She Wakes (6 page)

    “Don’t be silly.”

    “Silly? I woke and you were gone. I looked for you. I called you. I couldn’t find you. Anywhere.”

    “Now you’re being irritating.”

    “Huh?"

    “Look. We fell asleep. I woke up. You weren’t there. I had to find my own way back from the beach alone. And I was still a little drunk, too. I was angry. I’m not anymore.”

    “That’s it, then.”

    “What’s it?”

    “You were drunk.”

    “I said a little. You weren’t?”

    “Well, maybe some. Not enough to…”

    “Robert. Let’s not make a thing of it. I’ve long since forgiven you. I told you that!”

    “You have.”

    “Of course. The rest of it was lovely, wasn’t it?”

    “Yes it was.”

    “Well then.”

    

    

    He sat down on the sand. It’s some sort of silly game, he thought. And if she has to win it then I suppose she has to win it.

    He looked at her lying on her back, eyes closed against the sun, at the lovely easy nudity, and he couldn’t figure it. He felt the first uneasy stirrings of doubt about her.

    
I don’t like games,
he thought.

    
I hope she isn’t into that.

    Or it’s going to be a short relationship.

    

    

    Yet the rest of the day passed pleasantly.

    There was no more mention of the night before. The sun and sand worked on them and Dodgson relaxed again. They talked a little. She asked about his books and he told her. A serious and flawed first novel that had somehow after three long years found a publisher and which everyone-quite rightly in Dodgson’s estimation-ignored. Followed by a cynical commercial thriller that had found a home easily and, surprisingly, sold even fewer copies than the first book. He spoke of them without regret or anger.

    Which was something.

    

    

    “There are a few…perks, I guess you’d call them. I still have some of the advance money on the thriller for one thing. It got me here. And then I suppose there’s some cachet to being a published novelist. People figure you’re probably bright enough, possibly talented. So you’re accepted into circles you wouldn’t be, ordinarily. That’s sort of interesting for a while.”

    “Fashionable circles?”

    “Some, yes.”

    “You’re handsome, you know. Your looks can’t hurt you much either.”

    He shrugged.

    “Anyway, I accept you.”

    “Are you…fashionable?”

    “You mean am I rich. Obviously I’m fashionable.”

    “Obviously.”

    

    

    He wondered if she was rich. It wouldn’t surprise him. If so that would leave him the poor relation again. Michelle had private money and so did Danny-he’d inherited his father’s pharmaceutical company. It ran itself, he said. Working it was hardly more than a hobby for him at the moment.

    He wondered if he gave a damn. He didn’t think so. He worried, sometimes, what would happen after the advance ran out. He doubted that there was another book left in him-except for fee one about Margot.

    And he wasn’t writing that one, not ever.

    He’d probably end up teaching.

    And for a moment the depression was on him again, perched like a vulture. What was the saying? Depression was nothing but anger without urgency.

    
You’re a bore,
he thought.
Cut it out.

    He lay back on the sand and baked awhile and his depression lifted. Here, eventually, it always did. So much of Greece was purely physical-it was his own particular brand of Zen. Oh, there were ruins, museums, monasteries. But Greece reached Dodgson through sun and sand and sea, through the senses, through good light eating and clean air, through women, through nude bodies and hot dry days and breezy nights, through the wine and liquor and the taste of clear fresh water. If there was struggle at all it was only for more of what was good-more comfort, more wine, more long cool nights.

    Even the smokes are good, he thought. They’d make you cough like hell in the long run-they were strong-but the sinuses drained. You could breathe with them.

    He lit one. Smoke drifted.

    They swam later and the sea was calm. He watched her dive and surface, the water rolling off her oiled naked body. She was beautiful. She swam and you could see the strength hidden in the slim graceful body, the strong shoulder muscles, the thighs, the long slender arms.

    He couldn’t keep up with her. He didn’t try.

    He lay back at the tideline and let the waves curl over his ankles and watched her.

    
She's a little strange,
he thought.
So what.
Maybe she’d get the message now that games were out for him. He hoped so.

    Seawater stung his eyes, trickling from his hair. He wiped them as he watched her dive again.

    
Time to towel off,
he thought. He got up and walked to the wicker mats. Behind him he heard her splashing. She swims like a seal does, he thought. Mostly underwater. He dried his hair. He brushed the sand off his legs and sat down on the mat.

    At first he couldn’t see her. There was too much glare off the water.

    Then he did.

    And it felt as though his heart had stopped for a moment.

    She was floating.

    She floated faceup, buoyant with the high salt content of the water, calves and forearms dangling limp, arms and legs spread wide so that the waves lapped over them and tossed her gently. Her head lay back, the hair completely under, completely submerged. And for a moment he thought, Dead. She's dead. My god, she’s drowned herself. How long have I not been watching?

    Long enough.

    He got to his feet.
Impossible,
he thought.

    And then thought, no, it’s not.

    He started forward, moving fast. Then stopped.

    He saw her left hand rise and brush a long dark lock of hair off her cheek.

    It made him laugh. It wasn’t pleasant laughter.

    He stood there feeling foolish and relieved, feeling his heartbeat slow, the blood in his face recede. Dodgson, he thought, you’re an ass. He kicked at the sand in front of him. He watched her.

    Now that he knew she was okay it was very sexy, what she was doing out there. Very sexy indeed. The languor. The wide-open spread to the arms and legs-he could see the waves lap gently at her pubic hair. It glistened in the sun. She wore a look of submission to the elements, to the air and water. He could see her body rise and fall as she breathed, lungs and liquids keeping the heavy bones afloat. And he imagined what it felt like-the air wanning her upper body, buttocks, legs and genitals colder, caressed by the cold as the body sank and rose and sank again.

    He remembered what they called it now.

    Dead man’s float. Or was that face down?

    It was just a little too apt though and for a moment it frightened him again. He thought of Margot in a tubfull of bloody water.

    He looked at her and couldn't help it-he pictured her dead.

    Lelia dead.

    Sickeningly, the sight of her still aroused him.

    
You’re crazy,
he thought.

    She turned in the water and saw him watching, got to her feet and came splashing out to him on a run. He must have showed, though. Because she stopped then in front of him and said, “What? What’s the matter?”

    “Nothing.”

    “Come on. What?”

    She stared at him and then smiled. Comprehension lit her face. “You were worried about me, weren’t you?”

    “A little. For a second there.”

    She laughed. “You fool. That’s wonderful!”

    “You think so?”

    “Of course I do.” She touched his face. Her hand was cold and wet, clammy.

    “You thought I’d drowned out there.”

    “For a second or two, yes.”

    “That’s lovely. You’re a sweet man, Robert.”

    “Am I?”

    “Yes you are." She reached for the towel, dried her hair, draped it over her shoulder and looked at him.

    “But I think you worry too much, Robert. I don’t know what about. I know you’ve been hurt somehow and you’re very gloomy sometimes. It’s all right. It really is. I can take care of you.”

    She kissed him. He tasted salt.

    “Trust me. I can take care of you.”

    She kissed him again more deeply this time and there were people there close by and he felt an erection growing-but her mouth was warm and fine.

    And still in his imagination he saw her, floating.

    
Dead man’s float.

    The dead would float higher, wouldn't they? Gasses in the body. But the caress would be the same, the cold caress of seawater, the heat above.

    He returned her kiss.

    
Forget the dead,
he thought.

    
Forget whoever’s watching.
The erection was insistent now and her mouth was nearly everything.

    He took her hand and led her back into the water.

    

    

    What belonged to her was hers alone and now she could feel the sudden white-hot anger choking her inside like an imploding star, turning in upon itself, pulling into her silent rage the entire table full of them, even the entire island. Just to see him smiling at her, this other woman, this stranger. While she, Lelia, had given him her body twice now, in the sea, had bathed his prick in the slick of her.

    
Who is this bitch? How dare he?

    It was dinnertime and Lelia was a little angry.

    They sat at the taverna at the farthest edge of town, overlooking the bay. Danny, Michelle, the German girls, Lelia, Dodgson and now this other one. It was the best place in town for fish and seafood and Lelia saw that the cats knew it too, probably better than the tourists did. They prowled the floor searching for morsels of food, a bit of kalamari here, a flake of swordfish there. Over a dozen of them. She’d had to shove one away in order to pull out her chair and sit down, a mangy little tabby that looked at her hopefully now, creeping close. As though it knew.

    
Cats.

    
That’s what the bitch was saying.

    “Idon’t like ’em.”

    Sitting right next to him, a pretty green-eyed blonde. Dodgson listening as though he could care. As though he could actually give a damn.

    Her face was burning. She bathed it in a cold inner control.

    Billie. A man’s name. Billie Durant.
From England,
Danny said.

    “Cornwall, actually."

    
You little cunt.

    Lelia forced herself to talk to her.
Make her face you. Yes.

    “You have a problem with cats?”

    “Well, yes. When I was a child, you see, six or seven, I got between a pair of them. It was very stupid. They were fighting.”

    She laughed. Her teeth were very white and even.

    “Little bugger left me with some very pretty scars. Here…”

    She indicated a long curved line on her left calf. A good calf, thought Lelia, golden brown. No doubt she was a real blonde too.

    “…and here.”

    There were two smaller scars at her collarbone.

    “And here.” She poked at her thin blue dress just above the left breast. She laughed again.

    “Climbed me like a bloody tree.”

    “Could we see that last one up close, please?” Danny said.

    “You’re lucky,” Dodgson said. He pointed to the scars at her collarbone. He was right, of course. They were only inches from the jugular.

    “I suppose I am. They had to pull her off me, you see. I still don’t care for cats much.”

    
Noted,
thought Lelia. The tabby at her feet nudged her ankle with a dirty wet pink nose.

    “You must be…uncomfortable,” she said. She swept the cats with her gaze and then fixed upon the girl, who met and held her eyes.

    “A little. Perhaps just a little.”

    There was just enough reserve in her voice so that Lelia knew the girl had heard her, had heard subtext as well as text and was resolved to tough it out. All right. Dare me, she thought.

    “That’s a shame,” she said.

    And hugged her rage like a lover.

    

    

    They had moved from cats to accidents to murder. Their conversation had. In this case it was not an inappropriate progression.

    Billie thought that Dodgson was handsome and rather nice too and might have been wholly glad that Danny’d found her on the beach and introduced her to his friend were he not so obviously a previously claimed territory. But of course he was and that was that. She had no intention of moving in on someone else’s man. It was not her style at all.

    She wished someone would tell that to Lelia.

    
If looks could kill…
she thought.

    But she also had to wonder why he was there with her. The woman was beautiful, certainly. But such possessiveness! Such high-handedness! The woman had been jealous as a cat the moment she sat down.

    He didn’t seem the sort to put up with it.

    And perhaps he wasn’t.

    Their talk had taken a fairly unpleasant turn at the moment and Dodgson was looking at her with less than indulgence.