Page 5 of Apple of My Eye
–They love me and will be grateful to spend more time with me
–Regenerative agriculture will improve the health of the soil, better for all generations to come (like their grandchildren!)**
–I will be around to take care of them as they get older instead of stuffing them into a retirement home like Linden, my older brother, would***
–It was so much hard work!
**It is worth pointing out that I made it very clear grandchildren arenoton the horizon, seeing as I’m single as a pringle and quite literally haven’t thought a man was hot in a year.
***It is also worth pointing out that, although I have beef with my older brother, Linden, I do not think hewantsto stuff my parents into a retirement home. But I do agree with Shari and Evan that hewould.
Even though I had been working on the loan application for months, when I finally cross off ‘submit loan application’, I don’t feel any sort of relief or celebration.
I try modifying my ongoing to-do list, adding ‘send in loan application’ and scratching a clean line right through it, hoping a double cross-off will shake the feeling, but .?.?. nothing—no butterflies in my stomach, no sense of accomplishment or pride. I squint at the message on the computer.
THANK YOU FOR YOUR LOAN APPLICATION TO THE US FARM SERVICES AGENCY.
Why is it so .?.?. anticlimactic? They couldn’t even animate some sort of ‘CONGRATULATIONS!’ banner?I think, before remembering how notoriously underfunded the Farm Services Agency is and deciding it is probably for the best that they are not wasting taxpayers’ dollars on animatronic word art.
I thought it would be like the movies. I imagined myself going to the bank in person and waiting nervously for someone to meet with me. The day I started the loan application I also started online shopping for a blazer.
I planned to sit back and cross one leg over the other while a man in a suit scanned Excel sheet after Excel sheet. I was going to let a smile bloom across my face as they looked up to tell me, ‘Yes, Miss Anderson, your numbers do look correct. How refreshing to have someone come in here with a well-thought-out plan to pay us backandsave the world while doing it. Forget the firstborn son,youare the prodigal daughter every parent dreams of.’
In reality, the loan application was late nights after weekdays in the lab, weekends sharing pizza with Evan and Shari after volunteering at the kids’ camp, ceaselessly double-checking my numbers, and almost ruining the surprise to my parents every time they asked me how my summer was going. Shari wrote up a business plan to finish her Master’s degree too, but hers was to secure a loan to farm hydroponic strawberries, and mine was to save my family’s apple farm.
I text my group chat with Evan and Shari.
Me: I just pressed submit. *Scream emoji*
Shari: ME TOO ME TOO ME TOO!!!
My phone vibrates loudly on my desk.
Shari: So .?.?. how did telling your parents go?
I grimace at my phone. I start to type out an honest response, that I haven’t told them yet. But I hesitate. Shari is leaving for Italy tomorrow, her ‘Lizzie McGuire’ moment before she settles down to farm strawberries, and I don’t want her to feel like she has to pump me up to tell my parents all over again. Lord knows she and Evan have done that enough times already. Instead, I avoid the question, opting to ask Evan if he’s lonely in Seattle yet now that Shari and I have left.
Evan: Ha! It is stillsummerin Seattle. So .?.?.
People who rave about Seattle summers clearly haven’t spent time on a farm. Wide open spaces, clean air, and fresh eggs in the morning. Tangible work for the apple harvest—the sweet smell of dandelions and the thick smell of old roots, the feel of a gnarled branch and the bud of an apple blossom, the sight of a perfectly pruned, symmetrical orchard.
Evan: JK. I really miss you guys *Sent with invisible ink*
Shari sends a selfie in response, posing next to a half-packed suitcase.
You’ll miss me even more after tomorrow!!
Shari’s tall, with dark brown hair that is either cascading down her back in soft waves or pulled back tightly into a braid. Her eyebrows are dark and arch perfectly above her piercing brown eyes. She has a square chin that lends her a permanent look of defiance. In short, she’s nothing like the strawberry shortcake you would expect to be running a strawberry farm. She doesn’t act like one either.
The next picture she sends is a screenshot of her Hinge with her location changed to Rome. Her inbox is filled with messages asking when she’s free.
Shari: *Purple devil emoji*
Shari: Emphasized ‘so how did telling your parents go?’
Evan: LOU – don’t tell me you didn’t tell them yet?! You said you would when you got home.
Me: I will. I PROMISE. But last night was so nice. Mom made lasagna.
