Here Come the Girls (22 page)

They wouldn’t have known it was a pharmacy, had there not been a big green cross outside a serving hatch set in the wall. In the absence of a door or a doorbell, Ven rapped tentatively on the wooden shutters. They snapped apart to reveal a very short woman with a scarily unsmiling demeanour.

‘Er . . . I have stomach pain,’ said Ven in her best staccato Granglais, rubbing an imaginary circle over her tum. ‘I need medicine.’ In a tourist town like this, how come she had met the only two people who didn’t speak any English?

Frankie and Olive turned quickly away, on the brink of a fit of giggles. Frankie wasn’t much help on the translating front in Greece, alas.

The woman came out with a flurry of Greek that Ven, with a totally blank expression, shook her head at. Then the woman rethought and mimed stuff coming out of her mouth.

‘
Oui ja
,’ said Ven enthusiastically. The woman appeared to understand. She disappeared for a moment, then came back with a white box which she proceeded to open and show Ven the brightly dual-coloured capsules. She pointed to one of them, then a second.

‘She means take two,’ said Roz.

‘How often though?’

‘HOW MANY TIME?’ asked Roz, in loud fluent pidgin Greek, her palms tilted upwards in a gesture of questioning. Then she had a brainwave and tapped her watch.

The woman held up two fingers in V formation.

‘I think she means every two hours,’ said Roz.

‘Either that or she’s telling you to bugger off, you bladdy Eeenglish tourist,’ said Frankie, giggling with Olive.

The woman feigned some more vomiting then clamped her hand over her mouth.

‘I think she means that will stop any vomiting,’ said Roz, pleased with herself. Who needed language?

Then the woman waved a slow warning hand in front of her mouth and did the two-finger thing again. Then she held up four fingers and waved her hand back and forwards.

‘What the heck does that bit mean?’ asked Ven. ‘It’s like watching an old
Vision On
with the sound off!’

‘Haven’t a clue,’ said Roz, deciding that maybe you did need language, after all.

Ven handed over a ten-euro note, hoping that was enough. The woman didn’t volunteer any change.

‘Veystron,’ said the woman. She held up her two fingers again and tapped them with the other hand, making a definite point about the number two which Ven took as being that she needed to take two. Easy enough to understand.

‘Veystron,’ repeated Ven, presuming that was Greek for thank you.

As they turned back towards the town, Ven dry swallowed two of the capsules until Roz handed over her bottle of now horribly warm water. But Ven was only glad that she had medicine in her system now and was going to be all right.

They headed then for a handbag heaven shop. The leather smelled gorgeous and the shop-owner didn’t pester them. He was rewarded with a sale of six handbags, four purses and two belts.

‘Fancy a spot of lunch?’ asked Olive, after they’d all bought cowboy hats to shield themselves from the sun.

‘We can’t come here and not have a Greek salad,’ said Roz. Ven nodded, but knew she couldn’t face any food. She would get something and poke around in it, hoping the others didn’t notice that she wasn’t eating much.

Around the corner, who should they see sitting at a pretty pavement table under a sheltering awning bearing the lettering
Restaurant Rex
but Royston and Stella, also wearing cowboy hats. Royston was in a bright purple vest, looking twelve degrees more tanned than he was the previous night – and knee-length flowery shorts.

‘
Yassou
,’ he called out. ‘Hello, girls. Isn’t this awful, all this sunshine?’

‘Terrible,’ said Roz. ‘What’s the food like here?’

‘Let me tell you,’ began Royston, ‘this is the oldest restaurant in Corfu. We’ve been coming here for years. Beautiful. Best Dolmades in Greece and shrimp the size of lobsters. My Stella has the Greek salad and it’s superb, isn’t it, boss?’

‘It’s divine,’ endorsed Stella, finishing off the last of her coffee before waving her immaculate golden nails at them. ‘Just had these done in the spa. Ask for Roxanne, she’s the best. Here, you have our table if you want. We’re going to get a taxi now to Paleokastritsa. Lovely little bay to swim in.’

‘Thanks, Stella,’ said Roz, sitting in the seat which Stella had just vacated. An army of waiters arrived and began changing the tablecloth whilst Stella and Royston gathered up their bags.

They really were a sweet couple, Roz decided. Okay, he might have been a bit of a naughty boy once, but anyone could see they butted together like a dovetail joint. So he made a mistake once. The irony in her thinking bypassed her.

‘Oh, and if you’re going to buy any local liqueurs, turn left at the top of this street and you’ll see a shop with a swinging sign saying “Yamas!” on it. Go there.’

‘Thank you,’ waved Roz.

‘See you at dinner,’ said Royston loudly. ‘Casual tonight, I do believe.
Yassou
.’

‘
Yassou!
’ they all returned.

‘Yannis,’ called Royston to a rotund man with a huge moustache who came out to wave also, ‘these ladies are friends of ours. Be nice to them.’

Royston was right about the fare in Restaurant Rex. Yannis brought out a basket of bread big enough to feed the five thousand – even without the fish – and a huge dish of fat oily black olives to nibble on whilst they perused the menu, but they couldn’t find anything they wanted more than Greek salad. The tomatoes were big and beefy and tasted divine, the feta cheese was creamy and on the right side of salty. Ven ate because her mum always said she shouldn’t take medication on an empty stomach but even she was surprised at how much she put away. Olive’s huge burp at the end of it summed it up perfectly.

‘How nice was that,’ said Roz, popping the last of her feta cubes into her mouth and rolling it around to savour it.

‘Very,’ said Ven.

‘I don’t want to move,’ said Roz. ‘I want to sit here for ever and watch the world go by.’

So they didn’t move for another half-hour. They ordered coffees which came with an accompaniment of sticky dates and cubes of nougat. Then Ven paid the bill, once again insisting she would claim it back, and after a visit to the loo, they set off for the ‘Yamas!’ shop.

They didn’t want to venture into the new part of Corfu Town; the quaint labyrinth of shops in this quarter was enough for them. And they reckoned after exhausting every leather shop in the place, that they had built up enough appetite for a dainty cream tea back on the ship. Ven nodded along with the idea but was just glad that she would soon be on board again. The medicine had stopped her from throwing up, but the effect wouldn’t last for ever.

Laden with bags, the four of them set off for the shuttle bus stop. The queue was long, but two buses turned up one after the other and they were soon being driven out of Corfu Town.

‘Show me the way to the scones,’ sang Frankie.

‘And me,’ chorused Roz.

Ven just smiled. There was no way she was going to do anything but have a lie-down for half an hour. She decided she would pick up a port and brandy from one of the bars to take to her cabin as well. Her dad always said that was a surefire way to settle a stomach.

‘I’m going for a jog on the top deck first,’ said Olive, as she loaded her shopping bags onto the ship’s security X-ray machine.

‘You are joking,’ said Roz.

‘Course I’m bloody joking!’ Olive told her. ‘I’m going for the full cream and jam shebang. Thank God for shorts with Lycra in them!’

When the others went up to the Buttery, Ven took a double port and brandy to her room. She felt a fabulous relief as she pushed open the door and found her cabin totally Jesus-ified. It was like coming home, with its big soft bed and non-Greek loo.

She ran a bath and sank into it whilst she sipped at half of her port and brandy. Minutes after she had got out of the water, she was asleep on top of her bed, naked and still damp. She was awoken an hour and a half later by the noise of children running down the corridor. There was three-quarters of an hour until dinner – she had better rouse herself, but boy, she really didn’t feel 100 per cent at all. She drained the rest of the port and brandy whilst she got herself dressed in her favourite buy, a sweet blue dress with frothy cap sleeves. She didn’t apply much make-up because her hand was a bit shaky. Her lipstick took three attempts to get right.

Thirty seconds before the others called for her, she threw a second lot of the Greek tablets into her mouth and washed them down with some mineral water. Hadn’t the pharmacist said something about her needing four tablets – presumably for full effect? She felt quite spaced, slightly removed from herself. She obviously needed food, but she really didn’t want any. She pasted on a smile of normality and opened the cabin door.

‘Your eyes look a bit glassy, Ven – are you okay?’ asked Frankie, as the bing-bong call to dinner sounded through the loudspeakers. ‘
Ladies and gentlemen, dinner is now being served in the Olympia and the Ambrosia restaurants. Do have an enjoyable evening
.’

‘I’m fine,’ insisted Ven, in a slightly slurry voice. ‘I’ve not long woken up so I’m a bit groggy. I’ll be great after I’ve had something to eat. I’m starving now,’ she lied.

‘Good, let’s go and get some food inside you then,’ said Olive, taking her arm. It was a good job she did too, because Ven was having difficulty seeing the ship as it was. The walls looked as if they were twisted out of shape and she doubted she could have negotiated the staircase. She made them take the lift down to the Olympia, then thought she had better go to the loo again before going to the table.

‘I’ll come with you,’ said Olive. ‘Roz, Frankie – we’ll meet you inside.’

Eric, Irene, Royston and Stella were already at the table when Frankie and Roz reached it – they were all beaming. An extra place had been laid at the table.

‘Apparently the Captain’s dining with us,’ said Royston proudly. ‘I’m trusting you don’t have any objections, ladies?’

‘Ooh,’ said Frankie. ‘Let Ven sit next to him, seeing as this is her birthday cruise.’

By the time Olive and Ven arrived at the table, Captain Nigel O’Shaughnessy had already made his introductions to everyone. Olive was getting a bit worried about Ven. She wasn’t too steady on her feet, and her speech was slurry, even though she insisted she was perfectly fine. The Captain stood as Elvis and Buzz pulled the chairs out for Ven and Olive. Ven found herself being seated next to the same tall, drop-dead gorgeously handsome officer in white who made her visibly melt whenever she saw him around the ship.

‘Nice to meet you, ladies,’ he said in a lovely soft Irish accent, shaking their hands in turn. ‘I’m Nigel O’Shaughnessy.’

‘Hello,’ said Olive, answering for Ven who had her mouth open wide enough to catch a passing helicopter, never mind a fly. ‘I’m Olive and this is Venice.’

‘Venice? We’ll be visiting your namesake in a couple of days. Were you named after it?’

‘Yes,’ said Ven, trying to sound sober and failing. ‘I was concepted in Venice. My parents thought of it long before the Beckenhams . . .
Beckhams
did.’

Olive mouthed ‘concepted?’ at Frankie behind Ven’s back. Frankie made a face that managed to say with one gesture ‘Well, this is Ven we’re talking about!’

‘Ven’s forty when we go to Venice,’ said Roz, with a wink at her friend.

‘I know,’ said Nigel.

‘Do you?’ said Ven, deciding then that this man must be someone who looked after records.

Two bottles of wine arrived on the table, courtesy of Nigel. Ven decided to stick to water. She was becoming more spaced by the minute, and if she had a mere sip of anything alcoholic, she felt in danger of leaping up on a table, dancing to ‘Knees Up, Mother Brown’ and showing off her knickers. She took some speciality bread from the basket which Buzz was proffering – sage and onion – and buttered it, although her coordination wasn’t spot on and she ended up buttering some of her hand as well.

‘So, Mr Ocean Sea.’ She considered the name as her mouth said it. The words sounded echoey as if they hadn’t come from her but from someone at the side of her. ‘Hey, what a great name for someone who works on a ship.’

‘Mr Ocean Sea,’ Nigel repeated with a very deep grin. ‘I’ve never heard that pronunciation of my name before.’

Across the table, Royston, Stella, Eric and Irene seemed equally impressed and were nodding and smiling.

Frankie topped Ven’s glass up with water and, with more than a gentle hint, held it up to her. Ven took a big glug and then said, ‘This isn’t wine, is it?’

‘It’s water,’ whispered Frankie. ‘I think you may be in need of some.’

‘Is she all right?’ mouthed Irene to Roz.

‘I hope so,’ whispered Roz, by way of explanation. ‘She’s been a bit poorly today and took some tablets. She hasn’t been drinking, if that’s what you think.’ She pressed the point in case Irene thought Ven was tipsy.

‘So, are you all having a good cruise?’ said Nigel. ‘Ship up to standard, is it?’

‘Brilliant,’ slurred Ven. ‘We’ve even got Jesus cleaning our cabin. And Mary and Joseph doing room service.’

‘Our cabin steward is called Jesus,’ explained Frankie to the bemused sea of faces around the table. ‘The Mary and Joseph bit is a joke.’ Frankie gave Ven a puzzled stare.

Royston, Stella, Eric and Irene gave a little laugh. Nigel was smiling too as he turned his attention to his menu.

Buzz appeared at Ven’s side to take down her order. The words she was reading kept swimming in and out of focus. She took a deep breath and tried to herd herself into line.

‘I’ll have the asparagus tits. Sorry, I mean tits not tips. Then the . . .’ Crikey, she’d better get this one right. She took it slowly and carefully. ‘Flambéed duck,’ she said, and giggled. ‘Good job I said that right. I nearly—’

‘I’ll have the same,’ Olive cut in quickly. Bloody hell, what was wrong with Ven? She sounded pissed as a fart!

But in Ven’s head everything was now lovely. Her body was buzzing from a nice mellow hum, her lovely friends were around her, there were four other lovely people on the table and Mr Drop-Dead Lovely-Gorgeous at her side. She couldn’t remember why he was at her side. She hadn’t pulled him, had she? She sat and listened to the lovely lovely lovely conversation happening around the table which sounded slightly muffled, as if a layer of cotton wool was wrapped around them all.