Chapter 53
53
‘Does coffee go out of date?’
Molly smiled as she sat up, blanket wrapped around her naked body, and Christos brought a small bowl and a cup of steaming liquid over to the banquette seating, wearing nothing more than a pair of Hugo Boss she had stripped him of earlier.
‘I don’t care right now,’ Molly admitted, accepting the cup as he sat slightly behind her and she leaned into him.
Armeena let out a miaow of annoyance at being disturbed on the other end of the seating and padded around in a circle before settling down again.
‘I think the storm has died down,’ Christos said, looking out the porthole. ‘The waves are smaller. The boat does not move as hard.’
Molly swallowed. The boat had moved very hard not that long ago and she wasn’t sure it had anything to do with the waves.
‘I know what you are thinking,’ Christos said, his face close to hers. ‘I am thinking that too. But we have hot coffee now, it would be dangerous to make any more moves and burn ourselves, yes?’
‘Hmm, I don’t know,’ Molly said, putting her cup down on the ledge that ran around under the portholes. ‘I think a certain small element of danger has been what our relationship has been built on from the beginning.’
‘Our relationship .’
For a second she felt as if she had let her mouth run away with itself. It was so new. Brand new. And neither of them really knew where it was going to end up. It could just be a beautiful holiday romance but… she wasn’t going to rephrase or backtrack. She knew what she wanted and she was going to lead with her heart.
‘Does that word scare you?’ she asked, up on her knees and facing him.
‘Does it not scare you?’
‘I don’t really know what it means for me. I’ve never had anything like it before.’
‘It is the same for me,’ Christos told her.
‘So if we have not had anything like it before then we should not be scared,’ Molly said. ‘Because that would mean we were frightened of trying something new and I don’t think that’s what either of us are about.’
‘I agree,’ he said, wrapping his arms around her.
‘So, let’s figure it out as we go along but…’
‘But?’
‘I’m not going to walk off this boat and pretend it was nothing or… do that awkward avoiding-eye-contact-pretending-we-haven’t-seen-each-other-naked thing.’
He laughed. ‘OK.’
‘You know what I mean, right?’
‘It is the worst. So…’
‘So…’
She let her gaze linger on his a while, sensing what might be about to come out of those beautiful, full lips that had kissed her everywhere.
‘Tell me… about your father,’ he said, brushing her hair from her face.
She took a deep breath and nodded. Sitting back a little, she pulled the blanket closer, shivered. ‘So…’ She swallowed, pausing as she was hit with the realisation that she was about to say the words out loud and tell someone what her mother had told her.
‘Molly, I do not want you to say anything that you are not ready for me to hear,’ Christos said, his hand on her arm, comforting, gentle yet supportive.
She shook her head. ‘No, I am ready, it’s just been a lot and it will take time to fully process it but… I need to make a start.’
She smiled, took a breath and began.
‘My mum… was abused. By my Aunt Maud’s foster son. And when my mum told my aunt, when my mum found out that she was pregnant with me, my aunt told her that she was lying and that she didn’t believe her and that no one else would believe her either because she was the adult and her foster son was only seventeen at the time and he would not have done any such thing.’
‘Oh, Molly?—’
‘And then, after that, Aunt Maud read my mum’s diary, found out about Vaggelis and decided to write to him, telling him about me and saying that I was his daughter. She kept that up for years! Right up until Vaggelis died, he thought I was his daughter. I don’t know why she did it, I haven’t dared speak to her yet but I think half of it was to cover up the shame, lie to herself and make my backstory more palatable, and the rest was guilt. She took money from Vaggelis, passed it off as her own and gave it to my mum and me. My mum hated taking anything from her but times could be really hard for us some months.’ She took a breath. ‘But it makes me so sad Vaggelis thought I was his daughter, because he left me his things and I didn’t deserve his things and… I am only here on this earth because someone forced my mum to do something she didn’t want to do because they were bigger and stronger than her, and the adult who should have been protecting her did the exact opposite.’
‘Molly,’ Christos whispered, his hand finding hers and squeezing it tight.
‘It’s no wonder my mum didn’t ever want to tell me how I was made, right? Because she’s had to live with that truth all this time, carrying the weight of it for my sake.’
He pulled her close then and she saw tears in his eyes as hers spilled onto his shoulders as she let herself be gathered up and held.
‘Listen to me,’ Christos said. ‘These “fathers”, all of them, they have made mistakes, the very worst mistakes… but they only win if we let their mistakes become part of our future. I am not going to do that. Not with Andreas. Not with Vaggelis. I might have a child some day and he or she or they will only know Christos as their father and the choices he has made. I hope they will only be good choices and, if I make mistakes, then I will hold up my head and admit them, own them and ask for forgiveness for them if I need to.’
She held him tight. ‘Did Vaggelis know… that you were his son?’
‘No,’ he answered. ‘He never knew.’
‘He thought he had a child, but it was the wrong one.’
He held her away from him then, looked into her eyes, an angry fire flaring there.
‘And the man who did this to your mother? Where is he?’
‘He died,’ Molly said. ‘Took his own life. Legacy that he was a good person protected by my aunt even now.’
Christos shook his head. ‘That is no one else’s truth but yours and your mother’s, Molly. You need to do what you want to do with that.’
She nodded. ‘I know. And, maybe when my mum has had longer to think about things and when she’s had time to really digest what Maud did to Vaggelis, as well as everything else, she’ll want to change her mind about keeping things under wraps. I just think, right now, we need time… to sit with it and to see how it feels now we both know.’
‘I understand,’ Christos said. ‘Completely.’
‘It feels like ever since I got to Greece everything has started changing.’
‘Oh, I agree,’ Christos said, wiping away one of her tears with a finger. ‘Everything has changed since you got to Greece. I do not think my life will ever be the same. I am kept awake at night by thoughts of party boats and… renting out apartments and how to tame a cat. And, I find that I like my sister’s boyfriend.’
‘This sounds terrible,’ Molly began. ‘And like you’re trying to say it’s somehow my fault.’
‘It is absolutely your fault. There is no doubt.’
‘Really?’ she asked, inching forward on the seat.
‘Really,’ he said, nodding.
‘So what are you going to do about it?’ Molly asked.
‘Hmm,’ he mused softly. ‘Maybe… start by… removing this blanket.’
He tugged at the throw and in one quick move she was naked.
‘And, what now?’ she asked him, a little breathless already.
‘Oh, I think you know what now,’ Christos said, picking her up in his arms again.