Peaches with Bonus Material

  And also how disappointing.

  Neither Leeda nor Murphy had emerged from the dorms, and this befuddled Birdie. She hadn’t noticed their absence until the past half hour, when the work was calming down. But now that she had, she couldn’t help but feel let down. “Whatever,” she muttered. They’d be gone by tomorrow, and Birdie didn’t care anymore.

  A few minutes passed, and soon the last figure left was the first that had come out to help Birdie. She watched Enrico from her spot by the tree, sure that she was hidden, and admired the way his arms worked over the fires and how his shirt was soaked in sweat. That sweat had all been for her orchard, and that made it that much more mesmerizing. She stared at him, willing him to see her.

  And then he turned and started walking toward her, and she realized he’d known she was there the whole time.

  Enrico sank down beside her, onto his knees like she had, then into a cross-legged position.

  “Birdie, I think you must be Supergirl,” he said, giving her an exhausted smile. He swiped at a smudge of ash beside his eye. “You are very strong.”

  Birdie shook her head and stammered. “Oh—oh no. I don’t have a choice, you know. But you guys…” Birdie felt choked up. She was too tired to be embarrassed, though, and she simply let her voice trail off.

  Enrico, who appeared equally incapable of being awkward at the moment, let out a long, serious breath, his smile fading. “You have choice. Your dad choose to go to bed, no? You choose to try.” He shook his head. “You are crazy.”

  “Oh.” Birdie shifted uncomfortably at the thought that Enrico might be criticizing her dad and her, but he quickly set her at ease by moving on.

  “Not everyone is as, um, strong…not everyone cares like you. That is it.”

  “Well, everyone else cared enough to help. You cared enough…” Birdie offered, not seeing what kind of strength he was talking about. She knew she was a big girl. She had brute force—but she wasn’t sure she wanted Enrico pointing this out.

  But Enrico looked at her very seriously. “Birdie, they do it because of you. I do it because of you. Maybe you don’t see this.” Birdie was speechless, so he continued. “My mom say things like this. She say I am a thoughtful guy, smart, good guy. I don’t see it. I just think, I am…” He searched for the English words he needed. “Normal. But maybe it’s better to believe good things when you hear them.”

  Birdie smiled. “Take a compliment.”

  “Yeah.” Enrico nodded solemnly.

  “Maybe.” Birdie swiped the sweat off her face and then stopped.

  Enrico looked concerned. “What?”

  “Um.” Birdie stared at him. “Um. Do I have a dirt mustache?” Enrico looked at her for a second and then started laughing. Like the time in the cider house, she felt like he wasn’t laughing at her, just with her. So she started laughing too.

  “See. What girl would ask this? Crazy.”

  Birdie had always thought of herself as the opposite of crazy. She thought she liked being crazy, the way Enrico said it.

  When he stopped laughing, Enrico looked at her for another moment and then stood up.

  “Temperatures go up today, no?”

  Birdie nodded. “Yeah. I think so.”

  “When do we find if peaches are okay?” Enrico asked, dusting the grass off his butt. The way his body twisted while he did this, making the muscles of his shoulders stand out, made Birdie achy. But then his question settled in, and she was filled with fear.

  “Not till they ripen,” she said. “And we start to pick. In June.”

  Enrico nodded. “I leave for Texas tomorrow.”

  “Are you coming back?” Birdie asked, trying not to sound too agonized.

  “Yes. I will see you then.” He reached out his hand and Birdie took it, letting him pull her up. Then he shook it. It was a quick, hard shake, and Birdie suddenly felt he was distant again, even though he hadn’t gone anywhere yet. “Bye, Birdie.”

  She squeezed his hand back. “Bye.”

  As she watched him walk away, Birdie considered going after him, in a way that they did in the movies. She pictured calling him and running up to him and just planting a kiss on him. She envisioned him turning and walking back and planting one on her. She imagined sneaking into his room in a few minutes and kissing him then.

  But the farther away he got across the grass, the more glaring it was to Birdie that a lot could change between April and June. He could come back with a girlfriend. Or not come back at all.

  She trailed far behind him and paced outside the dorms for several minutes, meditating on the third movie option. She even walked up the stairs of the men’s dorm. But really, she was kidding herself. She didn’t even come close to going inside.

  She decided to take a walk through the orchard to clear her mind. She ended up at the pecan grove and then beyond it, at the edge of the country club.

  The sun had just laid the first orange slices on the horizon. It lit up the manicured grounds of the clubhouse on the rise, the rooftops of the condos in the distance, making the country club look a bit like Disney World. Birdie had been to Disney World, but she’d never liked it. It didn’t feel like real life.

  The view was enough to make a person think that God was smiling on Horatio Balmeade. He would never have to worry about frost, unless it might kill his imported pine trees, which had no business being in Georgia in the first place. A person could assume that his club would never have any problems, that it would always be perfect, and that at some point it was inevitable it would swallow up the mess of the orchard.

  But Birdie saw it differently.

  She took it as a good omen that the sun, though it was shining on Horatio Balmeade and all of his glittering property, was the exact same color every morning. That is, it was the exact same color as peaches.

  In 1976, two teenagers were making out to the sounds of Sonny and Cher in an unplanted orchard field when they were struck by lightning. Both survived, but from that time on, the boy, Richard, who went on to work at Pep Boys, claimed to have a mental connection to the airwaves that enabled him to predict whenever “I’ve Got You Babe” was being played on the radio.

  Chapter Eleven

  Though April wandered on into May with heavy showers and scattered thunder and the rain in Bridgewater continued relentlessly for almost fifteen days straight, it was bright and perfect on Danay’s graduation day. Which, Leeda figured, was the only way God would have it, since apparently He too loved Danay best.

  The Cawley-Smiths and Brighton’s family, the Wests, ate at Nikolai’s Roof after the ceremony—which had a 360-degree view of Atlanta and a bunch of hot Russian waiters. Leeda sat in a strapless, flowy GSUS dress she’d bought in Buckhead the day before. Her legs had returned to their usual creamy white milk-and-honey complexion, with nary a fire ant scar in sight. Her hair was perfect, and the few freckles she’d picked up working at the orchard a month ago had faded. She looked perfect, but of course nobody, aside from her friend Alicia who she’d brought from Bridgewater, noticed.

  While the adults talked with one another, Leeda and Alicia gossiped.

  “How’s Rex?” Alicia said, raising her eyebrows suggestively. Alicia always wanted to talk about him, as if Rex were the most fascinating subject of all time. It made Leeda feel possessive, proud, and bored all at the same time.

  Leeda shrugged. “He’s good. Working at the country club and the orchard. I hardly see him.”

  “Too bad. He’s worth seeing.”

  Leeda smiled halfheartedly. The first few weeks she and Rex had dated, she’d definitely been infatuated with his looks, his body. But she’d sort of stopped seeing that after a while. It was like it had faded into the background. Which was probably what had happened for Rex too. She wondered how he saw her now.

  “Alicia, do you think I’m anal?”

  Alicia shook her head. “No way. You’re just particular.”

  Leeda eyed her friend. Yesterday at Lenox she’d chosen almost the e
xact same dress as Leeda had after she’d seen Leeda try it on.

  Leeda sighed. She was leaning toward mostly bored.

  The conversation had turned to the weekend, when the Cawley-Smiths were having a graduation dinner for Danay at their most upscale hotel, the Bridgewater Plantation View. The name Horatio Balmeade drifted across the table.

  “You guys aren’t inviting him, are you?” Leeda asked.

  Her dad was dipping into a platter of beluga caviar. “Of course we are. Horace is a good friend of mine.”

  “Daddy, I can’t stand him.”

  “All the more reason to learn to like him. He’s been a good business partner to me.”

  Danay was rolling her eyes as if this was the same old crap, different day. Leeda’s mom was nibbling on the caviar with a glazed-over expression.

  “Dad, he hits on me. I hate it.”

  Mr. Cawley-Smith glanced at the Wests with embarrassment. “Leeda, that’s enough. You’re exaggerating. He thinks you’re a nice young girl.”

  Leeda’s blood began to simmer. She rearranged the silverware in front of her. Next to her Alicia shifted uncomfortably, then excused herself to the bathroom. Danay took the opportunity to sidle up beside her sister.

  “So have you started your speech yet?”

  Leeda wiggled farther into her seat. As maid of honor, she was supposed to plan a speech for the wedding reception. But she couldn’t imagine having to get up in front of all those people and ooze over her sister, on top of all the people who were already going to be oozing all over Danay.

  “It’s coming along,” she muttered.

  Danay’s lips parted in an excited smile. “What about the bachelorette party?”

  “Um.” Leeda hadn’t even thought about it. In fact, she’d kind of forgotten that was her job as maid of honor.

  Danay grinned, squeezing her wrist. “Well, I know it’s supposed to be a surprise and everything, but I think it would be fabulous if we did it here in Atlanta. I’d like to get that Fur Bus around the city.” Leeda winced. The Fur Bus was, as the name suggested, a bus covered in fur, lined inside with strobe lights and disco balls, that tooled around the city while its riders got drunk and rowdy. Leeda hated drinking and motion at the same time. “And I love the desserts at the Ritz; I love Xavier Salomon. Dancing would be good. I hear Compound is great.”

  “But I won’t be able to get in.”

  “Oh.” Danay frowned. “That’s right. Damn.”

  “And no strippers, Leeda, please,” Mrs. Cawley-Smith added from across the table wryly.

  “Mom, don’t be gross,” Leeda growled.

  But Danay and her mom were giggling, like they were suddenly women together.

  “I don’t even know why you’re having me plan the party if you already have it all planned out yourself.”

  “Leeda, really,” Mrs. Cawley-Smith said. “It’s Danay’s night. It should be perfect. Don’t be such a baby.”

  “You know.” Leeda put down the spoon she was playing with and pushed her chair back from the table. “Maybe it would be better if I got out of your hair. You’re so in sync. I could just spend the whole summer in New York. Or with Uncle Walter and Birdie. I could plan the party on my laptop.”

  Lucretia blinked at her a few times. And then she smiled. “I think that’s a nice idea.” Before Leeda could say more, her mom leaned behind Danay’s back to look at their dad. “Leeda wants to spend the summer at Walter’s. What do you think?”

  “Leeda, that’s great.”

  Leeda was a bug paralyzed by a spider. She wanted to say she hadn’t meant it, but her pride wouldn’t let her. Her chest ached.

  She whipped out her cell phone. “Do you have their number?”

  That night, Leeda lay in bed thinking about Murphy McGowen. She hadn’t thought of her much since the orchard, outside of the first few awkward days in Bio, when they’d both tentatively established that although they had known each other for a while, they didn’t know each other now.

  Leeda wondered what Murphy would have done in the same situation with her family. Not keep her mouth shut. Not lock herself into something she didn’t want to do. But Murphy was this full person. Leeda was mostly empty.

  She rolled over and stared at the clock. It was 2:13 A.M. Leeda wanted to go swimming in the lake. She wanted to do something daring, something that made her feel like she wasn’t this perfectly controlled mess, but a real, messy mess.

  A few minutes later, not wanting to wake her parents with her car, she hopped on Danay’s old Trek to ride over to Rex’s.

  She’d never ridden a bike through town in the dark, much less through Rex’s side of town, which was empty at this time of night except for the rows of fast-food joints and the lines of traffic lights, blinking aimlessly, red yellow green.

  She parked the bike on the edge of Pearly Gates Cemetery and then lifted his basement window open and slid in silently. He didn’t wake up. At home, Leeda had just pulled jeans on under her silky tank top, so now she just slipped out of them and slid silkily into his bed.

  Rex started, shrinking back against the wall.

  “It’s me,” Leeda whispered, planting a kiss on his warm, soft mouth.

  “God, Lee, you scared me.”

  “Sorry.” Rex’s body was toasty and relaxed, his hair was messy, and his body felt more fragile than it usually did—a little defenseless with sleepiness. Leeda snuggled into it like an old T-shirt. “I just wanted to see you.”

  She nuzzled up against his neck and kissed him just beneath his jaw. He began kissing her back, first on the top of her head, then on the lips.

  Leeda let him pull her tank top off and run his hands lightly over her body. This was all they had ever done. Rex had always been the perfect gentleman.

  “Rex,” she whispered, stopping his hands. “You’re working in the orchard for the rest of the summer, right?”

  “Yeah, why?”

  “Well, I kinda told Daddy I was going to spend the summer there.”

  Rex sat up, incredulous. “Why’d you do that?”

  Leeda sat up too. “I just don’t want to be around them this summer. And they don’t care if I’m around or not. So I might as well be at the orchard.”

  “Oh, Lee.” Rex put his palm to his forehead, laughing softly.

  “What?” Leeda frowned.

  “Lee, you’re so spoiled sometimes.”

  Leeda scowled. “What does that have to do with anything?”

  “When did you pull this diva maneuver?”

  Leeda frowned. “At Danay’s graduation.”

  “I see.”

  “Rex, you’re supposed to support me.” Leeda pulled her tank top on. “You don’t understand. They don’t love me like they love her.” Leeda stood up to leave, but Rex touched her back.

  “Come ’ere.” He took Leeda’s wrist and pulled her gently back onto the bed. He kissed her on the corner of her lips and then on the cheek. “Just tell your parents tomorrow that you didn’t mean it.”

  “I can’t. I already called Uncle Walter. I can’t take it back.”

  “Good one.”

  “Rex.”

  “Lee, look at your spaghetti arms.” He waggled her wrist, making her skinny arm wiggle. “You weren’t made for picking peaches.”

  “I’m leaving.”

  “Okay. Bye.”

  This was something Leeda hated and loved about their relationship. Other guys who liked Leeda would do anything to keep Leeda from freezing them out, but Rex was never intimidated by her ice-queen routine. He slid back down on his back.

  “C’mon. Lie down with me awhile. It doesn’t matter. What were you going to do with your summer anyway?”

  “I don’t know. Go to France. Get pedicures.” This was the problem: Leeda didn’t have things she loved doing. Rex loved working with his hands; Danay loved school. Her cousin Birdie loved small dogs and peaches.

  “See? Maybe it’s a good thing.”

  Leeda relented and lay down. R
ex always made her feel better and worse about things. Usually because he told her the truth. She let him pull the covers around her and wrap his muscular arms around her shoulders.

  “So will you keep working there?”

  “Sure. Whatever.”

  “Thanks, Rex.”

  She lay beside him for another hour or more until she was in that dreamy trance state where cartoon-like scenes played themselves out in her mind—Danay riding the Fur Bus, Rex sitting with her on Tybee Beach, and the endless motion of Murphy and Birdie thinning the peach trees, plucking the buds and dropping them on the ground.

  Birdie laid down her fork and took a sip of sweet tea, smiling at her mom. Cynthia looked fabulous, dressed in a bright red summer set, her hair freshly trimmed in a freshly tinted bob. On the orchard she’d always looked unkempt.

  Cynthia made the sign toward the waiter for the check.

  Liddie’s Tea Room was one of the most old-school and most popular restaurants in Bridgewater, with tiny round tables that were always full of loud women who sat practically on top of each other. Cynthia had to lean toward Birdie to be heard.

  “Don’t worry about it, honey. That orchard’s been dying for years. It’ll be nice for it to have a fresh start. Have you lost weight?” Cynthia fiddled with her red beaded necklace.

  Birdie took a bite of the salad plate her mom had ordered for her before she’d arrived and tried to talk herself out of the stomachache that was gathering below her ribs. Hearing her mom talk so casually about the orchard made her feel like it was already lost. And it also made her feel melodramatic for feeling that the whole thing was ripping her in half. Her mom made it sound so ordinary.

  “I’ve heard Mr. Balmeade is going to have the man who did Howl Mill do the condos. They’re beautiful. Who knows, in a couple of years maybe we could move into one on the very same spot as the house!”