Desperately Seeking Summer

by Mandy Baggot

  ‘No,’ Abby said. ‘And neither is my mother.’

  That was why she was doing this now. Getting rid of as much pink tat as she could manage before her mum opened her eyelids. She might not even confess to begin with. She could blame a strong Corfiot wind … She just needed to remove enough bubble-gum colour so that Jackie wouldn’t be able to able to protest when she appeared with a tin of white emulsion later. A lick of neutral, yet fresh, colour and a more traditional sign. Something in olive wood.

  ‘Business is a little slow, huh?’ Spyridoula stated, bracelets jangling as she reached into her designer leather handbag for her sunglasses, the sunshine becoming brighter.

  ‘No, no they are busy,’ Abby reacted immediately. ‘Super-busy. Completely sooo busy.’

  ‘Humph,’ Spyridoula sighed. ‘That is a shame.’ She touched her chignon. ‘Because I know of a very nice villa that needs to be valued. I think, being not an expert in these things, it would be close to two million euros.’

  ‘It would?’ Abby asked, her heart beginning to thump.

  ‘But I will go to see Aleko at Ionian Dreams. I hear he is offering special treatments—’

  ‘No!’ Abby gasped. ‘No, there’s no need for you to do that. We will … I can … if you let me know the address, sorry.’ She had temporarily forgotten that not much on Corfu had an actual address. ‘Let me know where it is and I will get my mum or my sister to visit straightaway, or whenever is convenient to you, of course.’

  Spyridoula smiled. ‘Any time before twelve today would be convenient.’ She pointed, across the road and upwards to a rather attractive looking, two-storey villa painted peach. ‘Villa Pappas.’

  Even to Abby’s untrained eye, just from its well-kept exterior, it looked worthy of a place in the pages of a luxury home magazine. Getting rid of the pink was one thing, but if she could head back to the house before breakfast with a two million euro property to value, Melody and her mum were going to be thrilled.

  ‘Desperately Seeking will be there today,’ Abby stated confidently. ‘Before twelve.’

  ‘Poli kalo,’ Spyridoula said with a smile.

  ‘Thank you.’ Abby picked up the second flamingo as the woman moved past her.

  ‘Daughter-of-Jackie,’ Spyridoula called, turning back to face her.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Dispose of the pink away from the main street, yes?’ She made circles in the air with her fingers. ‘Behind.’

  ‘Yes.’ Abby nodded. ‘Yes, of course.’

  The sun scorching her shoulders she leant on the easel, catching her breath, eyes going to the wonderful view. No matter the hard financial situation her mum and sister were in, Corfu, beautiful green, luscious Corfu, was both their workplace and home. The scent of honey and fresh bread wafting from the nearby tavernas hit Abby’s senses and she was suddenly struck with a feeling of loss. Her dad had loved this place. He had left so suddenly and dramatically and then her mum and Melody had left too. And now she didn’t have Darrell – or Poldark – she was truly, completely on her own. Tears building in her eyes, she felt her body curl into that default position of the-world-is-against-me slouch that really required a bag of Kettle Chips. Get a grip, Abby.

  ‘Kalimera,’ the soft, low tone of a male Greek spoke.

  Abby straightened up, banging her elbow on the easel, securely gripping a flamingo. ‘Kalimera,’ she answered.

  The man was possibly in his fifties with thick dark hair, a little speckled with grey. Wearing dark trousers and a loose white linen shirt, shiny black shoes on his feet, he looked like he was ready to attend a special occasion. He looked a little familiar. He smiled at her and pointed.

  ‘You have Jackie’s flamingos.’

  ‘Yes,’ Abby answered. ‘I’m taking them … to … be cleaned.’ Why had she had lied? If they ended up in the village skip then everyone was going to know about it.

  ‘To be clean?’ the man repeated.

  No going back now. Abby nodded. ‘My mum, well, we are … sprucing up the business, you know, making smarter … good. Poli kalo.’

  The man nodded. ‘You are Abby.’ He extended his hand. ‘I remember,’ he said. ‘And I see photograph of you dressed like a kangaroo.’

  Shaking his hand, Abby blushed. That damn photograph from the dress-up day at school! Melody had been dressed up like some sort of Australian Ray Mears while she had got the short straw – literally – when Jackie had bought a supposedly one-size-fits-all kangaroo costume from the fancy dress shop. It was on display back at the house along with several other gawky shots.

  ‘I am George,’ the man told her. ‘From George’s Taverna, just at the end of the road.’

  ‘Hello,’ Abby said. ‘It’s lovely to meet you. Xero poli.’

  ‘Ki ego.’

  Then she gasped. ‘I remember you, and I remember your restaurant. I went there once when I was little. It has blue-and-white tablecloths and bright blue chairs with … wind chimes made of shells.’ She felt her cheeks redden as she spoke. She remembered the restaurant hadn’t been there the last times she had visited because she had looked.

  He smiled widely then. ‘Yes, it does. But I have moved a little, down the road. It is a little smaller than it used to be.’ He took a breath in. ‘There have been hard times here, as I am sure you know. I have had to … what does Jackie say?’ He looked to the sky, as if the heavens would help him find the word then looked back to Abby. ‘Downsize.’

  ‘I’m sorry to hear that.’

  He waved away her concern like it was of no importance at all. ‘It is no matter. And this season I am busy again, almost like old times.’

  ‘Do you still do the fish with lemon?’ As she said the words, Abby could almost taste it. Beautifully cooked light-as-air fish in natural juices enhanced only slightly with lemon and pepper.

  ‘Of course,’ George answered. ‘My mother’s recipe.’ He smiled. ‘You must come. Try this again.’

  ‘I would love to.’

  ‘Tonight,’ George stated.

  ‘Well …’

  ‘Seven thirty. I will reserve the best table.’

  ‘Oh …’

  He put one hand on the easel and looked at it. ‘How you clean this?’

  ‘Well, I was going to …’ Suddenly her eyes found the shoreline, small white-tipped waves caressing the sand. ‘Wash it in the sea.’

  She wanted to kick herself. Wash it in the sea?! She smiled, hoping that George would just nod and move along from her craziness.

  ‘I take this,’ he said instead, swiftly picking up the easel.

  ‘Take it?’ Abby queried.

  ‘I will paint,’ he said. ‘I make it white instead of pink. This will be good.’

  Was this the George who had painted her mother’s house? George from the taverna all those years ago? Abby opened her mouth to reply, unsure what she was going to say, but George was turning back the way he had come, the easel tucked under his arm. She had to say something.

  ‘But,’ Abby called out. ‘We can’t afford to pay you.’

  George was a good few Greek strides ahead now and appeared not to have heard. She looked to the flamingos in her hands and sighed. ‘And then there were two.’

  Sixteen

  Desperately Seeking

  ‘Do you think English food or Greek?’ Jackie asked, glittery pen in her hand, poised over a pad of paper.

  ‘For dinner?’ Melody asked. ‘Well, I was hoping that Igor might take us to that gorgeous restaurant in Kassiopi called Tavernaki. You know, the one that does the most to-die-for steaks.’

  ‘I meant the food for the Desperately Seeking party,’ Jackie replied. ‘Most of our clients are English, aren’t they so …’

  ‘But they’re coming here because they want the Greek dream,’ Abby piped up. And she had inadvertently booked a table for dinner at George’s tonight.

  They were sat on the small oblong of terrace outside the business, at one of the quite tasteful rattan-and-glass tables, a palm providin
g a little shade. Abby was trying to navigate her mum’s rather ancient laptop to get a good grounding of what sort of properties they had on the books, how long they had been for sale, prices etc., before she announced her big news about Villa Pappas.

  The sun was already centre stage, lighting up the sand and shingle beach and sprinkling the sea with flecks of bright white, then warm amber. Having whisked her arms, face, chest and legs with factor thirty, Abby was enjoying the chance to sit outside without the need to have an anorak in her handbag. And, if her mum and sister weren’t in such dire straits and if she hadn’t had another text from Darrell this morning, she could almost be relishing this sunshine break.

  ‘How about a mix,’ Jackie said, turning her attention to Abby. ‘Proper English sausages from that place in Sidari with some feta cheese on sticks.’

  ‘Bleurgh!’ Melody said. ‘That sounds disgusting.’

  Abby looked to her sister. She was doing exactly what Abby had asked her to do while their mum was getting ready this morning. She was subtly and quickly de-pinking the display in the window. Abby’s vision was for them to re-brand Desperately Seeking with a sleeker, cleaner, more professional style and Melody had concurred. It wouldn’t take much to knock up a logo and print off new details for the properties. A banner for the window display might cost a little bit. She would maybe go to Acharavi later and find out how much. Maybe it would have to be a banner or the olive wood sign.

  ‘What are you doing, Melody?’

  Jackie had looked up from her notepad and Abby stopped tapping the laptop.

  ‘Nothing,’ Melody said quickly, standing stock still like a mannequin, one salmon-coloured sheet of paper in her hands.

  Melody hadn’t sounded at all convincing for someone who had been so adept at insisting she was showing a house, not dancing at a bar last night.

  Jackie gasped and got to her flip-flop-clad feet. ‘Where are all the details gone?! And my easel! And … where are my flamingos?!’

  ‘Abby …’ Melody said as Jackie began padding towards her, a furious look on her face.

  ‘I bet it was Aleko! Or that Spyridoula Pappas! She walks along with her rich nose in the air saying “good morning” but really meaning “clear off”. She’s very close to Hera at The Blue Vine and she’s practically best friends with the head of the council.’

  Abby swallowed. Her mum didn’t like Spyridoula? But the Greek woman was giving them the opportunity to value her villa. Unless it was somehow a poisoned chalice … Abby shook her head. No, this was ridiculous. Her mum was just down-on-her-luck and thinking everyone was out to sabotage her. It was time to come clean.

  ‘Mum, sit down,’ Abby said softly.

  ‘Why would I want to sit down? I’ve got a party to plan, you two are destroying my new branding …’ Jackie plucked the details of a one-bedroom wreck in Agios Gordios from Melody’s fingers. ‘And someone has stolen my flamingos!’

  ‘They haven’t been stolen,’ Abby said quickly. ‘I’ve … relocated them.’ She swallowed, an image of the skip coming to mind. The plastic birds nestled with lemon rind, plastic bags full of used toilet paper and a child’s trike.

  ‘Relocated them?’ Jackie asked. ‘Where?’

  ‘Mum,’ Abby begged. ‘Please. Sit down for a minute.’

  ‘She knows,’ Melody said boldly, hands going to her hips.

  Jackie looked from Melody to Abby and back again. ‘Knows what?’ The voice was faint and tentative.

  ‘I told her,’ Melody continued. ‘About how we … haven’t got very many euros to rub together.’

  Jackie suddenly inhaled like she had been deprived of oxygen for hours. Waving a hand dismissively she picked up her notepad and, eyes down, began to write. ‘Things aren’t that bad.’

  ‘Oh, Mum!’ Melody exclaimed, flapping her arms up in frustration. ‘They are that bad!’

  ‘Well,’ Abby cut in, ‘they have to be pretty bad to be spending time with awful men just to get given expensive gifts you can sell.’

  Jackie sent a furious look Melody’s way but her sister folded her arms across her chest and stood her ground.

  ‘Mum, I don’t know why you didn’t tell me about it before, but right now that isn’t the most important thing,’ Abby continued. ‘I’m here. And I’m here to help.’

  ‘You’re here on holiday, to spend time relaxing, enjoying the Corfiot sun, sea and saganaki.’ Jackie forced a smile a second before she plumped back down into her seat as if all the wind had been taken from her sails.

  ‘No,’ Abby said. ‘I came to see you. You and Melody. To spend time with you both.’ She drew her mum’s notebook away from her, taking hostage of the sparkly pen. ‘And we are going to spend time rejuvenating Desperately Seeking.’

  Jackie sighed heavily. Melody sat down next to her and gently pushed her cup of Greek coffee towards her. ‘We’ve tried everything.’

  ‘I don’t believe that,’ Abby replied quickly.

  ‘We’ve dropped our commission rates,’ Jackie pointed out. ‘We gave away car bumper stickers …’

  ‘They were awful,’ Melody remarked. ‘Most of them fell off because of the heat. Stathis does still have one stuck to his bicycle though.’

  ‘We did an email mailshot offering a free no-strings-attached valuation …’ Jackie carried on.

  ‘People got that and then went and signed up with Ionian Dreams to get what he was offering at the time – a free lunch at the Eucalyptus Taverna.’

  ‘I’ve done everything I can think of,’ Jackie rephrased.

  ‘And disregarded most things I thought of,’ Melody added.

  ‘For good reason,’ Jackie snapped. ‘And don’t think I like the dancing now any more than I did when you started it.’

  ‘It’s kept us in bread and feta!’

  ‘OK,’ Abby interjected, hands out, palms towards the table in a bid to de-escalate the issue. ‘There’s no point in going over old ground. What we need to do is prioritise, then refocus and move forward. Together.’

  Jackie nodded but the expression wasn’t quite mirrored in her eyes. ‘But, apart from throwing a party, we really have tried everything. I don’t see how—’

  ‘Well, I’ve made a list.’ Abby swallowed, knowing some items were not going to be easily accepted. ‘It’s just a few things that I’ve implemented at The Travellers’ Rest.’ She turned the laptop towards her mum and Melody, then desperately tried to reposition it so the sun’s reflection wasn’t interfering with the visual.

  Despite the reaction lenses of her glasses starting to kick in, Jackie was squinting. ‘What does that say?’ she asked. ‘White paint?’

  Melody began to shake her head, red nails going to her lips.

  ‘Yes,’ Abby said confidently. ‘I’m sorry, Mum, but the pink really has to go.’

  ‘Go?’ Jackie queried. ‘What d’you mean by “go”?’

  There was only one way to handle this. Bravely. Quickly. With a lot more confidence than she actually felt.

  ‘We’re going to paint the outside white,’ Abby said, getting to her feet and rushing to the entrance of the shopfront. ‘Get rid of all the pink.’ She splayed her hands across the doorframe as if to highlight the point. ‘It’s too … fuchsia. It’s not selling “Greece” or “the sunshine dream”. It needs to look more … relaxing. Tranquil.’

  As the last word was out of Abby’s mouth, a giant carpenter bee flew past her nose with the drone of a light aircraft. She shrugged quickly, not letting it break her stride. ‘We can get it done in a morning and then, this afternoon I’ll pop into Acharavi and see if we can get a new sign made. I was thinking olive wood.’

  ‘Olive wood,’ Jackie said as if it were a rare species.

  ‘I thought it would look nice,’ Abby said. ‘Desperately Seeking … ingrained in a lovely piece of traditional material.’

  ‘Olive wood’s pricey,’ Melody remarked. ‘There’s a fruit bowl in the window of a shop there for over two hundred euro.’

  Was ther
e? That seemed a bit steep. Did it have to be olive wood? Was there something else they already had they could recycle maybe? No, not recycle, upcycle. That was the word she used when she wanted Kathy to take on board an idea or three back in Romsey.

  ‘Well, driftwood then, something that gives a real flavour of everything that’s around us.’ Abby looked to the sea, breathing in and letting the delicious sun, salt and countryside do its thing. ‘The life we’re trying to sell to the customers. Carefree, permanent peace and summer days.’

  ‘I think white would look nice,’ Melody joined in. ‘We could accent it with some plants. Lavender’s cheap and easy to look after and the smell always makes me feel relaxed.’

  Abby had said the same herself only a few weeks ago about UK lavender, which had nothing on the fragrance of Greek lavender. Abby looked at her mum who was staring out at the sea view as if her mind was lost out there in the wide blue yonder.

  ‘Mum,’ Abby said softly, waiting for the turn of head that quickly came. ‘It is going to be all right.’

  Jackie swallowed and nodded, pushing her glasses a little further up her nose. ‘I know,’ she sighed. ‘We have the house. I mean, I’ve avoided remortgaging, but if we have to, then—’

  ‘What?!’ Melody exclaimed. ‘Mum! You can’t do that! It’s our home! The only thing we have that no one can take from us.’

  ‘Let’s not get ahead of ourselves,’ Abby said quickly. ‘Let’s see what we can come up with before any drastic action is taken.’ Now was her moment. Now was the perfect time to tell them about the villa valuation …

  ‘Are you sure you’ve got time for this, Abby?’ Jackie asked. ‘I wanted you to come here and have a lovely time.’

  ‘I will be having a lovely time,’ she reassured her mum.

  ‘Can’t Darrell come out for a bit?’ Jackie said. ‘If we need to paint he could paint. I remember him being a dab hand with it when you moved into your lovely flat.’

  ‘Don’t forget that gorgeous feature wallpaper too,’ Melody added.

  Abby swallowed, maintaining an expression only ever mirrored on a passport photograph. ‘He would be here if he could, but you know how it is with his work.’ She did an eye roll worthy of being immortalised in a gif. ‘It’s all, you know, power meetings and … intense negotiations.’