by Jo Bunt
She let out a huge sigh as the melodic tune lifted her spirits. If it wasn’t for the interminable heat she could almost imagine that she was back in her bedroom in England listening to music on her headphones. She liked her apartment. It was one of the only things she did like in Cyprus. There was a small balcony from which you could just spot the sea through the gap between the grand hotels. They were quite close to the famous Argo Hotel where, rumour had it, Raquel Welch was staying at this very moment. It pleased Pru to think of herself as a neighbour to the great and the good. Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor stayed there sometimes too. Yes, thought Pru, this was definitely the right neighbourhood for her.
Pru counted herself lucky to have been able to secure this apartment. They’d managed to negotiate the rent down because of that God-awful stench that hung heavy in the streets. According to the boy across the road, it was due to a pig’s head that had fallen off a truck. When the local council had come to investigate they simply kicked the head further into the bamboo.
The smell had long gone now, even though the locals were still talking about it. The ants had probably stripped the meat to bone anyway. They were as big as bullets and, as far as Pru was concerned, twice as deadly. She often woke up to find they’d eaten the gusset off her knickers in the laundry. Eddie once woke up to find them covering his feet like a moving blanket of black sequins. She hated them passionately, but not as much as she hated the scuttling cockroaches. Disgusting armoured creatures, she squealed every time she saw one. Pru was meticulous in her cleaning of the flat and her extermination of the strange Cypriot insects.
Now that the pig head smell had gone, Pru could inhale the scent of the orange blossom and jasmine. Most Cypriots seemed to favour geraniums but Pru couldn’t stand the overpowering smell. She missed English smells like freshly mown grass and Dad’s greenhouse full of tomatoes, the smell of a Victoria sponge baking in the oven and of Pear’s soap. She could buy some of these things from the NAAFI but the aroma wasn’t quite the same after it had bounced off the tiled walls and floors.
Pru didn’t believe for a single minute that they were in any danger here. How could they be? This was where Elizabeth Taylor holidayed. Pru had heard that there were problems between the Greeks and Turks on the island but she had never seen any outward hostility between the two. She and Eddie often headed into Famagusta’s old town to eat where it was cheaper. The Turks ran most of the restaurants there but they were never anything but polite to the interlopers.
More than anything though, the main feeling Pru was experiencing was annoyance. She didn’t see why she should be moving out of her apartment when the fight had nothing to do with her. And how about the rent? Would the army be reimbursing them for the time they would be paying for their apartment but not actually living there? She didn’t think so.
“Why now?” she moaned. “Why wait until I’m eight months pregnant before you invade? Selfish bastards!”
She pushed herself out of the chair with a sigh and headed towards the bedroom to pack ‘one small bag’.
Pru’s idea of ‘small’ appeared to be larger than most people’s and she could see several people looking unkindly at the case by her side. She sat on the wall in the shade and waited for the bus to come and evacuate them. In the midday heat, Pru’s delicate skin could burn in ten minutes and her nose blister and peel. Hot weather didn’t suit Pru. Sure, she liked the sunshine, the sea and the evenings warm enough to sit out in, but the summer sun was fierce and aggressive here. Even in the shade, the heat still made its mark on her and Pru’s chest throbbed with the red rash of prickly heat. Pru was always relieved to watch the sun give up and slip soundlessly into the sea. Not that it gave as much respite as it should. Back home the arrival of summer would be greeted by the removal of one heavy blanket from the bed. No longer any need for warming pans wrapped in tea-towels under the sheets. Windows would occasionally be opened during the day but always closed by night time.
In Cyprus, however, the nocturnal heat danced around semi-naked bodies while the windows and doors hung open in the futile hope of catching a winsome breeze. There was no expectation of intimacy between Pru and her husband. The last thing she wanted was to feel another hot and clammy body against hers. It surprised her to find that the woman who lived downstairs was pregnant. How anyone managed to conceive in this heat was beyond Pru’s comprehension. She was surprised the population hadn’t died out years ago.
Discordant yapping alerted Pru to the fact that the local children were arriving home from school already. Pru wondered how on earth they were meant to get a decent education if they did such short days at school here. She was going to have to talk to Eddie about where they were going to educate their child. Eddie had never cared much for school but Pru had done well in her O-levels and had been studying for her A-levels when she had been forced to leave home, drop out of college and get a job. She’d dreamt of going to Art College to study Fine Art. But that was all behind her now. Pru ground her teeth in irritation at the thought. She wasn’t sure who she blamed most; her Mum, Eddie or the baby. She did a quick calculation in her head and realised with horror she’d be well into her thirties by the time she got her life back. What fun could she possibly have then?
The smell of the fumes from the traffic turned her stomach and she was just about to head back to the apartment when a small white bus slowed down in front of her and wound down the window. The wheel arches were peppered with rust and the exhaust pipe was belching out thick black clouds. Disgusted by the thought that this was to be her lift, she reluctantly stood up to be first in the queue.
It was then that Pru noticed the face looking back at her from within the vehicle. A young boy, no more than fourteen, was pointing a rifle in her direction. Time froze as Pru noticed the minutiae of the scene unfolding before her. The boy had the smoothest of brown faces with the slight covering of soft dark down above his top lip. He could have been any one of a number of boys playing soldiers with their friends with a block of wood as a hand-gun. But this was no toy in the overlarge hands of the man-child before her. The rifle looked heavy in his lean arms. There was something in the way he cradled the weapon and the narrowing of his black eyes that left no room for doubt. The rifle was loaded and his finger was curled around the trigger.
This was a boy who should be kicking a ball in the park or climbing trees, but his lifeless eyes suggested that such childish pastimes had long since been forgotten. As they locked eyes, the rest of the world shrank around them. The open mouth of the gun expanded to fill up all of Pru’s vision. The heat of the day was sucked away down the looming barrel. Pru tried to take her eyes off the gun and concentrate on her connection with the boy. She willed him to hear just one word.
No.
She thought she saw the muscles in his forearms tense and she braced herself for the explosion but she was unable to duck and too scared to even flinch.
No.
His eyes narrowed and his cheek pushed up against the armament almost tenderly.
No.
A shrill scream rose from somewhere behind Pru which made her jump and broke the connection between her and the would-be assassin. No one else made a sound or movement as the bus continued at its stately pace inches from their feet. The eye of the rifle slid from Pru to the man standing next to her, and then to the woman holding his arm. The boy was taking each person in his sights one by one. The strange thing, Pru reflected later, was that no one ran or took cover. Every man, woman and child stood motionless as a young boy decided their fate. It was the first time that Pru had even noticed the people who had been waiting by her side. And even though she knew that they were all in danger, she could only feel relief that the boy was no longer looking in her direction.
A sudden screech of tyres and a gritty dust cloud was thrown into the air. Satisfied that they had put the fear of God into the English people, the boys in the white bus sped off. Pru sat down suddenly onto the wall with her pulse booming in her ears. She felt
the baby squirm within her and felt genuine fear for the first time. She let out the breath which she hadn’t realised she’d been holding. She briefly considered locking herself in the apartment until it was all over but Eddie’s words about there being fighting in the streets of Famagusta seemed all too realistic now. Perhaps Eddie was right after all. Not that she would tell him that, of course.
Layers of voices were asking each other, “Are you okay? Is anyone hurt?” Pru could hear them but didn’t feel like answering. Every concerned step in her direction was met with a frosty glare. She didn’t see why this should make them all friends when moments earlier they had been murmuring about the size of her bag. Nothing had changed, Pru reassured herself. Everything was still the same as before. Pru sat up straight, consciously lengthening her neck and pushing out her rounded breasts. A jumped up little boy playing ‘soldiers’ would not intimidate her. She pulled her long blonde hair over her shoulders and, knowing that she looked good, clasped her trembling hands in her lap and waited for the evacuation bus to appear.
Chapter three
Without even seeing the room, I knew that this was going to be the perfect base for me. The Pleiades was a low, uneven white block of a building. It was all on ground level but it spread out generously, oozing across the mountainside. The window boxes at the bright blue shuttered windows were exploding with fierce colour. They were brimming with geraniums of every shade of red, orange and pink bowing down before the white-washed walls, their heads heavy with masses of fiery blooms.
The late afternoon was still glowing with buttery sunlight and the warmth in the air was soft and comforting, even in the shade that was growing in front of the house. Sounds of people talking good-naturedly, dogs barking and the hum of a distant car reminded me that I wasn’t alone in Paradise. Insects made their presence known by flitting in front of my face as I batted them aside.
The main road, if you could call it that, ran close to the front of the house. On what should have been the pavement sat an old lady, dressed head-to-toe in black, on a starkly plain wooden chair. I hadn’t noticed her motionless form when I first stepped out of the taxi. She leant forward, stooping over her gnarled wooden walking stick. Her hands were a mass of liver spots and protruding knuckles.
“Kalispera. My name is Leni. George gave me this address. I am looking for Antheia. Are you Antheia?”
The wizened woman looked up at me and narrowed her hooded eyes. They were encircled with a milky white ring that confirmed her advancing years. Her hirsute top lip curled to reveal a gap where her front teeth should be. She muttered something unintelligible, but unmistakeably harsh, and spat on the pale dirt at her feet. With no more explanation she turned her skeletal face back to the empty road.
I stepped backwards, startled. After my initial shock, I fought back a laugh. After all, I wanted a more genuine ‘Greek’ experience away from the tourists and it appeared that I was getting exactly what I asked for. I made my way to the blue front door bumping my bag across the ground behind me. I could hear voices, both adult and child, from within. A roughly hewn wooden plaque announcing The Pleiades informed me that I was in the correct place but there was no doorbell or knocker. I tapped on the middle of the door, painfully aware as I did so that it wasn’t nearly loud enough.
The voices continued inside the house but there was no sound of movement towards the door. I counted to ten and then tried again, louder this time. I didn’t want to give up, and certainly didn’t want to go back to the spitting woman at the side of the road, so I grabbed my courage with one hand and the door handle with the other.
“Kalispera?” I called shakily into the cool dark room beyond the door and my voice echoed back at me from the terracotta-tiled floors.
“Ahhhhhhh! Leni!” shouted a female voice, assaulting my ears with its force. “Come. Come.”
A large doughy woman appeared in the arch towards the rear of the house and beckoned me. She disappeared back into the other room talking to someone in Greek. I closed the door behind me and followed timidly towards the hubbub.
As I stepped through into a large kitchen area an amusing scene greeted my eyes. Two young boys, with chocolate-smeared faces, were running around naked. One of them had a colander on his head and the other was brandishing a wooden spoon menacingly. There was a slightly older girl of about six standing on the table. The woman, who I assumed was Antheia, was pinning up the hem of the girl’s yellow dress while holding pins in her mouth. One last twirl and the older woman nodded with satisfaction. She said something to the girl in Greek, slipped the dress off her slender shoulders and then lifted her off the table. The young girl, now in her underwear, ran out of the door following her two brothers while the hefty woman put her sewing kit away.
Another girl of about ten or more stood in the corner looking wistfully out of the half open window. She turned her head to me sadly and, when our eyes met, her face illuminated with a smile that brought light and warmth to the kitchen. I couldn’t explain it but she looked so pleased to see me that I thought I must know her from somewhere. I shook off the unlikely thought and smiled back at her. There was a peculiar connection between us, and for a fleeting moment I thought she was going to embrace me. She took a step towards me but just raised her hand in my direction.
Antheia turned her attention to me as if she was appraising me with her enormous bovine eyes, which were topped by generous black eyebrows, and then she grinned so that her cheeks bulged and her nose wrinkled up. She was almost as tall as I was, which was a rare occurrence for me. To say she was plump would be an understatement, but I wouldn’t really have called her fat either. Her face wasn’t conventionally pretty but it held a strong beauty that comes with age and self-assurance. She had that allure that only women truly comfortable in their own skin have and I couldn’t look away from her clear, deep brown, almost black, eyes.
“Leni!” she said as if greeting an old friend. “How are you?” Her Greek accent was strong but her English confident. “George telephoned and said I must look after his good friend, the writer.”
I opened my mouth to respond but all of the air rushed out of my lungs as she squeezed me in an embrace. I didn’t quite know whether to hug her back so instead a stood with arms limply and self-consciously by my side. By the time I decided that this was too awkward, and that I really should hug her back, she had let go of me.
“Come. You are tired. Let me show you your room and then I will make tea. I have PG Tips. That is what you drink in England, yes?”
She weaved her way out through the open double doors of the kitchen and through the shrieking whirlpool of children. She cuffed them playfully as we dodged past them and they squealed with delight. In front of me, an open terrace held uninterrupted views down the mountainside and towards the sea.
Despite the cries of the children at play, tranquillity washed over me. The house was set around three sides of a courtyard with the right-hand-side wing protruding further towards the sea than the left. The focal point of the courtyard was a stone trough and water pump and, judging by the pools of water on the ground, was still in use. A quick glance around me revealed that there were two sunshades canopying four assorted and mismatched chairs and a table each. I was almost overwhelmed by the smell of warming rosemary, and looking behind me, I found raised beds beneath the kitchen window holding aloft thick bushes of herbs with small purple flowers hanging between wide pungent needles. The older girl was watching me from the doorway, unwilling to play with the others but surely not too old for games. Much as I wanted to, I had no time to engage in conversation with her as Antheia had already crossed the courtyard and was descending some hidden steps. I hastened after her leaving the three youngest children encircling the water-pump.
A few yards down the hill, along a sloping track, was a grey stone cottage with its stooped back to the main house. As we rounded the corner I didn’t know where to look first, the picturesque landscape or the quaint Cypriot cottage. There were only two windows in
the entire building and they were hidden behind blistered wooden shutters on the front wall. Cracked irregular tiles paved our progress to the narrow door that stood lazily against the large grey stones. Dry, but fragrant, lavender bushes skirted the house, their elegant silver stems topped with violet butterflies. A small oblong table with a low, sun-bleached bench offered an invitation to come sit awhile. My legs started to ache at the thought of the possibility of taking the weight off them. A low level vibration in my thighs coupled with the throbbing of my tired muscles suddenly became very apparent. A sharp ache erupted between my eyebrows and I rubbed at it with the heel of my hand.
Antheia pushed open the door on surprisingly silent and well-oiled hinges and then took a step back. I brushed past her into the cool darkness. The room was sparse and dark but clean. The walls and floor were bare and all that was in the room was a double bed with a canary yellow bedspread, a hurricane lamp with a chunky, partly used candle, a box of matches and water jug. In the corner was a chair and, behind a crudely constructed low wall, a toilet and sink. There was the slightly bitter smell of toilet cleaner sharpening the air.
“I leave you now and get some tea and some biscuits. See? I know English people.” She laughed, a round and hearty sound. “You tired?” Antheia questioned as she placed my suitcase by the foot of the bed.
“A little, yes. This is wonderful, Antheia. What does ‘The Pleiades’ mean?”
“Ahhhh! The Pleiades! They are stars that were the seven daughters of Atlas. Zeus made them… ah… immortal, yes? He put them in the sky. There are seven rooms here and each one is called after one of the sisters. This room is Merope, the youngest sister.”