We leave the house without making a plan. The back doors open, and we step straight onto the path between rows. Late afternoon, the sun is still bright, but the air is starting to cool with an evening wind. The dirt is packed and dry under my shoes. The vines run in endless lines. It’s ordinary in the best way.
Gio falls in beside me without taking my hand. He doesn’t have to. The awareness is there the whole time. Under that, I’m aware of everything else. Birds somewhere. The sound of evening approaching.
Everyone has long gone home, so the quiet of the fields settles into me.
“North block?” he asks.
“Show me where that Sangiovese starts,” I say.
He points us up a gentle rise. No speeches, no tour guide voice. Just rows, wire, leaves, and the two of us moving in the same direction.
“Vigna Torre,” he says, like he’s trying the words on again.
“Primo Raggio,” I counter, automatically.
He glances at me, amused. “You’re relentless.”
“When I’m right.” I tip my head, mock-solemn. “Which is often.”
He hums as if he might allow it. For now.
We take the shallow slope between two rows, leaf canopies rattling in a breeze that doesn’t quite make it down to us. The wires are taut; the shoots have been tucked and clipped with a precision that makes the organized chef in me unreasonably happy.
“You train on Guyot here?” I run my fingers lightly beneath a cane, careful not to snag anything tender.
He nods. “Single in the cooler rows, double where the soil is more lively. You want the fruit to see the morning and hide from the worst of the afternoon.”
I swing my arm, letting the robe I put on earlier back in the room feel like a lifetime ago. I’m in a simple outfit now. A pair of comfortable jeans and an oversized sweater that drapes over my body just right.
We pass a yellow bin stacked empty at row’s end, the stain of last harvest’s work still ghosted along its rim. I picture hands here in September, a quick flick of the wrist, the clatter of clusters dropping into plastic, the jokes and the curses, the weight building one cut at a time. Work has a sound; I hear it even when the rows are quiet.
“How many pickers?” I ask.
“Depends on the day.” He ticks off numbers in his head. “Two crews during the push. One local, one from farther south. We keep them housed well. Paid well. Fed well.”
“Fed well,” I repeat, because it matters in my bones. “What’s well?”
“Morning—espresso, cornetti, fruit. Midday—pasta, protein, greens. Big jugs of water. Dinner—whatever the cook decides and as much as they want.”
We continue up the slope until we get to the right vines. Up close, the Sangiovese leaves are dark and confident, five lobescrisp against the sky. Tiny green clusters are there if you know how to look.
The clusters are baby-small, hiding under leaves like they’re shy. I touch the air beside one.
“This is the parcel?” I ask.
He nods toward the stone tower on the hill. “From here to the cypresses. The tower keeps its eye on it.”
“Vigna Torre,” I say, teasing on principle.
His mouth curves. “Primo Raggio,” he says back, the words easy between us now.
We walk again. A lark zips up and out. The dirt changes slightly underfoot, finer, then a little rougher. Small things you notice when you’re not talking much. I like this kind of quiet, the shared kind that isn’t empty. He lets me set the speed. I don’t speed up.
“What did you do out here when you were a kid?” I ask.
“Escaped,” he says. “Got into trouble. Came back with scraped knees, bruises, dirt on my face.”
I smile, picturing a young boy with dark hair and eyes, running wild through the fields. “So a streak of rebellion even then.”
