One Greek Summer Wedding

Chapter 31

Cara closed her eyes and held the last note, feeling the vibration running through every single fibre of her body. The sensation was as natural as it was alien, like it was a beautiful routine she had forgotten about and needed to re-engage anew with. She opened her eyes… and it was then she heard the applause.

Akis got up off the stool and went out onto the balcony.

‘There are many people, Cara,’ he announced. ‘At other balconies and down on the street, looking up.’

She swallowed. Her worst fear. People wanting to watch her. She tried to stop the swell in her stomach, waves of fear threatening to arrive. But, she was safe here. No one could see her. And people had enjoyed her voice. That was enough.

‘Hey,’ Akis said, coming back into the room. ‘You know, no one can see you, even if they can see you.’

‘What?’ Cara said. ‘That’s not true.’

‘It is exactly true. You think, when I dance on stage that I am on stage, thinking about the audience?’

‘Aren’t you?’

He shook his head. ‘No, of course not. And I do not believe you always are when you sing. Because the music moves you, does it not? That’s the main thing that music does. It takes you away from where you are and it puts you in another time, another place, when you were happier, when you were sadder, when you were feeling a little sexy.’

She swallowed. The more time she was spending with this ridiculously good-looking guy with these alternative views of living, the sexier she was finding him.

‘OK,’ Akis said. ‘I think I need to show you what I mean.’ He took his phone from the top of the piano, put it in the pocket of his jeans and then he grabbed what looked like a speaker from a shelf. ‘Come on.’

‘OK, I need a bench,’ Akis said, once they were outside in the town, near Spianada Square. ‘A moped, yes, this one is good. A lamp post. OK, here.’

‘I have no idea what you’re doing,’ Cara said.

‘Letting people see me but not see me,’ he announced. ‘But we need people.’ Suddenly he was jumping on top of the bench, hands either side of his mouth, yelling something in Greek and then English.

‘Come! See a taster of a new dance for the hot show at the Escape Theatre Bar on Friday! Completely free! Right now!’

If he had done this somewhere in London, Cara knew the kinds of looks he would be getting, but here people seemed to be interested, were slowing their pace, stopping and waiting.

‘OK,’ Akis said. ‘I have only run through this half a dozen times and it has never gone completely right before but this is not the point of the exercise. Now, you sit here and… let’s see if you or anyone else can see me.’

A few moments later and the music started, pulsing bass coming from the speaker he had positioned at the foot of a tree. Cara recognised it instantly. It was ‘Under the Influence’ by Chris Brown and the second Akis began to move she was completely spellbound. And the crowd started to grow as he span and stretched and prowled across the ground, moving effortlessly from the ground and into a handstand then back down again. She couldn’t take her eyes away from him, he was mesmerising in every single way and it was obvious every other person in this makeshift audience felt exactly the same.

Using a bench to propel himself off, Akis did a turn in the air before flipping over the moped and grabbing the lamp post like it was a pole from the stage and twirling around it with so much power. Then his feet were back to the ground, sliding this way and that, hips winding, with all the finesse he had shown at the hen night show. But, somehow this was different. It was more organic, felt less like a formulated routine, and now, as she continued to watch, she noticed that no matter how enthralled the audience were, his eyes were only on her. She shivered despite the heat of the day, the heartbeat in her throat thrumming.

And with a final pop and lock, the routine was over.

The way Cara felt could only be described as having the immediate after-glow of the greatest sex. She sat up a little straighter, trying to stabilise herself. She swallowed as she watched Akis accept the applause and then he was tearing off his T-shirt, wiping his body down with it and coming over to her.

‘So, that’s how you’re seen, but not really seen,’ he said, a little out of breath.

‘I don’t think I understand any better,’ she admitted. ‘I mean, it was incredible, obviously, and there were people right there, watching you, not able to think about anything else but what they were seeing.’

‘Yeah,’ he told her. ‘But… I wasn’t really there.’

She frowned. ‘I don’t get it.’

He smiled. ‘In my head,’ he said, touching his brow. ‘I was back in my apartment thinking about how it felt to hear you sing.’ He took a deep breath. ‘The only person who could have been able to see me was you.’

A tidal wave of passion slapped Cara hard and her insides coiled as if a snake blessing was imminent. She had seen him. And despite everyone else circled around, she was the only one he’d let in.

He put his hand on hers and it felt so hot and intense she half-expected to see sparks in the air.

‘People can only really see you if you let them,’ Akis whispered.

She swallowed as she drowned in those eyes and then her eyes dropped to his lips. Those lips that had almost scorched hers once already. What was it between them? Circumstances, or perhaps the universe, putting them together and their connection keeping them there. She hadn’t actually ever felt anything like this before.

He stood up, letting her hand go.

‘So, I should go get that speaker before someone takes it,’ he said, taking a step back from the bench.

‘Oh, yes, yes, you should.’

And she watched him retreat, and it felt like it was in more ways than one.