Read Online Weekends in Carolina by Jennifer Lohmann - Free Book Online Page A

that he was moving, anger poured back into the empty space left from his meditation. The tightness that had been in his shoulders from stillness morphed into the restrictive straitjacket he was familiar with. He tilted his head from the left to the right, hoping to add ease back into his muscles.
    Max directed him through cleaning up and they walked out of the greenhouse into the drizzle together. Only the noise of the rain, the shuffling of their steps and the rustle of their clothing accompanied them, leaving Trey to concentrate on Max walking next to him. Even Ashes seemed contemplative. As they were passing the chicken coop, Max spoke again. “I thought a lot about your question.”
    “My question?” After the absorbing quiet of the greenhouse, his question now felt intrusive. His idea of bigger, better and flashier was out of sync with the peace of the farm.
    “There are so many things I could do with this farm that would make a splash in the organic farming world. There’s this guy in upstate New York with a complete CSA. People pay him a yearly fee and once a week they pick up all their food, meat, cheese, bread, preserves, vegetables, everything. His wife wrote a book about it. Closer to home, there’s a farm in Orange County with a complete rotation of their animals and vegetables. They do things with organic farming I could only dream about.”
    “But?” Just because he felt like he was intruding, didn’t mean he was going to stop.
    “I’m pretty simple. My dreams for the farm are modest: a winter CSA, a renovated tobacco barn and land I can count as mine.”
    “What’s wrong with saying that?”
    “What are your dreams, Trey?”
    Trey stopped and stared at the farmhouse. His mouth opened to speak but drizzle dripped off his nose into the emptiness of what he couldn’t say and he had to shut his mouth before he drowned. He either said what he didn’t even want to admit to himself or never speak again. “All I ever wanted was to get away from my father and this farm.”
    “And after you moved away, how did you decide what to do next if you didn’t have dreams?”
    Max’s eyes were clear and bright, even through the fading light and the spit coming down from the heavens. Trey started walking again, to the farmhouse. He’d never imagined wanting to enter those doors, but the house was dry. And warm.
    When Max and Ashes caught up with him on the enclosed porch, he could feel the cowardly way he hadn’t answered her question in the prickle in his spine. The drips off the metal roof were louder now than the sound of the rain, but neither noise was loud enough to drown out the truth he didn’t want to admit to himself.
    “Since I packed up my car and left North Carolina, I haven’t had a single dream for my life. I’ve taken logical and practical steps to further my career and the agendas of my employers, but nothing I’ve done has been my dream.”
    Ashes’s wet tail made a squishing noise as it swept back and forth on the concrete floor. Max was silent.
    “Kelly’s coming over soon so we can do more packing. I should go inside.” Trey hadn’t looked at her during his confession. He didn’t want to see pity in her eyes.
    The irony of the situation wasn’t lost on him as he watched Max and Ashes shuffle down the steps and around the back of the house. Max had one very simple dream, and he owned it. He had had one simple dream, too, and owning Max’s dream meant he hadn’t fully realized his.

CHAPTER SIX
    “A RE YOU SURE you don’t want to drive?” Max asked with a smile in her voice as Trey opened the passenger door to the truck late the next morning.
    “No, I’m comfortable enough in my masculinity to let you drive.”
    Trey had looked in the cab while they were filling the bed with his dad’s crap. The rust around the gearshift hadn’t given him much hope that the transmission actually worked, though he’d seen Max drive the beast around the farm. This would be the first time