The Orchard Bus – Part 2: The Last Tree

The last day of the season was bright and still.

The pickers worked in a long line down the final row, singing, laughing, tossing the odd apricot across the aisle. Aroha was brown from the sun, her hands scratched and her hair full of leaves. She had picked six tonnes of fruit. She had saved a seat. She had talked more in two months than in two years.

At four, the last ladder came down.

The orchard went quiet. The bus rumbled away with the others, singing. Aroha and Sam stayed behind, sitting on the grass beneath the final tree, a gnarled old apricot at the top of the slope, heavy with one last cluster of fruit.

"Last one," said Sam.

He reached up and picked the largest. It was the colour of a sunset, warm and plump. He split it in half with his thumbs and handed her one side. They ate together, juice running down their wrists, looking out over the valley.

The view was enormous. The hills rolled away in layers of gold and blue to a line of snow-topped mountains. The sun lay low and amber across the vineyards. Somewhere, a bellbird sang.

"I don't want to go back," said Aroha.

"To Auckland?"

"To the wards. To the flat. To being tired."

"You could come back next season."

"Will you be here?"

"I'll be wherever you are," said Sam, and then went scarlet. "I mean. If it was in an orchard."

She laughed, her eyes bright. Her hand found his in the long grass.

"Can I ask you something?" said Aroha.

"Yes."

"May I kiss you, Sam?"

"Yes," he said, his voice cracking. "And if you say stop, you must come back and pick the cherries."

"That's no punishment."

"I'm told I'm bad at them."

She kissed him, warm and sticky-sweet, a hand rising to his sandy hair. He kissed her back with a slow, delighted tenderness, tasting of apricot and sun. A warm breeze stirred the leaves. The valley glowed in the last light.

When they parted, both of them were smiling.

"Green?" he asked.

"Green," said Aroha. "Very green."

She came back for the cherries. She has her own seat on the bus now. It has her name on the back, in marker pen, and a small drawing of an apricot.

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