Dancing in the Dark (22 page)

‘As a matter of fact,
a chuisle
, neither have I.'

‘What's that mean?'

‘An Irish term. Just slipped out.' One thing he's not ever done is trade on the ould blarneystone nonsense, agenbite of inwit subJoycean thing, not that there's anything wrong with it in its place and if he were to ever set Brendan down on paper, he might be tempted. Brendan the Voyager, barely navigating his coracled way through the shoals and reefs, waves swamping his frail bark until he finally foundered.

She tugs up the strap again. Gazes out to sea. ‘But you're right, Fergus,' she says. ‘You're absolutely right.'

The two of them have fallen into a semi-routine. Shopping in the morning, lounging around, swimming, working, and then, when dusk begins to fall, wine on the terrace followed by the shared task of cooking garlicky herby dishes that linger on the lips. They do the laundry, talk when the spirit moves or stay silent, read together, watch the news on the uncertain black-and-white television in the salon. It's how he imagines marriage to be, were it not for the celibacy. Don't think about that. For the moment, but only for the moment, it's enough just to be with her, getting to know her, worming his way under her skin. Sometimes, in the warm nights, he imagines he can hear her quiet breathing, breasts lifting beneath the virginal sheets, dark crotch musky in the heat; wonders if she sleeps naked, not his business, not his concern – separate entities, independent, simply chums sharing a holiday, that's all.

If he is honest, he has to admit that the island is not the paradise he had hoped for. His dreams of a bare table, a white wall, the timeless Odyssean sea, have been shattered, or not so much shattered as stretched to breaking point by noise, tourists, the constant thutt-thutt of the caïques carrying visitors round the point to unluckier beaches than theirs, the unrelenting music from the cafés. It can only be a matter of time before there'll be a taverna down on their own little bay, concrete lavatories, brutish British beer-swillers, farting and fucking. He thinks of the Durrells, of Edward Lear. That idyll is slowly vanishing, is almost gone for ever.

Meanwhile, as the days pass, he watches Theodora change. Seeing her unwind is like unwrapping a mummy, eating an artichoke, layer after layer of whatever it is she has encased herself in slowly sloughing off to reveal the soft tenderness at the heart. He wonders what precipitated that phone call to say she would, after all, come with him. He thinks he has unfathomed her mystery: she is afraid to be happy in case it's snatched away, as it must have been when her mother dropped out of sight. She's so different now from what she was a week ago: languid, loose-bodied, her mouth tender in the warmth of the candles she lights each evening, eyes secret in the semi-dark, shadows jumping on her smooth skin. He wants to take her to bed, wants to kiss every part of her, wants to savour her. He knows that he must be careful. He feels he is moving closer to her, taking tiny unhurried steps nearer. Softlee, softlee . . . Sometimes, standing in the kitchen while she pegs out her bras and knickers on the washing line strung across the courtyard outside, he feels explosive with desire. Too erotic, too intimate, do those nylon (silk or maybe cotton?) garments take on the tang of the air in which they've dried? When she puts them on in the morning is she assailed by syringa, lapped in lavender?

‘Do you have an address for your father?' she asks. It's another of the evenings spent eating a long, slow meal by candlelight, under the stars, mournful moon higher now, paler, less of it as the days go by, sage and sea-smells brought on the breeze.

‘I know where he used to live. Which isn't to say he's there still.'

‘But if anything had happened to him, you'd be told?'

‘There are enough people who would make it their business to let me know.' Thinking of the man, he experiences the familiar mix of fear, regret and rage.

She holds her glass thoughtfully by the side of her mouth. ‘I think you ought to go and find him.'

‘To what end? All it will do is rekindle old hostilities.' Start stirring, and who knows what will float to the surface, what debris lies buried in the thick sludge at the bottom of his heart. ‘I can't see the point.'

He mustn't let her sense the fear. How can he bear to meet his father face to face again, with Brendan intolerable between them, draped across his shoulders like the flayed skins of Aztec victims? He's done all right for himself, he's slipped out from under, but his brother was captured. He has to be avenged, can't let that go. Easier to stay away, fall instead into the fictional jungle where Gerard Fargo paints his huge canvases, far from prying eyes and amazing Grace.

‘He must be getting on a bit, isn't he?'

‘So?'

‘If I knew who or where
my
father was, I'd go and see him. Besides, you might get a book out of it.'

‘It's too much of a cliché, too common an Irish story. In any case, other better people have told it already.'

A silence falls. He is aware of a happiness so intense that it could burn him up like a martyr at the stake if it were not also fleeting, gone almost before glimpsed. ‘Theodora,' he says, ‘in Corfu Town there's a saint that has the same name as you. We should go and visit the shrine.'

‘Years ago my mother told me there were lots of Saint Theodoras.'

Below them, in the darkness, the sea surges against the edges of the shore. ‘Want to walk down to the beach?' he asks.

‘Why not.'

The kitchen is well stocked with torches and we take one each, make our way down to the little bay. The shimmering dark is full of scent. Waves lap softly at the pebbled beach. The night is warm, hot even. Sweat breaks out under my arms and along my forehead. We can hear music from the cafes beyond the point; tonight it's the Beatles and Tom Jones. It's intrusive, but not unpleasant. ‘
Yesterday
,' croons Paul McCartney. Fergus takes me into his arms and we sway together beside the silver water.

Corfu has seduced me. Despite the serpents in this Eden, it enters me like a lover to whom I willingly give myself up, it runs through my blood. For this moment, I concentrate on nothing, am simply content to be. Is Fergus finding this holiday as productive as he'd hoped? I've heard the meaty thunk of his computer keys when I pass the room he's using as an office, but not very often, and not for very long. Maybe that's how it works with creative fiction, periods of thought interspersed with intense activity on the keyboard.

Why, Delilah?
Tom Jones demands muscularly from the next bay down. Fergus's arms tighten round me. I can smell his skin, the wine he's drunk, candle smoke. I am weak with desire. ‘Want to swim?' he says into my ear, tickling me.

‘We didn't bring our—' I break off. Lighten Up, Seize the Day, Go For it. ‘All right.' I disengage from him, pull off my shirt, my shorts. I hesitate a moment, then I step quickly out of my panties and run wincingly across the pebbles into the cool embrace of the sea.

He follows me. I can see the pale swing of his penis against the dark bush of hair as he splashes untidily through the shallows, staggering as the pebbles punch the soles of his feet. As he comes nearer, I plunge beneath the waves and swim strongly away. When I surface, he is peering through the moonlight for me, his wet body shining as though made of quicksilver. ‘Fergus!' I call, before submerging again. I swim underwater towards the pale columns of his legs and push out of the water beside him.

‘You look like a mermaid,' he says. ‘A siren.'

His eyes are on my breasts and I turn and swim away once more. The moon throws a gilded path across the dark sea. The sensuous feel of water against bare skin is almost indescribable; my whole body is given over to silky sensations. I can hear Fergus behind me. Sirens lure men to their deaths with promises they have no intention of fulfilling. Is that what I'm doing? Does he think that because we're both naked, there's a tacit agreement that we will make love? Why am I so reluctant to do something which I know will be all I've ever wanted, read about, longed for? I know the answer to that: I cannot afford to be subsumed in someone else.

As soon as I can, I make for the shore and run back up to my clothes. Clumsily I pull on my T-shirt. The breeze has more than a touch of chill in it.

He comes up the beach and flops down beside me. ‘Don't be afraid,' he says quietly. And it's this gentle sentence which undoes me. Had he touched me, I could have risen to my feet and walked back up to the house, but his words disarm me, leave me defenceless.

‘Fergus . . .' I give an involuntary sigh, a sound so full of desire and passion that I am embarrassed.

He puts his hand on my still-wet thigh. ‘You're shivering,' he says.

‘So will you, if you don't put some clothes on.'

‘Not yet.' He pulls me closer, puts his mouth over mine. He is warm, and I instinctively move into his arms. He puts his hand under my T-shirt, holds my breast. I ought to tell him not to but it's lovely. I want him to touch my other breast and when he does, I find myself moaning with pleasure. At what point do I call a halt? I remind myself that I am thirty-one years old, not a schoolgirl, not inexperienced, this is just a bonk, a screw, a fuck, it carries no significance and I can stop whenever I please, but somehow I don't seem to have done so as his hand inches lower and then he is on top of me, and the sweet ache of desire floods me, it's been such a long time since I did this or wanted it as much as I do now, just the act, no involvement, nothing like that, and I am urging him onwards, and then he's slipping into the warm wetness of my body and despite all my intentions, I am not pushing him away, but already exploding as I welcome him in.

‘You told me I should go and see my father,' he says. They're sitting at a table outside a taverna in the town, eating grilled lamb, courgettes stewed in oil, fresh tomatoes. The wine is rough and red. Under the table, their legs are entwined, one of her feet resting between his thighs. Around them is music and bustle, the slap of tourist flip-flops echoing back from the tall Venetian façades, clop of donkey hooves, cries from the owners of shops and stalls along the street.

‘Yes.'

‘You ought to do the same.'

She thinks about it. Chews slowly. Crumbles bread on the tabletop. ‘You could be right. But it's not possible.'

‘Why?'

‘Where would I start? My mother won't tell me the slightest thing. It's as though she's deliberately tried to expunge him from our lives, every last memory, every clue as to who he was – or is. I'm so angry with her, so furious . . .'

‘You have a right to be.'

‘Then why do I feel so guilty?' She lifts her glass towards her mouth then stops with it in mid-air. ‘You don't think he could be somebody important, do you? Like, the prime minister or . . . or a presidential candidate? Or royalty?'

‘Could be. From what you've said, the possibilities are endless. Whatever it is, I think you need to find out.'

She slumps in her chair. Shakes her head. ‘I don't want to.'

‘But . . .' He's confused. ‘Didn't you say you needed to find out about him?' He takes her hand and holds it tightly enough that she can't pull away without a struggle. ‘How come you're so ready to tell me what to do, but won't take your own very sensible advice?'

She shrugs. ‘Maybe I'm afraid of what I might discover.'

‘Where would you start? If you're not afraid, that is?'

‘If you think about the timing, she'd have found herself pregnant with me by March of her second year at college in the States. So there would seem a logical place to start looking.'

‘If you go, I could come with you.' He can't let her go, now that he has found her. ‘I could chauffeur you around and buy you iced coffee at the Dairy Queen and slay any dragons who are bothering you.'

‘I can slay my own.'

‘I could carry your bags.'

‘I travel light.'

She's deathly afraid and he doesn't know how to help her.

He's asleep, my lovely troubadour, my wandering minstrel. I look down at his sleeping face, the non-aligned eyebrows, the dark hair, and feel dampness between my thighs, heat in my lower belly. I've never felt anything like this sexual closeness; I am famished, ravenous for him. I want to wake him, arch over him, lower myself hard and fast on to him. Instead, I touch the tattoo on his shoulder. Standing on the edge of the bottomless pit of love, I am afraid.

‘I think I love you,' I murmur. But how can I love someone else when I don't know who I myself am? Do I dare to love someone else when the last time, I was left alone? And of all men, how sensible would it be to fall in love with this one, a man without commitment? Enjoy it, Theo, I tell myself.
Carpe diem.
Seize the day, and then move on.

Move on . . . something I've never been good at!

I don't want to go back to what my existence seems to have become: responsibilities, sudden rages, panic attacks. Not yet, not ever. I need to change things. A thought ricochets around my skull, something never considered before: the wrenching up of tap roots is like pulling a tooth or severing a limb, but no more painful, surely, than a wanderer forced against his will to stay put.

I press my hands against my flat stomach. Will I ever swell as pregnant Jenny does, walk with that proud jut, cradle my belly in both hands as though shielding the child inside from harm? I move closer to Fergus, run my hands down the front of his body, stroke the feathers of dark hair across his chest, in his groin. Even in sleep, he thickens for me. I throw my leg over his hip and guide him into me.

‘I'm having the most fabulous dream,' he murmurs. His gypsy fingers touch my breasts, my nipples, and turn me into liquid silver as we move together, slowly at first and then with increasing passion.