Alice's Farm

by Maryrose Wood

  Alice and Thistle joined in the bun-bun action now and then, when Berry and Marigold needed a break from all the love and crudités, but they kept working, too, tidying the hay and picking up stray candy wrappers the humans dropped. It might not make a difference in terms of keeping the Mauler away, but they were so very proud of the garden for its own sake. After today, everything would change. The growing season would be over. Debts would be paid and the garden put to bed until springtime, to rest and gather strength through the winter, just as their new friend the black bear was doing. It was a big day, a special day. For reasons of her own, Alice wanted to enjoy every minute of it.

  Thistle made a few remarks about what they ought to grow next season, but Alice wasn’t thinking about springtime. For her, there was no need.

  Now and then she thought she saw a flash of white, sneaking around the barn, flicking a black-tipped tail as it curved its sinewy way along the garden fence. But Worm would come when he came. Today was what mattered. She’d give it her all, until the day was done and she could do no more. She hoped that would be enough.

  * * *

  Emmanuel’s family stayed at Prune Street Farm for the whole morning, and they were helpful as can be. His dad Andrew poured apple cider into paper cups for visitors, and his dad Joe collected the money for the pick-your-own bags. Emmanuel praised Carl’s enormous light-filled room and played peekaboo with Marie, which pleased her a lot.

  But they’d planned to leave early, and as lunchtime approached, they decided to head over to Fleischman’s Farm to get some of those amazing onion rings the people on the latest bus were both raving about and reeking of. They’d head back to the city from there.

  “Will you come to Brooklyn soon, to visit?” Emmanuel asked, before he left. Carl said he’d try; maybe in a month or so. There’d be more time for visiting when the growing season was done, but he wondered how he’d feel in his old neighborhood. All that concrete, all those apartments stacked one on top of the other like shoeboxes in a shoe store, all those people rushing to get here and there. Funny how he hadn’t thought any of that strange when he lived there. It was just the way life was.

  He had a brief urge to tell Emmanuel about what the Fleischman twins had said to him, about being in a gang and being murdered—but he let it pass. Just as Carl was when he lived in Brooklyn, the twins were steeped in a particular way of life. What they thought they knew about how other people lived and thought and behaved came from sideways sources, television and movies and things repeated secondhand. It was like a big game of telephone, so no wonder there were some oddball opinions at the far ends of the line. Carl hadn’t known what to think about farmers when he lived in Brooklyn, either.

  Anyway, the Fleischman twins weren’t so bad. They’d told their dad about Big Robot right away and he’d fixed the metal guy himself; he’d even let Carl try on the welding mask. They’d spent a few days helping with the apple harvest, too, when it became clear that Brad was in way over his head.

  Best not to form opinions about people too quickly, Carl had decided. And there was no need to repeat stories that were simply unkind.

  Carl bid his friend from the city goodbye, and this time they hugged long and hard. “Thank you for coming, Emmanuel,” he said. “Next time, I’ll come visit you.”

  Now, wasn’t that something? A few months of digging in the earth beneath a wide-open sky, and young Carl Harvey had grown wise as the Great Rabbit himself!

  * * *

  It was one o’clock, halfway through the festival. The day was going well—as well as it could go, really. The only wrinkle was when Brad gave the first orchard tour of the day and discovered that something both big and strong had knocked over his beehives in an apparent attempt to extract the honey. Luckily the damage was minor. The bees would be fine.

  At the top of the hour the bus honked to let folks know it was time to board and go to the next stop, but many chose to stay at Prune Street Farm for one more shift. The bun-bun factor remained the number-one draw, the sheep were placid and pettable, and the orchard practically threw its remaining apples into the prepaid canvas bags. Happy visitors filled their shopping baskets with jars of applesauce and homemade relishes, sourdough crackers and the last tomatoes of the season, bundles of fresh herbs and purple kale, and those adorably carved pumpkins, too.

  “Make sure you tag your photos!” Brad said many times as he wandered around shaking hands. He’d had a T-shirt made that said FARMER BRAD with #PRUNESTREETFARM written underneath. Sally had one that said FARMER SALLY. Marie had a romper that said BABY FARMER, but by midday she was overwhelmed by all the visitors and had become too cranky to stay outside. A panicked phone call was made; in a heartbeat, Margie Fleischman (the twins’ mother) had dispatched her sister Phoebe to babysit for the afternoon. Baby Farmer Marie and Aunt Phoebe were holed up in Carl’s room watching Finding Nemo on the computer while eating the store-bought Goldfish crackers that Phoebe never went to a babysitting job without, and all was well.

  Carl thought the T-shirts were weird and politely declined to wear the Farmer Carl shirt his parents got for him, but they didn’t mind, truly. Brad and Sally were in a strange mood, a mellow, bittersweet mix of joy and loss, gratitude and dread. This was a special day for them, too, maybe the best day of their whole farming career. Years from now, when they looked back at their brief, foolish stint at working the land, this was the day they’d remember and smile about. If the First Annual Harvest Festival had to be their last, at least let it be fun, they thought.

  It’s not that they’d given up hope. But they’d been up half the night doing the math, and the truth was plain as the tail on a cottontail’s rump. Even if they sold everything they had by day’s end, every jar of applesauce and tomato relish and pickled string beans, every fresh-picked bag of apples, every little ribbon-tied packet of dried fruit and spicy radish coins, every last scrap of gorgeous produce—the money wasn’t going to be enough.

  The numbers just didn’t add up.

  Brad would be the one to make the phone call when the time came—Sally was much too angry at Rowes; she’d never be able to get through it without losing her temper—but not yet. First they would enjoy this day.

  This was not a day to rue, not one bit. It was a wonderful, special day, and like all days, it would never come again.

  * * *

  By midafternoon, all the visitors smelled of onions; it was obvious where they’d already been. Some carried small baskets of hard-boiled eggs decorated in colorful tie-dye patterns, as if it were Easter and Woodstock at the same time. Those were from Janis’s place. There were families with kids and couples without, casual groups of friends and solo travelers, old and young and in between. It was a joyous day for the visitors, many of whom were from the city and seemed to think of farms as scenic nature preserves full of friendly animals and effortless bounty, a cross between a petting zoo and an all-you-can-eat buffet. It was Camp Cityfolk in the Woods, and the cityfolk were happy campers indeed.

  Among the late crop of visitors were two people Carl couldn’t help noticing. They were so hip you could spot them a mile away. The man was dressed in skinny black jeans that looked dipped in wax and a floral-print vest under a tightly fitted blazer. He wore dark-rimmed glasses, a thick walrus mustache, and a derby hat. The woman was in a maroon velvet jumpsuit that revealed a T-shirt underneath, with a picture of the earth and the words THERE IS NO PLANET B written across it. She wore a wide-brimmed straw hat and huge sunglasses with yellow plastic frames that made her look like a bug.

  Were they work friends of his dad’s, art-school friends of his mom’s, or just some random people? They didn’t have kids with them, but they did have old-fashioned film cameras slung around their necks.

  “We’re looking for Carl Harvey,” the woman said. “I’m Tallulah, coeditor of Hipster Farmer magazine. This is my coeditor, Zane Banks.”

  “Hipster?” Carl blurted. “Hipster Farmer? Is this about the contest?”

  The
man grinned and checked his phone. “It sure is. Are you—Carl?” Carl nodded. “We thought you might be a kid; that’s awesome! Well, Carl, you applied to be Hipster Farmer of the Year, and guess what? You’re a finalist, dude!”

  Tallulah smiled, which made the delicate ring that pierced her lower lip twitch upward. “Zane and I are here for the site visit.”

  “What’s a site visit?” To Carl it sounded like an eye exam.

  “It was in the application,” Tallulah said. “In the fine print, I guess. All finalists will be subject to an unannounced site visit before we choose a winner. Prune Street Farm is the last one on our list. We’ll be making our decision imminently, so you won’t be in suspense for long.”

  Zane bopped his head as if listening to some private music. “We would have come sooner, but when we heard about this festival of yours, it just seemed like the perfect day to drop in.”

  “Wow.” Carl didn’t know what else to say. He’d been half asleep when he submitted his application, and if there was fine print, he’d missed it. “This is good news, I guess. But how’d you know about the Harvest Festival?”

  Zane’s head was really bopping now. “It’s on your website, dude. Cool website, by the way! Love the pop-up animations. Really clever.”

  “My dad made it.”

  Brad was already on his way over, a look of curiosity mixed with caution on his face.

  Carl stepped aside. “Here’s my dad. Um, may I introduce Brad Harvey?”

  “Mr. Harvey”—Tallulah spotted the T-shirt—“Farmer Brad, I mean. Such a pleasure to meet you.”

  “Congratulations, dude!” Zane seemed to call people dude in general.

  Brad looked puzzled. “Thanks. Carl, do you know these people?”

  “Not really,” Carl said. “This is Zane Banks, and this is Tallulah.”

  The woman extended a hand. “Just Tallulah,” she explained. “We’re from the magazine.” At Brad’s evident confusion, she added, “Hipster Farmer? Hipster Farmer magazine.”

  “Wait—did you say Hipster Farmer magazine?” The word magazine made Brad stand up straight. As for hipster farmer: His journey from confusion to comprehension, from mild offense to openhearted acceptance of the label took all of two seconds. “Sweet!” he exclaimed, full of newfound hipster farmer pride. “Welcome! Welcome to Prune Street Farm.”

  Brad quickly flagged down Sally, who was over at the sheep-petting area, and gestured for her to come, here, quick. She made the connection right away. “Hipster Farmer—oh! Aren’t you the magazine that had Armando Shubert on the cover?”

  Zane flashed a thumbs-up. “Right-o. That was way back in January. Poor Armando.”

  “Armando Shubert, what a shame.” Tallulah clucked her tongue, tsk, tsk. “We had high hopes for him, but…”

  “He’s kind of on the way out,” Zane confided. “So inventive. But still…”

  “So creative,” Tallulah agreed. “And yet…”

  Sally tried to look sad. “Do you mean his restaurant is not doing so well?”

  Zane interlaced his fingers like an undertaker and dropped his voice. “Loco for Locavores is … struggling.”

  “The food is too, what you’d call … experimental,” Tallulah elaborated. “Tiny portions, and it’s hard to eat. Not what people crave when they go out for a meal. You know what I’m saying?”

  “But hey!” said Zane, now a happy preschool teacher, clapping his hands together. “We had an awesome meal this morning. At Cindy’s Diner! Pure Americana. Delicious food, huge portions, everything homemade.”

  “That’s what our readers love. Authenticity. Real small-town cooking,” Tallulah agreed.

  Brad nodded. “What about being locally sourced? Is that not a thing?”

  Tallulah grinned. “Cindy buys all her eggs and produce locally because, duh, all her neighbors and customers are farmers. She’s always done it that way. She didn’t realize it was something to brag about. Now, that’s a thing!”

  Zane nodded. “Cindy is awesome. I think we should put her on the cover. Do you concur, Tallulah?”

  “Totally.” She beamed at the Harveys. “Anyway, finalists: We’re stuffed, but not too stuffed taste some of your products. Official site visit begins now. Are you ready?”

  The look on Sally’s face was nothing short of angelic. “Of course. Can I interest you in some dried fruit?”

  “Yummy, dude! Bring it on!” said Zane.

  Tallulah looked just as thrilled. “Oh, yeah! I love dried fruit!”

  Throwing a backward “can you believe this?” look at her husband and son, Sally led them away.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  The golden hour.

  The scientists had come to the festival, too. They didn’t seriously expect John Glenn to show his noble face on such a noisy, crowded day, although it would be a real showstopper if he did. Still, bird or no bird, it was a perfect opportunity for “public outreach and education,” which was one of the things the Eagle Restoration Project’s precarious funding depended upon.

  With Carl’s permission, they’d set up a table not far from the sheep pen. They gave out ERP brochures and ERP buttons and ERP ballpoint pens, and they talked about the plight of endangered species. To keep things interesting, they offered several slimy and goopy science activities. The best one was how to compost with worms in a bucket. It was irresistibly gross, and all the kids in attendance gathered around, groaning in mock-disgust and begging to hold the worms.

  “Great job with the educational component,” Tallulah remarked, as she, Zane, and Sally speed-walked past the science table on their way to the farmhouse. “You’re really serving the community.”

  “Well, we do what we can,” Sally replied. She had no idea what the scientists were up to; it was all Carl’s doing. “As I was saying, I’ve been experimenting with drying all kinds of fruits and vegetables. It’s fascinating to see how differently they respond to the process…”

  “Good afternoon, Mrs. Harvey.” It was Chuck, calling from the table. The scientists had been extra respectful toward Sally since that first awkward meeting. “Nice festival. Just checking: You haven’t seen John Glenn today, have you?”

  “No, not that I’ve noticed,” she called over her shoulder, still walking. “Anyway, dried apples were my first attempt—”

  “John Glenn, the astronaut?” Zane asked. “What an awesome dude. Is he coming to the festival?”

  “He’s dead, Zane,” Tallulah replied. “But an awesome dude for sure.”

  Zane quickly course-corrected. “Bummer. I loved that movie he was in. About the Apollo space program. The Stuff, right?”

  “The Right Stuff. You were close!” Sally knew her movies, even the ones Meryl Streep wasn’t in. “That was an actor playing John Glenn, and it was about the Mercury space program, not Apollo. But I agree, it was an awesome movie.” The word was contagious. Sally took a breath and turned to Tallulah. “There’s an American bald eagle the scientists have named John Glenn. For some reason, the bird likes to hang out here.”

  Tallulah peeked over her sunglasses. “Here? At the farm?”

  “Funny, right? That’s why the scientists come, I don’t know, a few times a week. They’re observing John Glenn. The eagle,” she added, for Zane’s benefit.

  Sally was matter-of-fact about it. Tallulah nodded, deep in thought, and Zane took rapid and copious notes. He finished scribbling and motioned for Sally and Tallulah to wait while he jogged back to take a photo of the science table. “Mind if we chat with you dudes later?” he asked the scientists. “Pose a few questions about science and eagles and whatnot?”

  Enrique handed him a flyer about the ERP. “We’d be delighted. It’s why we’re here.”

  “The dried radish coins are what I’m most excited about,” Sally went on, to Tallulah. “Radishes get extra spicy when they’re dehydrated. I’m playing around with different flavor profiles. Sweet, savory…”

  “Are those rabbits yours?” Tallulah interrupte
d. They were in sight of the bunny-petting area.

  “Nope,” said Sally. “They’re wild rabbits. I guess they live around here.”

  “People are petting them,” Tallulah said, a note of wonder in her voice. “Those wild rabbits are playing fetch with your dog.”

  Indeed they were. Much to the delight of the crowd, Foxy was tossing crudités by flinging them with her mouth. Marigold and Berry found them and zigzagged all the way back, to drop them at Foxy’s feet.

  “That is your dog, right?” Tallulah asked.

  Sally didn’t know what to say about the dog playing fetch with rabbits, so she chose the easier question. “Yes, Foxy is ours. A city dog in the country. She’s adapting well.”

  By now Zane had torn himself away from the awesome worms and caught up with Tallulah and Sally. “Question for you, Sally: How did a city dog learn to herd sheep?”

  Sally laughed. “Foxy, herd sheep? No way. That dog is lazy, if you ask me.”

  He tapped his camera. “She was herding the sheep earlier. I saw it when we arrived. Captured it on film, right here.”

  The conversation had slipped far out of Sally’s control. Weakly she replied, “Well, I guess it’s a new trick Carl taught her.”

  “This farm is pretty unusual,” Zane said.

  Sally didn’t want to disagree, but she wasn’t going to make the mistake of talking about how the plants had come up by themselves, either. “Yes, it is,” she said, forcing a smile. “And just wait until you taste the applesauce!”

  * * *

  Carl was wiped out, with another two hours of festival to go. They’d sold out of the pickled string beans and sourdough bread; the produce was nearly gone. The rabbit-face pumpkins were a huge hit, but he felt strange every time he sold one. The customer always said something like, “Adorable! Did you carve these yourself, young man?” to which Carl felt obligated to say yes, because if not him, then who? The lie felt heavy in his belly, though.