Black Greek Coffee by Konstantina Sozou-Kyrkou

Author:Konstantina Sozou-Kyrkou
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781784627058
Publisher: Troubador Publishing Ltd

The Scorpion Fish

Stavroula wipes the wooden bench clean with a paper tissue and straightens her long, blue skirt at the back before she sits. She occupies half the bench as the back of the other half is strewn with bird droppings and squashed, overripe, brownish figs. The fig tree is towering above her, bright green-yellow leaves precariously latching onto the half-naked, grey twigs. The place around the bench is littered with leaves scattered on the floor like the pieces of a giant puzzle. She picks one up and smells it. The sweet aroma of melancholic autumn, the smell of change and decay fills her nostrils. She fingers its jagged edges, the gritty, paper-rough surface and traces along the sleek midrib and the smaller veins that stem from it, jutting out like the swollen veins on the back of a struggling man’s hands.

The park is refreshingly cool and peaceful this time of year, particularly in the mornings when most people are at work. Older people mainly amble here, grandparents swinging their toddler grandchildren at the playground, lonely people like her, smoking, flicking through a newspaper or feeding the pigeons. When she’s not working at the restaurant, she likes spending some time in the open, somewhere sunny and quiet, away from the greying walls of her tiny apartment that seem to be closing in on her, pressing her breathless. If she had children of her own, life would be so different now. She’d have a reason to exist. Too late now.

She takes her embroidery out of a plastic bag, unfolds it and lays it on her lap. It will be ready in a few days. The young couple stamped on it is already done. The purplish sunset surrounding them remains for it to be complete. Ready to be framed and hung on the living room wall opposite the sofa. She unpins the needle with the purple thread and starts cross stitching.

And then she sees him. Arm in arm with an old woman they stroll to the bench across from her. Stavroula’s heart races. God can’t be doing this to me, she thinks. The man lets go of the woman’s arm and sits, propping his walking stick against the bench. He’s wearing big black sunglasses and looks quite younger than his companion. Tall and wiry, with greying hair, he sits there with a stiff back and limbs, the lenses of his sunglasses steady, mirrors reflecting the space opposite him, reflecting Stavroula. He doesn’t turn to the woman beside him or show any interest in anything else around him. What if he’s Yannis, Stavroula shudders. He looks like him. But that’s not possible. Yannis lives in Halandri, the northern end of Athens and this is Alimos, in the south. It can’t be.

The woman senses they’re being watched and eyes Stavroula with curiosity. She quickly bends over her embroidery, stitching again.

Seeing him has stirred painful memories, which numb her veins with dread and guilt.

A white plastic bag with fish. That was what had united them in the first place.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.