Chapter 13
Chapter Thirteen
Once inside, the array of swimming costumes, bags and scarves on display had Sofia darting from one to the other like a bee collecting pollen in a field of flowers.
Maddie rolled her eyes at Charlotte.
‘Here we go again…’
After they’d given their approval rating on yet more bikinis for Sofia’s ever-growing collection, Maddie noticed that Sofia had returned with a selection of stuff that looked far too big for her.
‘Girls…’
‘Oh no.’ Maddie knew what her friend was going to say before she said it.
‘Oh yes.’
Sofia thrust one armful at Charlotte and one at her.
‘You said you’d let me buy you a few treats to get over my sadness at being made redundant.’
Sofia framed her own chin with her hands to give maximum waif vibes.
‘To cheer me up, I insist you both try on the bikini and sarong I’ve picked out for you.’
Sofia put up a hand.
‘And before you start kicking up a fuss, you must have realised by now that every woman in Greece wears a bikini, whether she’s nineteen or ninety. And they don’t give a damn about what other people think.’
Maddie couldn’t disagree with her there.
She’d seen women of all shapes and sizes in bikinis on the beach, relaxed and happy in their own skins.
She definitely wouldn’t be the biggest, although she’d almost certainly be the palest. Dare she give it a go?
The idea of going home with a lovely brown tummy really appealed.
Even if she’d be the only one to see it.
She looked over at Charlotte who shrugged.
‘Why not?’
Sofia clapped her hands with joy.
‘Oooh goodie.’
Sofia’s keen eye for fashion and sizing meant she’d chosen well, Maddie had to admit to herself as she tried on the dreaded bikini.
‘Show me, show me, please.’
She supposed Sofia had earned her fun.
Maddie emerged from the changing room in a high waisted khaki green number which unusually didn’t make her shy away from herself in the full-length mirror, and Charlotte’s simple blue two-piece also suited her down to the ground.
The matching sarongs in complementary colours and patterns – blue and white stripes for Charlotte, and leopard print in khaki and pink for her – would make great cover-ups.
Charlotte walked up and down in front of the mirror, her hourglass figure complimented by the structure of the well-made bikini.
‘I have to say, Sof, you’ve chosen brilliantly.’
Maddie smiled too.
‘Yes, even I can cope with this. Thank you.’
Sofia’s eyes were shining with an evangelist’s zeal at the sight of them both.
‘You look fabulous, girls! Too glam to give a damn!’
‘If you say so.’ Maddie turned to go back into the changing room.
‘No, don’t put your underwear back on!’
Sofia’s shouted command had the shop owner looking over with a startled expression.
‘My one condition is that you keep your bikinis and sarongs on and put your clothes in your bags. We’ve got the boat trip in precisely’—Sofia checked her phone—‘five minutes. The weather’s gorgeous, so what better time to test out our new gear than while exploring beaches with Thanassis?’
Maddie didn’t miss the wink, but she couldn’t be bothered to respond.
Rubbing a little more suntan oil onto her bare stomach, Maddie laid back down on the pristine white sand with a contented sigh. The beach really was all that Thanassis had promised and more.
At first, she’d been too self-conscious to take off her sarong under the fisherman’s watchful eye and kept it firmly in place until he’d anchored the boat a way out of the bay.
But when Thanassis held up the snorkelling equipment, she’d realised she’d be mad to turn down the opportunity to swim in the turquoise waters with the others for the sake of a piece of cloth.
All those brightly coloured fish darting in and out of the reeds on the seabed would have been just a story for her friends to tell her rather than the gloriously immersive experience it had turned out to be.
With her friends’ encouragement, she’d also managed to push herself straight into the water from the edge of the boat without panicking about how deep it was below her.
Swimming through the gorge to the waterfall the previous day had been terrifying, but she’d had to admit that it had given her a little bit more confidence in her own abilities.
Tony’s death had brutally ripped up her plans for the future, their future, so trying a few new things was important, and it might help her stumble her way into framing a new future.
Not that she wanted to sound like a self-help book in her own head, but it did make a lot of sense.
Her temper was still a work in progress.
But slowly, slowly, or sigá, sigá, as the Greeks wisely say.
She closed her eyes for a moment and relived the three of them swimming under the surface of the water, holding hands, Sofia in a barely-there red bikini she’d bought earlier, next to her in green and Charlotte in blue, and she wondered what the fish had made of the multi-coloured giant shapes swimming above them.
It would make a fabulous painting, and she wondered whether she should ask Charlotte to have a go at ‘The Snorkelling Trip’ to get her out of her artistic funk.
Not that she could ask her friend anything right this minute, as after their hour of swimming and snorkelling, Charlotte was fast asleep, gently snoring away.
The woman deserved a break. And she and Sofia still needed to get to the bottom of what was wrong.
They’d nearly got it out of her at the café, but she’d stopped short of confessing.
Sofia seemed to be asleep too, but just in case she was faking, Maddie pulled her hat down further over her eyes so she could watch Thanassis doing his thing in peace without being observed or even worse, teased mercilessly.
Their chef had set up a little tent over his cooking station on the beach, and the coals on the simple BBQ grill had gradually turned from red to white, which she knew from Tony’s tutorials meant the heat would be just right for the fish.
Not that she’d been watching Thanassis the whole time she’d been lying there.
She picked up a handful of golden sand and let it run away through her fingers, feeling rather than seeing the silky particles as they rejoined the rest. They had the whole beach to themselves.
There was no way anyone could get down the almost vertical rocks to the shore on foot; they would tax even a goat.
The rugged coastline they’d seen on their trip round the top of the island was gorgeous but wild, more like Devon and Cornwall than Greece.
Coming across little golden pockets of beaches tucked away behind vicious-looking rocks every couple of hundred metres had been a welcome surprise.
The sea spray had coated her face in a refreshing mist which was cool to the touch, as they’d bobbed along the coastline, riding the waves with ease.
Thanassis, totally in control at the helm, had pointed out passing birds and once a very large fish, all while manoeuvring the wheel with one hand and managing to smoke a stream of roll-ups with the other.
The boat had rocked alarmingly when Thanassis had guided her into their last stop for a very late lunch on the beach, but his experienced hands had held on to the wheel until the boat calmed, even though he’d had to throw a half-smoked cigarette into the pool of water at the bottom of the boat, which must have pained him.
She was just pleased he hadn’t thrown the butt into the sea for some unsuspecting marine creature to choke on.
Boats were always female for some reason; she wasn’t sure why. She’d have to ask Charlotte. It was the sort of useless information she could reel off at the drop of a hat.
But Thanassis certainly knew how to handle his prized possession.
If pressed, she’d have to admit to a weakness for men with a practical bent.
Tony had been a half decent carpenter, when he could he bothered.
The shelves he’d put up were still going strong, even if he was long gone.
His cheerful face, hammer in hand and the silly tool belt that he’d insisted on buying around his waist, flashed into her mind, but she pushed it away.
She needed something else to focus on, and both her friends were asleep, so she had no option but to study Thanassis, did she?
Maddie watched him take the fish out of a battered box full of ice and put the first pieces on the grill.
The three of them had been dozing side by side in the late afternoon sun for quite a while, and the first pangs of hunger had crept up on her unawares.
A large rumble from her stomach coincided with the first waft of frying fish coming their way.
Sofia leant up on one elbow.
‘Mads, is that you, or rather your stomach?’
‘Guilty as charged.’
‘It already smells amazing, even from here. Thanassis is a very versatile man, isn’t he?’
‘I’m not answering that one.’
She really wasn’t in the mood for another row.
‘For fear of incriminating yourself?’
‘Stop your dirty legal talk right now.’
‘Oh look, he’s setting up a place for us under the trees in the shade. How considerate. It must be nearly ready.’
Thanassis waved his long arm in the air.
‘Paréa, my friends. It’s time. You can eat now.’
‘Lovely.’
Maddie reached for her bag to take out her sarong, but Sofia shook her head.
‘Let’s just take our towels to sit on. We’re on a beach in the middle of nowhere. Why do we need to cover up?’
‘OK. You’re right.’
‘Yes, I usually am when it comes to fashion choices.’
Sofia pointed at Charlotte’s inert body.
‘She looks really sweet when she’s asleep, doesn’t she? It’s smoothed out those worry lines we’ve seen far too much of on this holiday. We’d better get her up and at it.’
A gentle tug on both arms produced a strangled cry from Charlotte.
‘Hey, sweetie. It’s OK. It’s just us.’ Sofia put Charlotte’s dislodged hat back on her head.
‘Grub’s up and the hunky fisherman is ready for us.’