by Alex A King
“Trish knows that. She's a teacher, remember?” Chris lifts his wife's hand, drops a kiss on her pinkie.
Vivi wants to cry, but she won’t do it here.
Fuck you, John. Nothing but a thief, who stole her shot at romance and happiness. And she let him. She’s the one who sat back and said, “Yes please,” to the few crumbs he tossed her way.
No way will that happen again. She wants cake, not crumbs.
Footsteps in the hall, then her dad appears. He winks at Vivi, smiles his wide, friendly smile.
“Would you look at this, all of my favorite people in the same room. Except my girl.” He drops a kiss on Trish’s cheek. “Melissa will be up in a minute. She is reading about some malakas named Humbert Humbert.”
(Malakas: A man who masturbates so frequently, so furiously, that his brain turns to mush.)
Eleni glares at Vivi across the room. “Why do you let her read these things? It is not appropriate.”
“Lolita is a classic,” Trish says. “And if Vivi’s okay with it, I don’t see the problem.”
“It is smut,” Eleni says.
“Oh, have you read it?”
“I don’t need to read it to know it is smut.”
Chris winks at Vivi; Trish can hold her own with Eleni Pappas and he loves it. Vivi wishes she had that gift, but it’s easier when you didn’t pop out of Eleni’s womb while she was walking to work in the snow – barefoot and uphill both ways, of course.
Worrying about Melissa is Vivi’s new hobby. She’s always quiet, always sullen – times ten if she’s been out with John.
Because Melissa H-A-T-E-S Ian. And Ian’s always around.
Vivi talked to John about it, told him it wasn’t cool to flaunt his fling in front of their daughter, but John told her this is how it is, and if Vivi doesn’t like it, they can let the lawyers scrap over the details.
Anyway, the worrying, it’s reaching critical mass. So, when Melissa is happy, Vivi’s happy. And reading makes Melissa happy, which means . . .
There’s zero chance Vivi’s going to mess with that.
“It's on the school reading list,” she says. “It's not like she's leafing through Playboy.”
Mom makes a huffing sound over the boiling potatoes. “It is pornography.”
A loud thwack of newspaper on wood makes her stop. Her husband glares at her over the top of his wire-rimmed glasses. “Eleni, always with the nagging. You never stop. Leave the poor girl alone.”
“How can I leave her alone when she is in the garage reading dirty books? She is not here to leave alone.”
“Mom – ” Chris starts.
Mom slams the lid on the potatoes, hurls the spoon across the room. The wooden spoon strikes the hutch, bounces off the fruit bowl, hits Vivi on the head with a skull-echoing thud.
“Now look what you have done,” Elias Pappas says. Trish hurries to Vivi’s side, but she’s fine. No dents, no cuts, no life-threatening outpouring of blood.
It’s all good. Except for the screaming in her head that won’t shut up.
Eleni waves her hands at the ceiling. “I am the one who is hurting and you take her side? My daughter is getting divorced, has no job, has no husband, and now no home. What am I supposed to tell people?”
Vivi looks at the lunatic. “I don’t care what you tell them. I’m too busy trying to make a new life with my daughter.”
“What are you trying to do? You sit here in my kitchen and eat baklava while my granddaughter reads filth.”
“Well, this time next week we'll be gone.”
“You found a place?” Chris asks.
Vivi glances at Trish, who shakes her head. She hasn’t said a thing because, as previously mentioned, Chris can’t keep secrets.
“Sort of,” she says. “Melissa and I are going away. To Greece.” She doesn’t look at her mother, but thanks to the power of peripheral vision, she catches the instant weather change.
“Good for you!” Chris says. “Is this like a holiday?”
“More like a maybe-permanent thing. Or maybe not. We’re testing the warmer waters.”
He whistles. “Damn, Vivi. Good for you.” He looks at his wife. “Babe, did you know about this?”
Trish nods. “It wasn't an easy secret to keep, but Vivi needed a sounding board and some advice about education.”
Eleni is a statue. The tantrum is coming, the drama ratcheting. The air pressure shifts, the way it does when a storm is bundling up its energy for the big strike.
Vivi says, “What do you think, Dad?”
He shrugs. “Eh. If you think it is best.”
“No,” Eleni whispers. “I forbid it.”
All eyes on the two of them. Vivi and Eleni in the ring alone, only one will be left standing.
“Too late. The tickets are in my handbag.”
Eleni runs out of the kitchen.
“That went well,” Chris says.
Trish slaps his arm. “Vivi, are you okay?”
Is she okay?
Is a train wreck okay?
Is a meteor headed straight for Earth okay?
Oh yeah, she’s okay. And now her mother is pouting in the bedroom where she'll stay until they all take turns comforting her and Vivi begs for forgiveness.
That’s the Eleni protocol.
Right now, in this moment, Vivi feels every day of a million years old.
“Yeah, I’m okay,” she says.
“Are you sure about this?” her father asks. His forehead is wearing more creases than usual, probably from the constant pressure of Mom’s thumb.
“It's already done. All Mel and I have to do is get on the plane.”
There’s a scuffle in the hallway. Eleni runs back into the kitchen, Vivi’s handbag in her fists.
“You want to go to Greece, eh? I do not think so!”
She upends the lot on the kitchen floor. Lipstick bouncing, tampons rolling, receipts fluttering to the floor. She moves fast, pouncing on the floppy plastic ticket holder, yanks them from their protective coating.
“You want to go to Greece? How will you do that without tickets?”
She makes confetti. Sprinkles some, crams the rest into her mouth.
“I can print new ones,” Vivi says. “It’s all electronic, anyway.”
Eleni raises both hands (chewing, chewing), makes them shiver in the air, as though she’s at one of those Holy Roller services.
“The spirits . . . they are saying you should not go! Bad things will happen if you do!”
“She always says that when it's convenient,” Chris says, in a stage whisper.
“Trust my words,” Eleni says. “If you go to Greece you will regret it. There is nothing for you there except unhappiness.”
So, just like here, then?
* * *
Things have changed. In the old days Eleni said no to night-lights. “Why we want to pay for light we don’t see, eh?” Now there’s a tiny LED nightlight in every room that isn’t a bedroom. The hallway reminds her of an airport’s landing strip, with its white-blue glow.
It’s Eleni’s way of acknowledging the passing of the years. Vivi’s parents are not as young as they used to be, nor are they as old as they will be soon.
Vivi goes to the kitchen, raids the galaktobouriko Eleni didn’t bake.
“Cut me a piece, too, eh?” Elias says, from the doorway.
“Can’t sleep, Dad?”
“The older your mother gets, the more she talks in her sleep. Tonight she is having a conversation with a shoe.”
“What kind of shoe?”
“An old shoe.”
Two plates, two forks, two desserts. Two silent eaters.
When his plate is clean, her father says, “Your mother is upset with you, but she will get over it. Like she did with the Friday underwear – remember?”
Like Vivi could forget. Eleni swore she would kill Vivi, but that didn’t work out. Vivi wound up with a mouthful of pepper, and seven years of dishwashing. One year for each pa
ir.
Elias leans back in his chair, pats his belly. “When you go to Greece, maybe people will tell you some stories, eh? About me, about your mother.”
“What kind of stories?”
“It has been so long . . . Who knows what the stories will be now. Time changes the shape of a story. Enough time passes and only the original idea is the same as it was. Everything else becomes different. The truth is no longer true, the names change. You will see. Fifty years from now, you will look at this time and you will not recognize the character of Vivi as yourself.”
Okay . . .
“Don’t believe everything you hear, eh? When somebody gossips, they are not doing you a favor by giving you information. They are trying to elevate their position, to seem more important than they are. And they are trying to extract information from you, also. Remember that.”
“Does this have anything to do with that box, Dad?”
“What box?” he says. “There was no box.”
* * *
Yeah, right. No box.
But that’s okay. It’s not her business.
Elias and Eleni Pappas are not John and Vivi Tyler. Their marriage is a rock.
15
MELISSA
MELISSA IS MAKING PROGRESS of the backwards kind.
Regress?
If anyone pointed that out to her, she’d say, “Whatever,” and keep on cutting.
Nobody her age wears a watch anymore. They’ve all got phones to give them life’s Cliff’s Notes. Time, date, number of “friends” at any given moment. Bored? Your cell phone’s got that covered, too.
But Melissa dug out her watch from three years ago, strapped the silver-on-white face to her wrist, risked being uncool. And – voila! – it’s the perfect hiding place. So what if leather on shredded skin stings? That’s kind of the point. It’s a modern day take on the hair shirt. Things start rolling down that slope, her head gets muddled, all she has to do is rub, press, and everything floats away, courtesy of fresh pain.
Three days to go.
She saw Dad last night and she’s seeing him again tonight. He promised Ian wouldn’t be there, but he promised that last night, too.
Ian can’t help himself. He’s desperate to be friends.
Well. Was.
Last night he was playing at being her BFF, asking too many questions about stuff Melissa doesn’t want to talk about. Boys, friends, blah, blah, blah. And all the pressing and rubbing on her wrist wasn’t making him go away. So, she stalked off to the bathroom and made an old cut new.
She came back ready to deal. Said, “Did Dad tell you how a guy from my school saw him sucking dicks in the park?”
Melissa expected:
An explosion.
A fight.
Screaming, tears, and one last look at Ian’s back as he stormed out of the house.
Yeah, none of those things happened.
Ian gave her a steel smile and said, “John and I love each other very much, but we don’t chain each other to the bed. Much.”
Dad said, “Ian!”
Ian said, “What? Your kid was asking for it.”
While they were bickering, Melissa puked two slices of pepperoni and twelve ounces of Fanta onto Ian’s plate.
Now Melissa can’t wait to fly away to the Ian-free zone. Her safety pin is all packed.
16
VIVI
VIVI IS THE TITANIC and Eleni is the iceberg. But the way Eleni’s behaving, anyone would think she’s the doomed ship. This time, the ship’s not going down; if it does, Vivi has lifeboats. Chris and Trish are at the airport with them. They’re all hovering in a small, noisy cluster near the security checkpoint.
Time marches to the right. Nobody says goodbye.
“Is Dad coming?” Melissa wants to know.
“He said he'd be here, Honey.”
Eleni makes a face. “Some nerve he has, showing his face to this family.”
“Chill out, Mom,” Vivi says. “He's Mel's dad.”
“And that's as it should be,” Trish says, hugging her around the neck. “I know you need to go, but I don’t want you to.”
“She does not have to go.” Eleni cups Melissa's cheeks in her hands and kisses her forehead over and over, until it’s Revlon orange. “She is deserting me, depriving me of my beautiful granddaughter.”
Vivi wants to scream, but the TSA guys already look jumpy.
“Eleni, they need to go,” her father says.
The line is growing exponentially. Harried travelers, annoyed and tired before they even take off their shoes and dump their belongings into those plastic tubs, are being sucked into the security vortex.
“Dad's here!”
Vivi looks up, and sure enough, John is striding their way in his dark blue pinstripe. She must have taken that thing to the dry cleaners’ a hundred times. But as he gets closer, she sees the slightly different cut of the lapels, the shinier buttons. It’s new – a post-Vivi suit.
“I got caught up with a client.” He drops an awkward kiss on Vivi’s cheek before scooping Melissa into a bear hug.
Next, John shakes hands. Trish gets her usual peck, and then he closes in on Eleni.
Eleni is glowering, a dangerous shine to her eyes. They’re all skating along a paper-thin line. One wrong word and she’ll explode.
Vivi holds her breath.
He leans closer.
Eleni’s hand shoots up, steel trap gripping his mouth. He looks like a shocked goldfish. Fresh Botox amplifies his distress.
“Wha – ?” he starts, but her other hand clobbers him around the ear.
“Do not touch me with that mouth,” she says. “Your breath smells like a man's penis.”
“As opposed to a woman's penis,” Chris says for everyone's benefit. Melissa’s eyes bug. Trish elbows him.
“Go and wash the penis off your mouth, then you can come back and kiss me. Go!” Her fingers unclamp, she shoves him in the direction of the men's room. John walks away, dazed.
“Mom,” Vivi says, into her hands.
“Eleni, enough,” her father says.
“What? He smelled like a penis. I do not want that on my face. Who knows where he has been?”
Vivi covers Melissa’s ears. “Mom, enough. Don't make this unpleasant.”
Hands in the air. “Unpleasant? This is already unpleasant. You think I want to be here sending my child alone into the snake pit? Greece will eat you alive. You will come crawling back bleeding, crying, 'You were right, Mama,’ and, ‘Why didn't I listen to you when I had the chance, Mama?' Trust me, you will be back.”
“Hey, Mel,” Trish says cheerfully. “Let’s go get some magazines for the trip.”
Mel’s face says that’s a great idea.
Vivi wags her finger under her mother’s nose. “Don't make this harder for my daughter. Do you think this is easy? I packed up our whole lives because I want to make something better. I don't want Mel to grow up with one of those weepy divorcees for a mother, who just lies around the house watching soaps and reading magazines, wishing she had a life. Don't you want more for me than that? Aren't you supposed to want me to make my life better?”
Olympic-level eye rolling.
Her dad reels her in for a hug. She holds him tight. “Thanks, Dad.”
“If you need anything, you call us, okay?” he says into her hair.
Chris says, “Ditto, Sis.”
John is on his way back from the bathroom. The minty fresh mouthwash reaches them before he does.
“Good boy,” Eleni says. “Much better. Did you wash your hands, too?”
“What did I say, Mom?”
She ignores Vivi, offers her cheek to John.
Trish and Melissa return with an armload of magazines. Her sister-in-law slides a couple into Vivi’s carry-on bag. “It's a long flight. Celebrity gossip will either keep you amused or put you to sleep. You can't lose.”
Hugs. Tears. I love yous.
“I'd give you a tissue, but I'm not sure whi
ch compartment they're in,” Vivi says. Their half-hearted laughter is damp. The security line is waiting. “We have to go now.”
John hugs her again. “Don't be a stranger,” he says.
Like you? But she’s beyond that now; time for a clean slate, and that means letting go. “We'll call you when we get there.”
Chris goes next. “Don't do anything I wouldn't do.”
Trish scoffs. “That's like giving her an open checkbook. If you decide to stay for good, we're coming for Christmas.”
Eleni is horrified. “And who will I have Christmas with? Everyone is leaving me.”
“What, I am chopped gyro meat now?” her husband asks. He hugs them again. “Remember what I said. You need anything, you call.”
“I will.”
And finally, it’s mother and daughter, staring each other down.
“You will regret this,” Eleni says.
“I'll regret it more if I don't go.”
“Do as you please.”
“Mom . . .”
“Fine, go. Your aunt Dora will pick you up in Volos. She is less of a snake than the others, but she is still a small snake. Never forget.”
Snakes. Got it.
Then she and Melissa are wending their way through the paranoia zone.
“Mom?” Melissa inches closer. Vivi wraps an arm around her shoulders. Melissa doesn't flinch, thank God.
“What, Honey?”
“What's that?” She points to a TSA guy brandishing a handheld metal detector.
“Don't worry, it's not for a cavity search.”
“A what?”
“Never mind,” Vivi says. “When we get to Greece, you call Dad, ask him to explain it.”
Okay, so it’s going be a while before the bygones are, well, bygone.
17
MAX
EVERYTHING ABOUT ANASTASIA IS a mystery, except what’s between her legs. She sizzles one moment, freezes him the next.
Sometimes she makes him beg to come. Next day, she claws his clothes off, like fucking him is going to keep her alive.
It’s a new game – her game.
She’s playing, playing, and he’s eating her up like a starving beast. He doesn’t care, he just wants more.