Lovelight Farms

And so there it sits. Horrible cracking brown leather with bits of stuffing spilling out onto the floor. It feels like a metaphor.

Beckett peers at the faded trees decorating the carpet, the cardboard curling up at the edges. One eyebrow shoots straight up his forehead. “Care to explain why you have 75 gas station air fresheners in your office?”

Leave it to Beckett to forget an apology and start digging into something personal instead. My phone buzzes again. Three staccato bursts in rapid-fire. It’s either Luka’s dissertation on pizza crust consistency or another vendor looking for their late payment.

Beckett’s eyebrow creeps higher. “Or perhaps door number two. Care to explain why you’re ignoring Luka?”

I hate when Beckett is feeling clever. It almost always ends poorly for me. He’s too astute for his own good, despite the dumb farmer act he plays a majority of the time. I bend down and pick up an air freshener, tossing it in the bottom drawer of my desk with all of the rest. A big ol’ mess of tangled strings, stale pine, and unrequited feelings. A single pine tree for every time Luka has been home, starting back when we were twenty-one and stupid. I typically find them a week or two after he’s left - tucked away in some hidden spot. Beneath my snowglobe, under my keyboard.

Wedged in my coffee filter.

“I’m not and I don’t,” I mumble. Hard pass on both those options, thank you. “Care to explain what you found out there this morning?”

Beckett slips off his hat and runs his fingers through his dark blonde hair, working a smudge or two of dirt in there. His skin is tanned by the sun and from spending his days in the fields, the flannel rolled up to his elbows displaying a cacophony of color and ink on his forearms. All the women in town are crazy about him - which is probably why he doesn’t go into town.

Also probably why he frowned at me when I suggested a Hot Farmer calendar to boost profits.

I swear, I’d have no financial concerns if he let me take that one to market.

“I don’t understand,” he mutters, thumb rubbing at his jaw. If Cindy Croswell were here right now, she’d drop dead on the spot. She works at the pharmacy and sometimes pretends she’s hard of hearing when Beck comes in, just so he has to lean into her space and yell straight into her ear. I even saw that old bat pretend to stumble into a shelf so Beckett would help her back up. Hopeless.

“These trees are probably the lowest maintenance crop I’ve ever had to support.” There’s a joke in there somewhere, but I frankly don’t have the energy. My lips tilt down until my frown mirrors his. Two sad clowns. “I can’t think of a single reason why the trees in the south pasture look like - like -”

I think of the way the trees growing at the base of the hills curve and bend, the brittle texture of the bark. The limp, sad needles. “Like a darker version of the Charlie Brown Christmas tree?”

“That’s it, yeah.”

Strangely enough, there’s a market for lonely-looking Christmas trees. But these don’t fall into that category. These are unsalvageable. I went out the other day and I swear one of them crumbled when I looked at it. I can’t imagine one of these things sitting in anyone’s home - ironically or not. I pluck at my bottom lip with my thumb and do some quick calculations in my head. There are dozens of trees in that lot.

“Will we be alright without them?” Beckett looks worried and he has every reason to be. It’s another hit we can’t afford to take. As head of farming operations, I know I owe him the truth. That we’re hanging on by the skin of our teeth. But I can’t make the words come out. He took a leap of faith when he left his job at the produce farm to work here with me. I know he’s counting on this being a success. For all of the promises I made him to hold true.

And so far they have, thanks to my savings. I’ve had to scrimp and save and eat ramen more nights than not, but no one who works here has seen a dip in their pay. I’m not willing to sacrifice that.

But that won’t last forever. Something has to give soon.

I glance back at my computer screen, the email at the top of my inbox. “Well,” I chew on my bottom lip. In for a penny, in for a pound, and all that. If Beckett wants us to make it through this next season with the farm in one piece, there is something he can do. I breathe deep and summon the scraps of courage that didn’t abandon me during my call with Luka. “Want to be my boyfriend?”

I’d laugh at the look on his face if I wasn’t so serious. He looks like I asked him to go out into the orchards and bury a dead body.

“Is that - “ He shifts in his chair, the leather squeaking under his legs. “Stella, I’m not - I don’t really see you - you’re like my -”

When was the last time I heard this man stutter? I honestly can’t think of it. Maybe when Betsey Johnson tried to cop a feel in front of a group of school kids during his Arbor Day presentation at the middle school.

“Relax,” I press the toe of my boot into another air freshener and drag it towards me. “I don’t mean a real boyfriend.”

I’m struggling with dragging the piece of cardboard towards me, so I don’t see the way Beckett’s body goes ramrod straight in the chair. All I see is his leg, jumping up and down a mile a minute. I snort. When I look up, his eyes are wide and he looks like I’ve put a gun to his head. It’s the same thinly-veiled apprehension and mortification he wears on his face every time he steps foot in town.

“Stella,” he swallows. “Is this - are you propositioning me?”

“What? Oh my god, Beck -” I can’t help the full-body shudder. I love Beckett, but - god. “No! Jesus, is that what you think of me?!”

“What do I think?! What do you think?” His voice has hit a register I have never heard from him before. He gestures wildly with his hand, clearly not knowing what to do with himself. “This is all a little out of left field, Stella!”

“I meant like a fake boyfriend thing!” I shriek, like that was obvious. Like this is a normal thing people request from their very platonic friends. Like my overactive imagination and half a bottle of sauvignon blanc didn’t get me into this mess to begin with. I click to open the email and stare at it mournfully, ignoring the animated confetti that explodes across my screen. I watch it three times in a row and pretend Beckett’s eyes are not currently drilling a hole into the side of my head.

“I did a thing,” I supply, and leave it at that.

“A thing,” he parrots.

I hum in response.

“Do you want to share what that thing is?”

No.

“I - “

As if summoned by sheer force of will, Layla tiptoes her way into my office, a tray of something preceding her around the edge of my door. I smell cinnamon, dried cranberries, and a hint of vanilla.

Zucchini bread.

Like an angel descending from the heavens, she brought zucchini bread. The one thing that always, always distracts Beckett.

Beckett makes a noise that is borderline obscene and I vaguely consider recording it and putting it on OnlyFans. That might bring in some dollars: Hot Farmer Eats Zucchini. I chuckle to myself. He reaches for the tray with grabby hands but Layla smacks his knuckles with a wooden spoon she pulls out of her - back pocket, I think? She balances the tray neatly on the edge of my desk. I peer into it and almost weep. She added chocolate chips.

“Made you something, boss lady.”

She nudges it forward with the edge of her spoon and rests her chin prettily in one hand.

While Beckett embodies rugged recluse with all the charm of a paper bag, Layla Dupree brightens any room she walks into with her sweet southern hospitality and no-nonsense wit. She is striking with her crystal clear hazel eyes and cropped dark hair. She’s kind to a fault and makes the best hot chocolate in the tri-state area. I snatched her up to manage the dining options at my little tree farm as soon as I tasted one of her chocolate chip cookies at the firehouse bake sale. She’s the third member of our humble little trio, and if she’s bringing me sweets, she wants something.

Something I probably can’t afford.

I shove a slice of bread into my mouth before she can ask, bound and determined to enjoy at least one thing before I have to tell her no.

My phone takes advantage too, buzzing merrily across my desk. Layla blinks at it, exchanges a glance with Beckett, and then looks at me.

“Why are you ignoring Luka?”

“I’m not -” A spray of golden, flaky, delicious crumbs accompany my denial. “I’m not ignoring Luka.”

It sounds more like m’snot snore ukeah.

Layla hums and pivots. “So, I was thinking,” she starts. Bingo. “If I add another stove in the back corner of the kitchen, we could almost double our output. Maybe even start some prepackaged things if people want to take a little basket out into the fields with them.”

Beckett crosses his arms as I continue chewing my massive bite. I ignore Layla for now and stare him dead in the eye.

“It’s still warm,” I tell him.

He groans.

Layla relents and rolls her eyes, plucking a slice off the top and offering it to him.

“If people start leaving trash in the pastures, I’m going to have a problem with that,” Beckett grouches. He shoves the whole slice of bread into his mouth and then collapses against the back of the chair in rapture, the leather once again releasing an ominous squeak of defeat. Just like I’m about to.

“I love the idea, but we might need to put a hold on any big purchases right now.” I think about the sad little number in my savings account. How I was barely able to cover operational expenses this past quarter.

Layla’s face falls, her hand reaching out to mine. She touches my knuckles once. It’s a kindness I don’t deserve, given that I haven’t been completely honest about how bad things are right now. “Are we doing okay?”

“We’re doing - “ I search for a word to categorize hanging on by my fingernails. “ - alright.”

Beckett finally swallows his ridiculous bite of food and kicks out a leg. “We were just talking about that, actually. Stella propositioned me.”

“Oh? That’s interesting. Don’t understand how it plays into our operational status, though.”

“Yeah, me too. But that’s what I got when I asked her the same question.”

“Do I get to be propositioned too?”

I roll my eyes and choose not to dignify that with a response. Instead, I turn my computer screen around so they both can see the animated confetti in all its glory. Beckett doesn't so much as blink, but Layla throws both arms up in the air with a high-pitched screech that has me wincing.

“Is that for real?” She grabs the sides of my desktop and leans closer, nose practically pressed up against the screen. “You’re a finalist for that Evelyn St. James thing?”

Beckett eyeballs the zucchini bread as it balances precariously on the edge of my desk, eyes glazed like he’s been drugged. “Aspirin Saint what?”

Layla slaps his hand again without even looking at him. “She’s an influencer.”

Beckett makes a face. “Is that like a political thing?”

“How do you exist in this century? She’s a big deal on social media. She does destination features. Sort of like a mini travel channel thing.”

I feel a small burst of pride. She is the influencer for destination hospitality. Snagging a feature on her account is equivalent to thousands in ad spend - thousands we have never had the budget for. It would turn our farm into a place people want to visit, not just a stopping point for locals. And the $100,000 cash prize for the winner of her small business sweepstakes would keep us afloat for another year, if not more.

Too bad I lied on my application.

“Where does the propositioning come in?”

“I didn’t - I didn’t proposition Beckett.” I swing my computer screen back around and minimize the email. I drum my fingers against my lips and remember the night that got me into this mess. I had been on the phone with Luka, a little bit dizzy off white wine and the way his eyes crinkled at the corners. He had been making some stupid joke about ham sandwiches and couldn’t stop laughing long enough to get the full thing out. I still don’t know the punchline.

“I said in the application that I own the farm with my boyfriend,” I mumble. Color heats my cheeks. I bet I look as red as one of my barn doors. “I thought it would be more romantic than sad, lonely woman who hasn’t been on a date in 17 months.”

“I hope to god you’re having meaningless sex with someone.”

“Why do you need a boyfriend to be successful?”

Layla and Beckett speak over each other, though to be fair, Layla makes a much more aggressive effort as she propels herself forward in the chair and yells her statement about my sex life. She collapses back, jaw hinged open, hand-pressed dramatically against her chest.

“Holy cannoli, no wonder you are -” she gestures at me with her spoon-wielding hand and I fight not to blush a deeper shade of red. We’re probably hitting crimson territory by now. “ - the way you are.”

I fidget in my chair and press on. I don’t have to tell Layla that dating in a small town has its complications, let alone starting a no-strings-attached situation. “She’s coming for five days for an in-person interview and she’ll feature us on her social accounts. The boyfriend thing, I don’t know. I guess I thought having a boyfriend would make this place seem more romantic. She loves romance stuff.”

Beckett sneaks another piece of zucchini bread. He’s taking advantage of Layla’s continued shock and awe at my celibacy. “Well, that’s fucking stupid.”

I give him a look. “Thank you, Beckett. Your input is helpful.”

“Seriously though,” he breaks his zucchini bread slice in two. “You’ve made this place amazing. You. On your own. You should be proud of that. Adding a boyfriend doesn’t make your story any more or less important.”

I blink at him. “Sometimes I forget you have three sisters.”

He shrugs. “Just my two cents.”

“You sure you don’t want to pretend you find me irresistible for a week?”

Layla shakes her head, finally emerging from her trance-like state. “Bad idea. Have you seen him try to lie to anyone? It’s horrible. He turns into a monosyllabic fool every time he has to go into town for groceries.”

It’s true. I’ve had to pick up his order from the butcher more than once. I’m convinced he became a produce farmer purely so he’d have to make fewer stops at the Save More. Beckett doesn’t enjoy people, and he especially doesn’t enjoy the overt flirtations of half the town whenever he stops in. Sometimes I feel like Layla and I are the only ones immune to his considerable lack of charm, but I suppose that’s what happens when you’ve seen a man muttering obscenities to trees half the day, every day.

And when your heart has been hopelessly pining over the same person for close to ten years.

I grab another slice of zucchini bread and begin to nibble, considering my options. My non-Luka-shaped options. I could ask Jesse, the owner of our town’s only bar. But he’d likely think it’s more than it is and I don’t have the time or energy for a fake break-up for my fake relationship. I could look into escort services, maybe. That’s a thing, right? Like, that’s why escort services exist? For people to - I don’t know, escort others?

I press my fingers under my eyes, forgetting that one hand is still clutching a piece of zucchini bread. There’s an obvious answer here. It just - it scares me to death.

“There it is,” Beckett mutters, and it takes every fiber of my being not to hurl this bread at his face. “It just hit her.”

“I don’t know why you’re freaking out. It’s a simple solution. He’d do it in a heartbeat.”

I peek through my fingers at Layla. She’s smiling a smug little grin. She looks like she should be wearing a monocle and stroking a hairless cat, Bond style. Why I ever thought she was all sweetness is beyond me. She’s a spicy little thing.

“Ask Luka.”

Two

There’s this bar in the city that Luka and I like to go to. The beer is cheap, the floors are sticky, and when I kick the jukebox in the bottom right corner, it’ll play Ella Fitzgerald thirteen times in a row exactly. It’s perfect.

But sometimes on a Saturday night when the bar gets crowded and bodies press close, I have trouble holding my space. Emboldened by whiskey, it’s always inevitable that a hand lands on my ass or some pretty, dumb thing who thinks he’s a gift and a delight leers down my shirt. And always, Luka slips his hand over my shoulder, under my hair, and presses it to the nape of my neck. He pulls me close and tucks his chin on top of my head. I fit perfectly there, folded in close to his body. I find my space.

I’ve thought about that a time or two in the stillness of night. How his hand feels against my skin, his palm gently cupping the back of my head, the move both possessive and reverent. I’ve thought about what it might feel like for his fingers to tighten, to sift up into my hair, to pull and angle me until his mouth finds mine.

I’ve thought about a lot of things when it comes to Luka. Things you shouldn’t think about your best friend.

We met when I was twenty-one years old. I ran smack into him as I was leaving the hardware store, lost in a shadow of grief I couldn’t shake. It clung to me like an uncomfortable blanket, relentless since the passing of my mom just three months earlier. I remember standing in one of the aisles, holding a mismatched set of nuts and bolts, determined to do something with all my listless energy. Build a birdhouse. A new shelf for the hallway. I stumbled into Luka on the front steps when I was leaving and he cupped his hands around my elbows to hold me steady. I remember staring at his caramel brown hair, just starting to curl from beneath his baseball hat, the way his smile pulled at one side of his mouth before the other. It felt like the first time in a long time I noticed anything. Luka had cleared his throat, steadied my arms, and asked if I wanted grilled cheese. No hello. No how are you. Just, wanna go get a grilled cheese?

I don’t know what made me say yes. I’d barely been talking to people I had known for years at that point. I was existing, at best. Floundering, at worst. But I went with Luka and ate grilled cheese at the little cafe in town. It turned out his mom had just moved to Inglewild and he was helping her get settled. I offered him the set of hardware I picked up and he had stuttered a surprised laugh. I can still remember the rasp of his fingers against my palm as he took the stupid wing knob I had aimlessly purchased.

Luka called it kismet. He had been on the way to the store for that exact piece of hardware.

From there, we fell into a routine. Whenever he was in town, he managed to find me and we got grilled cheese. Grilled cheese turned into afternoon walks through the park and early morning farmer’s markets. Afternoon happy hours and trivia nights. His trips to Inglewild became more frequent and he invited me to stop by if I ever found myself in New York. I got brave and tried, booking a bus ticket on a whim.

Luka filled the empty places in my life slowly, carefully, with his easy smile and stupid jokes. He brought me back to myself.

And it’s been that way ever since.

Frustratingly, perfectly platonic.

This wouldn’t be any different, I try to tell myself. Asking Luka to pretend for five days would just be - a friend helping a friend. I’d do the same for him or Beckett or Layla. It doesn’t have to - it doesn’t have to mean whatever my mind seems fixated on having it mean.

Layla’s suggestion isn’t the first I’ve thought of it. Of course, I’ve thought of it. I’ve been trying to ask him all week. He’s the reason I wrote it down in the first place. Call it wishful thinking or living a fantasy, but I know when I typed those words who I was thinking of.

But it does feel a little like crossing a line we’ve both been careful to hold. A line I have been absolutely meticulous in my desire to hold. Luka is the very first person in my life who hasn’t disappeared. He’s more than my best friend - he’s tradition and familiarity. He is homemade pop tarts on the first Saturday of the month. He is late-night viewings of Die Hard in the sticky summer heat, both of our phones propped up on our respective coffee tables. He is pizza with extra mushrooms and light sauce, a crust that has to be perfect.

The relationship I have with him is the closest thing I have to family. I can’t - I wouldn’t - risk that for a chance to see what we could be.

Even if I wonder. Even if the reason I haven’t been with anyone in seventeen months is because I always inevitably compare every man against Luka, and I’m always left disappointed.

But maybe this idea - this pretending to be together - maybe this is the solution. After a week of pretending I can get it out of my system. Get him out of my system. I can stop with the wondering and the comparing and just move on.

After all, if something were supposed to have happened with Luka, wouldn’t it have happened already?

The thought aches like an old bruise, one I press my thumb in from time to time just to feel the dull hurt of it. Because the truth is, there have been times when I thought he might want something different too. Sometimes after a night of drinking, I’ll catch his gaze lingering. On the curve of my shoulder or the swell of my bottom lip. His touches become freer. A hand on my hip as he swings me around the tiny dance floor. His forehead pressed against mine. Moments frozen in time throughout the years, always just for a second or two. But it has always been enough to make me feel like maybe he might want me the same way I’ve always wanted him. More than a friend.

More than anything.

But then I press that bruise and tell myself it’s better this way.

Because this is the way I get to keep him.

“I’m not sure he’s in town that week,” I respond to Layla after a lengthy retreat down memory lane, very aware it’s a thin excuse at best.

She gives me an unimpressed look. “He lives three hours away. Plus, haven’t I seen him like twice this month already?”

Beckett decides this is a fine time to chime in. “And didn’t you ask him to come home for the strawberry jam cook-off in April?”