Chapter Two #2
"That comes after humble."
Daphne looked at me. "Is that official P-Patch policy?"
"Birdie makes policy when I'm not fast enough to stop her."
Birdie smiled. "Which is often."
I handed Daphne a pair of gloves from the bin. Not the same ones as yesterday. I'd set those aside after shaking out the fingers and brushing off the dirt. I wasn't proud of that. I also wasn't going to hand them to Tyler.
"These should fit better," I said.
Daphne took them. Our fingers didn't touch this time.
Good.
Her gaze dipped to my hand anyway, quick enough that nobody else would've noticed.
I noticed.
That wasn't good either.
"Thank you," she said.
"You're on tomatoes with me first. Then mulch touch-up along the east row."
Her face tightened with dramatic caution. "The mulch and I have history."
"I heard about the conflict."
"You were there."
"I survived the conflict."
Her eyes warmed. "Barely."
Tyler made a sound that could've been a cough if a man had never heard a cough before.
I looked at him.
He turned toward the compost. "I love compost. Compost is my purpose now."
Gus shook his head and headed for the south fence.
Daphne pulled on the gloves, flexing her fingers into the leather. The movement was practical. I still remembered how her hand had felt under mine on the hose nozzle. Small compared to mine. Warm through the glove. Tense for half a second before she'd laughed.
I picked up the tomato ties. "Come on."
She followed me down the row, careful on the path.
The garden was already awake around us. Bees moved through the purple flowers near the gate.
The air smelled like wet soil, pine sap, and the sharp green scent of tomato leaves.
Sun pressed against the back of my neck and lit the fine hairs escaping from Daphne's twist.
I stopped beside the split cage I'd fixed the night before. "These vines are getting heavy. We're going to tie them up before they bend."
"I feel emotionally aligned with the tomatoes."
"You're bending?"
"I'm carrying a lot."
I looked at her.
She looked back at me, then down at the plant. "That sounded less dramatic in my head."
"Most things do."
A laugh escaped her, soft and quick. "Rude but fair."
I crouched beside the bed, caught one sagging stem between two fingers, and lifted it toward the cage. "You want the tie loose enough that the stem can grow. Too tight and it cuts in."
Daphne crouched across from me. Her knees touched the edge of the soil, and she made a small sound like she'd already negotiated with her thighs and lost.
"You okay?" I asked.
"Yesterday introduced me to muscles I've apparently ignored for twenty-eight years."
"Stretch before you leave today."
"Is that a suggestion or a command?"
"It's garden advice."
"From my supervisor?"
"From the man who doesn't want to fill out an incident report because you fought a tomato and lost."
Her gaze lifted.
The tomato tie hung loose between my fingers. Her eyes stayed on mine, my hand stayed on the stem, and the air between us warmed like July had leaned closer to listen.
I looked back at the plant. "Knot goes outside."
"Right," she said, quieter. "Knot outside."
I tore off a strip of soft cloth tie and wrapped it around the vine, leaving room between the stem and the cage. "Like this."
She leaned closer to see.
Too close.
I caught the scent of her sunscreen, light and warm, mixed with clean soap and the faint coffee smell that apparently counted as breakfast in Daphne's world. A bead of sweat slid along the side of her throat.
I kept my hands on the tomato cage.
"Your turn," I said.
My voice came out rougher than I wanted.
Daphne took a tie from the bundle and reached for the next stem. "Loose enough to grow. Knot outside. Don't strangle the tomato."
"That's the goal."
"Seems merciful."
"I try not to bully produce before noon."
She smiled, and for one second, I forgot to care about the sun, the work list, Fletcher, or the fact that the woman in front of me had sixteen hours left under my signature.
Then her tie slipped.
The vine dipped.
She grabbed for it, and I reached at the same time. My hand closed around hers and the stem together.
Everything stopped.
Her glove was rough under my palm. Her fingers tightened. Her eyes flew to mine, wide and startled, but she didn't pull away.
The garden moved around us. Tyler dragged a shovel through compost. Birdie clipped herbs. Gus hammered something near the south fence. A truck passed on the road.
Daphne's lips parted.
Heat moved through me, hard and fast.
I let go first.
"Careful," I said.
The word sounded like it had more than one meaning.
Daphne swallowed. "With the tomato?"
"With all of it."
Her cheeks flushed.
I stood because staying crouched across from her was getting dangerous.
"Finish this side," I said. "I'll check Tyler's pile before he invents a new problem."
"Do you think he can invent new problems with compost?"
"Tyler can invent new problems with air."
She laughed, and the sound followed me halfway down the row.
I found Tyler standing beside the compost bin with his shovel planted in the pile and his eyes narrowed at it.
"No," I said.
He looked over. "You don't know what I was thinking."
"That's why I said no."
"I was only wondering if faster turning would help."
"You were wondering if jumping on the shovel would help."
Tyler's mouth opened.
I pointed at the pile. "Turn it from the side."
He deflated. "Fine."
Gus chuckled from the fence.
I glanced back toward the tomatoes.
Daphne had her head bent over the vine, concentrating like the whole morning depended on a decent knot. Birdie stood a few feet away, watching her with the satisfied look of a woman who had never once missed a thing in her life.
Birdie looked at me next.
I narrowed my eyes.
She smiled and clipped basil into her basket.
By midmorning, Daphne's white sneakers were losing the war.
She noticed around the same time I did. She stood at the end of the row, looked down, and lifted one foot carefully. The side was smeared with soil, and one lace had turned gray.
"Well," she said. "They had a beautiful life."
"They lasted longer than the flats."
"Low bar, Zane."
"They cleared it."
She wiped sweat from her forehead with the back of her wrist. The movement pulled her shirt tighter across her chest for half a second, and I turned toward the wheelbarrow like it had asked me a question.
I kept both hands on the tomato ties until my attention remembered where it belonged.
"Water break," I said.
Daphne's eyes narrowed. "Was I making dehydration face again?"
"You were making July face."
"That's just my face now."
"Drink anyway."
I got bottles from the cooler. When I handed one to her, I kept my grip on the plastic until she looked up.
"Sit in the shade for five," I said. "You're pushing hard."
Her fingers tightened around the bottle. Her gaze slid back to the unfinished row.
"I'm fine."
"I know. Sit anyway."
She took the bottle. "Garden advice?"
"Common sense."
"Is common sense mandatory here?"
"It is when I'm watching."
Her mouth curved again, but this time it didn't quite make it all the way to a joke. "Then I'll sit."
She went to the bench under the pines. Birdie joined her with the herb basket, and Tyler wandered over like a man drawn by the possibility of avoiding labor.
I stayed by the shed and drank half a bottle in three long swallows.
My phone lit on the workbench inside.
I knew better than to look.
I looked anyway.
FLETCHER:
In town. I'll swing by later. You should hear the numbers before you keep saying no.
I stared at the message until the screen dimmed.
Numbers.
Fletcher loved numbers because they behaved when he lined them up.
Acres, access points, projected growth, potential return.
Enough clean columns, and a man could pretend he wasn't talking about soil under someone's boots, lake water at dusk, or a strip of land his brother had already refused to put on the table.
My thumb hovered over the screen.
Then I typed back.
ME:
Don't come during crew hours.
The reply came fast.
FLETCHER:
Still hiding behind garden work?
My fingers tightened around the phone.
ME:
Still saying no.
I set the phone facedown on the bench before I sent anything else.
Outside, Birdie lifted a sprig from her basket and held it toward Daphne. "Mint. Easy to grow, impossible to control. Like half the people in this town."
Daphne laughed. "Should I be worried that you're handing it to me like a warning?"
"Only if you plant it without a border."
I stepped into the doorway.
Daphne sat on the bench with her elbows braced on her knees, water bottle dangling between her hands. Her hair had come looser, soft brown strands curling against her damp neck. Dirt marked one forearm. Her sneakers were a mess. Her face was flushed from sun and work.
Tyler leaned closer. "Can mint win against compost?"
"Tyler," Daphne said, "I'm not taking life advice from a man who lost to compost."
"I'm in a growth period," Tyler said.
"Emotionally or agriculturally?"
"Both, maybe."
Gus walked over with a coil of wire. "That boy grows any more, I'm leaving."
Birdie patted the bench beside her. "We're all very proud."
I should've let them have the moment.
Instead, I watched Daphne's shoulders loosen. I watched her laugh without checking first to see who might judge her for it, and something in my chest pulled tight.
Daphne caught me looking.
Her smile faded a little. Not gone. Just quieter.
I lifted my chin toward the water bottle. "Finish it."
"Yes, supervisor," she called, but her voice had gone soft enough to make my jaw clench.
Birdie's eyebrows rose.
I went back inside the shed before she could say a word.
Work carried us through the next hour.
Daphne finished tying the tomatoes, then helped spread mulch along the east row. She didn't trust the mulch any more today than yesterday, but she handled the rake better.
She pointed at a low green stem near the edge of the bed. "Plant or problem?"
"Plant."
"Good thing I asked."
"Very good thing."
She aimed the rake at the mulch instead. "I'm choosing restraint."