A Stranger in the Village

by Sara Alexi

  Another curve of the path and then, there it is! A slice of ancient wonder visible between the high canyon walls. Startlingly bright in the sun after the shadow of the canyon. It is larger than he remembered it, the edges of the carved pillars and doors sharper than his recollection. It towers regally above them.

  ‘Oh yeah, got to get a picture of me with that!’ Rose exclaims. Grace is a little apart from the rest of the group, her nose in her guidebook. Jess has glanced briefly at the incredible facade and is now petting one of the camels. At least Josh is staring at the sight before them: four tall columns, carved to give the impression that they are supporting the ornate triangular lintel that is one with the rock. The doorway is set back and it is possible to walk behind the central columns into the cool, dark interior. The last time he was here, Miltos expected the grandeur to continue inside the carved monolith and was a little disappointed to find there was nothing more than a small, unremarkable chamber beyond the entrance. The stone itself, however, is a beautiful mix of colours – pink, purple, maroon, in stripes where the different strata were laid one on top of another.

  He wants to remark on the age of the sculptured stone, the design of the architecture, the magnificence of the location, and he moves towards Josh a little to make him his confidant.

  ‘Got any painkillers?’ Josh may be facing the Treasury but his eyes are glazed. ‘I have the hangover from hell.’ He swallows and his Adam’s apple bobs.

  Miltos steps away to find that Grace is staring at him. She colours as their eyes meet and then she looks down at her book.

  Is it so much to ask to have someone to share this with? Someone who understands the history of these remarkable carved buildings, someone who can appreciate the architecture, the stone, the stunning location?

  With this thought, he steps away from the group and continues his discoveries by himself.

  Chapter 31

  ‘So, what you are saying is that they left you?’ The taxi driver’s right hand rests idly on the wheel, and he appears to be paying remarkably little attention to the road ahead. Bouzouki music plays softly on the radio, and the scent of pine trees and dust drift in through the open windows. In a couple of hours they will be in the Peloponnese, and then in Saros. The taxi driver offers a cigarette to Miltos, who shakes his head, and then lights one for himself, during which operation both hands leave the wheel. Miltos is glad that the road is empty of other cars.

  ‘Yes,’ he confirms, looking out at the olive trees that stretch away towards the hills on one side. On the other side is the sea, shining, sparkling, darkly blue and promising adventure.

  The relief at being back in Greece is greater than he expected. In the hospital bed in Jordan he became obsessed by the idea of returning home, and it shocked him to realise that he felt this way. Even though he had been born in Greece and lived there for the first twenty years of his life, it made no sense: given that his numerous adventures and escapades had been spread across so many locations, why decide Greece was home? Was it just because he was born there, or was there something more about the country?

  ‘Aman!’ the taxi driver exclaims. ‘So how long were you in the hospital?’

  ‘Only a few days. They wanted to keep me in for two weeks, in case I had a reaction to the antivenom.’

  The taxi is an expensive indulgence but his priorities have shifted to such a degree that getting back to the village speedily seems more important than anything.

  ‘Did this Skinner man not even thank you?’ The taxi driver asks.

  Miltos grunts his answer. ‘They got me back down the track to the visitor’s centre, and by then I was shaking and my arm was numb so they called an ambulance. Some man said to keep my hand below my heart and to take slow breaths, so I was concentrating on that – you know, to stop the venom working its way through my system.’

  ‘Scorpion stings are common out there then?’

  Miltos begins to wish he had not started telling his tale, which is diverting the driver’s attention from the road again. ‘I don’t think so. The locals, and the hospital, seemed pretty surprised.’

  The car veers slowly from one lane to the next; even so, Miltos’s thoughts drift back to Petra in Jordan.

  Skinner seemed to be in so much pain, his ankle wedged at an awkward angle after his fall. Miltos had already warned him that it was an unsuitable place to run about – there was so much loose rock that far off the track – but there had been no stopping him and Bryce once they understood that the monastery was the highest and last of the carved facades. Their youthful energy needed an outlet and off they ran, and Skinner fell, wedging his ankle between two rocks and twisting it badly.

  Bryce raised the alarm but he seemed to go into a sort of panic, in which he was unable to process the situation in front of him. All he needed to do was lift the rock so that Skinner’s ankle was released, but instead he just stood there with his mouth open and a blank expression. Miltos did not hesitate, thrusting his hands under the rock and lifting it clear. Skinner eased his foot out and sighed with relief, but there was no word of thanks.

  As he released the rock, Miltos felt the sting like a hammer blow; he withdrew his hand quickly and saw the red mark. It is funny how some things you just know; even though he did not see the creature, he knew what had happened.

  Initially it caused him no alarm. Most scorpions are not very harmful, he had once read. So they started the walk back down the track from the monastery with everyone’s attention focused on Skinner, who demanded support, mostly from the girls. Miltos had expected the red mark on his hand to have stopped stinging by the time they got to the visitors centre, but instead the inflamed area had grown, he was sweating, his arm was tingling and his tongue had started to feel numb.

  ‘Well, thank goodness they knew what to do, eh?’ The taxi driver makes a last-minute swerve around a slow truck and Miltos grips the dashboard.

  ‘Come on, man, I don’t want to survive a scorpion sting only to be killed in a road crash.’

  The taxi driver stares intently through the windscreen, both hands on the wheel, and Miltos decides he will not tell him any more details. The story is distracting him. They continue the journey in silence but his mind is replaying the conversation he had as he was being loaded into the ambulance.

  ‘You never said there were scorpions.’ Jess was holding onto Rose’s arm as if it was she who was bitten, Virginia looking on.

  ‘They are mostly harmless,’ Josh said with authority.

  ‘Well, that’s not the case, is it, else we would not be watching him being loaded into an ambulance?’ Virginia pointed out.

  ‘Well, of course the old and the young are vulnerable.’ Josh stated, waving his hand in Miltos’s direction. ‘People our age wouldn’t be bothered by such a bite,’ Josh concluded.

  Josh and Grace had gone to the hospital with him, and of the two Grace had seemed more concerned. But nothing much was happening after the first antivenom injection, and neither of them stayed once the minutes turned to boring hours.

  Josh mumbled something about visas expiring and patted Miltos awkwardly on his shoulder. ‘Here’s my number, man,’ he said, ‘and you know I would stay if I could, but the guys are already complaining that they’ve paid for a diving holiday. You know how it is, bro, but here’s my number, and call me if you need anything.’

  He had twittered on for a while, and Grace had nodded her agreement but she looked tired. Her compassion was exhausted and he had given her nothing in return, not even a smile.

  It was the same in the hospital, where the younger nurses were over-sympathetic and talked at him more loudly than was necessary and then, moments later, just a short distance away at the nurse’s station, they spoke to each other about him as if he could not hear.

  So he lay there in that alien bed waiting for the antivenom to take effect, for some sensation to return to his arm, for the swelling in his hand to go down. For a while he watched the nurses, compared the room to the hospital he
was in when he broke his collarbone climbing. But this time he had no visitors, nor any clinging women wanting his attention. He was alone.

  Lying there for hour upon hour, time was the only thing he had. The day drifted into the night, and finally, almost through boredom, he used the hours to face the chasm between himself and people like Josh or Skinner. This naturally led him to contemplate the fact that he was over fifty, which in turn led to the harsh shock of realising how little he had to show for the years he had been alive. Nothing except a heap of memories that he had churned out to entertain people so many times they had lost their vibrancy and become stagnant snippets of his glory days. He had nothing of material value, but, worse than that, he had no friends – not a single person he had kept in touch with over the years, no one who had witnessed his life. This awareness crushed him, because he realised that the free spirit he had always prided himself on had reduced his life to such a state that if he did die of a scorpion bite … Well, first of all no one would know, but more importantly no one would care.

  He discharged himself the next day, following a sleepless night chewing over these revelations. The course of antivenom had finished and it felt like it was working. He comforted himself with the knowledge that if he lived to be ninety, which seemed like a reasonable estimate, then he had forty years of life left, and he resolved to make better use of them.

  That was when he knew he wanted to return to Saros, and to the small village with the woman in the kiosk and the woman in the blue dress in the corner shop. It was time to do the one thing that terrified him. It was time to settle down and stay in one place. With this decision came a calm, a peace, as if he were underwater and his limbs were loose and nature was surrounding him like a blanket, tucking him in and keeping him safe.

  Chapter 32

  ‘Are you sure you want to walk from here?’ The taxi has stopped at the edge of the village.

  ‘Thank you.’ Miltos pays the man and watches as he pulls away, mounts the kerb, overcorrects and drives on the wrong side of the road for some distance.

  Maybe he should get a taxi licence? After all, he can drive better than that!

  He rubs at his hand, which is still a little swollen, and with his small bag over his shoulder he passes the brightly coloured railings around the infant school, suddenly nervous, doubting his earlier resolve as he heads up the street that leads to the square.

  ‘So, Milto,’ he says to himself under his breath. ‘This is home. Where you will let life wash over you, let your branches bend with the wind but keep your trunk strong and encourage your roots to grow. A job and a house will come. It always has, only this time you are playing for keeps.’ The thought both thrills and terrifies him.

  Single-storey whitewashed cottages line the road on either side, and from the one with pale grey-blue shutters, he can hear the sounds of an acoustic guitar. Perhaps it is Sakis; he relishes the fact that already he has some history in the place, some knowledge, even if it is very little. He can see the kiosk up ahead now, and for the first time he wonders if either of the women who have so occupied his thoughts recently is married. The one in the kiosk was wearing black, so she could be a widow, but the other had a blue dress on. Perhaps her husband is still alive. That would be a shame.

  He immediately rebukes himself for such a selfish thought, but cannot help feeling a little disappointed. On the plane from Sharm el-Sheikh he found himself dwelling more on her than on the woman in the kiosk.

  As he approaches the square, the thought creeps up on him that he has no plan – not as such, not about what to actually do next. He has presumed he will spend the first night at Stella’s hotel, where he stayed before, in the same room if possible, but who knows what tomorrow will bring? The narrow entrance of the sandwich shop on the left is closed, but the eatery on the right is open and his stomach growls. His flight this morning left before breakfast and the hours have spun away since. Did he eat on the plane? Some nuts, perhaps; he cannot remember. The noises from his stomach are too loud to be ignored. He will have a plate of something and sit and contemplate this village that he is to call home.

  Out on the pavement, under a thin tree whose trunk and branches are wrapped in fairy lights, is the choice table. As he sits down, he can hear talking and laughing inside, but for now he wants to be on the pavement, to take stock of everything and feel the pace of the place. The pharmacy on the corner is shut, but there is a light on in the upstairs window. The bakery opposite looks dark both downstairs and up. No doubt they will have an early start, and they might be in bed already, even though the sun has not quite set. There is a pinkish glow to the houses and everything is softened in the gentle early evening light. The kafenio at the top of the square seems fairly busy, with the chairs out on the square itself facing a large flatscreen television that is propped up on a table against the floor-to-ceiling windows. Adverts are showing and the men are chatting, but soon the football is on again and their attention is regained. Tomorrow he will have a morning coffee there, get the feel of who is who, see if anyone wants a worker, ask around about a room to rent, maybe.

  ‘What can I get you?’ A slight woman with thin legs, wearing a sleeveless floral dress, appears by his side. She seems familiar. Her hair is shoulder-length and he suspects its frizz comes from working over a hot grill all day.

  ‘Chicken, sausage, chips, Greek salad. Not the greatest choice in the world, but what we have is good, hot and served with a smile.’

  She rests a hand on his shoulder and he takes this as a sign that he is already accepted.

  He immediately likes her and takes a longer look, trying to judge her age. Then heat rushes up his neck and into his cheeks as he catches himself slipping into this old habit.

  ‘What is it?’ she asks, ‘Have I got charcoal smudges on my face again? It happens all the time.’

  The woman pats self-consciously at her face and Miltos shakes his head.

  ‘So what will it be? Or maybe you just want a drink – but you look hungry to me.’

  She is lively, about his own age, a bit thin, perhaps, for his liking, but what a smile!

  ‘Yeia sou.’ A man with one arm saunters out from inside, wearing an apron.

  ‘Yeia sou,’ Miltos replies, and he watches. The man excuses the interruption and talks to the woman about ordering more charcoal with such familiar ease and such admiration in his eyes that there can be no mistake – he is in love. The way she moves her hips towards him, turns her body to face him, makes it clear that this is not a one-way romance.

  The one-armed man returns inside, calling as he does to Miltos, ‘You want a beer?’ The way the man addresses him, it is as if he has lived here all his life and he too is part of the family.

  ‘Oh yes, please,’ he calls. ‘And chicken and chips, please.’ He addresses this last request to the woman.

  ‘Okay.’ She turns and is gone and he is left listening to the laughter coming from inside, the hub to the village.

  ‘So, you are back.’ The woman is quick to return and she sets a plate of food before him. ‘I put lemon sauce on it. I hope you are all right with that?’

  ‘It smells amazing.’ Miltos hears the unintended surprise in his voice, and immediately feels heat in his cheeks. The impressions he makes and the relationships he develops will have long-lasting significance if he is to settle here and call this village home. This thought both excites and scares him at once.

  ‘Couldn’t stay away, eh?’ The woman is fishing. He kind of likes this – at least she is showing an interest in him. His instinct is to say nothing: that has always been his way. Tell stories, keep people amused, but always stay at a distance and wind up with nothing. Well, that needs to change for a start, if he is to stay.

  ‘No. Couldn’t keep away. You know what? I’ve decided to make this place home.’

  It sounds ridiculous. He takes up his cutlery so he does not have to meet her gaze. It is strange how vulnerable he feels knowing that he is not just going to walk away tomorr
ow, or the next day. But what if he cannot make it? What if it all feels too scary, too intense, and he feels compelled to run? Maybe it is his destiny to always be apart. Maybe it is something over which he has no control. He stabs at the chips with his fork, forcing his doubts to recede.

  ‘Good a place as any,’ the woman replies, organising the napkin holder and the bottles of oil and vinegar on the corner of his table. ‘Best you know our names then.’ She pulls out a chair, uninvited, and sits down. ‘I am Stella, and in there is Mitsos, my husband.’

  So this is Stella. Stella of the hotel and Stella who runs the candle factory with Sakis’s girlfriend. He should have realised, and now she tells him it is so obvious; here she is, running the eatery. She is much slighter than he imagined but he feels a thrill to finally meet her, as if he is meeting the mainstay of the village.

  ‘Theo,’ she continues, ‘he owns the kafenio up there. Yes, there he is.’ Stella looks across the square and nods her head at a man carrying a tray across the road. ‘That man with the bouncy hair. And in the kiosk is Vasso.’

  ‘She married?’ he says before he can stop himself.

  ‘Was. Widowed now.’ Stella is just as abrupt but she is searching his face now, and a little smirk plays around her lips. She continues, but her eyes are on him and she speaks more slowly.