Glenda Young shares a short story with TripFiction

The Lemon Tree Café

“Sabrina, come quickly!” Marie called.

Sabrina looked up sharply at the sound of her mum’s voice. She ran to the farmhouse door, desperately looking for her mum in the orchard. She couldn’t see her at first, the sun bleached the view in front of her and she had to shield her eyes with her hand.

“Mum?” she called.

“Here, Sabrina. Here!” Marie called back.

Sabrina saw her then, caught the blue of her mum’s apron in the brown of the tree trunks and the dappled shade. She saw her mum standing still with one hand reached up to green leaves of the trees. Sabrina guessed at once what her mum was doing, what she had found and wanted to share. Her heart skipped as she ran to her mum.

“It’s here, Sabrina. The first one, it’s here!” Marie exclaimed as she turned to see her daughter running towards her.

Sabrina reached her mum and stood close to her as she caught her breath. She felt her mum’s arm slip around her waist and pull her towards her. The two women stood together in the shade of their biggest, oldest tree.  Sabrina looked up to see the tiny white flowers nestled in her mum’s hand. She knew her mum would never pull the blossom from the tree, their livelihood depended on the blossom and the fruit it would become.

“The first sign of new fruit, such a special time, such a joyous day,” Marie said. “Your papa always said lemon blossom is the happiest scent in the world.”

Over the coming days and weeks, the tiny white flowers would blossom on all of their trees with the promise of fruit to follow. And later in the year with the fruit ready to pick, when the branches hung low with jewels of yellow, then Sabrina and her mum would take their produce to the market in town. In this way, the two women made their living, depending solely on the orchard that had been left to them with the farmhouse after Esteban passed away.

Marie smiled at her daughter.

“You look so beautiful today in the light that shines down through the trees. Your papa would be proud.”

Sabrina kissed her mum lightly on her cheek.

“It is you he would be most proud of. You have kept his beloved orchard healthy, you have worked so hard to keep it as he had always planned it to be.”

“Only with your help, my daughter,” Marie said. “I could not have done it without you.”

Marie dropped her hand from the blossom and the branch sprung back to the tree.

“Come,” Maria said, reaching for Sabrina’s hand. “Let us prepare the food for the men will soon be here.”

Sabrina followed her mum to the kitchen that Esteban had built with his own hands. The walls were thick to keep out the burn of the sun. The floor was tiled to keep the room cool and a veranda ran outside to give shade to those working within. It was a dark room but cool, the most comfortable room in the house. It was where Sabrina and her mum worked together daily, preparing plates of cheese made from the milk of their goats to be served with fresh baked bread. These plates would be taken by the men who worked in the valley. They were road builders working on a new road, a camino that would lead straight into town. When the road was finished, no more would Sabrina and her mum need to walk their old donkey across fields to the market with panniers full of lemons attached to the donkey’s sides. They planned to buy a cart to take the lemons to market travelling along the new road.

“Can you imagine such a thing?” Marie had told Sabrina when they first found out about the new road. “Our journey to market will be cut in half. The donkey will enjoy pulling the cart on a straight road, no more traipsing over fields and hills.”

“It is a long way off yet,” Sabrina had warned her mum when the news first reached them of the road. But that had been months ago, and now the road was almost complete.

When Sabrina thought of the road builders, she thought of their laughter, the way they removed their caps in polite respect to her mum. Marie was known for miles around as the lemon tree lady, everyone knew who she was, had known Esteban too, and they all knew the orchard on the hill.  Each afternoon when the road builders rested in the shade of lemon trees, Sabrina and Marie offered food and drink with water flavoured by pressed lemons when the fruit was in season. And in return the builders paid a generous sum for which Marie and Sabrina were grateful. After the builders had eaten and taken a drink, they would rest in the orchard with their backs against tree trunks. Then they would rise, yawn and stretch, joke with each other and then stagger to their feet before calling their goodbyes and heading back to the valley to work.

One of the builders Sabrina had found herself thinking of more than the others. He was Miguel, the son of Joe who lead the group of builders, and the youngest of them all. Sabrina guessed he was the same age as her. She liked Miguel, there was a gentleness about him in the way that he moved. And she liked the shyness he had, it came in the way he smiled and when he said hello when he arrived for lunch.  They rarely had time to speak to each other, for the lunchtimes kept Sabrina busy serving food and drink.  Knowing that she would no longer see Miguel once the road was finished and he moved to another job in a different village, made Sabrina’s heart feel heavy. She had not told her mum about Miguel and had thought it best to kept her thoughts to herself. She didn’t want to upset her mum in any way, she had to put the orchard and the lemons above everything and everyone else. The orchard was their life and she had now, more than ever since her dad passed away, to help her mum and work hard.  But she knew she would miss seeing Miguel, the boy who made her smile.

“Tomorrow is our last day,” Joe, the leader of the builders told Marie one afternoon. “Next week, we move on.”

More than a year had gone by since the builders began to take shelter and lunch at Marie’s orchard. Seasons had changed in that time, lemon blossom had grown, trees had come into fruit that had been picked and sold. Both Marie and Sabrina knew the day would come when the builders moved on. They would miss their money certainly, but they would miss their company too, their jokes and their noise bringing joy to the quiet of their day.

On the final day, a special lunch was prepared with an almond cake baked to wish the builders goodbye. In the centre of the cake Marie placed a tiny decoration, the most valuable of all of her possessions, a tiny white flower.

“Blossom, mum?” Sabrina asked, surprised when she saw the flower there.

“We won’t miss one lemon,” Marie replied. “It is the least we can do for the men who have come to us these long months and paid us handsomely too. They will see the blossom and will know how grateful we are. That tiny white flower says more than any words from my lips could ever do.”

When the men arrived that afternoon on their final day, they were more quiet than they’d ever been before. They too felt the weight of their final visit to the orchard. It had provided more than shelter for them, more than food or drink. For many of them, working away from their wives, loved ones and children, Marie’s hospitality had been their only taste of home.

“They’re coming. Here, take this,” Marie said.

Sabrina took the plattter of sliced meats from her mum’s hands and walked out to the orchard where a white cotton sheet was spread in the shade. Above, the shiny-leaved lemon trees stood proud. Blossom hung from many of the branches and the aroma filled the orchard with a zesty, citrus delight.  Sabrina laid the plattter to the ground, headed back to the kitchen and helped her mum bring out more food, jugs of water, and in the centre of it all was placed the almond cake.  The men silently took their places, sitting on the ground and removing their caps. This time they did not joke with each other as their hearts hung heavy too. Many of them did not know if they would have work the next week, or if they did, how much further it would take them from their families and home.  When all the food had been brought from the kitchen, Joe stood from his spot on the ground.

“Please, join us,” he called to Marie. “It is our last day and we would like to give thanks.”

Marie smiled at her daughter and walked from the kitchen. Sabrina followed her mum, her eyes seeking out Miguel and when she found him, she saw an empty space next to him at the lunch.

“Please,” Joe said, indicating the space next to Miguel.

Marie and Sabrina exchanged a look.

“You sit there,” Marie said. “I’ll take my seat beside Joe.”

Sabrina felt her heart pound as she walked towards Miguel. He stood and held her hand to help her to the ground. She sat cross legged, her apron falling over her skirt and legs. Miguel sat next to her, taking care to leave a respectful space between them both.  As the men began to eat, their talk and chatter slowly began. Sabrina looked up to see her mum deep in conversation with Joe and wondered what they could be talking about. But her attention was soon turned to Miguel, who began hesitantly to ask about the trees and fruit. In return she told him about her life on the farm, about the orchard and Esteban whose dream it had all been.

“And would you ever leave here?” Miguel asked.

Sabrina looked deep into Miguel’s brown eyes and then pulled her gaze away.

“No,” she said firmly. “The orchard is my father’s legacy and it is my life.”

“And what of the new camino, the road?” he asked. “It will become easy to travel to town, no?”

Sabrina thought of the cart she and her mum would buy to take the lemons to market.

“The road will be wonderful and I will always think of …”

The word was almost out of her mouth before she knew what she was saying.

“… always think of all the men here,” she said. Sabrina felt her face flush with embarrassment and knew Miguel was staring at her.

“And when I travel the road again, it is you I will think of,” he said softly.

“Me?” she said.

Miguel laid his free hand to his heart.

“Always.”

Sabrina let his words sink in, enjoying the way they made her feel.

“You say you will travel it again?” she asked at last. “I thought you were all moving away to work on a new job?”

“Not all of us,” Miguel said. “My father is leading a new project, building a bridge in the valley. He has asked me to work with him and I have said yes. He is speaking to your mum now about feeding his new men.”