One Greek Summer Wedding

Chapter 64

There were more people outside the chapel than in, most standing amid the olive trees, taking whatever shade there was and as Wren and her mother walked towards the little white building, the congregation began to applaud.

‘She looks so beautiful,’ Cara remarked. She and Margot were outside for the time being, until Cara went in to sing ‘Make You Feel My Love’ with Akis accompanying her on the piano.

‘She does,’ Margot said. ‘Surprisingly, as she’s quite a plain-looking girl.’

‘Margot!’

‘I said she looked beautiful, didn’t I?’

Cara thought Wren looked like the most radiant bride she had ever seen. It was all so natural, from the floor-length white gown with tiny daisy embellishments, to her subtle make-up and the little braids her hair had been tied into. It was hard to believe now that the circus of the huge event Sofia had been planning had ever been right for this couple. It took her back to the organisation of her own. Had she really wanted to commit to Seb in a whisky distillery? Had she really wanted to commit to Seb at all?

Her gaze found Akis then, waiting with Cosmos and the priest at the door of the chapel. Every time she looked at him a chain reaction of feelings set off like a rollercoaster inside her. She remembered what it was like to touch him, to kiss him, to talk deeply with him. She ached for a future that included him…

‘Look at Horatio,’ Margot remarked. ‘A Maxi-Go injury on one arm and now a snake bite on the other.’

Cara looked at her aunt as if she’d given away a secret code word. ‘A Maxi-Go injury.’

‘Well… I guess the game is up now.’

‘And you called him Horatio instead of Horror.’

‘He’s a stupid boy,’ Margot continued. ‘But he’s actually the only man who has ever bothered to get to know me.’ She smiled. ‘He listened to me talk my usual game and he gave appropriate answers and then he stopped answering and let me carry on talking and he just watched me. And I felt so utterly transparent, Cara. And then I started telling him things I don’t usually tell men and he stayed and he wanted to keep on staying.’

Cara looked at Margot now and it was like seeing another layer to her, one without the heavy armour. A softer, more authentic slice of the aunt she loved so much. Yes, she had made mistakes – plenty of them – but despite the bullish approach, Cara never had any doubt that these mistakes were made with the very best intentions at the root of them.

‘You know what you did with Seb… it was wrong,’ Cara said.

Margot sighed. ‘Don’t you think I know that? I knew that when I was doing it, I knew it when he left you and I’ve known it ever since I carried on keeping it from you. I always knew it was wrong but that didn’t seem to stop me ploughing forward. When you love someone like a daughter you get blinded by that and to hell with anything rational.’

Cara swallowed. This was Margot being as real as it got. ‘You can’t ever do anything like that again, Margot. We have to draw a line in the sand and accept what happened and move on with complete honesty.’

‘Agreed. No more using MI5 connections for tailing unsuitable suitors. No more trying to make decisions for you. And?—’

‘And you should tell Horatio how you feel,’ Cara said as the wedding party went through the door of the church.

‘You’re right, I should,’ Margot agreed. ‘Even if it doesn’t really have any legs.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Well, it doesn’t have a future, does it? How can it? He’s a hapless, penniless dancer on a Greek island and I’m me.’

‘But you said?—’

‘Ooo, let’s squeeze up to the door now. I want to get a picture of Sofia’s furious face seeing as there’s an actual guest in dirty overalls.’

The only sound Cara could hear as she entered the chapel was the faint chirrup of the cicadas from the olive trees surrounding this special place. There were candles burning in every nook, casting everything in a romantic glow, and as she looked to Wren and Cosmos, standing with the priest, her heart swelled with joy for them. She should have felt nervous about this, only her second public performance since finding the courage to begin again, yet she didn’t. Because as important as it was to her that she sang well for the occasion, her role wasn’t to impress for anyone’s status, it was an acknowledgement of feeling part of this slightly crazy Greek family’s event – Cosmos and Wren’s event – finally.

And there was Akis, at the piano, waiting as she shimmied past Irini’s odd walking frame on wheels and stepped over the bag that had – and hopefully wasn’t still – holding the snakes.

‘You are OK?’ he whispered to her.

‘Yes,’ she replied and took a breath. There was no need for a microphone in its stand here, the building was so small her voice was going to fill up every space, so, therefore, there was no need for her to stand either.

She moved next to Akis and dropped her head, to whisper in his ear.

‘Can I sit?’

‘Fisika,’ he answered, moving a little to make space. ‘Of course. Yes.’

She sat down and they were as close as they could be, body to body, her heat, his heat, and then he began to play.

As his beautiful fingers moved across the keys, Cara started to sing, her eyes on Wren and Cosmos, holding hands. But once she had dwelt a little on their union and the purity of their love, she realised she didn’t need to be seen any more. The lyrics flowing from her, she relaxed into a place she had gone to before when she had most needed it, feeling the warmth of Akis’s body up close to hers, the humidity in the air, the scent of clematis on the breeze. She was floating away along with her notes and as the song came to an end she realised she had never felt so free.

Applause jolted her, unexpected in this holy setting and she suddenly felt that everything she had been visualising in her mind was exposed. She could feel her cheeks already heating up.

‘You are OK.’

It was Akis, telling not asking, reassuring, his presence as calming as it was arousing…

‘I’m more than OK,’ she answered, raising her eyes to meet his.