Eight Hundred Grapes (26)

“Someone else has to eat!” Louise said, running over, kissing my mother. Giving me a hearty squeeze, then a second one. “Do they not feed you in Los Angeles?”

Louise was a large woman, in every way: her stature, her kindness, her love of wine. I had never seen her completely sober, now being no exception. She held a mostly finished jelly jar of wine in her hand.

“I guess that’s what you get for becoming a big-city girl,” Louise said.

“Weight Watchers?” Finn said.

“Exactly.” She laughed.

Bobby put his hand on my shoulder. “She’s about to get even more big city. She is a very important real estate lawyer. And she’s moving to London with her amazing fiancé.”

He was trying to help. As usual, he was doing the opposite.

“Okay, folks, let’s get this started!” Gary said.

He clapped his hands together, excitedly, and motioned to my father.

My father put the barrel by the table, pausing for dramatic effect. Then he took out his thief to a loud cheer.

My father’s thief. A winemaker’s tool that he used to extract wine. It looked like a swirly straw. And, in many ways, it was. My father put the thief into the top of the barrel, sucking from the free end of it to pull enough wine from the barrel to give everyone a taste. Everyone was quiet suddenly, like we were in a library. Then he gently pulled on the thief, filled glasses for everyone.

As he finished, the Dorks erupted in a cheer, Finn stepping forward to distribute the glasses.

My mother usually served the wine, which led me to look around the room for her. She was standing in the corner, hiding by the tall soda maker, like she wanted to disappear into it.

I was so busy staring at her that I didn’t see Jacob move in front of me, holding glasses of wine, making it hard to escape.

Jacob held a glass in my direction. “Hey, there,” he said.

“What are you doing here, Jacob?”

“Your father invited me.”

I took the wine from him. “He was just trying to be nice,” I said.

He smiled. “Then he succeeded,” he said.

“Ladies and gentlemen!” Gary called out again. “If you’d please shut it!”

We all turned to the front of The Tasting Room. Gary stood next to my father, his arm on his shoulder. My father leaned into him, his old friend, waiting to hear what he had to say.

Gary held up his glass. “Jen, what are you doing standing in the back? Get up here!”

Everyone turned to see my mother, hiding by the soda maker. She smiled and smoothed her dress. Then she made her way to the front of the room to take her place by my father.

“I’m going to tell you all a little story,” Gary said. “I was running a wine shop in The Haight, when this guy walks in and says I have the loveliest selection of wine he’s ever seen. And he wants to show me a place where he thinks I’d like to move. I thought he was crazy. Then I got here. And I knew he was.”

My father smiled.

“None of us would be here. Not without Dan Ford. Not without Jen Ford. And we are grateful.” He held up his glass. “Even if you’re cashing in your chips and getting the hell out. Though I can’t quite believe you’re selling out to the Murray Grant empire . . . How many chips did they give you, exactly?

Everyone started laughing, but there was an edge to it. No one in the room was a Murray Grant Wine fan. I turned to Jacob, who forced himself to smile, playing it off.

“What’s the big plan, Dan?” Brian Queen called out. “Second honey-moon?”

Louise laughed. “You should be asking Jen that.”

My mother stared anxiously at my father, asking him silently how to answer. No one knew that when they left here, they wouldn’t be leaving together.

She pulled herself together and held her wineglass up, tipping it in my father’s direction.

“Whatever Dan wants!” she said.

The Dorks cheered as my father awkwardly put his arm around my mother.

Bobby headed to the front of the room, Finn staying by the back door.

My father took my mother in, forcing a smile. I watched as he struggled. It was too much. I grabbed for another glass of wine, downing it as my father held up a bottle of unlabeled wine, faced his friends.

“I don’t know if any of you all remember, but at one of the very first Cork Dork meetings, we sat around talking about it, doing the math on it, how much work a single grape requires. From vine to finish. A single grape the start of it, this unlabeled bottle right here in my hand the end of it, the eight hundred grapes inside.”

He looked out at his group of colleagues and friends.

“We know the secret, right? It’s not just eight hundred grapes in this bottle. It’s everything else that makes it heavy. Patience and focus and sacrifice and . . . fucking boredom.”

The Dorks laughed.

“Let’s just call it time. This bottle holds the endless time that I was lucky to spend with all of you.” My father nodded. “Thank you, guys,” he said. “Thank you all, for today, and for everything. It has been a really good run.”

Then, as was tradition, he uncorked the bottle and took a sip right from it. The Cork Dorks cheered.

My father didn’t look sad. He looked happy, maybe for the first time since I’d been home. My father looked truly and seriously happy. He took a sip of his wine, nodding, appreciating what he had accomplished with this wine, with all of his wines. Lost in it. My mother looked up at him, their eyes meeting, sharing that moment, both of them having the same experience of the wine.