So much for being smothered in love and sympathy over the loss of my dream job. I don’t have time to rescue Gran, who I know will most certainly notneedany rescuing, unless it’s from her own family. I need to find another job and fast. Zero-bed apartments in LA do not come cheap. And book scout jobs are almost impossible to find. Yet now I’m being forced on a mercy mission. This is so typical of my family and our dynamic.
‘I can’t go to Santorini. I have a life here, you know.’ OK that’s a lie but I’m working on it (if that includes reading about fictional people with complex relationship woes). ‘Gran’s a formidable woman. I don’t get why you insist on intruding into her life like this.’
‘Please. I’ll pay for your flight. It’s the least I can do,’ Mom says. ‘Gran’s too old to be running around a sun-drenched bookshop, pandering to tourists. You know what her knees are like.’
Wait, what? ‘A bookshop?’
‘Keep up, Evie!’ Posy says, exasperation in her voice. ‘Gran’s new husband has a little bookshop perched on some cliff, which she’s apparently spent the last month renovating. Picture her up on a ladder painting. She’s one step away from a fall that will break her hip – or worse, her head! Although, I suppose it could knock some sense into that melon of hers …’
Well, well, well. Perhaps I could relinquish my frightfully expensive zero-bed apartment lease and stay with Gran for a bit. There could be worse places to cool my heels than a sun-drenched clifftop bookshop on a Greek island while I figure out what to do about my job prospects. ‘Book me a ticket then, Mom. I’ll go and see what all the fuss is about.’
Chapter 3
I arrive in Santorini having lost all track of time, head fuzzy from the last-minute scramble of packing up my LA life and getting on a plane in the next breath. I’m a knot of anxiety, but I’m hoping that’ll ease when I see my gran in the flesh.
Suitcase in hand, I spot a driver holding a sign bearing my name – Mom to the rescue, planning my journey with military precision. Handy when you’re not the most adventurous traveller, like myself.
Once it’s obvious I don’t speak Greek, he motions for me to follow him. We find the car and get going. There’s no time to check out the view because we move like the speed of light and everything is a supersonic blur.
The driver doesn’t say much, which is probably a good thing because I’m white-knuckled as he takes each bend as if he’s a rally car driver, all the while gazing at the azure of the sea and not the road itself. I picture my imminent death, kamikazeing into the deep blue as the car explodes, because my demise wouldn’t be cinematic without a fireball of some sort. And if I’m to die young, it better be bloody spectacular.
We pass a sign announcing the upcoming Megalochori traditional village. At least that’s what I hope it says as we hurtle past. What I’ve learned from my very hasty research into Gran’s latest choice of abode is that Megalochori is located on the south-west side of the island, about seven kilometres from Fira, the capital of Santorini. It’s a winemaking region, which might come in handy after this car ride of doom.
What feels like a lifetime later, he pulls to a stop, gravel crunching and dust rising. No matter that I’m wearing white jeans, I grab my suitcase and launch myself at the volcanic-y soil, never happier to see ground beneath my feet than I am right this moment.
‘Thank you, Aphrodite! Persephone! Artemis! All the goddesses. I’M ALIVE!’ The tension leaves my body with a whoosh. It’s not often you have a second chance at life and arriving here not dead is a huge adrenaline rush after that nail-biter of a ride.
Without so much as a goodbye, the driver is up on two wheels as he burns rubber on his way back to wherever nightmares are made.
Standing up, I pat myself down, thrilled that every appendage is where it’s meant to be. My self-analysis is interrupted by a chorus of two very animated voices. Their heated argument sounds incongruous in a place where the rocky cliffs fall away to the breathtaking blue of the Aegean Sea.
I walk towards the noise, recognising Gran’s strident voice shouting Greek words like bullets. Since when did Gran learn another language? She is a woman of many talents, that’s for sure. The wily fox probably picked it up easily over the last month or so.
By a blinding-white building, I spot her, dressed fabulously in a colourful caftan, wearing a full face of make-up and blingy OTT jewellery. She’s flamboyant, like a bird of paradise, which is why everyone flocks to her.
Inexplicably, the younger guy standing opposite her doesn’t seem to be under her spell. Curious. In fact, he looks downright irritated from the way he’s gesticulating and scrubbing his face as if she’s pushed his very last button.
A thought hits.Please don’t let that be her husband and this is some sort of lover’s tiff!He’s got to be my age, or a touch older, and it would be grossly unfair if this eighty-three-year-old is pulling the likes of him when I can’t even get my fictional book boyfriends to commit.
Gran takes control of the conversation again and goes ballistic. I’m no expert on the language of Greece but part of me wonders if she’s partaking in a bit of coinage. Are they in fact words, or just an angry mix of letters set to bamboozle him? Did I mention she can be crafty when she wants to be? Still, she’s my gran and I must protect her at all costs. Posy’s advice springs to mind:Be fierce with a capital F.
While confrontation is not my thing, I’ve been sent on a mission, and I am nothing if not a steadfast comrade. You want fierce, you’ve got fierce, even if my knees knock while doing so. But just how to convey this to Mr Scrub-his-face when I don’t speak the language?
Look ferocious? Make a growling sound! A two-handed chest-push. No, it would be just my luck he’d fall off the cliff and land in a bloody mess, appendages akimbo and then we’d have to hide the body. Not worth the hassle.
I go for the storming-over, hands-on-hips angle. ‘Excuse me!How dare you speak to this little old lady in such a manner. You should be ashamed of yourself!’
He turns to me; confusion slips over his features before he breaks into a slow smile. Did he not translate my meaning from the velocity of that delivery? I widen my baby blues and channel a fierceness from within, but it doesn’t quite surface. He’s sort of disarming what with his Greek god looks and soulful seductive eyes. If he is Gran’s husband, she has really hit the jackpot, the lucky thing.
Honestly, all her husbands have been stunners. Well, except my own granddad, husband numero uno, who had the unfortunate luck of being born with a face that looked like he’d had an altercation with a pot of hot soup. According to Gran he was a squat, square man with nary a happy bone in his body. I can’t say for sure since I never met him myself. Tragically, he died young, after a mix-up with some antifreeze.
‘Evie! What on earth—’ Gran says, her face softening as she takes me in for a hug. ‘I take it the Fun Police heard about the arrest and they’ve sent you to do their bidding?’
‘That they did,’ I confirm. ‘They know about the whole abandoning the cruise ship thing. The quickie marriage. Something about you up a ladder and a broken hip, the list goes on. Coincidentally, I was made redundant – so here I am!’
Gran gives my shoulders a squeeze. ‘I’m sorry about your job, darling, but I’m not sorry that you’re here.’
The Greek god clears his throat, probably in readiness to start yelling again. I’d almost forgotten about him. He hasn’t even apologised to her yet.
