On A Thread

Chapter 5

Brie had just stamped on the label on the mid batch of newly pressed wine stacked on a metal wine rack that ran from ceiling to base. She rolled her shoulders, her neck was sore, she'd been the one to dismiss the four labelers and took over a six row, four column wine rack. Started working at the top, gradually descending. The ladder was fairly sturdy but she was nearly done to panic.
She moved meticulously and with recalled expertise while carrying out the function, she was akin to, labeling and taking inventory records had been the only vineyard chore she enjoyed doing, any other chore felt like a punishment but when it came to inventory and labeling she gave it her best and it brought out her tactile talent. She handwrote the content of the label, being as intentional and creative which each stroke of the brush against the hard paper plastered on the bottle.
Then, it was a hobby but now, it served as her means of escapism, a means to think about other things besides her marriage and Josh.
The night wasn't restful.
The single bed in her old room felt bigger and colder than usual, she'd forgotten how warm Josh's mere presence kept her.
She could remember the countless times her and Josh had snuggled together on the small bed but without him the bed was a little lonely.
It's not as though, they still snuggled like the earlier years. Her, breathing against his bare chest, chest hairs tickling her face. Him rubbing her hair and kissing her head everytime she moved against him, no, it wasn't like that anymore, she slept on her side and him on his. But every time he moved she was tempted to reach for him and let his warmth wrap around her but she didn't, she had fallen into a habit of staring at his face when she heard his soft breathing which told her that he was already asleep, and she'd draw up the comforter to cover his bare chest.
Josh always slept bare chested and it bothered her even after she moved out of their house. Brie  worried about him, if he ate and at least covered himself while he slept. Her thoughts refused to conform with her brain to be rational, Josh suffocated her thoughts and the night had proven useless.
She slipped out of her family house as early as 6am, she didn't want to lie to her mom again. When she had arrived, her mom welcomed her but Brie noticed her disappointment when she was the only one. she merely told her mom that she came by to take a rest. Her mom wouldn't handle it well if she really knew what that issue was. so, Brie took one of the yard vans and drove to her family vineyard to keep her self busy, stay out of sight from whoever might know her and Josh's story. She tried to keep mind occupied but no ounce of her hometown didn't remind her of Josh as she drove from her home to the vineyard. Almost every place had been tainted with a memory of her and Josh's early years, the years when they had been mad— mad for each other, obsessed and possessive of each other.
The small town of Geneva had not changed much, it was still as earthy and beautiful as ever with the quaint cafes and wine shops, small bakeries and vast rolling hills of wine valley, the air still smelt of grapes mingled with an undertone of freshly baked bread and croissant courtesy of the French owned bakeries and restaurants. She could swear that if she drove in the opposite direction, the old playground— where they both sat on the swing and downed a bottle of wine, chugging it down without glasses— would still be there. She didn't and steadied her hands on the steering wheel reminding herself that she'd come home to breathe and not reminisce but last night proved to her that coming back to her home meant coming back to the origin of Josh and Brielle Anderson.
Brielle shivered, her skin responding to the enormous cooling units stationed around the corners of the dimly lit cellar. The cellar wasn't so cold when she arrived but after almost five hours in the place, goosebumps peppered the exposed skin of her bare arms.
Safe for the gentle hum of the cooling units and dehumidifiers, the only sound in the cellar was of clinking bottles been moved around by the workers. Brielle was thankful for the minimal noise as she mindlessly labelled the bottles. She had been too immersed in her thoughts and didn't pay any attention to the staggering ladder. As she began to climb down, a sudden misstep threw her off balance. Gravity seized hold, swiftly dragging her downwards. With a helpless cry escaping her lips, she landed on the stone tiles with a jarring thud, her elbows and palms bearing the brunt of the impact against the hard ground.
A little disoriented,  she struggled to collect herself, sharp stings of pain pulsed from her scraped elbows and palms, the friction having torn jagged lines through layers of skin. Blood trickled, mingling with the dust and grit from the ladder's rungs. With trembling hands, she gingerly inspected the wounds, wincing at the sight of raw exposed flesh.
Her breath came in ragged gasps, a mix of shock and throbbing pain, as she assessed the extent of her injuries, not just physically,  her heart was hurting also, she hadn't cried a drop since she left her home, her true home with Josh but now the stinging somehow reminded her of how much pain her heart was in and the tears came streaming down, uncontrollably.
Slowly, she gathered her resolve, pushing herself upright with careful movements. Each motion sending waves of discomfort through her limbs, a reminder of the fall that had momentarily reminded her of reality. It had been two days since she left her husband and he hadn't looked for her. Her friends had called her and told her they couldn't make the five hour drive to Geneva Fingerlake but would come in on Friday evening for the wine tasting event. That had been comforting, but each hour that passed without a call or text from her husband jarred at her tender heart. Had he been too busy to even notice her absence while her chest was knotting in helpless longing?
Face shimmering with hot tears, she steadied herself against the ladder's frame, the rough wood providing a stark contrast to the smooth skin she had just injured. With a deep breath, she resolved to continue working but the physical impact of the accident overpowered Brie's determination to work her self to exhaustion. Gathering her tools once more, and freeing some from the waist band of her work clothes, she tried to resume her task but the buck in her shoulders made her decide against it. She rolled her eyes at the ladder and stepped away from it.
How had she been so careless on a ladder?  She could've gotten badly hurt if she crashed her back on an oak barrel. Thankful that her back didn't bear the wicked impact, she stomped the ladder aside.
It  stung where she scraped and it bled. Again, she examined the bloody lines the floor drew into her skin she couldn't stop the tears from flowing, she peeled off her apron and threw them to the ground, her sobs increasing from whimpers to breathless sobs. She'd been keeping those tears away since she got back home, for herself, for her mother and her sister, especially her mom. Brie looked around for a first aid kit, she was just returning to her workstation with the small box in hand when she heard the sound of boots crunching against the gravel stone of the cellar's staircase leading to the inventory section.
She quickly wiped her face with her work shirt.
"Brie,"
It was her sister, Suzie.
Brie stilled herself and plastered on a practiced smile before turning towards the direction of her sister. "Suzie" Brie called out with forced animation, her head banging together with the throb in her arms.
Her sister turned from the stairs looking effortlessly gorgeous in a pair of jeans, grey top and a plaid jacket tied around her waist. Suzie lifted both hands revealing packed lunch and two bottles of beer, "I know you didn't have breakfast. Mom sent them to you, I brought the beer." She smiled to one side but as she approached her younger sister her smile slipped, replaced by a worried frown when she saw the first aid box in Brie's hands.
With hastened steps, Suzie dumped the lunch and beers on the top of a barrel and rushed to Brie. Her eyes roamed her body and stopped at her scraped bloody elbows. "Brielle!"
Brie made a sound in the back of her throat, her eyes hurt from the sting of tears in them. Suzie brought Brielle over to sit down, taking the box from her hand she placed it between them. "How did you get hurt?" She pushed Brie's erratic brown curls behind her ear. One look at her baby sister who used to cry a lot less than giggle, whom she used to practice braiding with her wild voluminous curls, Suzie could tell she'd been crying, her thick eye lashes stood apart, damp and darker. She noticed her low countenance since she arrived, it was already ominous that Josh hadn't returned with her and Brie came with a small suitcase. She never packed clothes when she was coming home for a few days, she simply wore her sister's or made do with the old clothes hanging in her closet. But two days ago when she arrived, Suzie had instantly noticed that all wasn't well with her little Brie. Brie even refused ranch fries, she never did.
Brie bit her bottom lip not wanting to risk it by speaking. "I fell from the ladder."
Brie wanted to let it out, she needed to talk about it with someone else, the burden was wounding her heart.
Lynn was right, if she didn't have an outlet she'd harm herself with the burden.
Suzie cupped Brie's face, her eyes grew softer as she looked at her sister, "talk to me Brie, what happened between the both of you?"
The bomb had just dropped.
What Brie was avoiding had sought her out, but still she was thankful it was her sister and not their mother. Brie's body trembled as Suzie drew her in for a hug, her hand resting on her full head of curly brown hair. Brie was no longer sobbing, she was heaving heavily, she did with hope that the low hum of the cooling units will drown her sobs.
"Brielle..." Suzie's voice broke, she swallowed painfully feeling heartbroken for her little sister. Suzie had been on the call with Brie the night after she returned home from the hospital, Suzie knew the incident that broke Brielle apart, she knew it and she wanted to hate Josh but he didn't know.
"He doesn't know yet?"
Brie shook her head, with her runny nose buried in her sister's hair. "I hate him Suzie. I shouldn't" she sobbed harder, heer chest rising and falling with every sob. "I told him I wanted time alone. Suzie I'm contemplating divorce."
The room suddenly went silent. Brie realized that she'd never said that out loud before, the word scorched her tongue and broke her heart and it did so to Suzie's seeing how she momentarily stopped patting Brie's head.
Unable to bear the weight of the words, Brie attempted to take them back.
"I don't want it. I want to fight for us but Josh hasn't even called me yet." Brie's voice had disappeared into a whisper at the last word. Why on earth hasn't he called? She'd mulched and tumbled that thought in her mind and punctuated it with different excuses for him. He claimed to love her, he had been heartbroken when she told him but he still didn't reach out.
Suzie shushed Brie's sobs, pressing her head into the crook of her neck.  Her sobs had gotten louder and her head throbbed more. The hurt in her heart dominating the physical pain she was feeling earlier.
"It's going to be alright." Suzie said but Brie only embraced her tighter, sniffing in the grape and vine scent on her sister. There was a time when the two girls had been so passionate about grapes and wine before Brie became more passionate about Josh. She had been someone asides her marriage, she had been a talented taster with superior knowledge in the art of winery. To Brie and Suzie, winery was an art, an expression, to their family it was much more than a random combination of set down formulas, it was divine. Brie had forgotten about all that but she had rushed down to the wine cellar earlier just to do what she used to love but the same wine cellar also had a beautiful smear of her and Josh's love story. They'd shared one of her father's most expensive wine prized at one fifty thousand dollars and thought they'd get away with it but fate had better plans on getting them busted when the door jammed and refused to open, their rescue had been her father. It was the day he had approved of them and began to tell all his friends that his daughter Brie would end up with Josh Anderson, they did.
Brie's effort to shift her line of thought wasn't effective, her force of it got her a scraped elbow. Suzie held Brie's shoulder to see her eyes but Brie looked down, Brie knew her sister would never find any joy in her pain but something her sister used to say pricked her and jeered at her barely surviving love life.
Love doesn't hurt who doesn't crave it.
Her sister's mantra. And she still swore by it.
Suzie bent forward a bit, lifting Brie's chin to catch her sister's hazy brown eyes in the dim lit area, the light casted on her teary eyes created an animated sparkle, all Suzie saw whenever she looked at her sister was the big brown eyed fairy she used to give a piggy back ride, the one she'd almost fallen to the muddy yard ground countless times considering they were just two years apart and no very significant weight or height difference. Suzie had and still was ever joyed to be Brie's big sister.
"You're going to be alright Brielle. You're going to do what makes you happy."
Brie's eyes found her sister's brown orbs and she nodded. Somehow she felt better, less suffocated.
Suzie carefully applied ointment on Brielle's elbows and palms, sealing it in with a bandage. She tried using a less conspicuous one so their mom wouldn't notice but the white band could be spotted from far. They both laughed at their failed effort. Suzie rubbed her sister's arm and smiled at her.
"Let's get you a dress for the evening."
Brie furrowed her brows, a slight frown appeared between them.
Suzie was putting stuff back into the first aid box "Mom's hosting a wine and barbecue event over the weekend. The yard will be packed until Sunday."
"Till Sunday?"
"Yup" Suzie nodded. "Till Sunday; she wants to get in as much guests as she can while increasing tourist number"
Brie chuckled at their mother's creative exuberance.
Suzie hummed, she looked forward trying to peak Brie's inquisitiveness.
When Brie leaned forward, Suzie knew it worked. "What?" Brie asked, a smile ghosting her lips.
Suzie glanced at her and just shook her head.
Brie nudged her on.
Suzie glanced at her again. " This morning, mom sent him an invite."
Brie's heart dropped, her eye wide. "You're joking."
Suzie made a face and shook her head, "I typed the message for Mom."
Typing a message for their mother was valid. Their mom hated to text because of autocorrect intrusion so it could be true that Suzie in fact typed the message.
Brie's heart beat errantly against the reins, her pulse peaked with both excitement and dread. She steadied her breath. "Josh is too busy. He won't come." She said, trying to resound it loud enough for her stupid heart to hear, she didn't have the ability to stomach any disappointment so she'd rsther not anticipate anything. He hasn't been available for her all this time not even on weekends. He won't be free to come, there was nothing to worry about. She told herself but still she couldn't ignore the excitement. She felt like a teenage girl meeting her hockey player crush one on one.
"Get me a dress" Brie said and Suzie nearly laughed. She had been watching her sister's face portray the confusion in her mind.
She still loved Josh, even Suzie could tell.
It wasn't hate, it was anything but hate.