Chapter 34
Chapter Thirty-Four
Tallahassee, Florida
Four years later
J enny was nervous about seeing Hemingway for the first time since she had to fire him two years earlier. He would probably be decent about it, but Hemingway was a wild card so it was impossible to be sure.
“Don’t worry,” Wyatt soothed as they headed toward a local bookstore a few blocks from the Florida State campus. “You did Hemingway the biggest favor of his life when you kicked him off the grove.”
Maybe, but she still regretted it. After the Firebird Egg sold at auction, she and Hemingway each got a little over a million dollars once the taxes and fees were paid. Hemingway still wanted to work on the grove, but he got lazy and neglected anything he didn’t feel like doing, such as handling the grove’s paperwork. The worst was when he let their contract with the OJ plant lapse because he rarely bothered to open the mail. It meant Jenny had to take a week of leave from her job in Tallahassee to drive down and mend fences with the guys at the plant.
After getting fired, Hemingway packed his bags and left Pierce County without a word. She worried herself sick for weeks and resorted to calling Bad Penny to find out what happened to him.
“He’s working on a shrimp boat down in the Florida Keys,” Penny had told her. “I think he’s dating the owner’s daughter. Who knows? Anyway, he still claims to be writing the great American novel.”
That was two years ago, and as usual, Penny was right. Hemingway’s novel was finally published last year. It was on the New York Times bestseller list for months and was short-listed for a Pulitzer. Who could have guessed that the novel embodying the spirit of rural America would finally be written by a guy from Iceland?
The sun had set and streetlamps illuminated the avenue of quaint shops. Jenny squeezed Wyatt’s hand as they strolled past a sidewalk café, a candle shop, and an overpriced antique store. The bookshop where Hemingway was doing an author-signing was straight ahead, and her steps slowed.
“Come on, don’t be nervous,” Wyatt coaxed. “Hemingway isn’t the type to hold a grudge.”
Neither was she. It wasn’t a confrontation with Hemingway she feared, it was seeing a glimpse of her old life that was going to be painful. She still owned the grove, but now spent the majority of her life in Tallahassee. Almost all the changes she’d been through since marrying Wyatt had been marvelous, but a part of her would always miss living on the grove.
The signboard propped outside the bookstore showed a photo of Hemingway with a long list of cities for his book tour. Stacks of his novel filled the window display, its cover showing the silhouette of a lone man fishing by a river.
On the other side of the plate-glass window, the warmly lit bookstore was crowded with shoppers and a line had formed at Hemingway’s table. He looked tanned and healthy and fit. Mercifully, he’d put on a shirt. With Hemingway, things like that couldn’t be taken for granted. It looked like he was enjoying himself with a couple of college girls standing before his table, their young faces alive as they preened and flirted. Hemingway returned their flirtation with a roguish grin.
She missed him. She and Hemingway had walked through fire together and come out on the other side with a few dings, but mostly whole and healthy and stronger for having known each other.
Wyatt must have sensed the rush of nostalgia that threatened to drag her back into the past, and he leaned down to kiss her cheek. “Thank you for coming to Tallahassee,” he whispered before straightening to gaze through the bookstore window.
“I wouldn’t have it any other way,” she said. Moving here had been difficult, but major life changes usually were. And so far, the good things that came from marrying Wyatt vastly outweighed the sacrifices. The orange grove had once been her only world and she tried to cram everything else that mattered onto those lonely thirty acres. It wasn’t until she moved to Tallahassee that she realized how limiting it had become.
The grove gave her priceless insight into farming and perseverance. Now instead of growing oranges, she used that knowledge for the World Famine Commission. She worked in an office where she raised funds, hired experts, and figured out how to turn difficult soil all over the world into productive farmland. Most of it was done from here in Tallahassee, but she flew to various parts of the world a few times a year for conferences or as an adviser in grove management.
“Come on, let’s go inside,” she said and snagged a copy of Hemingway’s novel off the front table. The college girls still had him captivated, so she headed to the cashier to buy the book while Wyatt went for a cup of coffee.
The line at Hemingway’s table continued to get longer. There was no chance for a private chat, so she joined the end of the line to wait. The college girls had moved on, but Hemingway was just as congenial to the matronly lady buying the book for her husband, an avid fly-fisherman. After the lady went on her way, Hemingway stood and glanced around the store as though looking for someone, but came up disappointed. He was about to greet the next customer when he spotted her.
“Jenny!” he said and beckoned her forward, ignoring the line of people in front of her.
“I’ll wait my turn,” she called up to him.
“Nonsense, woman,” he groused, coming around the table to join her at the back of the line. “We haven’t seen each other in two years. Am I forgiven?”
“You miserable Viking,” she teased. “I just spent thirty dollars on your book. What do you think?”
His laughter was warm and familiar as she stepped into his hug. “I was worried you might be travelling and couldn’t come tonight,” he said. “How do you like working for the World Famine Commission?”
“It’s good. I’m on my way to Morocco next month to speak at a conference on Mediterranean citrus.” She and Wyatt were finally going to see Morocco after all. What an irony that it would be because of her job, not his. He had managed to clear his calendar for two weeks and they planned on stealing time to camp beneath the hot desert skies.
Wyatt soon joined them, and Hemingway congratulated him on getting elected to another term as Commissioner of Agriculture. It was nice to see the two men finally being decent to each other, but her gaze strayed to the cover of Hemingway’s book. The silhouette of the lone man fishing in a lazy river reminded her of home.
Wyatt’s reelection meant they had another four years in Tallahassee, and she would spread her wings to make the most of them. And if she occasionally missed the grove? Well, she still had access to the closed-circuit security cameras and sometimes tuned in to watch the sun rising above the grove in the early morning hours as the breeze rustled the leaves. The trees were healthy and tall now and stretched in orderly rows toward the horizon. This year they produced their first crop of oranges since they’d been planted, and she proudly watched the harvest from afar.
They still came back to the farmhouse each year at Christmas. Maybe she and Wyatt would return for good someday, or maybe they’d stay in Tallahassee forever. No matter what happened, Jenny would make the most out of every day . . . but her favorite sound on earth would always be the squeak of the porch swing while gazing out at her grove.
The line to meet Hemingway was getting longer, and this wasn’t the place for a reunion. “What are you doing after your signing is over?” she asked. “There’s a pub down the street that serves great smoked brisket. Want to join us?”
“Absolutely,” he instantly replied. He signed her book and she gave him directions to the pub.
Though she would never admit it, the brisket at the new place was even better than at the Brickhouse. She and Wyatt already had platters of brisket, baked beans, and cornbread by the time Hemingway joined them half an hour later. They laughed about old times, and naturally, the conversation soon turned to Svetlana, the senator, and all the other people they’d known in Amity.
As expected, Senator Wakefield resigned from the senate and pled guilty to involuntary manslaughter. He’d been given a fine and performed community service, which most people thought was fair. Millicent Hawkins and her husband never returned to Amity. Rumor had it they relocated to be near their daughter in Orlando, but Jenny wondered if Mrs. Hawkins was finally ready to put Max behind her forever.
As for Svetlana, they all agreed her story deserved to be commemorated.
“Have you ever thought of writing a book about her?” she asked Hemingway, who shifted in annoyance.
“You sound like my agent,” he said. “Every month she nags me about it. I don’t know what I’ll write next. I’ve toyed with some ideas, but nothing has gelled yet and I’m in no hurry.”
Expecting Hemingway to do anything he didn’t want to do was hopeless. Still, she hoped he’d find a way to write Svetlana’s story so she would be remembered as more than just a woman found in a tree. One hot July evening many years ago, a lightning strike hit an old cypress tree and split it wide open. In the years since, Jenny had often wondered if it was the hand of God that caused that bolt of lightning, leading them to discover Svetlana’s body and her amazing story.
Decades after her death, Svetlana’s example inspired Jenny to break free and explore the world. Last year she read the copy of War and Peace that Svetlana had given her grandfather. It was a magnificent novel, but the most moving passage in the entire volume was the handwritten note Svetlana penned on the title page:
Perhaps someday when we live in a more peaceful world, you and I shall meet again and raise a toast to our colorful lives. Until then, may God be with you, and please remember me fondly.
Svetlana never lived to see that more peaceful world, but the three of them around this table had been blessed beyond all measure. They had good food, friendship, faith, and a mission in life.
She lifted her glass. “In honor of Svetlana,” she said. “I’m grateful that our paths crossed with her, and hope that somewhere up there she is smiling down on us and knows that her life made a difference.”
They clinked their glasses and raised a toast in honor of Svetlana’s colorful life.