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“Oh, I was thinking maybe five dollars. What do you think about that?”
“The same as we charge for the eggs?”
Brady was stunned she’d remembered the price he was offering to sell the eggs. She was absorbing way more than he realized. It made him proud.
“Exactly the same. And it’s easier for me to think of them in terms of five dollars each. We get five dollars for the eggs. We get five dollars for these trees. I think, we could make a hundred dollars or more in a few weeks. What do you think?”
“A whole hundred dollars? Wow. That’s more money than I ever had.”
“And we have these others that we can also transplant and grow.”
“Can we grow other things and sell them?” she asked.
“Absolutely. We can do the same thing with seeds and grow tomato and pepper plants. Later on in the fall, we could grow cabbage, cauliflower, and broccoli.”
Emma scrunched up her nose and Brady knew why.
“I know you don’t care for those as much. But the way Mom makes those wonderful broccoli and cauliflower soups? They’re pretty good, and they’re good for you Emma.”
“I know.” She shrugged aside, resigned to the fact that even though the cold crops were not her favorite food, she owed them the respect of eating them anyway, because they were grown under her hand.
They heard Tate barking at the back porch. Brady whistled so the dog would know where to come, and in less than a minute, he nosed the door open and greeted both in the greenhouse. Tate had developed the habit of putting his paws on Brady’s thighs and sitting, almost praying or leaning into him, and he did so today, eager to accept his master’s praise.
“Good boy. Thanks for joining us, Tate.” Brady scratched around his ears and nuzzled him, kissing the top of his head and rubbing his back. He gently lifted Tate’s paws from his lower torso and set them on the ground. Tate immediately moved over to Emma and licked her right leg, sitting in front of her, waiting for her to jump down and pat him. But this time, Emma just giggled and stayed on the planting ledge.
They finished the transplanting, and Brady helped Emma down off of the shelf. They went out to the vegetable garden, picking some small tomatoes and peppers, a couple of green onions, and some purple basil for an egg scramble. Brady examined the corn, showing Emma how the stalks were starting to bloom. He explained that if he shook the tops, making the powdery corn silt fly all around them in the air, that it would help pollinate the corn so that they would have full ears come harvest time. He also pulled some weeds around the row of artichokes he’d planted in the spring.
“Have you had artichokes yet?” he asked Emma.
“I don’t think so. What do they look like?”
“Let’s see here, see if I can find it.” Brady searched on his cell phone until he found a picture of an artichoke globe, showing it to Emma. “You eat the leaves. Well, you don’t eat them; you scrape all the goodness on the underside of the leaf after you dip it in butter or mayonnaise. It’s really good. You’re going to love it.”
Emma looked at him as if he had purple hair and a third eye. Brady could tell she was evaluating this new vegetable group and wasn’t as excited as he had hoped.
“You’ll see. I promise you, you’ll love it.”
Maggie joined them, and the three of them sat out on the back deck. Brady serving up his scramble, garnishing it with cheese. Emma drank two glasses of orange juice. Maggie had a second helping of coffee and slipped a chocolate croissant onto Brady’s plate when he wasn’t looking.
“You bought this yesterday at the market?” he asked Maggie.
“I did. I couldn’t buy macaroons for Emma and not get you a chocolate croissant.”
Brady sliced the croissant into three pieces, placing one on Maggie’s plate, another on Emma’s, and finishing the third piece by tossing the whole slice into his mouth. It was heavenly, and he closed his eyes to savor every bit of sunshine, family time, and chocolatey goodness that he could muster.
He looked between his two girls.
“Emma, I want you to think about all the things you want to do while your mom’s away. We’ve got to stay busy, so we don’t miss her too much.”
“Brady, that’s not nice.” Maggie said and then broke into a healthy laugh. “You guys are going to be fine. You have the neighbors to go help, there’s lots of work to be done in the garden, and—”
“Mama, I transplanted papayas today. We’re going to have trees by the time you come back. We hope we get all females and bifactual ones.”
Maggie stared back at Brady, completely puzzled.
“She means bisexual plants. Papayas can come that way. Sorry, I was just giving her—”
“Careful on the sex education, Brady. You can see miss big ears is going to tell her preschool all about it now. Be expecting a call from the teacher soon.”
