Northwest Months & Years

The sports coat’s color darkened when he used it as shelter from the rain. He was thirty-two minutes late.

She, in all of her tints beneath the table’s individual lighting––her canary gold, her cocktail dress not unlike others under other tablecloths––sat near the back. Beside her ran a floor-to-ceiling pane of glass that overlooked Madsney Avenue and the few cars that trailed up it.

The hostess was mid-sentence when he saw her far table, and he moved through the other couples.

“God––I’m sorry,” he began as he reached the table, draping the sports jacket over the back of the chair. “The cab driver took an early exit––it took us about fifteen minutes to even get back on.”

She stood and shook his hand, laughing slightly. “It’s alright. Good to finally meet you.”

“Yeah––you as well.”

They both sat.

“Well,” he said, “that’s about the worst start I could’ve possibly had.”

She looked to her watch. “I don’t know. You could’ve been forty minutes late. Or an hour.”

“When would you’ve pulled the plug?”

“Oh, I don’t know,” she said. “I was talking to the bartender over there for a little bit since we both went to the same college, so I was staying entertained while I waited.”

He glanced toward the bar and the man behind it. “Great,” he said, “so I’ve got some competition?”

“He had a ring on,” she replied. “I wouldn’t be too worried.”

He nodded back. “So what’s this college you both went to?”

“Whitman.”

“Oh yeah? Where are you from?”

“Spokane, but my family’s all Seattle.”

“Mine’s Portland.”

“Where’d you go?”

“I didn’t, actually.”

“Oh, I’m sorry––”

“No––please,” he said. “I’m a writer. For now, at least.”

“I know you said you were writing something, I just didn’t know it was actually what you did.”

“Yeah. I got pretty lucky a few years out of high school and got something published, so I quit what I was doing back then and started trying to write full-time.”

“What do you write?”

“Nothing in particular, really. I’ve done a few novels, some poetry… I’m writing a nonfiction thing about my dad right now.”

“Okay. I’ve really only been reading fiction these days, but I should branch out.”

“Me too,” he said. “I mean, I’ve had to dive into some nonfiction stuff just to get a grip on what I’m working on now, but that can get pretty dry.” He drank from the cup of water before him. “What about you?”

“Well, right now I’m getting a master’s at California State for biochemistry.”

He drank more, nodding, swallowing. “Wow.”

“Yeah, but it’s pretty dry,” she said. “Kinda like nonfiction.”

“A different kind of dry, I’m assuming.”

She smiled back. “Maybe.”

“I took chemistry in high school, so I’m familiar.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah,” he replied. “Lithium, sodium… I had to drop at some point and take geology instead.”

“Lithium and sodium are about all you need to know for biochemistry.”

“Then you might also be interested in other ones…”

She waited.

“Titanium,” he continued, “osmium…”

“Oh––wow. Osmium.”

“As I said, you might be interested.”

She drank from her water as well.

“Alright––I’ve kept you waiting,” he said, taking his menu and reading it. “What do you want?”

“For food?”

“For drinks.”

She took hers, adjusting her hair on her shoulders. “What do you normally stick to?”

And he looked around the restaurant. “I feel like it should probably be some type of wine for a place like this.”

“What kind, then?”

“Not too sure…” he read more of the laminated pages. “It’s been awhile since I’ve seen Sideways.”

“Uh-oh. So you’re not a wine guy?”

“Well, I just can’t remember what kind Paul Giamatti loved so much.”

“I think it was Pinot,” she said.

“Right.”

“But I normally don’t go for too much Pinot.”

“Oh––okay.”

“But we can do that if that’s what you want.”

“No––like I said, I’m not an expert.”

“Merlot, then?” she asked.

“Doesn’t Giamatti’s character yell about that?”

“So you’re basing the entirety of your wine knowledge off Sideways?”

He chuckled. “He gives a convincing monologue in that one part.”

“Well,” she said, “if you remember, his character doesn’t wanna drink any merlot because it was his ex-wife’s favorite.”

Again, he laughed, placing his menu to the table. “No––I forgot about that, actually.”

“But it made merlot sales plummet because people didn’t know any better––they just saw it and remembered him yelling about it.”

“I guess I’m part of that problem.”

She smiled, still toward her menu. “Merlot’s my favorite––that’s the only reason I know any of this.”

“Then we’ll go for merlot.”

“Unless you’re not gonna drink any of it,” she said. “If that’s the case, I’ll just be stuck with an entire bottle in front of me.”

“Oh––I’ll help you out. Don’t worry.” And he motioned to the bartender. “Or the Whitman graduate over there might wanna help you finish it.”

“Oh, please,” she laughed. “No––merlot gets a bad rap for the wrong reasons. People don’t know what they want out of a red, and they’ll just settle for something else.”

“I feel like I offended you with my little Sideways reference,” he replied.

“No,” she said. “No––my grandpa’s from Italy. He worked on a winery for a lot of his life. He actually bought one and ran it for a few years before he died.”

“I didn’t know you were Italian.”

“Caserta. Just my dad’s side, though. My mom’s Welsh.”

“My mom’s side is Sicilian.”

“Really?” she asked, nodding.

“No wineries, though.”

“Well––anyway, my grandpa got both my parents into that kind of stuff, and I guess I got some of that through osmosis or whatever.”

“Are you parents first generation?”

“Yeah. My grandpa technically spent some time in New York when he was younger, but he moved back and had my dad in Caserta. So my dad was raised on the winery before he came over here.”

“And merlot’s the family favorite?”

“I don’t know about that,” she said. “No––I just latched onto it for some reason… it doesn’t matter at all, though, obviously.”

“Please,” he replied. “I’m curious.”

She shook her head. “It’s just that it’s considered such a beginner’s wine, and it’s looked down upon by so many for no reason. But it’s the exact opposite of a beginner’s wine––every one you get has subtleties that are way harder to pick apart than other stuff out there. You know, people think of it as a generic red that’s easily looked over, but it’s really the best little… I don’t know––it’s the best little piece of exactly where it’s grown. It takes the mountains and the height, the amount of sun, the amount of fog, the amount of clear days and cloudy days and rain and dryness… and it grows, and it reaches exactly how much care was put into it by the time it’s picked and harvested and put into a bottle.” And she, like him, glanced into a deeper part of the restaurant. “So it’s always reliable and what you want if you were to go out and just pick up a bottle of it and start sipping on it, but it’s never quite the exact same. It’s never boring. Its…”

He still listened, watching her eyes.

She scanned more of the hardwood ceiling, its light fixtures, its ends, and returned to him. “I don’t know,” she said. “It’s the type that I remember my grandpa having to take his time with.”

He nodded to her.

“But we can get Pinot since the movie was so convincing,” she said.

“No––God,” he laughed. “No––you’ve convinced me.”

She laughed as well. “Alright. Fine.”

The waiter––a thinner, well-kept man––approached the side of their shared table, and he returned minutes later with the bottle of black glass. It was wrapped with a cream label of italics, a burgundy logo that looked like a wax stamp, and a cork wrapped in sealed paper. The waiter sunk the corkscrew in, pressed down, up, and popped it free, pouring for her first, then him.

“We’ll just keep it,” he said to the waiter, having yet to taste it.

She smiled from the table’s opposing side, the rim of the glass close to her nose.

He drank it when she did, swirling what remained in his glass as though he knew what he was doing, and she laughed.

“It’s subtle,” he said. “Oaky.”

“Oh––come on. Don’t pretend.”

“Sorry.”

She drank more after he poured it. The level in the black glass lowered.

He left the signed receipt in the bill folder and took his suit jacket from the chair’s back, following her out. On the sidewalk, each soaked in the restaurant’s front lights, the rain had stopped. On their right, the block broke for a Madsney Avenue that they crossed, the asphalt streamed in streetlight reflections. The other side held a park flanking either end of the walkway, roped with an iron fence and sheltered in canopies of red maple. They continued on.

“Have you been up to Rangeview?” she asked.

He looked down to her. “I don’t think so.”

And she walked further, stepping from the curb, raising her hand when the headlights of a taxi approached. Its brake lights showered the behind road in red. They entered it, and she told the driver.

More streetlights came and passed, washing over them through windows.

When the car once more braked, the two stepped out and began up a dirt road from the dirt lot, lost somewhere between the dark and its moonlight. At the top of the incline, the trees broke for a small alcove with a single bench overlooking a gulley colored only with autumn colors dimmed by the late evening. In its middle snaked a river and its temporary pause in the overgrowth, in its loosening greens and rich oranges, and its density.

But the sun was somewhat higher when the two returned. His hair was shorter, hers longer. They each chose the bench and sat facing the widening expanse. She looked to him moments later, the sky fading to a deeper blue over them.