried to put
on a brave face but quickly fell into his arms, sobbing, and let him take her home.
Doc had discovered Blueberry Acres, a twenty-five-acre farm off the Coastal Loop just outside of Cape Willington, during one of his long drives along the coast a few weeks after Holly died. He and Holly had looked for a place just like this for years, and he knew as soon as he saw it that this was exactly what he had sought for so long. At first he had hesitated in making such a big change, which involved leaving teaching and taking up a career as a gentleman farmer. He questioned whether it was wise to make a decision of that magnitude when he was in such an emotional state. But in the end Candy had convinced him that it was the right way to go. He loved the farming life immensely — but he realized only after he moved in just how much work the place needed, and had been picking at it as best he could ever since. Still, at times it seemed to overwhelm him.
Candy had visited the farm many times before, but during that weekend stay after Doc had come down and rescued her, she began to see the place in a new light, and the idea of a permanent change for her as well took shape quickly in her mind. She knew Doc could use her help. She knew she could use a change. It hadn’t been a difficult decision.
So Doc drove her back to Boston, they cleaned out her apartment, and without looking back, she moved to a blueberry farm in Downeast Maine.
Now they had just over fifteen acres of the lowbush wild blueberries that were native only to this farnortheastern corner of the country, and they were planning, in the next year or so, to push back the thin piney woods that edged their property even farther to open up a few more acres. They also had half an acre of vegetables, a small herb garden, and various flower beds around the property, as well as the chicken coop behind the barn. They had talked about adding more — a few farm animals, a larger vegetable garden — but decided to keep things manageable, at least for the time being.
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