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“Oh I got me one of those,” the driver’s assistant said, going over to a cage on the back of the trailer and smacking the side. “Feed them in the trunk first, and they’ll come out nice and netted on the other end. Ain’t no way I’m trying to unload a thousand Christmas trees when all the branches are tangled up. Bad enough as it is.”
“How about a fifth set of hands?”
Ethan turned, and saw Laura walking up, looking… very distracting. She’d dressed for work, in jeans and an old flannel shirt that was clearly one of Mr.Bennett’s, tied off at the waist and rolled at the forearms so that she wasn’t swimming in it. She had on boots, and tucked in her belt was a pair of old leather work gloves that Ethan suspected were in her grandfather’s garage a day ago.
“You’re not heading into the county offices?” Ethan asked, and Laura shook her head. “What happened?”
“What happened is that the county is still waiting on paperwork from the hospital,” Laura said. “Apparently because Paw-Paw died outside of a hospital, they need to do a full work up on him, so the paperwork won’t be ready until tomorrow at the earliest. So what can I do?”
“You can haul a six-foot Douglas fir?” one of the driver’s assistants asked, and Laura’s withering look shut him up quickly. “Okay, okay. Just askin’.”
“How about this,” Ethan offered the driver. “The main lot’s not open for sales until this afternoon. So until then, the five of us work, rotating jobs. One cutter, three haulers, and one stacker inside the truck. Fair?”
“Give us ten minutes to set up the net machine, and you’ve got yourself a deal,” the driver said, clearly relieved. “How are we cutting?”
“I’ve got an electric limb lopper in my truck,” Ethan said. “It’s like a chainsaw, it’ll handle the trunks of these trees. I’ll go get it, and we can get started.”
It was hard work, even with Laura’s help. Cutting each tree down meant kneeling down, letting the small saw do the work, and then standing up to do the next tree while one of the haulers carried the tree away. Each tree wasn’t all that heavy, roughly thirty to forty pounds, but it had to be carried to the truck, andthen fed through the netting machine, and then placed in the back of the trailer.
So each job wasn’t difficult. There were just a lot of them to do, and by the time lunchtime came, Ethan’s knees ached and his back was tight from all the kneeling over. Still, he felt good. They’d gotten nearly two thirds of the lot cleared, which was more than he anticipated. “Okay guys, you good?”
“Yeah, we’ve got it from here.” The driver munched on a ham sandwich. “That idea that you had to just move ahead and cut the trees down helped. Four people hauling really picked up the speed.”
“Thanks,” Laura said. “If you need anything, we’ll be up at the shack.”
“No problem,” the driver answered. The workers went back to lunch while Ethan and Laura climbed into his truck, and backed down the dirt road towards the path that led to the office trailer.
As he drove, Ethan thought about the morning. It had been good, working with Laura. She clearly knew what she was doing, and handled the trees and the tools as if it was nothing.
“Guess it’s like riding a bicycle,” he said.
Laura looked over frowning.
“Handling the trees. You look like you haven’t lost a step from your school days you were telling me about last night.”
Laura chuckled, then groaned. “Tell that to my hands and feet. I’ve definitely got a few blisters in my boots. I forgot how hard it was to wear them, I’ve gotten used to high heels.”
“On the other hand, if I wore high heels for a couple of hours, I’d probably have some blisters myself,” Ethan joked, and Laura laughed. “What, I don’t look like the high heel type?”
“Definitely not.” She leaned back in the seat. “Ooof, I’m going to take twenty minutes to just stretch out in the office if youdon’t mind. Maybe change socks and look at my feet if you can put up with it?”
“I don’t mind at all,” Ethan said. “I’ve got a full first-aid kit, complete with moleskin, Cornhusker’s lotion, and more. I’ll even take a look at your feet if you want. I’ve gotten a few blisters from time to time around here.”
“Thanks… you promise you’re not one of those weirdos who get on the internet asking to see pictures of women’s feet?” she asked, and Ethan snorted, shaking his head. “Swear?”
“I promise,” Ethan said. “That’s totally not my thing. I’m looking for something else in life.”
“What, if I can ask?”
“An angel.” Ethan glanced over, smiling a little. “Not the church type, but a woman who doesn’t mind having a man who loves Christmas and Christmas trees the way I do. Who’s willing to have a man who isn’t ever going to pull down six figures, at least not the way I’m going, and who’s going to come home from work tired, probably sweaty, and more than happy to see her. A woman who likes simple pleasures, likes my tacos, and doesn’t mind that I listen to Christmas songs at work in July.”
“And what would you expect of her in return for putting up with… all that?” Laura asked.
Ethan paused, mainly because she sounded like everything he’d just said wasn’t all that bad a thing.
“I guess all I’d ask of her is to love me the way I’ll love her,” he said. “That’s all. I can’t offer a lot, but I’ll offer all I have. What about you, is there someone back east for you?”
Laura shook her head, and she chuckled darkly.
