St. Helena, Napa County, California
September 1999
CAMILLE WAS STILL AWAKE WHEN I returned home, sitting on my sofa, wrapped in one of my robes. Kieran was asleep on her chest, and a bud of annoyance flared through me—she never wanted to put him down, even though I made it clear he needed to get used to sleeping in his crib. I couldn’t hold him all the time the way she wanted to. Maybe it was less that I was annoyed, and more that I was jealous. Being with children brought out the best in Camille. Her tenderness, her joy. It brought out the worst in me. My impatience, my irritation.
I loved my sons. But I suspected that I was a better person when they weren’t around, and that they’d become better people without me. The thought used to storm my brain in the early years of my marriage. I imagined the horror David would feel if he knew what I was thinking. I pictured him leaving me, moving on with somebody who was a natural mother.
“What’s wrong?” Camille said as soon as I stepped into the kitchen. “Did it not go well?”
I couldn’t lie to Camille—she always knew when something was wrong. I didn’t even bother trying.
“It was fine, but… I did something stupid,” I mumbled, pulling a bottle of chardonnay out of the fridge—the same bottle I opened the last night I saw David. I was equal parts heady and humiliated. The kiss—the electric softness of it, the way it felt like taking my first breath after being starved for air—was blunted by what had come after it. And I couldn’t blame Emilia for rejecting me, especially after what had happened in college.
“What did you do?” Camille asked as I sat down beside her, handing her a glass of wine.
“I accidentally kissed Emilia. Except it wasn’t an accident. I wanted to kiss her. Not because I wanted revenge on David, but… because I just did. Maybe I have for a very long time.”
Camille nodded. “Oh,” was all she said, but she didn’t look the least bit surprised.
I realized in college that I was attracted to both men and women, but it was the one thing about myself that I’d never told David. I’d been honest with him when it came to everything else—including my parents, even though I was embarrassed by my dysfunctional family when his parents had been happily married for almost thirty years. I couldn’t bring myself to be totally open about my sexuality. Aside from Emilia, my friends were all straight, and I was scared I’d push David away if he knew I wasn’t.
Camille was the only person who knew what happened between Emilia and me the night before she left for Provence, when I’d gone to her dorm room to help her pack.
Emilia had opened a bottle of red wine—a malbec, she’d said—and we finished the entire thing as she tried on bell-sleeved blouses and corduroy miniskirts, deciding what to bring. We’d both been laughing when I flopped down on her bed beside her, and my hand automatically curled into hers, sadness suddenly unfurling in my chest. We’d been friends for two years; we’d been almost inseparable, and now she was leaving.
Maybe it was the wine, or maybe it was the flirtation that had always underscored our friendship. Or maybe it was the fact that she was leaving and this might be my only chance. Our heads were both on her pillow, and it was I who leaned in, I who kissed her first, the plushness of her mouth igniting my nerve endings. She kissed me back. I climbed on top of her, sucking in a breath, and let my hand rove up her shirt. But just as quickly as it began, I ended it. There was Provence: she was going, and I was not.
“I’m sorry,” I said, but I wasn’t.
“I’ll be back, you know,” she said, propping herself on her elbow. “This isn’t goodbye forever.”
A few weeks after she left, her absence a persistent knot in my stomach, I ran into David while I was out grabbing coffee. “Bev, right?” he said, later confessing that he hadn’t wanted to sound like he’d remembered more than just my first name, even though he’d been thinking about me. We ended up talking, which turned into a walk around campus, which turned into a late dinner. Emilia’s words echoed in my mind. I’ll be back, you know.
I convinced myself that what I felt for David was stronger. When I was with him, life felt safe and uncomplicated, like I could jump from any height and land softly.
David had made sense as a boyfriend, and I’d felt immensely lucky to have him. The physical attraction was immediate, and we shared an equal degree of emotional chemistry. His moods were stable. He had a plan for his future. We had entered each other’s lives at the exact right time. David had dated a few girls in college, but nothing serious; I’d dated a couple of guys, but had questioned everything after that night with Emilia in her dorm room. David almost felt like a sigh of relief. He had won my heart, yes, but also my lungs, and that was somehow more important. He made it easier to breathe.
David and I were asleep in bed together in my dorm room when the landline on my desk rang. It was two in the morning, and Emilia was on the other end, tinny and far away. She had been in Provence for three months, and I’d been hearing from her less and less.
“Bev?” she said. I hadn’t heard her voice in so long. My chest capsized. She was supposed to return in April.
“Hey,” I whispered.
It was the whisper that must have given me away. She knew I wasn’t alone.
“Look, Bev—I’m sorry for not saying anything sooner, but I really love it here. I’ve decided to stay. I’m going to put my degree on hold and work here for a bit. I’m learning so much, and just being immersed in everything—it’s truly a dream.”
“Wow,” I said, a lump in my throat. David stirred in my bed, his arm reaching for where my body should be.
“You could come, you know,” she said. “The school year is over soon. Why don’t you fly out here, and I’ll introduce you to my friends, and… I just think you’d love it here, Bev. All the art—it’s just so you.”
I squeezed my eyes shut, tears collecting in my lash line. Part of me wanted to be frivolous and impulsive, like Emilia. I could book a one-way ticket. I could choose to go. But I knew I wouldn’t. My parents wouldn’t approve, and I couldn’t afford the trip on my own, and most of all, because of the man quietly snoring on my pillow, his face bathed in moonlight. He had given me everything I wanted, and he deserved a girlfriend who did the same.
“I’m sorry—I can’t. I’m seeing someone… It’s serious.” I didn’t tell her it was David. She didn’t ask.
“Oh,” she said. The hurt in her voice pained me too. “That’s great. But… if you ever change your mind, I’ll be here,” she said, and those were the last words she spoke to me until three days ago in my tasting room.
“That’s it?” I said to Camille now, my pulse still racing. “You don’t have anything else to say about it? Just ‘Oh’?”
I could tell she wanted to roll her eyes. “Look, Bev. I just think you should be careful. You haven’t seen Emilia in, like, twenty years, and you have a family. This isn’t like you… I think you and David need to figure out what’s going on before you move on to someone else.”
“Well, he didn’t afford me the same courtesy,” I muttered.
“I know,” she said. “But that doesn’t make it right.” Her lips grazed the top of Kieran’s head. “And don’t take this the wrong way, but have you considered that part of this might be about punishing David?”
“No,” I said, even though I wasn’t so sure at all. Kieran burbled in Camille’s arms, stuffing his fingers in his mouth.
“He called here looking for you,” Camille said. “Tonight. I told him you were out. When I answered, he thought I was you. He sounded miserable.”
I pictured the scene—David in a dark hotel room, the phone cradled to his ear. I tried not to care, even though part of me was on autopilot, instinctively wanting to comfort him.
“What did he say?” I asked.
“Just that he’d try back again later,” she said.
I could picture what would have happened had I been home to answer the call. David would have pleaded with me not to hang up, to hear him out. His voice would have been thick with emotion. Bev, I screwed up, he’d say, a proclamation of his guilt. Things will change if you let me come home.
And if I relented—if I told him to come back—nothing would change. David’s indiscretion would be glossed over, and our marriage would be improved for a while, our issues invisible beneath the surface, buried far enough down that we could convince ourselves they didn’t exist. David would pull the same magic tricks he’d used with the school administration to make the problems go away, and sweep the evidence off our pristine floor.
Until another argument summoned them out of the depths. To keep the peace, I’d swallow my resentment until I was too heavy with it to move or fight back.
Camille’s face softened. “Look—if you and Emilia reconnect and decide you really want to pursue things, I’d fully support you, you know that. I know how much you cared about her. But you have to work through things with David first.”
“I know. And anyway, I doubt I’ll see her again.” A shiver crested my skin as I remembered the look on Emilia’s face, a mixture of longing and apology.
Camille stood up slowly. “I’ll go put Kieran down, okay? Then I think I’ll head to bed. Turns out this whole taking-care-of-babies thing is pretty tiring. They’re needy, huh?”
I smiled with a rush of gratitude that it wasn’t all as easy for her as she made it look. “Yeah, it’s not always what it’s cracked up to be.”
“Oh,” she said, pausing at the stairs. “I told Josh it was okay if he used my car to take Michelle out on a date. He was dressed in a button-down shirt and had some flowers for her—it was adorable.”
“That’s fine. Thanks for letting me know.” I normally would have smiled at the image, but it made me uneasy. Michelle, by the pond, talking about her future, so certain about where she fit in the world. So much like me at her age. Josh, never used to hearing the word no. I was afraid one of them would end up hurting the other, the way most teenage relationships played out, the love so intense that neither party saw the end coming. And Abby was in the back of my mind: Abby, who had changed everything for our family and who had been irrevocably changed by us. Not just changed, but broken.
I wouldn’t give Josh advice about Michelle. What had I said to him, when Abby hadn’t been at the house for a few days and I’d asked him how she was doing?
“She’s been busy,” he’d muttered, dropping his voice, a rare moment of vulnerability coming out. “Maybe too busy for me.”
“I’m sure that’s not true,” I’d said. “Can you do something to show her you care? You know her so well. Girls like it when you show them you’ve been paying attention.”
His eyes had lit up, a smile crawling across his face. “Maybe you’re right,” he’d said. “I know her so well.”
I shook off the memory, how his words had almost sounded like a threat. He had never indicated how close they were to the edge. Was it possible he had twisted my words into a weapon, or was it just another example of me saying the wrong thing at the wrong time?
“And one other thing—Kieran said mama.” Camille could barely suppress her grin. “I mean, he probably thought I was you… but I swear, my heart cracked in half.”
“That’s great,” I said, taking in her smile, which looked equal parts elated and guilty.
I watched her ascend the stairs with my sleeping baby, whose first word hadn’t even been directed at me. Camille had spent a lot of time with him over the past few days, more quality time than I had in weeks. Maybe he was just babbling and finding his voice, not assigning meaning to his words. Maybe he genuinely did think she was me. I waited to feel the gut punch of regret for not being there, but it never came. Instead, I felt happy for Camille. She had been talking to him nonstop. She had worked for it. She’d made Kieran the focal point of her days, and how many times had I thought of him as an obstacle instead?
When I was pregnant with Kieran, I did everything I could to get excited for a new baby, and sometimes it worked. David painted the nursery pale green and put the crib together himself. We’d chosen intentionally gender-neutral decor. I think it’s going to be a girl, he had said, because he thought we’d finally be having a daughter.
Thinking of that version of David—soft, excited, his eyes crinkling at the corners—weakened my resolve, and I fought the urge to find out what hotel he was at and tell him I was ready to talk, ready for him to come home. Maybe it would be for the best. We had so many memories between us from the past two decades: Who would gain custody of those, if we were to separate? Would everything we had built be for nothing?
But I had missed his call, and I convinced myself it was for a reason.
The landline rang just as I closed the fridge door, the sound of it making me jump. I raised the phone to my ear, pressing my hand into the counter, expecting it to be David calling back.
But it was Emilia on the other end.
“I’m sorry about tonight,” she said, her words coming out in a tumble. “I feel bad about where we left things. I didn’t mean to be so harsh.”
“Don’t worry about it.” I managed a small laugh. “I got caught up in the moment. You were right. It’s all too complicated.”
“Maybe,” she said.
I paused. “I should get going—”
“What would you say if I told you I was in your vineyard right now?” she said.
“What do you mean?” I held my breath in my throat like a bubble.
“I was thinking about when I left for Provence. How much I missed you. It’s totally insane, but I once considered getting on a plane to fly back and surprise you. What did I think was going to happen? Anyway, obviously I never did, but I always wondered—would it have changed things?”
“I don’t know,” I said, my mouth dry. I had imagined going to Provence and seeing Emilia, walking hand in hand with her as we explored cobbled streets. Sometimes I could have sworn I saw her in a crowd on campus, her blonde hair streaming down her back.
“I’m sick of wondering. I took a cab to your place, and I’m walking back by the pond. It smells amazing out here. I think the chardonnay grapes are ready to be picked.”
“I don’t know if they’re ripe yet,” I said.
“Maybe you should come outside and find out,” she said.
I sensed there was nothing left to say, only something left to do, a decision to make. I knew that if I did go outside, I’d be crossing a line I could never come back from. A line David had already blown past.
“I can’t,” I said.
The receiver trembled in my hands as I put it back in the cradle and drained the rest of my wineglass. Everything was moving in slow motion. I headed up the stairs but paused as a memory came flooding back: David shrugging into his oversize flannel jacket and heading out to tend to some business, forgetting to say goodbye. The same excitement he’d reserved for me, now given solely to our vineyard—or so I’d thought.
I rushed back down the stairs. Emilia was probably gone, but that didn’t stop me from slipping into my shoes and pulling the front door closed behind me, then breaking into a run when I reached the vines, their green tentacles stretching into the distance. David and I had broken the family we’d created, the one we’d sacrificed so much for. David wanted my forgiveness, my love, but I wasn’t sure I could give him either.
I didn’t see Emilia, but there were a few pickers who remained stationed at the vines, shearing the excess from the trellises. Their heads followed me as I ran down each aisle, as my legs burned with the exertion. Emilia was gone, and the moment had passed, almost like a dream.
But there she was, striding toward the pond with her shoes dangling from her fingertips, twilight fuzzing around the ends of her hair.
“You’re still here,” I said when I caught up with her.
“The grapes are ready,” she said, gesturing to one of the trellises. “Look at how perfect they are. This beautiful yellow green.”
“On this side,” I said, taking in the grapes, the swollen softness from the vines that had pumped them full of sugar, the process of veraison transforming them from the hard little berries they were less than two months ago. “These ones get the most sun.”
She closed the gap between us. Her hands were instantly all over me. On my face, in my hair, on my waist. And in the same spot where I’d taken Brix measurements two weeks ago with my husband, I sank to the ground with the woman who’d introduced us.
“Someone could see us,” I murmured, aware of the remaining pickers preparing the vines.
“Then we better be quiet,” she whispered, her lips soft against my clavicle.
It felt different but the same, kissing Emilia. But as she unwrapped my dress, my skin broke into goose bumps in the cool night air.
“I’ve never… with another woman,” I said. “You’re the only woman I’ve even kissed.” I didn’t tell her how often I’d thought about doing more with her, how I’d touched myself as I imagined it.
Emilia pulled back briefly, and I put her hand on my stomach, her finger just above my C-section scar, which was silvery and white. “I’ve thought about the night you kissed me so many times,” she said.
“Me too. It was the last time I felt that sure about anything.” It was a truth I was afraid to even admit to myself, and I didn’t allow it to linger long between us.
“We should—go somewhere before we get caught,” I said, my eyes searching out somewhere we could be alone. The barn near the edge of the property, the tall wooden structure where the boys sometimes hung out with their friends. “Follow me.”
She trailed behind me, and we both broke into a run. Suddenly, I felt as giddy as a teenager again, overrun with hormones and excitement. Maybe we were being watched, but in that moment, the anticipation was so intense that I didn’t care.
As soon as we were inside, Emilia’s hand snaked under my dress and up my legs, where her thumb pulsed against the outside of my underwear. I leaned back against a bale of hay and stared at the vaulted ceiling, then let my eyelids flutter shut as darkness pressed softly against them.
Emilia moved slowly. She pulled down my underwear gently and her fingers made contact with my skin and unfurled inside me. When I opened my eyes, I was brought back to my last conversation with David. The way he had yelled that he was never even allowed to touch me anymore.
I forced myself to stop thinking about David. I didn’t even think I was capable of being aroused like that, my body being played like an exquisite instrument. Emilia’s fingers worked faster and faster, her thumb rubbing against me, and when she brought her mouth down to meet her hand I caught fire, crying out.
I didn’t know how long we stayed there after, my body trembling. And I was desperate to touch her, to make her feel the way she’d made me feel, but a sound, a crackling from outside the barn, made me leap up.
“That was—” I started as I pulled my dress down, my legs still shaking.
“I know,” she said, preempting my sentence.
It all felt so reckless, letting my body govern my brain, and shame threatened to flood over me. But in the muted gray of the barn, Emilia’s own face looked peaceful, even though there was a hint of sadness in her dark eyes.
“I know this can’t go anywhere,” she said. “But maybe there’s a reason we met again, after all this time.”
I nodded, lacing my fingers through hers. I let myself believe what she did: that we were temporary. It was what I had told myself so many years ago, whenever the thought of her flared into my mind, disrupting the stability of my life. I had forced myself to believe it then, but I wasn’t so good at pretending anymore.