The Goodtime Girl

by Tess Fragoulis

  Over a few hectic weeks, they recorded several other songs that Marianthi had shown Kivelli in the days when her secret talent was their favourite game, as well as others she’d never seen before, but in which she could detect her friend’s lilt, her wit, and now her disappointment. Though they’d ceased to socialize and saw each other only on the rare occasion she came to the Bella Vista, Marianthi sent missives through her lyrics, which Kivelli was forced to sing and condemn herself with. She did what she could to change the emphasis, the tone and mood, singing the most cynical ones as frothily as love ballads, turning the ones dripping in accusations into the laments of a broken heart. Occasionally Diamantis sat in on the recording session, playing his legendary bouzouki as she sang her friend’s most passionate pleas to him. Marianthi would have both loved and hated it. She would eventually find out, once the record was released, but perhaps she already sensed it in her bones and was losing sleep over it.

  The Smyrniot never mentioned his wife, and Kivelli never asked how she was keeping or what she was doing to busy herself. Was she still going to Kyra Xanthi’s on the odd Wednesday? Did she drop by Kyria Effie’s on Saturday nights, to test her limits, to hear her songs and to ask Narella what to do?

  Though Kivelli was now at the Bella Vista on Saturdays, the brothel’s musical evenings had become so popular that one of Kyria Effie’s girls had picked up where she’d left off. It was a promotion of sorts, though the girl was also available at the end of the night for whoever was willing to wait and pay a premium, and there were plenty of contenders. The manghes had trickled back into town and Piraeus was its old self again. Barba Yannis had finally been released from prison, a little thinner but even happier than he’d been before. His stint behind bars and his new skills on the baglama had improved his mangha credentials. Kivelli heard he was looking to open another place, bigger than the taverna, with a new orchestra he could sit in with when he felt the urge. She was happy for him, but hoped he didn’t expect her to come back.

  So many of her nights and days were spent in Athens now that she’d become a stranger to Piraeus, her old neighbourhood and even to her room. They were the least likely places anyone looking for her would find her. On the nights she sang, she stayed over at the Hotel Xenos in one of the rooms reserved for travelling musicians, usually with Diamantis, who was happy not to have to sneak in and out of Margarita’s house like a burglar.

  “You know what the boys say about your house? If the widow’s daughter looks at your dick, it will shrivel up and fall off.” He patted the crotch of his pants as if to comfort it, and Kivelli couldn’t tell from the look in his eyes whether he was joking. That such a stupid rumour was circulating about poor Aspasia, she could well imagine, but that Diamantis might take it seriously was just too much for her to swallow.

  “Unless she’s been peeping in on us or you’ve been waggling it at her on your way out, I think you’re safe.” She patted it too, to make sure all was in order; Diamantis’s grin told her that was what he’d been aiming for all along.

  They both liked staying over in Athens, waking up together and making as much noise as they pleased. Sometimes they stayed in bed all day, ordering coffee and food, and lying around until it was time for one of them to be somewhere. Best of all, their indulgence was at Columbia’s expense. At least she was getting something out of her newfound popularity and success. Otherwise, she was still as poor as she’d been at Barba Yannis’s. The male musicians could get away with owning one good suit as long as they took care of it, aired it out at night, hung it properly so it didn’t lose its shape. Most of her earnings, however, were now spent on clothing and accessories — the requisite extras that went along with the role she’d been asked to play. She and the Smyrniot had argued about this in the beginning. Her wish was to dress simply, without frills or feathers, to express the truth of who she’d become. He claimed this would be bad for business.

  “If they just wanted your voice, they could go to a corner taverna, drink some ouzo and listen to a record. And then what would happen to the Bella Vista? No one wants to be reminded of reality, Kivelli. When they come here, they want to see a Smyrnean star.”

  So began the time-consuming task of living up to the expectations of her public. Kivelli found a girl who had been a dressmaker’s assistant in Smyrna. She visited her regularly to look through magazines, choose fabrics and try on her creations. This had once been her favourite way to spend the day, but now she was resentful — of the time it took, of the cost, and of the space all these new acquisitions ate up in her room.

  Overnight she’d been transformed from manghissa to chanteuse. She didn’t feel any different, but she was certainly perceived in a new light. The few details people knew of her recent hardships added to her reputation, her allure. She was now considered officially saved, restored to her proper place, though no one could guess where that had actually been. They made up their own stories, and Kivelli did not dissuade them. It was odd, however, that in all her time in Piraeus, and now at the Bella Vista, where the clientele was almost exclusively Smyrnean, she recognized no one from the other side, and no one recognized her. They had known so many people, received so many visitors that the silver card tray in their foyer was always full, and they’d attended the most important functions and balls. Was it possible that everyone whose path she’d ever crossed had perished? More likely, she had changed so drastically that she saw nothing in the same light, so no one looked familiar. Perhaps her family had survived and lived around the corner but were suffering the same jamais vu. The strangers in the audience might very well be her family, unknown to her now.

  Her fortunes began to improve when she decided to move her expanding wardrobe to the Bella Vista and leave Piraeus behind. Without any trepidation or emotion — and to the accompaniment of Aspasia’s funereal wails — Kivelli moved out of Margarita’s house, leaving behind only a few cakes of lavender soap in the girl’s room as a parting gift. Until something more permanent could be found, she took up residence in the Hotel Xenos. But there was no hurry.

  With no rent to pay or taxis to take back and forth, she could finally live without pinching her pennies, though the habit was hard to break. She made an exception for street musicians and beggar children who did circus tricks and belly dances on street corners. And when she went to hear Diamantis play at Argiropoulos’s, she showered him with flowers and sent him glasses of the best whisky in the house. Kivelli always wore her most dramatic outfits when she went to Argiropoulos’s, not only because Diamantis liked them, but because the Smyrniot insisted. She couldn’t be an asteri at the Bella Vista, an urchin everywhere else.

  Once in a while, Diamantis invited her on stage for a duet, which generated such an uproar that Argiropoulos begged her to come work in his club on the nights she wasn’t at the Bella Vista. When the Smyrniot caught wind of the offer, he made the same plea to Diamantis. They both refused, preferring to mingle their voices in the same way they entwined their bodies: when the mood struck. They did, however, agree to record together, which made the Smyrniot happier than Argiropoulos.

  To her relief, it wasn’t one of Marianthi’s songs but one of Diamantis’s. It was now common knowledge that Kivelli and Diamantis were a couple, which lent a certain cachet to the new recording, and made it an instant hit because people believed they were being let in on their secrets. It was called “Since You’re a Mangha,” and was about what a man had to do to possess the woman he desired. But it was not about them. It had been written long before they’d met and put aside, waiting for the ideal voice and partner to bring it to life. Kivelli liked it even though it said more about Diamantis than it did about her; the woman’s part was not quite right.

  If you’re a mangha and want to win her

  You’ll need a gun and sword to get her

  It wasn’t a man’s skill with a knife that made a woman want him, but the look in his eyes when he thought no one was watching. Kivelli was thrilled, however, that whatever might happen in t
he future, this one record would remain as a testament to their moment of perfect happiness. Perfect when she was able to ignore Marianthi’s shadow, which stalked them and skulked in the darkest corners at the most inopportune times.

  32

  One night after closing time at Argiropoulos’s, Diamantis and Kivelli lingered in the empty room. The front door was locked, but the chairs had not yet been turned up by Timos, the sweeper, who had, for the moment, disappeared. They spoke about the various comings and goings of the night, of the songs the band played well and those that fell flat. It was the quality of the applause, the enthusiasm of the crowd that differentiated the successes from the failures. Even the biggest drunks could tell if things were not quite right. “Never underestimate a drunk,” Diamantis said and laughed. It was a mundane conversation, but even shoptalk turned into sweet nothings when it passed between them.

  Diamantis picked up his bouzouki and began to play “Since You’re a Mangha,” and Kivelli stood behind him, her hands on his shoulders. They took turns singing — two lines hers, the next two his, their voices meeting at the very end. Together they were deadly — gun and bullet, knife and soft belly. That’s when Marianthi’s shadow brushed past them and slipped behind the velvet curtains that flanked the stage. If only I could sing, it whispered in Kivelli’s ear, it would be my nails grazing the back of Diamantis’s neck, my breath parting the short hairs at the top of his head like a caress. It’s not you he loves but your voice. What are you but my instrument, after all, and instruments can be replaced. Sometimes they break, sometimes they are stolen, sometimes they’re left behind in some club or forgotten on a train that is about to crash.

  But what Kivelli did next was not a thing Marianthi could ever do, not even in her imagination. While Diamantis played another of his compositions, she began to dance, lifting her skirts, showing him that she was wearing nothing underneath. It was a trick she’d learned from the girls at Kyria Effie’s, and he smiled as she danced towards the stage, twirling and unbuttoning her blouse, throwing it off and snaking her arms in the air. He stopped playing in the middle of the song so he could follow her. “Come to me, come to me lover, see what I have for your hunger,” she sang to him in a low growl. Marianthi had put those words in her mouth. It was neither the first nor the last irony of their collaboration. They were on stage now, an inch away from the curtain, and Kivelli was sure she could smell Marianthi’s flowery perfume, hear her telltale heart. She took Diamantis’s fingers into her mouth to stop herself from confessing everything, sucking on the rough tips calloused by the strings of his bouzouki.

  “Aman, aman,” Diamantis guttered, then groaned like a man shot with a velvet bullet, and Kivelli held on to him until he stopped shaking. As they composed themselves and gathered their belongings, Timos reappeared, looking rather stoned and amused by their presence. “Still here, friends?” he asked, and then began cleaning the stage, picking up one chair and then the next to get underneath, sweeping up cigarette butts and crushed flowers, pocketing the occasional lost coin. On their way out the back door, Timos called out. “Hey princess, is this yours?” He held up a sparkly earring in the shape of a star. Kivelli touched her ears instinctively, though she knew it wasn’t hers.

  “I don’t think so,” she called back, and hurried out the door. Diamantis, trailing behind her, joked that the old sweeper had probably been watching them all along.

  THE NEXT SONG THE SMYRNIOT brought her, she refused to sing. He tried to bully her into it, but she pointed out it was inappropriate for the Bella Vista, then asked him what sort of dirty dream had inspired such crassness. “It wasn’t my dream,” he stuttered, snatching the lyric sheet and scurrying away looking both guilty and chastened. No one else in the studio paid any attention to his agitation. Perhaps they all knew where the songs came from and, like her, were pretending not to have noticed. The new song demanded that Kivelli expose herself to the world as she had to Diamantis, “naked as a whore” under her skirts and “dancing and mewling like an alley cat in heat.”

  When the Smyrniot’s wife showed up at the Bella Vista that same night, she was dressed in brightly coloured fabrics that Kivelli and her dressmaker had considered, then rejected. Like the song, it was probably just a coincidence, she told herself. Marianthi waved a gloved hand curtly and gave her a vacant smile before sitting at a table with people Kivelli didn’t know, who seemed very pleased to see her former friend. Had she not been so busy, so in love, and if she still lived in Piraeus, perhaps Kivelli would have tried harder to patch things up with Marianthi. There were times she longed for a friend to talk with about all the things that were rushing in on her, changing her life without her consent in good ways and bad, and even about her feelings towards Diamantis. But once Kivelli had chosen him over Marianthi, there didn’t seem a way to turn back, even half way.

  Without discussing it or making any plans or promises, they were living as man and wife, occasionally introducing each other jokingly as such, though Diamantis still kept his clothes at his mother’s house — a place Kivelli was not welcome. This bothered her in a way she had not expected, but she said nothing and tried to push the feelings away by making fun of the starched old woman. What had happened to her vow to neither possess or be possessed? It seemed she’d conveniently forgotten it. All the things she’d renounced now filled her thoughts: a grand wedding with music and dancing, lily wreaths placed on the couple’s heads by a solemn priest; a house with a thick old palm tree in the front and white bougainvillea pouring over the windows; a sweet-smelling baby that combined their charms, looks and graces. These daydreams were becoming as relentless and unsettling as her charred night- mares. Even as a girl, her aspirations had been more modern, more dangerous, but perhaps she’d had her fill of danger. Kivelli did not dare express these fantasies out loud for fear of chasing Diamantis away. He was better than a husband, she told herself, because he would never take a mistress whom he treated like gold while she washed his socks. She was his mistress, though he didn’t have a wife and his mother did his laundry, which suited her fine. They reserved each other for all the pleasures Athens had to offer, and the only future plan they spoke of was the trip they would take together to Egypt.

  The Smyrniot had planned a ten day tour, and the couple would be appearing in a number of clubs frequented by Greeks and Turks who had managed to live peacefully in that other ancient land. Musicians from both the Bella Vista and Argiropoulos’s would be going too, but Diamantis and Kivelli talked about the trip as if it were their honeymoon. Since her arrival nearly two years ago, Kivelli hadn’t stepped off of dry land, not even for an excursion to one of the small islands close by. Part of her hoped the voyage to Egypt might erase the terrible journey that had brought her to Piraeus, though she also wondered whether, once freed, she would have the heart to come back. She pictured everyone who had influenced her fate seeing her off as the ship pushed out into open sea: Kyria Effie, Barba Yannis, Spiros, the Cucumber, Sakis and Marianthi in her flowered dress, dabbing a hankie to her eyes. She didn’t ask the Smyrniot if his wife would be coming along. It was doubtful. But if she did, they would find a way to coexist for the duration for the journey; they might even be forced to become friends again. What other choice would they have in the middle of nowhere between Crete and Egypt?

  Until that day came, there were many more nights at the Bella Vista, many more songs to sing, and the unsinkable knowledge that between now and then anything could happen. With those thoughts, Kivelli prepared herself for work, humming and playing with the lyrics of “The Goodtime Girl.” She’d sung it so many times it was now more hers than Marianthi’s. It had become her trade- mark song, and she started and ended the night with it so neither early birds nor latecomers would be disappointed.

  As she was leaving for the club, Giorgos, the hotel’s clerk, ran out onto the sidewalk, yelling her name. “Miss Kivelli, someone dropped this off for you earlier.” He handed her a blue envelope, unmarked and thick. She turned it over to see
if there was any trace of the sender, then sniffed the paper, which bore the faint scent of freesia. “Can’t say who left it,” Giorgos offered apologetically. “Happened during the previous shift.”

  “Doesn’t matter, Giorgos. I was expecting it.” This was true and not true. If she’d allowed herself to think about it, Kivelli could have predicted its arrival. She placed the envelope in her handbag and decided to forget about it until the end of the night.

  33

  I’ll dress you in the finest satins and gowns

  All heads will turn when we’re out on the town

  I hope you die of regret for refusing me

  For not spending my money and abusing me

  When Kivelli stepped into wood-panelled foyer of the Bella Vista, she was swarmed by a babbling, over-excited mob. It took her a moment to recognize its members, so unexpected was their presence. Standing around her in their Sunday best were Kyra Xanthi, her cousin Alekos, Narella, Crazy Manos and Aspasia, her hair loose and hiding her moth’s ears. The girl had decorated herself with every shiny thing Kivelli had given her, and from a certain angle she was almost pretty. Kyra Xanthi’s snow-white hair, until now always hidden underneath a gaudy kerchief, was pulled tight and wound into an elegant topknot, held in place with tortoiseshell pins. She’d also dabbed some colour onto her wrinkled cheeks and lips, which made her look a little bit like Kyria Effie’s sister. Alekos wore a black suit, old fashioned and probably reserved for funerals, and had shaved for the first time in a long time if the number of cuts on his weather-beaten cheeks were any indication. Narella and Manos seemed the least out of place in the opulent foyer. Illuminated by the crystal chandelier, they looked like the most beautiful and refined couple in Athens until they opened their mouths. “Don’t start with me, cunt, or I’ll break you,” he snarled at Narella.