Wild Abandon

by Jeannine Colette

  I take my glass and do my perfect ritual for tasting, à la Big Ed. “It has good color.” I lift the glass to my nose. “Nice bold aromas of black cherries, mocha, tobacco.” I take a sip and swish it around my mouth for a second. “Full-bodied and expressive. Sweet tannin and a good underlying structure,” I add with a little affluence to my voice.

  Nate blinks at me a few times, his mouth open and brows crinkled. “Oh my God, that was so pretentious.”

  I let out a loud laugh. “I know. Aren’t I remarkable?”

  He laughs, and it makes my insides dance. His smile is large and bright, the chip of his lower tooth only adding to the charm. If I’m not mistaken, there is a little twinkle in my eye.

  “Where did you learn so much about wine?”

  “My boss. He’s this amazing man with a big, round belly and a cane and a pissed off attitude when you first meet him, but when you get to know him, he’s the most insightful, sweetest, and most endearing man you’ve ever met.” I gush and take a peek at the roses sitting on the table, so vibrant in an apartment devoid of color.

  Nate’s chest rises, and he offers me a closed mouth smile, lopsided and understanding. “You care about him deeply then?”

  “I do,” I say.

  Then, I tell Nate about Russet Ranch. I don’t leave out a thing. I tell him about the first day I went there and Ed’s ridiculous wine test and the reason he hired me. I tell him about the rose garden and my talks with Ed, everything I’ve learned. I tell him about the restoration of the ranch, every single detail. And Nate hangs on to every word. He asks questions and is genuinely interested.

  “Why are you doing this on your own? Did he say if he has family?”

  I swirl my fork around my pasta. “He has a daughter who lives in San Francisco, but I don’t think they have a good relationship. She is sick or troubled of some sort. At first, I thought drugs, but now, I’m not so sure. I don’t ask. It’s a sore subject for him.” I ponder for a moment. “I don’t know how anyone could stay away from there.”

  “Tell me about your family.” Nate snaps me out of my melancholy.

  I wipe my mouth with a cloth napkin, unsure of where to start. So, I tell him about my parents, “Well, their names are Georgie and Melanie. They met at a rally in college where they found a mutual love of saving the world.”

  I laugh to myself, thinking of how many protests my parents go to a year. They are like their own caped crusaders, saving the world one cause at a time. “My parents run a foundation for inner city youth. They didn’t think you could help inner city kids if you didn’t live in the city, so they moved to Manhattan at a time when people were fleeing. Crime was high, and drugs and homeless people were taking over the streets. I grew up on the Upper West Side, not far from Harlem. It was a good life. My brother and I spent our weekends in parks and at museums and shows. What we lacked in space, we gained in culture.”

  “They sound very admirable. Do your parents still live there?”

  “Oh, yes. They’ll never leave. People have offered them millions for their apartment, but they love where they are. They love what they do and the people they have surrounded themselves with.

  “My mom has become quite the pillar of the community. She makes speeches all over, advocating for inner city development. Over the last thirty years, she has accomplished so much. I can’t see what else she could possibly need to change. But she always finds something.

  “My parents care more about helping others than retiring in a sunny climate and playing golf all day. Anyway, the do-gooder gene skipped me.”

  “You have a lot of your parents in you.” Nate leans his arm on the table, his body closer to me.

  I look up at him in confusion. I am nothing like them.

  “Russet Ranch was your way of fighting for something that was once neglected. You helped an old man who couldn’t help himself.” His intense green eyes focus on mine, holding my attention.

  I want to argue with him, but he has so much conviction in his words that it’s hard to deny them.

  “And you worked for a music school that provided free music education to children. You could have worked anywhere, and I’m sure you could have made a lot more money elsewhere. But you chose to be there, helping the less fortunate.”

  I offer Nate a smile at his words. They are very sweet.

  My mom told me about the position at the Juliette Academy. I know I could have worked somewhere else, but I did like the idea of helping kids who wouldn’t have the opportunity if we weren’t there to provide it.

  “I often wonder if I’m flighty.” My admission is making my stomach rumble with unease. “I play the cello for a living but don’t take it as seriously as I should. I go on vacation by myself once a year. I date men but don’t stick around long enough to make a commitment. And when things weren’t going as planned, I quit my job and hopped on a plane to Napa on a whim.” Just saying the words out loud makes me sure I’m the flightiest person on the planet.

  Nate’s hand moves to my chin and pulls my attention back to him. His warm skin sends tingles across my jaw.

  “Hey, stop focusing on those things like they’re negatives. You’re an amazing musician who doesn’t need to make money. Traveling alone is amazing. You’re talking to someone who’s done it as well. You date because you haven’t met the right one. You only live once. Why waste it with the wrong person?”

  His recitation of my words to him the first time we met leads me to smile into his hand.

  “And moving here was bold. You needed to make a change. Some people sit in their lives, caged by the choices they made and the decisions someone else made for them. Hell, some people are trapped by fate.” His eyes skim his glass for a moment and then look back up. “Why don’t you focus on what you are committed to? What do you love?”

  What do I love? Nothing. So many things. Everything. “I love my family. And I love my friends.” It’s an easy first answer. People are the most valuable to me. This might be the first time I’m truly realizing it.

  “That’s all you need.” He releases his hold on me.

  As gentle as it was, I feel the weight of its loss. I reach my arm across the table and grab his hand.

  When Nate looks up at me, he lets out a deep sigh and starts to talk, “Crystal, you still haven’t told me how delicious my balls are.”

  Thank God I didn’t have anything in my mouth because I would have spit it out with the large gasp I just took. I start coughing, holding my chest, while Nate leans over, laughing and patting me on the back.

  He meant his meatballs.

  When I recover and wipe away the tears that formed in my eyes from coughing and laughing and then coughing some more, I take a bite of my meatball. And, yes, his balls are indeed delicious.

  We eat. We talk some more. We do that thing two people do when they are getting to know each other. We don’t do that thing where we just start listing our favorite movies and colors. We share experiences and discuss topics. A little religion, a little politics, a little pop culture. We agree on nothing yet see eye-to-eye on everything. Nate tells me more about the pub and some of the behind-the-scenes stories of Henley’s. I share tales of New York.

  I can’t believe the man I’m sitting with is the same man I met that first day at Henley’s.

  When the dishes are cleaned and put away, I look over at my phone and notice it is really late. “Thank you for dinner.” I grab my bag off the table.

  “You’re leaving?” Nate swings around from his spot at the counter. He’s about to open a second bottle of wine.

  “I have a forty-minute drive ahead of me. Any more wine, and I’ll be passing out on your couch. I have to pack to leave for Tahoe tomorrow.” I take a breath and try not to misinterpret the look of disappointment on his face.

  He puts the bottle and corkscrew down and nods his head in agreement. “Yeah. We wouldn’t want that. I’ll walk you out. Come on, Willie.” He puts a leash on Willie Mays, and the two walk me downstairs.r />
  “You’ll stop by the bar?” he asks as I’m unlocking my car.

  “I don’t have any dates lined up this week.” I haven’t been on a date, aside from Brent, in three weeks.

  “The Barge Poppers will be playing. I’d like to see you play with them again. Or you can just come by to say hi.”

  “I’ll do that. I’ll swing by when I’m back from Tahoe.” I open my door and am about to get in.

  “Have you ever been to San Francisco?” he asks quickly, making me to turn around and do a double take.

  “Why? You inviting me?” I kid.

  “Yes.”

  His answer surprises me.

  “Oh. Well, I’d love to go. We’ll plan it when I get back—”

  He puts his hand on the space in between me and the door. He’s so close. With his body cornering me into the doorframe, I have no choice but to turn into him and see his beautiful face and those damn mesmerizing eyes boring into me, so hard and determined yet frightened at the same time.

  “Tomorrow.”

  “Tomorrow?”

  “Yes.”

  He takes his thumb and gently pulls my bottom lip from between my teeth. I have to do everything I can not to reach out, grab his face, and put my lips where I really want them to go.

  He either really wants to take me to San Francisco, or he just doesn’t want me to go to Tahoe with Brent.

  Either way, I’m a fool and an idiot and everything in between because I breathe, “Okay.”

  Nate backs away from me and opens the door all the way, letting me in.

  When I’m buckled, he leans down, and I lower the window. “I’ll pick you up at noon.”

  I nod and swallow. Then, I drive away more excited than I’ve been in a long time, yet I’m also absolutely frightened at what this trip could mean for my heart.

  chapter SIXTEEN

  “More food? Where do you put it, woman?” Nate is being pulled by me toward a food vendor at Fisherman’s Wharf.

  So far, I’ve had a chowder bread bowl from Guardino’s, a seafood cocktail from the Crab Station, and crab from Sabella. Right now, I am eyeing up a lobster roll from Nick’s Lighthouse.

  When I was getting ready this morning, I realized I had no idea what to expect.

  He said we were going to San Francisco this weekend, but did he mean overnight? Where would we be sleeping? What should I pack? Would I look presumptuous if I packed a bag?

  So, I started to pack an overnight bag just in case. As I was staring at it, trying to decide if I forgot anything, Naomi walked in and threw a box of condoms on top of it.

  “What are those for?”

  “If you don’t know what those are for, then you’ve been out of commission way longer than I thought.”

  I threw the box back at her. “It’s not that kind of trip.”

  She threw them right back in my bag. “Better safe than sorry.”

  “We’re just friends,” I repeated for the umpteenth time in as many weeks.

  “No man drives forty minutes in the opposite direction to pick a woman up for a weekend getaway.” She zipped my bag. “And trust me, accidents happen. Beautiful accidents,” she added, “but they happen.”

  When Nate pulled up to the curb, I walked to the car and shrugged my shoulders at my bag. “I didn’t know if we were spending the night. Are we spending the night?”

  Nate opened his trunk and placed my bag next to his. “Yes, Crystal. We’re spending the night,” he said.

  My heart sped up.

  “I booked two rooms at the Radisson.”

  And my heart slowed down. Two rooms. That’s good. That’s what friends do. That’s normal.

  As nervous as I had been while waiting for Nate to arrive, I was still a little on the way to San Francisco. We fought over what music to listen to on the radio. He told me not to put my feet on the dash, but I did anyway, and when I told him I was pretty sure we were on a different road from the one Naomi had driven when she picked me up from the airport, he just grinned and confirmed we were taking the scenic route. When the Golden Gate Bridge peeked through the hills, I had to pinch myself to make sure I wasn’t seeing things.

  I beamed over at Nate, about to say something to the effect of how much I wanted to see the bridge, but from the smile on his face, I knew he had known this already and planned the detour just for me.

  Now, in New York City, we have bridges. Suspension bridges, retractable bridges. Bridges for pedestrians only and one that is a one way to a jail. Bridges that go over land and over water. Bridges that connect us to other states and one that spans across three boroughs. The Brooklyn Bridge alone is a piece of architectural history. People travel from all over the world just to see it. And, the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge is one of the longest suspension bridges in the world.

  I’ve seen my fair share of brick and mortar. But what I’ve never seen before is how the tips of the burnt-reddish towers peek out from behind a cliff, and as you round the bend of US 101, approaching the bridge, like a ghostly metal goddess, the towers appear—tall, large, and covered in low rolling fog. It looked like a painting of vermillion orange and dusty gray. The span is long, and the towers made me feel like I was approaching a secret gate to a beloved city.

  Instead of driving onto the bridge, Nate exited to the right and drove up a hill, causing me to hold on to the door handle at the increase in altitude.

  We passed various lookouts, Nate needing to drive higher. When we reached the peak, he parked the car, and we walked out to the edge of the cliff. We took a seat on a stone wall overlooking the San Francisco Bay and gazed at the most stunning bridge I’d ever seen.

  By the time we got back into the car, I was breathing peacefully. My calm in Nate’s company was back. I had been nervous that this trip would be laced with misinterpretation and innuendo. Instead, it was just two friends, seeing a beautiful city, one for the first time.

  “We need to ride a cable car!”

  “People who live in San Francisco don’t wait in this line.”

  “But we don’t live in San Francisco, so we have to ride a trolley. Let go of my arm.”

  Nate is pulling me away from the line where tourists pay to ride a cable car across town, away from Fisherman’s Wharf.

  “Lines are for tourists. There’s a stop up the road. We can hop on up there.” He starts walking, and I get distracted by the sign for a chocolate shop.

  “Ghirardelli!” I exclaim as I start running off in the opposite direction.

  “How can you still be hungry?”

  After stuffing my face and my pockets with enough chocolate to last me through next year, Nate asks if he can show me one of his favorite spots in the city.

  Of course, it’s a bar.

  He holds the door open for me as we walk into Buena Vista Cafe. The place is packed—or mobbed is more like it. Every table is filled, and every seat at the bar taken.

  With his hand on my lower back, I try to ignore that intimate move and allow him to guide me to the end of the incredibly long bar where two people are getting up. We each slide onto a stool, and Nate holds two fingers up in the air for the bartender.

  I tilt my head at him, but he puts his hand on my lower back, leans into me, and nudges his chin toward the bartender, urging me to watch.

  A white-jacketed bartender lines up a dozen tulip-shaped glasses along the long wooden bar. With a rapid movement that only comes from muscle memory and sheer consistency, he drops two white sugar cubes into each cup and then pours hot black coffee into each, a continuous stream pouring from the pot like a cascading waterfall, steam billowing out. With a rapid stir, he melts the sugar and scoops out some coffee from each glass, making sure they are all equal height. A dramatic pour from a bottle of Irish whiskey is served to each glass in the same manner as the coffee, and then whipped cream is ladled. The entire process is performed in under a minute.

  Two Irish coffees are placed in front of us, and Nate and I cheers.

  “To tryin
g new things,” Nate says.

  “To being wild,” I add. I take a drink of the most spectacular Irish coffee I have ever had in my life.

  Yesterday, a hot air balloon ride over Napa. Today, Irish coffee in San Francisco. That’s two new experiences in two days. I like this side of Nate.

  “Tell me again, why are you subjecting me to this torture?” I ask, panting.

  “You wanted to see Lombard Street.”

  I stop and massage my calf muscle that is cramping from the insane uphill climb we have embarked on.

  “I want to drive on it. Not get a cardio workout,” the words come out funny from my labored breath. Looking behind me, I see the slope of what we already climbed. Looking ahead, I see we still have another block to go. Hands now on my knees, I raise an arm up in the air. “Go on without me. Save yourself!”

  Nate looks back at me with a crooked grin. He takes a few steps back to where I’m standing, grabs my hand, turns around, and swings his other hand toward my left hip. “Come on, soldier. No man left behind.” He hoists me up onto his back.

  “I can’t even walk up this thing. You are not carrying me up the hill.”

  He lets go of my right hand, places both hands under my ass, and carries me up the damn hill.

  Lombard Street is as crooked as I’d thought it would be. We walk along the curvy road, in awe of the shape, fragrant gardens, beautiful views of the bay, and we adore the houses built along the road, wondering how on earth people could live here. For one, the tourist traffic is insane. And, two, “How do you get your groceries inside?”

  “You don’t cook, so you wouldn’t need to bring groceries into my house.”

  “Well then, how is the delivery man supposed to bring me my takeout?”

  He laughs and gives me a noogie.

  When we get to the bottom, we hail a taxi back to the hotel.

  As promised, Nate booked two rooms, side by side. I slide my room key in and enter the room. Then, I turn around. He hands me my bag, and I place it on the desk.