Frost & Thaw by Brigita Pavshich
At first she thought the buzzing was coming from the phone in the hallway. Then she recognized the alarm. Just a second later she heard her father – was that brittle voice really his? – yelling something about frost. She lifted herself up onto her elbows and checked the clock. It was two in the morning. She moaned and then cursed softly. She put on her robe and went to silence the old man before he woke up the whole house.
“Father, what on earth does this mean?” she asked when she saw the wiry figure in the doorway of the hall.
“Hurry, Rose, it’s the frost. It’s coming. Wake Fred and the others.”
“Oh, you’re not just making things up, are you?” She walked to him and took hold of his elbow to escort him into his room. He couldn’t sleep so he imagined things. She couldn’t resent him. He was frail and that frustrated him after his full, active life.
He pulled his arm from her grip. “Look!” he pointed through the window. She neared the window pane. When she breathed a soft fog drew patterns on the glass. The sky outside was clear as a diamond and she could see the silvery threads forming on the grass and the remaining tree leaves. He was right.
“I’ll wake them. Go make the fires.”
She hurried down the hall and then turned. “Will you manage?” There was worry in her voice.
“Of course I will, you silly woman. I’m not dead yet,” he said. “Although some wish I were,” he added.
She banged on her son’s door.
“Fred, Mara! Wake up. Frost.” The message was clear and short and they would understand it.
She hurried into her bedroom and dressed in warm working trousers, a blouse and a thick, coarse sweater. She searched for her gloves and put on her boots. On her way out she tied her hair back. When she reached the stairs she was breathless.
Fred appeared behind her. He was sleepy and in a bad mood.
“What’s all this noise?” he snapped.
“Frost is coming. Alfonso is already out making the fires. Hurry up and wake Mike and Pedro.”
Fred disappeared back into his bedroom and Rose could hear the hurried words and quick movements.. In a matter of minutes the whole house was in frenzy.
Fred was the only one of her children who stayed at home. Her daughter, Sophia, went studying. She only returned home once or twice a year and then only after a lot of cajoling from her. Her youngest son, Greg, joined the army a year ago. If her husband were still alive he could have talked him out of it, but her opinion didn’t matter. She worried about him although he claimed in his letters he was happy. She didn’t understand how anyone could be happy in the army.
From the front steps she saw the smoke already rising over the vineyards. The scene was magical. The night was clear and the moon was shining over the landscape. The fires were like roses painted on a dark canvas.
Her skin prickled with the cold. She rubbed her face with her gloved hands and then hurried down the path and towards the first fire. They had waited with grape picking so the grapes would reach a higher sugar level. It was risky with the fall being so unreliable.
The first men were already bringing the boards, pieces of carton and even a pair of wings – two pieces of cloth tied to two pairs of sticks at right angles and then two of those wings were tied together into a butterfly. As a girl Rose had thought those were romantic. She had changed her mind once she had to use them at four in the morning as a ten-year old.
Frost hadn’t come so early in decades. She could hardly remember the last time when they had to light fires in the middle of the night. She picked up a wooden board and started swinging it from the fire towards the vines. That way they spread the warmth throughout the vineyards and prevented the frost from ruining their year’s work.
She fingered a grape. It was still soft and when she squeezed it, the blood-like juice squished over her fingers. She smiled. The smoke was invasive, but the cold air diluted it into a softer mist. Once, she would have just stood and admired everything around her: the smells, the delicious crunching of the frozen soil underneath her boots, the sight, the men around her, working hard at what, for most of them, was their dream job. Now, she just wanted to finish the work and go back to bed. For her, it had lost its traditional, romantic appeal. The cold penetrated too deeply into her bones.
She walked among the vines rhythmically. She had always imagined this was like hugging the vines and making them warm and comfortable. The extensive vineyard was quiet and peaceful despite the dozen of men moving around and perspiring in the cold night air. She heard Fred behind her shouting orders, sending men in different rows. He asked Alfonso to measure the air temperature.
Fred was only twenty-three, but he had been a grown man for a long time. She just didn’t want to see it because she had grown used to the pressure of responsibility on her shoulders. She feared if she gave up that feeling of duty, she’d become too light once the burden was lifted and she’d get blown away with the first wind.
When she turned she saw Fred showing Mara how to spread the heat with the boards. They had gotten married only six months ago. He was probably the first oldest child in their family to marry for love. Rose hadn’t had that choice. But at least her father had chosen a reasonable and fair man, although he wasn’t the most sensitive and caring person. He had died twelve years ago and ever since she had been at the head of the family business. When Fred had brought home the gentle and dainty Mara she was worried and she tried talking him out of marrying her. But he wouldn’t listen and she didn’t have the heart to break them up.
Mara raised her eyes and saw Rose staring at them. She blushed and when Rose nodded, her lips stretched wider..
Father approached her. He showed her the thermometer. “It’s getting warmer.”
“What time is it?” she asked.
Fred had a wrist watch. “Five in ten minutes.”
She tried to say something, but Fred interrupted. “I think we’ve beaten this thing. It won’t get any colder now. The sun will be up in an hour.”
“You’re right,” she agreed. Her brow creased. She pushed a strand of her strawy hair behind her ear, not caring that her gloves were smeared with dirt.
“I will measure the sugar contents tomorrow, that is today, and we’ll start picking this weekend. What do you say to that, grandpa?”
Alfonso listened to Fred and then looked at Rose. She raised her eyes to him.
“It’s your call,” he said to her.
After a second she turned to her oldest son. “No. Fred, it’s your decision. If you think that’s the right thing to do, than you should do it.”
He opened his mouth to argue, but then he smiled instead. She patted his back when she passed him.
“Good work, Mara.”
Slowly, everyone gathered in the kitchen.
“Shall I make some hot tea?” Rose asked when the last of the workers entered.
“Tea?” Alfonso made a face. “I’ll have brandy. Anyone cares to join me?” He glanced around the room. All the men cheered his invitation. He turned to Rose. “Don’t you worry about me, Rosie. I’ll probably live longer than you.”
She grinned. “Probably.”
Rose watched her family and the workers. Mara was sitting on Fred’s lap because there were too few chairs in the room. Several men were leaning against the wall, the dark patches there were a proof that that had been a habit for a long time. Alfonso lowered himself into a chair. He seemed breathless and his face was flushed; from the brandy or late night’s work she didn’t know.
When the men left half an hour later, Alfonso retired to his bedroom after a lot of convincing from Mara. He grumbled and complained, but in truth he loved the girl. He needed the help of the handrail to drag himself to the second floor.
“Well, I’ll go to bed, too,” Rose announced. Mara and Fred were the only ones left in the warm kitchen.
“We’ll go too,” Fred looked at his wife. She nodded, her eyelids drooping.
Rose cupped her son’s head and kissed his forehead. “Take care.”
“Ay, Mama, what is this all about? I’m not going anywhere” he said.
“I know, Frederick. I know.”
She shook her head and looked at them before she went through the door. In her bedroom she waited till she heard them go to bed, too.
She opened her old wardrobe with a squeaking sound. She had to dig a while through the clutter of the years before she found what she was looking for. She opened the bag and placed it onto her bed. Slowly and with unused gestures she filled it with her underwear, a couple of skirts and sweaters, a dress she had never worn, a pair of high-heeled shoes and stockings and a few personal things, including a framed picture of her family. She closed the bag and then changed from her working clothes into a pair of comfortable but elegant trousers, a white blouse and a velvet jacket. She tied a silk shawl around her neck and searched her drawer for a Sophia Loren style sun glasses. She had loved watching those old black and white movies with the Italian star, she had loved listening to Italian and she wished she could speak it.
Shyly she picked up a lipstick she had discovered abandoned in her daughter’s room. She was sure Sophia wouldn’t miss it. Rose colored her lips with the Wine red and smiled at the name of the lipstick. It would be sin using any other color.
She donned a black hat and looked at herself one last time in the big mirror. She didn’t recognize the woman staring back at her. She smiled and the stranger smiled back with a surprisingly confident, relaxed smile.
With her bag and sun glasses in her hands she tiptoed down into the kitchen where she drank a cup of tea before she picked up the car keys. One last time she looked around the vast kitchen, before she left through the back door. She repeated the ritual by taking a silent goodbye from the hill slopes with their invaluable black pearls on the vines.
Rose threw a look towards the bedroom windows. The house was quiet. They would sleep for at least a couple of hours longer, although the sun was already rising over the remotest parts of their estate.
She deposited her bag in front of the garage door. Despite her effort the door made a hair-raising sound. She placed the bag in the trunk of the Vauxhall. It had been her husband’s car and she was the only one who still used it for her weekly shopping in town. No one would miss it. The car was of faded lemon yellow color and the left tail light was cracked.
When she lowered herself into the driver’s seat, she prayed it would start without complications. To her relief the engine purred like a cat on a comfortable couch heated by warm sun. She backed out of the garage and turned down the driveway. Where the driveway joined the road, she stopped and looked over her shoulder at everything she was leaving behind. The moist in her eyes shone as a reflection of the red haze rising far behind her home.
Then she looked ahead. She drove off.
She turned on the radio and searched for the local radio station. She didn’t change it till the signal got weak once she was past her hometown. Then she listened to a station with evergreens, so old the crackling of the LPs became part of the music.
She saw a young man with a suitcase and a guitar hitchhiking by the side of the road when she neared the mark of 20 mile distance from home. She turned on the turn indicator and slowly veered to the shoulder of the road.
“Hello, ma’m,” he smiled cheerfully.
“Hey yourself. Throw the stuff in the back and sit in.”
He placed the guitar onto the back seat and kept his suitcase between his legs when he closed the door.
“Where are you going?”
“City of Angels.”
He slapped his thighs with his hands and laughed merrily. He wasn’t much older than her son. His hair was long, he wore glasses with wiry frames. “Where are you going?” he looked at her. Only then did he see she was a bit older than he had at first thought.
“I’m going to Italy,” she giggled.
“Really? Aren’t you going the wrong way?”
“I’ll take the long way,” she chuckled at his astonishment. She reached for the radio button and turn up the volume. “You mind?”
“Hell, no. When we take a break from the driving, I can play one for you myself.”
“Good. I’d like that.”
