{"id":4766,"date":"2021-09-01T16:20:37","date_gmt":"2021-09-01T23:20:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/underthetablebooks.com\/blog\/?p=4766"},"modified":"2021-09-01T16:20:37","modified_gmt":"2021-09-01T23:20:37","slug":"mothers-and-fathers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/underthetablebooks.com\/blog\/archives\/4766","title":{"rendered":"Mothers and Fathers"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

On a rainy Monday morning in mid-December on Ziggurat Farm, two miles inland from the northern California coastal town of Mercy, Vivienne and Andrea are working together in the farm office, one of the five rooms in the cottage where Andrea lives with her husband Marcel and their son Henri, a stone\u2019s throw from the farmhouse where Vivienne lives with her parents Lisa and Philip and her brother Arturo. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Vivienne turned twelve in October\nand has been Andrea\u2019s office assistant since June when she chose Andrea, the\nfarm manager, to be her Main Study mentor for home school summer session. Farm\nmanagement, gardening, and computer skills were the main focus of Vivienne\u2019s summer\nstudies, and she proved so helpful to Andrea, so adept at using the computer for\nbusiness correspondence and keeping track of sales and inventory, and such a\nwhiz with the bookkeeping software that has bedeviled Andrea for years, Andrea\nnow employs Vivienne in the office two afternoons a week at double the wage she\npays the kids for gardening work.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Passionate, meticulous, tenacious,\nand seemingly inexhaustible, Andrea was born in Germany fifty-seven years ago, her\nGerman accent now barely detectable after thirty-three years in America. Five-foot-seven,\nformidably strong, with long black hair only recently beginning to show signs\nof gray, Andrea is fiercely devoted to her friends and overjoyed that Vivienne says\nshe wants to one day assume the role of farm manager.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Vivienne, olive skinned and slender\nwith shoulder-length dark brown hair, has recently attained the height of\nfive-foot-three in the midst a growth spurt she hopes will eventually make her\nas tall as her best friend Irenia, who is three years older than Vivienne and\nfive-foot-nine. Vivienne\u2019s father is a handsome blend of Italian and French,\nher mother a pleasing mix of Brazilian Indio, African, and Ashkenazi Jew, and\nVivienne resembles both of them, her girlish cuteness fast giving way to\nwomanly beauty. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

With Ziggurat Farm Home School on\nhiatus until mid-January, Andrea is availing herself of Vivienne\u2019s greater\navailability to catch up on long neglected farm business, and this cold rainy\nday finds Vivienne and Andrea sitting across from each other at the big table\nthat serves as the farm office desk, Vivienne manning the computer while Andrea\norganizes a big pile of October and November invoices for Vivienne to log.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cHow interesting. We just received a\nnotice from Primero Press,\u201d says Vivienne, gazing at the computer\nscreen\u2014Primero Press the company handling the printing and distribution of\nPhilip\u2019s two cookbooks and a volume of Nathan\u2019s poetry, Nathan a dear friend of\nthe farm and the unofficial poet laureate of Mercy. \u201cThey are informing us of a\ntidy sum they just deposited into our account at Mercy Savings.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cFor how much?\u201d asks Andrea, looking\nup from the clutter of invoices.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cNine thousand two hundred and\nseventy-three dollars and forty-one cents.\u201d She frowns at Andrea. \u201cI wonder if\nthis could be, to quote my favorite Monopoly<\/em>\ncard, a bank error in our favor? Beats the previous monthly record by almost six\nthousand dollars. Then again, maybe that sum is<\/em> correct. The accompanying sales figures for September say we\nsold 1723 copies of Philip\u2019s Kitchen<\/em>\nand 1268 copies of Delicious Meals for\nthe Somewhat Ambitious Cook<\/em> and 47 copies of Nathan\u2019s book of poems.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cImpossible,\u201d says Andrea, coming to\nlook over Vivienne\u2019s shoulder at the screen. \u201cSend Primero an email to confirm\nthe amount and those totals, and ask if they\u2019ve got estimated sales for October\nand November.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cShall I read the email to you\nbefore I send?\u201d says Vivienne, quickly composing the missive. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cYes, please,\u201d says Andrea, sitting\ndown to listen.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201c\u2018Dear Wonderful Primero Press.\nAndrea here at Ziggurat Farm Productions. Surprised by apparent large increases\nin sales in September. Please verify accuracy of numbers. Curious if you have\nOctober and November sales figures yet. Many Thanks, Andrea.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cFine,\u201d says Andrea, smiling at\nVivienne. \u201cNow back to reality.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cOh but what if it\u2019s true?\u201d says\nVivienne, gazing at the $9,273.41. \u201cWouldn\u2019t Papa be so happy to know people\nare buying his books?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIf it\u2019s true and continues,\u201d says\nAndrea, resuming her sorting of invoices, \u201cyour father can finally stop working\nat Ocelot<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cHe does dread waiting tables these\ndays and traveling to and fro on these cold winter nights,\u201d says Vivienne,\ncomposing an email to Hortensio\u2019s Market in Mercy asking them to please pay for\nvegetables and fruit they purchased in September, October, and<\/em> November. \u201cThough he says it\u2019s more of a psychic strain than\nphysically difficult. Hmm. Interesting how psychic<\/em>\nand physic<\/em> are composed of the same\nletters in different orders. I\u2019ll track down those word origins later on my own\ntime.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe have enough money in the bank\nfor him to quit now, but he doesn\u2019t want to draw on our reserves,\u201d says Andrea,\nhanding a stack of invoices to Vivienne. \u201cWhen you get these entered, we\u2019ll be\ndone for the day.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWell, well, well,\u201d says Vivienne, gazing\nwide-eyed at the screen. \u201cThis just in from the very prompt Primero. Maybe Papa\nwill<\/em> be able to quit working at Ocelot<\/em> without drawing on our reserves.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cTell me,\u201d says Andrea, closing her\neyes and praying those sales figures were true.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIn October Philip\u2019s Kitchen<\/em> sold 3244 copies, and in November 5225, and that\u2019s\nonly a partial total for November, with similar numbers for Delicious Ambitious<\/em>. Which means, if my\ncalculations are correct, 50,000 dollars will soon be arriving in our bank\naccount. And who knows what<\/em> the\ntotals will be for December when all those frenzied Christmas shoppers get done\nsnatching up copies.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cNever mind the invoices,\u201d says\nAndrea, leaping to her feet. \u201cLet\u2019s go tell your father.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

*<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

On this same rainy December day, Marcel, the wine master of Ziggurat Farms, and Philip, Marcel\u2019s accomplice in wine, invite Raul the famous chef and Boris the wonderfully strong father of Irenia to join them in the gigantic old redwood barn and help stir the yeast in the seventy barrels of wine that have been fermenting since September, to be followed by tasting wine from six test barrels to determine if last<\/em> year\u2019s wine is ready for bottling after fourteen months of fermentation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Raul has been longing for such an\ninvitation because he considers Marcel\u2019s pinot noirs and cabernets among the\nbest he has ever tasted, and he has tasted the best in the world. Yet he knows Marcel\nbuys his pinot noir and cabernet grapes from three inland vineyards owned by three\nwineries producing wine Raul would never<\/em>\nserve in his restaurant in Mercy where customers pay hundreds of dollars for a\nbottle of wine and expect nothing less than world class, which Marcel\u2019s wine is.\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And now more and more wine aficionados,\nmany of whom first tasted Marcel\u2019s wine at Raul\u2019s restaurant, greatly covet Ziggurat\nFarm\u2019s incomparable pinot noir and cabernet that Andrea sells for twelve hundred\ndollars a case and could reasonably ask twice that. How, Raul wonders, does\nMarcel evoke such greatness from the same grapes that supposedly expert\nvintners can only rouse to mediocrity? <\/p>\n\n\n\n

When all the barrels of fermenting wine\nhave been stirred for the second time today, the tasting of the previous year\u2019s\nwine begins.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAs you can see there is no more\nsediment,\u201d says Marcel, dipping wine from the first of the six test barrels, his\nladle made of sturdy glass. \u201cMy nose is pleased, the color is good, and the\nwine has been transforming for nearly fifteen months, so perhaps this pinot is\nready for the bottle.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Marcel pours the dark purple wine\ninto each man\u2019s glass, and Philip says, \u201cMay Bacchus be with us.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cDionysus say the Greeks,\u201d says\nMarcel, raising his glass.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIn Russia we say the wine god is Kvasura,\u201d\nsays Boris, raising his glass, too. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIn Portugal we call him Lusus, son\nof Bacchus,\u201d says Raul, touching his glass to the others.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now they taste and swallow.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI know little about wine except\nwhat you teach me, Marcel,\u201d says Boris, having downed his wine in a single gulp,\n\u201cbut I know this is delicious. No trace of bitterness.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cOui,\u201d says Marcel, nodding. \u201cI like\nit.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI love<\/em> it,\u201d says Philip, grinning at Marcel. \u201cYou\u2019ve done it again.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt\u2019s magnificent,\u201d says Raul,\nshaking his head in wonder. \u201cHow do you do it? Why can\u2019t the growers of your\ngrapes make wine like this? Or even close to this?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cOur secret,\u201d says Marcel,\nmatter-of-factly. \u201cMaybe you\u2019ll find us out as we taste.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Marcel jots a few things in a small\nnotebook, they rinse their glasses, and he ladles out wine from the next\nbarrel.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThis is also a pinot?\u201d asks Raul,\nholding his glass up to the light and noting the wine is perhaps slightly darker\nthan the first one they tasted. \u201cFrom the same grapes?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cOui,\u201d says Marcel, tasting.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAh,\u201d says Boris, nodding. \u201cThis is\nmaybe just a little sweet. Yes?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cYou have good taste buds, Boris,\u201d\nsays Marcel, nodding. \u201cAnd I think the oak comes through a bit more in this\none.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI like this even better than the\nfirst,\u201d says Raul, frowning. \u201cBut it\u2019s the same grapes. Correct?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cOui,\u201d says Marcel, winking at\nPhilip. \u201cNow we taste the third pinot from those same grapes.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

They rinse their glasses and Marcel\nladles out the wine.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThis is the darkest yet,\u201d says\nRaul, tasting the wine. \u201cAnd maybe the best. I\u2019m not sure. In any case I want forty\ncases, whatever your price. Tell Andrea.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe shall,\u201d says Philip, clinking\nglasses with Marcel. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe begin bottling tomorrow,\u201d says\nMarcel, jotting a few more thing in his notebook, \u201cshould either of you want to\nhelp me and Philip and Lisa and Henri and Vivienne and Irenia, and with any\nluck Arturo. Now let us taste the cabernet.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cOne moment, my friend,\u201d says Raul, raising\nhis hand to forestall Marcel. \u201cThese three pinots are subtly different from\neach other in color and taste, though you say they are made from the same\ngrapes and spent exactly the same amount of time fermenting in the same barrels\nin the same old barn two miles from the same ocean. How can<\/em> they be the same grapes? And why can\u2019t those wineries make\nbetter wine from these same grapes when you can make this nectar of the gods?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cYou promise to tell no one?\u201d says\nMarcel, smiling at Raul.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI promise,\u201d says Raul, nodding solemnly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe buy from three vineyards we have\nchosen after some years of tasting the grapes at many vineyards. In each of\nthese vineyards we have found what Lisa calls sweet spots, groups of vines\nproducing grapes that taste especially delicious to us and are far superior to\nthe other grapes in that vineyard. Who knows why? More water? Better soil? We\ndon\u2019t know, but we visit these sweet spots every day in the last week when the\ngrapes are approaching ripeness, and when the grapes taste perfect to us, we\npay extra for those particular vines to be picked just for us.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAnd those vintners haven\u2019t\ndiscovered your secret?\u201d asks Raul, frowning. \u201cHow could they not?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cNot only have they not discovered\nour secret,\u201d says Marcel, chuckling, \u201cbut they say we only imagine<\/em> these grapes taste different than the others. Yet to us\nthere is no comparison.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThey\u2019re fools,\u201d says Raul, having\nknown countless fools masquerading as experts. \u201cBut even so they must have tried\nyour wine and tasted the difference.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cNot that we\u2019re aware of,\u201d says\nMarcel, shaking his head. \u201cThey think we are silly amateurs.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThey snicker when we come to claim\nour grapes,\u201d says Philip, shrugging in acceptance of the fact. \u201cEach to his\nown.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThen they are more than fools,\u201d\nsays Raul, shaking his head. \u201cThey\u2019re idiots.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cBut enough about them,\u201d says\nPhilip, rinsing his glass. \u201cLet\u2019s taste the cabernet.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Marcel ladles the first of the cabs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThis is more, how do you say it\u2026\nearthy,\u201d says Boris, feeling a little drunk. \u201cI like it very much.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThis is the best cabernet I\u2019ve ever\nhad,\u201d says Raul, also drunk. \u201cI want forty cases of this, too. So\u2026 your grapes\nare the best ones grown in those vineyards.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe best for my taste and for\nPhilip and Lisa,\u201d says Marcel, rinsing his glass. \u201cThey are my co-tasters in\nthe vineyards.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cSo you buy these special pinot\ngrapes and special cabernet grapes from those three vineyards,\u201d says Raul,\nawareness dawning. \u201cAnd you mix the three pinots together? And the three\ncabernets?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe do,\u201d says Marcel, ladling out\nthe second cabernet. \u201cBut we mix them in three or four different proportions to\neach other, this year three. Each mixture has a different proportion of each\ngrape to create subtly different flavors and sometimes slightly different\ncolors.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cYou create these proportions by\ntasting the grapes<\/em> in various proportions,\u201d\nsays Raul, nodding in understanding. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cYes,\u201d says Marcel, delighted with\nthe taste of the second cabernet. \u201cWe sit around the table with our mouths full\nof various combinations of grapes, the kids, too, and we write down our\nreactions, and eventually we discover the proportions we like best. Then we\ncrush the grapes from each vineyard separately, and when we know exactly how\nmuch juice of each grape we have, we figure out how to distribute all the juice\nto create these proportions in the barrels. Then Philip and I and Henri worry\nover the wine every day like mothers worrying over their first babies, we stir\nthe yeast two and three and sometimes four times a day, and we baby the wine as\nno big winery could ever afford to baby a wine, and the fermentation takes\nplace in this old redwood barn with the ocean breezes keeping the air sweet and\ncool, and\u2026 here we are.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At which moment, Andrea and Vivienne\nrush in with the news of Philip\u2019s cookbooks selling like hotcakes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

*<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

A few days later, Lisa and Andrea and Vivienne go for a bathe after supper in the big soaking tub in the bathhouse, the water a delicious ninety-nine degrees.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI wish Irenia had spent the night\ntonight,\u201d says Vivienne slipping into the warm water. \u201cShe loves it when all the\nwomen bathe together.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cTonight we wanted it to be just the\nthree of us,\u201d says Lisa, smiling at her daughter, \u201cbecause we want to tell you\nsomething we\u2019ve been waiting to tell you until you turned twelve.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIs this about sex?\u201d asks Vivienne, excitedly.\n\u201cBecause you know, Mama, I do<\/em> know\nhow all that works, even before<\/em>\nCaroline gave us an excellent lecture on mammalian reproduction.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Andrea laughs. \u201cThis is not about\nsex, sweetheart, though it is somewhat related.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThen why did you wait until I was twelve?\u201d\nasks Vivienne, frowning.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe chose the age a long time ago,\u201d\nsays Lisa, moving across the tub so she\u2019s sitting next to Vivienne. \u201cWe almost\ntold you a few other times, but then we didn\u2019t. And now we want to. It\u2019s\nnothing bad. Don\u2019t worry.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Vivienne gasps in her dramatic way.\n\u201cWas I adopted?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cNo,\u201d says Lisa, putting her arm\naround her daughter. \u201cYou came out of my womb, and Philip is your father.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThen what could it possibly<\/em> be?\u201d asks Vivienne, perplexed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhen Arturo was thirteen months\nold,\u201d says Lisa, speaking quietly, \u201cI stopped making milk and could no longer\nbreastfeed him. He was almost ready to stop, so it wasn\u2019t hard for him to\nswitch to goat\u2019s milk, and by the time you were born fifteen months later, my\nmilk was renewed and I breastfed you until you were three months old and then\nmy milk began to wane again.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cBecause you were forty-four?\u201d ask\nVivienne, nodding sympathetically. \u201cAnd that\u2019s a little old for being a\nmother?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThat was maybe part of the reason,\u201d\nsays Lisa, looking at Andrea, \u201cbut mostly I couldn\u2019t make milk because I lost so\nmuch weight after Arturo was born and couldn\u2019t gain it back, so I had very\nlittle body fat, which a woman needs to get pregnant and to make milk. In fact,\nwe didn\u2019t think I could get pregnant again after Arturo was born, but luckily I\ncould and you were born.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cBut you were too skinny to make\nenough milk for me,\u201d says Vivienne, nodding in understanding. \u201cSo then did you\ngive me goat\u2019s milk? Is that what you\u2019ve been waiting to tell me? Because I\nlove goats, Mama. I do.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe didn\u2019t give you goat\u2019s milk,\u201d\nsays Andrea, smiling fondly at Vivienne. \u201cWe gave you my<\/em> milk.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cYou<\/em>\nbreastfed me?\u201d says Vivienne, gazing in wonder at Andrea.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI did,\u201d says Andrea, crying. \u201cFrom\nwhen you were three months old until you were almost two. Henri was\nfourteen-months-old when you were born and I had plenty of milk for both of you.\nAnd then he weaned himself at eighteen months, and I continued nursing you for\nanother year.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cDid Mama ask you to?\u201d whispers\nVivienne, starting to cry.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cNo,\u201d says Andrea, coming to sit\nwith Vivienne and Lisa. \u201cOne morning I was holding you and you were fussing\nbecause you wanted to suckle. I rocked you and sang to you, but you would not\nbe appeased, so I gave you my breast and then you were happy, and so was I.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI don\u2019t remember,\u201d says Vivienne, embracing\nAndrea, \u201cbut I\u2019ve always thought of you as my other mother, and it turns out\nyou were.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

*<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

In the early evening a few days before Christmas, Gabriel Fernandez comes to Nathan and Celia and Delilah\u2019s little house on the outskirts of Mercy to drive the four of them to a dinner party at the new home of Joseph and Constance next door to Ziggurat Farm. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Gabriel is thirty-four, a Mercy\nnative and backhoe operator. Nathan is eighty-eight, a retired arborist and\npoet. Celia is eighty-two, a former nurse now gardener and cook, and Delilah is\ntwenty-eight, a musician, artist, and the main teacher at Ziggurat Farm Home School.\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nathan and Celia became Delilah\u2019s\nguardians when she was thirteen, her movie star mother, the late Margot\nCunningham, having brought Delilah to Mercy hoping to establish a better life\nfor her daughter far from the insatiable celebrity hounds, and Margot\u2019s hope\nwas realized when Delilah moved in with Nathan and Celia.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Margot died when Delilah was twenty,\nDelilah\u2019s father unknown even to Margot, because, as Margot confided to Nathan,\nany of several men might have impregnated her around the time Delilah was\nconceived.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Delilah and Gabriel have been dating\nfor two months and have yet to become lovers, both of them wary of rushing into\na sexual relationship and possibly wrecking their lovely friendship.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nathan and Celia sit in the backseat\nof Gabriel\u2019s new electric car and Delilah sits up front with Gabriel. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI thought for sure we\u2019d get one of\nthese,\u201d says Nathan, who rarely drives nowadays and is thinking of selling his\nold pickup truck. \u201cBut we hardly go anywhere and Celia\u2019s little old Toyota\nstill runs, so we probably won\u2019t get one. Not in this lifetime anyway.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI went to a tractor show in Santa\nRosa last year and tested some amazing electric ones,\u201d says Gabriel, who reveres\nNathan and Celia. \u201cI couldn\u2019t believe how quiet they were, but I just bought a\nnew tractor and backhoe two years ago and the best electric ones are incredibly\nexpensive, so\u2026 not for a few years.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThis car is so comfortable,\u201d says\nCelia, resting against Nathan. \u201cI could go to sleep.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cMi madre says the same thing,\u201d says\nGabriel, driving slowly up the curving road through the redwood forest to\nJoseph and Constance\u2019s house. \u201cBy the way, she says hello and wants to know\nwhat we can bring bring for supper on Saturday.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cNada,\u201d says Celia, who makes a\nprayer every morning and every evening that Delilah and Gabriel will marry\nbefore Nathan dies. \u201cJust your wonderful selves.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

*<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Following the lavish supper in Joseph and Constance\u2019s gorgeous new house, the twenty guests move into the living room where Raul and Caroline give a slide show on an enormous television screen\u2014photos from their October honeymoon in England and Portugal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After several pictures of the two of\nthem visiting Raul\u2019s old haunts in London where he became a culinary superstar when\nhe was in his twenties, the pictures change to the city of Aveiro in Portugal where\nRaul was born and lived until he was a young man.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cMy mother’s name was Beatrice,\u201d says Raul, narrating. \u201cThis is her grave in Aveiro.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A picture appears of his mother\u2019s large\ngray marble headstone standing in an old cemetery.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cShe was seventy-four when she died,\u201d\nhe says, the picture changing to one of a small house in a neighborhood of older\nhomes with tile roofs. \u201cThis is where she lived for the last thirty years of\nher life. Caroline wanted to know what my mother looked like, but because my\nmother refused to have her picture taken after she was forty, the most recent one\nI have of her is when she was thirty-five.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Everyone oohs at the photo of a\nstrikingly beautiful brunette in a shimmering green dress showing off her\nsplendid figure as she kisses the air in the direction of the camera, an\namorous look in her eyes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now the next slide appears \u2013 Caroline\nin sunhat and shorts and a sleeveless shirt, walking on a pier in Aveiro,\nseveral men ogling her as she goes by. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cMy beautiful bride turned many\nheads in Aveiro,\u201d says Raul, laughing. \u201cThe men there have very good taste in\nwomen.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Another picture appears \u2013 Caroline\nstanding at the end of the pier looking out to sea.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI used to fish here when I was five\nand six-years-old,\u201d says Raul, on the verge of tears. \u201cI would come with my\ngrandfather, my mother\u2019s father. My father was a fisherman and I liked to come\nhere and fish while we waited for his boat to come in. He died in a storm at\nsea when I was seven. Here is the only picture I have of him.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The next slide appears \u2013 a handsome\nman with curly brown hair playing a guitar.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cHis name was Goncalo. Besides being\na fisherman, he played the guitar and also the trumpet and the violin, and he sang\nlike an angel, or so I thought when I was a boy.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

They show many more pictures, the\nlast one taken just a few days ago\u2014Caroline and Raul holding hands on the beach\nat the mouth of the Mercy River.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThough you can\u2019t tell from this\npicture,\u201d says Caroline, her voice shaking with emotion, \u201cwe have it on good\nauthority that I am pregnant, and assuming all goes well our baby will be born\nin July.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cHallelujah!\u201d cries Joseph, turning\non the lights, everyone rushing to congratulate Caroline and Raul, everyone\nexcept Delilah and Gabriel, Delilah still in shock from seeing the picture of\nRaul\u2019s mother, which very well could have been a picture of Delilah. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cQue paso?\u201d asks Gabriel, gently putting\nhis arm around Delilah. \u201cAre you okay?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI\u2019m\u2026 do you think I look like Raul\u2019s\nmother?\u201d she whispers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cYes, very much,\u201d he says quietly. \u201cAnd\nI\u2019d love to see you in a dress like the one she was wearing.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWell,\u201d says Delilah, still\nwhispering, \u201cRaul once mentioned to me that he met my mother a few times when she\ndined at his restaurant in San Francisco. Twenty-nine years ago. He didn\u2019t say\nanything about them being lovers, but it\u2019s possible they were. She was prolific\nin that regard, as was he, and as I told you, she had no idea who my father\nwas.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI see,\u201d says Gabriel, looking\nacross the room at Raul surrounded by jubilant friends. \u201cSo you think maybe\nRaul is your father?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cNow that I\u2019ve seen his mother,\u201d says\nDelilah, gazing at Raul, \u201cI think maybe so.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

fin<\/em> <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Love\u2019s Body<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On a rainy Monday morning in mid-December on Ziggurat Farm, two miles inland from the northern California coastal town of Mercy, Vivienne and Andrea are working together in the farm office, one of the five rooms in the cottage where Andrea lives with her husband Marcel and their son Henri, a stone\u2019s throw from the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[6977,6971,6975,6973,6974,4305,6972,6976,6788],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/underthetablebooks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4766"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/underthetablebooks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/underthetablebooks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/underthetablebooks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/underthetablebooks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4766"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/underthetablebooks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4766\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4773,"href":"https:\/\/underthetablebooks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4766\/revisions\/4773"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/underthetablebooks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4766"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/underthetablebooks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4766"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/underthetablebooks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4766"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}