Hugs and Quiches by Candace Harper

Author:Candace Harper [Harper, Candace]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Foxglove Fiction
Published: 2020-10-11T22:00:00+00:00

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* * *

It was very obvious that both of us had been crying when Curtis walked back in, but he chose not to acknowledge it. I was really starting to like this man.

“Are we ready?”

The camera operators were right behind him, cameras already in position and filming. I sighed and pulled my hair out of its ponytail. It might be hotter to have my hair down, but at least I’d be able to cover my face a little bit and make myself look a little bit better.

“As ready as we’re going to get,” Zoe said simply. Curtis’s gaze shifted to me and I nodded.

“All right then. Y’all follow me.” He walked right back out the door he’d come in through, off the back porch, and in the opposite direction from the barn we’d been in before.

“Your second task of the afternoon is to pick some blueberries for tonight’s dinner service.”

That was much easier, and less smelly, than our first task. I used to love going to the places where you picked your own berries in the summer.

“How many do you use in a typical service?” Zoe asked.

“Well, they’re in season right now, so they get used in a lot of our dishes. You’d have to ask Ms. Carr for the exact numbers, but I know whatever you pick will get used.”

There was no way in hell I was asking Corrina anything, but he didn’t need to know that. He was already worried about me, and even if I did think he was all right, he didn’t need to worry any more. Worried men were annoying men.

“Interesting. What other kinds of produce do y’all grow here? And is it all organic?”

“Well, let’s see…” Curtis held up a hand and started counting on his fingers. “Blueberries, tomatoes, green beans, bell peppers, and spinach are our main crops. We also have goats and sheep…oh, and bees! Couldn’t run this place without them.”

“And you do all your dairy work on the premises as well? This place has to be huge.”

He puffed up proudly. “Our farm, grazing space, and processing facilities total a little over a thousand acres, though our pasteurization equipment is actually a little ways down the road. The only place they could have put it here was way too far from the electric grid to be reasonable.”

Zoe nodded, as if that made perfect sense.

“Does your family farm, Zoe? You seem to know a lot about this stuff.”

She shook her head. “No, my parents were teachers and we lived in the city limits. I used to have chickens. It’s how I came up with my blog name, but…I don’t anymore.”

There was something she wasn’t telling me there, and I thought back over everything she’d told me about herself. It wasn’t much, but I knew it had to do with her husband. She obviously didn’t want to talk about it, though, so I asked another, simpler question.

“Did you like having chickens?”

She smiled at me, and it was like the sun had come out from behind the clouds.

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