Honey’s First Harvest

‘Hurry up, Honey, you’ll be late!’

I scowled into the mirror—no matter how hard I dragged the brush through my hair, I simply couldn’t contain the golden ringlets that coiled like slinkies, threatening to tumble down my shoulders and take off down the stairs.

And as for my eyes! They sparked green and amber as if they couldn’t choose a colour at all. It was impossible. I was nineteen and I’d never be pretty. I threw down the hairbrush in disgust and stomped downstairs.

‘Oh, Honey—is that the best you could do?’ Mother’s voice cut me to the heart, but I was too proud to show it.

‘I’m helping old Mr Max with his bees, not going to a debutante ball,’ I retorted. 

Mother sighed and I regretted my sharp tongue. When would I learn to control it? Why was it always running away from me as if it couldn’t wait to escape the confines of my wet, pink mouth? 

I kissed Mother on her powdery cheek and ran all the way to old Mr Max’s, letting myself in the gate and running straight into a tall, hard tree. Only it wasn’t a tall, hard tree. It was a tall, hard man. Or at least a tall man’s … hard chest. 

I gasped in shock. 

‘What do we have here?’ said the tall, hard man with a laugh in his voice, like someone who’s about to laugh but is restraining themselves.

‘I’m Honey,’ I said.

‘You most certainly are delicious,’ he said, looking at me in a way that made me blush slowly from my toes all the way up.

‘I’m here to help old Mr Max with his bees,’ I said in my most businesslike voice.

‘My uncle isn’t well—he asked me to take care of the harvest.’

‘Your uncle?’

‘I’m Maxwell Junior.’

Maxwell Junior! My heart skipped a beat—maybe two beats, or even three, I wasn’t counting. Everyone in our town knew about Maxwell Junior. Heir to Mighty Maxwell Enterprises, he had left ten years ago on a big game hunt and hadn’t been seen since.

I looked up past his hard, muscled chest, but his face was obscured beneath a beekeeper’s veil. 

‘Your job today is the smoker,’ he said.

‘The smoker?’ 

He sighed. He’d obviously expected someone more experienced.

Kneeling down beside me, he held out a metal contraption. It had a pair of bellows at one end and a cylinder filled with gum leaves and wood shavings with a spout at the other.

‘It’s important to keep the smoke going at all times,’ he said. ‘It calms the bees and allows me to access the honey frames. Your job is to keep pumping so that the smoke keeps coming.’

‘Aha.’ I tried to sound knowledgeable, but I was feeling giddy from his nearness. He smelt smoky and sweet, but in a ruggedly masculine way.

He struck a match and I leapt as the flame surged in his fingers. He lit the leaves in the smoker and pumped until they were ablaze, then closed the lid and handed me the device.

‘Don’t let the fire go out,’ he warned.

I held the smoker tremulously in my trembling hands and followed him down to the beehives. 

Suddenly he turned, placing a hand on my chest to stop me running into him. I found myself wishing that he’d placed it just a few inches lower and to the right so that it could have touched my—I blushed as red as a ripe and delicious tomato at the thought of it. What was coming over me? 

‘Where is your veil?’ he asked. ‘You can’t come out here without protection.’ 

I almost swooned. He was worried about me!

With long, masculine strides, he strode to the shed and came out with a netted hat. He placed it on my head and pulled the veil over my face. One of my curls came loose and he took it in his hand and gently pulled on it.

‘Extraordinary,’ he said as it bounced pertly back into place.

He smiled at me like a cat smiles at a bowl filled with cream and led me down to the hives.

* * *

The rest, I’m afraid to say, must remain a beekeeper’s mystery. All I can tell you is that I pumped as I’ve never pumped before, following his instructions to go faster or slower … slower … slower … and now faster, faster, faster, more, more, more! He told me no one had ever kept the smoke coming as long as I kept it coming! By the time I’d finished, there was honey pouring everywhere, thick and golden, hot and sticky and inexpressibly delicious. 

Maxwell Junior was most impressed by my efforts. He gave me a jar to take back to Mother.

‘Honey,’ he said, ‘your nectar is the finest I’ve tasted.’ 

I felt myself swelling with pride as he unscrewed my jar, dipped his finger in one last time and sucked the golden nectar from his digit with greedy pleasure.

I was sticky from head to toe as I ran home to Mother.

Needless to say, she was delighted!

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