Faye sighed. ‘Not really. The worst thing happened. Matthew broke the news to her and now she hates me and thinks I’m an embarrassment to humankind for dating someone so much younger than me.’
‘She does not hate you, Fayemou,’ Dimitria assured. ‘You can be certain of that. She just has to take time to realise that you need to have your own life as a woman, that you are much more than “Mum” and deserve to be.’
Faye nodded. ‘I’m just giving her a bit of space to process things.’
‘Well, if that doesn’t work, there is always ice cream,’ Dimitria reminded her.
But ‘ice cream’ had Faye’s thoughts flooding back to the flavours she had shared with Kostas in Corfu Town and how the photographs in the press had tainted that somehow, despite everything they had shared last night. She had never heard him talk that way until then. As much as she loved their banter, this had been sharing of the deepest kind and she had sensed how unused to that he was. He had told her the most traumatic things, and he hadn’t had to. He had wanted to. Or perhaps that’s what he needed her to think?
‘I always felt a little sorry for Kostas, you know,’ Dimitria mused as they began to walk along the stones again, heading back towards the hotel. ‘His life seemed very disjointed from what I remember. Here sometimes, then Athens, then here again.’ Dimitria sighed. ‘People gossiped that his father was always in some kind of fix, his mother working double the amount, and I am not sure he had many friends until he discovered his passion for basketball.’
Faye nodded, knowing, but not willing to share. She took a second before replying: ‘I think he finds making genuine connections quite difficult.’
‘Then he is also searching for his happy-ever-after, maybe?’
‘Isos,’ Faye replied. ‘Maybe.’ But what form did that take? Maybe it wasn’t a connection with her. Maybe it was in the shape of a hotel… She had to be wrong about that. She was just overthinking and creating crazy scenarios, right?
‘So, when are you going to tell me about a little place on the beach in Almyros?’ Dimitria exclaimed. ‘I cannot hold it in any longer!’
‘How did you know? Alexandros is meant to keep things confidential!’ And there was that word again…
‘He did not tell me,’ Dimitria insisted. ‘The details are in the top drawer of your desk! I was looking for scissors.’
Faye smiled as she thought about the white-washed beach home. The idea of living there, of possibly making her new home there, was feeling like the right kind of opportunity she had been waiting for. ‘I want you and Saffron to come and see it with me. I’d really appreciate your advice.’
Dimitria put an arm around her shoulders. ‘I would like nothing more.’
52
THE TREEHOUSE, KERASIA
‘What are you doing?’
‘I have put things in the crate! Turn the lift on.’
‘I am not turning on the lift until you tell me what the things are.’
Kostas sighed in exasperation. He was having a conversation in woodland, shouting up towards his grandmother’s head that was barely visible between the foliage, and the heat of the morning was already getting to him. He had had to strap the box to his motorbike and worry about his balance the whole ride over here. Now his grandmother wouldn’t winch it upwards and her stairs were still blocked off.
‘Yiayia!Parakaló. Please.’
‘I already know, no matter what these things are, that I can live without them. If you want to have coffee then the only thing needed in the crate is you.’
Kostas looked at the box, then at the crate. He wouldn’t fit in the crate with it, there was no way. He made his choice.
‘The right decision,’ Kyriaki said as she helped to pull Kostas in at the window moments later.
‘You know you could make a bigger window here, with a door that opens out so visitors do not have to climb through,’ he said, legs bending and stretching to work his way inside.
‘That would be a wonderful idea,’ Kyriaki answered, ‘for someone who actually wants visitors. You would like sugar in your coffee?’
Kostas shook his head. ‘No, why would I want sugar? I never have sugar.’
‘For extra energy after you have rescued a turtle last night.’
‘How do you know this?’ There hadn’t been anything on the news pages that he’d missed, had there? When the experts had arrived last night he had stayed in the background for two reasons. One, because he didn’t want to get in the way, and two, because he knew he was going to have to come clean to Faye about his reason for coming to Corfu.
His grandmother touched a finger to her nose. ‘I have a network, you know. We do not have to see each other every moment of every day to stay connected.’
