by Sara Alexi
‘Drink something, Petta my love. You have eaten and drunk nothing all day,’ Marina soothes, putting down the newspaper.
‘Sometimes it is best not to take anything in when we are stressed,’ Captain Yorgos offers her in an obsequious tone of voice.
Petta gives him a sideways grimace, but Marina thanks him for his kindness. Yorgos excuses himself to get the ashtray and when he comes back, he casually moves his chair a little closer to Marina.
‘Marina, maybe we should take our minds off everything that is happening. I understand you have the corner shop in the village. Do you have land as well?’ Yorgos asks.
Marina’s look is blank.
‘Petta, ask the port police what will make them take action,’ she demands.
‘Mama, I am afraid for them to take action now. They say they might have to use guns if he refuses to surrender.’ A sparrow has landed on the palm tree outside the window, on a large feathery leaf that sways slightly with the contact. The bird does not sing, but Petta wonders if he would hear it even if it did, the cicadas are so loud. On the road that follows the harbour’s edge, a moped putters by, a young man steering and a woman in black sitting sidesaddle behind him. She is wearing green slippers and her feet are crossed to hold them on as the soles flap with the speed.
‘Well, surely the first thing to do is to ask him to surrender. Why don’t they do that over the radio?’ Marina says, ignoring Yorgos, who is trying to say something to her. Petta is quick to answer her.
‘He says that he must obey orders from Athens. It is not up to him to make the orders now.’ He watches Demosthenes walking up and down outside, and then he falls into a stare.
‘Panagia mou!’ Marina exclaims and stands up, bustles out the door of the corner office and over to the radio station and snatches the microphone from the operator’s hand.
‘Irini. Irini, are you there?’
‘Kyria, you cannot do that.’ The radio control man puts his hand out for the microphone.
Marina turns her back on him. ‘Irini, Rini, can you hear me?’
‘Kyria, I must insist.’ The radio man stands and tries to take the microphone from her. Marina slaps his wrist.
‘Rini, this is Marina. If you can hear me, ask that man who is with you if he will surrender.’
‘Kyria, I really must insist.’ The radio man takes hold of her wrist and tries to prise the microphone from her clenched hand.
‘Mama, what are you doing?’ Petta has hurried over to see what the fuss is about.
‘I am making something happen.’ Marina slaps at the radio operator’s hands again. ‘Ouch, you are hurting me. Don’t you dare put your hands on me! Have you no respect?’ The radio operator lets go of her wrist. ‘How old are you? Seventeen, eighteen? You don’t even look like you have started shaving yet. Well, I am old enough to be your mama, young man. By God, boy, if I had a wooden spoon on me now…’ The radio man backs away, fear and disbelief all over his face, sweat running from his temples down his smooth cheeks. Perhaps he has a mother at home with a wooden spoon. Either way, it is clear she has touched a nerve.
‘If you hurt my mama…’ Petta stands in front of her and it is the radio operator who looks relieved.
‘What on earth is going on?’ Demosthenes puffs as he enters the office.
‘Sir,’ the radio hand begins to explain. But before any one can say any more, Captain Demosthenes assesses the situation and strides to the radio and turns it off.
‘Right, explain,’ he demands and everyone talks at once, but it is Marina’s voice that comes across the clearest.
‘These boys, they have no respect,’ she barks. ‘When I was their age, I already had one son and another in the grave. You children don’t even know you are alive yet,’ she says, turning on the young port policemen who have grouped together in solidarity.
‘Please, please, this is an official office,’ Demosthenes pleads. ‘Come Marina, Petta. Let us take this outside so I can hear you without interruption.’ He ushers them to the door and looks back into the room with a scowl, jabbing his finger at the radio operator and then at the radio. The young man jumps across to his station and turns the radio back on.
Captain Yorgos looks about the room, which seems empty now with Marina gone. Maybe he should go now. Maybe he could go to one of the kiosks, ring up the insurance company, explain the situation, and get the ball rolling. He supposes he should really have let the Swiss people know that they were not sailing today, but what is the point of walking all the way down to the harbour just to let some people know that they will not be paying him anything today? So depressing. Although if he does go down to meet them, maybe he can persuade them to go sailing on another day if he gets his boat back. He lights up another cigarette.
Maybe this Marina could be a good bet. So there is a son and a daughter-in-law and even this little grandchild. He looks over to Angelos, who has slumped over Marina’s large bag, fast asleep. But even with her family, she could be a good port in which to shelter from the storm of his old age. Irini already knows her place. Petta might prove a problem, but he seems like a passive, easy-going man, and the child, like all children, can be moulded or silenced.
Yes, Marina might be a very good port. He could still do his day trips but only at weekends, and also there would be the payoff of no longer having to pay Irini to clean his boats; after all, family is family. She could hardly charge him.
He settles back into his chair, flicking his ash onto the floor. Not a bad looking woman too: solid, good hips. It has been a while since he has thought of any woman in those terms; it’s quite nice. He shifts about in his chair, but he can tell nothing has stirred. He breaks wind instead.
Chapter 12
The next hour on the boat feels like an eternity. The coastline seems to pass more slowly although they have not diminished their speed. The port police have gained on them but almost imperceptibly. The sun’s steady, incessant heat is relentless and the only movement for a while is a hand across a forehead or a thumb across a drip on the end of a chin. Irini has considered jumping again, but if he can shoot a child, perhaps he would not hesitate to shoot her. It seems so far removed from that kiss they shared, that moment of safety and acceptance. She wants to return to that, that sense of everything is going to be alright.
She wonders why the port police don’t do anything but at the same time, she has a sense of relief that they haven’t. She is not ready yet. Would it be worth the risk to call them again to get someone to telephone Stathoula? There is no way that it will cross Petta’s mind. She glances at her watch. He will probably have been down to the port by now, looking for her. Seeing the boat missing he will have found Yorgos, and know everything. Poor Petta. Thank goodness Angelos is too young to understand.
She walks up to the bow, leans against the pulpit, and watches the water being split by the stem. Sam remains in the cockpit, his head hanging, his forearms on his knees. He was, and is, asking her for forgiveness, but why? The tension between them now has reignited her fear. With the pressure on her to forgive, to release him from the painful place he is in, isn’t he putting her in the same position his baba put him in? She could say the words, but she knows she would not have feeling behind them. Lying would be the best move, but those days of ingratiating herself to her yiayia, to anyone, to stay alive, she is not sure she is prepared to return to that.
To hell with him! Let him suffer. If he had given half the thought she is giving him to the little girl, that child would be alive now and maybe he wouldn’t be in this situation.
Unless, of course, things had been different and the child really had been strapped up with explosives.
A shiver starts in her shoulders and runs down her spine.
It would be nice if a dolphin would come now, release her mind of all this. Leaning over, she looks deeper into the surf, the spray catching her face, refreshing and cool. He is no different than Pavlov’s dogs, salivating at the sound of a bell. The spray wets her t-shirt
and she stands straight. The wind and the sun dry it in minutes. If he is only a Pavlov’s dog, what really does she not forgive? What is the stumbling block?
Holding onto the pulpit rail, she leans backwards, the sun on her face and her eyes closed. The stumbling block is forgiving him for allowing himself to be made into one of Pavlov’s dogs, for telling her that it is possible. She does not want to know that a man can be conditioned to react in such extreme ways even when that reaction is against his nature.
She does not forgive him for showing her that the last shred of what she would call humanity can be stripped from a person and they can commit such atrocities even when their nature tells them otherwise. That is what she cannot forgive. For what is true of one will be true of another. What if she ever has to wear his shoes, or those like them? She does not want to know what she could be capable of. The emotional scars she has already cut deep enough and are enough to live with.
Damn him.
Damn him.
No, love him.
It is the only way to undo such evil.
She grips her left breast to feel her heart beating beneath. It aches for people like Sam, and it aches for all of mankind. It aches for the horror of life, the ugliness the world makes possible and for the fact that people make that horror manifest.
Then she lets go of her own skin and looks down into the water. She hates him.
Arms across her chest, she takes her time to wander back and lies down on her back under the boom, looking up at the mast. She does not want to be near him. With a glance, she sees he is standing, leaning against one of the stays at the back of the boat, his hips pushed forward, one hand to his groin, his back to her.
If she were a man, she would probably not use the inside toilet either but in this moment, this base action describes all he is.
Her eyes close and she drifts. When she wakes, he is lying next to her, not looking up the mast, but at her. If anyone else were there to take a picture of them in the moment, with the sun shining, the sea a calm endless blue, two people lying prone, only their heads turned as they look at each other, the result might be an advert for sailing, or for Greece, full of fun, friendly people and long, warm nights.
She turns her head away from him, closes her eyes again, tries to shut out the chaos of emotions he creates.
‘Tell me about your village or how you met your husband? Something normal,’ he says.
‘Normal. You want normal? After stealing this boat because you are running from something, taking me as a hostage at gunpoint, belittling the value of my life down to a shrug, you now want normal?’ She has run out of energy to be with him. She will lie here for a moment or two, longer if necessary. He will, in all probability, drift into sleep in the afternoon sun and when he does, she will soundlessly slip into the water and before he wakes, she will be far away.
Maybe a story will send him to sleep.
‘Okay. How I met Petta,’ she introduces her story.
‘With the hell I had lived on the streets, I was broken. I didn’t believe in society, or people, or care, love, friendship, nothing. I felt stripped of, how do I say, stripped of any connection, a place in the world. All around me, I saw the evidence of how thin the coating of civilisation was. I saw the characters people could become if they too ended up clinging onto the edges of life as I had done. It made them appear like they had two faces, the real one hidden, the polite one doing the bidding.’
As the day has progressed into the afternoon and the temperature has risen, the deep of the blue sky has intensified; it is almost purple.
‘I was amazed that my cousin cared enough to take me in. I did not trust her, nor her sister. I wondered what their motives were, but they had known my parents and, more importantly, my yiayia was also their yiayia, although they saw less of her than I did, living with her every day.’
Irini turns her head to see if he is asleep yet and flinches to find him staring at her. She turns away and continues looking at the sky.
‘I fought their care. I tested it and threw tempers. But they, both Stathoula and Glykeria, stayed calm and constant and I began to slot back into the workings of a household. You know: washing up, doing the laundry, taking showers, all of which were big things to me. On the streets, I had done none of those things for three years. Once back in company, I thought that their expectations that I should be doing these things were a pressure, like the pressure Yiayia put on me to not be me. It felt like being asked to give up who I was.
‘One day, I just did it automatically. I picked up my clothes from the floor and took them and put them in the washing machine along with Stathoula’s clothes from the basket.’ Her voice softens, quiets. The words come out more slowly.
‘It didn’t even occur to me what I had done until I went into the kitchen and Stathoula smiled at me in this particular way she has, as if to say ‘well done,’ and ‘I love you,’ all at once.’
She puts her hands above her head, relaxed, the light wind blowing across her armpits, cooling and silky.
‘I don’t really remember a lot of details after that until the day Stathoula got me a job. I was terrified. To go out into the world. They would see me for the fake I was, the street dweller, the problem. The first job was just handing out leaflets for a fast food place. Stathoula went with me and did not leave me until she was sure I was comfortable. The place I stood to give them out was down in Monastiraki, do you know it? Next to Plaka, near the Acropolis.’ She turns to look at him.
‘No,’ he replies.
‘Well, it doesn’t matter. It is just a busy shopping place. Stathoula went shopping, so every couple of hours, I would see her walking past. But no one shops for eight hours, so I knew she was really there for me. At the time, I wondered why Stathoula kept walking past. Did she not trust me? Did she think I was going to run away? That evening, Glykeria served a meal and afterwards brought out a cake she had made and iced, with the word Irini on it. The icing had all run, and when I read it, I thought it said Irida. Do you know Irida? She was a goddess in ancient Greece. Well, not exactly a goddess, but I don’t know the right word. Anyway, she was my favourite and she makes the rainbows. In Greek, the coloured part of the eye is called irida, from her. She still calls me that, Glykeria. Always Irida, not Rini or Irini.
For a moment, she says nothing, remembering Glykeria calling her Irida. Stathoula called her it too but soon went back to Rini. It became something personal between her and Glykeria and it gave a sense of place, a sense of belonging.
‘Go on,’ he encourages. He is showing no signs of being sleepy yet.
‘I had a series of short-term jobs, one for a week, another for a weekend. I think Stathoula thought it was the easiest way to ease me back into the world. Then one day, on a break from one of these jobs, I went for a walk in Plaka.’
Chapter 13
The square at Monastiraki was a cauldron of nationalities, a morass of merchandise, a nucleus of impromptu happenings. Entry to the square was impossible without pushing past one of many fruit barrows that blocked the roads that bled outwards from the paved hubbub. These hand carts on metal wheels, piled high with pyramids of fruit, all but formed a barricade that blocked day trippers exiting from the metro or ambushed the shoppers coming down from Athens’ central square of Syntagma. Some of the flat backs supported elaborate water fountains that cascaded into metal moats designed to keep fresh the coconut meat being chipped from their hairy shells with large knives. The stall holders called their wares in loud baritone voices, vying with one another to be first in line to skim the fat wallets brought by ever-eager pedestrians.
It was the feel of the square that Irini liked. When she was homeless, her nimble fingers also liked the easy pickings of the fruit stalls. Not the bananas, which were in bunches, nor the grapes, no matter how sweet, but the pears and the apples. One grab and you were away. One from each barrow, tucked under her shirt or down into the pocket she had improvised inside the front of her skirt. Once round the square a
nd she had enough to feed her for a couple of days if nothing else turned up.
But those days were gone, thank goodness. Now she worked at a kafeneio, making coffee for old men. She had a home and family, a mattress to sleep on with clean sheets, running water, electricity, and clean walls. Now there was no need to be sly as she passed the barrows; she had no need to be afraid. In her pocket, a tiropita, not even a bought tiropita but one Glykeria made last night, the feta crumbled into the filo pastry with a sprinkle of herbs. The smell when it was baking had drifted throughout the house and was equally as tempting as the stifado dinner that was cooking alongside it, the aromas mixing as they leaked into the warm night air.
Taking out her pie, she watched the backpackers file out of the metro, looking left and right around the barrows, trying to place themselves in the kaleidoscope of the square. The streets that led up to central Athens were lined with expensive clothes shops, the occasional oriental rug shop pressed in between, and the odd quality fur shop that looked out of place in the scorching summer heat. One or two art shops offering sculptures of broken Ionic columns and paintings of Olympian disc throwers also staked a claim and left their doors open with well-dressed experts loitering in them to explain their finer pieces to potential customers who dared to glance in the windows.
Another wide street led away from the square to climb a slope. The left side of this street boasted archaeological ruins, fenced off and mostly ignored, as this was the base of the Acropolis and higher up, grander things awaited. Where this road joined the square, street sellers displayed their goods on unlicensed tables. The illegal aspect, the insecurity, the risk taking, was what gave the place a feel of youthfulness, possibilities, creativity, life!
An African man selling fake designer handbags stood next to a young mother with jewellery fashioned from ring pulls saved from drink cans. Her nose was pierced and she had a tattoo on her thumb. Her child stayed close. Next to her, an old Greek man sold things that looked like he found them in his attic. He offered, in an ornate gold plastic frame, a print on canvas of a grand old English king. Next to that was a red plastic telephone box, the height of a whiskey bottle, with the words Jack Daniels where the word Telephone should have been. There was a futuristic orange telephone, all curves, from the 1960s, a baseball glove with ‘I love Greece’ woven on the back, and a chess set with three pawns missing. He sold things that Irini had no idea she wanted until she saw them. She picked up an enamelled ladybird keyring which was particularly pretty and a paper knife with a totem pole handle that might be useful.