Chapter 27
Twenty-seven
Elise
The alarm slices through the half-sleep I’ve been clinging to, and my body protests before my mind even registers the sound.
But then I remember. Kingston’s coming to pick me up after his business in London.
We’ve worked out the details, and it’s two more weeks until he arrives and we leave for home. But who’s counting?
Giddiness washes over me as I anticipate the future, but then I realize that today, every muscle aches.
My palms are raw, new blisters layered over yesterday’s blisters.
But the vines won’t wait. I roll out of bed, drag on clothes that already smell faintly of earth and copper spray, and make my way to the rows as the sun edges up over the horizon.
The light is soft at first, spilling gold across the sea of vines. For a moment, it feels worth it—the view, the quiet, the sense that the land itself is breathing awake. Then I crouch at the first vine and reality sets in. Suckering. Again. My least favorite job.
The young shoots push up from the trunk and roots in every direction, hungry and defiant.
I reach in and snap them off, tugging until the green stems give with a sharp pop, directing all the plant’s energy to more-developed branches.
The sweet smell of sap coats my fingers.
It’s sticky, cloying, and after ten minutes, my skin itches.
My knees burn from kneeling on uneven soil.
By the third vine, my back is already screaming.
I glance down the row at the line of bodies bent low, each lost in the rhythm of work.
No chatter, no laughter. Just the sound of snapping shoots, the rustle of leaves, the crunch of boots shifting through dry dirt.
I fall into the pattern, letting my thoughts drift toward home.
Two weeks. Just fourteen more days and I’ll be done with this, free of these endless rows, free of Sebastian and Chateau.
By midmorning the sun is higher, the light no longer gentle but hard, unrelenting.
My shirt clings damp to my back. Sweat slips into the corner of my eyes, stinging.
I wipe it with the back of my wrist, leaving a smear of stickiness across my cheek.
The rows blur into sameness—green, brown, green, brown—until I have to shake myself to remember where I am.
We switch tasks, moving to canopy work. The vines are already wild, the shoots growing faster than seems possible.
My job is to lift them, guide them toward the trellis, and secure them with thin green ties.
Over and over, row after row. My hands are scratched raw by curling tendrils.
The wires bite at my arms. Each time I tug a shoot into place, I feel the strain in my shoulders, my calves trembling from balancing on uneven ground.
The sun presses down, thick and hot. It feels like breathing through cloth. Somewhere, a tractor growls, distant but steady, like an old heartbeat. My water bottle is already half empty, and it’s not even noon.
Sebastian calls for a short break, and we gather in the thin shadow of an old stone wall.
Someone passes a thermos of bitter black coffee.
Another worker tears bread into rough chunks, the crust hard, the inside soft and warm.
I chew slowly, letting the salt of sweat mix with the yeasty bread.
No one talks much. Everyone saves their energy for the vines.
When the break ends, the heat feels worse, the light harsher.
The work shifts again—pest patrol. I trail behind Sebastian, notebook in hand, as he scans the leaves for intruders.
We stop often, crouching, peering, fingers brushing the underside of the foliage.
Sweat drips down my temple. My skin is tight with the beginning of sunburn.
He mutters when he finds the first sign of mildew—yellow spotting, faint but unmistakable.
I jot notes, mark the row, circle the leaves with chalk.
We move on, but the discovery weighs on me.
One sick leaf, then another, and the whole vineyard feels suddenly fragile, like it could collapse under something as small as a spore.
By the time we finish, the afternoon is slipping into early evening.
My legs are trembling. My neck is stiff from hours bent forward.
We gather the piles of shoots pulled from the trunks and haul them to the edge of the vineyard.
The smell of green waste is pungent, sour-sweet.
My nails are lined with dirt so deep it will take days to scrub out.
The light softens, finally, the air cooling just enough to breathe again.
I straighten, stretching my back, and look out across the rows.
The vines are orderly now, shoots tied, trunks cleared, the day’s work evident in the land.
Endless green stretching into the distance, each plant standing straighter because of my hands.
My exhaustion settles into something like pride.
I wipe my forehead with the hem of my shirt.
My body throbs with fatigue, but I can’t stop staring at the vines.
I’ve given so much to them—sweat, skin, blood even—and in return they’ve given me knowledge I couldn’t have gained anywhere else.
My body knows how to move now, my fingers know how to read the signs, and my eyes know how to look for danger in the leaves.
The workers drift toward the outbuildings, their faces as drawn and sunburned as mine. The day is done. Tomorrow, we’ll start again. I drag myself after them, every step a reminder of the ground I’ve covered. Two more weeks. I’ll survive it.
For now, though, I am only tired. Bone-deep, marrow-deep tired. The kind of tired that has no cure but rest.
Night wraps the building as I reach the stairs to my room.
The stairwell is narrow, and the wood is old, the paint scuffed where hands have traced it for years.
Five flights stretch before me like a dare.
My thighs shake. I take the steps one at a time and let my pace be slow.
On the fourth landing, I press a hand to the wall, close my eyes, and count my breaths.
In. Out. In. Out. Then I climb again because no one will carry me. The thought isn’t bitter. It’s steady.
Inside my room, I toe off my boots, and they thud against the floorboards.
The quiet settles like a blanket. I sit on the edge of the bed and drop my head into my hands.
The ache is everywhere. Wrists. Knees. Calves.
I flex my fingers, and they tingle. I stretch my neck until it ticks.
It should feel like failure. Instead, it feels like proof. I am still here.
I open my notebook. The pages smell faintly of dust and ink and grape sugar that dried along the edges weeks ago.
I draw three stars on today’s square and shade them until the paper shines.
My throat tightens. I smooth my palm over the page and leave it there.
Dignity in the small things. Claire is right.
I’m not waiting for someone else to hand it to me. I’m building it with work.
The laptop is cool against my thighs when I pull it close.
The screen glows, and it makes the shadows in the corners look deeper.
Kingston’s last email sits at the top. I read it again, even though I know the lines by heart.
His words are a hand between my shoulder blades.
I start to type. I stop, erase, and start again.
I type that the leaves on the vines looked like coins when the light turned gold. I tell him about my day. This is the time when the work is so overwhelming that you need to take the small wins when you can get them.
I send it, and the room goes quiet enough that I can hear my own breath.
A pipe ticks in the wall. Somewhere in the building a door closes, and the sound climbs the stairwell like a footstep that isn’t mine.
A draft lifts the corner of the curtain, bringing in the cool night air and the faint scent of earth.
I turn off the lamp, and the dark is kind.
Sleep moves over me like a tide. For the first time in weeks, it feels like floating instead of drowning.
Then a knock breaks the quiet.
It’s a calm sound. Not a fist. Not panic. Two firm knocks and then a pause. I sit up so fast my head swims. The room is a deeper blue than black. My heart pounds hard enough that I press a hand to my chest because I can feel it through my ribs. Another two knocks. Steady. My throat goes dry.
No one comes by this late. For a breath I think of Claire and her files and the way she frowns when something is wrong.
I think of a worker who might have brought a question up the stairs by mistake.
I think of Sebastian, and my mouth goes cold.
Then I push that thought away because he would not climb five flights for anything that did not benefit him.
I stand, and the boards are cool under my feet. I cross the room, and each step sounds loud to my ears. I rest my fingers on the knob and hesitate.
Then I open the door.
He’s here. Kingston, leaning one shoulder to the frame like he needs it to keep himself from falling over.
His tie hangs loose, the top button of his shirt is open, and his jacket is hooked over two fingers.
His hair is rumpled like he dragged a hand through it over and over the way he does when he’s thinking hard.
Travel clings to him. The line of his jaw looks sharper than usual.
His eyes find mine, and every tight place inside me lets go.
“Five flights of stairs,” he says. His voice is low and a little raw. “I should’ve negotiated hazard pay before coming up here.”
A sound rips out of me that is half laugh and half sob. The hallway smells like old wood and dust and paint that was new a decade ago, but now, under that is him. Cedar. Soap. Some warm note that is only Kingston. He’s here before he promised to be here.
For a heartbeat, neither of us moves. I want to tell him everything at once.
He shifts his jacket higher on his forearm and takes a slow breath. His gaze moves over my face like a touch.
My breath is shaky. My smile trembles and then holds. I think of two weeks and how long that sounded at sunrise, yet how short it feels now that he is five steps away. I think of the fifth flight and how my legs burn, but I keep climbing anyway.
“Five flights,” I whisper. It’s a joke and a thank you, and somehow it carries everything I mean.
His eyes warm, and I know he understands.