Chapter Forty-Five
Nelly
Nelly’s on her way back from coffee with Claudia when she feels the vibration of her phone in her bag. It’s probably one of her boys, she thinks. They have been solicitously calling and messaging every day to check in on her. So it comes as a surprise when she sees that it’s a message from an unknown number. It’s even more of a surprise when she actually reads what it says.
Nelly, is that really you? And you came to Ithaca? Icould not believe it when Katarina gave me your message. Ihave often thought about you over the years. Can Isee you? Are you still in Greece? Tell me where to meet you and Iwill be there. Your friend, always. Alexander
She stops dead, and has to read the message twice over before she actually believes the words are real. Oh my goodness. Alexander! Very much alive and wanting to see her! With everything that has happened recently, her trip to Ithaca has been sidelined in her thoughts, but now it races to the forefront of her mind, her nerve endings tingling to attention.
I’m staying on Kefalonia for another week, she writes back . Iwould love to see you again! My hotel is called The Ionian Escape but Ican meet you anywhere. How exciting!
She adds a kiss, then deletes it. Then she adds a heart emoji but deletes that too. Her sons are always taking the mick out of her for it but she does enjoy an emoji or three. She settles in the end for a smiling face with sunglasses, crosses her fingers that he’s not an emoji snob, then sends her message.
She’s still standing exactly where she stopped, in the middle of the terrace, so she starts walking slowly back towards her room, smiling at the idea of their two lives converging once more. Who would have thought it? She’s so glad she took herself off to Ithaca on a whim now, when this could so easily not be happening. In another world, where she hadn’t sneaked out for a spontaneous day trip, she’d still be wondering about him, her questions forever unanswered. But now. . . well, now, it looks as if she’ll be able to get all the answers she wants. Finally, she’ll achieve some closure on that terrible, heartbreaking parting of theirs so many years earlier. If he’s had a happy life in the meantime, she’ll be glad for him. Maybe they’ll even laugh affectionately about their passionate summer fling, toast their young, carefree selves of that time.
Her phone buzzes again just as she’s letting herself back into her hotel room, and she kicks off her shoes and sinks onto the bed to read his new message.
Is tonight too early?? he has written, along with– yes!– a laughing emoji. A friend of mine has a very good restaurant near your hotel. We could have a drink there, or even dinner? Of course you are welcome to bring your husband or family too. Let me know another day if that’s no good. He signs off with the champagne flutes emoji, and her stomach flips like a pancake inside her.
Tonight would be lovely, she types in reply. My husband, she continues, only to stop short. The situation with Frank is not something she can summarise in a few pithy words. Delete, delete.
Iwill be alone, she writes, but I’d be delighted to meet your wife/family if they are coming too. He must have beautiful children, she thinks to herself with a sudden pang, imagining strapping sons and a brown-eyed daughter. How does 7.30 sound? Let me know the address and I’ll see you there. She copies his champagne flutes emoji, feeling a frisson inside as she imagines herself sitting opposite him at a restaurant table later on, clinking glasses. How will it be to see him again? Will he still be handsome? Will they still find one another good company?
She presses Send and lies back on the bed, smiling up at the ceiling. She’s reacting as if she’s still the same twenty-something Nelly who first met him, she realises, even though she’s really in her sixties, she’s got lines and liver spots, and she’s just separated from her husband after a decades-long marriage. Calm down, you daft old bat, she tells herself, coming to her senses. All the same, it’s impossible to completely snuff out her excitement. Now. . . what is she going to wear?