Page 113 of Before We Say Goodbye
“Is it not?”
Her body slumped on an exhalation as she pointed and said, “There’s my bag.”
Otis was the only one who didn’t sleep that next weekend. “You don’t hear that?”
“The only reason I’m up is because you woke me. Let’s sleep in tomorrow. It’s Saturday.”
“I can’t. I have . . .”
She curled her naked body up next to him, her feet grazing his legs. “I dream of a day when we can lie in bed till noon on Saturdays.”
“Doing what?”
She pulled him close. “I could think of a few things.”
“A few? Oh, dear. But what about—”
“What? The vines and wines? Maybe I’ll ride into town tomorrow and find a rodeo man. I imagine he’d be happy to skip work and lie in bed with me all day.”
Otis gave her a loving squeeze and kissed the top of her head. “I recall a time in Germany when you said something similar. Yet it was a nice German man you wanted to find. I see things have barely changed.”
“I’m just a woman who wants to be satisfied.”
“Do I not satisfy you?”
“Very often you do. Not lately, though. I think Vance has all your attention.”
“Fair enough. I’ll try to forget Vance. Let’s lie in bed till noon and I’ll do nothing but satisfy you over and over. I’ll provide you with things not a handsome German nor a rodeo man could ever muster.”
“What would that be?”
“You’ll see. I will make orgasms like I make wine.”
Michael came home for the summer, and it was enough to keep Otis’s frustration with Vance at bay. UW had been good for him. If anything, his biggest fault was that he was like his father, always needing to do something, never sitting still. What Otis and Rebecca loved most was how his heart had grown even more. How many nineteen-year-olds were eager to ask questions of their parents? How many were eager to get back into the fields and work with their dad?
With the faint sound of Vance’s metal band creeping into the house one night, Otis asked, “What do they all do for work? Where do they come from? Where are their parents?”
“Dad,” Mike said, “I can barely hear them.”
“But they’re there, and just knowing they’re there is the problem.”
Rebecca and Mike looked at each other and shook their heads.Our Otis,they seemed to say.Always disturbed, forever pursuing the perfect vintage.
It was barely July when Mike met a kind young brunette named Emily, who worked as a nurse in Richland. He brought her over to dinner a few times, and Otis and Bec would let them enjoy a glass of wine. Emily would gush over the food, saying that she’d never had better in her life. Michael would spend most of the meal asking Otis not to embarrass him anymore.
Rebecca also did some connecting on the mountain. She developed a few friendships, joining several like-minded women on morning walks, sharing gardening and cooking tips, and likely expressing their never-ending frustrations with their husbands.
Meanwhile, Otis was trying to wrangle his vines. He constantly wondered what he’d gotten himself into. Sure it got cold at night, but those July days were a level of hot he’d never known. Those first two or three years, it was all about getting the new plantings to take root, which meant overwatering them. Not an easy task in the desert. His well water would drip out of the tubes and either dissipate in the heat or drain right through the silty soil.
August made July look like a cool winter month in San Francisco. There wasn’t a drop of humidity, such a far cry from the fog of the Bay Area. Otis’s skin flaked. Dust clung to everything, even the sheets.
Cam had come home for a visit, though, and that was far better than even a rainstorm. He adored his new job. A content smile nearly always graced his face. He was still as handsome as ever, long thick wavy hair and skin always brown from being outside.
At the moment, the boys had gone into town, and Otis had just wrapped up for the day. He found Rebecca on the back deck, stretched out on a lawn chair, reading. A slice of lemon floated in a tall glass of ice water on the small table beside her.
“How does anyone even survive in this heat?” Otis asked, wiping his dusty eyes. The lavender they’d planted was in full bloom and wafted off a lovely scent that Otis might have enjoyed had he not felt like an overcooked steak.
“At least there’s no humidity,” Bec said, setting down her book. “Kind of reminds me of that sauna we visited in Copenhagen.”
