waking me up completely, and I found myself relaxing against Dean’s firm back.
After a few minutes, he drove up to the corner of the first structure. He jumped off the four-wheeler, turning to grab me by my waist and setting me down before I could even realize
what was happening. There was a box strapped to the back of the vehicle that Dean
snapped open, handing me a green water bottle.
“Veggie and protein smoothie,” he explained. “Trust me, Miriam has nutrition and timing
down to a science. First the smoothie, then coffee in ten minutes – that’s the brown bottle.
Water bottles are blue.”
“Thanks. Wow, you and Miriam have thought of everything.”
“We try to be prepared for absolutely everything since it’s a long way back if you’ve
forgotten something,” he chuckled.
I tried a sip of the smoothie, and was surprised at how delicious it was. “We drink breakfast
while we survey the morning’s work,” Dean explained. He waved to the dozens and dozens
of long, tidy rows of fluffy green sprouts. “Baby carrots are picked by hand,” he explained.
I nodded, drinking and observing. As he showed me how to determine which ones were
ready for harvesting, I knew I shouldn’t be admiring his thick arms, and the little piece of
hair that fell in a perfect curl behind his left ear.
We quickly finished our breakfast and Dean held out an arm full of baskets. He stood over
me while I started, coaching me on how to accurately guess what the bottom of the carrot
looked like by analyzing the top.
It was pretty easy once I got going. Since everything had been planted at the same time,
everything was fairly uniform. But on a small organic farm, nobody wanted to waste even a
single plant.
“What kind of music do you like?” Dean asked.
“Oh. A bit of everything, really.” I looked around, wondering why he was asking. “Rock,
blues, lots of indie bands.”
His deep laugh was absolutely charming. “There are a couple of scientific studies that show
that plants grow better with music. Something about the vibrations of the sound waves
makes them absorb nutrients. But more importantly, it keeps us moving and makes the time
seem to go faster.”