CABERNET ZIN (Cabernet Zin Wine Country)

by J Gordon Smith

She saw Zack’s recently trimmed dark hair and how it framed his field-tanned face. A sharply handsome face. His blue eyes met hers. Claire’s stomach twisted and creaked like new rope, still unsure what she might say, but his eyes made her body vibrate as if she balanced on a guitar string. She said, “Hi, I wondered if you might give another winery tour?”

  Zack said, “Only special-occasion vineyard tours, but always exceptions.”

  “I’m not sure you remember me from January?”

  He smiled, “How could I not remember you?”

  Claire loved the sound of his voice. She could get lost in that tone. “My friend and I –” she turned and saw Leiko watching her from the window, making scooting movements with her hand to get back to Zack. “We came over so Leiko could get more wine and she saw you here.”

  “That’s a great friend.”

  “We’ve been friends for a long time.” Claire asked, “You were at the investor meeting but I heard you are working here too?”

  “Some of the investors are working at the winery. We’re filling in. Sometimes I don’t think we accomplish much but we get things done that need doing. Every bit helps push the business toward success. How about you? What are you doing these days?”

  “Started working in Internet retail.”

  “That could be busy. You probably are good friends with all the shipping guys.”

  “It’s not too bad.” Claire dug in her purse. “Here is my business card with my phone number. Do you have a card?”

  Zack reached for his wallet and pulled one of his cards, caught in the card exchange habit before thinking, and then he pinched the card. Claire tugged it from his fingers. Zack sighed and said, “You should know, I’m married.”

  Claire’s shoulders drooped, “You are?” Is that why I find you so charming and desirable? “You’re married?” I knew you were too good to be true.

  “I hope you know just how hard that is for me to say. A beautiful woman pulled the courage together to talk with me. It’s hard to get that kind of bravery, terrifying in fact, like storming a bunker in flip-flops. I’ve been trampled plenty of times revealing such interest – so I know. I should have told you before but you burn away my baggage with your beauty and you make me forget any manners.”

  Claire sniffed, “How about dinner? Dinner can’t get you in too much trouble, right? I can’t imagine if you don’t live out here normally that you have too much in the evenings to keep you busy, right?”

  “Yes it could, but … Ok. My next trip back here to the winery. I have an all-evening conference call in a little while with Detroit, Mexico, and China to help them resolve manufacturing glitches, which booked over top of my planting the section of the back vineyard with Zinfandel. Tomorrow morning I fly home.”

  Claire brought her face up, “Where’s your ring?”

  “I started taking it off when I worked on the car, not wanting to scratch it nor get it smashed on my hand. I’d forget to put it on. Then later it just became weird to wear. So I stopped.” He didn’t add that he only wore the ring when Lydia and he were happy. As the sadness and distance stripped them apart, the ring began to sit more and more alone on the bedroom dresser. He first wondered if Lydia might ever notice his reason, but she never did. Her anger and annoyance of everything blocked out any such subtleties in their relationship.

  Claire pressed the heel of her hand against her eye; she feared tears prickling her nose. She was glad he told her and somehow under that emotion and pain she found his honesty made her want him more. She moved to the edge of the railing next to him and looked over the vineyard, blinking against the breeze and hoping her eyes dried before Zack saw.

  Zack gazed from her face to her hair wispy in the breeze, waving to the vines running away from them in all directions as if she were the center of the world. He saw her sadness and it crushed his heart. He said, “Many people love the city so much because they get energized by it. I look over the vineyards and see how simultaneously organized they are as well as organic. They give me energy. I’m not sure why. The vines look dormant now but they are charging their roots and bubbling with buds just under the surface. They expect spring any day with just enough sunlight splashing across their bare arms; their buds will burst and sprout lush new leaves. Soon flowers will set and fruit. They wait now. Look across the field, do you feel the calmness?”

  “Yes. I see –” Claire saw her hand rise on its own from the railing and touch the side of Zack’s face. His beard unshaven since the prior morning felt gritty and warm under her fingertips. The heat of his neck. She leaned toward him, her lips melting against his.

  Zack’s startled lips stayed firm as his eyes searched her face. His loyalty to Lydia stabbed at his mind. The scent of Claire, from her cologne to her shampoo to just her being, her presence – enveloped him. He succumbed and softened into her; his arm pulled her against his body. A too brief of a moment. They pulled apart. Their hearts pounding and breaths as fast as if they stopped a sprint.

  “– Sorry,” Claire said, putting fingers to her lips that burned with fire, hot with desire, and longing. Her body clenched with need. She turned away to look over the vineyard.

  Zack squeezed the railing, his hands turning a tense white. He wanted her more than he could say. “No – don’t be sorry. I leaned in too. I shouldn’t have.”

  “We know it was all me.”

  “But I couldn’t let you go.” Zack felt as if something unlocked in his chest that he could not close again. Maybe he didn’t want it locked fast? Freedom from shackles, the prisoner sees the warm light outside the razor wire. Maybe he could never lock it away. Could he bar this woman from his mind? From his heart?

  “I should go,” Claire said, glancing at how Zack gripped the rail as if letting go would cause him to fall from a precipice. She spun away from him.

  Zack said, “Wait. When I get back out here, we should talk. So I’ll give you a call? Or you give me one?”

  Claire nodded and broke from her pause, fleeing to the winery and the car.

  Leiko was hopping in her shoes, a smile wrapping all the way around her head. Claire grabbed her hand and yanked, “We’re going.”

  “But what about –”

  “In the car.”

  Claire would have sprinted back to the car. She didn’t know what to do. Her chest burst with something and her head ached. When she pushed through the tall glass doors and the breeze brushed her eyelashes she couldn’t stop the tears from flooding her eyes. Her walk became faster and then almost a blurry run as she reached the car. She jerked on the door handle and collapsed in the seat burying her face in her hands.

  “What happened?” Leiko asked when she sat in the seat. “I saw you kiss him. Why aren’t you happy?”

  “He’s married.” She brushed the tears from her eyes and started the car. Why was she so pathetic to be that attracted to him?

  “What kind of shit is that?” Leiko looked across the hood of the car at the winery and the vineyard surrounding them like a bristle-filled fortified hedge, “You want me to drive?”

  Claire shook her head. She backed out of the parking space and drove from the lot, along the road, and back home.

  “Zack! There you are.”

  Zack loosened his fingers from the rail and turned at the winery manager’s voice. His fingers still curled so tight he was not sure how long it would take before he could straighten them again. “What’s up?”

  “I wanted to let you know I’ve had all the other investors, that have been out for any reason, taste your blend and they love it. It got the highest rating among all the investor-made blends including the two fancy consulting wine makers we brought in.”

  “That’s nice to hear. Thanks.”

  “We need to get those batches bottled so I had a call with the management council. We’ve unanimously agreed to blend all the wine into your blend.”

  “Are you sure? All of it? That’s a big decision. I’d say hold back a few barrels as pure varietals –
they are nice on their own.”

  “We also market tested to winery guests plus a special shipment to the wine-club members using those little half-size bottles. Written comments we tallied show an all around great performance.”

  Rutger walked over, “Zack, did Martin tell you we have pre-orders? What a business to be in.”

  Martin said, walking back to the winery office, “I’m shipping a case home to you, I know you can’t take them on the plane.”

  “Great job.” Rutger added a wink, “Old chap.” He went back in.

  Zack finished his cola and picked up his gloves to return to the field. He walked through the winery to the path he would follow across the property.

  “Hey, Zack!” called Jacob Winters. Zack waited while he jogged over to catch up. “I tasted Zack’s Blend. Just amazing.”

  “The magic is in the grapes.”

  “No. None of the other best options could compare. Who could guess that taking phenomenal grapes, because the base wines are really good, and mixing them together could come up with such magic?”

  Zack looked around to make sure no one lingered within hearing distance, “You still want to sell?”

  “No. I think I should stick to this and see how this wine does. My wife and I agreed we are going to continue betting on the future. Thanks, Zack.”

  Chapter 7

  “Go somewhere else to chew – this is my time to relax.”

  Zack swallowed his mouthful of cereal, “I thought I might sit on the couch and watch this mindless morning show with you since we haven’t seen each other all week.”

  “Why don’t you sit in the kitchen until you’re finished?”

  “Why so grouchy?”

  “Because you know how those kinds of noises bug me. We’ve talked about it before. Why can’t you seem to remember it? And I’m working all the time and you seem to be either jetting off to play at a winery or home goofing off all day.”

  Zack set his unfinished bowl on the end-table, “Why do you think I goof off?”

  “I don’t see you doing anything.”

  “That’s the measure? Are you short of laundered socks or something? You see me when you get home and I’m tired too, taking care of my work and the kids, the house, the landscaping, the cars. You don’t see anyone doing anything except those at your job, so what’s the deal? You have to have eyes on everyone all the time or you think they are goofing off?”

  “I keep close tabs on all the people in my department.”

  “You do know they resent you for such micromanaging? I’ve worked for and been that boss before – it fails in the long run.”

  “You don’t know what my job is like.”

  “I’ve spent time in and around corporations both larger and smaller than yours. I’ve found the supervisors most critical of how their team spent their time, the ones that worried the most – those supervisors were more likely screwing around themselves. They knew the fine art of goofing off since they had perfected it so well they could do it and still advance in the organization. That knowledge led them to be suspicious of everyone else. Then they forget the employee working on their own time nights or weekends, sometimes taking calls at midnight from clients.”

  “That’s not how it is.”

  “Yes it is. People are people and all companies are filled with managers that range from amazing to amazingly dysfunctional.”

  “I don’t know. Just don’t annoy me with chewing noises.”

  “Like you did with that bag of chips last night?” Zack pointed at the ravaged and empty chip bag sitting on the other end table, it’s mouth open and hollow after spewing vomit all night from its abused and post-party crumple.

  “Why do you spin every argument around to make it about you?”

  “Because you blow up every little irritation into aggravated arguments.”

  “You are impossible.”

  “I’m going outside.” Zack scooped up his cereal and finished it in the kitchen. He grabbed his hat and coat while shoving his feet into his boots. He went out to the shed.

  The shed door creaked open. Zack ducked his head and fished in the corner next to the lawn tractor for the post hole digger. He tossed it out the shed door. Then thought he should have leaned it against the door jamb. He was angry. Lydia got in those arguments with him and she seemed fine within ten minutes of venting while that argument swirled in his head for hours. Maybe doing this job might distract him into a better mood. Why does she get to me like that? He found the spool of galvanized wire. Zack shook out the dirty debris from the five gallon bucket and wiped out the spider webs filling its open top. He put in the fence tool, hammer, small crowbar, and other hardware he expected to use. He sloshed across the soggy ground to the side yard and pulled up the little stake he had put down last fall as his row marker. He gripped the two arms of the post hole digger, raised it up, and slammed it down at the ground. The steel shells sunk into the soil, crackling as the slushy ice still hiding below the surface fractured. He pulled the handles apart cradling the soft earth. He rotated and clanked the digger down so the soil spilled out. Then he raised and thrust the digger again into the soil. He repeated thrusting the shovel into the world.

  He took his tape measure from the bucket and extended it down the hole showing two inches deeper than the frost line would reach in Michigan. He walked back to the side of the shed and, using his pocket knife, cut through the banding. The posts relaxed and Zack pulled the first one from the stack. He thrust the pole into the ground then packed dirt around it until it held firm. He used his level and pushed the pole from each side until the post was straight with the world. Then he packed dirt in tight.

  “What are you doing?” Lydia startled Zack. She had Zack’s good wing-tip dress-shoes banging around on her bare feet and held her coat around her like a blanket held closed in the front only because her arms crossed over her chest.

  “I’m putting the posts in the ground for my vineyard.”

  “You’re putting a vineyard in here?” She waved an arm across the yard, “We have to talk about these things.”

  “I told you I ordered a few plants. They are getting delivered in a two weeks.”

  “How much money did you spend on all this?”

  Zack saw the kids coming from the house through the open garage door. He saw their cars sitting in the garage. “How much do we spend on that car of yours compared to mine?”

  “I need that for my job.”

  “You don’t need it. You wanted it.”

  “I have to keep certain appearances for my level of accomplishment in the company.”

  “Like wearing my shoes into the yard? Getting my good shoes all muddy?”

  Lydia turned, “I’m not sure what to do,” she waved her hands free in the air and stomped back to the house.

  “Daddy, can we help?”

  “Sure Noah.”

  “I have your shovel!” Grace said as she dragged it farther across the lawn. She raised it and struck it into the ground as she had seen her father from the window. Zack went to the next marker and started cutting the hole with a second regular round-nosed long-handled shovel. Grace dropped the heavy post-hole digger and ran back.

  “Dad! Let me use that one! It digs really well!”

  “Seems like it digs quick doesn’t it?” Zack smiled, “Dig this hole I started here.”

  “What can I do?” Noah asked, hopping on his toes.

  “We’ll need this second post in the ground and then we can put wire between the posts. You can help with that. Wait here, I’ll get my book to show you.” Zack walked to the shed and back. He flipped the book until a page of the trellis system he planned showed up. “Here kids, see this picture? This is what I’m building.”

  “That looks nice. What plants are in the picture?”

  “Grapes.”

  “Like at the store? Big bunches of grapes I can take to school for lunch?”

  “No. Grapes with seeds that we crush into juice.”


  “Grape juice? I like grape juice.”

  “Stand back and I’ll finish putting this second post in the ground.” Zack set his book on the edge of the pail. “I think we have enough room I can put another post up there. Do you kids want to take turns digging with this shovel where that stake is?”

  “Yes!” Both children agreed and ran to the shovel jostling each other.

  Zack dug again into the soil. The children didn’t last long with the other shovel and ran around chasing each other. Zack had the second post in the ground and then the third. He called the children to help with the lowest trellis wire. “Ok kids; hold this wire here while I hammer in these fence staples. Yes, hold the wires like that. Perfect.” Zack left an extra tail on the wire so he could grip it later in the spring after the posts settled tighter in the ground. Behind him Zack heard, “Sorry Dad!”

  Zack turned and saw Grace leaning over a puddle in the lawn watching his book sink below the surface as it soaked up the water. Zack stepped over to the puddle and dragged the book out. Thoroughly soaked, he held it up to let it drain, and then draped it over the wire.

  “Sorry Dad!” Grace looked scared.

  “It’s fine Grace. I shouldn’t have left it there. I know you didn’t intend for that to happen.”

  Grace shook her head.

  “Here, why don’t you walk back with me to the shed and I’ll show you how we help it dry out? Each of you grab a shovel and I’ll get the rest of the tools with the bucket.” In the shed Zack fanned the book open with as many things as he could find. “I think we’ll save it, what do you kids think?”

  “That will work Dad,” Noah said.

  “Sorry Dad, it won’t look nice even after drying, will it?”

  “No, but it’s a book I have for the information. And we’ll keep that.”

  “Kids, do you want hot chocolate?” Lydia called out the back door.

  “Bye, Dad!” The children ran back to the house. Zack knew the scattered scene of hats and boots he would find when he returned to the house. Zack put his tools away and before he could get out of the shed Lydia was at the back door holding a wad of paper towels that could sop up a giant’s soup from his bowl before he could eat it.