Total pages in book: 114
Estimated words: 111165 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 556(@200wpm)___ 445(@250wpm)___ 371(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 111165 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 556(@200wpm)___ 445(@250wpm)___ 371(@300wpm)
“And you think people take me seriously when I tell them I’m a beekeeper? Especially a full-time one?”
We’re both in the same boat when it comes to that one. The poet and the beekeeper.
“Be honest, Marina, is this what you’d talk about on a first date?” he asks after a few beats, studying my face before turning his attention back to the road.
I have to think on that. Though I don’t mention my job on my online profiles, it does come up during the first date. Naturally, I mean, “what do you do?” is a classic conversation starter. But I never go into the specifics of the job when it comes to anything remotely emotional or personal. I try and keep the conversation as shallow as possible, though I always try to educate them while I can. I like facts and will share them as often as I can. Who doesn’t like to learn?
“Did you know,” I say, twisting in my seat to face Laz, “that every bee in the hive has its own role and that role is entirely dependent on the age of the bee?”
“You’re starting to sound like Scooby.”
“I don’t know who this Scooby is but for example, when they are first born, they clean and polish the cells, starting with their own cell they just crawled out of. A few weeks go by and they move on from cleaning duties to feeding the brood, caring for the queen. They remove debris, handle incoming nectar, build beeswax combs, guard the entrance, and air-condition and ventilate the hive.” I pause to check if he’s listening. He is. “They don’t leave the hive until their final phase of life. They only have a few weeks after that, either acting as guards or scouts or collecting nectar, before they die.”
“So then the bees that you see flying around, pollinating flowers…”
“They’ve earned it. They’ve worked their little bee bottoms off their whole lives to have that privilege of smelling the flowers.”
He bursts out laughing.
“What?” I ask.
“You are so fucking cute, you know that? Little bee bottoms? I swear to god, I don’t know what to do with you.”
I’m beaming inside from that. “I guess it’s just a good metaphor. For life. You know, people see these bees flying around and assume that’s just what they do. People don’t realize all the jobs they’ve had, where they started from and the relentless work they’ve had to put in to get to that stage.”
He nods, rubbing his lips together. “You’re right. I didn’t realize.”
“No one does. They’re always so surprised when I tell them. But like I said, it applies to people too. Maybe people look at, say, you and assume that you’re just coasting along, they don’t know the struggle or what you’ve gone through in the past to get there. They look at this car and they don’t know it was a gift from Daryl.”
“It was never a gift,” he says sharply. “It was a set car and he got it for me to win favors with my mother, to pretend he was a good guy. It didn’t work. That’s why I had to buy it from him. It ate at my soul to drive it around otherwise.”
His jaw is tense. Whether the date is fake or not, this is the kind of topic we talk about when we’re drunk or tired at two a.m., not before a fun evening.
I switch the subject. “Did you know that there’s a queen, the drones and the workers. The drones are the males, who make up a very small percentage of the hive and they have zero purpose except to mate with the queen. They do shit all and when they’re done, the workers, the females, will literally drag them out of the hive and kick them out if they don’t leave voluntarily. They kick them out to die.”
“Is this a metaphor too?”
“Sometimes…”
“Is this what you’d actually talk about on a first date?”
“Yeah. Why?”
He raises his brows, gives his head a shake as he glances at me. “Are you serious?”
“Yeah,” I repeat, feeling defensive. “So? It’s interesting.”
“It’s not romantic in the slightest.”
“Romantic?”
“Marina, we’re on a date. A date means you’re interested in someone romantically, hopefully sexually.”
“I can’t talk about the bees? Just the birds and the bees?”
“Cute. But I’m serious. This kind of stuff, as interesting as it is…I don’t know.”
“Well what else am I going to talk about?”
“If you don’t know, then this is your problem. Damn it, Marina, I think I’ve figured you out already and we’ve barely been on the date.”
I cross my arms and huff, “Well gee, we might as well turn this car around and go home because you’ve just solved all my problems.”
He sighs. “Come on.”
“I’m just being myself.”
“It’s a game. The dating world is a game. You can’t show all your cards on the first date.”