AU: Myka is a broke teenage girl on her way to college, Helena is lonely widow needing a little help on her farm. (It sounds like the start to a porn film, but I swear it's not.)
Disclaimer: I know nothing about horticulture, so there's some guess work going on here. Also, I don't own shit. Nothing. Especially not Warehouse 13. Additionally, I am a meticulous proof-reader, as are my betas (thanks tosingtomestranger and ismellapplesisthenewiloveyou for reading this and giving me confidence/tearing me down, I needed it) but all mistakes, still mine. I feel like I can write more to this, but I haven't, I just thought 'heck, what's one more unfinished fanfic?' Love you, mean it.
The summer Myka Bering turned nineteen she decided to travel the country. Okay, she had decided to go to college on the east coast. But for her, that meant she had three months to get from Colorado Springs to Washington DC. And to any teenager that means adventure. She'd spent most of her childhood fairly protected by her parents; bounced from ice skating practice to fencing to earning her allowance at the family bookstore. She was busy and didn't get into trouble. When she graduated from high school her parents gave her eight hundred dollars for a car and the trip.
Myka realized now, after a side trip to visit her dad's family outside of Amarillo, that maybe spending most of that money on the vehicle, wasn't a great idea. It had made sense when she bought it. (Four hundred and fifty bucks for an old Ford truck was a fair price.) She'd thrown a sleeping bag in the back with the rest of her belongings, figuring she'd just sleep there. And she did, but the poor gas mileage on her truck (aptly named 'Rocinante') meant she'd almost gone through the remaining three hundred dollars before she even got past Arkansas.
So, at a diner in Washington County, ironically, with six weeks to get to DC, Myka sat combing over the local classifieds. Surely there was someone in need of an employee.
It took only minutes to find a small ad, the only 'HELP WANTED' ad in the paper. It read: 'Farmhand needed, short-term work. Must have truck. Wells Family Farmstead, East of Fayetteville.' Hm, looks promising. Myka thought while circling the ad. She'd never done farm work but it seemed viable. She thought back to any possible books she had read about agriculture, but the only thing she could think of was Charlotte's Web. She doubted that a book about a talking spider would help her any.
"Can I get you anything else, darlin'?" The waitress asked, pouring more coffee into Myka's cup.
"No, thanks," Myka answered absently. She was still staring at the ad. "What does the Wells family in Fayetteville do?"
"Oh, the Wells'…" The woman looked at the paper spread across the table. "Apples. Sometimes they'll have a booth at the farmer's market on Saturdays."
"Apples, huh?" Myka mused, she'd read The Giving Tree, that was about apples. "Are they…nice people?"
"By in large," The waitress nodded as she walked off to attend to another costumer.
The Wells' farm was a forty minute drive from Fayetteville (which wasn't a large town anyway); the drive to the orchard took her through acres of wheat fields, with an occasional cattle farm tossed in for variety. The farm was not large by the looks of it, less than twenty or so acres of trees but there could have been more to it in fields, it was hard to say.
Myka pulled her truck in the gate of the farm and parked in what she hoped was a safe place near the house. She walked up to the door and raised her hand to knock.
"Hullo?!" Myka turned her head to see a woman in her early thirties walking up from the tree line, a basket of apples in her arms. Her black hair was tied back in ponytail, she wore blue jeans and a white tank top under a flannel shirt. When Myka could get a look at her face she noticed the woman was quite attractive, too. "Hello, may I help you?" She greeted. She had an accent, English-ish, but Myka wasn't positive.
"Hi, uhm, I was looking for Mr. Wells." Myka said, holding up the classifieds.
The woman smiled apologetically. "My husband's deceased." Definitely British. "I was the one who put out the advertisement, though." She looked Myka over once. "Do you know someone interested in the job?"
"Yeah, I was hoping to do it." Myka nodded.
"Oh," The woman tilted her head slightly skeptical. "I was expecting a young man to want the job."
Myka straightened up. "I'm a good worker, Mrs. Wells. I don't have a lot of farm experience, but I learn quickly and follow directions well." Myka ducked her chin. "I also really need the work."
The woman set her basket of apples down on the porch and pulled off her glove. "Call me Helena." She corrected. "I'm sorry not to have introduced myself. I was being quite rude." She offered her hand for Myka to shake.
"I'm Myka…Bering." She answered taking the hand. The woman's hands were calloused but still gentle. "And I would like to work for you, Helena."
Helena smirked. "Where are you from, Miss Bering? That accent sounds absolutely nothing like the locals."
"You're one to talk." Myka commented, then realizing how rude that sounded, "Sorry, I'm from Colorado." She explained her situation. "I'm passing through on my way to college in DC. But I kinda ran out of cash and need to get back on the road by September 2nd. I'll help however I can until I need to leave though."
"That should be plenty of time, if you want that job. It's not difficult work, but it is physical." Helena turned to the orchard and gestured for Myka to follow. "I usually do fine by myself, the apples aren't supposed to come in to season all at once, but this year…" She pointed to the rows of apples all becoming heavy with fruit. "The Monarks were two weeks late and the Stellars were almost a month early, which means I have twice as much work to do in half the time. I figured a little help would be better in the long run than letting half the crop go to waste." She plucked a yellow, conical apple off a tree and walked a few rows down as she spoke. "There's one-hundred-twenty or so trees of each type, which means over two-hundred to collect apples from. It wasn't a great production year, not hot enough. I thought I could manage it on my own but…" She trailed off as she pulled a low-hanging apple from a branch, this one was red and yellow with a flat shape to it.
"So, you work this place alone?" Myka asked, a little surprised.
"Yes." Helena dismissed while placing the apples in Myka's hands. "Stellar, Monark." She indicated as she handed them to the girl. "These are perfectly ripe. But that means they are too ripe to ship, they go to the market in town. You want to get them a little early, when there's still some green on them, that way they have time to ripen."
Myka nodded, committing the new information to memory. Both the information about the farm, and that about the farmer. I wonder if she gets lonely out here. Myka pondered.
"The trees are separated into sections of a seventy, we will each do half a section, every day you get a new section, go through, pluck the ripe fruit and the fruit that will be ripe within the week, bring them up to the house for sorting. We do the sorting is done on Fridays. We'll start with the Monarks, they should be easier to identify as ready. Can you climb trees?"
"Some, I haven't regularly, but I can." Myka replied.
"Good. That will be very helpful. There will be a ladder for you, but you're, what, almost six feet tall?" She faced Myka and straightened her spine, literally sizing the girl up. She nodded, not waiting for an answer. "You shouldn't have too much trouble, most of the trees are young and short." She pulled off another ripe yellow apple, rubbing it on her shirt. "Have I lost you, yet?"
Myka shook her head. "I think I'm doing okay," She rolled the apple in her hand. "Monarks are the pinky ones, they should have come in earlier this month, and the yellow ones," Myka held up the apple in her hand, shouldn't have come in until the middle of next month. So it does makes sense to pick the Monarks first, even if I had experience picking fruit." She started to ramble a little while repeating Helena. "Thirty-five trees a day, each, pick all apples that are the right color or almost the right color, on Friday we sort the ripe ones for the market Saturday and the others ship." She looked up at Helena.
The Brit raised an eyebrow at the girl's uncanny memory of everything. "You're smart. Good." She pulled out a knife and sliced off a piece of the apple, juice dribbled on to her fingers with the cut. She looked up. "The last time I needed help I hired a young man." She rolled her eyes. "Men, they really can be such Neanderthals." She shook her head and bit off some of the slice and mulled it over as she chewed. Finding it satisfactory, she sliced off another piece and offered it to Myka on the knife. "These are great for applejack, and juiciness is very important. Try it." She smiled and cut another piece for herself, this time licking some of the juice off her finger.
"Thanks," Myka nodded, trying not to stare at what was the most fascinating consumption of an apple she'd ever seen. She chewed her piece slowly, it was sweet and the flesh crisp. Myka had never given a lot of thought to apple varieties. But these may be her favorite.
"So, where do I start?"
Helena smiled at Myka's eagerness. "I'm working in section 3-C, you can join me there."
Myka nodded. "Is that quadrant and row?" She guessed.
Helena smiled at the girl's quick-wittedness and explained the way the orchard was divided for ease of harvesting as they entered a shed where the shorter woman got out gloves for the girl. Myka found herself just enjoying the woman's voice and company.
Maybe running out of money wasn't the worst thing that could happen after all.
Thanks for reading, please review. I'll let you know if I can squeeze any more juice from this one.