Chapter 41
I’m in the supermarket with Pen and Mark, trying to find all the drinks that Tig requested. She was very insistent that we were doing cocktails tonight and not ‘boring wine like a bunch of middle-aged wankers’.
‘Gin, vodka,’ I tick off my list, as we walk down the spirit aisle. ‘What else?’
‘I guess one of the darker spirits,’ says Mark. ‘Whisky? Southern Comfort?’
‘Maybe both?’ I reply.
Mark grimaces. ‘God, I can feel the hangover already.’
‘Oh, live a little. It’s our last night,’ says Pen with the confidence of a uni student still blessed with an excellent tolerance for alcohol.
‘We’ll get soft drinks, too,’ I say. ‘We need them for cocktails, anyway.’
After we’ve paid and lugged everything into the boot, we’re back in the car. I’m sitting in the passenger seat with the AC turned up to max, and Pen is in the back, glued to her phone.
‘Seatbelt,’ I remind her.
‘Yes, Mum,’ she replies, not looking up.
Our next task is to buy desserts and Mark is very specific about which patisserie we should go to. The one five minutes from the house isn’t up to scratch, apparently.
‘Trust me on this.’
‘Didn’t think you had a sweet tooth,’ I say.
‘I used to go there all the time when I lived here. Mrs Evi, the owner, thought I was too skinny and used to try to fatten me up. Her weapon of choice was syrup-based desserts. It’s a miracle I didn’t double in size.’
‘As if you’ve ever had to worry about that,’ I murmur, glancing at him. ‘Mr Concrete Abs.’
He looks at me with an intimate smile, and I blush. I wasn’t consciously thinking of his naked body because surely it’s obvious, even when he’s dressed, he’s smoking hot.
I glance over my shoulder to see if Pen’s picked up on anything, but her head’s in her phone.
Mark’s got the radio on which is churning out a string of Greek pop from the last fifty years.
‘No way,’ he mumbles, turning up the volume. ‘This is my favourite Marinella song.’
‘You listen to Marinella? Enough to have a favourite song?’
‘You can’t call yourself Greek and not listen to her.’
‘Whatever, Granddad,’ Pen chimes in from the back.
‘How come Nella’s Mum and I’m Granddad? I’m only three years older.’
‘She doesn’t listen to old people music.’
I grin. ‘She’s not wrong.’
My victory is short-lived because I don’t notice that I’m swaying along to the music until Mark turns to me and grins. ‘I don’t believe you don’t listen to your namesake. Come on, ’fess up.’
I squirm in my seat. ‘I quite like that song about driving along to the car radio.’
Mark barks with laughter. ‘I like her proper rootsy stuff. Your favourite is from her disco phase.’
‘Shut up.’
Pen, in a brilliant display of sisterly solidarity, finds the song on her phone and starts playing it. ‘It’s not too bad, actually. And she looks amazing in her pink jump-suit in the video.’
‘Yes! Thank you.’
‘You are still officially young and cool, Nella.’
I turn round and give her a high-five and Mark pretends to be offended.
‘That’s the last time I offer to drive around the Praxitelis women.’
As we circle looking to park, Pen notices a bookshop on the same road as the bakery.
‘Oh, can we pop in?’ she asks. ‘I need something to read for the flight.’
I can never resist a bookshop, so I go with Pen and leave Mark to park.
Usually, I make straight for the English-language books, but The Hating Game in Greek catches my eye. I flick through it, finding my favourite spicy scenes, and picking up some new Greek vocab on the way. Including how to say ‘on all fours’.
Just as I’m getting to a good part, Mark appears.
‘What’s that?’ he asks.
‘Nothing,’ I say, quickly closing the book. I don’t want him reading over my shoulder. I can guarantee that he knows the Greek word for every sex position.
He peers at it. ‘Game of Hatred,’ he translates. ‘Sounds heavy.’
I hide a smile. ‘It’s good for my Greek to push myself.’
We wander to the English section and he suddenly stops at a carousel displaying racy romances.
‘You like a good heaving bosom?’
He looks at me confused, then his eyes flick to my neckline. ‘I mean … yes?’
He’s misunderstood my clumsy joke, and I’m suddenly back in the shed only wearing half my bikini. ‘I wasn’t talking about …’ I temper my breathing so my own bosom stays stock still. ‘I meant these books – they often get dismissed for having heaving bosoms on the cover.’
‘Oh, right, right.’ He keeps his eyes forward, like he doesn’t know where to look. ‘Have you read any? They’re not bad.’
It’s my turn to look confused. ‘And you know this how?’
‘Someone gave me one as a joke years ago but I lost it.’ He lowers his voice. ‘It was fucking hot.’
All the free porn available online at the click of a button and Mark finds erotic novels hot? I’m impressed. And slightly turned on.
‘You know you could order it on ?’
‘What, and fuck up my algorithm?’
I shake my head. ‘What was it called?’
‘That’s the problem – I don’t remember, but it was something like Sucking Off the Sicilian Surgeon.’
I laugh. ‘I can promise you, it was not called that.’
He smiles. ‘It should have been. The heroine spent half the book on her knees. Don’t get me wrong, I like a blow job as much as the next Sicilian surgeon but please don’t fellate me during a procedure.
My hand is steady, but it’s not that fucking steady.
World-famous brain surgeon Vincenzo Mascarelli either has nerves of steel or an excellent lawyer to fight off all the medical malpractice suits. ’
‘It’s called artistic licence. You have to suspend your disbelief.’
He steps towards me and drops his voice. ‘There’s a scene where he ties her hands together with his stethoscope …’ He trails off, and I give up trying to stop my bosom from heaving.
‘And then?’
His voice gets lower. ‘He takes some mascarpone cream and dips his first two fingers into it …’
‘And then …?’
Mark rubs his cushiony bottom lip with his knuckle. ‘You really want to know what the surgeon does next?’
I swallow and nod.
His eyes are glassy. ‘You’ll never look at tiramisu the same way again.’
‘I don’t care.’
He pauses for dramatic effect, then he leans in until I can feel his breath against my ear. ‘I don’t remember.’
‘Liar!’ I shove him, and he grins.
‘Guys?’
We both turn to find Pen standing behind us.
‘What’s up?’ I ask her.
‘Do you mind going to the bakery without me? They’ve got a café upstairs with comfy chairs and I just want to curl up with a good book and a frap.’
‘Of course,’ I assure her. ‘No worries. Half an hour enough?’
She nods, then skips off towards the staircase.
‘Are you okay, Nella?’ Mark asks. ‘You’re frowning.’
‘Pen seems off.’
‘I hadn’t noticed.’
I tilt my head to one side. ‘Her behaviour doesn’t seem strange?’
‘You think it’s strange she wants to stay here and sit on a sofa in an air-conditioned shop drinking iced coffee while the two of us slog up the street in thirty-five degree heat to go and listen to an old lady berate us for our life choices?’
I smile. ‘I thought you liked this cake shop.’
‘I do, but when you meet Mrs Evi, you’ll see what I mean.’
He’s not wrong. As soon as we enter the bakery, a tiny old lady sitting by a fan throws down her embroidery and leaps on him.
‘Marko, mou. How long has it been since you last came to see me? I could have been dead by now!’ She stops when she notices me and gives us a wide smile. ‘But I forgive you because you’ve brought me your bride. Na sou zisi. At last!’
‘Hello, Kyria Evi,’ he replies, bending down ninety degrees to hug her. ‘This is Nella and we’re just friends.’
‘Yie mou, son, what are you doing being friends with her? Look at her, en koukla, she’s pretty as a doll.’
I can’t help smiling. ‘Thanks, Kyria Evi.’
‘Kypraia? And she’s Cypriot? You’re an idiot, Marko.’ If she could reach, I get the impression she’d smack him upside the head.
‘So, how are you, how’s the family?’ he asks, ignoring her jab.
She starts giving him a run-down of what I’m assuming is her whole family’s aches and pains, so I take the opportunity to examine all the goods on offer.
A whole glass counter is filled with delicious syrupy pastries: baklava, kateifi, galatoboureko. How are we going to choose?
I’m about to tell her how amazing everything looks when Mark glances at me, and I take it as a sign he needs rescuing.
She seems to be having an angry reaction to Mark’s news that he’s moving to Latin America.
‘Kyrie eleison,’ she says, rolling her eyes.
‘What are you doing going to America? You’ve passed thirty now, you haven’t got time to waste on belares.
You need to settle down and get married.
Don’t wait until your hair is white and your teeth have fallen out and you’re no longer a leventis.
’ She points at me. ‘Do you think she’s going to sit at home waiting for you? ’
‘No one’s asking her to wait. She has her own life as a very successful psychologist. And like I said, we’re just friends.’
She doesn’t seem to hear him. ‘If you’re not careful, someone smarter than you will steal her. It won’t take long, not with that figure.’ She looks me up and down, and I feel like a cow at market. ‘Although she could do with being taller.’
I blink. Did the pot just call the kettle a titch? I mean, really.
‘I don’t understand why girls these days don’t wear heels,’ she mutters.
‘She does wear heels,’ Mark replies offhandedly.
He’s right, I do. And him admitting he’s noticed shouldn’t make my skin heat up. But it does.
Mrs Evi has already turned her critical eye towards Mark and has found something new to find fault with.
‘You look tired,’ she scolds. ‘Especially under the eyes. You need to stop going out every night.’
I wait for Mark to tell her about his unexpected trip to the bottom of the pool and subsequent stay in hospital, but he just smiles.
Everything she throws at him, he handles with good grace. Even when she circles back to her main gripe, namely, his lack of wife.
‘Marriage isn’t for everyone,’ he says. His honesty surprises me – wouldn’t it be easier to offer platitudes like he did with his Aunt Kiki?
‘I only want you to be happy,’ she sniffs. Then contradicts herself immediately: ‘Do it for me. I lose so much sleep over this.’
‘Okay, okay,’ he says soothingly. He turns to me. ‘Want to get married?’
‘Sure,’ I say, not missing a beat.
He turns back to Evi. ‘See, problem solved.’
Her mouth hangs open until she finds her voice.
She is not happy. ‘Kamni ton exipnon. He thinks he’s clever,’ she says, talking like he’s not here.
‘I know he’s teasing me.’ She throws her hands in the air to tell us she’s done with this crap.
‘Doulia diki sou, it’s none of my business.
And I know you’re not here to see me, you just want your galatoboureko.
You’re lucky – I made some this morning.
’ She turns towards the back of the shop.
‘Although you’re being so ataktos I’m not sure you deserve it,’ she adds before disappearing behind a beaded curtain.
‘Did you order in advance?’
‘No, but she knows it’s my favourite.’
When she returns, she’s not appeased, not even when we buy an enormous box of the stuff.
Mark holds the door open for me as we leave.
‘Just friends,’ she mutters. ‘Mishi mou. What rubbish.’
Once we’re outside, I clap my hand over my mouth to stop from laughing.
‘You’re so scared of a little old lady, you have to pretend to propose to me?’
‘She’s in her eighties. We’d only have to stay married for ten years – fifteen tops.’
‘The two of you are adorable.’
He rolls his eyes. ‘She’s permanently annoyed with me.’
‘That’s how older Greek women show love. They don’t bother with being polite – they give it to you straight.’
He shakes his head. ‘Unvarnished truth – my favourite kind.’
I text Pen as we walk back to the car.
‘Sorry about that,’ he says.
‘What are you talking about? She was nice about me. You’re the one she called an idiot.’
‘I don’t know why she doesn’t understand – some people aren’t cut out for marriage.’
‘It’s a generational thing. In her day, anyone unmarried was seen as suspect. She means well.’
‘She knows, though …’ he trails off.
‘What does she know?’
‘What a fucking awful example of marriage I grew up with. Half of me descends from a man who didn’t come to his own son’s funeral. I’m not sure I’ll ever be able to make peace with that.’
His sudden vulnerability cuts me to the quick.
I take his hand. ‘Anyone who knows you, knows you’re a good guy.’
We walk, neither of us speaking, our hands gently linked. And it’s only when I notice Pen is already waiting for us at the car that I release his hand.