Free Wildcat Wine by Claire Matturro

smiled.
    â€œTo get an organic label, a wine must be made without sulfites. But to make a large amount of wine without sulfites is tricky. Everything has to be perfect. The least miscalculation and you’ve got a barrel of moldy wine.”
    â€œThat’s disgusting,” squat Poodle Head said.
    â€œAh,” our environmentally sound vintner added, “but I don’t have that problem because I’ve perfected the system. There are neither sulfites nor mold in my wine. My system is labor intensive and that drives up the cost. But it also increases the quality, the taste, and the healthfulness of my wine.”
    â€œLet’s try some and see,” the lesser-squat woman said.
    Oh, great. If they started drinking free wine, I’d never get them to leave me and this smart, Maybe-Earl man alone.
    Remembering the flirty-girl tip to always ask a man questions about stuff he wants to talk about, I asked if muscadine grapes gave the wine any distinctive qualities.
    Smiling now in earnest, he explained that the native muscadine grapes are distinctive because of their 2-phenylethanol content. One of the ladies harrumphed, but he ignored her, and asked me if I knew what that was.
    Yeah, sure, it’s a long, boring word. But I leaned toward Maybe-Earl. “No. Please explain.”
    Earl, if this was Earl, was warming up to me and he was pleased to explain. “It’s the substance that also gives roses their characteristic fragrance.”
    I made a little gasp of appreciation.
    Outside, there was a sound of engine, a gust of diesel smell, and the slamming of doors, and I stretched my neck until I could see out the window and saw a whole damn busload of old people getting off. Didn’t the snowbirds go home in the spring anymore?
    They toddled in. Maybe-Earl went to greet them, and it became quickly obvious that this was an arranged tour. He invited me and the two Poodle Heads to join them. A tour I didn’t need; privacy with the real Earl I needed, so I thanked him, but declined.
    As I declined, I offered my hand. “Lilly,” I said. “I’ve so enjoyed this. Count on me coming back.”
    â€œEarl Stallings,” he said, “please do.”
    â€œActually,” I said, not wanting to give up now that I knew this was the famous Earl the Vintner, “but, with your permission”—big smile and little pause—“I think I’ll just wander around a bit on my own, until you have a few minutes for me. I’d sure like to talk to you.”
    â€œThat would be fine,” Earl said. “Look around and I’ll get this tour started in the shop, and then I’ll step outside and speak with you.”
    We smiled so hard at each other my jaws ached, and Poodle Heads clucked their tongues together as if Earl and I were consummating our little flirts right there.
    I went outside to amble around in the fresh air and wait until Earl had the tour group infatuated with his many different items for sale. Tired of watching the old folks nodding their heads at Earl through the plate-glass window, I cruised through the lot, toward the vineyard, until a big barnlike structure caught my eye. Someone had made a border of red bricks and planted a hedge of gardenias and hibiscus along the side of the barn. I huffed over toward it and poked my head right in through the big door. Nobody was home.
    The barn was cool and dim, with light coming in the windows. Buckets, rakes, a little tractor, and this and thats of what I took to be the usual accouterments of farming were scattered about. I read the labels on some sacks of rock phosphate and then wandered over to a table under a window with two big, bulky things on it under a tarp.
    Since nobody was about, and Earl did say, more or less, I could explore on my own, I pulled the tarp off. Under it, two strange-looking Star Wars –type models, or toys, or something mechanical and mostly metal sat on the table. They were