Chapter 4
CHAPTER 4
ETHAN
T he trailer was huge, a full fifty feet long, and looking at the empty space in the wire caged device, he knew he was in for a long, long day.
“You didn’t bring anyone?” he asked the driver, who shrugged. “Why?”
“Because the board voted themselves a billion dollars of stock buybacks that they used on themselves while forgetting to budget for holiday staffing,” the man said. “I just know I’ve got a three-man crew and a trailer full of trees to pick up.”
Ethan groaned, and looked behind him. The growth lot behind him was one of three that he was selling this year, a full acre of a thousand trees that had to be handled. “What about netting?”
“Oh I got me one of those,” the driver’s assistant said, going over to a cage on the back of the trailer and smacking the side. “Feed them in the trunk first, and they’ll come out nice and netted on the other end. Ain’t no way I’m trying to unload a thousand Christmas trees when all the branches are tangled up. Bad enough as it is.”
“How about a fifth set of hands?”
Ethan turned, and saw Laura walking up, looking… very distracting. She’d dressed for work, in jeans and an old flannel shirt that was clearly one of Mr.Bennett’s, tied off at the waist and rolled at the forearms so that she wasn’t swimming in it. She had on boots, and tucked in her belt was a pair of old leather work gloves that Ethan suspected were in her grandfather’s garage a day ago.
“You’re not heading into the county offices?” Ethan asked, and Laura shook her head. “What happened?”
“What happened is that the county is still waiting on paperwork from the hospital,” Laura said. “Apparently because Paw-Paw died outside of a hospital, they need to do a full work up on him, so the paperwork won’t be ready until tomorrow at the earliest. So what can I do?”
“You can haul a six-foot Douglas fir?” one of the driver’s assistants asked, and Laura’s withering look shut him up quickly. “Okay, okay. Just askin’.”
“How about this,” Ethan offered the driver. “The main lot’s not open for sales until this afternoon. So until then, the five of us work, rotating jobs. One cutter, three haulers, and one stacker inside the truck. Fair?”
“Give us ten minutes to set up the net machine, and you’ve got yourself a deal,” the driver said, clearly relieved. “How are we cutting?”
“I’ve got an electric limb lopper in my truck,” Ethan said. “It’s like a chainsaw, it’ll handle the trunks of these trees. I’ll go get it, and we can get started.”
It was hard work, even with Laura’s help. Cutting each tree down meant kneeling down, letting the small saw do the work, and then standing up to do the next tree while one of the haulers carried the tree away. Each tree wasn’t all that heavy, roughly thirty to forty pounds, but it had to be carried to the truck, and then fed through the netting machine, and then placed in the back of the trailer.
So each job wasn’t difficult. There were just a lot of them to do, and by the time lunchtime came, Ethan’s knees ached and his back was tight from all the kneeling over. Still, he felt good. They’d gotten nearly two thirds of the lot cleared, which was more than he anticipated. “Okay guys, you good?”
“Yeah, we’ve got it from here.” The driver munched on a ham sandwich. “That idea that you had to just move ahead and cut the trees down helped. Four people hauling really picked up the speed.”
“Thanks,” Laura said. “If you need anything, we’ll be up at the shack.”
“No problem,” the driver answered. The workers went back to lunch while Ethan and Laura climbed into his truck, and backed down the dirt road towards the path that led to the office trailer.
As he drove, Ethan thought about the morning. It had been good, working with Laura. She clearly knew what she was doing, and handled the trees and the tools as if it was nothing.
“Guess it’s like riding a bicycle,” he said.
Laura looked over frowning.
“Handling the trees. You look like you haven’t lost a step from your school days you were telling me about last night.”
Laura chuckled, then groaned. “Tell that to my hands and feet. I’ve definitely got a few blisters in my boots. I forgot how hard it was to wear them, I’ve gotten used to high heels.”
“On the other hand, if I wore high heels for a couple of hours, I’d probably have some blisters myself,” Ethan joked, and Laura laughed. “What, I don’t look like the high heel type?”
“Definitely not.” She leaned back in the seat. “Ooof, I’m going to take twenty minutes to just stretch out in the office if you don’t mind. Maybe change socks and look at my feet if you can put up with it?”
“I don’t mind at all,” Ethan said. “I’ve got a full first-aid kit, complete with moleskin, Cornhusker’s lotion, and more. I’ll even take a look at your feet if you want. I’ve gotten a few blisters from time to time around here.”
“Thanks… you promise you’re not one of those weirdos who get on the internet asking to see pictures of women’s feet?” she asked, and Ethan snorted, shaking his head. “Swear?”
“I promise,” Ethan said. “That’s totally not my thing. I’m looking for something else in life.”
“What, if I can ask?”
“An angel.” Ethan glanced over, smiling a little. “Not the church type, but a woman who doesn’t mind having a man who loves Christmas and Christmas trees the way I do. Who’s willing to have a man who isn’t ever going to pull down six figures, at least not the way I’m going, and who’s going to come home from work tired, probably sweaty, and more than happy to see her. A woman who likes simple pleasures, likes my tacos, and doesn’t mind that I listen to Christmas songs at work in July.”
“And what would you expect of her in return for putting up with… all that?” Laura asked.
Ethan paused, mainly because she sounded like everything he’d just said wasn’t all that bad a thing.
“I guess all I’d ask of her is to love me the way I’ll love her,” he said. “That’s all. I can’t offer a lot, but I’ll offer all I have. What about you, is there someone back east for you?”
Laura shook her head, and she chuckled darkly.
“I’m a workaholic who knows the night clerk at my local convenience store more than my own neighbors. My last boyfriend and I broke up… like, five years ago now. Hint, if you ever become an attorney. Do not date someone you might end up in court against, no matter how cute they look in a suit.”
“Duly noted,” Ethan said as they pulled up to the trailer. “Okay, let’s get those feet looked at.”
Laura didn’t mean to, but she whimpered as soon as her left foot touched the ground, and Ethan was immediately at her side, picking her up. “You?—”
“You’re hurt, I’m not.” He carried her to the steps and helped her into the trailer. Once inside, he put his lunch, a couple of Hot Pockets, in the small microwave he kept for just that purpose, and turned to Laura. “Okay, take off the boots, both of ’em. I’ll get the first aid kit.”
Her feet were a mess. Actually, Ethan thought, her feet were beautiful, with cute little toes that clearly at one point had pearlescent pink nail polish applied on them. It had suffered, but that was nothing compared to the mess that was the blisters on her left foot. Both her big toe and her middle toe had big blisters right on the knuckle, and her heel was an already popped mess.
“Why didn’t you say anything?” he asked as he opened the first aid kit and got the hydrogen peroxide and gauze. “This is going to sting.”
“I know, I… gah fudgey monkeys!” she hissed as he applied the peroxide to her heel. He looked at her in surprise, and she blushed, a very cute blush at that. “Pawpaw hated when I cursed. Said it wasn’t right for the trees.”
Ethan snorted, and carefully cleaned the popped blister before applying antiseptic cream.
“For now, let that dry, you don’t need to put your sock or boot back on for a good bit yet,” he said. “In fact if you want, you can stay behind the desk, ring up sales for a few hours.”
“That sounds nice.” Laura sighed. “Just seems to keep coming back. Last night, I even washed up the dishes exactly as Paw-Paw taught me, and loaded the dishwasher just as he wanted me to.”
Ethan chuckled. “Yeah, I bet. I debated for a full year before getting that little mini-chainsaw that we used today, because that wasn’t how Mr.Bennett did things. Don’t worry, I still have customers use a hand saw on the live lot, or I cut it myself if they can’t or don’t want to. Still… shame about today.”
“How so?” Laura asked, sighing as Ethan massaged her foot. “What are you doing?”
“You clearly wore non broke-in boots,” Ethan said. “I’m not being weird, I promise. But you need this. As for about today, those trees today, they’re not going to be their best by the time Christmas comes. Sure, the market’s going to spray them down with chemicals, preservatives that’ll keep them green, but they won’t be as pretty as they could be. It’s like… you’ve seen the big tree in Rockefeller Plaza, right?”
“Of course.”
“That tree’s cut down six weeks before Christmas, hauled down the highway, and put up in New York. Now sure, I bet with fifty thousand lights on it it looks beautiful, but the tree is… what?” Ethan asked as Laura sighed. “What is it?”
“I heard similar stories from Paw-Paw,” Laura said. “I told him back then, it’s just a tree, you know? Sure, people like green ones, but if the people don’t care, then why should you worry once it’s off the lot? I mean, I’m sure it’d be nice to have a line of cars out of the parking lot every night for the two weeks before Christmas, but that’s not the way the world works any more. In cities it never has.”
Ethan sighed, and set her foot down. “You don’t care about the trees, do you?”
“I care that they provided a life for me and my grandfather for all the years that they have,” Laura said matter-of-factly. “I’m glad that people got something out of them enough to keep coming back year after year. But if you mean, I care individually as to just how green someone’s tree is when they open their presents this Christmas? I couldn’t care less. It’s just another day.”
He stared at her in open shock, not even getting up when the microwave dinged.
“You don’t mean that.”
“What?”
“That Christmas is just another day,” he said. “Christmas is special. Even if you’re not a religious person, Christmas, the season, it’s important.”
“No more important than any of a dozen other big holidays, we just attach more sentimental meaning to it,” Laura said bitterly. Seeing Ethan’s expression, she held back a laugh. “You don’t believe me? Try reading the Times the day after Christmas. Not the front page, although you might find it there, too. But read the crime blotter. There, it’s same stuff, different day. Cops still need to work on Christmas, fire fighters and ambulance drivers and hospitals still need to work on Christmas. You want me to think that a day is special? Show me a day where people don’t care about money, or sports, or social media, or any of that. Show me that, Ethan, and I’ll say Christmas is special. Until then… it’s just a day.”
Ethan swallowed, and stood up. Going over to the microwave, he got his Hot Pockets out, and put them in his jacket pocket. “Excuse me,” he said. “I think I’ll eat lunch outside. I need to get ready for customers anyway.”
He left, and outside the bright afternoon sunshine didn’t help warm the pit in his stomach. He was certain, after such a good dinner the other night and seeing her work this morning, that Laura would come around. He’d hoped that maybe there was a chance he could get her to save the farm, and see that the joy it brought people, especially the people of the Rockaways. He’d hope she would see it was more important than immediately becoming a partner in a law firm.
Now, he wasn’t so sure.