Chapter Eighteen Satoshi
Tasting today: nothing.
Sometimes you can’t taste anything.
Some of the best vineyards in the world were misty. In the mornings, before the sun had reached its zenith, it felt like you were walking through a cloud.
One of my earliest memories was of my father waking me very early and taking me out into a misty vineyard in Alsace when I was a toddler.
He’d got distracted – typical of him, hyperfocusing on his work at the expense of everything else – and I’d wandered off into the fog.
Isamu had eventually found me sitting underneath one of the vines, sobbing.
Oh, Sato, he’d said, impossibly large in my memory, although he wouldn’t have been more than fifteen. Did you get lost?
My only response had been incoherent wailing. Onīchan – Onīchan—
It’s okay. I’ve got you. He let me wind my arms around his neck and cry snottily into his shoulder. But you’ve got to be careful in the vineyard, all right? Stay where someone can see you – or botrytis will grow all over you.
He’d showed me some grapes, covered in grey mould. You don’t want to be covered in this, do you?
Botrytised grapes produced beautiful dessert wines. The rot made little holes in the skins, evaporating the water and concentrating the sugars and flavours, and the resulting wines were so lovely I’d named Yquem after one.
But I’d never forgotten it: the terror of being lost in a cloud, and then the visceral repulsion I’d felt looking at those grapes and imagining being lost forever, grey mould creeping up my skin.
That was how I felt now, sitting in the third row of Sadie and Jonah’s wedding ceremony.
The sun was high in the sky, the mood lively and bright, bride and groom both weeping with joy as they professed their love to each other – but I was deep in the mist, unable to find my way out, being slowly enveloped by rot that was going to pierce my skin and drain me dry.
Standing beside Jonah, Fiona looked flawless.
Her hair was swept back from her face, her neck a long line disappearing into the sweetheart neckline of her rose-pink dress, her makeup pristine and even, concealing that tiny constellation of five freckles beside her nose I loved so much.
But even as she smiled at her brother and his bride, there was a furrow cutting a line between her brows, and her fingers were twisted tightly together, knuckles white.
I had seen her fall apart enough times to know that she was only just holding it together, and it made me feel like the marrow was being sucked out of my bones.
I wanted to go to her – to put my arms around her and hold her tight and not let go – but what would I even say to stop her slipping away from me?
I can give you what you want. I can be what you need.
I’ll never want anyone but you, so please let me keep trying to make you happy.
People around me started clapping. The groom was kissing the bride, and even as I started clapping too, sunshine beating down on the back of my neck, everything around me was cold and grey and murky.
I escaped to the cellar door as quickly as I could, grateful to have the excuse of the bar, something tangible I knew how to manage.
I had to reach down deep to dredge up my customer service smile, but I found it, and I plastered it across my face like the rictus grin of a skull.
‘It was a beautiful ceremony, wasn’t it?
’ I said, over and over again, pouring glasses of sparkling wine and taking ten seconds longer than I needed to open each new bottle.
‘Jonah and Sadie are a beautiful couple.’
There was no amount of busy I could be, however, that would keep me from noticing when Fiona entered.
She and Chess were walking together behind Jonah and Sadie, the respective pink and green of their dresses matching the flower girls, who had run in ahead.
Sadie murmured something to Jonah then leaned up to kiss him before she and Chess peeled off in the direction of their table, leaving Jonah and Fiona there alone.
Jonah put his hand on Fiona’s elbow. They stood there for a long moment as he said something to her.
Fiona nodded, and they hugged. Jonah was incandescently happy – there was no trace left of the drawn, white-faced man from earlier – but even though Fiona was facing away from me, I could see the long lines of tension in her body.
I wanted to go to her. I’ve got you, I would say, and maybe she would believe me. I swear, I promise, whatever you need, I’ve got you. It’s only you, forever.
But instead, I just watched her. Jonah let her go, and she walked away, over towards the table where Sadie and Chess and the kids were, and Jonah came up to the bar.
There was a buzzing in my ears, like static from an old television. ‘Congratulations, Jonah,’ I said. ‘Can I get you a drink?’
‘Please. For the table, if that’s okay.’
I uncorked another bottle of sparkling – no spray, but a pop loud enough it would have earned me a lecture from every head somm I’d ever worked under – and nodded to one of the waitstaff to help me.
‘Satoshi, tell me you’re going to sit down at some point!’ Sadie said, as the waitress set out wineglasses and I followed her with the bottle. ‘You’re supposed to be one of our guests.’
I made myself laugh. ‘What kind of friend would I be if I didn’t make sure you had the ultimate beverage experience on your wedding day? And now for the most important people—’
I presented a bottle of sparkling apple juice to the kids. I’d brought it with me in my carry-case, the best child-appropriate colour-match I could find to the blanc de blancs. ‘Does this meet your approval?’
Georgia clapped her hands. ‘Yes please!’
I poured, careful to use two hands. Please, Fiona, I can be what you need, I can be what your kids need, I can be enough. ‘Satoshi,’ Rosie asked, ‘did you film us being flower girls? Like you said?’
‘I sure did.’ I finished pouring Lex’s glass, then knelt between the twins, taking my phone out. ‘Let me show you.’
Rosie’s face was serious as she watched the video I’d taken. ‘It’s a bit shaky.’
‘I know. I’m sorry.’ My hands had not been properly steady all day. ‘But you know how sometimes you get so excited you can’t stay still? I couldn’t wait to see the two best flower girls in the world do their thing.’
‘And if the video’s not great, then don’t worry.’ Jonah draped his arm around Sadie’s shoulders. ‘We had a professional photographer taking photos and videos too. There’ll be lots to choose from.’
In that moment, despite the fact it was his wedding day, I could have gleefully murdered him.
‘Will you send it to Mummy anyway?’ Rosie asked.
‘Of course. I’ll do it right now.’
I texted Fiona the video. I didn’t know what to say – my brain was moving too slowly to think of anything even vaguely appropriate – so I just sent her a string of kisses with it, xxxxx, each one more desperate than the last.
‘Mummy, did you get it?’ Rosie said.
Fiona took her phone out of her clutch. I saw her see the line of kisses, saw her throat move as she swallowed. ‘Yes, I got it. I’ll send it to Daddy tomorrow, okay?’
Rosie nodded. ‘Thank you, Satoshi,’ she said seriously. ‘For trying your best.’
Tears pricked at the corner of my eyes. I really had, and it still wasn’t going to be enough. ‘You’re very welcome, Miss Rosie. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I should get back to work.’
This, at least, I knew how to do. Six twists to loosen the wire cage, thumb over the cork, bottle at a forty-five-degree angle as I rotated it to open it.
A splash to wet the glass before I poured it, glass tilted to minimise the foam, never more than two-thirds full so it wouldn’t sit too long and go flat.
But then I looked over at Fiona and the wine fizzed over, so badly there was barely any left in the glass. ‘So sorry about that!’ I apologised for what felt like the millionth time, fingers slippery no matter how many times I dried them. ‘This batch of sparkling is being very temperamental.’
‘Sato, you can take a break,’ Isamu said to me quietly, as another cork popped out of a bottle too loudly. ‘Sit down for ten minutes.’
‘Later.’ If I sat down, the mist would close around me, mould creeping up my arms and up my neck and down my throat. ‘It’s time for the toasts. I need to refresh everyone’s glasses.’
‘The waitstaff can—’
I didn’t stay to hear the end of the sentence.
The face of Fiona’s brother Elias appeared on the screen as I strode around the room, clenching and unclenching my fist before each glass I poured in the hopes it would help me regain the fine motor control that was slowly deserting me.
‘My brother Jonah is not only one of the cleverest people I know, but the luckiest,’ Elias said.
‘Plenty of academics have rivals. It’s only the very luckiest who also find in them the love of their life. ’
‘Oh, fuck off,’ the woman whose glass I was topping up murmured.
‘My apologies,’ I said quietly.
‘Not you!’ She looked up at me, sheepish, and I recognised Sadie’s friend Julia. ‘Just – never mind.’
‘I’m sorry I can’t be there today, little brother,’ Elias said. ‘But I do have a surprise, one that I hope you’ll consider a wedding present. I’ve decided to leave academia—’
‘What?!’ Fiona’s dad bellowed.
‘—and move to Hobart.’ On the screen, Elias held up a sheaf of paper. ‘I’ve just accepted a job as an art historian at the Museum of Old and New Art. I start in March.’
‘Oh, fuck off,’ Julia breathed.
‘I’ll give you all the details later,’ Elias said. ‘But I can’t wait to raise a glass in Hobart with you all – to be a proper part of the family again.’
I chanced a glance at Fiona as I moved onto the next guest. Her face was pale as milk.
According to the run sheet, Chess was supposed to give a speech next, but Fiona’s father grabbed the mic. ‘I have a few things to say,’ he announced.
‘Dad—’ Jonah said, half-rising.