The History of Bees

by Maja Lunde

  “My purse, bring it here. My purse!” Then she opened Daiyu’s hand and removed the piece of cake before turning to face us.

  “Are there nuts in it?”

  Nuts? None of us knew. Her expression was so insistent that I felt responsible. As if I should have known whether there were nuts in the cake.

  Someone came running up with her purse. Daiyu’s mother dug around in it, didn’t find what she was looking for, turned it upside down. The contents fell out onto the ground. I saw a lipstick, Handi Wipes, a hairbrush. She grabbed hold of something, a little white package bearing green letters. She tore it open and took out a syringe.

  Then my own mother was there. She pulled my head against her, didn’t want me to see any more. She led me gently away.

  “What is it? What’s wrong with Daiyu?” I asked. “What’s wrong with her?”

  WILLIAM

  It was morning. The leaves filtered the light. Everything moved above me, the trees in the wind, the clouds that slid across the sky, nothing stood still. I grew dizzy and closed my eyes. Just lay there and let the yellowness enshroud me, on my back without moving, against raw, damp soil. Because there was nothing else, there was no longer anything that could keep me away. Not the research—my passion. Not Edmund, he was lost, he’d been lost all along. Not even desire. It had disappeared. I no longer wanted to pound against the earth, euphoric, towards a climax. I wanted to let it swallow me, until I became soil myself.

  I hadn’t eaten, but it made no difference. The pie continued to turn over in my stomach, stuck in my throat, dried out my mouth.

  The village, the work in and around it, my own home, it could have been a thousand miles away, I had walked in the darkness until my feet ached, until no sounds slipped through any longer. The forest was trampled down in some places, I followed a path but strayed off it, wanted to get away from everything that reminded me of human beings. In the end I just collapsed on the grass.

  Did they miss me? Were they looking for me? Perhaps I would hear something soon, hear their cries, all the little girls’ voices at different pitches, from Georgiana’s thin, squeaky voice, the highest on the scale, to the deepest of them, Thilda herself, whose voice jarred rudely.

  Or perhaps none of them had missed me. Perhaps they were accustomed to my leaving, disappearing, perhaps they didn’t even notice I was missing.

  Or were they busy with Edmund? He was ill today, he had to be, today like so many other days. He slept, presumably, until the sun had passed its zenith, was as pale as a ghost from never showing his face outdoors. But it was not illness. All the things I hadn’t understood. And no, they weren’t concerned about his illness. The day was like all others, because it was absolutely not the first time he stayed in bed like that. All the days he had dawdled away, sleeping in his bedroom, while the alcohol slowly left his body. No hereditary melancholy, only self-inflicted lethargy and damage. He was no better than the vulgar manual workers who let life slip away into pints of ale. A drunkard.

  I followed the sun’s progress in the sky. Soon it was directly above me, dried out every single remnant of fluid inside me. The perspiration settled onto my skin. I breathed with my mouth open. My tongue was like dried moss. I wanted to lift my hand, wipe away the drops of sweat, but my arm was far too heavy.

  The day passed. The sun disappeared behind the trees again, the shadows grew longer, everything colder. My body temperature became the same as that of the earth beneath me. Behind my eyelids darkness awaited. Had I already been swallowed up?

  “Father?”

  Another shout. A clear pitch. At the middle of the scale.

  “Father?”

  The voice was louder now and soon I heard solid footsteps on heather and moss.

  I opened my eyes and looked straight into Charlotte’s clear eyes.

  “Good afternoon,” she said. There wasn’t a trace of surprise in her. She just stood there and looked at me, studied me, as if I were an insect, as I lay there completely stretched out. Suddenly I felt the blood flowing to my cheeks.

  “Yes. Here I am.”

  I sat up quickly, brushed the dirt off of my shirt, pulled my hand through my hair and shook off leaves and pine needles.

  “Was it difficult to find me?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Have you been searching a long time?”

  “No, not very long. The path is there.” She pointed behind her, and then I discovered it, the path towards the house, and then I couldn’t help but notice some very familiar trees. I had in no way disappeared far into the depths of the forest. In my delusion I hadn’t made it very far at all. I was right nearby my own home.

  She sat down beside me, and it was only then I noticed that she had something in her hand. The notebook, the one she always had with her, where she eagerly filled up the pages with her pen.

  “I’d like to show you something. May I?”

  She opened it without waiting for an answer.

  “It’s something I’ve been working on for a long time.”

  I tried to focus, but the ink marks crawled like worms on the paper.

  “Wait.” She took off my glasses, polished them quickly with the fabric of her dress and put them back on my nose. They were cleaner, but that wasn’t the main reason why I straightened up my back and tried to take in what she wanted to show me. The small gesture had given me a lump in my throat. I was so grateful that it had been she who had come, that she in particular had found me, seen me like this, and nobody else. I swallowed and directed my attention towards what she wanted to show me.

  A drawing. A hive. But completely different from mine.

  “I thought that if we turn it upside down, it will all be completely different,” she said. “If we insert the boards downwards from above, instead of hanging them from the ceiling, we’ll have much better control.”

  I stared at the drawings she showed me. They slowly came into focus on the page.

  “No,” I said and cleared my throat. “No. It won’t work.” I searched for the words. “They will get stuck on the sides of the box.” I straightened up. I was, after all, an authority. “The bees will attach them with propolis and wax, it will be impossible to get them out.”

  Then she smiled.

  “If they’re too close together, yes. Five millimeters or less.”

  “And if they are too far apart, the bees will build brace comb,” I said. “Regardless, it doesn’t work from above. I’ve already considered the possibility.” I spoke the last words with an indulgent smile.

  “I know, but you haven’t tried different alternatives. It’s just a matter of finding the right dimensions.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  She pointed at the drawings again. “There must be an inbetween point, Father. A point where they will stop producing wax and propolis, and start producing brace comb. What if we find the inbetween point? If we determine exactly the right distance between the outer edge on the molding and the inner wall, they will produce neither wax nor brace comb.”

  I just had to look at her. Look at her properly. She sat with complete calm, but her eyes were shining, revealing her enthusiasm. What was it she said? Wax. Brace comb. Was there something in between?

  My energy returned, I got on my feet.

  The inbetween point!

  GEORGE

  After the meeting at the stupid bank, I went out to the field by the Alabast River. It was empty now. Just a few hives were left in one corner near the end. There was still life in them, but I didn’t know for how long. There was nothing to set them apart from the others. There was no explanation for why they should survive.

  I walked in a circle. The hives had left marks behind all over the grass. Flattened, dead grass. But between the dead blades of grass there were new shoots. Soon the marks would be gone and there would no longer be any trace of all the bee colonies that had lived here.

  I walked closer to the buzzing. Suddenly I yearned to be stung. For the stinging pain.
The swelling. An excuse to curse loudly and with a vengeance.

  Once, just once, I’d been severely stung. I was eight years old. I remember I was sitting in the kitchen. My mother came home from the store. I don’t know why, but on this particular day she’d brought me something. Yes, actually, it was to cheer me up because I was going to be a big brother for the third time, and she obviously knew the news wouldn’t sit well with me. I never got toys except on my birthday and Christmas, but today she had nonetheless bought me something. A toy car. But not just any toy car. Hot Wheels. I had wanted one for ages. I was so happy it felt like my head would burst into flames. And I picked up the car and ran out to the field before she even had a chance to tell me about her tummy.

  My dad was there. With his head in a hive. I didn’t think twice. Ran straight towards him. Look! Look what I got! Look, Daddy! Then I noticed his eyes behind the veil. Stay away from here! Turn back! But it was too late to stop.

  I was bedridden for several days. Nobody counted, but there must have been more than a hundred bee stings. I developed a high fever. The doctor came. He gave me some pills that were so strong they could have knocked out a bear. And I didn’t learn about the child in Mom’s tummy until much later.

  After that I avoided bee stings at all costs.

  I used to think of bee stings as punishment. Like a sign that I hadn’t done my job properly. Hadn’t protected myself. Hadn’t been careful enough. A season without a bee sting was the goal, but there were always a few, no beekeeper manages to avoid stings for an entire summer. Except for this year. So far I hadn’t had a single sting, but for reasons completely different from those I would have liked. I walked in a circle. Close and closer. They droned listlessly. I stopped and did a count of the density. Not enough. And at the very least not 2.5 per square yard.

  I stomped hard on the ground. A single bee flew up.

  Sting me. Sting me!

  It sailed through the air, swerved away from me. Wouldn’t do me the favor.

  I turned and walked towards the barn.

  I hadn’t bought new materials. The spring’s last order still lay in a fresh-smelling pile in a corner. It frightened me. Time stood between me and that pile. Hours and hours, all the work that would be required to build all the hives. And after that, even more. It was just a matter of getting around to ordering more planks. Because I was gonna build them myself. As long as I was working with bees, I was gonna build the hives myself.

  I picked up a two-by-four, testing the weight in my hand. Felt the wood against my bare skin. Still damp. Suitably pliant. Alive.

  Then I put on my gloves. Through them the wood was nothing but dead material. I took out the safety earmuffs. Turned on the saw.

  Then light fell in across the floor through the doorway. The strip grew larger, a shadow filled it. Then it disappeared.

  I turned around.

  It was Emma.

  She looked at the woodpile and then at me. Shook her head gently.

  “What are you up to?”

  She asked, even though she knew the answer.

  She took a few steps towards me.

  “This is madness.”

  She nodded at the planks.

  “You have to build so many. We need so many.”

  As if I didn’t know. As if I wasn’t completely aware of it.

  I shrugged my shoulders, was about to put the earmuffs back on, when something in her eyes stopped me.

  “We could have sold,” she said.

  I dropped the earmuffs. They fell to the floor with a loud bang.

  “We could have sold last winter. Moved. Already been down there.”

  She didn’t say another word, not a word of what she was thinking. While we’d had the chance. While the farm was still worth something.

  I bent over, picked up the safety earmuffs, lifting them with both hands, as if one hand wasn’t enough, as if I were a child.

  Then I put them on my head and turned away.

  I didn’t hear her leave. Just saw the strip of light on the floor, how it grew larger, how her shadow filled it, then it grew smaller, and disappeared.

  We didn’t speak of it again. She didn’t say anything else. The days passed. I kept building until I got blisters, till my back hurt and my fingers were bleeding with cuts. I don’t know what Emma was doing. But at least she didn’t talk about it anymore. Just looked at me from time to time, with watery eyes, a gaze that said: It’s your fault.

  We tried to live like before. Do the same things. Dinner together every day. TV in the evening. She followed many shows. Laughed and wept in front of the TV. Gasped. Talked about them with me. Have you ever! No, it isn’t possible. But he doesn’t deserve it. And her, she’s so sweet. No, no, good heavens.

  And we sat together on the couch, never in separate chairs. She liked it when I stroked her hair. Ruffled it. But now my hands mostly rested in my lap. They hurt too much, were too sore.

  One evening while we were sitting like that, the telephone rang. She made no sign of moving. Neither did I.

  “You answer it,” she said. Her eyes were on the TV, waiting for some vote or other, the tension was building, would the blonde or the brunette be voted out? Extremely exciting, apparently.

  “Maybe it’s Tom,” I said.

  “Yeah, so?”

  “It’s better if you talk to him.”

  She looked at me in surprise.

  “Honestly, George.”

  “What?”

  “You can’t very well just stop talking to him.”

  I didn’t respond.

  The telephone kept ringing.

  “I’m not answering it,” she said and lifted her nose in the air.

  “Fine. Then we won’t answer it,” I said. But of course she won. I went out into the hallway and lifted the receiver.

  It was Lee. He was calling to tell me how the crop was doing.

  “I’m out there every day,” he said happily. “And it’s growing. Heaps of unripe berries.”

  “Wow,” I said. “In spite of the rain?”

  “They must have been busy when the sun was out. It’s gonna be a decent year after all. Better than I feared.”

  “Not bad.”

  “Not bad at all. Just wanted you to know. Great bees you have there.”

  “Had,” I said.

  “What?”

  “Had. Great bees I had.”

  He was silent on the other end. It was sinking in, probably. “Don’t tell me—did it happen at your place, too? Are they gone?”

  “Yes.”

  “But I didn’t think it had hit this far north. That it was just in Florida. And California.”

  “Evidently not.” I tried to keep my voice steady, but it cracked.

  “Oh, George. Good God. What can I say?”

  “Not much to say.”

  “No. Are you insured?”

  “Not against something like this.”

  “But what are you gonna do now?”

  I wound the telephone cord around my index finger. It tightened against a cut I had gotten earlier in the day. Didn’t know what to say.

  “No.”

  “George.” His voice was louder now. “Let me know if there’s anything I can do.”

  “Thank you.”

  “I mean it.”

  “I know.”

  “Wish I could have lent you the money.”

  “No you don’t.” I snickered.

  He laughed back, probably thinking it was all right to joke.

  “Don’t have anything, either. The crop isn’t that good.”

  “Even though you got a discount?”

  “Even though I got a discount.”

  He fell silent.

  “I shouldn’t have agreed to it.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “To the discount.”

  “Lee.”

  “Had I known . . .”

  “Lee. Forget it.”

  I unwound my index finger from the cord. It had
made spiraling marks all the way down to my palm.

  “You know what,” he said, suddenly cheerful. “In fact, I am calling to tell you the opposite. The crop went down the toilet. What terrible bees they were.”

  I had to laugh.

  “That was good to hear.”

  “Good thing they disappeared,” he said.

  “Yeah. Good thing they disappeared.”

  There was silence on the line.

  “But George, honestly. What are you going to do?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe I have to switch to ordering hives.”

  “Ordering? No. That’s your legacy. The hives are your legacy.”

  “It’s not worth much these days.”

  “No.”

  I heard him swallow.

  “But listen, anyway, don’t give up.”

  “Right . . . no.”

  I was unable to say anything else. The warmth in his voice made it impossible to talk.

  “George? Are you there?”

  “Yeah.”

  I took a deep breath, pulled myself together.

  “Yeah. I’m here. I’m not going anywhere.”

  TAO

  A couple of kilometers away from the flat where I’d spent the night, I finally found a subway station that was open. I’d been close the night before, already headed towards the populated part of the city, but without being aware of it. Two other people waited with me, a shaky old woman, skinny, virtually emaciated, who dragged herself over to a bench, and a man in his fifties, with vigilant eyes, carrying a heavy, lumpy string bag. Perhaps he’d robbed abandoned houses.

  We had to wait for half an hour before a subway finally lurched into the station. It took too long. I had to get back now, had to find a library, find answers. I snuck on without a ticket, scarcely noticing that the old woman was struggling to board. When it was almost too late I saw her eyes and hurried over to help. She said thank you many times and clearly wanted to start a conversation, but I didn’t have the strength.

  Inside the car I sat by myself. I would have preferred to stand, couldn’t sit still, but the train shook so much that I didn’t dare. It had been neither upgraded nor cleaned in a long time, perhaps decades. The smell was putrid, the windows covered with a thick layer of grease, the accumulation of thousands of fingers that had opened them when the hot sun beat down or closed them on cold days. On the outside they were discolored by dust and dirt. The deafening din when the train shuddered through the urban landscape made it almost impossible to think. All the same I felt like an animal on the trail of something—dogged, full of purpose. The same two faces revolved through my head. Wei-Wen and Daiyu. The same pallor. The same rasping breathing.