Mendocino Coast

Andre laughed. "Oh god no. Yes, we have a lot of customers there, but there is no way I would live there. Paris is bad enough, but New York . . . out of the question. Actually I was thinking of Napa, or perhaps something even smaller up the Valley. We have an old manager's home on the property in Rutherford. It sets up on the hill just a little a bit south of that old rock pile that Copola acquired from Inglenook. I want to drive over there tomorrow and take a look at it. I'm sure it is going to need a lot of repairs and remodeling, but I have always loved the setting. I was wondering if the two of you could join me? Perhaps late in the day. I have to check in with a couple of our wineries tomorrow and see how the crush is going. The harvest is completed, but now is when the real work begins in the wineries."

Late in the day Claudine and I met Andre at the old house. We brought a picnic supper and a couple of bottles of wine. We found Andre sitting on a weathered old armchair on the porch with a cigar and an already opened bottle of wine. The view from the large covered porch of the old house looked east and south across and down the valley at a sea of vineyards. There was an old barn and some other buildings in which grapes had once been crushed and made into wine. Andre had moved the wine making process down to more modern facilities the firm had constructed in St. Helena, so the buildings were empty now. Everything was silent.

We sat on chairs on either side of him as he filled up a glass for each of us with the Napa Cab he had already opened. "Most of the grapes for this wine come from the vineyard just down the hill from us," he said.

It was a stunning cabernet blend. We sat in silence, savoring the wine and looking out over the recently harvested vineyard, just beginning to show the earliest signs of fall colors.

"Beautiful, just beautiful," he said after several minutes of silence.

"How far does the vineyard extend?" Claudine asked.

"We own everything on the south side of the road down to the cross road you saw as you were coming up and south to that fence line you can see. It's about 100 acres." He laughed. "In Burgundy the boundaries are marked by old stone fences built centuries ago, and in some of the Grand Cru vineyards, ownership may be divided by row. Not here. Of course the family owns more than just this land we have a total of almost 800 acres here in the Valley and another 300 or so over on the Sonoma side. It's getting to be a pretty big operation. But this vineyard is my favorite."

"Why?"

"It's the soils. They are rocky and harsh. They make the grapes work and grow deep roots to get their water. And the exposure. Yes, the vineyard faces east, but see how the hill side is canted towards the north, just a bit. The grapes get the morning sun but not the full blast of the mid-day sun from the south—just enough and, it is sheltered by the ridge behind us from the heat of the late day. The yield is nothing to get excited about here, but the quality of the grapes from these old cabernet vines is superb. When we combine them with a bit of the merlot we grow elsewhere in the valley, they make a superb Bordeaux blend. John-Paul would never agree of course. He can never concede anything about his Medoc. And St. Emilion vintages. And they are good, I agree, but the wines from this vineyard . . ." He paused as he savored a sip. . . "Oh just magnificent. Don't you agree?" he asked holding up his glass.

We drank, toasting the vineyard. The wine was superb.

He chuckled. "And John-Paul doesn't complain about the price we get for these wines."

"Come on," he said, rising from his chair. "Refill your glasses and I will show you the vineyard. You have to walk it to really feel it."

And so we did. We spent half an hour in the late afternoon sun walking the rough rocky soil of the vineyard between the gnarled old vines. The few grapes left behind in the harvest had turned almost to raisins, but Andre insisted we taste them.

After our vineyard tour we inspected the old house and then sat on the front porch dining on food and wine we had brought as we discussed how we could modify the old house to provide a place for all three of us to live and work. I'm not quite sure when we decided we were all three going to live together in the old house but it was well before we opened the second of the two bottles of wine Claudine and I had brought. As we watched the shadow of the Mayacamas Mountains behind us creep across the valley laid out before us, we talked at length about modifications to the house and construction of a pair of studios near the house, one for each of Claudine and me. I made it clear to Andre that I was happy to live here and have a studio here, but I would still have to spend time painting at my Cottage in Mendocino. Mendocino was still a major inspiration for my art. There was no argument on the issue.

As darkness approached, Claudine made a suggestion. She thought we should christen our new home tonight by making love in the vineyard. It may have been the wine we had all consumed but the idea was quickly endorsed by all. There was no one around. We quickly stripped off all our clothes except for boots to protect our feet and walked nude into the vineyard where Andre fucked both of us ferociously, as we hung from the wires on which the grapes were strung and pushed our asses back at Andre. The synesthesiastic effects were stunning. I hung from the wire and Andre held my hips firmly as he repeatedly plowed his hard cock to the depths of my cunt. Reds, oranges, bright greens, even flashes of blue when parts of his cock hit my G Spot. It went on and on until I climaxed with a scream that could have been heard back up at the house, had anyone been there. I hung from the wire gasping as Andre repeated his performance in Claudine's juicy cunt. Eventually he would stroke himself to a climax splattering Claudine's and my chests with his hot milky cum. It would not be the last time we made love in the vineyard.

There was another revelation the next day. I walked from my home to the studio garage in Yountville and stretched and prepared a canvas. Then I began to paint, and for the first time I found myself able to recreate on the canvas the wash of synesthesiastic colors I had experienced as we were fucking in the vineyard the night before. It was a breakthrough that opened a whole new source of inspiration for my art. I decided to name this canvas simply "Vineyard." It hangs in the living room in our home in Rutherford.

Chapter 11. Howard

It's a cold rainy mid-winter day. I've ducked into a book store in San Francisco, mostly to kill time before a 1:30 appointment I have with my tax accountant. Yes, like most of America, I now have a tax accountant. No one in their right mind tries to do their own income taxes, especially when you have complex returns like mine. Success as a painter has been more than I ever dreamed of, but who knew it would come with tax returns in the US and France. The French ones are in French, so who knows what they say. I just sign the form saying I swear they are correct and off they go along with a large fund transfer. The US returns might as well be in a foreign language. I gave up trying to understand them years ago. Again, sign the form authorizing the accountant to file the return, and direct my bank to transfer money. As long as Gerard keeps selling my art and sending me money, I will keep paying the taxes.

As I'm browsing in the art book section, I get a real shock. A man walks around the corner of the isle and I look at him for a few seconds, thinking, no, it couldn't be. I don't believe they have a law book section in the City Lights Book Store. But it is; it's Howard. I haven't seen him since we agreed to divorce all those years ago. I had read someplace that he was a law professor now, but I had no idea where. It was just an article quoting "the renowned legal expert Professor Howard Pilch," about something I lacked enough interest in to finish reading.

"Howard?"

"Yes," an automated response with a blank, do I know you, stare.

"Howard, it's me Danielle. Remember? We were married. A long time ago."

He erupts, "My god, Danielle, how are you. I haven't seen you in . . . god what is it . . . twenty years?"

"Something like that," I respond, not wanting to do the numbers in my head.

He stares at me. "Your hair is longer."

"And grayer," I respond with a soft smile.

"Coffee. Yes, coffee. They have a coffee bar here. Do you have time for a coffee?"

I smile thinking that is the longest sentence I've ever heard Howard utter that didn't reference a legal precedent. "Yes, I'm just killing time before a 1:30 appointment with my accountant. He's just down the street in the Transamerica Tower."

As we walk towards the coffee bar, he points at a stack of coffee table books with one of my paintings on the cover. "That's yours, isn't it?"

"Yes, it's my painting on the cover, but there are other people's paintings in that book besides mine. Let's get some coffee and I'll tell you about it."

Minutes later we are sitting in silence sipping our coffee, neither knowing where to start.

"I heard you are a law professor now?" I ask.

"Yes, at Hastings. It's part of the University of California."

"I remember Hastings, Howard. We took the bar exam there."

"Oh yeah, sure."

"What do you teach?"

"Contracts and Business Associations. Then there is also a third year class on Securities Law. That's about stocks and bonds."

"I know Howard. Before I quit practicing law, I represented start-up companies in their IPOs."

"Oh, yeah. That's right you did. I had forgotten." He smiled, deferentially.

"And what do you do now?" he asked.

"I paint. Abstract art. Remember. You were just looking at a book with one of my pictures on the cover."

"Oh yes of course." He paused for a moment, perhaps little chagrined at his stupid question. Then in a weak attempt at recovery, he said, "Well, I mean. I thought perhaps . . . it wasn't a fulltime occupation. Maybe you were still practicing law somewhere and the painting was a hobby."

"No Howard, it's a full time occupation. I quit the law because I hated it." That came across harsher than I wanted it too, but I couldn't help but be offended at the notion that my art was just a hobby, especially given the amount of money I was making selling my paintings.

He looked down into his coffee and quietly said, "Yeah, I guess I knew that at the time. I just couldn't understand it."

"Don't worry about it, Howard." I reached out and covered his hand with mine. A touch of reconciliation for a conversation threatening to go unnecessarily awry. "I'm doing what I always wanted to do and quite successful at it—too successful according to the tax accountant I have to go see in twenty minutes."

He smiled and toasted me with his coffee cup, "Here's to success."

"Did you ever remarry?" I asked. "Children?"

He brightened. "No children, but my partner and I did tie the knot a couple of years ago when this marvelous state we live in finally pulled its head out of its collective ass and permitted us to do that."

"Partner?"

"Oh, yes. I'm gay. I guess I didn't figure that out for a year or two after we split up."

Wow, I thought. "Well, that explains a bit about what happened to our marriage."

"I think we were too young," he said. "Neither one of us knew what we wanted from life."

I toasted him and said in agreement, "Here's to knowing what you want in life."

"And you Danielle, are you married? Children?"

"No children," I responded. " And the great State of California has not seen fit to grant legal sanction to the kind of relationship the three of us have."

"Three? How does that work?"

"Very nicely, thank you. Andre, Claudine and I live in a big old house near Napa. It is on a hill on the west side of the Napa Valley with a grand view of the vineyards of Oakville and Rutherford. We spend most of the year there except for a month or so in Paris and Provence each year. Danielle is a painter and Andre is in the wine business.

"And you go to Paris to sell your art?"

"Yes and Claudine's art, although hers sells well in Napa and Sonoma also. And for Andre it is when he visits with John-Paul, his partner in the family wine business. Andre runs their US arm and John-Paul runs the European side of the business. They have vineyards and wineries in a number of places in France and Italy, and then of course in Napa and Sonoma."

But then how does your relationship, I mean among the three of you, work. What happens if one of you dies or decides to leave. Surely you given all of that some thought?"

"You mean the sex, or who cooks and who does the dishes, or what?" I knew he meant our legal relationship.

He looked confused.

"Howard, always the lawyer, aren't you?"

"Yes." He smiled and shrugged his shoulders as if to say, "What can I say, of course I am. Would you have expected anything else?"

"It's all right Howard. We are what we are, and you are a lawyer's lawyer. You always have been. And to answer your question, yes, we have given the issue of our relationship a lot of thought, both here and in France. I'll just say, 'It's complicated'."

He smiled, "Yes, I suppose it would be."

We finished our coffees, exchanged contact information via our cell phones so we could talk without using an interceding pair of lawyers, and then went on our way. He had told me that his partner was an architect who was a fan of my art, so I sent them a copy of one of my books for Christmas.

As I walked down Columbus Street to my 1:30 appointment, I was thinking about how important it was to know what you wanted in life.