‘We’re made of strong stuff,’ Robert says.
‘I can understand what with you coming from Wales, but Sophie’s been living in Greece
for years.’ She hobbles over on her crutches; her features look small and delicate in the
moonlight.
‘It does get cold there,’ I say.
‘Not like here it doesn’t,’ she says. ‘Anyway, I’ve been wondering where you disappeared to.’ She
looks at Robert. ‘And I’m sorry, but I walked through your kitchen.’
‘I’ll forgive you,’ he says. Their eyes are fixed on each other. ‘I came to find Sophie, to thank her for
tonight.’
Mum shifts her focus from Robert to me. ‘Bloody delicious food,’ she says. ‘I think we’ll be having a
few Greek nights at home.’
I’m reluctant to go back inside despite being numb from sitting on the cold flint wall. I trail after
Mum and Robert across the car park. Robert turns and smiles at me before ducking through
the door into the steamy heat of the kitchen. I smile back and curl my arms around my
stomach.
I open my eyes to sunshine streaming through the blinds. I stretch my arms and legs out before
snuggling back into the pillows. The cobwebs clouding my thoughts these past few days have lifted –
I’m ashamed to admit that last night’s talk with Robert might have something to do with it. I laugh
out loud with the realisation I’m excited about Alekos’ arrival. I want to tell him about our
baby.
Mum’s stacking plates in the dishwasher when I finally make it downstairs.
‘Do you want any coffee?’ she asks, waving the pot at me.
‘I’m trying to cut it out.’
‘Sod that,’ she says, pouring the dregs into her mug. ‘I gave up smoking, that’s enough willpower to
last a lifetime. I’m not giving up caffeine. Or alcohol. Does Alekos smoke?’
‘Occasionally.’
‘I don’t want to catch him hanging out your bedroom window having a sneaky fag.’
‘He’s thirty years old, Mum, not a teenager.’
‘I’m dead excited about meeting him,’ she says. ‘I thought I’d make apple crumble for after our
roast.’
‘Only if you feel like it. You should still be taking it easy.’
She waves a hand at me and takes a sip of her coffee. ‘I can’t believe he’s never had a proper
roast.’
‘He has.’
‘Not with Yorkshire pud and gravy.’
‘He is Greek.’
‘How do I say hello again?’
‘
Yasas
.’
‘
Yasas
.’
I nod. ‘It also means goodbye.’
‘Bloody complicated language.’
…
I want to get going. All this waiting around is making me nervous. I have nothing to do. My room’s tidy,
the whole house is spotless and I’ve already planned the journey. I must be getting on Mum’s nerves
because she sends me down the lane to pick blackberries for the crumble. It’s a perfect
September day with sun filtering through high white clouds. I dodge puddles by stepping on the
flint embedded in the muddy lane. I glance at my stomach. I still can’t believe it. Maybe I
shouldn’t tell him at the airport. I could choose my moment like Robert’s wife did and take
Alekos somewhere memorable: the windswept beach at Salthouse or up to the Downs with its
view to the sea. I don’t have to go far before I find brambles heavy with fruit. I stretch
into the hedgerow and take my pick of fat blackberries until I have an ice cream tub full.
…
It’s time to go. I get into Mum’s car, adjust the seat and start the engine. The UK road map lies on the
passenger seat with a piece of paper and scribbled directions lying on top. There are ham
and mustard sandwiches in the glove compartment and a bottle of water within reaching
distance.
‘Are you sure you’ll be all right?’ Mum asks through the open car window.
‘Mum, really. How do you think I’ve managed on my own for the last few years?’ I put the car into
first and she taps the roof as I drive off.
Marshton disappears from view and soon I’m driving on wide, fast roads heading away from the
coast. I’m tempted to change my route, to explore the long, straight road that veers off to my left
through a canopy of trees, signposted to Grimes Graves. But I keep going and slowly the countryside
dissolves into Little Chefs, pylons and a horizon filled with grey buildings and windows glinting in the
sunlight.
The radio’s playing songs from the eighties: Kylie and Jason and Wham. It reminds me of Mum and
I dancing around our kitchen in Hazel Road, using wooden spoons as mikes. I thought she was the
coolest Mum; none of my friends’ parents danced with them round the house or took them to see
Madonna. She impressed all my friends when we were teenagers, and sleepovers at our house
meant she cracked open a twelve-pack of lager and joined us watching
A Nightmare on Elm
Street
.
Best of all I loved the stories Mum read to me at bedtime. She used to get side-tracked and ad-lib –
even C S Lewis and Roald Dahl were given the Leila touch. I’d find myself in these stories:
it was
Sophie and the Chocolate Factory
, not Charlie. I was the one riding high inside a
peach, sitting on the shoulders of the BFG or walking out of the wardrobe and into Narnia
with Peter, Susan and Edmund. Every night was a performance. Mum created characters,
landscapes, stories and I painted them in my mind. That’s how I started drawing. The next day,
sitting at the kitchen table with crayons and pencils strewn across it, I would illustrate the
previous night’s story. I wonder if Mum still has my pictures or if they got lost during the
move to Marshton. I took so little to Greece. My past is here. I wonder if my future is too.
…
The thunderous roar of aeroplanes deafens me as I arrive at Heathrow. I can see a plane’s belly, shiny and
white, coming in to land. There’s a constant stream of planes taking off and landing. I’m envious of
all those people who are able to forget reality for one or two weeks. A month. A lifetime
perhaps.
I wonder what Alekos can see right now. The brown stretch of channel merging with land or green
fields petering out into rows of suburban terraced houses. Will he like it here? With patchy
sunlight and a vicious wind whipping leaves off the trees, it will certainly be too cold for
him. I hope he can see past that to the beauty I’ve discovered in the short time I’ve been
back.
I miss the entrance of the short stay car park and end up slamming my brakes on in the middle of
the road when I spy another way in. There’s no one behind me and my moment of dangerous – Greek –
driving goes unnoticed.
My legs feel heavy as I walk towards Terminal 2. There are flights due to land from Milan, Athens,
Cairo and Thessaloniki. This is where it all started just a few years ago when on impulse I jumped on a
plane and escaped to Alekos and Greece. Our roles have reversed: this time I’m on home turf and
Alekos is the one travelling to a new country to see me. I’d liked to have witnessed his conversation
with Despina. To see him stand up to her, now that would have been quite something. I’m sure by
allowing Alekos to leave
O Kipos
she’s realised how much we need this time together. I watch another
load of people arrive back from Malaga. The flight from Thessaloniki flashes up: delayed.
…
I can’t stand it any more, leaning my weight from one foot to the other, watching tanned and smiling
strangers emerge through the arrivals gate. The crowd around me disperses as friends and family find
each other. But there’s no sign of Alekos. I make my way to the nearby café and order a hot chocolate
with marshmallows. I’m allowed; I’m eating for two. I perch on a stool up at the bar that overlooks
arrivals and wait. I stir my hot chocolate until the marshmallows melt into a swirl of pink and
white.
The first time I saw Alekos he was onboard
Artemis
, throwing a rope to another crew member. I
was standing on the edge of the dock, waiting for Candy, who was bartering over a shell necklace, when
I saw him. He was as toned as a Greek sculpture but instead of being pale like marble he was dark as
honey. His shorts were slung low on his waist; the rest of him was bare, even his feet. He
didn’t see me, but that first sight of him is mine to keep. Candy, with her new necklace
tied round her neck, dragged me away from the sea towards one of the cafés. The next
day I knew his name, the day after I knew the taste of his lips, the day after that I just
knew.
How can such strong emotions lead to so much uncertainty? Over this past year I have questioned if
I fell in love with the place as much as with him. We’ve never gone back but it feels as if we left a part
of ourselves there. It felt more than just a holiday romance. It is more. We’ve moved on, changed,
grown and got to know each other. That takes time. We went from a romance on Cephalonia to the
reality of living and working together at
O Kipos
. The Alekos I glimpsed that summer is a fading
memory. The life he had, the passion, the independence seems to have been sucked out of him.
It’s his fault. Despina only rules him because he lets her. I’m hoping today is the start of
something new. We need to do more than just survive. Ben was right when he said life is for
living.
I take a sip of my hot chocolate and the melted marshmallow sticks to my top lip. The arrivals
board flashes ‘Thessaloniki: landed’. No one’s come through the arrivals gate yet. He’ll have to wait for
his luggage. That’ll take a while. In-between blowing on my hot chocolate, I take deep breaths. My
jeans fit fine and my top’s not too tight. There’s no bump showing. I don’t feel pregnant. I could quite
easily start believing it isn’t true. I used to be very good at make-believe when I was a child, out of
necessity, lacking a father; out of boredom in physics lessons; out of loneliness as an only child with a
working mother. Not that I blamed her, at least now I don’t. I understand why she had to work long
hours, sometimes in two jobs, or why we always had a lodger. ‘It’s useful having a man about the
house,’ she used to say. As if she had any choice. She’d never admit she
needed
a man about
the house, as well as a man in her life. There was always someone – their faces became a
blur, their names muddled. I gave up trying to remember. The ones I liked never seemed to
last and then I’d get upset, so I learnt it wasn’t worth getting to know them in the first
place.
A few people emerge through the arrivals gate. The dregs of my hot chocolate are cold but I stay
rooted to my seat as people flood into the terminal. I see his dark hair first, and then the white and
grey stripes of his favourite shirt – the one he wears when he wants to make an impression. I glimpse
his face between strangers: tanned skin, arched eyebrows and a long nose. But I also recognise the
hair-sprayed blonde hair behind him and the thick fur coat only brought out when it snows. Alekos sees
me, his smile only faltering when I don’t smile back. Then the woman emerges from Alekos’
shadow.
Despina is in her fur coat, fully made up, looking unruffled despite a four-hour flight. ‘
Yasou
!’ she calls,
smiling as they walk towards me. ‘You look surprised. Aleko didn’t tell you I was coming?’ she says,
kissing my cheeks.
This changes everything. I take a deep breath and smile. ‘No, he didn’t.’ I slip effortlessly back into
Greek.
Alekos moves in front of her and hugs me. ‘I’m sorry,’ he whispers. His skin smells of the beach, hot
and salty and so familiar. We hold on to each other for a moment and I don’t want to let go of his
familiarity and the comforting way he rests his hand in the small of my back. We pull away and our
eyes briefly meet.
‘How was the journey?’ is all I can think of to say. Everything else will have to wait. For when, I
don’t know.
‘Long,’ Despina replies. She buttons her coat right up despite the fact we’re still inside. ‘I’ve been
worried about you, Sophie. I had to come.’ She pinches my cheek, a habit I detest, particularly as she
seems to only do it to five-year-old Yannis and me.
‘That’s kind of you, but I’m fine. I wanted to stay to help Mum.’
‘Your poor mother, how is she?’
Another planeload of people emerge through the arrivals gate before I can answer. The three of us
are in the way with suitcases and bags surrounding us.
‘Let’s go.’ I begin to drag Despina’s suitcase towards the car park.
‘Sophie, wait. Where’s the bathroom?’
I stop and point her in the direction of the ladies. We both watch her clatter in her heels across the
tiled floor.
I turn to Alekos. ‘Are you insane?’
He was waiting for this. His forehead is already creased in a frown, his hands shoved deep in his
trouser pockets. ‘I couldn’t say no.’
‘You never can.’
‘She’s worried about you. And your Mum. She wanted to come. You know when she gets an idea in
her head, you can’t stop her.’
‘This time you should have.’
I want to walk away from him. Leave him here with no option but to go back to Greece with his
mother. I fold my arms across my chest and fight back the tears forming in my throat. I’m not going to
cry in front of him or have to explain myself to Despina.
Alekos’ hand gently brushes my cheek. ‘I didn’t know how to tell you.’
This isn’t the man I met on Cephalonia. He’s too preened and polished, with his hair gelled, smart
without jeans and too much tanned flesh on show. I wonder if Despina made him wear trousers and a
shirt. The man I met on Cephalonia would have stood up to her.
He steps closer me. ‘It’s so good to see you, Sophie.’
Our lips are inches apart. I want to kiss him.
‘This was your chance to make everything right,’ I say. ‘Forget any past promises, I just wanted to
be with you for a couple of days, somewhere other than
O Kipos
. I want some kind of commitment from
you.’
He takes my hands. ‘Sophie, I have committed to you. Whenever you’re…’