by Polis Loizou
The words on Kazantzakis’ grave came back to him. He felt them in his body, expelled in a breath across the world:
I hope for nothing
I fear nothing
I am free
Freedom. That old obsession. Of his, of his country’s. But freedom shifted from grasp to grasp. One man’s freedom might depend on another’s capture. Money was a release for some, oppression for others. Freedom could be control or release, the tourist’s discarded bikini or the woman’s burqa. America’s flag waved over a bombed Baghdad. A man with the right to vote, voting for dictators. It was the thing everyone wanted but no-one granted. Its acquisition meant its theft. When did you have it, and if you had it did you know it? Was that what you’d call it? The acceptance of things as they were, that was the road to happiness. But was acceptance a freedom or was it willing enslavement? God – no, not God; the gods, the many – decided your griefs but you were the one who led yourself to or away from them. Freedom or death. The refrain of Greek independence expressed in the very flag. He learned it at school. Freedom or death, in stripes of blue and white. A cross in the corner, God always watching.
Hope for nothing.
Fear nothing.
Be free.
PART IV
One
If Darya answered the door, everything would be all right. It circled Orestis’ head as he took the turning for Kaloyiri. The last time he’d driven here, it was in his dented little Honda.
The engagement had already borne previews of his life to come. One of the first things Eva had done was to take him shopping for a new car. ‘Finally,’ she’d said. ‘It’s within my rights to express an opinion on this tin can. Even Mr Bean would spit on it.’ Orestis had protested, but not with much force; she swept him along to the nearest showroom. What would his old man say to see him turn up in a BMW, a car he wouldn’t be allowed to service? By the time the new convertible was ready to collect – ‘Why collect? They deliver to you.’ – Orestis had decided he no longer cared what his father said or thought or wanted from him. He was a Ioannidou now, in spirit if not in name.
His fiancée had also taken him clothes shopping, once again in preparation for a new job. This time she’d purchased more than work trousers and the smart black shoes to go beneath them. She’d added chinos, shorts, sweaters and sunglasses to the basket on his arm, Valentino, Dolce & Gabbana, whatever he’d liked, whatever had made him look good, and she’d charged it all to her credit card.
One thing, however, was still off the table. Though she would sometimes let him touch her in places no one else had seen, Eva was still a virgin. It was idiotic – she said it herself, she knew it was idiotic – to hold on to archaic traditions. Yes, she believed in God but her God wasn’t one to vilify female pleasure. She had her reasons for celibacy, and they were unshakable. Orestis would simply have to put his libido on hold.
How could he? The past few months had been the most physically gratifying of his life. What even was a life without stimulation? After introducing him to Darya, Lefteris would invite him over to his place, a villa close to the Amathous ruins. He took Orestis on boat rides, where they would lie on the deck, eating grapes and melon, and smoke nargile. Cigarettes turned his stomach, but the apple tobacco made him dizzy in a way that felt like an orgasm. Lefteris would also bring women on board, clients, and on occasion men. If it was their preference, he would service them while Orestis watched, or service Orestis while they watched. One time he’d asked Orestis to take part in mutual masturbation for a kinky American on the Internet. Orestis had almost accepted, but the thought of his image travelling abroad, being downloaded, then possibly uploaded onto porn sites, gave him pause. Lefteris had found someone else. ‘You should think about porn, though,’ he’d said. ‘You’d make a lot of money from it.’ But even this side-gig had been too much of a risk. To his credit, Lefteris had understood, and been careful to match him to clients with no link to the hotel.
If Eva thought he would wait another year for sex, then she’d be disappointed. Orestis was a man, one at his peak. At first, he’d tried to put it out of his mind, out of respect and affection. Some nights he still went out with Paris to a café, and Eva was content to leave them alone while she went clubbing with her shallow friends. Paris would spark a conversation with a pretty barista, and the girl would be charmed at first. But then she’d catch sight of Orestis, and Paris would step aside with a look on his face that was best ignored. If the girl didn’t have a place of her own they would end up fucking in his bright new car. It gave him a sense of power, to lure the ones with diamonds in their eyes with a flash of his keys at the bar. It was out of the question to take the car to the beach, the salty air would scrub away its veneer, so he’d drive to the spot under the bridge by the old Lunar Park where his mum used to treat him to the Ferris wheel. But after these easy lays he was always, for a fleeting moment, surprised that the girl would call it a night.
He hadn’t heard from Darya since the cruise. To begin with, he felt guilty, then neglected. He had let her down. She no longer desired him. In bed, that conversation in his cabin came back to him; the mourning in her voice as she spoke of her brother’s death, her anger at the waste of life. That was the last time she had called on him.
Had he not been enough in her time of need? She had come to him, not for sex but compassion. He’d listened, he was sure he had listened. But the more he thought about that night, the more he heard a useless wanker, saying nothing of any help. She may as well have confessed to the linen.
He’d been lucky to land Darya: a beautiful, thoughtful stranger whose company he enjoyed. Lefteris had regaled him with many a tale of clients with freakish fantasies, fetishes that made him queasy. But with Darya, he’d felt a connection. They could be more than lovers, maybe even more than friends.
He had to see her. She had to speak to him again.
The car rolled up to the familiar neighbourhood, up to the side of that garden wall which had made his hands shake on that first day. If that neighbour were to spot him now, she might not even recognise him.
He made his way up to the front door and counted to twenty before ringing the bell. A van made a three-point turn in the street. If it completed the manoeuvre before the door opened—
Darya. From the change in her expression, she hadn’t even thought to check through the peephole. And he had registered her look: one of unwelcome surprise, after what had been serenity.
But the surprise faded into something else. It became disbelief, then tenderness.
He stood silent, the ability to speak leaving him entirely as her eyes filled with tears. She turned her head away. She was shutting the door.
‘Please,’ he said. ‘Darya. Please.’
She only stopped because he said it in Belarusian.
✽✽✽
They sat in the lounge, where she made him a whiskey and Coke at the bar. For herself, she poured an apple juice.
‘Are you well?’ she said in Greek.
‘Yes, thank you.’
‘I see it goes well at Harmonia.’
‘Yes, very well.’
‘Good. I’m glad.’
That last phrase came out wrong. She’d used the words for ‘pleased to meet you’. He caught her smile; so it had been a kindness. But it was his supposed job to put her at ease. All this time, he should’ve been paying her.
‘Look, Darya—’
Her hand came up to block him. A traffic warden, a crossing guard. ‘I don’t want,’ she said, her voice soft. ‘I don’t want.’
In her fist, she held the cross that hung around her neck. He felt a steep, sudden sadness.
A ringing made him blink, and he realised his eyes were wet. Darya was already up. She answered the phone on the wall behind the bar.
The next few minutes blurred in his memory. She’d said ‘Yes,’ as if confirming something. Then ‘No’ with mounting dread. ‘No. No. No, no, no.’ The phone dropped from her hand and he remembered sprinting to h
er. It was like that incident in Rhodos, with the beggar and the baby. Darya rattled to the core.
‘What is it? What happened? Darya? What happened?’
When she spoke it was in another tongue.
‘I don’t understand. Darya, I don’t understand. Is it your family? Is something wrong?’
She croaked the word: ‘Aristos.’
His blood ran cold. She had slid to the floor, and he had knelt down to her. But his knee was damp. And when he held her hand, it was slick. At first, he thought she’d spilt her apple juice. But he hadn’t heard the glass break, or even fall. It was still on the coffee table. Then there came that unmistakable smell.
‘I’m sorry,’ he kept saying. ‘I’m sorry. I’m sorry.’
‘God have mercy,’ said the widow.
Two
The police got a statement from a tourist who’d been walking nearby, a French Ecology undergrad doing a semester abroad. She first spotted Aristos by the chapel, where he was watching the kittens play. A man of his height and stature, he was easy to notice. She walked down the wooden steps to get as close to the water as possible, and when she came back up she caught sight of the impressive man further along the rocks. Almost at once, she saw him slip. She ran to help. He was older, he might have broken something and there was nobody else around, the few other tourists had walked ahead in the opposite direction. He’d hit his head. There wasn’t any blood, but she could tell it wasn’t good. He insisted he was all right, and then his face went red. She felt his wrist, his pulse was slow. Trying not to show her panic, she asked him the number for emergency services, but he couldn’t remember, or couldn’t understand. His car was in the parking space, it had to be his. ‘Hospital,’ she said in French, but he understood. She searched his pockets for his keys, but they were still in the ignition. By the time she realised, his pulse had got slower. She sped on the highway, she didn’t care if he got a ticket, she would pay. She barely even thought about driving on the other side of the road, the other side of the car, they might have died together. By the time she’d got him to a hospital, she knew it was too late. He was dead before they’d got him on a gurney. His last words were muffled. Nobody could make them out.
Eva pored over the details, again and again. For all her intensity, Orestis had never seen her cry before. Not that she sobbed and wailed; the tears ran in a continuous silent stream. The room echoed with the absence of her loudness. She stayed glued to the sofa in her mother’s house, leaning into the woman’s hug like a child. It was then that he realised he might love her.
‘How’s Darya?’ she asked. ‘Is somebody with her?’
‘Don’t worry,’ her mother replied, patting her head.
Eva stared into space until her breath became lighter, and her body gave in to sleep.
✽✽✽
Darya opened the door, slowly. This time she wasn’t surprised. Without letting him in, she extended her hand to his chest. He thought she was trying to push him away until he felt the beat of his own heart against her palm. He held her there, saying nothing until she took her hand away and shut the door.
The funeral was well attended. Not only were the hotel managers there, but so was Svetlana, who’d come to pay her respects to the man who paid her well and was always so pleasant. Aristos’ friends were worthy of headlines, politicians from the news, celebrities from music and sport. One man he spoke to was an old boss of Aristos’, who’d employed him as a contractor for one of the glass blocks by the seafront. He was the one to advise him on buying his first hotel. A rundown place at the time, but with plenty of potential. Investment. That was the key. Aristos had made a success of it. Of course, he had. Because he was a man who knew what people wanted.
Orestis’ father had insisted on attending. They’d bought him a sharp new suit, the best-fitting one he’d ever worn. His hair was gelled back and he was clean-shaven. Though his face drooped at the loss of a future in-law, Orestis felt there was something obscene about his presence there.
Darya kept her sunglasses on. No matter who came up to kiss her and offer their condolences, she stood still as a statue.
✽✽✽
‘Do you ever miss grandma?’ Pavlos asked him at the gym. They sat sweating out five sets of bench presses. Though his cousin had never actually met Aristos, and like the rest of the family emitted an amazed laugh at the engagement to Eva, he’d looked heartbroken as he kissed his crucifix, God rest his soul.
‘Of course,’ Orestis replied. ‘I think of her every day.’
‘She raised you.’
‘Yeah.’
‘Remember when she used to tell us about the archangel coming to cut off our heads?’
‘With the scythe, yeah.’
‘E, more to me than you.’
Orestis gave something between a breath and a laugh.
‘How’s Eva doing?’
This unpacked so much. Guilt, for one: Orestis had yet to introduce his fiancée to Pavlos. Either out of embarrassment, or concern that Eva would dismiss his cousin as a waste of space. Not that she would have a leg to stand on; whatever he used to be, Pavlos provided health and wellbeing now, while up to her father’s death Eva spent every day indulging herself. In any case, Orestis didn’t know how she was doing other than living her grief. How could he pick through the viper’s nest of a person’s despair?
‘She’s coping,’ he said. Then, to deflect, he asked after Skevi.
‘She’s good. Oh hey, she keeps trying to get me to go to this trendy spa in Paphos, she says Anna Vissi goes there, even Sakis Rouvas. I tell her I’m not up for any gay shit with Sakis. But I don’t know, it might be a laugh. Wanna go? They’ll give us massages, wax our legs.’
‘What type of massage? Don’t forget I’m engaged.’ He wondered what counted as gay in his cousin’s mind.
‘Ou, I forgot to tell you, I met her! Your mother-in-law.’
‘Who do you mean? Eva’s mum?’ But as soon as Orestis said it, he felt a chill.
‘No, re, Ioannidou’s wife. The Russian.’
‘A. You don’t say. How?’ For a moment he feared the worst.
‘I did a yoga class. Don’t laugh!’
Orestis forced a grin. ‘You do yoga?’
‘E, only a few times so far. But it’s good, re! It’s nice to clear your mind a bit. You know how I get really anxious.’
He didn’t, but Orestis nodded all the same.
‘They say it helps. Yoga and stuff.’ Then he leaned in. ‘I mean, so does the weed.’ And he laughed.
Orestis was dying to ask more, but he kept his mouth shut. They carried on with their workout.
‘It’s really difficult to bend for those poses, though,’ said Pavlos. ‘Like a Russian at the circus.’
With every pulldown and raise, Orestis felt a rising panic. The ground was parting. He’d thought he’d been digging a tunnel out of his prison, but he’d only dug a hole. Fate stood by and watched as he worked it into a grave. And Death, as he had seen twice since the start of his new life, was the visitor who called in unannounced. It didn’t care if you hadn’t prepared. He’d already lost whole nights’ sleep recalling what Aristos had said about the photos. Those evenings in half-lit rooms, turning to the camera, posing, the wanker, the idiot wanker, as the deceased clicked, flash, clicked, flash, documenting all of it. He pictured the photos in the hands of his colleagues. Svetlana, Yiorgos, who would stare at him as if they’d never known him at all. Night-shift Dino who’d be unsurprised, he’d known of the goings-on at the Harmonia and guessed that Orestis wanted his share. Thanos – his disappointment would be devastating.
He had to get those pictures, destroy them. He would speak to Darya, then sever all ties with her. He would have to lose her, too.
Three
With Aristos gone, Thanos called a meeting for the department managers. They already knew of the sales abroad. Dubai had gone through. The Paphos villas were to be handled by a Russian agency. The Lemesos residences would carry on as the
y were. The deceased had prepared for the handover. ‘As if he had known,’ the manager said in a fragile voice. Lastly, Aristos had made out his will, in which he ensured that all his staff would receive double their usual Christmas bonus in the event of his death. ‘So that they might have a good time on my behalf,’ as Thanos quoted. Tina from Events and Sia from Housekeeping dabbed at their eyes.
For the duration of the meeting, Orestis was outside his head. He watched himself from above, in his Armani suit, sitting at a polished table in the boardroom of a five-star hotel. He was a manager, convening with other managers, most of them a decade or more his senior. As a child he had been taken out of his good school, as a teenager snared by the Army, as a twenty-something consigned to his uncle’s taverna, dragging out heavy soggy refuse bags from bins, and now, a true man, at last, he had achieved his ideal body, he had been on a cruise, he drove a BMW, women wanted him, they had paid for him, those men in Greece had ogled him, his fiancée was a Ioannidou. And people were eulogising a powerful man he had cuckolded – a man who had not only watched him doing so but had paid him to. Orestis was both horse and cowboy.
An ornate clock hung on the boardroom wall: the sun, with rays fashioned out of sheet copper. If Thanos called the meeting to an end before quarter past three, everything would be all right.
✽✽✽
This time, Darya didn’t answer. A few moments’ wait, another attempt, nothing. He followed the stone path around to the garden. In the pool, he saw a black smudge — the back of her head, rising to the surface.
The sound of his voice startled her. Even when she saw who he was, she stayed floating in the water, watching with caution.
‘Aren’t you cold?’ he asked.
‘Not here.’
‘How long have you been in there?’