Eight Hundred Grapes (25 page)

“Where did you hear that?”

“I read it somewhere. That’s not the point.”

“What is?”

“Can you find out how she does it exactly? I love French fries and burgers.”

I tilted my head, looking at her. “Did you really drive all the way up here?”

“No. I flew and rented a car. For eight hundred dollars.”

“That is crazy.”

“For you, since you’re insisting on paying me back.”

I smiled. “You are amazing.”

She rolled her eyes. “Can we avoid going over the obvious? There is a time crunch. I have fifty minutes until I have to catch a flight back to Los Angeles.”

“You don’t want to stay for the harvest party?”

She cradled her stomach. “Sweetie, if I can’t drink, it may as well be the dentist.”

Suzannah and I walked through the vineyard. “So let’s start with what matters, okay?”

I nodded.

“What on earth are you wearing and why are you wearing it?”

I looked down at the jean shorts and peasant top I’d found in my closest, my hair in two loose buns. “This is how we dress in Sonoma County. It’s casual.”

She pointed at her own dress. “No, this is casual,” she said. “That is circa 1971. Pull it together!”

I smiled. “Working on it.”

“Good, because I have some advice for you, and it isn’t easy.”

“Okay.”

“I know I said you should marry Ben, but I thought about it and you shouldn’t marry Ben. You’re doing the right thing walking away.”

“What are you talking about?”

She linked her arm through mine. “I’m talking about how Charles
cheated on me in high school. I’m talking about how that was its own form of betrayal I had to get over.”

“But that was your evidence for why I should stay with Ben.”

“I know, which is my point. I could forgive Charles because I knew I never would have to compete for him, not really.” She shook her head. “I knew he really believes, as ridiculous as it is, that I’m the most beautiful woman in the world. That I’m his
have-to-have
.”

She paused.

“I don’t think Ben is yours.”

That stopped me. “Why not?”

She squeezed my arm tighter. “I always thought Ben got you, that you guys got each other. That’s why I’ve given him so much latitude with all of this, but . . I think if you came to that same conclusion, you’d know that you want to stay with Ben.”

“I do.”

“What do you mean you do?” she said.

“We’re working things out.”

She stopped walking. “What are you talking about, working things out?”

I shrugged, thinking about how to explain it to her, which was when she got there.

“He’s your
have-to-have
?” she said.

I smiled, thinking about how I trusted that he was again. I was letting go enough to do it, to try to be happy.

“So you’re all good?” she said.

“Well, apparently I’m throwing out these shorts, but yes.”

“Good,” she said. “That’s good.

She looked in the direction of her rental car, realizing something else. “I got on a plane and drove from San Francisco for nothing? You’re going to have to do a better job of keeping me posted.”

The Harvest Party

I
t made me happy and sad at once, looking down over the party.

From the upstairs bathroom, I could see people arriving, the bluegrass band playing them in. The tent was lit up with lanterns, tables inside lined with pizza and wine, gourmet pizza but pizza all the same—a tribute to the early harvest parties when that was all my parents could afford to serve. Tonight felt glamorous under the lanterns. Everyone was happy and excited to celebrate another harvest. My father’s last harvest. It looked, I imagined, how my wedding might.

Ben had left a note on the mirror, fogged into the glass.
COME DOWN SOON
.

I touched it with my hand. Then I checked out my reflection, smoothing down my purple dress, my hair pulled back off my face in a low ponytail. After the chaos of the last few days, I was surprised to find that it hadn’t taken me down. Maybe it was the break from the ninety-hour work weeks, but there was no denying it. I looked relaxed and happy.

I heard a soft knock and looked up to find my father standing in the bathroom doorway, looking handsome in his white button-down shirt and dark pants, holding out a sprig of lavender, like a bouquet.

“Here you go.”

I smiled. “That’s for me?”

He handed over the flower. “That’s for you,” he said. “If you’ll escort me downstairs.”

“I’d love that, but I should be asking you. How’re you doing?”

He put his arm in mine. “Better now.”

We headed downstairs and out onto the patio.

My father leaned in toward me as we headed into the tent. “A few days from now, I’ll be walking you into a different party here.”

My heart skipped a beat. “I guess you will.”

A waiter walked by and handed us each a glass of sparkling wine from his tray, the only sparkling wine my father would be serving tonight. It was from Louise and Gary’s small vineyard: a rosy, yummy mess of a California sparkling wine. Drier than it was sweet.

My father took one for me, one for himself, raising his glass in a toast.

“Thank you for trying to enjoin me. In an odd way, it’s the nicest thing anyone has done for me in a while.”

“You yelled at me, though.”

He tiled his glass, smiling. “Well. It’s also the meanest.”

But before he could clink our glasses, I saw my mother walking on the patio, Henry by her side. He wore a suit, looking—as much as I hated to admit it—somewhat dapper. My mother, meanwhile, looked beautiful in a long, yellow dress. She also looked overwhelmed—perhaps by having Henry by her side, perhaps by the party itself, which was especially big this year. Perhaps by looking for my father, who maybe wasn’t as okay with Henry being here as he might have suggested.

Then before my father could spot them, Gary and Louise walked up, Brian Queen behind them, and the three of them swept my father into the party. The beautiful party: tea lights and brown lanterns and flowers in jelly jars as far as the eye could see.

“I’ll be right back,” my father mouthed. “Is that okay?”

But he was already gone.

I closed my eyes, grateful for the opportunity to stay close to the tent’s entrance, no one inside feeling like someone I wanted to talk to: not Henry and my mother, not Margaret and Bobby standing next to each other by the bar, looking miserable. Margaret was in a white dress, Bobby was in his designer suit—a twin in each of their arms, like blockers. Bobby was talking to Nick Braeburn—my father’s California distributor—Margaret forcing a smile, looking down.

Then I saw them holed up at the far end of one of the farm tables, a box of crayons between them, large sheets of paper. Michelle and Maddie, coloring, Ben bending down beside them. It shocked me to see him with them. Even though I had wanted Michelle to come—to make a peace offering—it was different seeing her there with Ben. The two people who had made Maddie. Actually looking at them, together, it was a conversation I wasn’t ready for. Especially when I saw who was standing by them, blocking people from getting too near to them. Deputy Sheriff Ethan Tropper, in a pinstripe suit.

I turned quickly and ran, champagne first, into Jacob. He jumped back, the champagne spilling all over him.

“Hello to you too,” he said. He wasn’t wearing a sweater vest, but a sports coat and jeans, looking handsome, Lee by his side. She was wearing a slinky shirt, and one of those rings that was also a bracelet. A chain running the length of her hand, from her finger to her wrist, looking sexy.

Jacob used one hand to dry the champagne off his shirt, keeping the other hand wrapped around Lee’s waist.

“You could’ve just asked if I wanted a drink,” he said.

I was focused on Lee. She put her hand to her face, the chain shiny against her cheek.

“I know you,” she said. “How do I know you?” Her eyes got wide, making the connection. “We met yesterday at the Violet Café, didn’t we?”

Jacob looked back and forth between us. “You did?”

Lee nodded. “Yes. We met and I met her stepdaughter. Pancake girl, yes?” She pointed at Jacob with that chain. “You guys know each other?” she said.

“We don’t really,” I said.

Jacob shot me a look. “Georgia is Dan and Jen’s daughter.”

“Oh . . .” Lee said, confused. And I could see her mind going. Hadn’t she mentioned Jacob yesterday?

I gave her a smile. “I didn’t make the connection that you were Jacob’s fiancé.”

She smiled back, but there was an edge to it, as if she didn’t believe me. Which was fair—I had known who she was, I just hadn’t wanted to. “Well, you made it now,” Lee said.

Jacob took Lee’s hand, looking increasingly uncomfortable. “Lee and I are going to grab a drink,” Jacob said. “But I’m sure we’ll catch up with you later. Or during the announcement.”

“No,” Lee said, her voice a little forceful.

Jacob looked at her, confused. “Why not?”

“I’ll get us a drink,” she said. “You guys catch up.”

Jacob forced a smile, but Lee was already walking away from him. She was all legs and thin arms, glittering chain—a woman that you’d let leave you at the altar and then try to make things work with anyway.

Jacob turned to me. He turned to me and I could see him trying to decide what he wanted to yell about first.

“You filed an injunction against me?” he said. “You couldn’t be a bigger pain in my ass.”

“You weren’t giving me much of a choice, were you?”

He shook his head. “You’re making things difficult for your father here. No judge in his right mind is going to consider your case. You know that, right?”

I nodded, but a ruling wasn’t what I was after. If the board disliked the headache of a lawsuit enough, they would stop Jacob from moving forward. Jacob knew that, which was why it was confusing, the grin he was wearing.

“Why are you smiling like that?”

He shrugged. “I appreciate your desire,” he said. “Misplaced as it may be. I appreciate what you want to do for your family. Plus, you’re kind of glad that I came tonight, which is nice to see. Especially after what a dick I was. Sorry about that.”

“Really?”

“I’m a little sorry,” he said. He paused. “Were you spying on my girlfriend?”

“No. I like her. She’s lovely.”

“That’s not an answer. You were spying on my girlfriend. Why?”

“I don’t really know. Can we leave it at that?”

Jacob looked at me, really looked at me. “Okay,” he said.

Then he motioned to Michelle, the beautiful Michelle Carter. Ethan Tropper stood guard near her. Everyone was watching her every move and pretending they weren’t. The Sebastopol housewives whispered to one another as they checked out her shoes, her skin, her legs. A group of teenage boys walked back and forth past the table, trying to get up the nerve to ask her for an autograph, or maybe just to touch her hair and run away. Who could blame them? She was mesmerizing.

“I didn’t expect to see her here,” Jacob said.

“Please don’t say how pretty she is.”

“How about sexy?”

He smiled and so did I. I couldn’t help it.

“You decided that the way to go was to be a happy family?”

“I did.”

“I didn’t think you were going to do that.” He nodded approvingly. “That’s brave.”

Jacob looked back at Ben and Michelle, and I followed his eyes as Ben hugged their daughter, Michelle standing close by, smiling at him. They looked like they belonged together.

Jacob leaned in toward me. He leaned in closer, pushing my hair out of the way, holding the back of my neck.

“What if I told you that Michelle Carter has nothing on you?” Jacob whispered.

I leaned in closer to him. “I’d say you’re also the guy who predicted a rainstorm.”

When I arrived at the corner table, they were laughing. Maddie was working ferociously on her coloring book—on a large drawing of a purple Cookie Monster—Ben and Michelle watching her, joining in.

Ben looked up and saw me before Michelle or Maddie did. Then he made room for me beside himself.

“Pull up a crayon!” Ben said.

“No!” Michelle patted the seat beside her. “Come sit here.”