Fifty-six
“Your daughter has lost her mind,” Leonard said, bursting into the kitchen. “She’s out there telling people to expect a Hollander rosé next spring.”
Vivian and Peternelle were in the midst of trimming a bunch of bright pink ranunculus. The round, tightly petaled blossoms were one of her favorites, but they didn’t seem to have much staying power. Peternelle had just been explaining to Vivian that the soft-stem flowers needed only a little bit of water in the vase, and that was why they weren’t lasting as long when Vivian prepared them herself.
Peternelle, sensing the incoming storm, made a hasty retreat, mumbled about forgetting something from the herb garden.
“Oh, you’ve scared her off,” Vivian said. “She was just explaining to me how I’m mistreating my poor ranunculus.”
“Did you hear what I said?”
“Yes, I heard you,” Vivian said. “And I have news for you: your son has also lost his mind; he broke off his engagement over all of this.”
“I don’t see what any of this has to do with his engagement. And frankly, it’s not our business. It’s bad enough you got involved dragging Steven out here.”
As far as she could tell, that was one of the few things she’d done right. She saw the spark back in Leah’s eyes with Steven by her side at the production meeting.
“Fine. It’s not our business. But what about us? Is our relationship going to end over this, too?”
“Don’t be dramatic, Vivian.”
“Well, then please stop giving me the cold shoulder. Move back into the bedroom.”
“You put me in a terrible position. You put us in a terrible position.”
“What if I didn’t put us in a terrible position? What if this prevented us from taking the easy way out, and although it’s going to be tougher in the short term, we’ll be thankful—”
“No,” Leonard said.
She moved closer to him, looking into his eyes.
“What’s one of the first things you taught me about the plants?”
“I’m in no mood for games, Vivian.”
She held on to his arm, keeping him from moving away. “That the vines that have to struggle for resources ultimately produce the best grapes.”
His eyes softened. “I remember the first time I brought you out here to see the property. Just the empty fields. It was fall, leaves covering the ground. You looked at me like I was crazy.”
“No I did not.”
He nodded sadly. “You did. And I told you, just you wait and see. You trusted me. You gave it a shot. And I let you down. We let each other down.”
She began to protest, to tell him that no one let anyone down—that their struggle, like that of the vines, could make them stronger. But he walked out as abruptly as he had swept in, leaving her alone.
Vivian filled a vase one-third of the way with water, arranging it with flowers. She hoped this bunch would survive.
The English department offices hummed with the particular energy of the first week of classes. Office hours were populated by students wholly optimistic about the start of their new school year. No one had yet failed an exam, or run late on a paper, or doubted that they would correct any bad habits from the previous semester. No one, it seemed, except for Sadie.
She climbed the stairs to the second floor, gulping the dregs from her nearly empty coffee cup. Dr. Moore’s office door was open.
A call came in from her mother before she settled into her seat. Sadie was already nervous and fumbling; she felt like her entire academic future rested on this meeting—which in a way it did. She sent the call to voicemail.
“Good morning, Sadie,” Dr. Moore said, smiling. She looked stylish as usual, dressed a burnt-orange-colored linen suit with chocolate brown oversize beads around her neck and gold hoop earrings. Sadie, in her baggy jeans and wrinkled V-neck, her unkempt hair pulled back with a bandana, felt like a slob. But the past week had been twenty-four/seven work mode. She didn’t have time to worry about what she looked like.
“So,” Dr. Moore said, flipping through the pages in front of her. “‘The Peak of Literary Camp: Judith Krantz, Jackie Collins, and the Blockbuster Novels of the 1980s.’”
Once Sadie had the idea, writing the paper had been like running downhill. For the first time since she’d begun this agonizing project a year earlier, it formulated in her mind faster than she could type it. But ultimately, all that mattered was Dr. Moore’s opinion.
“I know you struggled to get this off the ground. It’s counter-logical, but I do find that some of my most talented students hit a wall at some point as undergrads, whereas students who have always struggled have a more even-keeled academic experience when they get here.”
Oh, that didn’t sound good. Dr. Moore was trying to let her down easy—as if that were even remotely possible. The coffee churned in her stomach.
“You have a distinct voice, and that’s something that can’t be taught,” Dr. Moore said.
Sadie braced herself for the “but.”
“But with this paper,” Dr. Moore said, “you’ve gone beyond intelligence and voice. You’ve found a point of view.”
“Wait—you like it?”
“I think you’ve got an excellent thesis on your hands. Keep going.”
They were the words she’d wanted to hear for months. She was back on track. She could throw herself into her schoolwork: No writer’s block. No pesky relationship. Nothing but Susan Sontag, Jackie Collins, and Judith Krantz for the foreseeable future.
Her phone chirped with a text from her mother.
I’m calling you—please pick up. Need to talk.
She looked up at Dr. Moore. “Um, can you excuse me for a minute?”
She slipped out into the hall to answer.
“Mom, I’m in a meeting. What’s wrong?”
“Nothing’s wrong. But I do need some help. Can you come back to the winery?”
The sun set before dinner for the first time all season. Just one of the many signs that fall was right around the corner despite the fact that it was still close to ninety degrees out. Leah pulled her hair off her neck, into a ponytail, walking with Steven to the veranda.
He put his arm around her shoulder. “For the record, I think you’re on to something. And I’m behind you one hundred percent.”
Leah squeezed his hand.
She’d told him the idea that had come to her during the wine and cheese class. Now she was going to spring it on her father over dinner. In this setting, she would at least have her mother’s support, and maybe even Asher would chime in with some of his own. Leonard would be outnumbered—not that it had ever swayed him before. But at the same time, for too long, none of them had had the nerve to stand up for new ideas.
“Having you here has made all the difference,” she said. And it had: she was freed up to consider all of her options with the winery. She was able to take professional risks because she didn’t feel like she was taking a personal risk just being there. “So . . . thank you.”
He kissed her, and as they hurried on, she had a moment of déjà vu, back to the first night they showed up at the house for their vacation and rushed to the veranda. She felt a pang, a sort of nostalgia, for her innocence in that moment. She’d believed her family home and the winery would always be there for her, something she could take for granted. Yes, ignorance was bliss. But at least now, under the threat of losing it all, she’d made room for herself. She was taking ownership in a way she never could have if things were running smoothly. For all the cracks, they did create an opening.
Her parents and brother were already seated. Leah was happily surprised to see Bridget back by Asher’s side. Maybe that was at least one family issue resolved.
The table was dressed with a blue cotton runner and set with several vases of pink and blue ranunculus. Her mother wore a white sheath dress and pearls, a pink Hermès scarf perfectly picking up the accent of the flowers. If appearances were everything, her family wouldn’t have a care in the world.
“I just opened the Viognier,” Leonard said, filling glasses. “Would you like some?”
“Sure. Thanks, Dad,” said Leah.
Peternelle set out Boston lettuce salad with blanched, salted Marcona almonds. Leah wouldn’t be able to eat until she’d had her say. Leonard stood at the head of the table:
“Cheers, everyone.”
“Cheers,” Leah murmured in chorus with the rest of the family. Then she stood as well. “I’ve been thinking about the harvest . . .”
“Leah, it’s been a long week. I’d like to relax over dinner. No work talk,” Leonard said.
“Yes, let’s enjoy just being together as a family,” Vivian said.
Leah glanced at Steven, and he nodded her on. She took a sip of her wine, then continued. “You know, all these years of living in the city, one thing I still miss is the first day of harvest. The way the air smells. The way everything feels sort of electric—all that anticipation of the hard work ahead. And my favorite thing of all is the end of the first day, when it’s almost dusk and everyone gathers to add things to the freshly pressed Chardonnay juice.”
“Oh, we did that last year,” Bridget said, turning to Asher. “Remember I added that pebble from the dock where we met?”
“It’s a great tradition,” Leah said. “And I want to share it more widely.”
Leonard glared at her.
Vivian cleared her throat. “Leah, you heard what your father said.”
Leah shot her mother a look. What happened to her wanting Leah to help save the winery? What happened to her belief in her ideas? Maybe her primary concern now was simply saving her marriage, and that meant being Team Leonard no matter what.
“Yeah, just chill for once,” Asher said.
“‘Chill’? Oh, babe, that expression is so nineties,” Bridget said.
“Technically, it’s probably from the eighties,” Asher said.
Leah could see that there was no way anyone at the table was going to jump in to support her. She would have to switch gears.
“Well, as much as I’d love to ‘just chill,’ I wanted to make this suggestion while we’re all together. Since it seems that we’re in sort of uncharted territory here, I was wondering, Dad, if you’d let me host the Harvest Circle this year. I have some people I’d like to invite—just for the fun of it.”
“What people?” Leonard said. “The whole point of the Harvest Circle is that our employees who spend the fall harvesting the wine are included in a ceremonial way. It gets them emotionally invested. That’s the purpose.”
Exactly, Leah thought. So why not offer it to the people who will potentially be buying the wine? She wanted to reach out to every group of women who had visited the winery over the summer and invite them to bring something from their home or garden to contribute to the starter yeast for their first vintage of Hollander rosé. The wine would be for them, and in this small way, also by them. It would be truly theirs—something they might even care enough about to preorder. It was something businesspeople called “proof of concept,” and it might be just enough to convince her father not to give up. But that wasn’t something she could explain to him. It was something she just had to make happen.
“Look, I’m asking if I can run with it this year. It’s something I always dreamed of, and this is probably my last chance. It would mean a lot to me.”
“Are you including the employees?”
“I want it to be only women,” she said. “So no. Unless Peternelle wants to join in.” The employees might be upset to miss out on what might be the final Harvest Circle. But this was what she needed to do to make sure it wasn’t the last.
“This is crazy talk, Leah. The Harvest Circle isn’t for entertainment,” Leonard said.
“Leonard, with all due respect, she’s never asked you for anything since the day she left this winery. Can you just consider this?” Steven said.
This seemed to give Leonard pause. He turned to her. “Just a few friends?”
“Absolutely,” Leah said. “Just a few friends.”