I feel like I’ve changed.
I’m not the same person I was a month ago, and I don’t know what to do with myself.
When I glance in the mirror, I still look the same. When I talk to the staff, I still sound the same. But when I stare out over the vineyard from the back porch, I don’t feel the same. The colors aren’t as bright, the wine isn’t as delicious, and I feel out of place.
Fuck me, I miss her.
Shelby drove away a little over two weeks ago, and every day still feels like the first day. I had been hoping she would be at the manor when Kyle and I returned from the hospital, but she wasn’t. What a debacle that was. Apparently, having one type of reaction doesn’t mean you’ll always have the same type reaction when stung, and now I’m extremely susceptible to anaphylaxis going forward. Thank goodness my mother had the foresight to have a bee kit, or that entire situation could have turned out so much worse, and thank goodness Shelby was there.
Shelby.
My heart dips as I think back to the moment of the beesting. I can see her sad eyes, the slight pout of her bottom lip that’s lost its smile for me, and the closure she was giving us as she squared her shoulders and turned away. I’m trying to give her some time, but with each passing day, I doubt a little more that she’s going to come back. I’ve sent her a few texts, which have gone unanswered. I’ve called both her cell phone and the restaurant, but she never responds. It’s as if she’s disappeared.
Swiveling around in my desk chair, I grab a hot boiled peanut and eat it without tasting it. Michelle made them and brought a bowl in. She’s been making my favorite foods and snacks and bringing them to my office. I guess it’s her way of apologizing, but it could also be because I haven’t left my office much or that she misses Shelby, too.
We all do.
The sky is darkening again. We had near perfect weather the entire time Shelby was here, and ever since she left, it’s been one storm after another. Currently, Kyle and I are tracking a storm cell that’s coming more from the north than the west. It does seem fitting that the day she left, she took the sun with her, but we could do without the rain. Overcast, yes, it matches my mood and I welcome it, but for the sake of this year’s harvest—enough is enough.
The door creaks open, and Kyle walks in. Without saying anything to each other, he sits in his usual spot across from me, grabs a peanut, and we stare at each other.
I don’t think he knows what to do with me, either.
“How are the vines?” I ask him.
He glances toward the white board and looks at the overall rainfall so far this season. We’re almost to the halfway mark of what’s desired, and there’s still three months to go.
“They’re fine. Soil is fine, too. At least this is happening now and not six weeks from now.” He leans forward in his chair, tosses the shell, and grabs another peanut.
“Agreed.” It’s all I offer. I know I should care more, this is my livelihood and my reputation, but I can’t find it in me today.
Resting his forearms on my desk, he studies me as he sorts through what he wants to say next.
“After this rain moves through, let’s do a little crop thinning.” His voice is low and calm. “It’ll get you out of here and keep you busy.”
Busy.
My brows drop down, wrinkling my forehead, and irritation leaks into my bloodstream. Does he not think I’ve been busy doing shit this entire time?
“Are you handling me now?” I ask through gritted teeth.
“Do I need to?” he fires back.
“No!”
Frustrated, I get up and start pacing around. I know I’m down. I know I could do more outside of my office, be more sociable toward my employees and our regular patrons, and I will, it’s just I’m disappointed with myself and confused by the loss of her.
How can one person alter me so drastically? I feel as if I’ve lost a part of myself. I ache for her, her laughter, smart wit, gracious heart and her shine. Why did I have to fall for her? Of all the girls who’ve crossed my path, why her?
Before her, my life was simple. It was me and the winery—the way I wanted it. And now, I don’t know.
Kyle’s expression wanes as he tracks me around the room. Sitting back in his chair, he crosses one ankle over his knee, and just waits patiently. He knows I’m having a hard time, even he feels the loss of her.
Sitting on the corner of my desk, I shake my head and stare at the floor.
“I keep asking myself, if I could go back and do the two weeks over again, would I do them differently? And I don’t think I would. From the night of the Feeding America event to the weeks that followed, I directed endless amounts of hate her way. I needed to be angry at someone, and she unknowingly became the target. I’ve been pissed off for so long, I didn’t even realize I was. The way Elaine ended things, and how that asshole critic and his shitty review left a taste so bad in my mouth I haven’t been able to see the forest for the trees. Then as fate would have it, she shows up at our door. I desperately wanted to be proven wrong. I wanted to believe she didn’t have that much power to influence the buying habits of so many, like that guy, but I wasn’t wrong. Her post affected us just like the four wilted grapes.”
“Yes, but it affected us for the better. There are always going to be articles, there will always be reviews. Some will be good and some will be bad, you’re never going to please everyone.”
“I know that, and I’m fine with it. I know who we are and how good our wines are, but this once, as we got closer to the end of the two weeks, I wanted to be wrong. I wanted to believe that she didn’t have the power to do what was done to us to someone else.”
“She’s not Elaine.”
“I know that.” My fingers grip the edge of the desk with tension.
“And she isn’t like that guy.”
“I know that too, but at the time, hearing what she said and seeing her with that guy, it felt too reminiscent of Elaine’s social climbing ways, and all critics were the same. Add in the fact that she works all the time, and it was the perfect storm.”
I release the desk and flex my hands. Hands that love the feel of her skin and hair.
“Then you should have stayed away from her. There’s a reason why people say you don’t mix business with pleasure.”
Pleasure I can handle. I think that’s been my track record for most of my adult life. What I felt with her, physically and emotionally, it went way beyond pleasure.
“You’re right. I should have stayed away, but I couldn’t. She . . . she’s just so . . .” I take a breath, trying to find the right words. “It was more than that, she was more than that, and you know it.”
He nods.
“I don’t think you were ever really testing her. The magazine hired her because of her knowledge in Southern foods and her popularity among foodies in the South. She wasn’t a random freelance hire. Look at her Instagram account, she has over a million followers. There was no way we weren’t going to have kickback from her post. This is why you set the plan in motion in the first place, are you forgetting that?”
“I haven’t forgotten, which is why I say I don’t think I would have done things differently. But what does that say about me? And I’m ashamed to admit I’ve looked at Starving for Southern and OBA’s Instagram pages way too much over the last few weeks. The amazing pictures of her food and the few shots of her at the restaurant, it makes me feel like I haven’t eaten in weeks, and I’m starving for it all.”
“I think you’re being too hard on yourself.”
“Am I? Because the only thing I know is I am no better than or different from the critic from last fall. Because she is a critic and words are her profession, I lumped her in with the rest of them. For months, I’ve been asking anyone and everyone to hear my side of the story, how we served the wrong wine, but at no time did I offer her the same courtesy. It didn’t even occur to me to go on to her blog and read what she has to say about the places she’s reviewing. In my head, I made her out to be a blood-sucking dream killer, when in reality she is the opposite.”
Getting up, I move back around the desk and drop into my chair. There’s a football on the floor, so I begin rolling under my foot back and forth.
“Okay, I’m not going to disagree with you there, but you can be different than him. It isn’t too late.”
I stop rolling the ball and eye him questioningly. How? It certainly feels too late.
Turning my head, I find the spot where she parked her car on day one. The ache and heaviness in my chest continues to grow, and I’m starting to think that maybe I’m one of those people where no matter what I do, or what decision I make, it’s going to be the wrong one.
One after another, some small and some large, incidents keep happening. I didn’t mean for the mix up in the tasting to occur, but it did and sales suffered. I didn’t mean for my plan to be mistaken for some sinister plot, I was trying to focus on what was important—the business. And I certainly didn’t mean to break her trust and hurt her, when in the end all I wanted was to love her.
Love her.
Turning to Kyle, I tell him the thing I desperately wish I had told her.
“I am in love with her.”
“I know,” he says, giving me a small sympathetic smile. “I’ve known since the day she arrived. Michelle, too. I tried to ignore it, keep my head in the game, but I knew.”
“Not true. I hated her then.”
“No, you didn’t.” He actually laughs at me.
“Yeah, I did,” I say more sternly.
“Zach, you’re one of the most laid-back people I know. It doesn’t matter what the situation is, you are known for being the calm, sensible one. You always act on logic and never emotions. That is until you found her standing in the tasting room.”
Thinking back to the Feeding America event, when I first saw her I felt like I had been struck with an electric rod. A zap of sorts that burned. Suddenly, I felt as if I wasn’t just meeting Lexi’s friend, I was meeting someone who was going to be so much more. Maybe I loved her in that first moment, maybe I just didn’t know how to recognize it, maybe that’s why I was so irrationally mad, but I do agree with Kyle, I have never acted like that before.
“So, how do I fix it?” I ask, hoping he has some advice for me.
“I don’t know.” He shrugs. “Grovel?”
“Grovel?” I chuckle. It occurs to me that this might be the first one in two weeks.
“Well, I happen to know when you want something bad enough you’re great at putting together a plan and executing it.” He grins and the tightness consuming me loosens a little.
“Yeah, you might be right.”