Tales of Sin & Fury, Part 1 (6 page)

‘So what did he do then?' asks Debs.

‘Who?'

‘The Greek boy. After you blew him out.'

‘Lefteris? He took defeat in good spirit,' I say. ‘We walked back down to the village. On the outskirts, by the cemetery, we passed an older woman dressed all in black. He greeted her and they chatted in Greek. I could see her looking me over from the corner of her eye. Then she went into the graveyard.'

That was a strange encounter. I didn't understand it. Perhaps we are doomed to keep re-telling what we don't understand until we can make sense of it.

‘I asked Lefteris who the woman was.

‘“My aunt,” he said. “She goes every day to talk to her daughter.”

‘I looked round to see the daughter.

‘“Her daughter, she died,” he explained. “Before five years. Now there is only bones. After some years, we dig the bones, we wash them and keep them.” He gestured towards his aunt, who I could see sitting in the graveyard, rocking to and fro, making a low moaning sound.

‘“Her daughter was very beautiful,” he said. “She was ill and then her thread was cut. You understand me?” He made a gesture of scissors cutting. Then he stretched his hands down in a gesture of helpless despair. “The people here say:
Meera tees
. Her fate. The Fates.”

‘I knew about the Fates from Greek myths. Spinning people's lives and cutting them.

‘“She was my cousin,” he said. “Very beautiful.”

‘“I'm sorry,” I said. I didn't know what else to say.

‘“You look a little something like her,” he said. He scrutinized my face. “But not the hairs, no.” He reached out and spread my hair over my shoulders, stroking it. It was long at the time and very blond.'

‘Out of a bottle?' asks Debs.

I shake my head. ‘I never had to.'

‘Unlike some,' says Debs, eyeballing Mandy.

Mandy ignores her. ‘Go on,' she says.

‘Lefteris said, “Since then every day my aunt…” Then he stopped, took my hand and pulled me away. “We are alive,” he said and gave that smile again. It made the scar on his left cheek crinkle up.

‘That evening we went to the pictures. An outdoor cinema with upright wooden chairs, and lizards crawling on the screen. The film was
Doctor Doolitle
so a few more animals didn't matter. They sold sugar-crusted almonds in little bags instead of popcorn. I can't remember much of the film.'

‘Too busy snogging, I bet,' says Debs from her bed opposite.

‘Not much. It was a public place so he held back. The Greeks are strict like that. It's just that the movie wasn't worth remembering. The night sky was more interesting. A dome of diamonds in blue velvet. A lid of warm air pressing down on us. The sounds of the evening streets around the cinema. Friends calling to each other through the dusk. I held Lefteris' hand and afterwards he kissed me goodnight. Very polite.'

‘No action there, then,' says Debs.

‘No,' I say. ‘Afraid not.

‘The next day he took me to meet his family. They all lived in one house. Lefteris' grandfather was still working the land, the family had a plot at the far end of the beach. The grandfather kept a donkey in the field behind the house. His handshake was brusque, the skin on his palms was rough. Lefteris' grandmother was crotcheting with a tiny hook and the finest thread. Her hands moved regularly like the inside of a clock. Beside her sat the widowed aunt dressed in black, the one we had seen at the cemetery. She watched everything from her hollowed-out eyes. On the table was a bowl full of crimson red hard-boiled eggs; Lefteris explained they were for Easter.

‘His dad had a shop on the harbour which sold a little of everything including tickets for the shipping line. He was suave and hospitable as he poured the home-made wine. Two younger sisters hovered shyly at the edge of the room. Apparently Lefteris was the first ever in the family to go to university, he was the apple of his mother's eye. She was a heavy woman in a dark patterned summer dress. She had huge breasts, they looked like they were built for mothering. Unlike mine.'

‘Yeah,' says Debs, ‘I ain't being personal, but there's not much going for you in that department.'

‘Don't mind Debs,' says Mandy. ‘So what did his mum do?'

‘She kept her eyes on me while I nibbled politely at the olives and nuts, as if she was deciding whether I would pass some kind of test. I wondered if she thought my blue cotton dress a bit shabby, or its skirt a bit short. Her first question sounded aggressive, and she made Lefteris translate: “Where is your mother?”

‘“At home in England,” I replied, and he translated.

‘“And she lets you come here alone?” she asked.

‘I couldn't tell her what really happened, so I gave the easy answer: “Yes.”

‘“Lefteris is a good boy” she said, and he squirmed as he translated. His face had such a liquid beauty: soft brown features, sharp restless eyes and his hair reminded me of when the goddess Athena makes Odysseus' locks curl like a hyacinth.'

‘Odysseus? Who's he when he's at home?' says Debs.

‘A hero in a Greek myth.' I pause. ‘He never was much at home, he went to fight in the Trojan War and got back twenty years later.'

‘Can't have been in much of a hurry,' says Mandy.

I can't help smiling. ‘Adventures on the way.'

‘I know the type.' Mandy pulls her feet out from under the bedclothes and rubs them. ‘What's with all this Greek myths stuff?'

‘It comes from reading a lot as a kid.'

‘What's the matter with you? What sort of weirdo reads Greek myths?' says Debs.

‘We didn't have a telly,' I say. ‘Not when I was little.' No way I could start to explain how weird my childhood was.

‘Takes all sorts,' says Mandy. ‘Go on, then.'

‘At one point they sent Lefteris to fetch another bottle of wine from the store room in the yard. His mother suddenly lent over, grasped my arm with a grip of iron and said something urgently in Greek. I couldn't understand, so she said it again. Then again, louder. As if repeating it would eventually make it understandable. I kept smiling and tried to listen to the intonation, but I couldn't work out what she was saying. When Lefteris came back she insisted he translate. He was embarrassed:

‘“My mother wants you to marry me.”

‘“But she doesn't know me,” I said.

‘His mother answered, “You are English. That is good.” The reply reached me round the table. She said, “We Greeks like to make cocktail.” Then she touched me again and added “You can come to live with us.” While Lefteris was translating, the aunt in black sneezed. That made everyone go quiet. Lefteris looked at the ground. The grandmother crossed herself three times. Then everyone started talking at once, I couldn't understand what was going on.

‘Afterwards he walked me back to my digs and tried to explain: “The sneeze, it is a tradition. They say it means, that the thing somebody says at that moment, it will happen. The older people here believe such things.
Teehi
. Chance. Fate. My mother is from the traditional culture, she believes it. Not me. I believe that each person, he makes his fate. Perhaps I marry here, perhaps I go to England. I like that. The island is very quiet…” he searched for a word “…far away from Athens. You understand me?” I understood. He wanted sex and adventure, his mother wanted marriage. He was parched for tourist flesh. His mother wanted to breed English blood into the family. And she thought a sneeze could make it happen. I was an exotic delicacy. I could be caught and tamed. And for me their Greekness – their generosity, their directness, their roots in the herb-scented rock of the island – that was exotic too. It was strange and seductive, a delightful garden I could escape into. But I'd never have belonged. We each yearned for difference. But even then I knew you can't escape your own life that easily.'

‘The way you talk…' says Mandy. ‘Did you get lessons?' She gets out of bed and wanders across the room to stare out of the window. ‘I'd have stayed there. Work in the shop. Sun every day. Down the beach with the kids. Give up all your bad habits. Fresh start. Happy ending.'

‘I don't do happy endings.' I look at her across the room, ‘A few days later I kissed him goodbye. I was not for him. I was no use to him.'

‘All that for nothing,' says Debs. ‘I thought you was going to tell us about these two guys sleeping on the beach?' She gags, gets up and goes to the toilet behind the wall next to my bed. We can hear her throwing up.

There's still a faint banging coming from down the corridor: ‘Nurse! I want a nurse! Fuck you!'

‘Poor cow,' says Mandy. ‘She don't realize they never go when you bang like that. Point of principle. To make you suffer. Go on, babes. The two guys on the beach.' She comes to sit on my bed.

I move my foot out of the way and make a last-ditch attempt to get out of carrying on. This story is going to get really personal. ‘It's not that interesting,' I say.

‘Yeah, it is,' says Debs, coming out of the toilet. ‘You tell a story good. You should be a writer.'

‘I can't write,' I say. ‘If only.'

The stories and poems I used to write when I was a kid. I hid them in the hollow of the oak tree in our garden. So she wouldn't find them. Then one day I went down there and they were gone. Thinking the tree didn't like my stories and I shouldn't write any more. I didn't write again for years. I never understood what happened to those stories.

I put my hands over my mouth. ‘I can't write,' I say again. ‘Not a word.' Why torture myself about my failures?

‘You can talk, can't yer?' says Mandy. ‘That's writing out loud.'

I take my hands from my mouth and stare at my palms. People use them to tell fortunes, but mine seem to give me no answer. All I can see are criss-crossed lines, paths merging, colliding, intercepting and some remnants of ingrained mud. I'm used to that from the gardening. What day of the week is it? I think I was meant to be pruning Mrs Downes' apple trees today. Like hell. I look at the silver ring on my little finger. From her bed opposite, Debs hasn't noticed. I repeat, ‘Writing out loud? Is it?'

No-one says anything for a while. Then I shrug and give in. ‘OK, if you say so…' I take a deep breath.

‘It was because of Lefteris that I met the two guys on the beach.

‘After I stopped seeing him, for a few days I stayed in my room reading. Every so often I heard explosions. The Greeks were preparing home-made fireworks for Easter. Once I saw a man running down the street outside my window clutching his hand and yelling to the heavens. Later that day in the taverna an old man did a mime show explaining to me about the man's accident with the gunpowder. All week you couldn't get meat in the taverna. It was Holy Week: no meat, no eggs, no oil, no butter, no fish. I've never eaten so much squid. That was allowed because it doesn't have blood. It gives you weird dreams. The owner of the taverna gestured and pointed at the clock to tell me not to miss midnight on Easter Saturday at the church.

‘So on Saturday evening I was watching out for when it would start, and I saw crowds going down the streets to the harbour in their best clothes. I waited 'till they'd all gone past, then I slipped out of my digs and followed them. I didn't want to go too near, not being a believer, I felt out of place. I found a spot at the top of some steps where I could see over a couple of roofs down into the church courtyard. It was full of people standing in the dark. From inside the white chapel the mumbled chanting of the priest came like an endless thread of sound winding its way around the houses. Beyond the church, fishing boats bobbed on the black water of the harbour. I watched it all from outside. The only person I belonged with was at the other end of Europe. I wondered if I would ever rejoin the community of the living, or if I would always be an outsider. If I would ever belong to anyone or anything.

‘It must have been nearly midnight when the chanting stopped. The crowd seemed to be waiting for something… a dark throng of humans, stirring in the shadows. Then from out of the church, a candle flame appeared. It became two, three, four… Each person had brought a candle and the lights spread through the crowd until the courtyard sparkled with tiny shining dots like the sky above us. Then the church bell started to ring. And the fireworks started – like all the bangers of bonfire night crackling around the village and the hills beyond.

‘People started leaving the churchyard, and sounds came up to me, a dull murmur as they spoke to each other with the ritual greeting. They say, “
Cristos annesti,
” and the other person replies, “
Alleethos annesti
.” I learnt later that it means “Christ is risen,” “Truly he has risen.” The same syllables over and over, spreading across the village as the crowd dispersed through the streets into the night… a low hubbub rising through the air as if the houses themselves were breathing. I tried to make my way back to my digs without meeting anyone. I felt ashamed because I didn't have a candle.

‘Then when I reached the door, my landlady saw me and invited me in downstairs. “
Ella, ella, ella!
” she kept saying, beckoning me in. She was with her son and a neighbour, who was also in black. She was a widow too. They were having a special soup. Egg and lemon. They showed me in mime how it was made. It was delicious: creamy and sweet, with an edge. They pressed second helpings onto me. You really appreciate kindness when you are alone.

‘The next day, Easter Day, the whole village had an aroma of roast lamb. People were cooking on spits in the street. Tempting me out to taste life.'

There's a rattle of keys in the lock: ‘Breakfast!'

‘Here's something to tempt you, all right,' says Mandy.

I can't even look at the food. After the trolley's gone, I'm still struggling not to gag. The others wander back to their beds carrying their paper plates without enthusiasm.