Page 69 of Big Island Neighbors
Being forced to earn a living was the best thing that could have happened. She loved sourcing local ingredients and making food for her neighbors. She loved how each of her children had chipped in and turned it into a family business.
When she looked at her modest bank account filled with money thatshehad earned, she felt the same sense of satisfaction that came with harvesting pounds of tomatoes or making a perfect cake. She had accomplished something, made something, provided for her children. And she had done it all on her own.
She felt so much lighter without the dead weight of an unhappy marriage.
And in the end, she was grateful to him for making that decision for her.
“I’d like to get a divorce,” she said softly, “and I’d like to do it without lawyers.”
“I can’t talk to you when you get like this.” He hung up, and all of her stress and exasperation bubbled up in a laugh.
She carted the wheelbarrow over to a stand of bananas and distributed the fertilizer around the base of each plant. Manure into gold. It was messy work, but it made her smile.
Barking sounded from the front of the property, first one dog and then both. They had gotten used to people coming and going from the farmstand, so sustained barking meant someone at the gate. She went to see who it was, discarding her dirty work gloves on the way.
Liam stood at her front gate wearing a simple black t-shirt that set off his silver hair. Tara felt a rush of warmth that surprised her. Reflexively, she squelched the feeling.
They were single parents with farms to run. Neither of them had time for any of that nonsense.
True enough, but the feeling in her chest - the fluttering nervousness of a schoolgirl crush - refused to be ground out so easily. He had never showed up unannounced before.
This was Liam, she scolded herself. They had been friends for years - and before that, she had been friends with his late wife. She had no time for romance to begin with, and if she did, it certainly wouldn’t be with him.
He smiled when he saw her, and her heart fluttered stupidly. She shushed the dogs and met him at the gate.
“I figured you’d be up,” he said. Dawn had turned the sky orange and gold. It made his tan skin and silver hair glow.
“I can’t remember the last time I slept past dawn.”
“Same.”
“I’m helping your neighbors install their pond today, but I have something for you.”
“Oh?”
“We butchered one of our cows last year, and it’s too much for Maddie and me. I thought that you could use some of it for your new business?”
“I’m sure you could get a good price for that meat. You can’t just give it to me.”
“I wasn’t planning on it.” His smile was teasing.
“Oh.” She felt her cheeks color. “I didn’t–”
“A fair trade,” he proposed. “Beef for a spot on your weekly meal deliveries.”
“Liam, you’re already giving the girls free riding lessons in exchange for those meals.”
“You can double our order if it makes you feel better. They’re the best thing we eat all week. We’d be happy to eat the same thing twice – Lord knows we do that often enough anyway, and it’s never as good as what you cook.”
“Sure, I guess we can do that.”
“I brought you a sample pack.” He hefted a medium-sized cooler out of his truck and handed it to her over the fence. “Use it for your recipe testing, and then take whatever you’d like the next time you bring the girls up for their lessons.”
She lowered the heavy cooler to the ground. “This is too much.”
“Well, feel free to test your recipes on Maddie and me.”
“I guess I could do that,” she agreed with a laugh.
