Blush Rosewood's Arc

Chapter 4 of 4

The fence held the deer, and Blush's herb stand kept selling out. But the herbs alone couldn't spread the healing she wanted across her land. She walked to the chicken run at dawn and stopped by the pink coop. Inside the nesting boxes she found more eggs than her family could eat. Brown ones from the russet hens. Speckled ones from the black-and-white pair. She held one warm in her palm. If people wanted her herbs, they would want fresh eggs too. She carried a full basket to Bear at the barn. "I want to sell these," she said. "Same as the herbs. But at the coop, not the front gate." Bear turned an egg over in his rough hand. "You've got the layers for it. That white fluffy one alone gives you two a day." The silkie hen watched them from the run, her feathers soft as spun cotton, her beak small and black. "I need a stand," Blush said. "Something by the coop." They built it that afternoon. Bear cut white boards and Blush painted the trim pale pink. She hung a small chalkboard for prices. By evening a wide farm stand stood beside the coop, its shelves lined with baskets. Blush arranged the eggs by color and tucked wildflowers between them. She stepped back and smiled. It looked like it belonged there. Word traveled fast, the same as it had with her herbs. By the second morning, cars slowed at the road and turned up her lane. A woman bought a full dozen. Two more waited behind her. Kitten sat by the stand and made change in a tin. By noon every basket sat empty. Blush counted the money and found she had sold three dozen eggs before lunch. That was the problem. Her hens laid barely two dozen a day. She stood at the empty shelves while a man in a truck asked for a dozen she didn't have. "Tomorrow," she told him. "Come back tomorrow." He frowned and drove off. She watched his taillights and knew he might not return. She found Bear filling the water trough. "They want more than the hens can lay," she said. "I sold out by noon and turned three people away." Bear wiped his hands. "Same trouble as the herbs, then. More demand than you can meet." Blush nodded slowly. The stand worked. The town wanted her eggs. But her small flock couldn't keep up, and every empty basket sent a buyer somewhere else. "I need more hens," she said. "A bigger flock, if I'm going to feed this land and the people too." She looked back at the coop, at the handful of birds pecking in the run. It wasn't enough. Not for the homestead she pictured. Tomorrow she would have to find a way to grow the flock, and fast, before the buyers stopped coming.