Seven Days of Friday (Women of Greece Book 1) (9 page)

V
ivi says
, “What?”

Her aunt is on the phone, chatting to someone in Greek. Something about Effie and soap.

Melissa huffs.

“I can’t hear you,” Vivi says. “You’ll have to speak up.”

Melissa gives her the “But moooom” look, with fifteen years of exasperation dumped in those extra vowels. She tries again.

“The toilet is broken. Remember that time you and Dad replaced the toilet in my bathroom and there was just that big round pipe underneath?”

Vivi nods.

Oh yeah, she remembers. She scraped away the gooey wax herself, and dragged the old toilet to the curb on her own, because John couldn’t, wouldn’t, shouldn’t risk messing up his manicure.

“Well it looks like that. You know, a big hole in the ground.”

“What – no toilet?”

“Nope. Just a round hole.”

This she has to see.

In she goes. Light on.

No toilet. Dead ahead is the hole Melissa described.

Good news? It’s not broken.

Bad news? It’s not broken.

Vivi knows a hole when she sees one, and this once is surrounded by white porcelain. Two wavy foot-sized patches straddle the opening.

She contemplates the physics.

That’s not all. It gets worse.

A small wicker trashcan sits within grabbing distance. No lid. Inside, small pieces of soiled toilet paper.

Perfect, she thinks. Perrrrfect.

Outside the bathroom, her smile goes back on. What the hell is she thinking, uprooting their lives, racing across the world to see what shade of green the grass is here?

(For the record, the grass she’s seen so far is sparse and leans toward the brown spectrum.)

Her marbles are gone.

She looks at Melissa.

“How hard can you cross your legs?”

G
ood food
.

Uninterrupted sleep.

Satisfying sex.

Most men need all three to thrive.

Max has all three, but he’s not thriving.

He watches Anastasia dress. First time she’s been over in three days and he just feels tired.

Her lens is focusing, zooming. “Why don't you redecorate this place? It's so . . .”

“Masculine?”

“Boring. You don't even have pictures.”

She leans forward, drops her breasts into the lace cups. He feels nothing. The urgency he felt earlier has evaporated, same as their sweat.

“What for?” He rolls over, grabs his own clothes. “I sleep here, that's all.”

“You should think about buying a house.”

He thinks about the money rolling, rolling, rolling in his bank account for exactly that.

“Maybe one day.”

“How old are you, Max?”

“You know how old I am.”

Her cleavage disappears behind the shirt’s buttons. Only a promise remains.

“What will you do when you get married?”

When we get married, she means. He can’t miss the thin, whining undercurrent of Anastasia winding up for another fight. What he thinks is that she likes the arguing more than she likes the sex.

“Then I guess my wife and I will buy a house to raise our children in.”

“Your wife? Are you planning on making someone else your wife?” Pencil skirt next, thin belt through the loops. “Max, are you seeing another woman?”

“I'm too tired to see anyone else.”

True.

Long days at the hospital. Long nights with Anastasia.

She’s sucking the life out of him through his balls.

And then there are the phone calls from Mama.

Have you proposed yet?

No.

Have you bought a ring?

No.

Why not?

Yeah, Max. Why not?

Because he doesn’t love her, he just loves fucking her.

Anastasia zeros in on her handbag. She pulls out a severe black tube, wields the lipstick, the make-believe dagger.

“That's not an answer, Max. That's avoidance. Do you know what I will do if I find out you are cheating on me?” Lipstick slashes through air.

I don’t care, he thinks. Just hurry up and do it and go away.

“Max?”

He grabs her wrist, holds it still. “There's no one else. I promise.”

She smiles, that bitch. “I know. I just wanted you to know how I feel.” Now she’s someone else, a smiling angel. “Let's go and get coffee.”

He’s tying his boots when the phone beeps.

“Sorry,” he tells Anastasia. “No coffee this morning.”

Her cold gaze stalks him. “Always the hospital.”

“Baby, it's my job. When we get married it will buy you lots of nice things.” When, not if. Is he trying to placate her or sabotage his life?

“Promise?”

“Of course.” And they’re out the door.

Alone in his Jeep at last. He looks in the rearview mirror and sees a stranger sitting where he’s sitting. The other guy is holding up a noose.

Don’t make me use this, he says.

Then Max laughs, because what is he so afraid of? A life with a beautiful woman?

Fool.

A
child dies
on his watch. Not because of negligence or lack of skill. It happens because sometimes it happens – and fuck you, God.

He tells the parents, but they don’t want to know.

He understands; he doesn’t want to know, either.

T
he ghost
of Max gets away early, but not much. He and Anastasia have plans for dinner at a café near St Nicholas Square.

St Nicholas, patron saint of sailors and children.

Maximos Andreou, patron saint of nothing, wanders like a man lost. He looks at jeans. Skims titles in a bookstore. He stops at a jewelry store’s window, temporarily blinded by the glare.

No price tags. What a racket.

So, he goes in.

Why? Because there’s no good reason not to. The store wants money and he has money to spend.

Anastasia is winding his hormones around her pinky, but after today . . .

Max doesn’t care.

He wants a wife and family to come home to. He needs to see something warm after a day like today, his own child to distract him with play, a woman to curl up on the inside of his spoon.

What would Kostas say?

Not much. He gave his blessing as long as the choice was Max’s – Didn’t he?

He could – should – cut Anastasia loose, let her find some other head to fuck with, but he doesn’t want to deal with the shit storm. He doesn’t have time to fight a battle on two fronts. The constant text messages from Anastasia and Mama, the non-stop phone calls – threats one minute, contrition the next.

Breakups get bad enough when you’re dealing with one person who won’t disappear.

He thinks about how their children might look – her golden eyes, his dark hair. Maybe after they marry the fights will slow to an occasional downpour.

Maybe the sex will crumble, too.

Doesn’t matter. He’s going to buy a ring, and when the right moment comes he’ll propose.

Even tired and beat up from the day, Max looks like money. The saleswoman is tripping on her own feet to get to him, euro signs dancing in her eyes.

Max doesn’t like to let a woman down, so he lays his plastic on the counter, points to the window

“The one in the middle.”

“A beautiful choice, sir.”

Choice.

Max chooses peace.

V
ivi is on a
desert island
, knocking back pina coladas, when Melissa pokes her.

She opens her eyes. Reality is made of pink walls and blue shutters.

Bold choices.

The sun is glaring through the thin gap where the shutters don’t quite meet. Every house has them here – practical, not ornamental. Shutters stay closed during the heat of day, and then they’re thrown wide at night so cool air can offer respite. Between shutters and marble floors, houses stay a bearable shade of sauna during daylight hours.

Melissa is balanced on the bed’s edge, ear buds curled around one hand, watermelon wedge in the other. For once she’s not plugged in and there’s no book in sight. She looks worried.

“Are you okay?” Vivi asks.

“I’m okay. Are you okay?”

“Sure, why?

“Well, you've only been asleep for nearly two days.”

Vivi hasn’t slept more than seven consecutive hours since high school. “Wow. What day is it?”

Melissa shrugs – her new signature move. “Saturday.
Thea
took me to the store. And I met some of the neighbors. There's this really weird old lady across the street. She has these funny chickens and she let me pat them. Plus she kept babbling at me and I couldn't understand anything she said. Well, hardly anything. Just the bit about Grams.”

“What about Grams?”

Melissa shrugs (again). “Don’t know. Just something about her and Grampy.”

Very mysterious. First the accidental mention of a scandal, and now this. Everyone seems to be in the loop but her and Melissa. Might have been nice if her mother had declared her baggage before Vivi rolled it across the world.

Then there’s Dad’s box, the one that never existed . . .

Outside a horn honks. Right on its heels, a megaphone crackles to life.

“Watermelon.” The voice is chipped, broken. “Watermelon with the knife!”

“Gypsies,” Melissa says. “You should see them. They wear all these really colorful clothes that totally clash, and their kids don't go to school. How cool is that?
Thea
says if you're not careful they'll put a gypsy curse on you. They're selling watermelon. You should try it, it's really good.”

Gypsies. Watermelon. Curses. Oh my.

“Romani,” Vivi says. “They’re Romani.” Sleep. She needs more sleep.

“And,” Melissa continues, “you know how we buy those tiny bottles of olive oil back home and you’re always complaining about how expensive it is?
Thea
has a huge metal container of it on the counter. Do you suppose she drinks it? Because that's just weird.”

“I don't think so,” Vivi mumbles. “Maybe it's cheaper to buy bulk.”

“Mom?” Melissa hasn’t used this many words in months. “Can we go to the beach?”

Best idea ever – and when she says so, Melissa beams.

“And can we go to McDonalds?”

Thousands of miles from the USA, some of the best cuisine in the world, and her kid wants McDonald’s?

“If there’s a McDonald’s, we’ll find it.”

Melissa crams the buds back into her ears. Says, “Cool. Whatever,” before slinking out of the room.

Now Vivi is alone in the false night.

Once upon a time, she was a teenager. Doesn’t mean she’s qualified to raise one of her own.

U
p close
, the ocean is the color of a cool forest. Seaweed swishes its fingers through the warm, gentle water. Colorful wooden fishing boats bob to the same languid rhythm, while teenagers swarm the decks, laughing and diving from the highest points.

Is anything better than sixteen?

Is anything worse?

“Can I – ” Melissa starts.

Vivi is wearing her psychic mommy hat. “Forget it. I don't want you diving off those boats.”

“Mom . . .”

“Those boats belong to someone. Would you want a bunch of kids using your things?”

“But everyone else is doing it.” She flops back on the towel, her life obviously O-V-E-R. “Don't say it.”

“If everyone else was jumping off a cliff, would you do it, too?”

“If it was fun, yeah. Maybe.”

Jumping off a cliff
is
fun. Vivi knows – she did it, back in the pre-John, pre-Melissa, post-Eleni days.

“Nice try, but do I look like Little Bo Peep?”

Bodies back and forth, sunburned and suntanned and sunstroked. Every shape and age. The less-than-perfects own every inch of themselves. Good for them. Paranoia and hiding beneath XXL T-shirts is the American way.

There’s a kiosk butted up to the beach, selling more drinks and cigarettes than anything else. They have ice cream, too.

Vivi pulls out money, waves it in front of Melissa’s nose. Foreign currency, but her kid can smell cash a mile away. Must be something in the ink.

She says, “I’m bribing you with ice cream, okay?”

“Can I go for a swim afterwards?”

“Sure. But take that watch off before you go in.”

“It's waterproof to thirty feet.”

Vivi gives her a look.

The cash vanishes. “Whatever. I'll get the ice cream.”

Vivi watches Melissa picking her way across the pebbled beach, towel wrapped around her waist, up to the kiosk, where she gets in line behind a couple of lobsters in Bermuda shorts and Birkenstocks.

She’s not the only watcher on this beach. Some of the boys are also getting an eyeful of Melissa Pappas. They’re like birds, chests puffed out, whistling as girls walks by. Melissa’s all cool, ignoring them, keeping her eyes on the ground.

Look up and straight ahead, Vivi wants to say. Don’t let anyone in this world make you look down.

When Melissa gets back, Vivi says, “You have admirers.”

Hair flip. “Whatever.”

But she’s smiling on high beam, isn’t she?

The ice cream disappears fast. Late spring, but the weather is hot. A benevolent breeze carries the sweat away as fast as they can make it.

The question comes out of nowhere.

“Mom? Are we ever going home?”

Home – where’s that? There hasn’t been time to figure out if Greece is a waiting room or the end of the line.

“I was hoping maybe this would be our new home. Do you hate it here already?”

“No.” She says it in a small voice Vivi hasn’t heard since the boogeyman days. “I just don’t want you to decide without telling me.”

“Honey, I wouldn't do that.”

“You kind of decided to come here without asking me.”

“Remember that day I told you?” Melissa nods. “I only thought of it that morning. As soon as I knew for sure, I told you. I gave you the chance to speak up.”

“I said I wanted to stay with Uncle Chris.”

“That wasn't an option.”

“Maybe I wish it was.”

“Mel, I'm not a dictator. But I’m the person who gets to make the hard decisions. Someone has to, for the good of the family. In time, if you’re seriously miserable here, we’ll go.”

“Whatever.”

“We can't just turn around now, Honey. We just got here.”

“I didn't say I want to leave.”

“I don’t get it,” Vivi says. “You’re as clear as mud. You hardly speak, and most of the time you’re sulking. We need to work together. I’m not psychic. If you’ve got things to say, say them.”

“Forget it.”

“Is this about your father?”

“I . . . said . . . forget it.”

Vivi jumps up, starts gathering their stuff as though a tsunami alarm is screaming, telling everybody to get high. “Grab your things, we're going.”

“McDonalds?”

She’s got to be kidding. “Back to
Thea
Dora’s house.”

“But her toilet sucks.”

Yeah, it sucks. But it’s better than an outhouse – right? Maybe she’ll offer to replace the thing. She’s done it before. She can do it again.

“Well, you're just going to have to get used to it for now.”

“But, Mom – ”

“Don’t like it? Go outside.”