In the Shade of the Monkey Puzzle Tree (14 page)

‘
Those are not the terms we agreed you would live here on. You must work for your roof over your head, like everybody else. You think Mr Theo does not work for the roof over his head? If he works, why should you not?’

Theo cringes at the sound of his name. He stops throwing bottles; he does not wish to be used as ammunition in this argument.

‘But if you keep me all day, I cannot go out to earn so we can eat.’

‘
You agreed the terms, you figure it out. Meanwhile, please trim the bushes down the side of the garden today.’ Theo breathes a sigh of relief as he hears the woman stomping off. He picks up his bottle and is about to resume his practice when he hears her footsteps return.

‘
And you owe me for the chicken,’ she screeches and stomps off again. Theo waits to see if she will return, but after two minutes’ silence, he continues his practice. Under his bedroom, he can hear murmurs, the same murmurs as he heard in the night. No wonder the place is so cheap. The argument did not sound like a new one; it must be hard for Margarita to keep tenants with all that going on.

With Maragita
’s mama arguing with the people in the cellar, Gypsies next door, and barking dogs, Margarita is lucky to rent the place at all. The bottle slips from his fingers, bounces off the edge of the bed and smashes on the floor. The murmuring below stops.

Theo ignores the mess and continues with the second bottle. He might as well sweep up two smashed bottles as well as one. When the second bottle smashes a few minutes later, he slides off the bed and then recalls he has not yet bought a broom.

The jagged shards have spread evenly all across the floor. Some glint in the sunlight while others remain invisible. If he does not sweep up the bits, the invisible slices will cut into his feet at bedtime, when he comes home sleepy. He uses the rag by the sink in the kitchen to wipe the floor over and gather the pieces in one corner.

As he works his way across the floor on hands and knees, he can hear the woman downstairs crying, the man trying to comfort her. The sounds are the murmurs he heard before, when he first thought it was a cat that was trapped. She must cry a lot. Looking at his fingers, he rubs his palms together to take off the black that has lodged there from wiping the floor. He looks at them again. The same hands that just refused to shake the crying woman
’s hands downstairs. Not because hers were dirty, but because she is from a poor village in the far north of the country. He shakes his head with disbelief at his actions and continues to work.

When he cuts his fingers, he does not stop. He considers it is karma, that he deserves the pain. Her crying continues, and it is reaching parts of his emotions that haven
’t been touched since leaving the village. What did his Baba’s friend say in the
kafeneio
? That Athens changes people. It turns their heads. Is he a victim already? The way he treated Aikaterina, but eager to shake Margarita’s mama’s ring-encrusted hand? No one in his village wears more than a wedding ring.

Still on hands and knees, he hangs his head and shakes it gently from side to side, closing his eyes to block out the world. But this does nothing to lesson his shame. The man in the cellar is from a village, just as he is. Who is he to withhold his hand and behave with the same snobbery as Margarita
’s mama?

He stands and retreats to the kitchen. Water, sugar, coffee, patience. He becomes lost in making the perfect cup of coffee and his condemnatory thoughts quiet. He watches the bubbles form and pop, judging the time to take it from the heat, releasing him from all thoughts. Once finished, he takes his coffee out to the balcony and flops on the sofa. He stares at the crazy puzzle made by the branches of trees against the blue sky. The caffeine, the blue sky, and the sound of birds wash him clean.

A light tread on metal steps causes him to sit upright. The Gypsy appears on the roof next door, a basket of washing in her hands, her children around her skirts. Today, the two small children are helping a sibling, no more than a baby, to walk, each holding a hand, pulling. The Gypsy queen frowns at them, spits a harsh word to stop them dragging the baby by the arms, to be more gentle.

‘
Good morning,’ Theo says enthusiastically, keen to show no prejudice.

The children look up, startled. She smiles but does not return his greeting.

‘I think we got off on a rather bad footing yesterday. I just wanted to let you know I am here for you.’ He grins, but she frowns. ‘And your children,’ he adds, smiling at them. Her frown deepens; she looks almost angry. ‘Oh, and your husband, as a neighbour,’ he qualifies, but it is clear he has said something wrong.

‘
If you need anything…’ He trails off. He wonders what his blunder is this time, runs over the words he has spoken in his mind. ‘Not that I think you need help, you know, your husband. I am sure your husband is a very capable man and I am sure you need no help with your children. I just thought that, with us being, living so close that…’ His words trail off again. He is not sure where this sentence is going. Her frown lifts and she is smiling, almost laughing, and the children resume teaching the little one to walk.

The washing now hung, she leaves the basket on the ground and herds the three children down the staircase. She has not said even one word today. The brightly coloured clothes flap slightly in the warm breeze, the colours gay, lifting Theo
’s heart. At least she smiled.

The breeze picks up, taking the washing from the line and gathering it into coloured streamers which float across the garden, swirling and spiralling until garments part to reveal a group of people assembled on the lawn. The Gypsy queen in a long satin dress of blue, Aikaterina in a gown of green, her hair washed, her eyebrows shaped, arm in arm with Marinos, whose suit now fits him well. Theo is on the lawn, too, and he shakes their hands heartily. A bar is set up in the shade of the monkey puzzle tree. Theo takes orders from the man in the overcoat—Phaedon—from work and Stathis from the village. Tasia arrives in a gown of gold, her hair threaded with diamonds. Theo flicks and spins the bottles in the air, round behind his back, turns to catch them, balances them on the ends of his fingers, and with a sudden flip and catch, he pours cocktails with great panache. Tasia says nothing, but her smile is broad and her fingers linger on his as he passes her a glass. Some of the drink spills over her fingers. She licks them slowly and then trails the remaining moisture down his cheek.

‘Oh, what? Off. Get off.’ Theo pushes the Bob the dog’s wet tongue from his face. The dog bolts and runs out of Theo’s front door. He must have left it open. He crawls to his knees and levers himself back onto the sofa. With these late nights, he is going to have to wake up later to get enough sleep. He feels exhausted.

May - November, Theo turns 41.

The spring warmth turns into the thick heat of summer, the arrival of which is accompanied by the cicadas rasping their incessant love song day and night. Theo’s limbs respond reluctantly as he walks to work with the setting sun. He needs new clothes for the change of season, he must at least buy a new shirt sometime soon. The cool relief that comes with the evening is negated by the number of people in the bar each night, and the next two weeks pass seamlessly from heat-filled day to heat-filled night.

The first weekend he is too tired from the late nights at the bar to even think about paying a visit to see Tasia, instead he spends the day on the sofa sleeping in the shade of the trees on the balcony. Somewhere into the second week his life starts to take on a routine and the dark of the bar seems to impregnate his core, the stench of stale smoke hovering around him like an aura, the dirt of the place imbedding itself into his hair. No matter how often he showers he never feels clean and he finds he cannot face Tasia. Instead be promises himself he will buy new clothes and scented soap and go the following weekend.

At work Dimitri sheds his long coat and looks like a waiter in his clean white shirt and suit trousers. His pudgy face and lifeless eyes are in stark contrast with the business nature his clothes imply. Makis remains in his music booth, and Jimmy is less friendly as the days pass. Theo tries to manoeuvre working alongside Jimmy on the main bar when new models are brought in to attract attention, as this means there is little trade at the small side bar. Jimmy tries to discourage him, which is not surprising as he has discovered that the girls who come and go so quickly are usually sacked by Jimmy for, allegedly, pocketing money. This is Jimmy’s insurance policy if Dimitri thinks the till is down, but it is a scam he cannot pull on Theo, and although Jimmy hired him, he does not have the authority to sack him.

With Theo alongside him, the amount Jimmy can cream off is vastly reduced.

‘Have we got a new model coming in tonight?’ Theo asks Jimmy, who is filling bottles behind the curtain.

‘
No, don’t think so,’ Jimmy calls, coming out with three full bottles, crunching them on invisible dirt on the streaky glass shelves. Scooping up a tumbler, he says, ‘Want one?’

‘
No thanks,’ Theo replies and picks up a beer bottle. ‘Watch this.’ He throws it and it twists and turns in mid-air, and he catches it behind his back.

‘
You’re getting quite handy. You going for a job down by the beach, or are you after my job?’ His eyes grow wide and anxious as he waits for the answer, his fist clenching.

‘
Just messing about,’ Theo says.

‘
I like it. Do it again.’ Neither of them heard Dimitri come in.

‘
Oh, okay.’ Theo picks up another bottle and tries the two-bottle pass he almost got the hang of this morning over his bed. He catches them both, his frizzy mop bouncing to the bottles’ rhythm.

‘
Good one, man.’ Jimmy tries to sound enthusiastic as he sips his whiskey.

‘
Been practising a bit,’ Theo says, putting the bottles down to go to the small bar. Better keep an eye on Jimmy before he gets stabbed in the back by him.

‘
You know what.’ Dimitri thumps a retaining hand on Theo’s chest. ‘Why don’t you stay here on this bar, throw a few bottles. Jimmy can handle the little bar. Can’t you, Jimmy?’ The look on Jimmy’s face turns from surprise to thunder.

‘
But it’s Friday night. Busy night to let Theo try his skills,’ Jimmy defends, taking another drink. His brow drops and his eyes narrow.

‘
Oh, I’ll be alright,’ Theo hears himself say. He coughs and rubs his hand across his mouth, briefly glancing at Jimmy before returning his gaze to the floor.

‘
Yeah, he’ll be fine.’ Dimitri looks at Jimmy who, throwing his tea-towel over his shoulder with disgust, saunters from behind the bar and reluctantly takes himself across the floor to the small bar, his boot heels scuffing the rough wood as he goes.

Dimitri talks to Theo in the manner he usually does each evening to Jimmy, about his day, who he lunched with, the important people he met. He tells Theo he has a degree in Human Psychology, which makes Theo look twice. He just does not see enough intelligence in the man
’s face to believe him. After this, he mentions the mafia in an offhand way, and Theo tunes out until the bar starts filling. He tosses a few bottles for a pretty girl, and this gains him a lot of attention. He can see Jimmy through the throng, his upper lip curling as he watches from afar. Dimitri looks smug and nods contentedly before leaving the bar.

As the evening winds on, Theo sees a girl who, for a heart-stopping moment, he thinks is Tasia. But this girl has no mole on her jawline and when she turns to face him, he can see she is nothing like Tasia. He pictures the way Tasia
’s fingers would linger on the saucer, her image so familiar, so real, so safe somehow, compared to the people he has met since. Though the baker and his wife are nice enough. He repeats to himself that he will visit Tasia this weekend, make his feelings clear. After all, he has the flat and the job now. Maybe it is time to seek out a wife. He shifts his weight to his other foot, shaking out his trousers.

Jimmy is staring at him hard from across the room, and there
’s a worried look in his eyes. Of course—takings on the long bar will shoot up, and Dimitri will ask questions. Theo holds Jimmy’s job in his hands. He sees that he must skim something off for Jimmy’s sake. Athens is a dog-eat-dog world, he has learnt the hard way. But he will not skim half. Jimmy is too greedy.

Serving two vodkas and a beer, he rings up all but a third of the price. He keeps this up for a while, and his pockets begin to bulge to the point where he worries it is noticeable. He slips behind the curtain in the back room to find somewhere to stash his wad of money. Rearranging the empty bottles to find a good hiding place, he lifts one bottle that feels heavier than the others. He shakes it to gauge the contents, and a coil of notes streams from the bottom, which turns out to be carefully severed. Theo checks behind him, to make sure the curtain is drawn, and looks in amazement as the notes spill onto the floor. They can only be Jimmy
’s. He coils them quickly, curls his own on top, and stuffs them back into the doctored bottle. Just in case, he swaps its position with one in a crate of empties and, wiping sweat from his brow, he walks back into the bar, trying to appear cool.

The last customers begin to drift away, the music is switched off, and Theo
’s ears ring in the silence. It is a late one, even for a Friday. Theo has been nibbling peanuts for the last hour—he is tired, hungry, and thirsty.

‘
So what did we make?’ Dimitri leans over the bar and rings open the till. He pulls the notes out and deftly counts them, getting quicker as he goes. The last one sticks to the bar top, swimming in a pool of beer. He counts again, his face turning red. Theo busies himself drying glasses. What if Jimmy doesn’t take half all night? What if he only takes half in the first hour? The till will be down. He swallows hard.

‘
Jimmy, get over here,’ Dimitri grunts. ‘Theo, pour me a whiskey.’

‘
Ice?’ Theo’s voice comes out high pitched; he is not sure Dimitri heard.

Jimmy is white.
‘I’ll have one too. No ice for me, either.’

‘
Explain,’ Dimitri says taking his whiskey, looking hard at Theo and then at Jimmy, and it’s unclear if he is addressing one or both of them. Theo judges it best not to say anything unless he has to. Dimitri sips. Jimmy’s mouth opens and closes several times. He swills his whiskey around the glass before draining it in one, putting it back on the counter and pushing it toward Theo for a refill.

Theo reaches out to take it, noiselessly.

Dimitri slams his hand on the counter behind the glass, nearly crushing Theo’s fingers. With a huge arc, he sweeps the glass off the bar. It spins in a prism of light across the room before smashing just in front of the bar opposite, the floor glittering with pieces.

Jimmy has frozen, his eyes wide. Theo stealthily retracts his hand, trying not to draw attention to himself.

Slowly, Dimitri pulls from his pocket the block of notes he has just counted. He hands them to Jimmy, whose eyes grow even wider. Theo licks his lips. He needs a drink too, now.

‘
Pour yourself one, Theo.’ Dimitri catches his action from the corner of his eye. Theo takes a clean glass and pours a good measure. The burn at the back of his throat eases the knots from his shoulders. They drop, and he exhales.

Dimitri is still holding out the block of cash to Jimmy.

‘Go on, take it.’ Dimitri’s voice is quiet and low, a growl.

Jimmy doesn
’t move.

Dimitri takes the smallest step towards him, leans his face close to Jimmy
’s ear, and annunciates very slowly. ‘Take it and count it.’

Jimmy
’s hand shakes, but he takes the cash. Resting it on the bar, his fingers and thumbs peel through, his lips moving as he goes. He gets to the last one and stops abruptly.

‘
Did you miscount? Would you like to count again?’ Dimitri’s voice is soft, feigning concern. Jimmy shakes his head and offers the money back. ‘Explain.’ The word hisses out, flying spittle highlighted by the dim bulb behind Dimitri’s head. His saliva remains thick on his bottom lip, his eyes bulging, his face red.

Jimmy looks at Theo. Theo looks at the bottom of his glass and pours another. He could have saved Jimmy from this if he had taken half. He chose not to, pretending that made him a better person than Jimmy. But now? Now, whatever happens to Jimmy will be his fault. He is not better than Jimmy; perhaps he is worse. Tipping the second whiskey down his throat makes him cough.

Jimmy stammers out, ‘I, er, umm. It isn’t, well …’ He is shaking all over.

‘
Do I have to call some friends to get what is mine back?’ Dimitri asks, the same hissing sound. Jimmy looks left and right and, with a sudden twist, runs as fast as he can from the bar. Dimitri watches him go.

‘
Fuck him. Pour me another drink and tell me how you like being my new manager.’ Dimitri’s mood switches and he turns with a smile.

Theo gulps another whiskey and looks over the rim of the glass. Part of him, somewhere deep inside, is horrified at what he has knowingly brought about, but on the face of it, he chinks glasses and drinks to his new position.

‘
They say luck comes in threes,’ he tells the Bob the dog the next morning as he carries up a small table and wooden chair he has found on the street. The dog follows him upstairs and is brave enough to go in, sniffing at the floor.

‘
There. What do you think?’ He puts the furniture on the balcony. Bob sniffs around the bottom of the sofa and jumps up onto it. ‘No you don’t. Off.’ But the dog resists and as he pulls him off by the collar, the cushion slides and money spills onto the floor.

Dimitri gave Theo the keys the night before and told him to lock up. He retrieved the money from the bottomless bottle and spread it as evenly as he could with the rest of his savings, but it is clear now that he needs a better hiding place or a bank account even, like his Baba.

Staring at the floor he rocks ever so slightly backwards and forwards as he thinks. Banks are for serious adults running proper businesses, not make-do bar tenders creaming off the top. Besides this is not money he really wants anyone to know about. He sits on the floor amongst the scattered bank notes.

‘
You know what, Bob? I have a dug myself a pit that I can’t get out of. Unless I walk away from my job. If I had taken half, Jimmy would still be there. If I had taken none, I could be honest, but I did neither and now I am destined to take a third every day so as not to be caught.’ The dog ignores him and settles its head on its paws. Theo ruffles its coat. ‘No, I do not want to think about it, either. Look, come see what I can do.’ The dog follows him into the bedroom, where he practises spinning and catching bottles. He pours himself a whiskey, and another.

Over the last few days, a routine has developed—sleeping till late afternoon. With his odd hours, Theo sees little of the man downstairs who seems to do all his chores in the morning. He still feels awkward when he sees Aikaterina sweeping the paths or hanging out her rugs and stiffly tries to make polite conversation. Sometimes he avoids her, which is easier than trying to find the words to right his earlier misconduct. He is uncomfortable about quite a few areas of his life at the moment, but the whiskey is helping. The weekend comes and goes unnoticed as one day is like the next, and sleep and whiskey take precedent.

A week later, he is lazing on his sofa when he thinks of Tasia and realises he has still not been to see her. But to go now would involve shaving and changing. He pours a whiskey instead. He will go next weekend without fail.

The Gypsy is regularly on the roof, judging by the washing that comes and goes. When he sees her, Theo tries to talk to her, but she answers with few words and he has no idea what to say. She seems to have a great number of children and once, Theo asks her if there are any twins, which would account for her having so many children so young. She laughs.