The Slap (43 page)

Thanassis lit his cigarette. Sotiris asked him for one.

‘You still smoke?’

‘Once or twice a year. Irini will nag at me all night.’

‘You’re lucky. You’ve got someone to look after you.’

Thanassis inhaled deeply, he was looking out to the vegetable garden in the darkness. In the centre of the yard was a fine, sturdy lemon tree, now barren. But there would be plenty of fruit in spring. It was clearly a strong tree. Manolis followed his gaze. Thimios had always been good with the earth. He’d planted tomato vines when they lived together, and every year the tomatoes would be plentiful and plump.

Manolis looked at the two old men, smoking silently on the verandah. Was it possible that the last time they had been together was at that filthy brothel in Victoria Street, so damn drunk that he remembered he could not get it up? He had ended up sucking on the whore’s tits, pulling his shameful half-erect cock to a pathetic small splatter of a climax. There had undoubtedly been dances, weddings, baptisms afterwards when they had met up, but it was that night that claimed any stake in his memory. He smiled to himself. They had been studs then, confident, virile, strong. They had been lads,
palikaria
. Now they were all dying. Maybe not ill yet, but death had begun, had started tightening its inexorable grip.

‘So, what’s it like being a bachelor, Arthur? You recommend it?’

At first they thought Thanassis wouldn’t answer. He was still peering out into the darkness of the yard. But he turned, his back against the fence, and smiled ruefully at Sotiris. ‘Lonely. It’s lonely.’ He sucked on his cigarette. ‘But I’ve got myself a Filipina girl. Antoinetta. She’s a nice girl.’

Manolis was shocked. And jealous. You’re cruel, God, you’re cruel. I am destined to always be envious of this man.

‘How old is she?’ Sotiris looked dubious.

‘Forty-eight.’ Thanassis laughed out loud, delighting in his friend’s surprise and discomfort. ‘I don’t live with her, of course, my children would put me in a mental asylum.’ His voice was suddenly bitter. ‘Not because they care about my mental health—because they’d be worried she’d get some of my money.’ He scrubbed the end of his cigarette against the wood and threw it, high, with determined aim; it landed over the neighbour’s fence. ‘They don’t have to worry. She’s not in the will.’

‘How long have you known her?’ Manolis’s voice was a whisper.

‘Ten years. She’s a good woman, I tell you. She has two children herself. The boy is a man now. The girl turns eighteen this year. They’re good kids. Normal people, not fucking doctors or lawyers or cocksuckers like our spoilt children. Just normal, hard-working, good people. To tell you the truth, they’re the ones who deserve my money.’

Sotiris put a warning hand on Thanassis’s shoulder. ‘Arthur, listen to me, you can’t deny your children your money. They’re your blood.’

Thanassis pushed the old man’s hand away. ‘Do you think I don’t fucking know that?’ He groped for another cigarette from his pocket and lit it. He blew out the first puff of smoke and continued. ‘I’ve opened up an account for Antoinetta, I put money in there from time to time. My kids don’t know. No reason to find out when I go. Anyway, they’ll have my savings, they’ll have my house. They’re fine. Like all our kids, they’ll be fine. They haven’t had to work for any of it but they’ll be fine.’

What can I say, thought Manolis? He screwed up his nose. The whiff of cigarette smoke was vile. What can I say? He’s right, isn’t he?

Sotiris had finished his cigarette and was leaning over the verandah. He turned around and looked at them. ‘Arthur, you’re probably the only one of us left who still gets the opportunity to fuck. I wouldn’t complain if I were you.’

The men broke out into laughter.

Thanassis seemed suddenly sober. ‘How long has it been since I’ve been with you, you damn cocksuckers, you fucking pair of demons? How long? Why? Why did we drift apart?’

‘Life is like that.’

‘Why is life like that, Sotiri?’

‘It just is.’

‘That’s no answer.’

‘We just got lazy. We just got too comfortable and too lazy. That’s what happened.’

Sotiris grinned. ‘That’s right, eh, Thanassi. Manoli was always the philosopher. He had a theory for everything.’

Thanassis was smiling. ‘You’re right, Manoli. We got fat and lazy.’ He put his arm around his old friend. Manolis felt its weight, its solidity. Thanassis had not weakened yet. Soon, but not yet.

‘You were the philosopher. You and Dimitri Portokaliou. We couldn’t get you to shut up.’

Thanassis’s arms felt tight around his neck. Manolis shrugged off his grip. His head felt thick. How could he forget Dimitri? How could memory play such a foul trick on him? There had been Thanassis, Sotiris and Thimios. There had also been Dimitri. At the coffee house, at the dances, at the weddings, the baptisms. At the brothel. There had been five of them that night. Of course there had been five. Dimitri and Manolis had come across the world on the same ship and had moved in together when they first arrived in Melbourne. Was it 1961, the bedroom they shared in Scotchmer Street, the middle-aged, widowed Polish landlady, not good-looking, buck-toothed, but a great body, blonde, a real blonde, they had both fucked her. Dimitri, short, funny Dimitri with two years of high school education, his smattering of French, his pencil-thin moustache that he groomed every morning and every evening. He ended up a mechanic; he’d been too slight for factory work, hadn’t a machine nearly crushed him at GMH? It had terrified all of them. Where the fuck was Dimitri tonight? The shiver passed through his body. He gripped onto the verandah. Black death had just passed through him.

‘Where is Dimitri? And Georgia? Where are they?’

Sotiris and Thanassis looked at one another.

Death was tightening its grip on them all. One by one, they were like rabbits trying to evade the hunter’s rifle. There was no dignity in being human. Not at the end.

But Dimitri and Georgia Portokaliou were not dead. Thanassis answered him. ‘No one sees them anymore. You haven’t heard what happened to Yianni?’

Manolis tried to remember. The son, the one child. It had been feared that Georgia would die in childbirth. She had lost so much blood. Was that right? Koula would remember. And could she not have children again?

‘No, what happened?’

‘He was shot. Ten years ago. In the middle of broad fucking daylight. Outside his own home in Box Hill. A bullet in the head and the young man was dead.’

Manolis could not stop himself. He crossed himself three times. ‘Why?’

Thanassis said nothing.

‘Drugs,’ answered Sotiris.

‘We don’t know that.’

‘What else could it be, Thanassi?’

‘Money. Sex. It could be anything.’

Sotiris shook his head. ‘No. It was mafia, gangsters. It was organised. ’ He looked at Manolis. ‘You didn’t hear about it? It was in the papers.’

‘Maybe I was away. Maybe I was in Greece.’

‘Fuck it.’ Thanassis took another good aim and propelled another butt across the fence. ‘Whatever the damned reason, it’s a tragedy and one that no one deserves.’

Lost in their thoughts, the men wandered back into the house. All that Manolis could remember of Dimitri’s Yianni—Little Johnny, didn’t they all call him that?—was that he seemed always to have a smudge of dirt on his cheeks and hands; that boy loved to climb, he had been fast and agile. Hadn’t Ecttora once kicked a footy with such force that it had landed on the Italian’s roof? Hadn’t Little Johnny scrambled up the side of the house, swung himself over the eaves and climbed fearlessly up the steep, sloping tiles to grab the football which had miraculously come to rest on the one flat stretch of roof on the old house? Signora Uccello had come out screaming, first in fury, then in terror that Yianni might impale himself on her roof. Hadn’t that set off a cacophany of wails as more mothers came out to see what was happening? His own heart had stopped too. And wasn’t his own son open-mouthed, breathless, as he watched his friend reach the ball? The boy had grabbed the ball triumphantly in one hand and beamed down to his mate below. Hector! I got it. Hadn’t Ecttora then let out a desperate breath? Hadn’t he done the same? Hadn’t Signora Uccello started to swear at Yianni in Italian as he slid off the roof? Hadn’t Georgia come running up to her son, hadn’t she held him tight and then released him to bring her hand sharply across his face? The shocked boy had stared at his mother, his lip had started to bleed, and then he had dropped the footy and begun to howl. Manolis remembered Ecttora running behind him, cowering in fear. Don’t be scared, my boy, he had told him, you’re not in trouble. It had been an extraordinary feeling, his young son gripping tight to his trouser leg, finding sanctuary in his height and solidity and strength, protection from the hysterical wrath of the terrified women. So long ago, when he towered over his son. So long ago, little Johnny Portokaliou with smudges of dirt on his cheeks and a triumphant grin on his face. Now dead, long eaten by the slugs and maggots. That was evidence of God’s incomprehensible, monstrous cruelty. That he, Manolis, was alive, and that Little Johnny was dead.

‘Uncle?’

How long had he been staring at Athena’s face, but looking through her into the past? How long had she been waiting for an answer from him? He came to, realised that the whole room had stopped talking, that everyone was looking at him. He was sitting in the chair, next to Thanassis as before.

‘For God’s sake, answer the girl,’ his wife said impatiently. ‘Where were you?’

‘Forgive me,’ he said quietly to the girl, pulling at his collar. He savagely loosened his tie and breathed in deeply. Still confused, flustered, he looked at the girl. ‘What did you ask me?’

‘Would you like a drink, Uncle?’

‘Another whisky.’

‘Manoli?’ Koula’s voice was a warning. He ignored it. He really craved a beer. Stupid useless rituals, all for the benefit of their malicious God.

Thanassis wrapped an arm around his friend’s shoulder. ‘We all get old, my Manoli, but don’t you dare go dotty on me.’

 

He was drunk by the time Koula rose, clutching her handbag, her face determined, brooking no argument.

‘Paraskevi, we have to go.’

The old woman shook her head furiously. ‘Stay—you can’t go.’ Paraskevi looked over to Manolis who was reminiscing with the men, laughing at an old joke from Stellio. ‘Mano, tell Koula that you have to stay.’

Manolis took one look at his wife and shook his head. She could not be convinced. Koula did not like to drive; she particularly did not like to drive at night. He would certainly not be forgiven for his drunkeness if he forced her to stay.

He rose from his chair. ‘We have to go.’

The farewell was a blur of hugs and kisses, of shaking hands, of promising to phone, to see one another. Athena showed them to the front door. In kissing the young girl’s cheek—the rejuvenating perfume of a young beautiful girl, this was intoxication, this was paradise, this was the only God worth knowing—he also remembered the occasion. Thimios was dead. He offered his condolences once more, but the words came out an incoherent jumble, from both the drink and his emotions. Athena waved them goodbye as Paraskevi walked them down the driveway. She was holding Koula’s hand.

‘We can’t lose one another again.’

‘I promise, we won’t.’

Paraskevi would not let go. ‘Koula, he was my everything, my sun in the day, my moon at night. I fear I will go crazy without him. I need you. I need you.’ Her last imploring words were lost in a sudden torrent of tears. Manolis watched the two women, now both crying, holding tight to each other. Slowly, reluctantly the old woman pulled herself away from Koula. She kissed Manolis on the cheek, wetting him with her tears.

‘Thimio loved you.’

I know. And I loved him. He knew that.

‘You must visit.’

‘We will.’

With a great effort, a stab of pain tearing through his knee, he climbed into the passenger seat of the car. Koula adjusted the mirrors, made her prayer, turned on the ignition. The car hesitantly reversed in the drive and turned into the street. With effort Manolis turned his head back to see Paraskevi receding, her hand still waving, looking old, weary, spent, out in the cold, in her funeral black.

 

The following morning he awoke from a dream of profound tranquility. He opened his eyes to the material world, a childlike smile on his face, his limbs, his bones feeling rested, youthful. He attempted to clutch onto the dream, force it into consciousness, but it eluded him. Thimios had come to him in his slumber; the night had been full of his old friend’s musical laughter. Paraskevi too had been in the dream, as had his wife. Koula had been young again, as they all had been. Her skin velvety, her body and breasts firm, as she had been when he first met her, when she had caused his eyes and his heart and his loins to tremble. Manolis stripped the sheet off himself. He was wearing flannel pyjamas, and he had been sweating. He released a shocked blasphemy: fuck Jesus. His cock was hard, upright, was poking through the slot in his pyjama bottoms. You old bastard, Thimio, are you reminding me of youth for the last time?

Koula was in the shower. Manolis shuffled down the hall and into the kitchen. Although they had found peace in the night, his old bones had not miraculously revived.

He grimaced as he bent down to find the
briki
; gently, he bent his knees, grabbed it, and then, clenching his teeth, forced himself quickly to stand upright. He released his breath and started to brew the coffee. He watched the thick lumps of chocolate coffee slowly dissolve into the water to form a thick black syrup. The warm peace of the dream had not yet deserted him. He had not forgotten that he’d buried a friend yesterday, that pain had not been displaced by the dream. But in being reminded of their shared past, and also of the inexorable finality of life, he found a renewal of his pleasure in the raw, coarse reality of being alive. Maybe that was why his cock had fought for one last stand. This vulgarity, this blood and flesh was life. Thimios had died; he too would soon be dead, God willing, as would Koula, as would Paraskevi, as would all of them. The suffering and the pain and the arguments and the mistakes of the past did not matter. In the end, they did not matter. Was that what the dream had shown him? Manolis was glad that there was no outstanding hatred, resentment or feud that he would take to the grave with him. He doubted Thimios had either, he was not that kind of man. Regrets, of course, only an imbecile did not have regrets. Regrets, some shame, a little guilt. But they had all done the best they could, they had raised their children well, educated them, housed them, made them safe and secure. They had all been good people. Death was never welcome but He always came. It was only to be truly lamented when He took the young, those neither prepared nor deserving of it. Then death was cruel. Manolis watched the foam rise in the
briki
and he turned off the flame.