Disclaimer: I don't own Harvest Moon, Karen, or any related characters or
events; to the best of my knowledge, they're all owned by Natsume. Any
resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or events is purely
coincidental. This story is based primarily on the plot of Harvest Moon 64.
Wine Red no Kokoro
by flame mage
Part 6: Fire on the Beach
**********
Ugh, Summer. Ann loves it--of course, her birthday's in summer, but it's a really obnoxious season when you think about it. In Fall, there's the grape harvest, and in Spring we have the planting, but in Summer I have to slog through the same chores every day, and it's even worse because of the heat. I like Winter--give me a season where almost nothing has to get done and you have a lot of excuses to drink any day over running back and forth in ninety-degree weather. And we're always worried about storms, of course. You know what it's like to have a typhoon lift off with half your take? Trust me, you don't want to. We almost starved that year.
The beach is THE place to be in the summer, which means no solitude for me on my days off. We all go through the motions of work, but you can see it on Popuri's face when she's dragging around with a watering can, on Elli's when her stove just makes the room even hotter until she can barely stand. Only Ann and the carpenters seem to be unaffected--they're all borderline fanatic about their work, so they don't even notice the heat.
The first ten days of summer were a little crazy. The library's closed at the beginnings of summer and winter, and Maria was spending a lot of time in the mountains, looking for bugs. Ann decided that we had to make Harris spend time in the mountains, and there was really only one way to do it: send mail to the carpenters. Without the benefit of scanners or copy machines, I had to copy by hand about a hundred letters saying "ignore this letter. This letter means nothing" to the carpenters. This definitely got Harris and Maria in the same place, but Harris was too busy to say anything except a tentative "hi" when he dashed past. It was definitely time for another approach.
I was still putting in long hours at the bar and even longer hours at the vineyard. I was constantly fretting about the grapevines--even on my days off I'd check back to make sure everything was okay. None of it was helping. The grapevines were barely rooted at all, and the grapes were small and grayish.
I can't be sure, but I think I started drinking more. On a hot night, the first drink makes you even hotter and the second drink makes you irritable, but by the third drink, you start to cool off.
Ann always makes that face when I say that. I never really understood why it bothers her so much. When I'm in a bad mood, drinking makes it all go away. Why shouldn't I like something that makes me feel good? And it's not like I couldn't stop drinking any time I wanted to...
*****
The first of summer is firework day. Almost everyone goes to the square, but I really hate crowds, so I went to the beach instead. I don't really like being all alone, either, but it's better than being surrounded by a total mob and not getting to see any fireworks.
This year I'd brought my own fireworks, too. There were some Roman candles, lots of flashy things, a box of sparklers, and a couple really loud ones just for good measure. I was getting the stuff laid out when a voice asked, "Need some help?"
I looked up to see Jack, his baseball cap still planted firmly on his head and a big grin on his face. "Good evening," I said. "You came to watch the fireworks, right?"
"Yep," he replied. "I heard this was the best place to see them, so here I am."
Something strange flickered across my mind, and without thinking, I said it. "I'm glad."
He shot a sideways glance at me, and I said quickly, "I don't like crowds, but I didn't want to watch alone."
"Yeah, I know what you mean," agreed Jack, nodding. "Are you normally stuck here alone?"
I shook my head. "I haven't watched the fireworks for a long time. I was sulky and didn't go out."
As I spoke, the first burst of color lit up the sky. The fireworks glimmered all around us, shining like jewels in every shade in the rainbow. The ocean spread out beneath them to the horizon, like an endless mirror.
"Look, the fireworks are being reflected in the water. How beautiful," I whispered.
"Yeah..." he breathed. "It's really incredible."
We watched in silence for the next half hour. Finally the last glowing streak faded from the sky. "Ahh, it's over," I said, disappointed.
Jack looked at his watch. "It seemed so much shorter than it really was. I feel like we just got here, but I hate to go home."
"Say, I have some fireworks." I pressed a sparkler into his hand. "Here."
He helped me line the larger ones up and we lit them, one by one. They exploded into the stars in brilliant showers of light.
"Ahh..." I sighed. "I feel like a kid again."
Summer is basically an endless string of long, hot days littered with boring festivals. Reference: the Vegetable Festival. I ask you, does anyone really care? Most of us brought whatever we had in our fridges, most of which came from the farm anyway. The only people that seriously grow vegetables are the Potion Shop guy, Lillia, and Jack. The rest of us have maybe a patch or two, but still...it's boring. And the gourmet judge! Ugh. Don't get me wrong; I know that some people are overweight because of health problems and there's not much they can do about it. But that guy eats all the time. I've even caught him trying to steal our grapes before, and Ann claims she found him trying to stuff a live chicken under his overcoat.
But I show up at the Vegetable Festival because it's free food, and I love anything I can eat raw. Celery, asparagus...ooh, especially tomatoes. We had some growing in a patch out back, but they had another day or two to grow before they were done, so I sighed and got the last of the turnips out of the fridge. It was a good excuse to get rid of it anyway. I had no idea how long it'd been sitting in there, possibly since last Spring.
Jack won with a massive cabbage, which he was about to give to Maria when the gourmet judge swooped down. I gave up and slunk down to the beach for the rest of the day. Might as well work on my tan.
I always show up at the Firefly Festival, though, to pay my respects to Grandma.
It was a beautifully clear night, and I got there early to watch the sunset. Popuri, Lillia, and Rick were already there when I arrived.
"Hi, Karen," Popuri and Lillia called, cheerfully and in unison. Rick was busy studying the glowing silver crystals he was dropping into the flowers.
"We're just putting the firefly lights into the flowers," Lillia explained. "Can you help?"
I nodded and came over to look. The flowers were a pale, almost translucent pink, and the petals were as soft as silk. Rick showed me the crystals he had chipped off. "Those are Moonlight stones," he told me. "See how it's glowing? It does that because..."
I found out a lot more than I ever wanted to know about geology, but we got the job done pretty fast. The mayor arrived a few minutes later, and he and his wife set everything up so they could hand the lights to everyone as they came in.
As the crowd started to arrive, I went off by myself and sat on the edge of the pier. It isn't that I don't like it when everyone's happy. But as I said, I don't really like crowds, and I wanted to be alone to think about my grandmother. I didn't want to be here with everyone laughing like it was a picnic.
I fingered the tiny vial of seashells in my pocket. "Grandma," I whispered into the ocean breeze, "please, help me. Tell me what to do."
I could hear Elli behind me, sniffling. She always gets teary-eyed at the Firefly Festival. I don't know why--I've known her all my life and I still don't know what happened to her parents--but she does tend to cry at the least provocation, including cute kittens and small children, so I wasn't too worried. Rick was giving his botany lecture to anyone who would stand still long enough.
"You're thinking about her, aren't you, Miss Karen," a voice said behind me. I jumped about a foot and nearly fell off the pier.
"Ahh, Kai! Don't sneak up on me like that!" I snapped, whirling around.
"S-sorry, Miss Karen."
I ran a hand through my hair. "Forget it. Yes, I'm thinking about her." I looked out at the ocean. "I wish she were here."
"I know," he said. "I wish she could tell us what to do."
"Look, don't worry about it. I'll figure something out." I looked at him. "Wasting your time getting upset over it is useless. Go have fun." The Firefly Festival is not a festival where you have fun, but I was getting edgy. I wanted to be alone.
He took the hint and wandered off slowly back toward the beach. I got about ten seconds to myself before another voice said, "Want some company?"
"Not really," I said honestly.
Jack backed off. "Okay, then, I'll talk to you later."
"No. You're here now; you might as well stay." He came back and sat down next to me.
"What are you thinking?" he asked after a while.
"They may be watching us from somewhere..." I said.
"Who?"
"I mean my grandma...or your grandpa."
"Do you really believe they're here?" he asked.
"Personally, if I got off this island, I wouldn't bother coming back, but maybe they're sentimental," I replied.
"Take it from me, the city's not that special," he said. "A lot of smog, a lot of people rushing everywhere. Life moves too fast to mean anything there. Even in a crowd you're always alone." I looked at him. He rubbed the back of his head and laughed. "Sorry. Didn't mean to get too melodramatic there."
"It's okay," I said. "It's a melodramatic night, I guess."
He was looking out over the water. "I just...I just wish I could see them one more time."
"Your grandfather?"
"My mother, too," he said quietly.
"Your mother--"
He cut me off. "--died of cancer five years ago."
I felt really bad suddenly. Pity doesn't make me like a person any more, but it does make me feel sorry for them. "I didn't know that." Pause. "I'm sorry. It must've been rough."
"Yeah, well...it's been a while." He was about to continue when the Mayor called, "All right! Let's send our firefly lights out to sea!"
I swung my legs up to kneel on the dock and set the flower carefully onto the surface of the glassy sea. It drifted out.
Gradually the light faded from the beach, leaving us in darkness. The stars overhead seemed to have vanished, as we all watched those fragile shining flowers glowing-golden pink in the night, slowly vanishing.
I don't know how long we stood there, watching them, but when we looked back, everyone was gone.
"Well..." I said, "let's go home. We can go together."
"Yeah. It is kinda dark without those lights," he said.
"I don't mean I'm scared at night!" I snapped.
"I know, I know," he laughed.
He walked me home, we said goodnight, and then I went indoors and went to sleep.
Wine Red no Kokoro
by flame mage
Part 6: Fire on the Beach
**********
Ugh, Summer. Ann loves it--of course, her birthday's in summer, but it's a really obnoxious season when you think about it. In Fall, there's the grape harvest, and in Spring we have the planting, but in Summer I have to slog through the same chores every day, and it's even worse because of the heat. I like Winter--give me a season where almost nothing has to get done and you have a lot of excuses to drink any day over running back and forth in ninety-degree weather. And we're always worried about storms, of course. You know what it's like to have a typhoon lift off with half your take? Trust me, you don't want to. We almost starved that year.
The beach is THE place to be in the summer, which means no solitude for me on my days off. We all go through the motions of work, but you can see it on Popuri's face when she's dragging around with a watering can, on Elli's when her stove just makes the room even hotter until she can barely stand. Only Ann and the carpenters seem to be unaffected--they're all borderline fanatic about their work, so they don't even notice the heat.
The first ten days of summer were a little crazy. The library's closed at the beginnings of summer and winter, and Maria was spending a lot of time in the mountains, looking for bugs. Ann decided that we had to make Harris spend time in the mountains, and there was really only one way to do it: send mail to the carpenters. Without the benefit of scanners or copy machines, I had to copy by hand about a hundred letters saying "ignore this letter. This letter means nothing" to the carpenters. This definitely got Harris and Maria in the same place, but Harris was too busy to say anything except a tentative "hi" when he dashed past. It was definitely time for another approach.
I was still putting in long hours at the bar and even longer hours at the vineyard. I was constantly fretting about the grapevines--even on my days off I'd check back to make sure everything was okay. None of it was helping. The grapevines were barely rooted at all, and the grapes were small and grayish.
I can't be sure, but I think I started drinking more. On a hot night, the first drink makes you even hotter and the second drink makes you irritable, but by the third drink, you start to cool off.
Ann always makes that face when I say that. I never really understood why it bothers her so much. When I'm in a bad mood, drinking makes it all go away. Why shouldn't I like something that makes me feel good? And it's not like I couldn't stop drinking any time I wanted to...
*****
The first of summer is firework day. Almost everyone goes to the square, but I really hate crowds, so I went to the beach instead. I don't really like being all alone, either, but it's better than being surrounded by a total mob and not getting to see any fireworks.
This year I'd brought my own fireworks, too. There were some Roman candles, lots of flashy things, a box of sparklers, and a couple really loud ones just for good measure. I was getting the stuff laid out when a voice asked, "Need some help?"
I looked up to see Jack, his baseball cap still planted firmly on his head and a big grin on his face. "Good evening," I said. "You came to watch the fireworks, right?"
"Yep," he replied. "I heard this was the best place to see them, so here I am."
Something strange flickered across my mind, and without thinking, I said it. "I'm glad."
He shot a sideways glance at me, and I said quickly, "I don't like crowds, but I didn't want to watch alone."
"Yeah, I know what you mean," agreed Jack, nodding. "Are you normally stuck here alone?"
I shook my head. "I haven't watched the fireworks for a long time. I was sulky and didn't go out."
As I spoke, the first burst of color lit up the sky. The fireworks glimmered all around us, shining like jewels in every shade in the rainbow. The ocean spread out beneath them to the horizon, like an endless mirror.
"Look, the fireworks are being reflected in the water. How beautiful," I whispered.
"Yeah..." he breathed. "It's really incredible."
We watched in silence for the next half hour. Finally the last glowing streak faded from the sky. "Ahh, it's over," I said, disappointed.
Jack looked at his watch. "It seemed so much shorter than it really was. I feel like we just got here, but I hate to go home."
"Say, I have some fireworks." I pressed a sparkler into his hand. "Here."
He helped me line the larger ones up and we lit them, one by one. They exploded into the stars in brilliant showers of light.
"Ahh..." I sighed. "I feel like a kid again."
Summer is basically an endless string of long, hot days littered with boring festivals. Reference: the Vegetable Festival. I ask you, does anyone really care? Most of us brought whatever we had in our fridges, most of which came from the farm anyway. The only people that seriously grow vegetables are the Potion Shop guy, Lillia, and Jack. The rest of us have maybe a patch or two, but still...it's boring. And the gourmet judge! Ugh. Don't get me wrong; I know that some people are overweight because of health problems and there's not much they can do about it. But that guy eats all the time. I've even caught him trying to steal our grapes before, and Ann claims she found him trying to stuff a live chicken under his overcoat.
But I show up at the Vegetable Festival because it's free food, and I love anything I can eat raw. Celery, asparagus...ooh, especially tomatoes. We had some growing in a patch out back, but they had another day or two to grow before they were done, so I sighed and got the last of the turnips out of the fridge. It was a good excuse to get rid of it anyway. I had no idea how long it'd been sitting in there, possibly since last Spring.
Jack won with a massive cabbage, which he was about to give to Maria when the gourmet judge swooped down. I gave up and slunk down to the beach for the rest of the day. Might as well work on my tan.
I always show up at the Firefly Festival, though, to pay my respects to Grandma.
It was a beautifully clear night, and I got there early to watch the sunset. Popuri, Lillia, and Rick were already there when I arrived.
"Hi, Karen," Popuri and Lillia called, cheerfully and in unison. Rick was busy studying the glowing silver crystals he was dropping into the flowers.
"We're just putting the firefly lights into the flowers," Lillia explained. "Can you help?"
I nodded and came over to look. The flowers were a pale, almost translucent pink, and the petals were as soft as silk. Rick showed me the crystals he had chipped off. "Those are Moonlight stones," he told me. "See how it's glowing? It does that because..."
I found out a lot more than I ever wanted to know about geology, but we got the job done pretty fast. The mayor arrived a few minutes later, and he and his wife set everything up so they could hand the lights to everyone as they came in.
As the crowd started to arrive, I went off by myself and sat on the edge of the pier. It isn't that I don't like it when everyone's happy. But as I said, I don't really like crowds, and I wanted to be alone to think about my grandmother. I didn't want to be here with everyone laughing like it was a picnic.
I fingered the tiny vial of seashells in my pocket. "Grandma," I whispered into the ocean breeze, "please, help me. Tell me what to do."
I could hear Elli behind me, sniffling. She always gets teary-eyed at the Firefly Festival. I don't know why--I've known her all my life and I still don't know what happened to her parents--but she does tend to cry at the least provocation, including cute kittens and small children, so I wasn't too worried. Rick was giving his botany lecture to anyone who would stand still long enough.
"You're thinking about her, aren't you, Miss Karen," a voice said behind me. I jumped about a foot and nearly fell off the pier.
"Ahh, Kai! Don't sneak up on me like that!" I snapped, whirling around.
"S-sorry, Miss Karen."
I ran a hand through my hair. "Forget it. Yes, I'm thinking about her." I looked out at the ocean. "I wish she were here."
"I know," he said. "I wish she could tell us what to do."
"Look, don't worry about it. I'll figure something out." I looked at him. "Wasting your time getting upset over it is useless. Go have fun." The Firefly Festival is not a festival where you have fun, but I was getting edgy. I wanted to be alone.
He took the hint and wandered off slowly back toward the beach. I got about ten seconds to myself before another voice said, "Want some company?"
"Not really," I said honestly.
Jack backed off. "Okay, then, I'll talk to you later."
"No. You're here now; you might as well stay." He came back and sat down next to me.
"What are you thinking?" he asked after a while.
"They may be watching us from somewhere..." I said.
"Who?"
"I mean my grandma...or your grandpa."
"Do you really believe they're here?" he asked.
"Personally, if I got off this island, I wouldn't bother coming back, but maybe they're sentimental," I replied.
"Take it from me, the city's not that special," he said. "A lot of smog, a lot of people rushing everywhere. Life moves too fast to mean anything there. Even in a crowd you're always alone." I looked at him. He rubbed the back of his head and laughed. "Sorry. Didn't mean to get too melodramatic there."
"It's okay," I said. "It's a melodramatic night, I guess."
He was looking out over the water. "I just...I just wish I could see them one more time."
"Your grandfather?"
"My mother, too," he said quietly.
"Your mother--"
He cut me off. "--died of cancer five years ago."
I felt really bad suddenly. Pity doesn't make me like a person any more, but it does make me feel sorry for them. "I didn't know that." Pause. "I'm sorry. It must've been rough."
"Yeah, well...it's been a while." He was about to continue when the Mayor called, "All right! Let's send our firefly lights out to sea!"
I swung my legs up to kneel on the dock and set the flower carefully onto the surface of the glassy sea. It drifted out.
Gradually the light faded from the beach, leaving us in darkness. The stars overhead seemed to have vanished, as we all watched those fragile shining flowers glowing-golden pink in the night, slowly vanishing.
I don't know how long we stood there, watching them, but when we looked back, everyone was gone.
"Well..." I said, "let's go home. We can go together."
"Yeah. It is kinda dark without those lights," he said.
"I don't mean I'm scared at night!" I snapped.
"I know, I know," he laughed.
He walked me home, we said goodnight, and then I went indoors and went to sleep.