The Winemaker's Wife

by Kristin Harmel

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  To Jason and Noah.

  You teach me again and again what love really is.

  It is not tolerable, it is not possible, that from so much death, so much sacrifice and ruin, so much heroism, a greater and better humanity shall not emerge.

  —General Charles de Gaulle, leader of the French Resistance, speaking about the impact of the Second World War

  one

  MAY 1940

  INÈS

  The road snaked over the lush vineyards of Champagne as Inès Chauveau sped southwest out of Reims, clouds of dust ballooning in the wake of her glossy black Citroën, wind whipping ferociously through her chestnut hair. It was May, and already the vines were awakening, their buds like tiny fists reaching for the sun. In weeks they would flower, and by September, their grapes—pale green Chardonnay, inky Pinot Meunier, blueberry-hued Pinot Noir—would be plump and bursting for the harvest.

  But would Inès still be here? Would any of them? A shiver ran through her as she braked to hug a curve, the engine growling in protest as she turned down the road that led home. Michel would tell her she was driving too quickly, too recklessly. But then, he was cautious about everything.

  In June, it would be a year since they’d married, and she couldn’t remember a day during that time that he hadn’t gently chided her about something. I’m simply looking out for you, Inès, he always said. That’s what a husband is supposed to do. Lately, nearly all his warnings had been about the Germans, who’d been lurking just on the other side of the impenetrable Maginot Line, the fortified border that protected France from the chaos besetting the rest of Europe. Those of us who were here for the Great War know to take them seriously, he said at least once a day, as if he hadn’t been just four years old when the final battle was waged.

  Of course Inès, younger than Michel by six years, hadn’t yet been born when the Germans finally withdrew from the Marne in 1918, after nearly obliterating the central city of Reims. But her father had told enough tales about the war—usually while drunk on brandy and pounding his fist against the table—that she knew to be wary.

  You can never trust the Huns! She could hear her father’s deep, gravelly voice in her ear now, though he’d been dead for years. They might play the role of France’s friend, but only fools would believe such a thing.

  Well, Inès was no fool. And this time, for once, she would bring the news that changed everything. She felt a small surge of triumph, but as she raced into Ville-Dommange, the silent, somber, seven-hundred-year-old Saint-Lié chapel that loomed over the small town seemed to taunt her for her pettiness. This wasn’t about who was wrong and who was right. This was about war. Death. The blood of young men already soaking the ground in the forests to the northeast. All the things her husband had predicted.

  She drove through the gates, braked hard in front of the grand two-story stone château, and leapt out, racing for the door that led down to the vast network of underground cellars. “Michel!” she called as she descended two stone steps at a time, the cool, damp air like a bucket of water to the face. “Michel!”

  Her voice echoed through the tangled maze of passageways, carved out of the earth three quarters of a century earlier by her husband’s eccentric great-grandfather. Thousands of champagne bottles rested on their sides there, a small fortune of bubbles waiting for their next act.

  “Inès?” Michel’s concerned voice wafted from somewhere deep within the cellars, and then she could hear footsteps coming closer until he rounded the corner ahead of her, followed by Theo Laurent, the Maison Chauveau’s chef de cave, the head winemaker. “My dear, what is it?” Michel asked as he rushed to her, putting his hands on her shoulders and studying her face. “Are you quite all right, Inès?”

  “No.” She hadn’t realized until then how breathless she was from the news and the drive and the rapid descent into the chill of the cellars. “No, Michel, I’m not all right at all.”

  “What’s happened?” Michel asked while Theo regarded her silently, his expression as impassive as always.

  “It has begun,” Inès managed to say. “The invasion, Michel. The Germans are coming!”

  A heavy silence hung in the damp air. How long would it be before the quiet of the cellars was punctured by the thud of goose-stepping boots overhead? Before everything they’d built was threatened, perhaps destroyed?

  “Well then,” Michel said at last. “I suppose it is time we finish hiding the champagne.”

  two

  JUNE 2019

  LIV

  Liv Kent’s left hand was naked. Or that’s how it felt, anyhow, each time she looked down and saw the empty space where her wedding ring had been for the past twelve years. And though she’d taken it off three months ago, five weeks after Eric had announced he was leaving and wanted the paperwork done as soon as possible, it still startled her sometimes, the absence of something she’d thought she would have forever. But then, there were a lot of things she’d thought she could count on.

  “Thanks for being cool about this,” Eric said as he carried the final cardboard box of their shared belongings into her small one-bedroom apartment, the one Liv had moved into after they’d separated. It felt strange to have him here, filling space that would never belong to him. Part of her wanted to scream at him to get out, but another piece of her, a piece she was utterly ashamed of, wanted to beg him to stay. The speed at which their marriage had disintegrated had left Liv feeling as if the ground had opened up beneath her.

  “Cool?” she repeated as he gazed around, taking in the apartment she’d filled with furniture they used to share. His eyes lingered on the distressed leather couch anchoring the room, and she wondered if he was thinking, as she suddenly was, of the day they’d bought it, the way they’d argued about the expense, the way they’d fallen onto its unforgiving cushions afterward to make up, sweaty and tangled up in each other. Then again, maybe he was just thinking that he was glad to have a fresh start, with none of the items they’d purchased together infringing on his new life.

  His eyes moved back to hers. “I just mean I know this hasn’t been easy.” He rearranged his features into a mask of somber sympathy, and Liv felt a spike of annoyance, which was better than the sadness that had been swirling through her like a storm since they’d officially signed their divorce papers that morning. “I really am sorry about the way things turned out, Liv, but we just wanted different things.”

  All Liv could manage was a noncommittal, “Mmmmm.”

  “I do want what’s best for you. You know that, right? I’ll always care about you.”

  “Just not as much as you care about yourself.” Liv couldn’t resist. “Or your new girlfriend.”

  Eric sighed. “Don’t be angry, Liv.” He set the cardboard box down on the floor and brushed his hands off. “I’d like to think that someday we might even be friends.”

  Liv snorted, and for a second, Eric’s sympathetic look slipped, and his forehead creased in annoyance, giving Liv a glimpse of the man she now knew lurked beneath the carefully curated exterior, the one who blamed her for everything that had gone wrong between them. Liv had wanted to have a baby, to build a family, and Eric had been seemingly happy to try. But then, after more than a year of disappointments, she had been di
agnosed with premature ovarian failure. They’d tried three rounds of in vitro using donor eggs before Eric had abruptly announced he was done—done with trying for a baby, done with trying to understand Liv’s sadness, done with their marriage. Of course, Liv later found out that by then he had already started dating a twenty-four-year-old named Anemone, one of the administrative assistants at the Bergman Restaurant Group, the company he managed. “Friends, huh?” Liv finally replied. “Sure. Maybe you and I and your girlfriend can set up a weekly dinner date. That sounds cozy.”

  “Liv, I know you’re angry. But this isn’t Anemone’s fault. You and I just outgrew each other. We weren’t meant to be together anymore.”

  “And you were meant to be with a millennial vegan whose hippie parents named her after a species of jellyfish?”

  “An anemone is actually a sea polyp,” Eric corrected without meeting her eyes. He shrugged with exaggerated helplessness. “What can I say, Liv? She gets me.”

  “What exactly does she get? That you’re a complete cliché? That you’re the walking embodiment of a midlife crisis? That someday, when Anemone becomes inconvenient for you, you’ll bail on her, too?”

  Eric sighed and Liv saw pity in his eyes, which made her feel even worse. “Liv, be honest. Did you even love me anymore by the time we split up?”

  She didn’t answer, because how could she explain that she would have loved him forever if he’d given her the chance? That was what you were supposed to do with the people you promised your life to. It was just that by the end, she hadn’t particularly liked him. But she’d been willing to work through it, to try to find her way back to who they’d once been. Her own parents had never gotten that chance; her father had died when Liv was just a baby, and her mother had flitted from relationship to relationship ever since. Liv had always vowed that her life would turn out differently. But maybe we were all doomed to repeat the mistakes of those who came before us, even if we knew better.

  The thing was, Eric was right. They didn’t belong together. Maybe they never had. And maybe going their separate ways was the best thing they could have done. But it still felt like he’d failed her when she needed him most.

  When the silence had dragged on for too long, Eric spoke again. “So what are you going to do now? Are you going to try to get back out there into the workforce? You know you can ask me for a letter of recommendation if you need one.”

  Liv bit her lip, hating him a little for the way he was looking at her, like she was pathetic. It had been his suggestion, a year ago, that she quit her job as the VP of marketing at Bergman, the place they’d met fifteen years earlier. They’d worked side by side for a decade and a half, him rising through the ranks in the finance department while she rose to the top of the marketing department. They had been the perfect power couple—until they weren’t.

  Look, if we’re doing in vitro for a third time, maybe you should just stay home and focus on that, he’d said last June. Besides, once we have the baby, you’ll want to take a leave of absence anyhow, right? She had reluctantly agreed, but she saw now that following his advice had been a mistake, that it had been the first step in him ushering her out the door of her own life. The result was that when the bottom had dropped out, she was left with nothing—no child, no husband, no job, no savings. She was utterly adrift. “I’ll figure it out,” she mumbled.

  “At least you’ve got your grandmother in the meantime.” Eric’s lips twitched. “I’m sure she’s helping you, right?”

  “She’s been generous,” Liv said stiffly. “I think she realizes she gave me some bad advice.” Grandma Edith—her father’s eccentric, wealthy mother, who lived in Paris—had been the one to insist on a prenup before Liv had married Eric, one that stipulated that if the marriage ended, neither was entitled to anything that originated with the other. It had obviously been intended to keep Eric from getting his hands on what would one day be Liv’s inheritance, but since Grandma Edith was still alive, and Eric was making mid–six figures while Liv was unemployed, the document now seemed like an insane mistake. At least Grandma Edith had offered to pay for Liv’s apartment while she figured out her life, but Liv felt guilty enough for taking the money without Eric rubbing it in.

  “And yet she was so sure of it at the time.” He chuckled. “Anyhow, Liv, I’ve got to get back to the office. But let me know if you need anything, all right? I guess I’ll see you around.”

  He didn’t wait for a reply. He left without a look back, and as Liv closed the door behind him, she had the sense she was finally shutting out the past and stepping into an uncertain future.

  • • •

  An hour later, Liv had finally worked up the courage to open the final box Eric had delivered. She felt as if she’d been punched in the gut when she sliced through the tape, lifted the flaps, and realized it contained their wedding album and two shoeboxes full of pictures from their life together, pictures that obviously meant nothing to Eric anymore. She flipped through the ones on top—honeymoon photos in which she and Eric held coconut drinks while standing on the beach in Maui, beaming at each other—before jamming them back into the box and backing away as if their mere proximity could wound her.

  There was a sharp rapping on the door, and Liv looked up. She wasn’t expecting anyone, and she’d only given her new address to a handful of people. Her sole friends during her marriage to Eric had been her coworkers at Bergman, and when she’d left her job last year, none of them had stayed in touch, which had only added to her feeling of being erased from her own life. Had Eric come back to discard another box of memories? She considered not answering, because she didn’t want to face him again, but then there was another knock, louder and more insistent this time.

  When she stood and peered out the peephole, she had to blink a few times to process what she was seeing. There, in the dimly lit hall, stood her ninety-nine-year-old, impossibly spry grandmother, white hair wound into a meticulous bun, gray tweed Chanel jacket perfectly tailored, black slacks impeccably cut. “Grandma Edith?” Liv asked in disbelief as she opened the door.

  The old woman pursed her lips, her penciled-in eyebrows knitting. “Honestly, Olivia, is that how you dress when I’m not here to supervise?” The dig sounded almost polite wrapped in Grandma Edith’s soft French accent. “Have I not taught you better than that?”

  “I, uh, wasn’t expecting you.” Liv looked down at the torn jeans and ratty sweatshirt she’d changed into after Eric had left, perfect clothes for moping in. “Should I have been expecting you?”

  “Well, I am here, am I not?”

  “But . . . what are you doing in New York?” When Liv had last spoken with her—three days earlier, when Grandma Edith called to crisply ask when the divorce would be final—there had been no talk of a transatlantic trip from Paris. Considering Grandma Edith’s age, a flight to New York should have merited at least a mention.

  “Well, I have come to get you, of course. Aren’t you going to invite me in? I’m dying for a martini. And do not dare tell me you are out of gin. I would have to disown you immediately.”

  “Um, no,” Liv said. “I have gin.” She stepped gingerly aside and watched as Grandma Edith swept past her. She wondered fleetingly why they never hugged like normal people did.

  “D’accord. Have you any blue cheese olives on hand?” Grandma Edith asked over her shoulder as Liv followed her in and shut the door. It was then that Liv realized Grandma Edith didn’t have anything with her aside from her familiar Kelly bag.

  “Where’s your luggage, Grandma Edith?”

  The older woman ignored her. “I would even take a garlic olive in a pinch.”

  “Um, I think I just have regular ones.”

  Grandma Edith harrumphed but seemed to accept this as she settled onto Liv’s living room couch.

  Liv was silent as she prepared her grandmother’s drink, a task that had been hers from the time she was nine. A healthy dose of gin, a splash of dry vermouth, a few drops of olive juice, shaken wi
th ice, and then strained.

  “You really should chill the glass first, Olivia,” Grandma Edith said in lieu of a thank-you as Liv handed over her drink. “Aren’t you going to have one, too?”

  “It’s two in the afternoon, Grandma Edith. And I’m still trying to figure out what you’re doing here.”

  The older woman shook her head. “Honestly, need you be so uptight?” She took a long sip. “Very well. If you must know, I’m here because today’s the day you are officially free of that soul-sucking salaud. I hate to say I told you so, but . . .”

  “So you’ve come to gloat.”

  Grandma Edith took another swallow of her martini, and Liv noticed fleetingly that her grandmother’s hand was shaking. “I most certainly have not,” she said. “I have come to help you pack your bags.”

  “Pack my bags?”

  Grandma Edith sighed dramatically as she stood and beckoned Liv toward the bedroom. “Well, come on, then! We are already behind schedule.”

  “For what?”

  “For our flight.”

  Liv just stared at her.

  “Enough wallowing, now, Olivia. Our plane leaves in four and a half hours, and you know how security is at JFK.”

  “Grandma Edith, what on earth are you talking about?”

  “Try to keep up, dear.” Grandma Edith rolled her eyes and drained the rest of her martini. “We are going to Paris, of course.”

  three

  MAY 1940

  INÈS

  The cellars beneath the Chauveau property were dark, dank, humid. The arched brick walls, carved into soft chalk and limestone, held the wetness in, had done so since Michel’s great-grandfather had begun constructing them seven decades earlier, and because of that, they were the perfect place for champagne bottles to sleep on their way to becoming something great.