Weekends in Carolina

by Jennifer Lohmann

She tried to have sympathy for his addiction and the struggle he faced to quit drinking. She tried to have compassion for the experience of a soldier with both the pressures of combat and of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell. She tried to be pleased that he’d managed almost the whole summer without drinking. She tried to understand the world from his point of view.

  But if she was going to feel any of those things, they would have to wait until tomorrow at the earliest. Because standing in the doorway staring at her drunken intern and a bottle of booze, all she felt was rage. With all his sins out in the open, he obviously wanted her to feel rage. She was playing right into the hand he’d dealt her. And even knowing it was what he wanted her to do, she said, “You’re fired.” He expected her to keep her word and she could do no less.

  Sean’s Adam’s apple bobbed and he took a shuddering breath. Then he ran back into the barn and she heard the sounds of vomiting coming from the bathroom. How long had he been sitting in the barn, drinking and wondering when she would check on him? Spending all that time convincing herself Sean could be trusted meant he’d had that many more minutes to pickle himself. She hoped the cool porcelain on his cheeks was worth all the work he’d put into this little episode.

  She didn’t leave the porch. She didn’t want to step into that barn and its alcohol-soaked filth right now. When he stepped back onto the porch, he had changed his shirt and splashed some water on his face. He looked more alive, but that was a hollow comparison to the puffy corpse he’d been a few minutes earlier.

  His charming, mysterious smile fell flat. Whether repeated use had diminished its power or he wasn’t sober enough to pull it off, she didn’t know. The first time she’d stood on the barn porch staring at her hungover intern, he’d looked roguishly handsome. She wouldn’t have wanted to wake up next to him, but she’d been able to credit his bad-boy appeal. Now she couldn’t ignore the bits of vomit crusted at the corner of his mouth.

  His half-assed attempt to clean himself up hadn’t amounted to much. Neither had his promise not to drink.

  She stood on the porch, her hand on Ashes’s head, and waited for the excuses to come pouring out of Sean’s mouth. She hadn’t grown up with an alcoholic father, and Hank had stopped drinking by the time she’d moved to the farm, but she’d talked enough with Trey and Kelly to know what to expect.

  It didn’t take long.

  “Last night wasn’t my fault.” His voice was hoarse. His voice box was probably also crusted over with puke. “I won’t do it again.”

  She waited for the last in the trifecta of avoiding responsibility. This one took him longer to get out. Sean had enough pride to try to meet her eyes, but she could tell he struggled with it by the way he grasped on to the door frame for support.

  “Give me another chance.”

  They both knew he’d set himself up to be fired, but he had played his role and so she could play hers. “This is my business and my livelihood, not baseball. There are no three strikes and you’re out. There’s only out.” The words sounded like they came from another person. A stronger, angrier person who had a future to protect, who didn’t waste time overthinking her problems.

  “I got this phone call last night from my mom. She never was happy when I joined the army, but now I’m out and she wants to come visit and...”

  “Stop.” She held up a hand. “You’ve never shared your past with me before and doing it now won’t change that you’re fired.”

  She was sorry for whatever had happened that had caused the bender and his sudden desire to get fired. As they’d worked on the farm together, she’d seen him struggle with himself and the relief that manual labor gave him. She’d seen him work his body so hard he looked like he would fall over into the pepper plants, and she gathered from Kelly that Sean was trying to keep his mind away from his demons.

  But those demons weren’t her demons, and this farm was her farm. Pity wouldn’t get him to quit drinking for good. Pity would only mean she’d be spending another morning in the near future looking at her watch and wondering where her employee was. Pity would hurt them both.

  He blinked, but looked more relieved than surprised. His shoulders drooped like a man beaten down by life and she was one more rock being thrown at him. Then she remembered how this morning had unfolded and decided that she may be the rock, but Sean was the hand that threw it. “If you’re not working here, you can’t stay in the barn. Do you have another place to go?”

  “Kelly’s.” She must have looked doubtful because he continued, “No, really. Kelly said I could stay with him when I’m done here and looking for something else.”

  Max didn’t think Kelly had planned on Sean showing up at his doorstep after being fired. “I’ll give you until the end of next week to move out. If Kelly won’t take you in, hopefully that will give you enough time to find someplace else to stay.”

  He nodded. The pride that had made him look her in the eyes while tossing excuses at her feet was powerful enough for him not to beg. She wondered if his pride was also what had brought on this bender. Better to sabotage yourself and know you had control over your fall than to trip over something you didn’t see. Max understood that feeling.

  “And next summer?” Sean asked.

  Short one intern, scrambling to find money to buy the land and rainy weather meant next summer would be a miracle. If Sean could promise his own miracle, she’d take him back. “If you’re sober and going to meetings. I won’t be so keen to grant you more than one chance, nor will you have the luxury of privacy if I suspect you of drinking.”

  The sun had gotten high enough in the sky to light up the inside of the barn, even through the clouds. Though Sean had been living in the barn for the entire summer, the inside still looked empty. How do you start your life over when you don’t have roots to keep you stable and feed you?

  Just as she had to fight to keep her roots solidly planted in this Carolina clay, Sean needed to struggle just to get his feet on the ground long enough not to be blown over.

  She didn’t know whether or not to hope Kelly took Sean in. He needed something to hold on to, to give him the motivation to resist a bender. The prospect of working the land hadn’t been enough. Maybe Kelly would be enough. Maybe rock bottom wouldn’t have to break too much of Sean when he hit it.

  “I’ll be sober next summer,” he said. She took his words with all the force of the promise every drunk makes, but she stuck out her hand and shook on it anyway.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  THE HOUSE WAS silent when Trey let himself in after his drive, which was unusual; Max had been waiting up for him in the kitchen the past several weekends he’d driven down from D.C. She’d left the kitchen light on, so she was expecting him. He took off his shoes and left them with his bag at the kitchen table, then made his way through the house to her bedroom.

  Ashes barely stirred as Trey walked past the old dog. If it hadn’t been for the twitching of the dog’s feet, he wouldn’t be certain the dog was alive at all. In her bedroom, Max’s dead sleep matched that of her dog’s. Her hair was in its usual braid and—also as Trey was coming to expect—most of her curls had popped out of the braid and were wild about her face. In the moonlight coming through the open curtains, Max’s hair was an otherworldly color.

  Trey peeled off his clothes and slid under the sheets. Even though Max didn’t wake up, she stirred enough to snuggle closer to him and throw an arm over his chest. He rested his hand on hers, feeling the lift of both of their hands with the rise and fall of his chest. He closed his eyes. His last coherent thought before falling asleep was to wonder whether he could dispense with the bag nonsense and just leave some clothes at the farm. Would that violate their understanding?

  * * *

  AT THE SOUND of stirring from the bedroom, Max smiled. She got out a mug and poured Trey a cup of coffee. It was her coffee, so he’d grimace. But if he wa
nted to be certain his first cup of the morning was coffee he approved of, he could beat her to the coffeepot.

  She found it amusing that even after the many weekends he’d been staying here he couldn’t wake up before she did. Though working the farmers’ market with her on Saturday mornings meant he was getting closer. She’d told him once to prepare the coffee when he got in on Friday nights and she’d push a button in the morning, but he’d replied that he usually had more important things on his mind after his drive.

  He’d been unzipping her jeans when she’d told him to make the coffee. He’d been pushing her onto the couch when he’d told her that he had better things to do.

  She could learn to make coffee with his fancy coffeepot. If she was being honest with herself, she could also taste a difference between his coffee and her “sludge.” But why learn to make coffee in a pot that will go away once she signed the mortgage papers? And why grow accustomed to fancy coffee she was too cheap to buy?

  Max didn’t share any of these worries with Trey when he stumbled into the kitchen, bleary-eyed and rubbing his face. He was here now. He had driven five hours after work to wake up early the next morning and help her buy her dream. For that, she would always love him. Even when he walked out the door, never to cross the Virginia–North Carolina border again.

  He grimaced in anticipation when she handed him his cup, but his eyes perked up at his first sip. After he’d drunk about half the mug, he declared himself awake enough to make “real coffee”—as soon as he’d had his good-morning kiss.

  Trey, who was so angry when he talked about his father, his childhood or the farm, could be so sweet when caught off guard. She’d sometimes catch herself wondering what he’d be like if he hadn’t grown up with such hatred and resentment, but then she’d remember that his bitterness had given him his drive to succeed.

  She took a sip of her coffee before her mind ran away with her. Philosophy was appropriate for hoeing tomatoes and eggplants, not so much for stale coffee on a rainy Saturday morning.

  “What are you smiling about?” Trey asked as he turned around to face her after starting his coffee.

  “Nothing. No, that’s not true. Thank you for coming down to help me at the market and for pushing me to buy the land. And the Kickstarter idea.” Not knowing what her life would look like after December was terrifying, but the thought of owning the land had taken on enough substance to dampen her fears—most of the time. “I just hope people invest in the Kickstarter. Otherwise, this whole plan is for naught.”

  “You have the resources to buy the farm, even if the Kickstarter doesn’t succeed.” She made a face, but Trey wrapped his free arm around her and dropped a coffee-scented kiss on her lips before she could argue with him. “And as far as the Kickstarter is concerned, you’re only convincing them to pay for a product they already want, and I’ll help you do that. Besides—” he pulled away far enough to take a sip of his coffee “—I’ve gotten something out of this summer, too.”

  Rid of the farm? Those were ungrateful words, sown in anxiety and fear about the future. She should eradicate them while they were still too small to spread. “Fresh vegetables?” was what she said instead.

  “Well,” he offered, “my vegetable intake does increase on the weekends I visit, but I come to see you. Working the farmers’ market is just a side pleasure.”

  It was on the tip of her tongue to ask what would happen to their relationship after she signed the mortgage papers, but they’d already talked about it, so she chickened out.

  Max ate some cereal before they left, but Trey preferred to search out his breakfast at the market. After they were both full of coffee, Max packed into the truck with Norma Jean while Trey got in his car to follow behind. At the market, the three of them unloaded the tables and tents, then proceeded to set up the vegetables.

  It was raining. Again.

  “There’s not a lot,” Trey whispered to her when they started pulling the vegetables out of the back of the truck.

  “I know.” She tried to say the words with a layer of optimism, but the sheer sadness of the season encumbered her voice. “The rains have hit us hard this summer.”

  “But I was here just three weekends ago and there was plenty.”

  “And we didn’t have one fully sunny day in those three weeks since.” She lifted a box of green tomatoes onto the table and laid them out in baskets. All she had were green tomatoes because her first planting had been overcome by blight and her second planting wasn’t ripe yet. Picking some of the tomatoes while green to sell would cut into future harvests, but she had to offer something, and with the way the weather had been going, she might not get red tomatoes out of her second planting anyway. To help sales, Max had printed out two recipes: one for fried green tomatoes and one for a green-tomato curry.

  She had no melons to offer, no summer squash, eggplant or basil. The peppers had done okay with all the rain and the onions had been harvested before the worst of it started, but her winter squash crop had been cut in half. Everything was rotting in the fields—everything except the weeds.

  “And I miss Sean,” she said, not fully believing that she was confessing such a thing. Sidney and Norma Jean were fine. They were hard workers and they were both interested in learning about farming. But Sean had put his soul into the work; Max had felt it each and every time they worked the land together.

  Trey stopped pulling vegetables out of the truck and pulled Max into his arms for a hug.

  “I feel like I shouldn’t miss him, because he got drunk knowing I would fire him and intending for me to do so. But I still do.” She turned her face into his shirt, hoping her next confession would be lost in the cotton. “And I’m afraid to call Kelly and ask how Sean is, because I’m afraid he ruined that, too.”

  Max could feel the pressure of Trey’s kiss through her hair, even if his lips never reached her skin. “You did the right thing. The hard thing, but the right thing.”

  “Maybe I should’ve never let him stay after that first time.” It was so easy to look back and question past decisions, especially now that she could see the results.

  He straightened his arms and she was able to look directly into his eyes. “When you let Sean stay the first time, you gave him a second chance. That was a hard decision, one I’m not sure I would have the ability to make. After all the weekends I’ve spent with you on the farm, I think you made the right one then. And you made the right one now.”

  She could feel the truth of his words in his grip on her shoulders. Trey didn’t like Sean, had hated that he was dating Kelly and despised the man’s alcohol abuse. He’d doubted her decision to give Sean another chance originally, so it was nice to hear a confirmation of it even after the consequences had become apparent. “Thank you.”

  Trey gave her a kiss on her lips, then went back to unloading the truck. After a couple minutes, sounding more like an afterthought, he asked, “And your finances?”

  Max’s heart sank a little further. In their daily—sometimes hourly—email and text exchanges, Trey hadn’t once asked about her finances. She didn’t want to tell him how tenuous this summer had made her bank account. She hadn’t eaten into her savings account—yet—but she hadn’t added anything to it, either. In the summer she ate mostly what she grew, and this summer there wasn’t much to eat. The downpours had even done the impossible and made the chickens look depressed with their muddy feet and rain dripping off their beaks and combs.

  “I’ll still be able to buy the farm—” so long as we get sunny days for the rest of the summer and I can get some quick fall crops in “—if that’s what you’re worried about.” Max was worried about so many things. She couldn’t use any Kickstarter money to buy real estate and every time she looked at her bank statement, she saw how close her savings was getting to the breaking point. And yet, when the time came, she’d probably still try to buy
the land, even if it took every penny she had.

  When she looked up at Trey, his eyes managed to be both warm with sympathy and cold with anger. “I don’t care about you being able to buy the farm. I care about you.” The box Trey was holding dropped with a thud onto the table—luckily it held onions. “Why do you think I’ve been coming down to the farm on all my free weekends?”

  “I don’t know.” Now, as people were starting to walk up to the various farmers for their vegetables, was not the time for this conversation. But Max had chickened out during all the appropriate times. “Sometimes I wonder if you’re softening on your stance against moving. I know you’ll never be a farmer, but I wonder if you could lobby at the General Assembly or if that would be a step down. I wonder if you could stand to live in the farmhouse.”

  When Trey’s eyes softened with pity and his mouth opened to politely turn her down, Max rushed to finish her thought. “But then I wonder if it would be my parents all over again. If the person you are right now is dependent on you living somewhere other than Durham. My mom may say she didn’t resent moving to Illinois, that it was worth it for the two children she’d borne, but I don’t always believe her.”

  Trey had closed his mouth and he was silent for several seconds. “Max, we agreed that our relationship was a temporary thing.”

  “I know. And I’m not trying to back out or renegotiate, I’m just...” What was she doing anyway? Trey hadn’t yet given her an outright no, but he would if she pressed the matter—and no amount of unburdening of her soul was worth how she’d feel when he did. She smiled; it was a weak smile, but the corners of her mouth lifted and she showed teeth, so it counted. “You said I should think big and not worry about reality.” She shook her head. “That’s all this is.”

  “Max, I never wanted to disappoint you, and it’s not about you.”

  “Can we not talk about this now?” she asked, interrupting him. “Customers are going to start arriving any minute.”