Imola (10 page)

“It’s nice to know where I fit on your priority list.”

She glanced over at him and accelerated into a turn. “Don’t get sensitive on me. You know you’re more than company.”

He turned until he felt slight pressure from the shoulder belt. “So how would you like to be stranded on a desert island? With me or with a top shelf Pinot Noir?”

Her right hand grappled air, then found his left knee. “Don’t ever give a single woman an either-or choice. You might not like the answer.” She exaggerated a grin with raised eyebrows, and brought her hand back to the wheel.

“Will they have Zinfandel? I like that one.” He leaned back into the car seat. “Donnie’s the one with the mouth for wine. If I want to perk him up, I just bring a bottle of Sebastiani Barbera. He says he prefers the Chianti types. I go for the whatever-they’re-serving types.”

“Do you want some lessons? They come with an overnight stay and some personalized attention.”

“I’ll have to make a drugstore run on the way home. I’m out of wetsuits.”

The car decelerated more than necessary for the slight bend in the road.

Jason noticed her knuckles go white on the steering wheel. “Anything wrong?”

April stared at the road. “You don’t need condoms.” Her eyes watered.

Her body language told him to just say okay, but the reporter in him kicked in. “You can’t have kids?”

Emotion drained from her face. “No. I can’t.”

“Sorry. You want to talk about it?”

“No.”

The next few minutes of silence ended with a noticeable acceleration of the BMW.

April leaned forward in her seat. “We’re around Forestville. Keep an eye out for the Blanchard Family Winery. It’s first on my list.” She glanced at a computer-generated map on the dash. “It should be right around here.”

They both said, “There,” at the same time as the billboard-sized sign came into view.

April turned onto the tree-and shrub-lined driveway and buzzed her window down. With a quick turn of her head, she launched a wad of gum from her mouth with a loud
ptoo
. She raised the window like nothing had happened.

“You chew a lot of gum.”

“Halitosis phobia. I’m afraid it’s untreatable. Probably a dopamine receptor problem.” She laughed alone.

Jason looked up at the rough-wood beams that crisscrossed the tasting room. Although he lived minutes from the wine country, this was his first tasting room experience. And his impression was mixed. Below the ceiling, the place looked like a fancy bar, clean to the point of sterility. But not really his kind of place. The dark plank paneling and crystal chandeliers dripped arrogance and artificial aristocracy, while the open beams and high-pitched roof countered with a sense of landed gentry. Perhaps the difference, heredity, came from the vines themselves. Either way, he felt the all-too-familiar modern reach for the yuppie checkbook.

Even though those around him swirled, swished, and spat, he gulped his wine in the hopes that April would speed through her sampling routine. No such luck. She was as meticulous as an obsessive-compulsive orb weaver spider, running through a series of facial expressions that would make Marcel Marceau envious. Twenty-five minutes seemed ten times that long, ticked monotonously by a grotesquely ornamented grandfather clock in the corner. The only thing he really liked was the smell, the scent of musky oak casks and in-progress fermentation.

The scent brought back a memory. He’d experimented with fermentation in his late teens, squeezing some of his mother’s backyard Concord grapes into mason jars and throwing in a little baker’s yeast. The initial smell permeated his bedroom closet, his fabric cologne for a few months of his senior year in high school. He managed to get a little alcohol out of the must, but it was barely palatable, even under the alcohol-any-way-you-could-get-it circumstances. Unfortunately, it had produced little more than a nasty headache.

Now, well past the magic of the twenty-first year, not much had changed for him. Wine still hadn’t climbed out of the lowest reaches of his alcohol list, and it still gave him a hellacious headache if he drank too much of it. He looked over at April but failed to get her attention. He wished he had some aspirin for a little preventive medication.

The box wasn’t full, so he didn’t have any trouble carrying it out to the BMW. “So how was it?”

April tapped the side of the box. “I don’t have a large collection, so you can tell by how much I buy. It has to be really good for me to buy any. The most I’ve ever bought is ten bottles. But usually, I don’t take more than five, like here. With this vintage, I’m prepared to get five from all of the wineries I visit, but I’m hoping for a ten or two before the day is out.”

With the spoils in the trunk, the BMW hummed into motion with April at the wheel.

“Their Zinfandel was good. Was that a good vintage?”

April shrugged. “According to my source, it was so-so. You won’t find the best Zins in the Russian River Valley, although some wineries contract with vineyards from other regions.” She chuckled. “Some fans claim that northern California Zins are like sex: the worst they’d ever had was wonderful. I think the nutty flavor forgives a lot.”

“How come they didn’t have White Zinfandel?”

Her look lowered the temperature in the car. “White Zinfandel was marketing genius and enological heresy: fast, mass production of a marginal wine that became trendy with the yuppie crowd. It’s barely aged. Might as well drink flavored malts.”

The temperature stabilized from the heat radiating from his face. “Where next?”

“Tedesco Vineyards. If we can find it. Then it’s off to Graton. There’s one winery there I want to taste. Then we loop around to Sebastopol and hit three or four places. That should do it for this afternoon.”

“That’s a lot of wine sipping. You worried about driving? I can be the designated driver.”

“No problem. I spit most of what I taste. Only swallow a little bit.”

He jabbed her in the ribs and laughed. “Pity.”

She veered so the right wheels left the pavement, bouncing the car. “Your mind goes in the gutter, so does the car.”

“Better go all the way off-road,” he said. “Wine hits me fast and hard.”

She glanced at his lap, yanked the wheels back onto the road, and pushed on the accelerator, lurching the car. “Let’s get to the next glass.”

About a quarter mile and the car slowed. April’s eyes were glued to the road but open wide, moist again. “Jason?”

His body shifted toward her. “Yes?”

Her mouth opened, but nothing came out.

He reached over and patted her right thigh.

A forced smile moved her lips. “I’m sorry. I wasn’t truthful before. I am capable of having children. I just choose not to. I’m on the pill. I’ve lied about it so much it just comes out, like it’s real.”

“Who would you have to lie to about being able to have kids?”

No words came through her moving lips.

Jason sat back in the seat. “If it’s none of my business, don’t worry about it. I’m not ready to have kids yet, either. Maybe I’ll mature enough by the time I hit forty.”

The sign for Tedesco Vineyards seemed to rescue her, although the relief was brief for Jason. Suddenly, he wanted to sample a few more wines—this time more for the side effects than for the tastes.

The afternoon dragged on, made more tolerable by April’s curious admission. A half-drunk reporter was still a reporter. And Jason’s skills were still sharp. Only his tact was blunted.

April grunted as she carried the box toward the back of the BMW.

“Why don’t you let me carry that for you?”

“It took five stops to find my ten-bottle Pinot. And you’re not very steady on your feet. For what I paid, I don’t want them dropped.”

Jason leaned close. “I’m feeling pretty good right now. And I noticed you stopped spitting two wineries ago. This time you asked for a second glass.”

“I was told that the best would be around Sebastopol, so I made the loop so we’d be here last. The information was accurate. One more stop to go, and I’m told this one is the best of the lot. No spitting that kind of quality.”

Jason leaned against the passenger door as April rearranged the boxes in the trunk. “I’ll sit the next one out. I’m beyond the point of taste discrimination. You could give me 7-Up and I’d have trouble telling it from champagne.”

She opened the door and slid into the driver’s seat. His second try caught the door handle, and he floppedinto the seat.

She helped him click his seat belt. “Don’t go to sleep on me, party boy. I’ll want to celebrate my acquisitions.”

“Some things are beyond mortal control.”

“Fast and hard, huh?”

She reached over and cupped his crotch, lightly massaging. “This help?”

“Heart rate’s up.” He straightened in his seat.

Her hand returned to the wheel. “Good. One more stop. I have to loop around the town. Shouldn’t take too long.”

The BMW sped out of the parking lot. His eyes closed two miles down the road.

“It was my father.” The words were loud.

Jason jumped. “What? What was your father?” He fisted his eyes.

“The person I’ve been lying to.”

It took a minute to play back the previous conversation and regain a mental focus. “Did he pressure you about grandkids?”

“It wasn’t that.”

The reporter resurfaced. “You just don’t want kids?”

Tears welled, this time cresting the levee. “Part of me does.”

“But part doesn’t. Why not?”

April pulled the BMW off the road onto a tamped dirt turnout and circled under a large oak tree. She loweredher window and cut the engine. It looked like she was fighting a lip quiver. Her head turned fast, startling him. “I’m afraid.”

“All women are a little afraid of pregnancy and childbirth. It’s normal.”

“That’s not my fear.” Her middle fingertips blotted the corners of her eyes. “I had a little brother.”

Had. A shiver penetrated his torso. “What happened to him?”

“He was born with a problem.” She looked him in the eyes. “Have you ever heard of microcephaly?”

He scanned his memory files. “No, but it must have something to do with a small head.”

“It’s a developmental problem. The head and brain don’t develop properly and, yes, they are undersized. In his case, there were severe mental and physical deficiencies.”

“Did he have a name?”

April’s hands shot to her face. “Oh, God.” Sobs accelerated to a bawl.

Jason unbuckled his seat belt and moved so his arms could surround her. She leaned her head onto his shoulder.

“I’m so sorry,” he said. “You don’t have to talk about it if it bothers you.” He hoped she’d go on.

Her head pulled away. “His name was Harry. Harold. Saying his name brings it all out of the abstract for me. It was so sad. He died when he was only four.”

He took a chance. “You seem to carry some guilt.”

“I was young. I didn’t deserve so much responsibility for him. Sometimes he was so cute, but most of the time he fought me. He had seizures and an uncontrollable temper. I guess I was glad when he died.”

“How old were you when he passed away?”

A heavy exhalation heaved her shoulders forward. She seemed to relax. “Seven.”