Peach Fuzz

On peaches, first loves, and the women who shape us.

I wrote this story last summer as a way to challenge myself to write more. It’s fictional, but like most stories, it carries pieces of truth—inspired by the women who’ve shaped me and the feeling of summer itself.

There’s something about this season that pulls us into the present. It asks us to slow down, to notice, to feel. To hold on and let go, sometimes in the very same breath.

I’m not a professional writer, just someone who enjoys finding meaning in small moments. I loved writing this piece, and I hope it resonates with you too.

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Peach Fuzz

I barely make it to the counter before dropping the produce I just bought all over the floor. My two youngest kids race around me, zig zagging through the kitchen with nerf dart guns. “Outside!” I yell in the toughest mom voice I can muster, but really, I don’t mind. Summers at the Cape are something I look forward to all year long. Our family has been coming here since I was a kid. My sisters and I would run wild around the house terrorizing the adults while they too tried to shoo us outside, exasperated at our youthful energy. My grandmother would just laugh and chase after us, only to call us back in later to “taste-test” whatever she was making for dessert that night.

“Mmm, coffee,” my father grunts as he ambles towards the coffee pot. “Morning, Dad.”

I smile.

With his white hair tufts sticking in every direction and his old man robe, my dad has become the cutest thing to me in the past few years. No longer the strong, unshakeable figure of my youth, age has slowed him down and softened him up. It had shrunk him a little, too.

“Morning, Jessy Boo.” He smiles and comes in to give me a quick peck on the cheek. “You’re up early.” He muses then turns back to the coffee pot. There’s not a thing on this earth my dad loves more than his coffee in the morning.

“Yeah, I had to get up early to make sure I got the best peaches because you…” I stopped. He was already walking away, coffee in hand, no doubt to his favorite chair in the living room where he’d spend the morning reading the news and the rest of the day complaining about it.

I chuckle to myself and refill my coffee tumbler. The Farmer’s Market was alive this morning with other shoppers competing for the best fruits and vegetables. I always make my way to the peach stand first, just like Grandma taught me when I was little.

“The best peaches are the early morning ones that haven’t been squished or sniffed by everyone,” she’d say. I remember as a little girl imagining people sniffing the peaches, their runny noses leaving slug trails on the fuzzy sides. Even as an adult I can’t get that image out of my mind, so I’m always there right at opening before anyone else has had a chance to touch them.

I pull the first peach out of the bag. It’s summer perfection. The epitome of long lazy days wrapped up in soft, fuzzy skin. Its tangy scent takes me back to the summer I turned 16 and tasted love for the first time.

I was at the town’s 4^th of July fireworks show with my family. My aunts, uncles, grandparents, cousins – everyone was there. After a while, I just needed a break from it all. Seeking an escape, I asked if I could go buy a soda. Knowingly, Grandma pressed a $5 into my hand and with a wink whispered, “Just be back before the show starts.” She was a saint.

I took my time walking over to the stands and got in line. That’s when I first saw him. He was a few people in front of me and a good head taller than most of them. He wore a royal blue baseball hat low on his head, which made his hair flip out at the bottom (and butterflies flip out in my stomach). Every now and then he’d turn his head sideways and I got a glimpse of his handsome profile and angular jaw. As if he could feel my gaze, he turned and locked eyes with me. Mortified, I quickly looked away. Omg did he really just catch me staring at him? Blood rushed to my cheeks. How embarrassing. When I got the nerve to look his way again, he was up at the register. The line inched forward, and I tried to figure out something to do with my arms. Be cool.
I glanced his way again, but he was already gone. A quiet disappointment settled in before I could stop it.

Then suddenly, he was there—standing beside me.

“Hey,” he said.

I looked up, surprised.
He held my gaze for a moment, then asked, softly,
“Do I know you?”

“Oh, hey. Um, I don’t think so?”
“You look familiar. What’s your name?” He asked.
“Jess.”
“Hi Jess, I’m Nick.” His easy smile reached his eyes. “Do you live around here?”
“No, but I come here every summer with my family.”
“Ah, maybe that’s it.” He smiled wider, seeming to relax. His arms were full, but he extended one hand holding a cold drink out to me. I looked at it and laughed as we awkwardly fist bumped.
“It’s nice to meet you.” We locked eyes again. God, he’s cute, I thought.
“Where are you sitting?” he asked.
“We’re just over there,” I said pointing to the right side of the crowd.
“And who is ‘we’?” He tilted his head down and raised his eyebrows comically.
“My family.” I laugh.
“No boyfriend?”
“No boyfriend.” I can’t seem to stop smiling.
“Good.”
“What about you?” I ask, raising my eyebrows back at him.
“No boyfriend either!” He shakes his head and we both laugh.
The line moves up again and suddenly I’m next in line to order.
“Would you want to hang out a little before the fireworks start? I have to run over and drop these things off first, but we could meet back here in say, 10 minutes?”
“Yeah, sure.”
“Okay, see you soon, Jess. Don’t be late.” He turns and walks away.

That was the first of many nights we spent together that summer. He was 17 and lived just a mile from the house we were renting. My family insisted I bring him over so they could meet him—and, as my dad put it, “make sure he’s not a Cowboys fan.”

Nick got along easy with everyone. “She’s been bit by the love bug,” I once overheard my grandma say as I ran out one evening to meet him.

That was the night everything changed. Summer was ending and I felt panicky that we were leaving soon. Nick hugged me and kissed me and told me we’d be okay, but inside, I knew it wouldn’t. We laid a blanket in the tall grass and made love for the first time under the waning August moon to the sound of crashing waves and a choir of crickets.

“MOM, where have you been?!” The peach slipped from my hand and hit the floor with a dull thud, jolting me out of the memory. Janie yanks open the refrigerator door and leans in—my sweet, angsty teen.

“I’m like so hungry.”
“Have you tried eating?” I deadpan. This gets me well-deserved eyeroll.
“I mean it. I’m starving and there’s nothing to eat!”

I look at her, long, lanky and beautiful leaning into the open fridge. Wasn’t it just yesterday that she wrapped her chubby little legs around my waist as I danced with her around the living room?

“If you can wait, I’ll throw together some eggy burritos when I’m done putting this stuff away.”
“Fine.” She closes the fridge and looks at me for the first time that morning. “Did you get peaches to make Grandma’s Pie?” I pick up the now bruised peach and present it to her.
“Of course I did.” I hold my arms out and smile adoringly at my firstborn. She walks over and wilts into me, letting me wrap her in a bear hug. I smell the top of her head and breathe her in.
Bone of my bone. “Call me when the burritos are ready.” She pushes off me and stalks out of the kitchen.
Flesh of my flesh.

Early motherhood wasn’t my finest season. The days were long, the years were short, and nights were an eternity. But before all that, I’ll never forget the joy of holding my first baby in my arms.

Labor pains started around 11 the night before she was born. At first, the contractions were slow and manageable.
“Like bad period cramps,” I told Josh, a little too confidently.

But as the night wore on, they kept getting worse—sharper, closer, harder to breathe through.
When they finally hit five minutes apart, I was panting.
“It’s time to go,” I said.

I labored through the early morning hours. By the time the doctor said it was time to push, I was already there.
My body didn’t need permission—it moved with instinct, guided by something deeper, something ancient and feminine.

I wasn’t just birthing a baby; I was birthing a new version of myself.
I pushed for life—hers and mine—and labored us both into the next chapter of our lives.

Forty-five minutes later, Janie was born. Her fierce cries pierced the quiet room, and the nurses cheered. When the doctor placed her in my arms for the first time, the tears flowed freely. I had never seen anything so beautiful in all my life. I couldn’t believe that this tiny miracle was mine to keep. I looked at Josh whose own eyes were overflowing. “She’s beautiful, Jess,” he whispered. “Just like you.”

The nurses soon took Janie to be washed, weighed, and measured while the doctor looked after me. Finally, they brought her back, swaddled in a pink hospital blanket. “Like a little burrito.” I chuckled to myself.

I spent the morning staring at her precious face. I couldn’t believe this was my baby. I watched as her tiny chest rose up and down with each little breath. I caressed her arms with the tips of my fingers, savoring their softness. The tiny little hairs reminded me of peach fuzz. I was smitten and more in love with life than I’d ever been.

“Do you need help with those?” I turned to see my mother smiling at me as she makes her way into the kitchen. “Oh, no thanks, Mom.” I turn and start pulling the rest of the peaches from the bag.

“Mmm, those look good. Your Grandma would be proud.”
She’s next to me now, reaching into the bag to help even though I told her I didn’t need it.

My Grandmother’s peach pies were a staple during the summers we spent here when I was growing up. After she died, it was Mom who insisted we keep making them every summer.

“Everyone loves them—we can’t let tradition die!” she’d say. But I think it was really her way of keeping my grandma alive.
Sometimes, I’d hear her talking to her, like she was still right there in the kitchen beside her.

Grandma passed a few years ago. Though she was in her eighties, it had still come as a shock. My grandma was in good health for her age. She went on daily walks, volunteered at the local food shelter, and met up with her neighbor to play pinochle. I had just dropped the kids off at school when I got the call.

“Jess?” The shake in my mom’s voice told me immediately that something was wrong.
“Mom? Is everything ok?”
“It’s Grandma, honey. She’s had a stroke.”
“Oh my God, Mom! Is she ok?”
“Well,” she paused, “We don’t really know. They rushed her to the hospital in an ambulance. She’s there now, but she’s in a coma.”

I panicked. Not Grandma! She’s too young, too healthy. This can’t be happening.

Somehow, I drove home. Mom told me to wait until she called with more news, so I paced around the house in a daze. When she finally did, there wasn’t much more to know. She had the stroke while at the food shelter and someone called an ambulance. When the paramedics arrived, they were able to stabilize her, but she didn’t regain consciousness. The doctor said that while this was common, there was no way to know if or when she’d wake up. But due to her age, it didn’t look good.

I visited Grandma in the hospital every day until the end came. She never did wake up. The doctors and nurses were kind and gave us the time and space we needed to process the inevitable. We knew Grandma would want us to let her go if it came to this. But even knowing that didn’t make it any easier. When a week passed with no change, we had to face the truth—she wasn’t going to wake up.

The day before we said goodbye, I asked if I could have a moment alone with her—just once more.

I sat beside her bed late into the evening. She looked so peaceful lying there in the glow of the bedside lamp. I took one of her hands and gently stroked it. Her skin was so soft. I traced the large veins that pushed up from under her skin. So delicate.
I couldn’t stop the tears rolling down my cheeks or hold in the sobs any longer.

“My grandma. I’m not ready to let you go.”

I cradled her hand against my wet cheek, squeezing it and kissing it.

“Please wake up. Please, Grandma. Please…” I begged in vain, willing her to move, to give a sign she was still in there. My heart ached. I couldn’t imagine a world without her.

As another transition unfolded before me, the foundations of my world shifted once again.

Eventually my tears slowed. I grabbed a tissue from the bedside table and blew my nose. I kissed her hand one last time and cradled it against my cheek. So soft and smooth, like the peaches she’d use for making pies at the summer house.

I shook my head, pulling myself out of the memory and back into the kitchen. A few tears had escaped, and I swiped them away. What is with me today? I picked up one of the peaches and breathed in its summery scent once more. So many big memories packed into such a tiny fruit.

I looked out the window then to see my mom with a giant nerf gun in her hand lost in a dart war with my two younger kids. I put the grocery bags away quickly and hurried outside to join them.

Breakfast could wait a few more minutes and tonight, we’d bake peach pie.

But for now—we’d play.