by Mandy Baggot
‘Beer?’ Alex asked, reaching under the counter for two bottles of Alfa.
‘Warm beer?’ Elektra said, pulling a face.
‘The fridge is loaded with your potions,’ Alex reminded.
‘That is true,’ she said, accepting the bottle.
A few minutes later they were above ground, the cellar hidden, lounging in the shade of the barn, sitting in two well-worn rattan chairs, overlooking the field of goats.
Elektra drank down a good swill of her beer and wiped her mouth with the back of her hand. ‘So, is Aunt Margalo talking to you yet?’
Alex shook his head. ‘I would take it as a blessing at the moment but… there are things I need to ask her.’
‘What things?’ Elektra asked.
Alex sighed. ‘Elektra, I know you weren’t born when my father left but… has your father ever spoken about him to you?’
‘You know it is my mother who is the one who talks in my family.’
‘Has she spoken about him?’
‘We have no photos of him in our house,’ Elektra said, like that was explanation enough. ‘But he was only a relation by marriage. A short marriage. You know how it is.’
‘And my mother does not ever have any good to say about him.’ He took a swig of his beer. ‘It is something that Toula said to me today that bothers me. She said that he would never have cheated on my mother. And it is that fact that my mother keeps telling me. That he was not a good husband or father. That he took jobs in inappropriate places so he could cheat on his family.’
Elektra snorted. ‘That sounds more like our grandfather, Tomas.’
‘What?’
‘Now, he is someone my mother talks about a lot. Most of the time when my father is spending too long at the cafeneon or he wants to go out and watch the Black Strat Band. Tomas cheated on our grandmother so many times even my mother has lost count and she keeps scores, believe me,’ Elektra informed.
Alex knew little about his maternal grandparents either. They had both died when he was a small boy, within six months of each other.
‘All everyone says is that yiayia died of a broken heart. But my mother says she died of shame because she could not bear to live the rest of her life as a widow mourning a man who shared his penis with the entire island.’
Was this food for thought? Or did he now have two apparently disloyal members of his male descendants to hope he had not inherited genes from?
‘And you wonder why I prefer women,’ Elektra said with a satisfied snort.
‘I have never wondered,’ Alex told her, smiling.
‘Even my mother says nothing about it any more. I think she can see the merits of a man-free existence now my father is dressing like a roadie for Iron Maiden.’ She leaned back in her chair, the two back legs taking her weight.
Iron Maiden. Perhaps he could incorporate some popular rock anthems into his set. So far he was working on current dance mixed with Ibiza killers from the past five years. Adding rock would be different, he hadn’t heard any DJs do it here, it would set him apart… but would it be in a good way?
‘Whoa!’ Elektra exclaimed all of a sudden. The legs of her chair slipped away from the straw-strewn concrete and she disappeared backwards, sprawling into shelving that housed all manner of animal food, watering cans, tins of random screws and nails and tools.
Alex leapt up from his seat, placing his beer bottle on the ground and going to Elektra’s aid.
‘I’m fine! I’m fine! Ow!’
He held his hand out to her. ‘We cannot have you becoming injured now. You have more Kalm Life health bars to make.’
‘I appreciate your sympathy. So sincere,’ Elektra said, squirming up into a sitting position. As she shifted, she knocked a round patterned tin and it fell to the floor with a clash, the lid popping off and its contents spilling.
‘Sorry,’ Elektra said. ‘If I wake up your mother I will… make her dinner.’
Alex’s eyes were not now on his cousin but on the tin, its lid revolving until finally spinning to a stop next to what it had been concealing.
‘Shit,’ Elektra exclaimed, getting to her feet and staring. ‘Is that euro?’
Alex gathered up the huge pile of notes. There had to be hundreds of euro here, perhaps more than hundreds. He couldn’t believe it. Where had it come from? Who did it belong to? It couldn’t be his mother’s, she had no job, no income, nothing she had told him about anyway…
‘How much is there?’ Elektra asked, bending over the pile as Alex collated it.
‘I don’t know,’ he answered. ‘I don’t know if I want to know.’
‘It’s an heirloom,’ Elektra said. ‘Something your father left? Or maybe money your mother is keeping for someone else?’
‘Who would she be keeping money like this for?’ Alex asked.
‘My father?’ Elektra suggested. ‘If he has invested in a scheme with his friend, Bemus, he would want to hide this from my mother.’ She seemed to think about this a little harder. ‘But, then again, if it was a scheme involving Bemus there would be no profit, only debt.’
He should take the money to his mother. Ask her about it. That would be the sensible thing to do. But that would involve talking.
‘What are you going to do?’ Elektra asked him as he thumbed through the notes.
‘For now,’ he said, picking up the tin, ‘I’m going to put this back.’
‘And later?’ Elektra said.
‘And later, if this has anything to do with my mother, she will not be able to avoid talking.’
Forty-Two
Nikolas Taverna, Agni Bay
‘I still say there’s a good chance he might die,’ Heidi remarked.
After a couple of hours walking up tracks onto the mountain, the women, and Charles, had descended to beachside and were resting up in one of the quaint little traditional tavernas right by the water. Buzzing with clientele, even this late in the afternoon, the restaurant had a prime spot at the water’s edge, a pontoon holding tethered boats for patrons. Beth had opted for a table outside of the main restaurant building, in shade, close enough to hear the gentle to-and-fro of the waves. It was so picturesque, and a very jolly Greek with a thick moustache had already taken their order for a jug of iced water, a litre of white wine and some fresh bread.
‘Did you hear what I said?’ Heidi asked. ‘I said, I still think there’s a good chance Charles might die.’
Beth turned her head, looking from the seascape, back into the restaurant where Charles was stood, by a large fan, waving his shirt away from his body, his face a rather strange shade of burgundy.
‘He wouldn’t give in, would he?’ Beth said. ‘Even when we commented that we might need ropes and crampons for the next section.’
‘I can’t believe he actually tried to scale that cliff face,’ Heidi stated.
‘In limited-edition Adidas,’ Beth added.
‘We shouldn’t laugh,’ Heidi said.
‘I’m not laughing.’
Poor Charles… It seemed the master manipulator was repentant. So much so he was doggedly determined to meet every challenge that was thrown his way. Even if it involved tasks that were completely and utterly out of his usual skillset.
‘Do you really think he thinks you’re going to be able to forgive his affair with Kendra and take him back?’
It wasn’t just the affair with Kendra. Perhaps, if it had been simply that, Beth might have tried harder to save the marriage. There had been many opportunities to call a halt to proceedings, take stock, about-turn. They could have embraced couple’s counselling or mediation, tried a trial separation even…
‘I never loved Charles,’ Beth said honestly. Saying the words aloud was like therapy for her soul. After a moment had passed, she looked up at her best friend, wondering what expression she would find in her eyes.
‘Thank fuck for that,’ Heidi said. ‘Because, although I was bridesmaid and I said all the supportive nice things, I did wonder if you had lost your mind
somewhere between Corfu and hedge funds.’ She sniffed. ‘I did ask you once, if you really really wanted to get married.’
‘It was my hen night. You were wasted.’
‘I was,’ Heidi agreed. ‘And that was the only time I plucked up enough courage to mention it. You had so much going on, Beth. Your change of career plans, your mum being so ill…’
‘It was thanks to you I had a job when I needed it most.’
‘Yes, but I feel guilty that that job led you to meeting Charles…’
‘I needed Charles,’ Beth admitted. ‘I know that sounds terrible, really, truly terrible, but if I hadn’t married him, I wouldn’t have got those extra years with my mum.’ She smiled. ‘It was only in those last years that she really opened up about my dad. Telling me their love story, remembering the good times they shared. Before her illness, she was always focused on the awful loss we’d had, but after, it was like she had new clarity, as if she realised that I needed to know the joy she’d had in her life before she lost it.’
‘Do you think Charles loved you?’ Heidi asked. ‘Loves you?’
Beth looked into the restaurant, her ex-husband’s face still puce. There was little hesitation with her reply. ‘No.’ She inhaled. ‘I’m not sure Charles really knows what love is. I know therapists usually blame the behaviour of adult men on their mothers but in Charles’s case I’m sure there’s more than a degree of truth in that. Charles, from the little he’s told me, was carted round as an accessory when it suited and dumped with a nanny the rest of the time. Did you know both his parents are volcanologists? So, their lives involve travelling the globe researching eruptive activity…’
‘No wonder he wanted to get his hands on those hot rocks earlier,’ Heidi quipped.
‘I think that’s why he loves London life. It’s not barren or scary…’
‘Unless you walk through Tower Hamlets.’
‘He craves normality, but always on his terms… which isn’t normal at all. It’s suffocating. He doesn’t know how to just be, and he doesn’t feel comfortable with just being.’ She did feel a degree of sadness for Charles. As much as he thought he wanted reckless abandon, he actually preferred rules and order, simply because that’s what made him happiest. He had never and, still didn’t, understand his parents’ quirky career choice.
‘So why is he here, Beth?’ Heidi asked, leaning an elbow on the table and propping up her head.
‘He’s here to try and get me back. But not because he loves me. Because he thinks I’m a good fit for his aim at normality. And I’m not a gold-digger like Kendra.’ She sighed. ‘I simply have to make him see that he shouldn’t want to settle. He should bravely step into the unknown and seek a real connection, not one he’s tried to manufacture.’
‘Well,’ Heidi said, ‘he’s gone aubergine with the effort he’s put in. Maybe he’s committed to the manufacturing.’
‘It doesn’t matter how committed he is,’ Beth reminded. ‘I’m out.’ She picked at the corner of the paper tablecloth. ‘And… I was never really in.’
Forty-Three
Alex and Margalo Hallas’s home, Almyros
‘What do you think for tomorrow night, Angelo? Sigala into Sia? Or more Gala and K-Klass?’
This was how desperate Alex was for conversation. He was talking to the goats. Filling their trough with grain, he watched as the less-interested-in-chat animals began trotting up the field towards the fresh injection of food. Milo appeared to have a bit of a limp.
‘Hey, boy,’ Alex said, getting hold of the russet-coloured animal and observing him. ‘Are you still not feeling well?’ The tear in his ear wasn’t bleeding, appeared clean and dry, but still looked sore. Perhaps one of his flock had taken exception to the goat’s rather bullish attitude and nibbled at him.
‘What are you doing to Milo?’
Margalo’s voice shocked him and he dropped the bucket he was holding with one hand to the ground. His mother was in the field, wearing boots and long grey socks, her silver hair slicked back from her face and fashioned into a bun at the back of her neck. And she was apparently now talking to him again.
‘Nothing,’ he answered. ‘I was simply checking him. He still does not seem himself. His cut on his ear and—’
‘He is fine,’ Margalo snapped. ‘He does not need to be babied. He is a goat.’
‘I know but—’
‘Why do you take so much interest in the animals now? It was not long ago that you would throw them some food and leave. Now you want to “see how they are” and talk about their feelings with them.’ Margalo made a scoffing noise which turned into a horrendous cough that sounded like the starting up of a very old car whose engine was on its last pistons.
‘Mama, take a long slow breath,’ Alex encouraged, putting a hand on her back.
His mother shrugged him off, the cough abating almost as abruptly as it had started. ‘I will see to the goats. You must have vinyl records to polish or something like that… for my big surprise.’
So, now she wanted to talk about it. Well, he wanted to talk too. About his father.
‘I am going to play my music in Sidari,’ Alex said bluntly, the goats butting into him as they made for the trough of feed.
‘And shame me?’ Margalo asked. ‘Because that is what you are doing.’
‘I’m not shaming anyone,’ Alex said. ‘I am making some money doing what I used to love to do. What I still love to do. What I should be doing more of.’
‘Have I not taught you to want better for yourself?’
‘Better than what?’ Alex questioned. ‘Better than working at a hire car office and as a handyman? Because that is what I have been doing all these years, when I am not looking after you. Of course I want better.’
‘Then you will be a garage manager, for your uncle.’
‘No, Mama,’ Alex stated with certainty. ‘No, I will not.’
He knew, underneath the thin line of his mother’s lips, her teeth would be gritted together. Her body language was already set to impossible, but this was too important to be swayed by her stubbornness.
‘You are exactly like your father,’ Margalo informed. ‘I do not know what I have done to deserve this treatment. I have given you everything. Tried to steer you along the right path and—’
‘And what was my father like, exactly?’ Alex asked. He put his hand onto Milo’s back, his fingers knitting with his rough coat.
‘What?’ Margalo asked, pupils like pinpricks.
‘I want to know exactly what my father was like.’
She waved a hand in the humid air and took hold of one of their other goats, Nancy. ‘I have told you many, many times.’
‘But have you told me the truth?’ Alex blasted with frustration.
His tone was enough to make Margalo turn round, hard, wrinkled features looking outraged at his outburst. ‘I do not know what you are asking.’
‘I am asking what my father did to you to make you feel so angry about him all the time.’
‘I have told you,’ Margalo said, leading Nancy by the scruff of her neck to the water trough. ‘He worked in all the bars and clubs with all the holidaymakers looking for a good time… and he gave them all a good time.’
‘What does that mean?’ Alex asked. ‘What do those words really mean?’
‘Aleko, I do not know why you are talking like this. Is it not enough that you make a show of me by acting in the same way? Loud music, popping E’s and doing hot-shots, being with unfit women…’
‘I am not doing any of those things and…’ He knew she was not going to like what he had to say next, but it really needed to be said. ‘And, I don’t think my father did either.’
‘You call me a liar now?’ Margalo asked, fighting a little with Nancy who did not want to drink.
‘I am saying that you have been angry for so long and I do not really know what is behind it.’ He stretched out his arms. ‘My father isn’t here. I see that. But where is he? Why did he not want to keep in tou
ch with me?’
‘Why do you ask me this?’ Margalo asked, tutting and shaking her head as she tried to keep a grip on Nancy.
‘Because I don’t know!’ Alex exclaimed. ‘Because I’ve never known. And you always stop me talking about it.’
‘And why are you talking about it now?’ Margalo snapped, Nancy butting her head in irritation at being held.
‘Did my father cheat on you with someone?’ Alex asked definitively. ‘Did he break the rules of your marriage and break your heart?’
‘He loved himself, Aleko. He always loved himself more than he loved us. That is why he is not here,’ Margalo answered.
‘Is that the truth?’ he asked, breath catching in his throat. ‘Or is that what you tell yourself is true?’
‘How can you say these things to me?’ Nancy let out a whimper, desperate for release.
‘Because Toula said my father would never have cheated on you and… and Elektra said the real cheat was your own father, who was an insatiable man who slept with half of the island by all accounts.’
‘You speak to other people about me?’ His mother’s tone was pure horror.
‘I need the truth, Mama. And I don’t think I’m getting that from you!’
‘Again, you call me a liar!’
‘I’m not. I just need to know the real reason you think I am going to play some music in a club and suddenly turn into a dishonourable person when all I have ever given you is… everything I have.’
His hand was trembling in Milo’s fur as so many feelings wound their way round him like vines. He had always been so accepting of his lot until he began to realise that if he did not make a change, he might always be here, leading this same existence. It was OK. But he deserved more than OK. His mother did too.
‘Your father had big dreams,’ Margalo said finally, her voice sounding different, faraway, like it didn’t quite belong to her. ‘Always big dreams. Make money fast, do something different, make more money, change again.’ She sighed, her frame dropping down onto the bar of the gate. ‘He was always so unrealistic. Never satisfied.’ She sniffed. ‘We live in Corfu. That is where our life is. That is where our life should be.’