Chapter 17
“I just think we could all use a little break is all I’m saying.
” Penny’s mom held out an open palm, the lines of her hands dark with dirt.
She always eschewed gloves when gardening, a preference she’d gotten from Mimi and passed on to Penny.
“Maybe a few days in a cabin somewhere farther upstate. Oh! Or we could go to Niagara. We haven’t done that for a while. ”
Penny swallowed a sigh as she passed over a peppermint seedling, its fuzzy leaves emerging an inch or so from its peat pot. “I don’t have time for a vacation, Mom.”
“I don’t mean right now. Maybe after the apple harvest this fall.
” Ruth scooped some more soil from the hole before dropping in the plant, covering it up, and patting the earth around its baby stem.
There were more efficient ways to plant a garden—Penny had researched all of them, even presented her mom with a plan for placement and shown her methods using new tools and systems, but her mom had laughed them all off.
“What’s the point of all of this?” she’d asked, shaking her head. “If I’m just working for efficiency? I want the plants in my hands, honey, and the dirt under my fingernails.”
“Mary Sue went on one of those cruises for vacation,” Mimi piped up now from her lawn chair at the edge of the herb garden, where she sipped sweet tea and swatted at mosquitos.
“They all sit around and knit all day, from what she explained. Why you’d go on a boat to do that I don’t understand.
Knitting is about as boring as watching a fly in a puddle of honey, and I don’t imagine it’s much better when you’re at sea.
I reckon I would rather be on one of those singles cruises where everybody’s looking to have some fun. ”
Penny shot her a smile. “We could not set you loose on one of those. Think of the hearts you’d break!”
The lines on Mimi’s face all came together as she laughed, capturing decades of shared smiles etched through time.
Penny had a list of things to do before going to Zander’s for lunch, but when her mom invited her to spend some time in the garden with them, she’d found herself saying yes.
Head and body still reeling from her encounter with Zander the day before, getting her hands in the ground was exactly what Penny needed.
“Oh, or we could go east,” her mom mused. “To the city, maybe, or down to Baltimore. It would be a little cold in the fall. It would be nicer to go a little earlier. Remember that guy I knew who ran a crab restaurant down there? He always said Maryland crab was the best.”
Penny’s hand flexed around the spongy peat pot of the next seedling, making some soil spill out the top. “Things will be busy here,” she said, noticing the bite in her tone and pulling it back, speaking out of a tight smile. “But you could go for sure.”
Ruth tsked and shook her head. “You know, honey, the world won’t stop turning if you let yourself take a break.”
“No.” Penny huffed a laugh as her thoughts tipped and tumbled, falling right into one of those potholes Quinn had described.
The one worn by years of Ruth promising Penny everything would be fine, then letting Penny do the work to make it so.
“The world would still turn. It’s only this place that would fall apart. ”
Her mother rolled her eyes. “You know that is—”
“Let’s not, okay?” Penny handed her mom another plant without looking at her. “I know how this conversation goes. I should work less, take a break, trust the universe to pay all the bills.”
Maybe she should and let them see what happened. Hell, maybe she should throw her little baby peppermint on the ground and shout for the other Becker women to hear: I took out a shitty loan and we can’t pay it back. If I stop working now, we’ll lose everything! How’s that for the world turning?
Penny marveled at her mom’s ability to look at everything through warped glass, somehow seeing only the positives.
An untimely freeze in the orchards? Just nature’s pruning.
A flat tire when the truck was laden with goods for a market?
An opportunity to notice the wildflowers blooming at the side of the road.
A man who moved so quickly through her life that he was gone by the time she got pregnant, and plainly turned down an invitation to come back and meet his daughter? A sperm donor who’d given Ruth a gift.
But could the ever-optimistic Ruth Becker find a silver lining to the disaster Penny had stepped into? Not likely.
“I would love”—Penny bit out the words—“to not have this conversation with you again, Mother.”
The lawn chair creaked under Mimi. “Penny girl, tell me this: What exactly crawled up your ass and died?”
“Nothing, Mimi.”
“Mm-hmm.” Mimi’s eyes narrowed. “Something is going on with you. Your mom told me you even suited up for a bee inspection the other day. I haven’t seen you suit up in ages.”
“It was just PMS,” Penny grumbled.
Mimi huffed, and they worked in silence for several minutes, Penny pulling over flats of plants and handing them to her mom to put in the ground.
Each peat pot was warm in her palm, full of possibility, roots ready to snake their way through the dirt.
Her tension eased with every plant she held, until Penny found herself lost in the easy movements of her mother’s weathered hands doing what they loved best.
“So.” She was often the first one to let her temper rise and also the first to make amends, so she broke the silence. “Zander Bouras is going to take on some of the Honey Festival planning.”
Penny wasn’t eager to discuss the Zander situation with her family, but it was better that they heard it from her. Ruth had spies all over town, and the only thing that would pique her curiosity more than Penny letting Zander help would be Penny keeping a secret about letting Zander help.
Ruth looked up with big eyes, clearly trying to play it cool. “Is that so? Aaannd…” She drew out the word. “How did that come about?”
They’d both shifted to a new row in the garden, and Penny rose to grab the flat of basil, its leaves broad and deep green.
“He helps start restaurants back in Boston, so he has a lot of experience that’s useful.
He’s also going to help RJ see if he can step up his baking stuff, try to make a business of it. ”
“Is he?” Ruth glowed. “Isn’t that wonderful!”
“Always knew that boy had a big heart,” Mimi added. “You don’t cause that kind of trouble without a big well of passion. He’s like his grandfather that way.”
“Like his grandfather?” Penny squatted as she watched her grandma. “The way Zander talks about him, his grandfather sounded cold, not passionate.”
It was safer to change the subject, but Penny was too eager for more information about Zander.
Seeing the different sides of him—devoted father, unrelenting flirt, bad boy—was like examining the rocks she and RJ used to collect during days spent at the nearest lake, where complex worlds existed under every turn.
Mimi ran a finger along the condensation of her glass and looked into the distance, toward the Bouras house.
“You can be both,” she offered. “Both passionate and cold. Sometimes that passion turns inward and all but eats you up. I never knew Nikolai too well, mind you. Always kept to himself. But anyone could see his love for Elsie, the care he poured into her.” A smile drifted across her face.
“Planted her rows of flowers in front of the house, all pinks and reds because those were her favorite colors.”
Mimi sighed and tucked a wisp of hair behind her ear. “A part of him broke when Elsie died so young, and he didn’t manage it well. Not with their daughter, and not with that boy, either.”
No, he hadn’t. The bits Penny had heard made her want to grab Nikolai Bouras by the shoulders and curse at him. Just as strong was the urge to travel back in time and actually try to talk to young Zander, to be a friend to him, to be someone who gave him a chance.
When the phone in her back pocket buzzed, Penny had a guess as to who was messaging her, because Zander had kept up a steady stream all morning.
First, it was How’d you sleep? I had great dreams but none of them did you justice.
Then, You’re still coming, right? I told Winter and he is ready to talk to you about “drone congregation areas,” whatever that is.
Later, as she was headed out to the garden, came her favorite one: Please tell me it’s not true that bee dicks are ripped off when they have sex.
Now, she gave in to the urge to pull out her phone but kept on her game face. No ridiculous smiles, no simpering sighs, nothing to give her away.
ZANDER B I know we said 12:30, but you should come anytime. we’d love to see you asap.
She grinned at the phone. Was it Winter who wanted to see her ASAP? Or Zander? What did “we” mean? Had Zander also kept thinking of their hot make-out session? Did he want to do it again?
“Penny,” her mimi called. “What’s happening on your phone? You look like you’re doing quadratic equations over there.”
“Nothing, Mimi.” Penny rose and brushed her hands off on her jeans. “Mom, are you good with the rest of the planting? I, um, have a meeting.”
Mimi shook the ice in her tea. “A meeting, huh? I wish my meetings made me blush like that.”
Penny touched her cheeks, surely blushing even more. “It’s just warm out here.”
“I’ve got it, hon,” her mom assured her, basil in hand. “Thanks for your help. Head on off to your meeting.”
Penny was almost to the trail when her mother called out.
“And say hi to Zander for us!”