To make matters worse, as soon as they left the highway they got lost. The back roads were unlit and the GPS wasn’t much help and they bumped down a rutted driveway before Glenn realized his mistake. A dog rushed out barking and lights came on and Glenn waved while the homeowner watched them turn around.
“What now?” Cassie said.
He sent her an exasperated look. “I find the right house. That’s what.”
The farmhouse, when they finally located it, was a split level with plastic chairs out front and a pile of debris under a tarp. An ancient Volvo that couldn’t possibly run had settled in front of the garage. She couldn’t tell anything about the man who came out, squinting into the headlights, but she felt a keen disappointment at the house. She’d expected something quaint, maybe a white picket fence, but this was just a tired tract house and except for the darkness, which was denser up here, they could be in any subdivision.
The farmer waved them around back. “Go ahead and pull all the way around. “You’ll see the trees.”
They rattled over a grass track that took them behind the house, Cassie wincing as she imagined the bees shaken and stirred inside their hives, ready to burst forth in a spray of aggravation. Glenn slowed to a stop when they came to a grove of trees, leaving the lights on.
Cassie’s breath caught. The peach trees were exquisite, rows and rows of them, with branches that began low on their trunks and forked delicately into a feathery mass of pink blossoms. Beyond the headlights, the individual trees blurred so the orchard looked dim and mysterious, like something out of a fairytale. Despite the tension with Glenn, a sense of peace suffused her.
She had a thought. “So when the bees wake up, they’re somewhere new. How does that work?”
Glenn cut the engine. “They figure it out pretty quick.” He got out of the truck without further explanation, but she sat a moment longer, soaking up the stillness.
“Mike Russo,” the farmer said when he caught up with them. He shook Glenn’s hand and nodded to Cassie. He had wire-rim glasses and a bit of a stoop and looked more like a college professor than a farmer.
“Does this spot here get afternoon shade?” Glenn said.
“Oh yeah, round about two o’clock it’s in shade.”
Glenn walked the ground, peering off into the trees and coming in and out of the headlights like an apparition. “You have water, right?”
Russo nodded toward the woods at the far edge of the orchard. “Stream’s over there, just down that little ridge. Plenty close for the bees. Daytime you could see better.”
Glenn nodded, satisfied. “This should work fine.”
He opened the truck bed and unstrapped the hives, then untied the ramp. The bees were quiet, but apparently they didn’t move around much after dark. Hopefully they hadn’t left any strays behind.
Glenn extended the ramp and Russo took an end. He gave Cassie a pleasant smile. “Nice of you to come along and keep him company. I hope he’s going to buy you a drink after all this.” He tipped his chin at Glenn. “Your wife might like Casey’s. Just up the Post Road there. You might’ve passed it on the way in.”
The silence was broken only by the throaty belch of a toad.
Thank goodness it was dark because she could tell her face had gone red. Did they look like a married couple? Maybe because of the taut silence between them.
Glenn, straining down the ramp with the first hive, didn’t answer.
“How about it, honey,” she said pointedly. “A drink sounds nice.”
Glenn shot her awhat the fucklook and Russo laughed. He had a surprisingly hearty laugh for such a reedy man. “Hope I didn’t start something.”
“Let’s just get these hives unloaded,” Glenn muttered.
Cassie asked Russo a few questions about peach farming, which he answered amiably. Glenn had a cramped look on his face but he deserved to be uncomfortable, the way he was acting. So caught up with whatever was bothering him, he couldn’teven be polite. She eventually left them to the unloading and wandered through the orchard, the trees enveloping her with the delicate scent of honey and almond. No wonder the bees liked them.
Glenn was a difficult man. A solid, principled man. But difficult. He had a moody side she hadn’t fully appreciated. She was used to Phil, who would chase you down the hall to get the last word in. But Glenn was a brooder, probably up there on the truck right now cataloging his grievances. With Lilah. With her. Whoever. She wished she knew what had happened to upend him between the time he invited her and when she arrived. She would gladly listen, but he’d shut her out completely.
When it got quiet, she drifted back to the truck. The hives were all unloaded, arranged in neat pairs in the first row of the orchard. In the dark, they looked like cake boxes lined up for a wedding. Glenn was making his way up the row from the far end, removing the cloth covering the openings of each hive so the bees could get out in the morning.
“Looks like we’re all set,” Russo said when she reappeared. “In a few weeks, you can come back and do this all over again.”
“Oh no,” she said, summoning a smile. “You don’t need me.”
“Moral support, then.”
She shook Russo’s hand and climbed into the truck. Glenn got in, tired and sweaty, but she ignored him, staring out the window as they bounced out the way they’d come.
