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“No, stay. We’ve already started on some of the early varieties, and I’ve got a little time before they need me in the orchards.” He looked at her with open curiosity. “What brought you over?”
“I wanted to see what happens when harvest actually gets going. Yesterday I saw the trees, but that isn’t the same as seeing how everything works once you start picking the apples.” Kate glanced around the yard. “If this is what Mom and Dad are heading into, I’d like to understand it a little better. So I can help where I can instead of getting in the way.”
“Come on, then. I’ll walk you through it. You’ll get a better idea once you see how the yard and barn work together.”
“Thanks.” Kate fell into step beside him. “I’m not sure whether Mom and Dad would be happier if I took less of an interest. I was pretty vocal about my concerns before I got here.”
Wes smiled. “I think your dad has noticed.”
Kate laughed. They walked toward the nearest rows, where several empty bins had already been placed beneath the trees.
Wes stopped beside the first one and rested a hand on its edge. “This section will probably be one of the first we pick. The bins go out before the crew comes through so nobody wastes time moving them later. Once one is full, it has to get back to the yard and the fruit has to go where it’s supposed to go. Some will be sold fresh, some stored, some used for cider. The picking is only one part of it.”
“So Dad can’t just worry about getting the apples off the trees.”
“No. Once they come off, you need to know what happens next.” Wes nodded toward one of the lower branches. “Try that one.”
Kate reached for an apple.
“Wait.”
Her hand stopped. “What?”
“First apple you pick at Russet Hill in the fall, you eat under the tree.”
Kate looked from him to the apple. “Is that an actual orchard rule?”
“It’s one of mine.”
Something about the perfectly serious way he said it made her suspicious. “How old were you when you made that up?”
Wes’s mouth twitched. “Nine.”
“And everyone just went along with it?”
“Long enough for it to become a tradition.”
“That’s convenient.”
“I thought so.”
She twisted the apple free and polished it against her jacket before taking a bite. It was crisp and sharp-sweet, cool from the morning air.
Wes watched her. “Well?”
Kate took another bite. “I’m prepared to respect the tradition.”
“Good.”
She held the apple as they started along the row. “Do you have any other rules you invented when you were nine that I need to know about?”
“Probably.”
Kate laughed again.
“Once picking gets underway, everything starts moving at once,” Wes continued. “Full bins coming in, empty ones going back out, trailers moving through the rows. You don’t want fruit sitting around because there’s nowhere for it to go next. That’s when harvest gets hard.”
They moved farther along the row while Wes explained enough for Kate to begin seeing the orchard differently. Yesterday she had noticed the trees. Today she noticed the spaces between them, the access for tractors, the bins waiting where they would be needed and the people already preparing for work that had not quite started. She noticed Wes too.
