The Enlightenment of Bees

by Rachel Linden

  “A man will do a lot for love,” he says sheepishly. “There’s an express option for passports now. And Valium is my new best travel buddy.”

  He grins, and I laugh in spite of myself, and for a moment it feels like it did in the beginning. Easy between us. Ethan is an easy man to like, to love. But apparently he did not feel the same way about me, at least not until he saw me with Kai. I guess jealousy can be clarifying. It can show us the hidden corners of our hearts.

  The fact that Ethan came for me says something. But I am not willing to let him off so easy. I am not the same girl who ate take-out salmon nigiri and watched this man shatter my future and my heart on the shore of Lake Union. I’ve tasted a different life. I’ve grown. And I want to know why he thinks we will work a second time. He needs to convince me we could still be good together.

  “You said we were going different directions. You said we don’t fit together anymore.” I cap my water bottle and pin him with a pointed look.

  “I was wrong, Mia. We can make this work, I know it.” Ethan has adopted his persuasive tone, the one that landed the sale of his start-up, the one that makes any plan sound reasonable and right. He reaches out and takes my hands, his fingers warm and strong and so familiar. My heart breaks a little. I’ve missed him so much.

  “Are you still moving to San Jose?” I balk, not ready yet to be convinced but not sure I don’t want to be. I slip my hands from his grasp and nibble my last slice of cucumber.

  “No.” He shakes his head. “I knew moving to San Jose would be a deal breaker for you, and I wanted to give us another chance. The company’s agreed to let me work remotely from Seattle and just fly down every couple of weeks for a day or so to meet with my team. I start the end of this month. If we ever change our minds and want to move to Cali, I can always relocate at a later date.”

  This is unexpected. Ethan is both practical and ambitious. San Jose would be a smart career move for him. To turn it down for me, for the chance of getting me back, highlights just how serious he is.

  “I didn’t think you’d do that,” I say, softening a little more.

  He nods, face serious. “I’ll do anything, Mia.”

  I toy with my water bottle and gaze out at the camp. “What you said about us going different directions, though—it’s true. We want really different things.” I meet his eyes, needing him to see how I’ve changed, how I’ve grown. “I’ve tasted a life I’d forgotten to even dream about, a life I wanted since I was a little girl, and I can’t go back to our old plans now. My desire to make a difference and to have a life of adventure isn’t going away. It’s who I am.”

  Ethan spreads his hands, a gesture of surrender. “We can compromise. Isn’t that what any relationship is about? We can keep the dreams we still want and build new ones if we don’t. The Craftsman cottage in Green Lake? A Frenchie named Butterworth? If that’s not us anymore, no problem. What do you want? A yearly humanitarian trip abroad? You want to start a not-for-profit in Seattle? We can make a life that works for both of us, Mia. I’m sure we can.” His eyes are pleading, so sincere.

  It’s enticing, but is it enough?

  “I love you,” he says softly, earnestly. “And there’s adventure and need everywhere in the world. Anywhere you go you’ll make a difference. Let’s do it together.”

  I hesitate. It would be so simple to slide back into the shape of our life together. But I am not that shape anymore. India changed me. The refugee camp is changing me. And Kai—if I’m honest, Kai has changed the shape of my heart too. Ethan is positive we can reinvent our future to accommodate the shape of my alternate life. I’m not convinced.

  “I need to think about all of this,” I tell him briskly. “I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”

  I stand, brushing the dirt from my jeans, and Ethan stands with me. He looks a little surprised at being dismissed, but he recovers quickly.

  “Sure, take all the time you need,” he says. He leans over and kisses my cheek, just a quick brush of his lips against my cheekbone before I can react. “Thank you,” he whispers. I glance up just as Kai emerges from the food tent. He freezes, his eyes focused on us, on Ethan’s lips against my skin. He wheels around abruptly and heads back the way he came, his face set like granite, impossible to read.

  Chapter 36

  Late in the afternoon a Spanish charity arrives with a truck full of sodden donated clothing. They got caught in a rainstorm in the mountains on the way, and the canvas truck cover leaked. There is a lull in camp activity since the bus left with almost half the refugees after lunch. No one is waiting at the medical tent, and Szilvia seizes the opportunity to conscript all volunteers into helping in one of two ways. Half the volunteers are tasked with picking up trash. The other half of us are to sort through the wet clothes for anything helpful and then bag the remnants up to be hauled away as garbage.

  I am assigned to the clothing truck, and although it looks like it will be a damp and unpleasant job, I’m grateful for the chance to focus on something other than my own internal drama. I need to do something else for a few minutes and give my poor psyche a break. In the dim and humid confines of the truck bed, Winnie stands on one side of me, Rosie on the other, sorting through soggy cardboard boxes of clothing. The clothes are unusable, sopping mounds of shorts and tank tops and strappy sandals, clothes that, even had they been dry, would not have been suitable for most of the refugees, who are predominantly Muslim and dress conservatively. Winnie holds up a glittery gold mini skirt.

  “Start your new life in Europe like a Eurotrash disco queen,” she remarks dryly, tossing it onto the garbage pile. I find a few pairs of socks and some blouses that are just a little damp and put them on the small save pile.

  I’m fast learning in the world of disaster relief that good intentions do not always equal helpful results. We could have been using this time more productively, but instead we’re here sorting through someone’s kind but ill-conceived gesture of goodwill. I throw a red snakeskin bra on the garbage pile with a sigh.

  “Oh my stars.” Rosie holds up a pair of strappy black stiletto heels. “If this isn’t the biggest waste of a trip. All the way from Spain to deliver stilettos to refugees.” She tosses them on the garbage pile. While the comment is true, it is also a little ironic coming from a woman who is currently wearing watermelon-colored fringed suede Gucci flats, compliments of Lars Lindquist. She catches my eye and rolls hers ruefully. “I know, look who’s talking.”

  To her credit she’s been switching between the striped dress and the plum one, trying to be sensitive both to the refugees’ situation and their expectations of women’s modest attire.

  “So what’s the deal with you and Malibu Ken?” Winnie asks, jerking her head toward the open back of the truck. Ethan is just visible over by the tents, gathering trash with a rake and dumping it into a garbage bag. He is moving gingerly but working without complaint.

  “He’s, ah . . .” I pause, not sure how to summarize whatever Ethan is.

  “He’s Mia’s ex-college boyfriend who strung her along for six years and then dumped her on a Ferris wheel when she thought he was going to propose,” Rosie explains, summarizing my disastrous love story in one unpunctuated sentence. “He had the diamond ring and everything. And now he’s had a change of heart and has come all the way over here to win her back, even though he’s never set foot outside of America until now.” She tosses a denim jacket on the save pile.

  Winnie looks mildly impressed. “Wow,” she says, surveying me. “Bold move. So are you going to give him a second chance?”

  “I don’t know.” I frown at a purple cocktail dress, then glance over at Ethan. My heart speeds up every time I look at him, but I can’t tell if it’s from annoyance or anticipation. Maybe a mixture of both.

  Rosie shoots me a sympathetic look.

  “Don’t,” Winnie advises. “If it took him this long to figure out he made a mistake, he’s either really dumb or he doesn’t really want you. Either way you don’t want
to go down that road again.”

  Surprisingly sound advice from a woman who has a tattoo of a disturbingly anatomically accurate heart wrapped in yellow caution tape on her left bicep.

  Kai suddenly appears at the mouth of the truck, his arms full of wet blankets. “Szilvia told me to bring these here. I guess someone’s coming from Budapest to pick them up.” He dumps the blankets in a mound by the door and then turns to go, giving me a brief confused look.

  I wince and drop my eyes. I desperately want to go to him, to explain. But what would I say? I don’t even know what I think about this whole situation. I have nothing to offer Kai, not until I know my own mind. He starts to go.

  “Kai.” I say his name before I can stop myself. He waits, but I don’t say anything more.

  “I’ve got to get back to work,” he says, turning away, his jaw set and his expression stony.

  Winnie whistles slow and low. “Looks like you’ve got yourself a regular love triangle,” she says, tossing some more clothes on the trash pile. “This is getting fun.”

  I shoot her a black look, which she ignores.

  “Take my advice, Pollyanna,” she says. “Don’t let a man decide your life for you. Be the captain of your own ship.” She tosses a huge white brassiere trimmed with sodden feathers onto the trash pile.

  I pause, considering her words. “Winnie, that may be the first thing we’ve ever agreed on,” I say with a touch of irony. Then I force my attention from my disastrous love triangle and the two men who each seem to be occupying some portion of my heart and make myself focus on the task at hand.

  * * *

  Back at the hostel later that night, I listen to a voicemail from my mother as I brush my teeth. I’m still confused by my conversation with Ethan and my interaction with Kai, and I just want to hear her voice. She would know what to do with the mess I’ve gotten myself into. Oddly, we are actually quite close geographically. Only Romania separates Hungary from Moldova. We’re practically neighbors, but right now my parents feel inaccessible to me in their unexpected new life. I miss them.

  “Darling!” Her voice sounds bright and a little tinny from a bad connection, as though she’s talking to me through an aluminum can. “We got your message. So glad it’s going well with the refugees. Your father and I are having an amazing trip. It’s truly inspiring to see what this program is doing to help the women and their families.” She sounds exuberant, light and happy in a way I’ve never heard her sound before. There’s some static, and her words trail off into garbled nonsense. I hear only the last sentence. “It’s going so well we’re tempted not to come home.” She laughs, but there is something in her tone that makes me pause.

  My homebody parents have cast aside every script I had for them and done the unexpected. What if they do indeed stay in Moldova? What would become of the farm? For a moment I picture West Wind—the old white clapboard farmhouse, the rows of tidy lavender bushes spreading out across the fields, the very soil where I grew up. I want to freeze my family and childhood home in time and space, just for a little bit, so that something feels familiar and predictable. Everything is changing, my past suddenly unsteady, my future topsy-turvy.

  I tap water from my toothbrush, suddenly missing my mother with a palpable ache. I need to hear her voice. I need to tell her about Ethan and get her advice. My wise, practical, steady mother will know just what to do.

  I wander through the hostel in my pajamas, holding my phone aloft, searching for a stronger signal, and finally get one strong enough to make a call. It goes directly to her voicemail.

  “You’ve reached Meg West’s voicemail. I’m in rural Moldova and can only access my messages once a week when I get into town, but leave a message and I’ll get back with you next week!”

  Dismayed and disappointed, I hang up without leaving a message. How could I possibly explain the complexity of the situation in a few seconds? And by the time she is able to return my call, it will be far too late. I will have made my decision already.

  Feeling a little orphaned, I head for bed. My head and heart are a muddle, but it looks like I’m going to have to figure this one out on my own.

  Hurrying down the dark, narrow confines of the hostel hall, I clutch my phone, lost in thought. As I pass the men’s shower room, the door flies open and Kai steps out into the hall. I startle, glancing up at him. He is bare chested with a towel knotted around his waist, his hair hanging loose around his face. He smells like soap and that spicy scent that makes me think of chai tea and his lips on mine.

  “Mia.” He looks surprised to see me. I freeze, trying to ignore the fact that he is shirtless again. Why do we have to be so different in height? I’m staring directly at his smoothly defined pecs. It puts me at a disadvantage.

  “Kai, hey.” I want to run, to make excuses. This is excruciatingly awkward, but I don’t move. I can’t just pretend nothing is happening. Kai looks down at me in the gloom of the hallway that smells like mildew and grilled sausages.

  “Mia, what’s going on?” he asks. The question to end all questions.

  I stare at him dumbly and shake my head. I have no idea what to tell him. I have no idea what is actually going on.

  “It’s Ethan,” I finally manage to say. “He came for me. He says he made a mistake, and he’s asking me to give him another chance.”

  For a split second an unguarded expression flickers across Kai’s face. Disappointment, hurt, betrayal.

  “What did you tell him?” he asks.

  “Nothing,” I admit hesitantly. “I’m so confused.”

  Kai says nothing, just leans against the doorframe to the bathroom, crosses his arms, and watches me. The words start to trickle out of me, taking me by surprise.

  “I don’t know what to do,” I say, focusing on the brown carpet in the hallway, a safe zone. “He’s my first love. I’ve dreamed for weeks about this very thing happening—him coming for me, saying he’d made a mistake, that what he really wants is me, is us. But now that he’s here . . . It’s different than I imagined. I’m different. Things have changed.” My voice trails away.

  “What’s changed?” There’s a sharp edge to Kai’s tone, challenging me to say the words. I glance up at him and then away, thinking of our incendiary kiss in the Tesco aisle, at what it has lit in me, bright and fervent as a struck match.

  “Us,” I say. “Me. I’ve changed. I started dreaming different dreams.”

  Kai straightens. “Like what?” he asks.

  I shake my head, doubt creeping into my voice. “I don’t know.”

  Kai stares at me for a long moment, his face set like stone. “You said you wanted better things,” he says. “Now’s your chance.”

  “I don’t know what I want,” I say, a whisper, a confession.

  Kai gives me a long, searching look, his expression tinged with challenge and a touch of frustration. “Yes, you do,” he says. And then he brushes past me without another word and shuts the door to his room.

  I stand there for a moment in the dank hallway, smelling the faintest whiff of cardamom and freshly cut grass. I’m sick with apprehension, with anticipation, with a premonition of the truth.

  Chapter 37

  One in the morning. I sit up in bed with a groan of frustration, giving up on sleep. My thoughts are buzzing, angry and energetic as bees, around and around in my head. When I close my eyes I feel the agitated vibration of their wings, the ominous hum of their concern rattling my teeth. The bees are trying to tell me something, but I can’t pinpoint what it is. I just know something is off-kilter.

  With a sigh I throw on a hoodie over my pajamas and tiptoe from the room, making my way through the dark, sleeping hostel. The beer garden is deserted at this hour, and I slump into one of the metal chairs by a small gurgling fountain, trying to clear my mind. The air is warm and soft, the night absolutely still about me. I tip my head back and search the sky for the faint glow of stars, looking for inspiration.

  “You okay, sugar?” I whip around, su
rprised. Rosie is hovering in the doorway, clutching a short silk robe around herself. It’s cantaloupe colored with aqua cranes, one of the items from Lars that she did not donate to refugees. She’s holding something in her other hand, but I can’t quite make it out in the darkness.

  “Yes,” I say automatically, then shake my head. “No. I’m so confused.”

  Rosie fumbles along the wall for a moment and finds the light switch, illuminating the garden in festive, soft-colored lights strung in long swoops through the spreading trees overhead. She sinks into a chair across from me and sets a small turquoise-striped box in the middle of the table. A Trophy cupcake box.

  “For clarity,” she explains. “It’s hummingbird.”

  I lift the lid, amazed. “Where in the world did you get this?”

  Rosie shoots me an opaque look. “Ethan brought it for you, a peace offering. He gave it to me after our shift today and asked me to give it to you.”

  I lift the cupcake from the box. Its coconut-dusted frosting is only slightly smashed at one edge. It is a thoughtful gesture.

  “Share it with me?” I tear it gently, handing her half.

  She sighs and leans back in the chair, nibbling the edge of the cupcake. “So what are you going to do?”

  “I don’t know.” I bite into my half, the buttery frosting a generous inch tall. Butter and sugar always have a comforting quality. Let’s hope tonight they also have revelatory powers. “You have any bright ideas?” My words are gummy with frosting.

  Rosie shakes her head, her hair cascading like a living flame around her shoulders. “I think it comes down to what you really want.” She licks frosting from her upper lip.

  “I don’t know what I want,” I say without thinking, then stop. That isn’t really true. I want it all, Ethan, Kai, and this new, unexpected life.

  I glance over at the chair next to me, picturing Ethan sitting there, the bright gold of his head bent over his guitar. He’s laughing at something, and I can see the dimple in his cheek. He looks so young, like the day we first met, when everything was possible and likely and filled with promise. My heart constricts just a little.