Chapter Thirteen
I throw the blanket over the saddle and smooth it down neatly.
“Coming,” I call, and make my way to the front of the barn, wiping sweat away from my temples.
When I see Cash at the door, I stop in my tracks. He has on a straw sun hat, like mine only bigger, like a sombrero. I can’t help but giggle because he’s a big tough guy from the neck down, and an earth-muffin-granny-gardener on the top.
“That’s the cutest sun hat I’ve ever seen,” I say.
“You think I look cute, huh?” He waggles his brow, arms folded.
“That’s not what I said.” I blush, tipping the front of his hat up.
“Don’t knock the hat. It keeps the sun out of my eyes. Plus, I can’t afford to crisp.”
“Crisp? My grandma used to say that.” I laugh. “But you probably don’t burn too badly with your olive skin, do you?”
“My neck does. What were you up to?” he asks as I point him towards the trail leading to the orchard. “I thought we were meeting by the trees.”
“I… Yeah, we were, but I … uh, heard a sound in the barn.” I look back at the door as we reach the trail. He’ll think I’m nuts if I tell him I thought I felt something from the barn. “I wanted to check it out.”
“Was it a critter or something?” he asks.
“Yeah, it might have been.”
“Where there’s one, there’s more,” Cash says.
“Really?” I ask, running my sweaty palms across my back pockets. It’s surreal seeing Cash again. I feel guilty that he’s here to help, especially after how thoughtful he was yesterday.
His face turns serious. “Well, you’ve got to be careful – pack rats could destroy the place.”
He walks ahead of me, and I check my phone as it buzzes. It’s Lani.
Heard from Wyatt?
Not yet, I reply. I’ll tell her about cherry picking with Cash later.
We reach the cherry trees where a chest pack with shoulder straps sits by the first tree. My eyes widen. “Is that what you’re supposed to use for picking? This thing is great! I mean, I could carry three times as many cherries at once. Where did you get it?”
His face brightens under his silly hat. I laugh to myself but not quietly enough.
“It’s the hat, isn’t it?”
“Yeah, sorry.”
“So … this is a harvesting bag. We use them for our apple trees, but it’ll work for cherries too. I’ve heard you can shake sour cherry trees to get them off. Is that true?”
“I think so, but we’ve never done it that way,” I say, guessing the equipment would cost a fortune. “I wish I’d known about these bags. Grandpa always had these baskets around.”
“They look like a pain to carry,” he says.
“They are.” I pull a crimson cherry off a twig and hand it to Cash. As our hands touch, he finds my eyes and then looks away quickly. “Let’s start with these. They’re Montmorencies.”
He throws it in his mouth. His head tilts sideways and his cheeks pull into a pucker at the flavour. He swallows hard and spits the pit out at me.
“Hey!” I jump to the side, laughing.
He grimaces again and closes his eyes.
“These are the ones I’ve been preserving. When I mix them with honey, they are to die for.”
“Honey sounds pretty good right now,” he mumbles. “I got a really sour one.”
He proceeds to put on the harvesting bag, which looks incredibly like a baby carrier, and something falls to the ground.
“I forgot,” he says, picking it up. “I made you a poultice with osha root for your sting.”
“Wow, thank you,” I say, touched. “What’s osha root?”
“It’s a native plant that can be used for remedies. The tops look like carrot leaves. Here, smell it.”
“It smells like a spicy carrot,” I say.
“Wrap it round your hand while we pick. It should help with the pain and inflammation.”
I take the poultice from him and use the old T-shirt material it’s in to wrap it round my palm. I fumble to fasten it with my other hand, so Cash steps in, tying it snugly.
He looks up, fixing his eyes on mine. “Too tight?”
“Just right. Thanks.”
I start picking the bright-red fruits and place them gently in my basket. We get into a rhythm of picking and Cash starts humming a calming tune. He’s more than six feet tall, and with his long arms he can reach cherries only the birds normally get.
The wooden step stool, grey and white from years of weather, helps me reach a little higher. Cash’s song hits a new part that repeats itself, and suddenly blood throbs in my ears, pulsing with each note. My arms stiffen, and I jerk in his direction to listen.
“Cash…” I say, unsure.
“Hmm?”
“What song is that?”
“I don’t know the name of it. It’s a Spanish lullaby. My dad used to sing me to sleep with it while he played a Peruvian instrument called a charango.”
“Huh,” I say. I shake off my strange reaction. “It sounds … familiar. What’s a charango?”
“It’s like a tiny guitar, but with ten strings. It’s been in my family forever. Came from Peru with an ancestor.”
I reach to pick what looks like the perfect cherry, but I pull too hard and its ripe skin bursts open, spraying juice on to my face. Cash hands me a handkerchief and I dab my skin, getting spots of red all over the pure white cloth.
“So what are you going to do about harvesting honey now?” Cash asks, his belly bag growing full.
“I’ll have to always wear my suit. No more tempting fate,” I sigh.
“OK, but what about right now?” He hesitates. “Aren’t you at risk by the trees?”
“I haven’t figured it out yet. I can’t just stop taking care of the bees or the trees,” I sigh. “Cherries and honey are all this place has, and I’ve got to make money somehow.”
I walk under the shade of the next tree. Cash continues to a branch on the other side. He works steadily and with a precision I have yet to master.
“Can your mom help?” He peeks through the leaves.
“No, she gets too tired picking. She helps with preserving them sometimes. Now that the sweet cherries are coming in, she helps put them in cartons.”
Cash comes round to my tree. “Yeah, those are everyone’s favourites. And just so you know … I’ve lived here my whole life, and I’ve never seen anyone’s trees with this many cherries.”
“Really?”
“Heck yeah. This is incredible.” He puts a hand on his cherry-filled belly bag. “You’re going to have a lot to sell.”
“Yeah,” I say distantly and look down the row of trees, “but I’m so cooked.
Last week I barely got the cases in my mom’s car.
” My head starts to ache. I sit down and pull my sweat-damp hair off my shoulder, leaning into my hand and resting my elbows on my legs.
“I’d have it all figured out if I was getting my dad’s truck.
Then I could bring so much more to the market. ”
I look up at him. He smiles at me, and the scar on his neck jumps up as he swallows.
Then he stands and puts out his hand expectantly.
I lift mine, and he grasps it firmly, pulling me to my feet with ease.
When I’m standing, I feel the weight of his sharp eyes searching mine for answers.
He keeps hold of my hand. I don’t know what he’s asking, but all I want to say is yes and yes.
I brush away the tiny twigs stuck to the back of my legs and change the subject, withdrawing my hand. “Do you mind if I ask how you got your scar?”
He touches his forefinger to it. “It’s a birthmark, actually.” He leans over and pulls his belly bag back on.
“I’ve never seen a birthmark like that.”
“Right?” he says. “It’s like a choker, huh?”
“Oh, I didn’t mean…” I start.
“No, really, it’s OK. My mom has a theory about it. Actually, it’s not only her theory – lots of people believe birthmarks are injuries from past lives.”
“So, what does she think happened to you?”
Cash shrugs. “Guillotine.”
“Really?”
He traces the thin pink line in a semi-circle at the side of his neck. “Yeah, but I don’t think so. Otherwise, wouldn’t it go all the way round?”
“Hmm. My birthmark could only be seen when I was a baby. It’s on the top of my head and it’s mostly faded.” I braid my hair over my shoulder and smooth back the top. My curly hair is frizzing in the heat. “I wonder what kind of injury it could be from.”
“Maybe you were dropped on your head as a baby.” He smirks.
“Ha!” I snort. “You’re probably right.”
We pick cherries until my basket is brimming and his belly bag makes him look like he’s nine months along. We empty them into crates and pick again.
After we get the cherries inside, my head aches and exhaustion claws at my back. Mom comes in from watching TV and thanks Cash for all he did yesterday. He acts like it was nothing.
I pour us both glasses of lavender lemonade, my favourite drink from a store in town, before he leaves, and savour it. Then I watch him ride Luna away.
When I pull the poultice from my hand, it’s still incredibly swollen but the pain is nearly gone.