Family Tree

“You don’t sound like you’re from around here either,” he said.

“Oh, I sure as tootin’ can if I’ve a mind to,” she said in her broadest Vermonter’s accent.

He laughed. “Why don’t you want to?”

“I’m going into broadcasting. One of the first rules is that you can’t sound like you’re from any particular place. Regional accents limit you.”

“What do you want to broadcast?”

Annie tended to guard her dream from people, not wanting to hear it was going to be hard or it couldn’t be done, or you had to know the right people or you’d never break in. Yet she instinctively trusted that Fletcher wouldn’t say any of those things.

“A cooking show,” she said.

“Cooking? For real?” He didn’t seem to think it was funny or weird.

“For real,” she said.

“Cool.”

She went to the pie safe and offered him an iced maple pecan cookie. “We made these last night.”

He took a bite and clutched his chest. “Man, that’s good. You’re gonna do great with your show. If everybody knew how to make something like this, it would probably bring about world peace.”

She laughed. “See, this is what I love. Making food that makes someone happy.”

“Oh.” He crammed the rest of the cookie into his mouth. “This is me being more than happy. This is me being … oh, man.”

She laughed again. “Maple is everyone’s favorite. It’s one of those things most people never get tired of. Ever try sugar on snow?”

“Nope.”

She scooped up a ladle of hot syrup from the finishing pan, stepped outside and poured a thin stream over a mound of clean snow. “See? It hardens into the world’s purest candy.”

He broke off a piece and sampled it. “It’s really good.”

“When I’m feeling fancy, I make snowflakes and spiderwebs with it.”

“Artistic, like your mom.”

She couldn’t stop smiling. How was it that everyone thought this guy was bad, just because he had long hair and came from nowhere? He was totally nice.

“How are you not the size of a linebacker from eating maple sugar all day, every day?” he asked.

She wondered if that was a compliment or merely an observation. “I’ve been on swim team since the third grade. Plus, I work like a rented mule around here. It’s not just making sugar a few weeks out of the year. We have to take care of the trees so they’ll be good producers. Then there’s the firewood. I’m not much for cutting, but I’ve done my share. I usually drive the tractor with the stone boat behind it. In the summer, there’s the garden and the critters. In the fall, the orchard keeps us busy. Apple cider.”

“And you want to leave all this for the big city and a broadcasting career.”

“Oh, hell, yes. Please. Why does that surprise you?”

He studied her in a way she wasn’t used to—as if he was really seeing her. Not just her long dark hair and her boobs, but seeing who she was.

“Because just now when you were talking about this place, you looked like the happiest person in the world,” he said.

“I did?”

“You did.”

“Well. I suppose that’s because I am happy. But I want to be happy trying something else, something I’ve always dreamed of doing.”

“Fair enough.”

“What about you? What are your plans after graduation?”

“I’ll probably work with my dad. He needs the extra help getting his business off the ground.”

Her spirits dampened just a bit. Her mother was constantly warning her about hometown boys with no ambition. “They’ll hold you back,” Mom would say. “They never amount to anything. They want to settle down and raise a family, same as their parents and grandparents.”

Annie didn’t necessarily see that as a bad thing. But doing exactly that hadn’t worked out for her parents. No wonder her mother was so skeptical.

“So you’re interested in being a mechanic,” she ventured.

He grinned. “I’m interested in girls and beer. And maple syrup. I just added that to the list.”

6 (#ulink_8d5cb232-1cd4-5444-be77-797db25d6d4d)

Fletcher Wyndham stuck around through the rest of the sugar season, coming up the mountain each day at the end of school, and all day Saturday and Sunday. True to his word, Gordy brought on his two older sisters. Paula and Roberta were large, like Gordy, but a lot more outgoing, and they seemed to love the outdoors. They gathered and hauled and worked as hard as any man.

Every day as Annie finished up the boiling, Fletcher would come into the sugar shack and they would talk—about school, life, family, the future, everything. She could listen to him talk all day. She liked the cadence of his voice and the light in his eyes when he looked at her. She liked his large hands and the easy, athletic grace with which he moved. She liked him in ways she’d never felt for a boy before.

She wondered what it would be like to go all the way with him. Sex was still this big unknown thing to her, even though she thought about it all the time. It was like Europe—a place she studied and yearned to visit, but hadn’t had the opportunity yet. She was just waiting for her moment.

All her instincts and urges told her that Fletcher Wyndham was her moment. Yet even though he was totally easy to talk to, she couldn’t figure out how to bring up the topic with him. Based on her past boyfriends, she figured all she had to do was offer, and he’d jump at the chance. She didn’t want to do that, though. Fletcher mattered to her. His opinion mattered. She didn’t want him to think she was easy, or worse, using him.

He might not like her at all in that way. How could a girl tell? They needed to get to know each other better. Maybe then it would happen naturally.

“There’s a cooking competition at the Culinary Institute down in Montpelier on Saturday,” she said one day as she was finishing the boiling. “Want to come?”

“And do what?” He peered at her through the steam rising from the evaporator. “I know how to make a few things, but competitively? Probably not.”

“No, you’d watch me cook,” she said. Then she blushed. “I realize it doesn’t sound like a barrel of laughs, but—”

“Sure,” he said. “Sounds great.”

On Saturday morning. Gran helped her load her ingredients into an ice chest and wished her luck. “Are you taking the pickup?” Gran asked.

“I’m getting a ride with a friend,” Annie said.

“Oh?” This was code for “You’d better explain yourself.”