Yesterday`s flower by Michelle Tarynne (good romance books to read .TXT) 📖

but the rhythm of her movements made her almost meditative. As the vineyards grew ho er, the sounds of insects grew louder. Bees. The odd fly. Cicadas. A few rows across, two pickers sang as they worked. She had no idea what they were singing about, but they sounded beautiful, catching melodies as they filled their trays. Erika realised she was content.

 

And Max had predicted correctly. At some point Jared returned with supplies, and a loose co on shirt for her to cover herself with, but grew bored within forty-five minutes. He was faster than she was, and had filled and dumped a tray before he seemed to get restless.

 

‘You don’t have to stay with me, Jared. After all, you’re the boss,’ she teased him. ‘I can’t just abandon you. Some might accuse me of using slave labour.’

 

‘Slave to love, what can I say?’ Erika laughed. ‘Anyway, I’ll expect payment later in beer shandies and lunch.’

When she next looked up, Jared was already walking away.

 

‘Well, you don’t have to be a martyr; you can come back up to the house whenever you want,’ he called back to her.

‘Max will be down soon to entertain me,’ Erika reminded him.

 

‘Speak of the devil,’ Jared said, as he noticed Max walking nonchalantly down the drive.

 

♥

 

Erika sat on the porch, waving a Farmer’s Weekly like a fan.

 

 

 

‘I don’t know how they do it,’ she said, looking towards the vineyards.

 

‘No work, no pay,’ Max said. ‘This is peak season; they need to take advantage of the busy times, so they move from farm to farm.’

‘Well, I’m in awe.’

 

‘You’re also very sweaty and dusty, and deserving of a nice cold drink,’ Jared said, as he appeared around the corner with two shandies.

‘Where’ve you been all morning?’ Erika asked.

 

‘I had some very important business to a end to. No, seriously Max,’ Jared said, noticing the doubt crossing Max’s face. ‘One of the pumps on the tanks blew. I asked Heinrich to bring some parts over so I can fix it before we transfer the wine.’ Jared gave Erika a shandy and a quick kiss, then gulped down his drink in a few seconds.

‘What about me?’ Max asked a li le grumpily.

 

‘Well, I’ll kiss you if you like,’ Jared said, plopping himself into a chair, ‘but I didn’t think you were into that sort of thing.’

‘I guess I’ll get myself a drink.’ Max stood up.

 

‘Well, seeing as you’re up,’ Jared said innocently. ‘No harm in another. What about you, Erika? Still thirsty?’?

 

♥

 

The tanks stood side by side like squat metallic wrestlers. In a way, Erika was a li le disappointed. From the outside of the building, she was expecting something a li le less like a factory, and more like a French cave. Something romantic and dominated by a central half-barrel, where she could take off her shoes, clean off her feet and jump up and down as the juice pushed luxuriously through her toes.

‘Christ, Erika,’ Jared said, ‘We’re not in the Middle Ages.’

 

‘And it’s not all it’s cracked up to being,’ Max said a li le more kindly. ‘Not nearly as hygienic either.’

 

Erika nodded, then moved forward. The high-ceilinged room smelt like fermentation, even though none had begun yet; she guessed the years of wine-making had embedded themselves into the stone walls. And at least it was cool. One of the troughs from the vineyard was already lined up next to an oval-shaped machine on wheels.

‘It works on inflation and deflation,’ Max explained. ‘See that hatch?’

 

Erika looked at the opening on top of the machine, which reminded her of a submarine.

 

‘We put the grapes in through there once the stems have been shaken off. We call that destemming. There’s a contraption inside the crusher that basically blows up like a balloon, and then pushes against the berries, causing them to burst. It’ll take a few hours, but eventually all the juice will be extracted. Skin and seeds float to the top, but the bo om three-quarters will be liquids.’

 

‘With red wine, though,’ Jared added, ‘we keep the skins. And for rosé, we expose the juice to the skins for about an hour – for the colour.’

 

‘For red wines,’ Max continued, ‘we do what we call “pump overs” about three times a day for a week. It’s pre y much a circular flow-through of the liquids, and we remove the skins on the last press.’

‘It all sounds so complicated,’ Erika commented.

 

‘Not really,’ said Jared. ‘It’s fairly logical if we just follow the system. That’s probably

 

 

 

enough of a tour for now, don’t you think?’

 

But Erika, who was not quite finished learning about the processing of the magical nectar, asked Jared, ‘Where does the wine go next?’

 

‘Into the tanks over there. We’ve got 5 100- to 15 000-litre tanks, depending on the cultivar and the harvest. We’ll use cultured yeast, and the natural sugars will be converted into alcohol. For whites, it takes from a few weeks to a few months until all the yeast is used up. It’s all temperature controlled.’

 

‘It’s really about ge ing the wines to the point where they’re stable,’ added Max. ‘We check the acidity, and the wines only stay in the tank until they’ve se led. We have to wait for the fizz to die out.’

 

Chapter 20

 

And then Jared’s mood changed. It was as if at one specific moment, a switch had been

 

turned off in his brain. Erika could scarcely understand it. While the harvesting of the white grapes had swept him into a frenzy, the red-grape harvest was heralded with a vague nod of recognition, and a slump back under the covers.

‘He won’t get up,’ Erika told Max on the phone. ‘He says you’ll manage.’

 

‘Of course he does,’ replied Max, not bothering to hide the frustration in his voice. ‘He drives me crazy sometimes, you know. One moment full of inspiration and plans that he starts to implement and never finish, and the next he’s lost the will to live.’

 

‘Well, I wouldn’t say that exactly,’ Erika replied, remembering his relentless drinking the night before at the Elephant and Barrel. Perhaps he was just hung over. She didn’t, however, think this was worth mentioning to Max. It would only antagonise him further.

 

‘I’d love to come over there and give him a piece of my mind,’ Max growled, the anger in his voice was unmistakable.

 

‘This is Jared you’re talking about,’ Erika said. ‘Do you think that would even help?’ ‘Believe me if I did, I’d be there now.’ Max sighed. ‘I guess I’ll have to cancel my

meetings.’

‘I’m sorry, Max. He just won’t move.’

‘I know. It’s not like this is a first for us.’

 

She wasn’t really sure what that meant, but it certainly didn’t sound promising. ‘Listen,’ she said. ‘I think I should go. I’ll call you later with an update.’

 

When she’d put down the receiver, Erika went back to the bedside. ‘Jared?’ she said softly. ‘Jared?’

 

He groaned, and rolled over. ‘Leave me alone, for fuck’s sake,’ he said, pulling a pillow over his head. And then he slept.

 

He slept all day, leaving his tea to grow cold and his lunch, a tuna-mayo sandwich, to go grow dry and crusty at the side of bed. Erika checked on him every half hour, but he never moved. After a few times, she wondered if she should check his breathing. She leant in close, listening.

 

‘Go away,’ Jared mu ered, not even bothering to open his eyes. ‘Just go away, okay?’ Startled, she jumped away from him. For the first time since they’d met, Erika wished

 

Jared apart from her. What was wrong with him? Erika tried to keep her temper in check. There must be a rational explanations for his behaviour. Jared clearly wasn’t well. He was exhausted or maybe he was simply burnt out. But seeing as he wasn’t going anywhere, she’d be the one to take a breather.

 

‘I’m going out, Sally,’ she said, picking up her handbag and car keys. ‘I need to go to Paarl to buy some acrylic glaze. Call me if you need me.’ She was too embarrassed to mention Jared’s inert body upstairs, the sheets souring with his body heat. And now that she recalled, he hadn’t even showered last night. If he surprised Sally downstairs, then so be it. She could handle it. ‘Cheerio,’ she said, with a brightness she did not feel.

 

♥

 

But in Paarl, Erika couldn’t focus on art supplies.

Seeing a computer shop, she ducked in and, under the guise of testing out a laptop,

 

 

 

typed a few keywords into Google: mood changes; sadness; insomnia; recklessness. The

first result was a website on depression: How to recognise depression and get effective help.

 

bit of Jared, but not him exactly. She flipped back to the previous screen, her eyes scanning the other options. And the same words starting repeating themselves, over and over again.

 

Bipolar disorder. Manic depression.

 

She opened each page, and realised she recognised her boyfriend in almost every one. Her heart thumped. What had she got herself into? And why had nobody told her the

truth?

 

‘Excuse me, ma’am?’ said a young salesman after she’d monopolised the laptop for close to half an hour.

‘Yes?’ she snapped.

 

‘I just wanted to warn you. My manager’s going to be back in five minutes and he doesn’t really allow research on the machines.’

‘He’s really ill,’ she said, her voice fading.

 

‘My manager?’ he said in confusion. ‘Listen, I’m sorry, ma’am, it’s just, um … Oh, I see. Can I get you a glass of water?’

‘I’ve had to work it out myself because nobody told me.’

 

The youngster looked vaguely nauseous. He flicked his fringe in the direction of a woman behind the counter, who taking the cue, left her perch and flu ered towards them.

Erika stood up. ‘Don’t worry, I won’t get you into trouble. I’m leaving.’

 

Driving towards Le Domaine, Erika realised that she was not just muddled. She was furious. She’d thought that of all people, Max would have been honest with her. Was perfect Big Brother Max really capable of subterfuge? And for what? It certainly hadn’t worked out in his favour.

 

When she got out the car, she found him with the horses. He was sponging sweaty marks from Star’s saddle, crooning to her softly.

‘You’ve been out ,’ Erika said.

 

‘I needed to think,’ Max said, dropping the sponge into a bucket and beginning to rub Star’s back with a towel. ‘Things on my mind. And from the look on your face, you have too.’

 

‘It’s Jared. Why didn’t you tell me?’ she said.

 

‘Tell you what? I’ve always said Jared gets sad sometimes. That’s never been a secret.’ ‘But it’s more than that, Max. It’s much more, and you know it.’

 

Max glanced at Erika, then handed her a rubber curry. ‘You could do Pinotage. She followed us into the fields; managed to get mud caked on her neck, how I’ve no idea.’ Max stroked the body brush along Star’s back and the patches he was working began to shine.

 

Erika took the brush, dropping her handbag and keys onto a patch of grass next to them.

 

‘Hello, girl,’ she said. ‘I’ve missed you.’ She began to brush along the horse’s neck, clumps of mud falling to the ground. Her hands shook slightly and she wondered if it was from nerves or anger.

 

Max cut through the silence. ‘Perhaps I need to tell you a bit about our upbringing,’ Max said,