Wing Jones(38)

“Welcome to Whistle Apple Farms,” says an apple-cheeked old woman from inside the squat red farmhouse. “Y’all been here before?”

Monica swallows and nods. “I have,” she says in a fragile voice.

The old woman looks at me and Aaron, eyes resting on me for just a moment longer, trying to figure out what kind of box I go in. “First time for you two?” We nod. She smiles at us as she hands us our wooden basket, telling us that we pay for what we pick on our way out. She also gives us a map that explains where all the different kinds of apples grow and what they’re good for.

“Some are good for pies, others for juicin’, and some…” She leans toward me, eyes sparkling in her wrinkled face. “Some are best right then and there.”

It’s hard to know where to start. The orchards go on and on and there are too many trees to count, each one bejeweled with fat, shiny apples. All different shades of red and green and yellow. I didn’t know apples come in so many colors.

“I’ve never picked apples,” I admit as I tug on an especially shiny red one hanging low on the nearest tree.

“Me neither,” says Aaron. He’s on the other side of the tree, reaching up as high as he can. “Reckon they taste sweeter at the top,” he says, jumping a bit to pull one down. He’s so graceful in everything he does. Even jumping up to grab an apple. I bet he’d be good at ballet. He’s elegant in a way that it isn’t fair for a boy to be; it’s a fierce elegance, like he’s a leopard or an eagle. I could watch him jump and run and just move all day long. I like to watch him when he’s still too. I like to watch him all the time.

He lopes around the tree to where I’m standing and presents me with his apple.

“This apple,” he says, bowing a bit, “is a perfect apple. I’m sure of it. Best apple in the whole damn orchard.”

I don’t know if he wants me to take it from him or take a bite while it’s in his hand. The thought of eating it while it’s nestled between his fingers sends shivers from my lips to my toes, but then he straightens himself up and takes a bite himself, giving an exaggerated moan of pleasure.

“A perfect apple! I knew it! I told you, best ones come from the top. The best ones, you have to work for.” He takes another bite and it makes a satisfying crunch.

“Since when are you such an apple expert? I thought this was your first time picking apples,” I say as I toss my own apple into the basket, trying to play it cool. “Monica, we’re relying on you to be the real expert… Monica?” I can’t see her. “Mon?” I peer down the row of trees next to us and glimpse the back of her blond head just before she disappears behind another tree.

“Mon!” I drop the basket, not caring that my specially picked apple is probably bruised now, and dash after her. I almost miss her. She’s sitting slumped under an apple tree, tears trailing down her cheeks.

I sit next to her and try to rub her back like Tash does. “Mon?”

“Marc—” She hiccups. “Marcus was the one who picked all the apples last year. I’d point out which one I wanted and he’d pull it off for me, and he’d be stupid about it, you know him, he’d juggle some or try to put the whole thing in his mouth or put them down his shirt like apple boobs.”

“Apple boobs?”

Monica chokes out a short laugh, snot bubbling out her nose. She wipes her nose with the back of her hand and takes a deep shuddery breath, so full of tears and snot it sounds like she’s drowning from the inside.

“He’s everywhere, Wing. Everything I do makes me think of him. And the thing is, I don’t want to make new memories without him. I want to hold onto everything that makes me think of him. Is that wrong? Is that sick? What if … what if he doesn’t wake up? What if the last time I saw him I was drunk and he was drunk and our last kiss tasted like beer and I forgot to tell him that I loved him before he got in that car? What if I never move on? If I can’t move on, how can Michael or that woman’s family move on?”

I flinch. We never say her name, the mother who Marcus killed.

“I can’t stop thinking about them, Wing. I can’t stop thinking about if it had been the other way.” Monica’s eyes are wide, so wide I can see the whites all the way around. She’s staring at me without blinking, eyes getting wider with every word she says. “What if one of them had been driving and it was their fault? What would I think? Would I have moved on? Would I hate them more than I hate Marcus for what he did? If he had died too, would I hate him? Would they hate him? But he’s alive, and I’m glad, so glad, and it is the most selfish feeling I’ve ever had, but I’m stuck. Stuck still loving him and still so angry at him, but if loving him and being angry at him were on a scale it would be no competition. Even if I wanted to stop loving him, and sometimes I wish I could, because it would be easier, you know? And sometimes I don’t even think he deserves my love. Or your love. He doesn’t deserve any kind of love after what he did. But I can’t help it, I can’t turn it off. I can’t turn off loving Marcus and I’m scared I’ll never be able to, and what will I be then? I don’t wanna be a girl in love with the wrong kind of guy, but I don’t want to ever stop loving him either.”

At some point her tears stop and her snot dries up and her voice gets louder and louder and pitched higher and higher. The sun is starting to set over the hills and it’s turning the air gold, and in the golden light, Monica looks like some kind of broken doll.