Delmar Pruitt, 62, has made a living keeping bees and selling small-batch wildflower honey in western Kentucky for 22 years. His only consistent flaw, as his late wife Elaine used to tease him, is that he’d rather argue with a cranky queen bee than make small talk with anyone outside his hive line. Since Elaine died of lung cancer 11 years prior, that flaw has hardened into a routine: he wakes at 5 a.m. to check hives, sells honey at the weekly farmers market only for the first two hours before the crowd shows, and avoids all county functions where the group of local widows who call themselves the “Peach Pie Brigade” linger. He only agreed to drop off his honey entry for the county fair because the prize money would cover a new set of hive boxes for the plot he leases by the river.
The August heat sits thick as molasses at 10 a.m., sweat soaking the collar of his faded work shirt, Stetson pulled low enough to hide the gray hair curling at his ears. He’s hauling three crates of glass honey jars toward the ag exhibit tent when his boot catches on a loose tent stake, the top crate slipping out of his grip. Before it can shatter on the dust-caked asphalt, a pair of calloused hands grabs the edge, steadying it. Delmar looks up, meets the eyes of a woman he’s never seen before, 50-something, sun streaks in her brown hair, a thin scar slicing across her left knuckle, wearing denim overalls with a beekeepers’ association patch stitched to the breast pocket. She smells like lemon dish soap and clover, no fancy perfume, no heavy makeup, and she grins like she knows exactly who he is.
“Delmar Pruitt, right?” She sets the crate down gently, brushes a fleck of dirt off the top jar. “Marnie Cole, new county ag agent. Transferred over from east Tennessee last month. I’ve been bugging the old extension secretary for your number for two weeks, I can’t get my test hive behind the office to stop swarming.”
They lean against the tent pole for 20 minutes, talking about mite treatments and clover yields and the weirdly wet spring that made this year’s honey darker and sweeter than usual. At one point, Delmar spots a tiny forager bee tangled in the collar of the flannel shirt Marnie has tied around her waist, and he reaches out to pluck it free before it stings her. His knuckle brushes hers when he passes her the bee to set free, a sharp static shock jolting both of them, and they hold eye contact for three full beats, longer than polite, Delmar’s chest tight like he’s run up a flight of stairs. He hasn’t felt that spark since he was 17, sneaking Elaine into the drive-in to watch old westerns.
When Marnie mentions the annual fair square dance that night, offhand, her foot kicking a loose rock in the dirt like she’s nervous to ask, Delmar’s throat goes dry. The old voice in his head screams that he’s betraying Elaine, that anyone he lets close will just get taken away, that the whole town will gossip for months if the reclusive widower shows up with the new ag agent on his arm. He mumbles some half-assed excuse about having to check a feral hive at dusk, grabs his entry paperwork, and practically jogs back to his truck, kicking himself the whole drive home.
He sits on his porch that evening, twisting open a jar of this year’s sunflower honey, listening to the crickets buzz in the field behind his house, and can’t stop replaying the way Marnie laughed when he told her his bees prefer sunflower nectar over clover, the way her thumb brushed his when she took a sample jar of honey from him earlier that day. The hive he lied about checking is fine, he knows it, he checked it two days prior. He changes into the only clean flannel shirt he owns, grabs the jar of sunflower honey he’d originally set aside for Elaine’s grave, and drives back to the fairgrounds.
The dance is in full swing when he gets there, the bluegrass band playing a slow Merle Haggard track, the smell of fried oreos and cotton candy hanging in the warm air. Marnie is sitting on the bleachers by the root beer truck, boots propped up on the lower rail, sipping a cold can, like she was waiting for him. He walks over, holds out the jar of honey, and tells her he lied about the hive, that he’s just a stubborn old fool who forgot how to talk to women he likes.
She grins, takes the jar, runs her finger over the hand-stamped sunflower label he makes for all his special batches, and says she already figured that out, she asked around and everyone told her Delmar Pruitt would rather face a hive of angry bees than a public dance. She stands up, sets her root beer down, holds out her hand, says she’s got two left feet but she’ll dance with him if he promises to teach her how to stop getting stung by her test hive.
He takes her hand, her palm warm and calloused just like his, and leads her toward the dance floor where the string section swells into the next verse.
