This gets Caroline’s attention as I ease in behind Eli. “You know him?” she asks.
“Yeah… buddy of mine. Eli Hart. He’s an apiarist.”
“A what?” Chris asks from the back.
“A beekeeper,” Caroline provides, showing an intellect I imagine would be necessary for her line of work.
“That’s right. He owns an apiary.”
“To make honey?”
I put my truck in park. “That and beeswax products, but more importantly, he rents out his bees to assist in crop pollination for a lot of the berry farms.”
“That’s fascinating,” Caroline says, and then sucks in a breath when Eli raises his head and turns our way. His handsome face has her murmuring, “Oh, wow… do they make them all so ruggedly handsome around here?”
I have no clue what the standard is, but I don’tanswer, instead saying, “Gimme a minute. Let me see if I can give him a hand since he’s got probably a hundred thousand employees in boxes back there. Feel free to get out and shoot some of the farmland here. It’s really pretty.”
I’m barely out of the truck before Caroline is scrambling out as well, Chris right behind with his camera on his shoulder. Caroline lifts her hand to her forehead to shade against the sun and points over the freshly tilled earth. Chris aims in that direction, and Derek watches from inside the truck.
Eli straightens as I approach, looks curiously at my guests, and then walks to greet me. He looks to them and then back to me. “Impressive posse you got going on there, Sam.”
I rub at the back of my neck. “Yeah… they’re filming me for an interview. Something called B-roll footage.” I toss a thumb over my shoulder. “It’s admittedly a little awkward.”
“I bet,” Eli chuckles. “That would be a hard pass for me.”
While Eli is friendly enough and will chat over a beer at Chesty’s once in a blue moon, he’s pretty much a loner. Always has been.
I lean to the right and check out his back tire, flatter than a pancake. Caroline and Chris creep closer to watch but maintain some distance. “Need any help?”
“Got it covered,” he says. “But I could use another set of hands this weekend if you can spare some time. Bought a used bottling tank from a guy in Sanford, and it’s too damn heavy to muscle down alone.”
“I got you covered,” I assure him. “Just text me when you’re ready.”
“Appreciate it.” Eli grabs a mason jar from a box in his cab and hands it to me. “For your efforts.”
Laughing, I accept the jar of honey with the slightly crooked Hart Apiary label. “Will never say no to this stuff. Later, man.”
“Later,” he says, and I head back to my truck. Caroline and Chris get back in and are seated by the time I’m closing my door.
“Get what you need?” I ask them.
“Sure did,” Chris replies.
As we’re buckling in, Caroline asks, “Assume your friend didn’t need any help?”
“Just a flat and he had it covered, but it’s a good thing I stopped. He needs help at his farm this weekend.” I show her the jar of honey before tucking it under my seat. “Advance payment.”
“Is everyone so friendly and helpful around here?”
I consider that, scratching at the scruff on my jaw. “Well, Eli’s not all that friendly, but yeah… we all help each other. I’ve got to clear out some bushes at the back of my property, and I’ll probably ask him to bring his backhoe over to help me at some point.”
“That’s really lovely,” she murmurs, jotting down a few notes. “True sense of community.”
“That’s the beauty of small-town living,” I tell her.
She looks at me longer than the moment probably needs. “I think that line just wrote your closing segment.”
We pull onto the road, and she reverts to interview mode. “How has success changed you?”
