She watches his eyes scanning in the reflection of the rearview mirror, not sticking on anything. “Don’t you see?”
“I understand you’re nervous, Silvia, but I promise, I swear on my life, that everything is going to be fine.”
Silvia shakes her head, no longer trying not to cry, and lifts her arms to try to stop the bees from descending, but nothing happens. They’re not connected to her anymore; there are no strings between them. They hover there, loud as an airplane before takeoff. “Forgive me,” she says, not even sure if Ibrahim can hear her above the noise. “It was never about God at all, was it? God had nothing to do with it.”
Silvia stares at Cynthia as the car pulls her away down the same path she came from, into the rising sun.
Acknowledgments
THANK YOU to:
Laura Dawe for truth and beauty, Caroline Schuurman for every week, Nafkote Tamirat for humour disproportionate to your size, along with Amanda Dennis and Amélie Goldberg for coming to the farm, Rose Lipton for doing the voices, Katharine Campbell for doing the listening (and for the swag, and for being my dinosaur), Stephanie Feeney for Turkey and Amsterdam, Lucy André for the quince and the understanding, Kit Brown for the trade, Sarahjane Macdonald for the instinct to persevere, Darren Frey, Julia Grummitt for the airport meeting, Hanna Rasmunds and her family for keeping me in Sweden, Anders for the tractor ride, Lauren Elkin and Anne Marsella for taking me seriously, everyone at Shakespeare & Company including Colette and Aggie, Maddie Woda for wanting to read it before it existed, Krista Halverson for making me laugh during that phone call, Lendl Barcelos for the Tarot, Katie Harris for being the only one in the book club, Billimarie Lubiano Robinson, Alice Moon, Ryan Kerr for the flamingo and the duck, Michelle Engel, Sarah Boston for giving me jobs when I needed them, Susie Fournier for knowing the characters, Dave Hurlow for driving the U-Haul, Jeffrey Greene for Burgundy and believing in me always, Ben Gallagher, Andrea Gunraj, Greg Farrell for being such a cheerleader, Nina Campbell for the Grange, Monica Russell for giving me a home, Michael Follow whom I’ve never met and maybe never will, Gareth Sergeant for your deeply intelligent intuition, Cal Irvine, King of Cups. My family: the Matlocks, the Lyes, the Caseys, the Robinsons, the Smiths, and the Mikhails. Martha Sharpe and Maggie Gee for being writer mums, Diana Quick for being a London mum, Margaux Williamson for inviting me for dinner to talk about it, Diane Borsato for the honeycomb. Rosa Rankin-Gee, for your big heart, for going everywhere with me. My parents—my favourite parents—for always reading to me with all the voices, and for letting me go into the world.
To Stephanie Sinclair for your strategy, speed, and continual support; Whitney Moran, for taking the risk of the first step and working so hard to make this feel easy for me; Katie Henderson Adams, for your confidence and insight. All the rest of the Liveright team for your sharp eyes, especially Liz, Gina, and Amy. You’ve all helped make this book a better version of itself.
I’d also like to thank the Toronto Arts Council and the Ontario Arts Council for their support in affording me time to write.
Note: While the author has done her best to represent local plant-and wildlife, certain liberties have been taken to manipulate the workings of the natural world at the service of the story.
Copyright © 2018 by Harriet Alida Lye
First American Edition 2018
All rights reserved
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ISBN 978-1-63149-434-5
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