The History of Bees

by Maja Lunde

  He took another bite. He chewed and chewed, apparently unable to swallow.

  “He’s encouraging me to write more.”

  “More? More of what?”

  “He says that . . .”

  He fell silent. Put the sandwich down, gripped around his coffee cup, but didn’t drink. That was when I first noticed that his hand was shaking a little.

  “He says that I have a voice.”

  A voice? Academic nonsense. I forced a grin, I couldn’t be bothered to take this seriously.

  “I could have told you that a long time ago,” I said. “Especially when you were little. Loud and cutting it was. Thank God your voice changed. It didn’t happen one day too soon.”

  He didn’t smile at the joke. He just sat there in silence.

  The grin slid off my face. He wanted to say something, no doubt about that. He was sitting there with some burning issue on his mind, and I had a strong suspicion that it was something that I absolutely did not want to hear.

  “It’s good the teachers are satisfied with you,” I said finally.

  “He really thinks I should write more,” Tom said softly, with an emphasis on really. “He said I can apply for scholarships, too, and maybe continue with it.”

  “Continue?”

  “A Ph.D.”

  My chest tightened, my throat grew constricted, I could taste the raw flavor of peanut butter in my mouth, but was unable to swallow.

  “Is that right. So he said that.”

  Tom nodded.

  I tried to keep my voice calm. “How many years does one of those Ph.D.s take?”

  He just stared down at the toes of his shoes, without answering.

  “I’m not exactly getting any younger,” I continued. “Things don’t run by themselves up here.”

  “No, I know that,” he said quietly. “But you do have help?”

  “Jimmy and Rick come and go as they please. It’s not their farm. Besides, they don’t work for free.”

  I started working again, lifted the dirty boards over onto the flatbed. The woodwork in the frames hit the metal on the flatbed with a rude clang. Yes indeed, we had heard from teachers before about how Tom was good with words. He’d always gotten As in English, there was obviously nothing wrong with his head. But it wasn’t English we had in mind when we sent him to college. He was supposed to learn economics and marketing, prepare the farm for the future. Expand, modernize, make operations more efficient. And maybe make a proper website. Those were the kinds of things he was supposed to learn. That was why we had scrimped and saved for his tuition, ever since he was a little boy. We hadn’t treated ourselves to a single real vacation in all those years, not once. Everything had gone into the college account.

  What did an English teacher know? Probably sat there in his dusty college office full of books he pretended to have read and slurped tea and wore a scarf while he was inside, trimming his beard with embroidery scissors. While he gave “good” advice to young boys who happened to be good at writing, without knowing shit about what he was starting.

  “We can talk more about that later,” I said. We never had that talk. He left before we had the chance. I decided that “later” was a long way off. Or maybe he was the one who decided that. Or maybe Emma. Because we were never alone in the same room, Tom and I, not on one single occasion, the rest of the time that he was home. Emma cooed around us like a wood pigeon on speed, served, cleared, talked and talked about absolutely nothing.

  I was so tired during those days. Fell asleep on the couch all the time. Had a long list of jobs I was supposed to do, old hives that needed maintenance, orders I needed to follow up on. But I didn’t have the gumption. It was like I was going around with a mild fever all the time. But I didn’t have a fever. I even took my temperature. Snuck into the bathroom and found a thermometer at the bottom of the first-aid kit. Light blue with teddy bears on it, Emma had bought it for Tom when he was a baby. It was supposed to be especially quick, the instructions said, so as not to disturb the child any longer than necessary. But it sure had to stay in long enough. Somewhere or other in the house I could hear Emma cooing and Tom answering from time to time. And there I was, with the cold metal tip in my butt, that had been in the backside of my son hundreds of times. Emma was not the kind to think twice about checking his temperature, and yet again I felt my eyes fall shut while I was waiting for the digital peep that told me my body was as it should be, even though it felt as if I had run a marathon, or how I figured that had to feel.

  Once I had finally confirmed that I didn’t have a fever, I just went and lay down anyway, without saying anything. Let them carry on.

  The cooing continued until he was sitting on the bus. Then, with Tom inside, his face plastered against the back window and relief painted all over his mug, she was finally silent.

  We stood there and waved, as automatically as if we were full of batteries, hands up and down, up and down, completely in sync. Emma’s eyes became shiny, or perhaps it was just the wind, but luckily she didn’t cry.

  The bus pulled out onto the road, Tom’s face shone faintly at us, smaller and smaller. It suddenly reminded me of another time when he drove away from me on a bus. Then, too, his face had shimmered faintly at me with relief. But also with fear.

  I shook my head, wanted to get rid of the memory.

  Finally the bus disappeared around the corner. We lowered our hands in unison, stood there watching the point where it disappeared, as if we were stupid enough to believe it would suddenly come back.

  “Well, well,” Emma said. “That was that.”

  “That was that? What do you mean?”

  “We just have them on loan.” She dried a tear that the wind had nudged out of her left eye. I had a good mind to unleash a sharp retort, but let it go. I had too much respect for that tear. So I turned and walked towards the car.

  She plodded behind me. It seemed she’d grown smaller as well.

  I got in behind the wheel, but was incapable of starting the engine. My hands were so limp, as if worn out by all of the waving.

  Emma put on her seat belt, she was always so particular about that, and turned towards me.

  “Aren’t you going to drive?”

  I wanted to lift my hand, but it didn’t work.

  “Did he talk to you about it?” I said to the steering wheel.

  “What?” Emma asked.

  “About what he’s planning? For the future?”

  She was quiet for a moment. Then it came, softly.

  “You do know he loves to write. He always has.”

  “I love Star Wars. Haven’t become no Jedi, though.”

  “He clearly has a special talent.”

  “So you support him? You think his plan is wise? Real smart? A good choice of direction?” I turned to face her now, straightened my neck, tried to seem severe.

  “I just want him to be happy,” she said meekly.

  “You do.”

  “Yes. I do.”

  “You haven’t thought about how he has to live as well? Earn money eventually?”

  “The teacher has said that he has something to offer.”

  She sat there with that large, open gaze of hers, completely sincere. She wasn’t angry, just had such an unshakable belief that she was right.

  I squeezed the car keys in my hand, suddenly noticed that it hurt, but couldn’t let go.

  “Have you thought about what we’ll do with the farm then?”

  She was silent. For a long while. Looked away, fiddled a bit with her wedding ring, pulled it up over the first joint in her finger. The white band on her skin below was revealed, the mark from the ring that had been there for twenty-five years.

  “Nellie called last week,” she said finally, into space, not to me. “They have summer temperatures in Gulf Harbors now. Seventy degrees in the water.”

  There it was again. Gulf Harbors. Floating, even though the name of the housing development hit me like a shingle in the head every time she
said it. Nellie and Rob were childhood friends of ours. Unfortunately, they had moved to Florida. Ever since that happened, they had been pestering us something fierce, not just to visit this so-called oasis on the outskirts of Tampa, but also that we should move there ourselves. Emma kept showing me new ads for houses in Gulf Harbors. Real cheap. On the market for a long time. We could find a bargain. A pier and a swimming pool, recently renovated, a common beach and tennis courts, as if we would need that, yes, it seems they even had dolphins, and manatees, carrying on and splashing around, right outside their front door. Who needed it? Manatees? Ugly beasts.

  Nellie and Rob bragged like crazy. They’d made lots of new friends, they said, listing random names: Laurie, Mark, Randy, Steven. There was no end to it. Every week they had Sunday brunch together at the community center, a full brunch for only five dollars, with pancakes, bacon, eggs and fried potatoes. And now they were trying to get us to come down, all of us, yes indeed, they were nagging more people than just us, apparently wanted all of Autumn to come south. But I knew what it was really all about. They were lonely down there on their deep-water canal. It was wretched living so far away from family and friends, to have run away from everything they’d had around them their whole lives. Besides, summer in Florida, you can’t get closer to hell, sticky and hot and horrible, with insane thunderstorms several times a day. And even though the winter is probably just fine, with summer temperatures and not much rain, who wants to live without a real winter? Without snow and the cold? I’d told Emma this many times, but she still wouldn’t give up. Thought we had to start making proper plans, plans for our old age. She didn’t understand that I’d done just that. I wanted to leave behind something substantial, a legacy, instead of sitting there with a run-down vacation home that was impossible to sell. Yes indeed. I’d done a little reading about how things were on the housing market in Florida these days. There were good reasons why these houses weren’t sold the first weekend they were shown, to put it that way.

  But I had another plan. Some new investments. More hives, many more. Trucks. Trailers. Full-time employees. Plans for agreements with farms in California, Georgia, maybe Florida.

  And Tom.

  It was a good plan. Realistic. Levelheaded. Before Tom knew it, he’d have a wife and children. Then it would be a good thing that his father had made proper plans, that the farm was in working order, well maintained, that the enterprise was adapted to the modern world, that Tom had worked here long enough so he knew the craft from the inside out. And that maybe there was a little money in the bank. These were uncertain times. I created security. I alone created security for this family. A future. But it didn’t seem like anyone understood that.

  I got tired just thinking about it, about the plan. Before it had given me the energy to work extra, but now the road ahead seemed as long and twisted as a muddy wheel rut in the autumn rain.

  I couldn’t bring myself to answer Emma. Stuck the car keys in the ignition, the key was slick with sweat and had created a red mark on the palm of my hand. I had to drive now, before I fell asleep. She didn’t look up, had taken off her wedding ring and was rubbing her fingers against the white band on the skin. She couldn’t fool me, but all the same she wanted to put our whole life in jeopardy.

  TAO

  Will you turn off the light?” Kuan turned around to face me, pale with sleepiness.

  “Just want to finish reading this.”

  I continued with the old book about early-childhood education. My eyes were sore, but I didn’t want to go to sleep yet. Didn’t want to sleep, wake up and then have to go out into a new day.

  He sighed beside me. Pulled the blanket over his head to shut out the light. A minute passed. Two.

  “Tao . . . please. In six hours we have to get up.”

  I didn’t answer, merely did as he asked.

  “Good night,” he said softly.

  “Good night,” I said and turned to face the wall.

  Sleep was just taking me away when I felt his hands creeping under my camisole. I reacted to them instinctively, unable to refrain from taking pleasure in his caresses, but I tried to push them away all the same. Wasn’t he tired? Why had he asked me to turn off the light if this was what he wanted?

  His hands disappeared, but his breathing was still shallow. Then he cleared his throat, as if he had something on his mind. “How . . . How did things go today?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “You’ve forgotten what day it is.”

  “No. I haven’t forgotten.”

  I didn’t say that I’d hoped he had forgotten so I wouldn’t have to have this conversation.

  He stroked my hair, tenderly now, not seductively. “Have you been OK?”

  “Every year it gets a little easier,” I said, because that was certainly what he wanted to hear.

  “Good.”

  He stroked my hair one more time, then his hand disappeared back under his own blanket.

  The mattress undulated slightly when he turned over, perhaps onto his stomach, that’s how he liked to sleep. Then he mumbled good night again. Judging from how it sounded, he had turned over with his back to me. Soon he was sleeping deeply. But I lay awake in bed.

  Five years.

  Five years had passed since my mother left.

  No. Not left. Was sent away.

  My father died when I was nineteen. He was just a little over fifty, but his body was much older. Shoulders, back, joints, all of him was worn out from all of the years in the trees. He moved more heavily with each passing day. Perhaps his blood circulated more poorly as well, because one day when he got a splinter in his palm, the cut wouldn’t heal.

  He put off seeking help for too long, being the man that he was. And when the doctor had finally received approval to give him antibiotics, even though my father was actually too old to be given priority for this type of expensive treatment, it was already too late.

  My mother recovered surprisingly quickly after his death. Said all the right things, was optimistic. She was still young, she said, and smiled bravely, had a long life ahead of her. Perhaps she would even meet another man one day.

  But they were just words. Because she fluttered away, the way petals blow away when the blossoming season is over. There was wind in her gaze, impossible to capture.

  Soon she failed to show up for work in the fields. She just stayed home. She had been thin before, and now she ate almost nothing. Began sniffling, coughing, grew more and more lethargic, and soon she developed pneumonia.

  One day when I came to look in on her she didn’t open the door. I rang the bell several times, but nothing happened. I had an extra key that I took out and unlocked the door with.

  The flat was neat and clean, all that remained were the old furnishings that belonged to the household. All of her things were gone; the pillow she used to lean her back against on the couch, the bonsai tree she tended with such diligence, the embroidered blanket she liked to fold up and spread across her thighs, as if she felt a particular chill right there.

  The same afternoon I found out that she’d been sent north. She was fine, the district’s health supervisor assured me, and gave me the name of the nursing home. I was shown a choppy presentation film from there. Bright and beautiful, large rooms, high ceilings, smiling personnel. But when I asked about leave so I could go and visit her, I was told that I would have to wait until the blossoming season was over.

  A few weeks later word came that she had departed.

  Departed. That was the word they used, as if she had in fact gotten out of bed and left. I tried not to think about how her final days had been. A rasping cough, feverish, frightened and alone. To think she had to die like that.

  But there was nothing I could have done. Kuan said so as well. There was nothing I could have done. He said it again and again, and I continued saying it to myself.

  Until I almost believed it.

  WILLIAM

  Edmund?”

  “Good afterno
on, Father.”

  He stood alone beside my bed. I had no idea how long he’d been in the room. He had become somebody else, taller, and his nose . . . The last time I saw him, it was far too big. Noses often grow at their own pace in young people, leaping ahead of the rest of the body, but now it suited his face, his features had grown into place around it. He had become handsome, a beauty that had always lain latent in him, elegant, but dressed a bit rakishly, a bottle-green scarf hung loosely around his neck, his fringe just a bit too long, it was becoming, but made it difficult to see his eyes. On top of it all he was pale. Wasn’t he getting enough sleep?

  Edmund, my only son. Thilda’s only son. It hadn’t been long before I understood that he was hers, wholly and completely. From the day we met, she let it be known that her greatest wish was to have a boy and when he arrived the following year, her vocation was fulfilled. Dorothea and Charlotte, and later the five other little girls, became mere shadows of him. In a sense I understood her. The seven girls gave me a constant headache. Their fierce and unceasing howling, shouting, whining, crying, giggling, running, coughing, sniffling, not to mention chattering—the way such young girls could chatter, they were relentless chatterboxes—all of these sounds surrounded me from the minute I got up until I went to bed, and not just that—they continued all through the night as well. There was always a child who cried over a dream, always one who came tiptoeing in wearing only a nightgown and had kicked off her stockings in her sleep, so that bare feet slapped lightly against the cold floorboards, and then crept up into the bed making some sound or other, some woebegone whimpers, or an almost aggressive demand to be allowed to squeeze in between us in our bed.

  It seemed impossible for them to be quiet and it was therefore impossible for me to work, impossible to write. I had really tried, I had not given up right away, as Rahm believed. But it was no use. Even though I closed the door to my room after having clearly informed the entire family that Father had to work, they had to show consideration, even though I tied a scarf around my head to shut out the noise, or stuffed my ears full of wool, even then I could hear them. It was no use. Over the years there was increasingly less time for my own work, and soon I was no more than a simple merchant who struggled to feed the eternally voracious little-girl stomachs. They were bottomless. The promising naturalist had to step aside for a weary, middle-aged seed merchant, with tired feet from hours spent behind the counter, rusty vocal cords from the eternal small talk with the customers, and the fingers, endlessly counting the money that there was never quite enough of. All of it due to the noise made by the young girls.