🍎under the orchard tree

And at one o'clock Sharey came all the way up that lane with half a sandwich held out in front, which is how Sharey arrives everywhere.

"Half for you, half for me."

We sat under a tree with it, and Sharey made me count three good things the orchard had that the bridge did not. I thought it was a stupid question and said so, and then counted them anyway: shade, apples, and forty hooks in a line, every one of them filled, which from that end looked like a very long sentence somebody had finished.

Sharey left a spoonful of oil with me afterwards. For the orchard. Which was already done and did not need it.

I had been up there earlier with half a sandwich, at one o'clock, after the row — because Jelly had spent the entire morning on a hill where nobody could see, and had come down and had a shout about it, and had gone back up. And I had made Jelly count three good things the orchard had that the bridge did not, and Jelly told me it was a stupid question and then counted them anyway.

Shade. Apples. Forty hooks in a line, every one filled.

The spoonful was the second half of that conversation.