The Queen Bee, Part 6 of 7

Joan’s broken hip hospitalized her for a few weeks, then a transfer to a rehabilitation facility for a few weeks. Through the wooziness and pain, she forced herself to think about her bees and the beekeepers. Now, beekeeping strained her, but she intended to keep as many bees as possible for as long as possible.

Joan wrote instructions, some devised during Ross’s ordeal to prevent another and some considered in hospital. She wrote several copies by hand in prim cursive with her purse’s fountain pen and paper borrowed from the nurse’s station.

Joan changed neither Melanie nor Emma’s hours, but they needed a supervisor; normally, Joan supervised. Her policy that apiculturist supervisors were legal adults ruled out Emma. When Emma turned eighteen, she planned to live in an interesting place or find an exciting job and decided against attending university. Joan already wrote her a glowing letter of recommendation and Emma applied to various dull, unskilled jobs in London. Therefore, Joan’s new plans excluded her, but Joan welcomed Emma’s employment and might promote her or schedule her full-time.

In the time between Clarence’s death and Joan and Norman’s marriage, Joan gave Melanie a choice: extra housework (allowing Joan more beekeeping hours), beekeeping (supporting the family via the farm), or a steady job (partially supporting herself and therefore lowering the budget). Melanie chose a job to utterly avoid the bees, but until she married Norman, Joan often forced her to tend them. The year Joan turned 65, Melanie, out of self-imposed obligation, began working at the apiary, and, therefore, she had significantly more apiculture experience than Melissa. By her own free will and against Joan’s wishes, Melanie was unpaid; she thought Joan could not afford another employee. Also, Melanie worked full-time and Paige needed more motherly attention than before, while the supervisor worked full-time and paid close attention to the bees.

Further, Melanie knew better than to make the vast majority of her mistakes. More than she wished, Joan worried about intentional anti-bee activity. Melanie’s mistakes outnumbered Emma’s, a fact to which Joan thought Emma was oblivious. Joan kept a closer eye on Melanie and fixed them quietly in private. Bees stung Melanie and now Joan wondered if they considered her hostile and Joan’s absence gave opportunity to attack Melanie en mass. An irate colony Melanie tended to quickly calmed down once Emma took over and the colony behaved itself better in Joan’s presence. Joan thought affectionate attention paid to the bees improved their lives and production.

During the extermination of Paige’s bees, Melanie’s revelry unnerved and betrayed Joan. She thought Melanie had more cause and opportunity to accidentally-on-purpose destroy a colony or provoke them into an extermination-worthy situation. Melanie might include reliable colonies in the annual weakest hives list and destroy contradictory produce, and it was impossible for Joan to check the hives personally.

To manage the business, Joan preferred Melissa, and if Melissa refused, she would hire somebody else, despite potential Melanie issues. For Melissa, Joan expected coping well with Melanie would be the worst part beewise and otherwise, changing Melissa’s entire life and abandoning her research were. Melissa stopped keeping them professionally once she left for university, and several years passed without hobby bees. Already, Melanie demonstrated her ability to overbear Emma; Melissa developed resilience. Joan thought Melissa would willingly become a supervisor, even though she preferred other jobs. Melissa and Emma would probably work well together, and Joan thought a peaceful job improved her employees’ lives, and peaceful coworkers, like happy, healthy bees, increased production and quality.

From the airport, Melissa texted Emma an official Telling the Bees statement: Auntie Joan is ill. She will feel better soon. Melanie, Melissa, Norman, and Emma will take care of the colony. Auntie Joan says if the colony tries to kill humans, Auntie Joan shall tell Melanie, Melissa, and Emma to kill the colony.

Emma considered waiting to work or telling the bees until Melissa arrived, but Joan had not canceled work through her convalescence. From Emma’s perspective, her job was more important than ever because Joan was unavailable, Paige and Joan’s conditions preoccupied Melanie, a single day of apiculture would exhaust Norman for a week, and Emma knew nothing about Melissa’s role. Though Emma liked her job, she preferred several other activities, but helping the Spencers seemed like the right thing. It annoyed her a bit.

While contemplating how to tell the bees and keep them calm, Emma imagined millions of bees activating the hospital motion detectors and buzzing through the hospital, confusedly stinging panicking people to death, until they found Joan. Obviously, Joan’s reputation among her bees guaranteed her safety, but what about the patients and staff?

Also, Emma dreaded Melanie’s reaction to a mass sighting. She worried if Melanie killed all of Joan’s bees, she and Joan would estrange themselves. In an emergency, Emma hoped Joan and Melanie promptly figured out a response. Melissa might have a good solution and probably knew how to handle Melanie in a bee-related situation.

Emma stopped by the cottage briefly to ask if Norman needed help. He said Melanie would drop him off at the hospital to visit Joan before she picked up Melissa from the airport. Norman suggested Emma wait with him until he left—otherwise when Melanie saw her car, she would tell off Emma.

“I’m not here to work,” Emma said.

“Joan said not to tell Melanie you were telling the bees,” Norman said.

“I’ll help you and Auntie Joan. The washing up needs doing or something.”

“Thanks, or you can come back lat—Ah, well. Here comes Melanie.”

Emma skidded to the kitchen sink.

Norman and Melanie spoke in the hall for a few minutes. Emma clattered the dishes, trying not to eavesdrop, and thought to distract herself. She figured out how to survive Melanie in Joan’s absence. Over the past couple of weeks, Emma became convinced Melanie felt hostile towards the bees, though hopefully only to the murderous colonies. Emma thought she and Melanie made approximately the same number of mistakes, and recently, Emma wondered why Melanie had not outgrown them. Emma noticed Melanie made weird, careless mistakes, like knocking over a full bee waterer and not refilling it, or opening a hive in the rain. Long before the others, Melanie complained about the labor. She procrastinated protective measures, especially in foul weather. Taking instructions from Melanie seemed like a bad idea. So, Emma intended to beekeep the way Joan taught her, whatever Melanie or Melissa said, unless Joan explicitly told her otherwise.

Melanie brought instructions from Joan and insisted upon reading them aloud to Emma. Melanie interrupted herself frequently to harangue, incoherently or confusingly, and so Emma listened politely, intending to re-read the instructions herself later.

Though Melanie wanted Emma to work under strict, immediate supervision, especially until she proved herself capable of following them, Norman supported Emma’s opinion that she could already adapt her behavior and work independently.

“But you are silly about the bees,” Melanie said.

“I am not!” Emma said. “I’m following Auntie Joan’s instructions.”

“She is worse than silly, and I don’t know what we will do if her new ideas make it worse. God knows how Melissa will encourage the bees. Let’s go over the instructions carefully, step-by-step, and you will prove to me you understand them.”

“Melanie, simply ask Emma if she has any questions, and take me to visit Joan. Let her call Joan if she needs help,” Norman said.

Reluctantly, Melanie asked, “Do you have questions?”

“No,” Emma said, rather than, Can you go away, please, so I can read the real instructions?

“You must need help with something.”

“So, I’ll ask Joan for help.”

“No, you won’t. You can’t. She is too unwell for work.”

“Melanie, trust Emma’s reading comprehension and take me to visit your mother,” Norman said, sternly.

To Emma’s surprise, Melanie objected.

Among other instructions, telling the bees required specific wording, in routine activities, certain words needed to be spelled out, such as extermination, and bee-related knowledge must be either read silently among the bees or discussed indoors with the door and windows closed. Coincidentally, the instructions explained Melissa’s clunky Telling the Bees statement.

To tell the bees, Emma wore a bee suit. All night, the bees hid in their hives and remained indoors when Emma approached. They also seemed scared and so unaggressive she doubted they would sting a wasp stealing honey. Gently, Emma knocked on each hive and a few bees crawled out to listen. She read Melissa’s statement aloud, and then the bees reentered the hive and repeated it to the queen. They understood humans well without pausing to translate. What Joan called “repeating” seemed to be a mix of body language, vibrations, and acoustics.

As Emma moved from the first acre to the second, she heard a loud buzzing in every direction. Hundreds of thousands of worker bees had waited for her to leave, and now they flew from the hive. Briefly, she worried they intended to attack her or somebody, but some settled on their own acre; a great diversity of plants grew in the farm’s fields. Other bees left, flying up to five miles away to visit customers’ gardens, local outdoor trails, hedgerows, and the like. That day, the bees foraged quietly, and relatively few left the farm.

The other colonies perked up and, while Emma informed them, bees across the remaining acres prepared themselves to forage. She felt comfortable in the fields again.

Telling the bees required hours. Emma returned to the apiary. Joan scheduled her part-time until harvest, then full-time.

Emma wanted to work full-time immediately and she felt qualified. Her business skills lay in processing honey and beeswax, packaging orders, and hand-writing receipts and shipping labels. Also, when Joan still sold other bee products, she taught Emma a little baking, soapmaking, and candlemaking. She deemed the results good enough for normal people’s everyday purposes; according to Norman, it was high praise.

Emma had no idea what an accounting ledger was until Joan explained hers. Later, Emma mentioned her mother taught her to cash the paychecks, but Emma forgot how to write a check. Whenever they bought something in-store, Joan told Emma to write the business’s check. She taught Emma to make change in her head, though more slowly than Joan.

Emma flipped through the ledger to last year’s breaking even. Once Joan quit various enterprises, she stopped paying herself, but, unknown to Emma, she and Norman saved for a sensible retirement. Most of the farm’s earnings went towards the employees’ salaries, slightly above the area’s average farming wages. So, the accounting ledger’s lack of profit seemed worse to Emma than to Joan.

Monthly, Joan wrote the schedule on a magnetic calendar blackboard. Emma wrote a note explaining her lateness, listed convenient times for her to catch up, and only wrote down the hours left in her shift. She wanted overtime, but thought mentioning it under the circumstances was rude or tactless—her mother said elderly people lived off fixed incomes.

Emma completed Joan’s usual morning to-do list and went about the routine work for a couple of hours after her scheduled shift ended. According to Joan, bees thrived in as stable, reliable environments as weather cycles permitted.

Melanie found Emma’s car, and ignoring Norman’s warning, Melanie pelted across acres. Norman scootered to Emma’s rescue, but Melissa dashed ahead, rumpled, jet-lagged, and at the end of an hours-long bee argument. Through the one-sided argument, the bees retreated into their hives and the colonies quieted themselves. They cowered from Melanie’s rath.

In the rant, Melanie accused Emma of coming to work, working unsupervised outside her normal area and hours, waiting for new training (Joan’s instructions had not specified it), and (Melanie jumped to the conclusion) disregarding or disobeying instructions. But Melanie’s words were so confusing, that Emma struggled to identify the problem. She insulted Emma and yelled at her. To add to Emma’s indignity, Joan always sent upset beekeepers away from the hives. It might disturb the bees, and her employees’ mental health concerned her. Because Emma felt fine until Melanie arrived and she recognized distressed behavior, Emma knew Melanie had broken the instructions.

Melanie thought Emma cultivated the bees’ aggression and intelligence by informing them of recent distressing events. Somehow, Emma kept herself from verifying Melanie’s guess—and Melanie, as mothers tend to, figured out Emma lied, which Emma recognized as a teenager.

Also, according to Melanie, Joan issued instructions to exterminate the bees closest related to Paige’s hive. Emma intuitively understood the wisdom, but she wanted Joan herself to assign it.

Finally, from Melanie’s perspective, Emma apparently continued working during the rant; Melanie thought Emma totally disregarded her like a snotty teenager. Actually, Melanie said off-hand that the bees probably absconded and needed immediate retrieval. Emma opened the Bluebell Hive to see whether every bee old enough to fly abandoned it—but she saw adult bees in their thousands buzzing anxiously in the hive. Melanie slammed the lid shut. Emma burst into tears and tried to fling open the lid, but Melanie leaned on it.

“You squashed a bee!” Emma yelled, yanking the lid open.

“I most certainly did not!” Melanie yelled.

As Emma held the lid open with both hands and her head, and the bees scuttled into the recesses to avoid Melanie, Norman said, “Melanie, calm down, and stop yelling at everybody. Emma, the bees are fine or they would have stung Melanie. We shouldn’t upset the bees, and Melanie, before you say one word about indicating the bees are dangerous, think again. Let’s go to the cottage. Melissa, take Melanie ahead.”

Emma walked slowly with Norman and between sobs explained her side. Her crushed finger hurt much less than her feelings, and Emma neither knew what Melanie thought she did wrong nor thought she had done anything wrong. Joan’s new set of instructions emphasized the bees were innocent until they misbehaved.

They heard Melanie and Melissa fight in the distance as Emma and Norman turned towards the shed and apiary to tidy up.

Melanie’s attitudes and opinions regarding Joan’s bees soured the relationship with her parents and half-sister. Incidentally, in her personal opinion, archaeoentomologists wasted their lives in a pointless field. Years ago, Melanie and Melissa concluded Joan and Norman were healthy enough for Melissa to live abroad; Melissa promised to return when they suffered serious problems. The arrangement suited everybody. However, Melanie felt bitter that Melissa became an archaeoentomologist and moved away, leaving the care of seniors to Melanie and forcing an obligation upon her to work on the loathed bee farm.

“Melanie said she needed to exterminate unusual or dangerous hives and I shouldn’t work until then,” Emma said.

“Melanie! Melissa! Come here immediately!” Norman called.

The half-sisters returned and Emma edged away to examine a meadow thistle.

“Emma, did you observe any unusual bee-hive-yor,” Norman asked.

Nobody even dignified that with a groan or an eye-roll, let alone a proper response. But Emma snuffled her observations.

“How do you know which hives are which, Melanie?” Norman asked. “When did you research it?”

“Listen to the bees,” Melanie snapped. “Do they sound like themselves?”

Everybody paused and listened.

“Yesterday, they sounded similar,” Norman said.

“Oh, there is another aggressive colony nobody told me about?” Melanie groaned. “Over the whole farm. We can’t control them. We—muffeh.”

Melissa clamped a hand over Melanie’s mouth.

“Mum said unusual, dangerous behavior, and this is not dangerous,” Melissa said.

Melanie attempted to say, “How do you know?”

“Emma, Melissa is your new supervisor. Listen to her and it will be all right,” Norman said.

“Mum always harvests the produce before e-x-t-e-r-m-i-n-a-t-i-o-n, so we have to wait until f-r-o-s-t,” Melissa said.

Melanie answered except nobody understood her: “Needing to spell words around the bees shows how dangerous they are.”

“Did you hear Melissa, Melanie?” Norman asked.

Melanie nodded.

“Take your hand off your sister’s mouth,” Norman said. “Honestly, I thought you had given it up years ago.”

In Melissa’s opinion, the situation called for emergency measures, but she looked dutifully chagrined and said, “Sorry.”

“What did Melissa say with Joan’s approval, Melanie?” Norman asked, and Melanie grumpily mumbled it.

In the cottage, Norman, Melanie, Melissa, and Emma reviewed Joan’s new arrangements. An argument resumed and affronted Melanie quit beekeeping, saying if the others wanted to harbor and breed more dangerous bees, she wanted nothing to do with it, and she forbade Paige from approaching Joan’s bees.

Emma inspected her yellow rose tea cup until Melanie slammed the door behind her. “I didn’t mean to bother her.”

“You didn’t, really,” Norman said. “She is a bit stressed and scared.”

Melissa said, “I wrote my PhD thesis about bug horror media and real bugs! Why would I experiment on a horror movie or allow one to escalate?” She sighed. “Thanks for coming to work today, Emma.”

“I want to work full-time, but I didn’t write the time on the blackboard,” Emma said.

“Write it on the board for overtime and you can have Melanie’s hours if you want, full-time,” Melissa said.

Part 7 coming on Monday, January 1, 2024.