Page 47 of Apple of My Eye

Chapter Thirty-Seven

Eloise

Things I’m Grateful For

– I found a new home for JJ (mixed feelings about this, trying to be grateful)

– Living in a place where I can hear the birds sing.

– Gas is cheap here

– U-Pick is busy

– The air isn’t polluted . The air isn’t as polluted as other places

– I’ve finally won a round of gin rummy

– I don’t have to cook (even though I have to clean)

– Shari, for making me start this. I guess

Nick: If you ever come visit Linden, you know where to find me.

Nick: That is, if you change your mind.

‘I’m beginning to think doing all the social media marketing for the farm has made you addicted to that thing,’ Dad grunts as he fills up his coffee.

I click out of my messages in a hurry and stow my phone in my pocket. ‘It worked, though.’

‘Sure did. Our busiest season yet.’

‘Not that it matters,’ I sigh.

‘Eloise,’ Dad says sternly, his reading glasses perched on the bridge of his nose like they are every morning when he reads the paper, ‘it does matter.’

I shrug and pick up my coffee. Suddenly the room feels too small for my thoughts. I head to the front porch. Mom isn’t far behind me, settling onto the front stoop next to me without saying a word. We both watch the morning fog baking off the grass as the sun rises.

‘It’s not like you to be so short with your father,’ she says.

Tears sting my eyes. ‘I’m just tired.’

Mom sighs. ‘Is this about Nick, JJ, or that offer from Scott’s Orchards?’

‘There’s so much going on.’

Mom nods. ‘I know, sweetheart.’

I pick the simplest topic first. ‘I’m happy. And relieved. And I know JJ will be so happy,’ I sniffle, my sadness at the prospect of losing JJ hitting me like a ton of bricks, ‘but he’s one of my best friends.’

‘Oh, honey.’ Mom rubs a gentle hand on my back. ‘The family that met him last weekend at U-Pick, I think they’ll be a really good fit. Their daughter is the age you were when you got JJ. And they live on a big farm too. It’s not so far, you can visit.’

‘I know,’ I say glumly.

She stares out at the fields. ‘I know it’s hard to say goodbye.’

‘I don’t want him to think I don’t love him anymore.’

‘Sometimes doing the uncomfortable thing, the scary thing, sometimes that is how to love somebody best.’

I pinch the bridge of my nose. We both know she’s right. ‘How did you know about Scott’s?’ I ask her.

Mom harrumphs. ‘You think you heard about it from Amie and nobody else did? That girl never hushes up.’

‘Yeah, you’re right,’ I mumble. ‘I just can’t believe it.’

‘We don’t know if they actually signed it.’

I fix my gaze on her. ‘Mom,’ I say, ‘there’s no way they didn’t. If they haven’t already, there’s no way they won’t. Scott’s? Come on. They probably offered them more than was fair.’

‘Did you hear any of the details from Amie?’

‘No.’

Mom sips her coffee and sighs. The sun is creeping past the horizon now, a soft orange and yellow cascading over the hills. ‘Scott’s put in only a half offer. The Parkers would still manage it, Scott’s would just bring in some folks to help.’

I’m stunned into silence. That isn’t what I expected. ‘Oh.’

‘I was surprised too. I thought they would want to get all out.’

My response comes flying out of my mouth before I can stop it. ‘You mean like you guys did? Like you guys do?’

‘That isn’t fair,’ Mom says, but her shoulders slacken with resignation. ‘Selling just might be our best option. You know that.’

I pick at a piece of wood peeling up from the deck, tearing it away from the front step.

‘I still can’t believe Nick went on a date with her.’ Mom deftly changes the subject, jostling me with her shoulder. ‘She never hushed up about that either.’

‘I don’t want to talk about him,’ I grumble.

‘Oh stop,’ she hushes me. ‘He had eyes for you. We all saw it. And you spent so much time with him. You must miss him a little.’

‘I don’t,’ I retort. But my words are hollow. The morning swallows have started to sing, and their chirping fills the silence.

After a beat Mom says, ‘You know the Scott’s deal isn’t Nick’s fault.’

‘But it is,’ I protest.

‘They were looking for a way out before he even got here.’ She throws up her hands. ‘Hell, that’s why he was here in the first place.’

‘That way out could have been me. It could have been us.’

‘Honey.’ Mom reaches a hand over to pat my knee. ‘This might have been a blessing in disguise. We have to face it. It will be too much for us as we get older.’

‘But that’s why I’m here.’ My voice breaks. ‘Isn’t it?’

‘Eloise.’ Mom turns to me, her brows knitted together. ‘What you’re doing here is up to you to decide.’ And with that, she gets up and walks inside, leaving me in stunned silence on the front porch.

Shari: How cute are these baby strawberry plants?? *Heart-eyes emoji*

Evan: love them. Could not be cuter. They deserve more.

Shari: I’m not enough?

Evan: OK hold up. Let’s not cue the immediate post-grad crisis we all knew was on the horizon. I meant they deserve their own Instagram page.

Shari: OH. LOL. That they do.

Me: Not to be the bearer of bad news but I think I may have started my immediate post-grad crisis that I, in fact, did not see coming.

Evan: Babes. Nooooo.

Shari: Tell us more

Me: That’s the problem. There is no more?? What am I doing here? I have spent the last week getting permits to host weddings. I put in an offer for a large-scale donut fryer. For what? So I can play my part to increase capitalism and obesity?

Evan: WOAH.

Evan: This may be bigger than the after-school crisis I was referring to.

Evan: I meant more like I thought one of you would get bangs. *Sent with invisible ink*

Shari: Weddings???

Me: AHHHHH.

Shari: Girl, you need to be starting a gratitude journal before this goes really off the rails.

U-Pick is still busier than ever, all the way through September.

We’re officially picked out of apples by October 1st, which is a first for us.

Dad celebrates by breaking out his favorite whiskey.

I try to muster up happiness but end up going to bed early.

All the days feel the same now, even the ones when we celebrate.

Mom and Dad exchange a worried glance when I excuse myself for bed.

I wasn’t meant to see it, so I don’t acknowledge it.

I don’t have the energy. JJ got officially rehomed last week to the family that met him during U-Pick.

They have one other horse, so he won’t be alone.

Their daughter was the happiest ten-year-old I’ve ever seen when we dropped him off.

I could tell he was happy, nickering and prancing around in the field they fenced in for him.

I tried to muster up cheerful gratitude, I am happy that JJ has someone to ride him now, that he has a horse-friend to be with, but the farm feels empty without him.

It’s like the last dregs of my childhood are gone.

When I’m not missing JJ, I’m busy spending all my time trying to figure out how to raise the money myself, without a loan from the bank, to start regenerative agriculture on our farm.

Maybe if I restructure how I was planning to do things, maybe if I build hydroponic gardens to increase our potential yields instead of buying the land next door, I can still figure this out.

The only unfortunate thing is that weddings are still looking like our best option.

And thinking about other people finding their soulmate, falling in love, makes my own heart hurt more than I care to admit.

Mom reminds me every now and then that we have no idea if Betsy officially signed, that my plan might still work.

It speaks to how depressed I must seem that Mom is now the one reminding me that I could still buy their property when at the beginning of this summer she was staunchly against it.

I return the favor by reminding her that the bank hasn’t even told me if my loan was approved.

It’s a vicious cycle. One that Dad stays out of by quickly ducking into another room when it comes up.

The day after we ‘celebrate’ U-Pick being over, Mom asks me if I’ve considered going back to the city.

‘San Francisco?’ I ask, confused.

‘No,’ she returns an equally confused expression. ‘Seattle.’

I cringe at my Freudian slip. I’ve thought about San Francisco a lot since Nick left, my thoughts often a swirling mass of confusion over the siren call of a big city.

The more I think about it the more I feel myself softening towards Linden, towards Nick .

.?. if I’m thinking about leaving the farm too, how can I fault them for it?

But as soon as the thought completes another one replaces it, Who will I be if I leave the farm?

What will anchor me to this world, what will be my purpose?

Mom is staring at me intently. I try to brush past it. ‘I guess I could visit Evan,’ I wonder aloud. I feel tears sting my eyes. It takes almost nothing for me to cry these days.

‘Honey, I just think you might need a break. Now that you say it, San Francisco could be good for you. You could go see your brother.’

‘So that’s it, you’ve had enough of me moping around and want to pawn me off to someone else?’ I ask, anger edging into my voice.

Mom sighs. ‘That isn’t it exactly—’

I bristle. Whatever I was expecting her to say, it was not to acknowledge that she was in fact trying to get rid of me moping around.

‘We are worried about you,’ she says. ‘We think maybe you need some space to think about what you want to do next.’

‘So, you and Dad have been talking about me.’

‘You say that like that isn’t in our job description.’

I stare glumly at the kitchen table. ‘What is my job description?’ I say in a small voice. It can’t be licensing out the barn for weddings. It can’t be.

‘Only you know that.’ She squeezes my hand before heading out the door, reminding me that she agreed to volunteer at the soup kitchen that morning.

I thought my job description was to take care of you , I think, as I watch her retreat into the mudroom.

Lily: Excuse me, since when did the girl who basically swore off men forever get into wedding planning?

Lily: Is there something you need to tell me? What alien exchanged places with you?

Me: Ugh. Who told you?

Lily: My mom said you reached out to her for catering.

Me: Right. Duh. Sorry, I should have texted. The whole thing kind of bums me out.

Lily: What is the ‘whole thing’?

Me: Hmm. Do I start with the fact that I literally spent the past five years of my life getting a degree in agriculture only to come to a farm my parents don’t even know if they want?

Here I was thinking I could use my degree to offer classes or tours or something but no.

Now, in order to save us from financial ruin, I need to start hosting weddings in the back barn?

Lily: Uh-oh.

Me: Or that I actually had a good plan to revamp the farm with regenerative ag but now the Parkers have this crazy offer from a conglomerate so we can’t buy their farm?

So now we’re totally stuck? So now I’ve bought an industrial fryer so we can make more donuts? Because that’s what the people want?

Lily: OMG.

Me: I’m sorry I’m dumping. I miss you. When are you coming home again?

Lily: I feel like I should be asking you when you’re leaving home. Because it seems like a little space could do you good. Especially now that JJ isn’t around.

Me: I don’t have anywhere to go.

Lily: Linden has space in his fancy new apartment.

Me: What fancy new apartment?

Lily: He just moved into a new place? What is the point of you having an Instagram for the farm if you aren’t using it to keep tabs on your own family. He has a spare bedroom. I mean, it’s ugly because he’s a boy, but it exists.

Me: I can’t go to San Francisco. *Sent with invisible ink*

Lily: Right, because of the minuscule chances you’ll run into Nick?

Me: Only 800,000 people live in SF. Those chances aren’t miniscule.

Lily: Did you seriously just google how many people live there? I bet you did the stupid thing where you only cared about the actual San Francisco zip code.

Lily: EIGHT MILLION people live in the Bay Area.

Lily: I’ve won.

Lily: Tell me when you’ve texted Linden. He owes you. Cash in that favor.