Piper, Once & Again

by Caroline E. Zani

  She marveled at the accomplishment and likened it to the progress a new foal experiences, but kept this to herself. At first the long legs are wobbly and the baby doesn’t know what to do with them. The foal stumbles and shakes but is determined to get it right. Fifteen minutes later the foal is galloping around his or her mother in the field as she stands grazing. Both are just doing what nature tells them they must. And before you know it, the foal is weaned and onto the next stage of life.

  “Are you ready for this? I mean really ready?” Piper asked. “I mean, it’s been your dream for so long and now it’s finally here.” He raised an eyebrow.

  “Almost here.”

  She ruffled his hair at the kitchen table.

  “You’ve waited this long, a few weeks won’t kill you.”

  He took her hand and looked at her with a serious expression on his face.

  “Honey, I know it’s been stressful these past couple of years and I just … I just want to thank you for your patience and—”

  She burst into surprised laughter. “Patience? Did you say you want to thank me for my patience?”

  He rolled his eyes.

  “Did I say that?”

  She kissed his lips and smiled. “Yes. Yes you did, my dear.”

  He smiled then. “Well then, you can thank me for teaching you the lesson of patience.”

  “Whatever,” she said as she got up to clear the dinner dishes away.

  Patience was something completely lost on her. It just didn’t seem to be in her genetic makeup. It wasn’t that she didn’t make efforts throughout the years, but she always slipped back to her old ways, taking shortcuts, being a bit impulsive. Paul loved her despite her chronic impatience, saying that it was what made her so “cute,” a term she hated. In return, she was so grateful for him, not being able to comprehend how he could have so much patience.

  “I’ve got enough for us both,” he would sometimes explain, which left her feeling completely off the hook.

  They suffered two more miscarriages over the years, one Paul knew about and one he did not. On a drag hunt one Sunday, Piper rode with the Nashoba Valley Hunt Club, having been invited by one of her long-time clients. She fell hard from Valo’s back when an inexperienced rider pulled up her horse hard in front of them. Valo balked at the stone wall, sending Piper over without him. At first she didn’t think much of it as she felt certain she hadn’t broken anything. She rode the rest of the morning and returned home before the familiar cramping struck her like a bolt from the blue. She made the trip to her obstetrician, calling Paul on his phone and telling him only that she was going to the market to get them some fish for dinner and she might stop at Mr. Boudreau’s for coffee. He was so busy pruning the vines in the field she was certain he would lose track of time while she was gone.

  At her doctor’s office it was confirmed that she had in fact been pregnant and that she had just lost the baby. This being the third time, she was almost used to the stinging disappointment, the pain, the guilt, the fear of being alone in her old age. But having reached her early forties, she decided that she most definitely would remain childless and knew that Paul had already accepted this fact. She decided then and there as she sat in the blue johnny inside the emergency room that she, too, needed to come to grips with that reality. She never spoke of it again with Paul.

  The tasting of the first bottling at Black Horse Vineyard was scheduled for November 20th, a Friday night event that they had planned for months. Family and friends all pitched in and printed up formal invitations and placed ads in several New England publications. They worked out all the details through emails and the vineyard’s website, and several reporters were invited to cover the story. White lights were strung over the gable end of the two-story barn, and, inside, they twined around the beams on the ceiling. A dozen round tables were covered with elegant linens custom made for the event, with the vineyard’s Black Horse silhouette logo on each, and a hundred chairs were scattered throughout the barn. Paul “borrowed” Piper’s stereo system from the barn, much to her chagrin. For the prior week and a half she’d had to resort to using her iPod out in the barn doing her chores, ignoring her vibrating cell phone, making a point to let Paul know that she couldn’t hear her phone ringing like she could with her normal musical setup.

  He was undaunted and spent every evening planning the flow of the event evening. First he would make an announcement to thank everyone who had traveled there to try the area’s newest (and best) wine. Then he would thank Piper for her “patience” and graciousness throughout the years and for allowing him to follow his dreams. He would thank his parents and siblings and the Porrazzos for their unending support, and finally, Mr. Boudreaux for his encouragement. And then the wine would flow, hors d’oeuvres would be served, and he could finally relax after years of planning, growing, harvesting, cooking, fermenting, tasting, bottling, testing, designing. He would, at long last, have his “baby,” his legacy. He had given up years ago on the idea that he and his wife would become parents. He knew there was always the chance they’d have a “miracle baby” but no longer waited for each cycle to come and bring with it the hope and ultimately the despair it had for years. He left it in God’s hands, praying, “Please God, whatever is meant to be, let us do it well, whether it’s being parents, vintners, insurance agents, or just your servants, just let us do it well.”

  He never prayed out loud, as he knew Piper would be upset with the knowledge that he was ready to accept whatever it was God gave to them.

  The week leading up to the grand tasting was a tumultuous one. Seemingly, everything that could go wrong, did. The labels for the wine bottles, which they had so feverishly worked on, were not ready yet, the printer from Wellesley having called Piper’s phone and left a message on her voicemail which she forgot to check. He had said something about the foil border they chose clogging up his equipment and not being able to have it fixed in time to print their 1,000 labels. The cocktail napkins with their logo had come in but were misprinted, and though they had a chuckle over “Black Whores Vineyard,” they knew they absolutely could not be put to use. The matchbooks with the same misprint, however, would be kept for posterity.

  The evening of the 19th was a very tense one. Piper explained that she would get the last of the supplies in the morning. Paul would meet with the caterer and the waitresses they had hired to help out that night. Paul asked why she hadn’t gone to pick up the labels that day, that a thousand labels was a lot of work if they were going to be placed perfectly.

  “Well, we don’t need a thousand bottles labeled for tomorrow, Paul, only about two hundred fifty probably. You said so yourself.”

  He raised one eyebrow.

  “I did?”

  She raised both brows and responded,

  “You said you’d be happy if you sold 250 bottles.”

  “That’s not the point, Sweetheart. That’s just not the point.”

  He stared at her with a stern look which suggested anger was not far behind. What he didn’t know was that the new order of labels had not been sent to the same printer and it hadn’t been placed until the 18th which was the day before the celebration, and his wife was paying a huge rush order fee because she had not retrieved her voicemail until that morning, thinking the voicemail was Paul wondering when she would be done in the barn, and what was for dinner, etc. The only printer willing to rush the job was in Albany, a two-plus hour drive one way. She didn’t want to leave the overnight shipping to chance, and she knew Paul would have absolutely flipped out if he knew his labels were that far away on the eve of his big night. She planned on being up early and out the door by 7a.m., home by noon, and she would have all afternoon to “perfectly place each label” on the bottles for her husband. This was not her dream and she had to admit she was getting a little tired of all she had to do to get it to come to fruition. You’re being selfish and you know it, she would think and shrug it off with, So what? He’s being selfish by not wanting to talk about
adoption or being foster parents, by not talking about anything but his godforsaken grapes! But she knew, too, that once the big night passed, life might get back to a somewhat normal pace. And besides, she could use the time to herself on the drive, staying out of Paul’s way.

  Paul couldn’t sleep that night; he tossed, turned, tossed again until Piper woke up for the third time. She called up her most patient-sounding tone.

  “Why don’t you have some chamomile tea? It’ll help you sleep.”

  She reached out, rubbing his back, her eyes not opening.

  “No. I was almost asleep until you just said that.”

  She opened her eyes wide then and wanted to yell at him, but knew it wouldn’t help even a little bit. She quietly got up, slid her pillow from her side of the bed and went downstairs to the living room. She closed the blinds and curtains and settled herself on the leather couch; she thought about writing, but knew she really needed to sleep and closed her eyes. The first scent-ache in nearly a year came to her: lavender, a glimpse of rocks piled one on another, freshly turned soil, a deeply sad feeling, panic. She spoke in the quiet room to no one.

  “Not now, I don’t have time to wonder what that’s all about.”

  When she woke up the next morning and looked around, Piper realized where she was and bolted upright, throwing her blankets to the floor like an angry child, Viceroy jumping and barking in surprise.

  “Oh my God! What time is it?” she whispered loudly. She jumped up, looked around and prayed that it was not yet 7 a.m. She tripped over the blanket but righted herself and rushed to the kitchen to see what time it was: 9:47.

  “Oh my God,” she said again. “I’ve got to get out of here.” She saw a note on the microwave door, Hi Babe. Sorry about last night. I’ll be out at the barn.

  Paul thought she was only going to Wellesley for labels and decided to let her sleep. She raced upstairs, threw on a pair of jeans, a navy sweater and her favorite black leather clogs. She ran back downstairs, heart thumping, and grabbed her purse and keys and was out the door only six minutes after she awoke. She sped down the driveway and out toward the turnpike. By her calculations, she would be home before 3:30 and she would just have to deal with Paul’s questions later. Her cell phone buzzed in her pocket when she passed Exit 2, but she ignored it, figuring it was Paul wanting to know if she had left for Wellesley yet. She stepped on the accelerator and hoped that Paul fed the animals that morning.

  When she finally arrived at the printer, she tried to compose herself. She looked quickly in the visor mirror, took her hair out of its elastic and shook it out, tossed her keys into her purse and, realizing that she hadn’t brushed her teeth, searched for a piece of gum. Her shaking hands spilled the contents of her purse onto the passenger seat.

  “Screw it,” she said and grabbed her purse by one strap and got out of the car in haste. As the door handle left her hand she caught a glimpse of the keys on the seat. “No! God, no! What the f—?” she said to no one. She tried the handle but knew she had locked it from habit as she had learned to do when her car was cleaned out of change, CDs and a new stereo the year she moved to Marblehead. “Arrgghhh!” was all she could come up with. Her phone buzzed in her pocket; but, again, she ignored it and rushed into the printer’s. She hurriedly told the man at the counter her name and order number as she fumbled through her wallet for her AAA card.

  “What’s wrong?” asked the man at the counter.

  “Oh, nothing, just locked my keys in the car. I was hurrying.”

  “Oh, wish I could help, but the new cars are harder to get into. The old ones were easy: you just needed a coat hanger. AAA’s your best bet, young lady. Even the police won’t help anymore—’fraid o’ lawsuits, ya know.” He winked at her, but she had looked away, toward the window.

  “An hour?” She spoke slowly and deliberately into the phone, “Is there anyway someone could come sooner than that? Any way at all? Okay. Okay. Yup.” She hung up and sighed even as the dispatcher was wishing her a nice day.

  “There’s a breakfast place across the way, great coffee, and they serve breakfast all day.”

  The man at the counter tried to be helpful, but she was extremely irritated and just nodded, handing him her American Express card.

  “Sorry, Miss, we don’t accept American Express. MasterCard, Visa, Dis—.”

  She slid her Discover card on the counter toward him and he could tell she was out of patience. He ran her card, and she signed the receipt in an illegible scrawl, thanked him and left, almost forgetting her package. The man at the counter, once again alone in his store, shook his head and said aloud, “Young kids, always in a hurry.”

  She took his advice and went across the street to the breakfast spot and ordered coffee and French toast, something she always loved as a kid. Deciding she should check her phone, she saw both messages were from Paul but decided only to listen to them once she got back into her car and onto the turnpike. She tried to eat slowly and relax, knowing that nothing she could do now would help the situation. I can’t believe I am sitting in a diner in New York when I am supposed to be at home in Massachusetts preparing for the biggest night of my husband’s life. He’s going to kill me.

  When the tow truck pulled up, she quickly paid her bill and ran out the door. The driver looked her up and down and tipped his ball cap backwards so he could scratch his forehead. Rocking back on his heels, hands in his pockets, he asked, “Afternoon, Ma’am, this your car?”

  “Yes, I’m in a big hurry, how long will this take?” She knew full well it would only take the guy a couple of minutes at most, but she didn’t want the small talk that she knew this guy was capable of.

  “Oh, just a minute or two,” he said as she tapped her foot, arms crossed. She looked nervously around, wondering how fast she could get back onto the highway. When the man finally had her door open, she jumped in and grabbed her keys.

  “Just a second there, ma’am, I need you to sign—” She pretended not to hear him as she shut her door, turned the ignition and tore away from the sidewalk, leaving her AAA card and the confused-looking man behind.

  The man from the printing office joined him on the sidewalk, and this time they both scratched their heads.

  “Over the phone, she was nice as pie when she ordered her labels, needed them in a hurry, she said. Asked about a hundred questions about the self-stick ones and then ordered plain ones. I couldn’t figure it.”

  The driver looked at him and laughed. “Women, I’ll tell ya, can’t make up their minds to save their lives. And patience? Haven’t met one with more than a thimbleful.”

  When she reached the turnpike, she took a deep breath. “Please God, don’t let me get pulled over or hit any traffic.” She knew that Fridays on the Pike could be horrible, but she felt she had left early enough and pressed the accelerator, feeling the power of the engine throttle her up to 90mph without so much as a hiccup. She gripped the wheel, and then put the radio on, thinking it might calm her and quickly decided it was only going to be a dangerous distraction. She looked around, hoping not to see any troopers waiting for crazy women like herself.

  When she saw Exit 2 again, she took a breath and reached for her phone. She flipped it open and saw that Paul had called five times. She dialed her voicemail, pressed her password and held her breath. She skipped the first three messages, having no patience and figuring that she would get all the information she needed in the last message or two.

  “Piper, where the hell are you? I called the printer and he said you didn’t place a second order with him. Call me and let me know what’s going on.”

  She pressed delete, took a breath and held it.

  “I’m starting to get worried here. If you get this message, call me right away, I can’t concentrate on anything. You’re driving me nuts, Piper. It’s 2:25. Bye.”

  She shut her phone and tossed it on the seat beside her.

  Not as bad as I thought.

  “Now if only I can come up with a so
mewhat solid excuse, he might not want to divorce me after today.” She rolled her eyes and exhaled deeply, feeling a little panicked by the darkening sky. Where does the sunlight go after October? She pulled into the driveway at 20 mph and slammed the car into park before it had stopped moving, hoping Paul wasn’t within earshot. When the car stopped rocking, she grabbed the bag of labels, left her purse and ran into the house. She was relieved that none of the family had shown up yet. Glancing at the clock, she realized that she hadn’t even taken a shower yet, cleaned the stalls or the house for that matter, but she felt a surge of adrenaline rush through her from her heart to her fingertips. She had heartburn and a headache but ignored them both and headed for the stairs. Paul stepped out from the laundry room and just stood there with his hands in his pockets.

  “Hi,” he said, knowing she hadn’t yet noticed him.

  She screamed and dropped the labels, her hands immediately flying to her throat in a panic.

  “Shit! Paul, what the…? You scared the hell out of me.”

  He raised his brow, never having liked it when she used profanity. He felt it was beneath his elegant and educated wife. “Where on earth have you been? Do you even have the labels?” He glared at her as if he just caught her with another man.

  “Yeah. Right there,” she said and pointed to the bag on the floor. Neither of them being able to swallow their anger or frustration, they both stood their ground.

  “Whatever,” she said under her breath, knowing full well her husband could hear her. She knew, but didn’t much care, that this made her sound like a teenager and how that answer bothered Paul to no end. She stepped over the bag in an exaggerated snub and ran up the stairs, peeling her sweater over her head and tossing it into the bedroom as she stopped to check the thermostat, feeling the chill in the house. Paul walked toward the stairs and intended to demand an answer and possibly an apology from her, but when he looked up to his semi-clothed wife, saw her breathtaking figure as she stood briefly in the hall, he was overcome with a sensation of pure love. He felt tears forming behind his eyes as, for the first and last time in his life, he experienced what his wife had tried to explain to him for so long. A scent-ache: burnt raisins and lavender sat not in his nose, but behind it. He saw a glimpse of roses and a black veil, similar to Piper’s dressage turnout. He was instantly washed in a warm light that gave him an inner peace he had never before experienced.