Ray Voss, 53, has run his small wild honey apiary outside Asheville, North Carolina, for eight years, ever since his ex-wife packed their Charlotte condo and drove west to Portland without a forwarding address. He’s stubborn to a fault, convinced every half-friendly smile from a local woman is just a lead for the town gossip mill, so he keeps to himself unless he’s manning his stall at the weekly Saturday farmers market, or hauling hive boxes up the side of Craggy Mountain at dawn.
It’s 7:12 a.m. on a mid-May Saturday, warm enough that he’s rolled the sleeves of his frayed Carhartt button-down to his elbows, a fresh, pink bee sting swelling just above his left wrist. The air smells like cut clover and warm asphalt, the faint, tinny twang of a bluegrass busker tuning his fiddle drifting from the market entrance. He’s just set out the first stack of sourwood honey jars when a woman he hasn’t seen before stops at the edge of his stall, holding a frosty pint of strawberries in one hand, a canvas library tote slung over her shoulder.
He recognizes the tote first—printed with the Buncombe County Public Library logo, the new part-time youth librarian who moved to town three months prior, the one the old ladies at the bakery had chattered about two weeks back, saying she had a nose ring and “unladylike” tattoos. She’s wearing a faded blue linen shirt unbuttoned at the collar, cutoffs that show a smattering of freckles across her knees, beat-up white Converse caked with mud from the hiking trails. A sliver of honeycomb ink peeks out from under the cuff of her shirt, on her right wrist.
She leans in to smell the open sample jar of creamed honey on the counter, her shoulder brushing his bicep for half a second, and he freezes. He hasn’t been that close to a woman he finds himself drawn to in years, his first instinct to step back, mumble a gruff price and send her on her way, but she laughs before he can, soft and low, and says her grandpa kept hives outside Knoxville when she was a kid, that she hasn’t smelled creamed honey that thick since he died.
He blinks, surprised, and nods, pointing to the observation hive he brings to the market every week, tiny honeybees crawling over the combs inside the glass box. He explains the difference between sourwood and clover, the way high elevation on Craggy Mountain gives wild honey a brighter, almost citrusy finish, and she listens, leaning in a little more every time he speaks, holding eye contact like she’s actually paying attention, not just being polite. When he hands her a wooden dipper dipped in sourwood honey to sample, their fingers brush, her skin cold from holding the frosty strawberry pint, and he feels a jolt run up his arm, stupid and sharp, like he touched a live fence wire.
She licks the honey off the dipper slow, wipes a stray drop off her lower lip with the tip of her thumb, and says it’s the best honey she’s ever tasted, no exaggeration. He feels the back of his neck warm, scoffs half-teasing, says she’s just saying that to get a discount, and she grins, showing a tiny gap between her two front teeth, says she’d happily pay full price, but wouldn’t say no to a discount if he’s offering.
A little kid in a dinosaur costume runs past, tripping over the leg of a picnic table, and slams into the side of Ray’s stall, knocking a full jar of creamed honey off the edge. Both of them lunge for it at the same time, their heads bumping soft, a dull little thud, and they both laugh as Ray catches the jar an inch off the ground, his hand wrapped around the glass, hers wrapped around his wrist. They stay like that for a beat, the kid’s laughter fading down the row of stalls, the bluegrass busker starting up a slow version of “Foggy Mountain Breakdown,” before she pulls her hand back, rubbing the spot on her forehead where they bumped.
She asks him if he’s busy that night, says she’s having a small bonfire at her cabin up the road from the trailhead, just a couple of friends, no loud music, no drama. She says she’s making cornbread, that it’d taste even better with that sourwood honey he was selling. His first instinct is to say no, to make up an excuse about checking hives at dusk, about having to bottle a new batch for a restaurant order, but he looks at her, the sun catching the auburn streaks in her brown hair, the smudge of strawberry juice on her left thumb, and he finds himself saying yes.
He shows up at her cabin at 7 that night, the sun dipping low over the mountains, painting the sky pink and orange, a jar of sourwood honey in one hand, a handful of beeswax candles he’d poured the week prior in the other. She meets him at the door, wearing a flannel shirt tied around her waist, holding a cold beer out to him, the cabin behind her smelling like baked cornbread and pine. When she takes the candles from his hand, her thumb brushes the faint bee sting on his forearm, and he doesn’t pull away.
