on the parking brake isn’t supposed to be a metaphor. “You’ve really never been on a farm before? No school field trips? Community gardens? Romantic weekend getaways to a dude ranch in Montana where you could commune with nature?”
I’d mostly skipped field trips because they’d cost money and I hadn’t wanted to be someone’s charity case. “Give me the grand tour, okay?”
The first thing that hits me when I get out is the smell. It’s not so much bad as it is unexpected. There’s a shitload of flowers, which I’d guessed there’d be, but there are also notes of decomposing greenery, salt water and a whole lot of compost. The sun filters through the trees, painting Hana with little gold flecks and bouncing off the red-and-white roof of the farm cottage. As we get closer to her house, there’s a soft droning noise from the lavender massed around the big front porch. I’ve found the bees.
She barrels up the porch and pushes the door open. Of course it’s not locked.
“You’re not worried about the woodsman paying you a visit? Or the Three Bears?”
She grabs my hand, laughing. “Come on, city boy. I’ll show you around.”
I’ve never been in here before but I think I would have recognized it as hers. It’s sunny and cheerful, with a steep staircase on the right. A bright floral pattern covers the treads and bookcases crammed with books fill the landing above. She leads me through the living room, which has a fireplace, glass-faced built-ins and a squashy sofa. I catch just a glimpse of a dining room on the left and then we’re hotfooting it through a dollhouse-sized hallway, past a bathroom dominated by an enormous claw-foot tub and into the bedroom.
She turns and plants her hands on her hips. The laughter’s back in her eyes. “What do you think of farm life so far?”
“Is it nap time? Do good farm employees get a ten-minute break?” I pounce on her and toss her onto the bed. In no time at all, I’ve got her clothes off, and mine follow.
“There’ll be a performance review later,” she says with mock gravity.
* * *
The next day brings more of the same. Lots of sexing mixed with outdoor time while we work through her chore list. After we check to make sure the bees are well-watered and that no enemy mites have tried to move in since we checked yesterday, Hana whips up a stellar PB&J for lunch. It turns out we get the afternoon off since the bees are good.
“Come on.” She reaches for my hand as if it’s the most natural thing in the world for us to be joined together like that and then she starts down what looks like a rocky, wildflower-covered hillside.
I let her pull me along although this is crazy.
“Is there a path? A destination? For the record, I prefer to climb up mountains and not down.”
For all I know, she’s decided to resolve our marital status the old-fashioned way. She could just roll me down the hill—honestly, it’s nearly a mountain—and no one would ever find my poor, dead body once my cell phone had died and the signal had vanished.
She turns—still moving down the path/track/whatever it is—and grins at me. “God, you’re so old.”
I think my mouth falls open, which is a mistake at a bee farm. Who knows what will fly into it?
“I’m only five years older than you. Turn around and watch where you’re going.”
She rolls her eyes but turns around. My heart settles back into my chest.
Once I’m convinced Hana isn’t about to barrel-roll herself into an early death, I can appreciate the view. There’s definitely a path, although it’s mostly just a dirt thread that’s almost entirely swallowed up by the clouds of meadow grass and flowers on either side of us. If this is what Hana’s bees live on, it’s no wonder her honey tastes so fantastic.
And then we step into a grove of tall pines, the sunlight muted for a handful of seconds, and out again onto a beach that’s hidden at the bottom of the mountain-hill we’ve just climbed down. A pocket of cream-colored sand and dune grass separates us from the water and there’s a darker strip of wet sand where the ocean breaks. A ring of rocks juts out from the cliff on the right, taking the brunt of the incoming waves.
Hana drops my hand as if it’s on fire. “I’m going for a swim.”
“Now?”
She beams at me. “Unless you want