The Chatsfield Short Romances 11-15. Fiona Harper
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staring at his wine very much the same way I have been.
He turns his head, finds me looking at him. I speak to cover up my very English awkwardness. ‘How did you know?’ I ask. ‘About the Malbec…?’
He blinks slowly, considering my question. ‘Because I work in the wine industry, like my family before me for three generations. Things like this get passed down from father to son. Not just the technical aspects of making a good wine, but it’s less…tangible…secrets.’
‘You make wine?’
He shakes his head. ‘My family used to. I work as a wine broker.’
I nod as if I know what that is. Suddenly, I feel very much the girl from a little country village in Sussex, even with Gareth’s exclusive credit card tucked in my clutch bag. ‘In Spain?’ I ask, trying to steer the conversation towards something I might know something about.
He shakes his head. ‘Argentina.’
So much for steering. I think I just hit a brick wall. He doesn’t seem to mind, though.
‘You didn’t want to stay home and grow grapes?’
He shrugs. ‘Times were tough when I was a teenager. My father had to sell the vineyard. I don’t think I would have stayed, even if I could have. I had itchy feet, and my job takes me all over the world.’
‘Even London,’ I say, smiling slightly. ‘Where there is a distinct lack of vineyards.’
He smiles back at me and I feel a little jolt down in my stomach. ‘Even London, occasionally. Although, this trip I am here for my brother’s wedding.’
Ah. Yes. The wedding. I’d kind of forgotten about that. I glance nervously towards the ballroom doors, regretting my bold outburst about crashing. I shift on my stool, reaching a leg towards the floor, preparing to leave.
‘No,’ he says softly. ‘Stay. Nobody minds. Finish your wine at least.’
I stare at the dark red liquid in the goblet, then I sit back firmly on my stool and take another sip. ‘Why London for the wedding?’
‘My new sister-in-law is English, and they’ve been living here for four years.’
I nod. That makes sense. But I hate the feeling of jealousy that creeps over me for the now-absent bride and groom. Envy that their day went as planned, and they probably hadn’t even entertained the idea it wouldn’t. Just as I hadn’t.
I don’t want to talk about his family. Work is safer. ‘So you travel a lot for your job?’ I ask, finally turning my head.
‘I am more often away from home than I am there.’
‘That sounds lonely,’ I say.
He nods. There is something in his eyes as he does it, something that makes me realise his answer to my question about the Malbec was a sidestep. Instinct tells me his knowledge about its restorative qualities is not professional, but personal. Just like that, I feel a bond forged between us. He understands, a voice whispers inside my head. He doesn’t judge and he understands.
I think it must show in my eyes because, for a moment, I see revelation in his too—this feeling of looking in a mirror. But this time, even though the reflection isn’t mine, it feels as if we are in synch. I look away, take refuge in my Malbec, but I can still feel him looking at me. He is not scared of this strange sense of connection the way I am.
‘And what is your job?’ he asks softly, and I can hear the warmth in his voice. ‘You know my life story now and I know nothing about you.’
He’s right. But I am sad that he’s asked. I was pleased to have this tiny holiday from being me—from being ‘Poor Sophie’. ‘I teach ballet,’ I say slightly hoarsely. ‘To children. I have my own dance school.’
‘Did you ever want to dance yourself?’
I look at him. I have the funniest feeling he can look deep inside me and see my heart—not only its current rawness, but its history, its dreams and desires. ‘Yes.’ This time it is barely more than a whisper. ‘I was good, but not good enough.’ It seems some dreams just aren’t made to come true. Something I have begun to understand more and more in the last seven days.
He seems to comprehend this, and doesn’t press for more. ‘So…apart from crashing my brother’s wedding, why are you here…at The Chatsfield?’
I’m surprised he doesn’t know, I feel that transparent before him. As tired as I am of lying, I can’t bring myself to tell him the whole truth. I tell him as much as I can while remaining insulated from it.
‘Oh, you know…’ I say with false brightness ‘…a trip with the girls. Shopping and silliness, really.’ That much is true, but my voice catches on the end of the sentence, calling me a liar anyway, and I know that he hears it, sees it.
For a long moment he doesn’t say anything. ‘Many people come to this magnificent hotel to run away,’ he replies simply.
I know it’s true. He does too. And I’m angry with him for it.
He takes in my short, staccato movements as I shift on my stool, drain the last of my wine and prepare to leave.
‘Would you like to dance?’ he asks, surprising me so much I laugh.
I look round the ballroom, at all the people who were actually invited, who actually know this man’s brother and his new wife, and I shake my head. ‘I shouldn’t be here.’
He gives me that long, studying look again. There is a calmness about him that both intrigues and infuriates me. ‘If it really bothers you, you can be my ‘plus one’. I could have brought someone if I had wished to, but I didn’t.’
I glance over at the dance floor. While we’ve been talking the music has changed, and the dance with it. Instead of the upbeat and sassy salsa, everything has slowed into an intense and mysterious tango. Again, it is nothing showy, nothing attention-seeking. Even a couple with silver hair glide round the dance floor, their cheeks lightly touching, the woman’s eyes closed.
I look back at him in panic. I can’t be out there with them. The emotion is tangible, flowing with the music like a second melody. I can’t risk it. What if everything I’ve been feeling since last Saturday starts spilling out of me and I slowly unravel? I’m not sure I know how to put myself back together again.
My voice comes out as if someone is strangling me. ‘I can’t.’
My host takes no notice as he leaves his stool. He just smiles so barely that the expression doesn’t leave his eyes, and then he offers me his hand.
I hug myself. ‘I can’t. I don’t know how.’
His hand remains stretched out to me. ‘Can you walk?’
I nod.
He gives a little shrug. ‘Then that is all you need to know.’ When I don’t respond, he adds. ‘Tango is merely walking with a partner to the music.’
I glance over to the dance floor. Sure, what’s happening there doesn’t look like the version of the tango I’d seen at the ballroom studio when Gareth and I had gone for our trio of lessons in preparation for the wedding. The couples are close together, and while there are no roses between teeth or dramatic head or arm gestures, there are still patterns and small turns, little flicks and pauses that everyone seems to know by instinct. It looks a lot harder than walking to me.
He reaches out and his fingers slide across mine, then he grips my hand. He doesn’t pull, just leaves it there, like a question waiting for an answer. ‘Don’t worry,’ he says, reading my mind again. ‘You are a dancer, you will pick it up. And there are no steps to learn. This kind of tango is improvised, and it is