The sun was bright in a clear, vivid sky. The breeze was sweet, carrying the scent of wildflowers and rustling the leaves of the trees all around. A distant trickle of a slow-moving river could be heard above the chirping of the birds, the calling of chipmunks and small wild animals. But Vincent Serrano’s bright green eyes weren’t looking at any of the scenery he stood among. They were trained on a contract in his hands. An old thing, torn and worn along the edges, its bold, black text faded a bit. But the word “Deed” read loud and clear at the top.

He looked up to the house. Two stories, a small thing, bordered by a low stone wall covered by ivy, a tall gate leading into the yard. A small thing, perfect for two people, perhaps three, a dog or cat as well. The house had once been used as a private winery for the ones who had lived there before, but in their old age, couldn’t keep up with the garden of grapevines in the back of the house.

He glanced toward his right, where on the brown cobblestone path his longtime friend Lucy Kuhn stood. Together, they had worked to get enough money to get away from their families. It had taken longer than they thought, but finally, they had made enough to get away from the city and their families. When Vincent heard the place was a private winery, he jumped at it, hoping to use what he learned to make a bit of money on the side. “Nice place, isn’t it?” He asked at last, glancing at Lucy. Her hair was red, and it gleamed under the sun.

Vincent couldn’t hold back a smile. Lucy was eccentric in her own way. “Homey and quiet is perfect.” He said. “And this place has so much history. I’m going around back to look around.” He stepped through the gate, folding the deed carefully and placing it in his pocket. It would soon go into a safe place both he and Lucy could access when inside. The back yard was also enclosed in the same vine-covered stone fence, a small fish-filled pond sitting in the shade of a giant oak to the left. To the right was a single-story building where the distilling and aging tank was located, and outside the low stone gate behind the smaller fence, a hundred-yard-long, hundred-yard-wide field of deep purple grapes sat on their vines, almost ready for harvest. He could smell the fruit and water from the pond mixing with the sweet grass all over. A small wooden bench sat in front of the pond, resting in the shade.

It was so different from the town. Though his family owned a massive winery and grape fields, he had never been around such silence and such complete nature. With a deep sigh, he turned to go into the house and find Lucy.

Vincent looked around the living room. A small thing, but it housed a large fireplace far to the left, where a three-seated brown-leather couch sat across from two similar chairs that flanked a bookshelf. Behind the couch and against the wall, between the two arched windows that showed the front yard, another bookshelf sat. To the right of the door, between it and the archway to the kitchen, a brown-leather loveseat rested in the corner.

The whole of the living room was lighted by a table lamp that rested on the coffee table between couch and chairs, a couple caged lamps. A dark red curtain was cast out of the way of the archway between living room and kitchen, ready at any time to be pulled to hide the room beyond. He loved the setup. It was warm and cozy, quiet. The house hardly creaked with the wind despite its age. As he stood there, observing the room, he heard footsteps on the stairs behind the wall in front of him and saw Lucy return. “Two bedrooms upstairs.” He said. “You choose yours?”

Vincent cocked his head to the side and squinted his eyes, but he’d been around Lucy enough to just nod his head and smile in understanding. He hadn’t seen the rooms yet, but she obviously had a plan in mind. “Er, I’ll go take a look at the other room...” He went past her and up the stairs, into the wide hallway. Lucy seemed to have left her door slightly open, nearer the staircase, so he went a ways down the hall to the end, and was faced with two doors, one to the left and one to the right. He opened the one to the left.

A bathroom greeted him, with the same wallpaper as the hallway, and he left that behind to the other door. The room was dark red, a bed resting near the wall farthest to the left, and a dresser was across from it. A desk sat with a lantern burning, a mirror near the bedside table that held a red-shaded lamp. There were two windows, one across from the door and one on the farthest wall. A clock ticked on the wall above the desk and its computer. Taking a step out, he closed the door. The entire house was what he’d loved to have earlier, at a young age, rather than the monstrosity that he and his family resided in. Sprawling, hardly a yard in the front, it was like an army barracks, built to hold twenty people but really housing a couple less. He went back downstairs to find Lucy and speak of the grapevines in the back.

“I have to agree.” Vincent said as he returned downstairs. “It’s an amazing place.” He went to the bookcase between the two chairs and took the deed out of his pocket, taking one of the dusty old books off the shelf and hiding the flimsy paper inside the pages, then checked his watch. “Heh, it looks like it’s about an hour ‘till lunchtime. We should get out and buy groceries, shouldn’t we? Town’s just a while away.” He looked to his friend. She had seemed a little lost, perhaps in thought.

Vincent came down the stairs after her, the wind whipping his brown hair forward. “Good lord, we should get back fast.” He said over the wind. “Don’t want the storm to take our work when we get back!” He ran out the gate and to the car they’d come to the house in: A dark blue 1960 Lincoln Continental. “Hurry up, girl!” He called, tossing open the driver side door and putting the key in the ignition. The road leading to their little home was very well-packed dirt, and neither of them would know if it would turn to mud very quickly in the rain.

Vincent looked at Lucy as they started off, down the road as the rain came down. “You know, I’ve been thinking about the vineyard out back.” He said. “Maybe we can work together and start things up, make wine of our own with the distilling tank. It’s not too difficult to do on a small scale, and we’d even be able to sell it!” He stared at the road. It wasn’t becoming too soft, luckily, there seemed to be some kind of clay mixed with stone holding things together and keeping their wheels from sinking. “We’d have to harvest the grapes on our own, though, by hand. Doesn’t seem like a lot of work, there aren’t many vines. What say you?”

Vincent smiled. Lucy was her own person, and questions like that made him happy to know her. “In this case, it’s a large tank that can be heated or cooled to ferment and age the squeezed juice, make the sugars break down and make the alcohol emerge from the juice.” The road twisted to the left, the trees starting to thin as the ground became flat, as though they were entering grasslands, but buildings dotted the landscape as well.

Vincent had put an elbow on the door, resting his head as he watched the town approach, one hand resting lightly on the wheel. But he had to narrow his eyes when his friend spoke. “Strange?” He repeated. “What’s strange to you, Lucy?” He studied his friend for a moment, one eye on the road. She was rather random, but he couldn’t pinpoint what she found strange. The town, the house, the forest or weather?

Vincent laughed silently. Sometimes even he couldn’t understand the girl. But she was right. The house felt as though they’d been there forever. It was so welcoming, relaxing, and secluded from the world. It had its own atmosphere, its own heart and soul. “Relax, Lucy, we’re almost there.” He studied the buildings as they drove by, road turning to complete, packed concrete. “Maybe we should stop for lunch at a coffee house, then get groceries.” He glanced sideways at the girl.

Vincent killed the engine and sat there for a moment, near the cafe in one of the open parking spots alongside the road. The rain hit the top of the car in a hollow, metallic sound, streaming down the windows. It was a nice sound, something he rarely heard in his old home, with such a huge family. Parents, grandparents, thirteen siblings both older and younger, a couple aunts and uncles, all lived under that one massive roof, and with all the room and space, it was still as loud as a zoo of monkeys. “Let’s go, then,” he said to Lucy, and opened his door, hurrying his actions to keep as dry as possible.

Vincent shook his head free of water before following Lucy. She had taken off, leaving him to contemplate the menu choices for a moment. When he found her, she was sitting at a two-seated table by the window that portrayed the road and falling rain. “Of course I know how to use it.” He said, taking a seat across from her. “Of course, I’ll have to look a little deeper into the fermentation process, I know we may need yeast for full progression, and, perhaps, a temperature control item of some sort.” He drew with his finger on the fake wood covering the table. “I just hope you’ll be willing to squish grapes with your feet. That’s the traditional way of getting the juices out of the fruit, when making small batches of juice or wine.”