Love's Harvest, page 10
part #1 of A Salmon Run Novel Series
This made things tough for the children who were forced to stay indoors. Yet by the time the sun made its way over the Olympics, the ghost town of a compound came to life. By Thursday evening, Eduardo and Felicia could no longer stand it and found themselves drawn by the piano music coming from Julia’s home situated on the hill right above their apartment.
“Come on, Felicia. No one’s going to find out where we are,” Eduardo challenged.
“But mama said we weren’t supposed to bother the Señora anymore, not unless she invites us in.”
Eduardo rolled his eyes and sighed exaggeratedly. “You’re such a chicken, you know that? Bak! Bak! Bak!”
Felicia fisted her hands at her sides and answered angrily. “I’m not a chicken. You’re a chicken!”
“Am not!”
“Are too!”
“Am not. Besides, you for sure wouldn’t be one if you’d come with me. No one will find out, I tell you. Come on!” Eduardo insisted.
Felicia had second thoughts but she wasn’t about to let Eduardo think she was anything but eager to get into trouble.
“All right, but let’s not stay too long or mama will start looking for us.”
“Yes!” Eduardo said as he double fist-pumped.
~
The two children tore up the road to Julia’s home and rang the front door bell. It took Julia a moment to pull her attention away from the new Chopin Opus 28 Prelude she was committing to memory and instead register that someone was at her door.
Her heart fluttered as she imagined it may be Diego. Then immediately sank as she guessed it could also just as well be James or even Duncan, for that matter. As she moved toward the front foyer, she heard two little voices calling her name.
“Señora Julia. It’s me, Eduardo.”
“And me, Felicia. Can we have a piano lesson now?”
Eduardo shook his sister’s arm and whispered, “You can’t come out and ask her that, dummy.”
“Ouch, you’re hurting me, Eduardo. I can so ask her if I want. You’re the dummy!”
“Am not!”
“Are too!”
“Am …”
The door suddenly opened and Julia stood before them with stern look on her face. She actually felt like smiling, for even when these two argued, they were utterly charming.
“Did I hear the two of you fighting? I can’t allow children in my house if all they plan to do is fight with each other.”
The two children stood perfectly still with their mouths open in shock. Finally, Eduardo spoke. “We weren’t fighting, Señora. I was only instructing.”
Felicia turned her head to look at her brother and then back again to Julia. “Sí, he was only destructing me.”
Julia could only stifle a grin so long before giving up her stoic façade. “All right, you two. You may come in, but no more of this instructing and destructing. Do you understand?”
Before the children could answer, they were on the other side of the door, making a beeline toward the piano. Julia ducked quickly into the kitchen where she retrieved two super-sized oatmeal cookies from a box someone had given her immediately after the funeral. Sweets were never actually her thing, but she was glad she had them to share with the two Pasqual children who sat reverently on her piano bench, looking up at the sheet music in front of them.
“Señora, this music looks hard. Can you read it?” asked Felicia.
“Of course, she can read it, dummy. She’s a famous pianist!”
Julia, from the kitchen, interrupted Eduardo before he could get started. “Now, remember what I said? No instructing or destructing, and absolutely no name calling. Comprender?”
The both answered simultaneously. “Si, Señora Julia. Entendemos!”
“Good. Now, I don’t suppose the two of you are at all interested in cookies, are you?” Julia asked as she made her way toward her dining room table.
“Sí, we’re interested in cookies, aren’t we, Felicia?” Eduardo elbowed his sister.
“Yes, we’re always interested in cookies, Señora.”
Julia smiled at their innocent enjoyment of such a simple thing as a cookie. “Well, come on then and sit at my big table. Would you like a glass of milk or lemonade with your cookie?”
“Limonada!” they both exclaimed as they ran to seat themselves at the beautiful Castilian, genuine teakwood table situated on the other side of the concert grand. Julia then placed the cookies in front of them.
She was on her way to the kitchen for the lemonade when the doorbell rang once again. Eduardo and Felicia froze. Like the children, Julia hoped whoever was at the door wasn’t their mother or father ordering them to come home.
“Hold on a moment!” Julia called. Quickly, she poured the two glasses of lemonade and handed them to the children. As she scuttled toward the door, she whispered, “It’s okay. You’re not in trouble. I’ll make sure of that!”
Julia prayed “Uncle” Diego was at last here to retrieve his niece and nephew. Hurriedly, she threw the door open, only to be surprised by the last person on earth she thought would appear. There standing before her was Gayle, her eyes as wide as Julia’s.
“I’m not interrupting anything, am I?” Gayle asked timidly.
Julia shook her head and smiled. “No, not at all. Would you like to come in and join us for an oatmeal cookie and a glass of lemonade?”
Gayle smiled in return and nodded. “Don’t mind if I do!”
~
Diego looked forward to ending his work day by stretching his legs out and over the porch rail, knocking back an ice-cold cerveza or two. He wasn’t much of a drinker, but after a hard day like today, a cold beer was exactly what the doctor ordered. Before he could clock out, however, he needed to speak to Joaquin one last time before the next morning’s events.
As he entered the production house, Diego could see his friend speaking with his new assistant, Umberto Colon. If Diego wasn’t mistaken, it sounded as if the two were quarreling.
This was unusual, for in the few years of his employment at the winery Diego had never heard a sharp word or one single argumentative response from Joaquin. In fact, he was more often than not the voice of reason, the so-called peacemaker of the plant.
Not wanting to draw attention, Diego kept himself out of sight and pretended to busy himself with the labeling machine while standing within earshot of the two men.
“I already told you, Joaquin, I don’t want anything to do with this fight between Señor Reynolds and Señora Julia. As far as I can see, Señor James has as much right to do what he will with this place as the Señora does.”
“But think about your people, all the families who live and work here. Where will they go and what will they do if Señor Reynolds closes the winery? Huh?” Joaquin persisted.
“I don’t care!” Umberto spit out. “This work is temporary for me. I have bigger ideas for myself than toiling like some peon farm worker, or putting labels on bottles of overpriced wine. I’m here simply for the money, and then I’m gone!”
“Cabron!” Joaquin barked as he pushed the young whelp.
In turn, Umberto took a swing at Joaquin’s face, which took the older man by surprise and laid him out flat on the floor of the plant. Immediately, Diego put down what he was fiddling with and ran interference between the two.
“Hey, hey, Hey! No need for fighting, amigos!” he said.
“Mind your own business, Diego!” retorted Umberto.
“As long as you work here, you’re my business.”
“Well, that’s just great, isn’t it?”
“Come on, Umberto, calm down.” Diego reached out to set his hand on Umberto’s shoulder, but the young man shirked away and yelled, “Well, for your information, I quit.”
Joaquin struggled to sit up, his head spinning like a top. “You won’t get another job like this again, Umberto,” he said.
The kid only laughed. “Fine. I don’t need this job like you two do, sucking up to the gringa. You make me want to puke!”
It took everything Diego had not to punch the man out, but he knew violence in this case wasn’t the answer. Violence only begot more violence, until there’s nothing left to fight for. He reached down to help Joaquin return to his feet.
“Then I accept your resignation effective immediately, Umberto,” said Diego. “Good luck with your life. You’ll need it!”
Umberto grabbed his things and stormed out of the building, cussing all the way. As soon as he was several yards away, Joaquin turned to Diego and apologized.
“I’m sorry, Diego. Sometimes I can be a bit pushy.”
“Nah, it’s all right. With that kind of attitude it’s best he leave. But you, mi amigo, are too old for this kind of foolishness.”
Joaquin wiggled his jaw and laughed. “I think you’re right about that, Diego. But, as they say, ‘there’s no fool like an old fool.’”
Diego escorted his friend back toward his apartment in the compound barracks. It’d been a difficult day, and Diego was certain the next day was going to be even more so.
After seeing Joaquin to his door, Diego locked up the bottling barn and walked back to his own room. Looking up at the house on the hill, he again thought about the strong but lonely woman who lived there.
True, perhaps the winery was not any of his business either. Yet he’d give anything in this moment if somehow, someway he could make the woman inside that fortress of a house his business, and in the most intimate of ways imaginable.
~
As soon as Gayle entered the house, she was surprised to see two children seated at Julia’s formal dining table. Eduardo and Felicia were so thrilled it wasn’t one of their parents or Uncle Diego at the door that they grinned from ear to ear at the woman standing in front of them.
“Gayle, I’d like to introduce you to my two new students, Eduardo and Felicia Pasqual. Children, this is another Señora Reynolds.”
“How do you do?’ Gayle said and extended her arm for a round of handshakes.
“Mucho gusto!” the children answered and immediately went back to eating their cookies.
“Were you married to Señor Robert, too?” asked Felicia.
Gayle smiled. “No, I’m married to his brother, who’s another Mr. Reynolds.”
“Oh.” For a moment Felicia appeared a bit confused, but the answer must’ve sufficed, for she immediately went back to her cookie.
Gayle followed Julia into the kitchen. “Whose children are they?”
Julia placed a cookie on a napkin and handed it, along with the lemonade, to Gayle.
“The children belong to Mariela and Rafael. Robert told me they used to enjoy coming up to the house to hear him play his cello. Now that he’s gone, they’ve attached themselves to me. They do have a deep love for music, but I think they may come up here merely for the cookies, if you see what I mean.”
“Of course,” Gayle sniggered. “If they’re anything like Jimmy and Bobbie, cookies override just about everything!”
Gayle could see Julia take a moment to assess her. “So what brings you out here to the winery on this hot and sticky night?” asked Julia.
Gayle took in a deep breath. “Two things, actually. First, I want to again apologize for the way James and I’ve been acting. In trying to appease him and his attitude toward Robert’s death and the winery, I’ve betrayed my own self. For that I’m deeply sorry.”
There, she said it. Now it was time to really eat humble pie.
“And second, I need a job. James and I have separated, and I absolutely cannot go back into that office. Especially now that I know James doctored the property deed. You live with a man nearly half of your life, and he still does things you’d never believe he was capable of.”
Julia stared at her sister-in-law, her mouth wide open. “You want to work at the winery?”
“Yes, if you can afford it. For the last ten years I’ve run the office for James—answering phones, opening the mail, dealing with public relations and such. I don’t need a lot of money, but I do need to make enough for gas and groceries. Besides, I’ve got to stay busy or I’ll fall apart.”
Julia put her arms around Gayle and hugged her close to her chest. “I’m so sorry, Gayle. You and James have been a couple as long as I’ve known the two of you.”
She then pulled away, smiled, and peered into Gayle’s tear-filled eyes. “How are you at accounting?”
Suddenly, Julia felt a tug at her trousers. It was Felicia.
“Señora, it’s getting late and mama will come looking for us soon. Eduardo and I have to leave now, but can we come back to visit you again tomorrow?”
Julia put her hands on the tops of each of the children’s heads. “Probably not tomorrow, but Saturday or Sunday perhaps. I’ll speak with your mama and papa to make sure that works for them, too.”
“¡Qué Bueno! That’s great!” Eduardo answered for the two of them as they charged out the door.
Gayle studied Julia as she followed the children with her eyes. “You like those two, don’t you?”
Julia smiled. “I find them absolutely delightful!”
Gayle seated herself at the recently vacated table. “Do you ever wish you and Robert would’ve had a child?”
Julia pulled out a chair and joined her. “Not while he was alive. Between the winery and my career, the right time never seemed to come up. Then when he became sick, the issue got buried for good. Now that he’s gone? Yes, of course, I’d give anything to have had a child with Robert.”
Gayle stared at the cookie in her hand, not feeling much like eating it. Her appetite hadn’t been the same since she discovered the issue with James and the deed.
“You know, James’ll never approve of you coming out here to work for me instead of for him. How will you explain that?”
Gayle put down the cookie and placed her empty hand on top of Julia’s. “I won’t have to. I asked James for a divorce the morning after I called you, and he packed a bag and left the house. The children are upset, naturally, but honest to God, Julia, I can’t live under the same roof with a man I don’t know anymore.”
The held-back tears Gayle was so afraid of showing geysered out and flowed down her cheeks. Julia immediately wrapped her arms around the woman. In all the time Gayle had known Julia, she’d never cried, not like this anyway.
“I feel so stupid. Here I’m getting your shirt all wet and gooey, and it’s you I should be offering my shoulder to.”
Julia gave a short giggle. “Oh, come on, Gayle. What are friends for if not to ruin their favorite blouse, huh?”
Gayle straightened in her chair and blew her nose into her table napkin. “I didn’t think you thought of me as your friend anymore, not after the way James and I treated you.”
“Oh, stop, Gayle. I knew it was only a temporary thing. We’ve been close for too long of a time to let this last year’s difficulties dictate the quality of our friendship. I merely figured you and James had grief issues. You know, each of us deals with sorrow in our own way.”
Gayle noted her friend’s wet eyes. “And how are you doing?”
Julia smiled. “Not too bad, considering the winery is struggling, my career is adrift, and my husband is buried just east of the vineyard. Other than those trivial things, pretty darn peachy.”
~
Both women were silent for a moment, and then what started as a snicker or two became a wave of ribald laughter, forcing them to laugh until their sides hurt and the tears to fall once again.
Julia tore her napkin in half and gave it to Gayle. When they both simultaneously blew their noses, they glanced at each other before their laughter resumed once again. When at last Julia had gotten control of herself, she thought about the possibility of Gayle being a part of the resuscitation process for the winery and felt a glow inside which had been missing for some time.
“So, about the job, Gayle, I’d love to have you on board, but I must warn you, James has threatened to show up in the morning to throw me out of my home and close the winery for good. Things could get nasty, and I don’t want you here if there’s any chance of you getting hurt.”
“I want to be here, Julia, when he comes. I want to look directly into his evil face and show him who I am and not who he thinks I ought to be. I want him to know he can’t push me or my friends around merely for his pleasure.”
Gayle stood up and began to pace. “He won’t hurt me; he’s too afraid I’ll press charges and take him for everything he has in the divorce. He knows I can also keep the children from seeing him if he threatens harm to you or any one of your workers. No, Julia, I need to be here, for it’s finally where I truly belong!”
Julia was moved by her friend’s loyalty and passion. She was about ready to thank her, when her home phone rang.
“Julia, it’s Barb again. Sorry to call so late but I wanted to give you a heads up about tomorrow.”
“Oh, hi Barb,” Julia announced for Gayle’s benefit. “No, it’s not too late. I’m sitting here eating cookies and drinking lemonade with Gayle.”
The phone line went silent for a moment, then Barbara spoke up. “You’re shitting me!”
Julia laughed and continued. “I don’t think so. Actually, I decided to hire Gayle to help me out here at the winery. She starts tomorrow.”
“I hope you’ve told her about the possible events of the day,” Barb said, obviously concerned. Gayle was her friend, too.
“Yes, Gayle is well aware. So, what’s your news? Why the phone call?”
It took a few seconds before Barbara could get herself back on track. “Oh, yeah, the phone call. I finally got a copy of the deed from Kaliope. It’s exactly as you thought. The ownership is split in three ways: one third to James, one third to Robert, and one third to you. And legally speaking, because you’re Robert’s wife, his third goes directly to you—no questions asked.”
“I knew it. I just needed the proof and the legal backing.” Julia felt the tension and stress she’d been holding onto since Monday morning’s meeting finally dissolve. She rolled her head and shoulders to unlock the tightness she felt in her neck and upper back.
