A Handful of Pebbles (7 page)

The thought is too much effort. It would be less exerting to cook.

‘Or I can do us omelettes.’ It is the easiest thing she can think of that Laurence will consider a proper meal.

‘
Oh, good idea,’ he says.

‘
Good for me.’ Liz pushes herself off from the end of the pool. She has left her empty glass on the side.

‘
Oh, you don’t want to leave that there.’ Neville strides over and picks it up.

‘
Laurence, why don’t you get Liz a top up and something for Neville?’ Sarah pulls her wrap around her and heads for the kitchen, marvelling at being outside in nothing but a bikini and a wrap at seven o’ clock at night and for it to still be warm. Laurence pours drinks and leaves one for Sarah on the side before returning outside.

The place is well equipped and she wants for nothing. Nothing but eggs. She never did make it to the supermarket, but, she guesses, they are bound to sell them at the village shop. Undoing her sarong and crossing it to tie it at the back of her neck converts it into a presentable dress. Grabbing her bag
, she hesitates at the gate. Perhaps she should tell them where she is going, but then, she’ll only be a minute or two.

Sarah walks slowly. Why not; it is her first holiday abroad in the sun since they got married. Somewhere, a dog is barking; another answers it and a chain of howls fades into the distance. In the garden next door but one, with the masses of flowers in pots, there is a lady with a watering can, her back turned to the lane, black skirt and jumper, a blue misshapen hat for shade, and pink slippers. Sarah walks past quietly, not wishing to disturb her, her footsteps more sure as she reaches the abandoned house at the corner. It looks forlorn even in the sun, and she wonders if it is for sale. There’s no sign.

The dog is there again. It runs past her towards the main road, and she follows, turning the corner.

A voice startles her.

‘Hi.’ Sarah jumps.

‘Oh Stella, hello. You surprised me.’ Today, Stella wears a belted floral, sleeveless dress. Sarah instinctively likes Stella. Her countenance is open. She moves as if she is capable of hard work, but there is a softness about her.

‘
Are you settled in now? Everything good?’ Stella asks as they fall into step, heading towards the village centre.

‘
Oh it’s lovely.’ Sarah replies.

‘
It is a beautiful house. Michelle, she came for a holiday and now she lives here,’ Stella says. Her skin is darker than most Greeks Sarah has seen, her eyes almost black, and there is a childlike quality about her that is not just to do with her size, but somehow conveyed by her energy.

‘
Michelle, oh yes, the owner. Did she know Juliet before she came?’

‘
Oh yes, they are old friends. That is why she came here on holiday.
Yia sou Stavro
.’ She waves and calls to a boy who passes them on a slow moped, a partly filled crate of oranges gripped in his fist, which is disconcertingly balanced on the foot of one extended leg.

‘
So if she lives here, does she have more than one house?’ Sarah wonders where Stella has learnt such fluent English but then reflects that many foreigners speak two languages. It is the English who only speak one.

‘
She has a guest house on Orino Island. Have you been there?’ Stella shields her eyes with her hand to watch the moped negotiate the turning past the square ahead.

‘
To the island? No.’ Sarah cannot help but wonder if there are any age limits on driving mopeds and motorcycles, as it certainly doesn’t seem so.

‘
It is very beautiful,’ Stella continues. ‘No cars, no bikes, just donkeys.
Yia sou Maria pos paei
?’ Stella greets a woman brushing her front steps.

The thought of no cars or bikes sounds like a slow and ponderous life.
‘I suppose there is a lot of tourism on such an island?’ she states.

‘
Many tourists, many tavernas and hotels. Also, many houses belong to foreigners,’ Stella chirps. ‘But you are here. You like our village?’ She gesticulates to everything around them with an open hand.

A man in overalls is on his knees with a bag of tools by the fountain. The men from the kafenio have now spilled out onto the square in the relative cool of the evening, drinking coffee and watching a big screen television propped in the open window of the caf
é. In the dusk, the lights are on inside, creating an inviting glow. The shepherd is not there.

‘
This is my husband, Mitsos.’ Stella points to the one-armed man as they draw near to one of the tables which is crammed with glasses, cigarette packets, and ashtrays.

‘
Hello, very pleased to meet you.’ Sarah offers her hand to shake. Mitsos gently takes it but instead of shaking it, brushes it lightly against his lips. It is the action of a content man.

‘
He does not speak a word of English,’ Stella laughs.
‘Afti einai i gynaka apo tis Michelle
.’

Sarah wonders what Stella has said, recognises the word Michelle and figures she is explaining who she is.

‘Where are you going?’ Stella asks. Sarah is still making eye contact with Mitsos and his companions but breaks her gaze to answer.

‘
Oh, just to the shop.’

‘
Come, I go there too. It is new,’ she says proudly, and for a moment, Sarah is not sure what Stella is talking about. ‘Well, not new. The old shop, it was hit by a tree, so they built it again. It looks the same but it is new.’

‘
Ah.’ Sarah’s understanding comes as a sigh, her attention still drawn by the villagers in the square. ‘Everyone here seems so, oh I don’t know, content?’

‘Most of them sit and argue or complain when really, they should be happy drinking ouzo in the warm evening surrounded by friends.
Yia sou Damiane
.’ She taps a man on the shoulder as they pass his table before crossing the empty road. She seems to know everyone, but then, of course, it is her village.

Three steps take them onto the raised forecourt of the village shop. A woman sits on a chair by the door with her feet up on an empty crate.

‘
Marina afti einai
. Sorry, what was your name again?’ Stella turns to Sarah, who answers her. ‘Oh yes,
afti eiani i Sarah pou menei sto spiti tis Michelle
.’

Sarah hears her own name and picks out the word Michelle more easily this time.

‘Ah, welcome, welcome. I understand but no speak. Welcome. Marina.’ The woman says in broken English before she pats her ample housecoated bosom as she says her name.

‘
How do I say hello?’ Sarah asks Stella. She is not sure if the feeling in her stomach is excitement or hunger.

‘
Yia sou
.’ Stella tries to say it in an English accent, enunciating clearly.

‘
Yia sou Marina
.’ Sarah smiles into the shop owner’s face. The woman stands and waddles into the shop. Behind the counter, from floor to ceiling, are shelves piled high with different brands of cigarettes. To the right is a little window that looks out to the raised forecourt with its three drinks cabinets and a rack displaying soil-clogged loose vegetables. A Spanish omelette would be nice. Everything looks so fresh.

Marina settles in behind the counter. To her right on the top shelf is a row of bottles of wine
. Below that is a shelf of knitting needles, dolls, plastic flowers, and playing cards; under that, boxes of stockings and shower caps. Sarah cannot take it all in; the whole place is lined with shelves, including a row that stands back to back down the centre of the narrow space.

‘
How many days you here?’ Marina’s accent is so strong, Sarah can barely understand her. The sounds sink in and she filters out the words.

‘
It’s my son’s wedding. He is marrying Helena Plusiopoulos. Do you know her?’

‘
Ah yes.’ She resorts to her mother tongue. ‘
Poli kala, kali ikoyenia me ta hrimata. Poli kala yia to yio sou
.’

Sarah looks blankly at Stella.
‘She says they are a good family.’

‘
Now what did I come for?’ Stella asks herself and then turns to Marina and they speak fluently for some minutes.

This gives Sarah time to discover shepherds
’ crooks leaning in the corner, dog collars by the biscuits, red and yellow boxed mousetraps on the shelf below the pasta, and a glimpse through a back door onto a flower-filled courtyard across which is a house, presumably Marina’s. A chicken pecks away in the middle at the weeds between the thick flagstones.

It all seems so much more real here. Closer to nature maybe. She doubts there will be co-ops growing organic vegetables or evening classes on lace making. By the looks of what she has seen
, everyone grows vegetables. Every garden seems to have something planted between the flowers; even the lady with the garden filled with potted flowers on her lane has a border of lettuce and some other things growing. There’ll be no time for night courses, what with chickens to feed, courtyards to sweep, and glasses of ouzo to drink.

‘
She says what do you need?’ Stella touches Sarah’s shoulder.

‘
Oh, er, a dozen eggs please.’

‘
Do you want village eggs or for the town?’ Stella asks.

The question feels like liquid gold to her spirit
, it pulls her so far from her life back home. Not graded for size or colour, instead whether they have come from someone in the village or a place just a few miles away.

‘
Oh village, please. Do I just go and choose vegetables or do I ask?’

‘
Either.’ Stella slides her plastic bag up her arm. ‘I go now. Bye.’ And with no more said, Stella swings her bag as she heads down the steps and across the square towards what looks like a basic taverna with tables outside and unlit fairy lights wrapped around the tree that arches the door.

The vegetables smell of the ground; the tomatoes are not an even red but have a strong
, warm smell; the lettuces are wet, and one has a tiny slug near where it has been cut from its roots.

‘
These please, Marina, and a bottle of wine.’ She takes out her purse.

‘
Kokkino, lefko, rosé
?’ Marina asks, her toe tapping a long line of plastic bottles arranged up on the floor beneath the lowest shelf. Sarah had not noticed them before, with so much else to look at. She glances at the glass bottles of wine on the top shelf. There are not many of them and they are dusty, and Marina could not even reach them up there without standing on something.

‘
Sorry?’ She looks back at the plastic bottles.

‘
Kokkino
.’ Marina taps a red plastic bottle with her toe. ‘
Lefko
.’ She taps a pale yellow bottle. ‘
Ee rosé
?’ She taps a pale pink one.

‘
Oh.’ Sarah laughs with the relief of her comprehension. ‘One,’ she holds up a finger, ‘
kokkino
and one,’ she tucks her purse under her arm and holds up a finger with her other hand, ‘Rosé.’

Marina bags the bottles.
‘Finish?’ she asks.

Nodding, Sarah pulls out some cash, examining the notes. Marina rings everything up on the cash register and points to the numbers. It is cheaper than Sarah could have imagined, and she counts out her coins to find she is twenty cents short in change and will have to break a fifty Euro note.

‘Sorry.’ She passes the note across. Marina pushes it back and cupping her hand she mimes that Sarah should tip up her purse.

‘
I am twenty cents short.’ She tips the change out. Marina’s fingers are swift to count.

‘
Okay, okay.’ She pours the change into her till.

‘
But it is short,’ Sarah insists.

‘
Ah, tomorrow.’ The word almost becomes lost in her thick accent but her smile makes everything clear.

‘
Thank you so much.’ Sarah’s cheeks are aching from smiling. She has not stopped since she meet Stella. Gathering her bags, she repeats herself, ‘Thank you, thank you.’

‘
Adio
.’ Marina waves.

Sarah hadn
’t realized there was air conditioning in the shop until she steps back outside, nor how warm the evening is. It would be nice to wander for a little, see where some of the streets lead.

‘
Hello.’ It is Helena. ‘I’ve just come down for wine, too.’

‘
Oh hi, is Finn with you?’ She looks up the side lane, but only an old lady in black follows.

‘
Sarah, this is my aunt Sofrona, Frona for short. Frona, this is Sarah.’ She raises her voice for the second sentence. ‘Finn’s mother.’ She keeps the pitch high.

‘
Ah!’ The old woman’s eyes light up and her arms extend, and she approaches Sarah on shaky legs. The embrace is gentle but heartfelt. ‘A good boy,’ she states in a Greek American accent, kissing Sarah first on one cheek, then the other.

‘
Nice to meet you,’ Sarah replies. The aunt says no more, so Sarah turns back to Helena. ‘I thought you were going to bouzouki clubs?’

‘
We are, but Finn is still asleep, and besides, it is early yet. But I am glad we have bumped into you. Tomorrow, you must come up to the house, meet everyone, have some lunch, spend some time, okay?’

‘
Oh yes, okay.’ Sarah quite likes the idea. Helena seems more relaxed this evening; maybe the village is rubbing off on her, too.

‘
Come about, oh I don’t know, eleven, twelve. We will eat around half two or three, if you want to stay at ours for a sleep at
mesimeri
, there are plenty of rooms.’

‘
Thank you.’

Helena gives Sarah a little wave as she passes to go inside the shop, very relaxed, nice. The aunt smiles
‘A good boy,’ she says again and shuffles away.