He tugs his eyes away from mine to look past me at his mother and brother.
“I’ll take you to the farthest field I can find.”
At his low tone, butterflies swarm into my stomach.
We drive along the dusty track and turn right onto the sun-bleached road, the hazy blue sky stretching overhead and golden fields all around. After a while, Anders pulls off the road ontothe grassy verge and then we’re staring down at acre upon acre of dried-out corn swaying in the breeze, like waves on the ocean.
He presses some buttons on a digital display and we advance slowly on the cornfield, the green rocket teeth drawing in the stalks. He turns round to look out of the rear window, so I do the same, and to my amazement, corn kernels, fully shelled and free of chaff, are pouring into the combine behind us.
“You going to tell me what you were thinking?”
“I’m warming up to it,” I reply.
He raises one eyebrow and faces forward again, returning his attention to the digital display. “Well, with the way this yield is looking, we’ve only got about twelve minutes before Jonas will be coming with the grain cart.”
“Twelve minutes? That soon?”
“Yep.”
“What’s the grain cart?”
“It’s a trailer towed by the tractor. I’ll unload this lot into it and he’ll take it back to the farm to empty it into the grain bin.”
It’s not as noisy in here as I expected it to be, just a low hum of the engine as we move at an unhurried pace, gathering up cornstalks and leaving behind a flattened field of crispy, shredded chaff.
“This is kind of addictive,” I say as I peer over my shoulder again.
“I bet you wouldn’t still feel that way if you were out here at two in the morning,” he teases.
“Is that how long you’re sometimes at it?”
“When the conditions are right, we can go all night. But obviously, you can head home whenever you want to.”
“No way. If you’re staying, I’m staying. Don’t you have work tomorrow, though?”
“I can go in late.”
I turn toward him and lean my shoulder against the seat back, crossing my legs. He glances down at my knees, at the white trainers on my feet, and then he swivels to look out the back again.
“Sometimes I think I spend more of my time looking backward than forward,” he says.
“In more ways than one?”
He meets my eyes. It’s a moment before he replies. “I guess you could say that.”
I am so jittery as I stare back at him. I have so much to say and no idea where to start. It’s just as well we’re going to be out here all day.
“Have you warmed up yet?” he asks me.
I shake my head.
He narrows his eyes at me, puzzled.
“How were your parents after last night?” I ask.
He smiles and faces forward again. “They were good. I was up late last night, talking to Ma and Jonas. We had another long chat this morning with Pa too.”
“What about?”
