Page 203 of You've Got Hate Mail
Yep.
This really is the life.
36
LOVE SIDE STORY
Cricket
Everything iscrazy busy around the winery.
Mostly the good kind of crazy busy, but still crazy busy.
We’re in high gear getting ready for the wedding, which is a month away. We’re making sure the chairs and tables in the basement of the events center are in good working order so that we can get replacements if needed and ordering food and flowers and borrowing sound equipment from the neighbors and asking trusted friends if they can sign NDAs and show up to help.
When we’re not getting ready for the wedding, I’m soaking up all of the knowledge I can find about grapes and following Winona in both our fields and hers to glean what I can from her years of experience. The kind of things you can’t find with internet research and online classes.
Dori’s often with us too.
Some days feel helpless, like we’re both learning all we can about wine for nothing, since the grapes belong to Winona this year, and even if they didn’t, making wine still takes time, even the fastest wines.
Other days, I tap into my optimism—or possibly my denial—and am convinced we’ll have enough miracles to get us through to when our first batch of wine could be ready.
In a year and a half.
I told Heath and Mabel and Ginny about Pip draining all of the wine and asked them not to give her shit about it, and now Heath’s offered to check every barrel. They’re two-deep and four high on both sides of the cellar walls, so we’re hoping Pip didn’t get the back and high barrels—and that the wine’s still good—but the equipment he needs to move the barrels is broken, so that has to be fixed first.
More Cheeky Beaver AI videos have gone up on GrippaBeav.com, stretching out my original video’s notoriety even longer. Mabel says she has a plan to find out who’s running the channel so that we can go directly to the source since the site’s legal team isn’t being helpful.
I didn’t ask details—I’m too busy with everything else.Waytoo busy, but I’d do anything for Mabel and this winery. Mabel’s the overprotective big sister I never knew I needed.
And then there’s the rest of everything with Heath.
Who really should come first, becauseoh my holy orgasms.
He sneaks into my apartment nearly every night, where we share a glass of wine and talk about our days and then fall into bed together.
He never stays late, but I’m seeing him more often during the day with all of the work necessary around the property to finish up before the wedding.
The man knows how to work a tool belt.
And he’s sexy as hell no matter what he’s doing.
Holding a paintbrush? I drool.
Pulling chairs and tables out of storage to stage in the event space? I swoon.
Replacing loose boards on the deck with a carpenter’s pencil behind his ear, quick efficiency with a tape measure, and then expertly wielding his power tools? I save that for my fantasies on the nights that he falls asleep on his couch and I have to get myself off.
That, and the smiles he gives me.
Mr. Grumpy Handyman is now a pretty happy guy most days.
I like to think it’s me, but some days, I still worry it’s not.
That it’s just sex making him happy.
Or that his favorite baseball team is doing well.
