Her mother says to come home. Insists it would be best, for whom, Elisabeth isn’t quite sure. Without a doubt, it won’t be for her. Her parent’s house is not good grieving ground. The endless judgments of her parenting, the constant little digs she’d have to endure for ‘following’ Jack to Israel, and then having a child here, and staying. Gust of wind comes off the Med and whips the U.S. and Israeli flags fluttering half-staff on separate poles in front of the Hilton several block from her flat. Four soldiers were killed in a suicide bombing yesterday. Just another day in Israel.
Going home might be better for Cameron. Having grandma and grandpa fuss over him could compensate, even minimally, for not having his father anymore. But grandma is sure to make her life Hellish, however unwittingly, and that won’t be good for mommy. If she’s sad now, she can’t imagine how miserable she’d be within a few short days of being there. And ultimately that wouldn’t be good for Cameron. No. Going back to L.A., running back to her family is not an option.
She’d given thirty days notice to Helen and Clive over three weeks ago. She and Cameron have to be out because Helen arranged for Clive’s cousin to move in at the end of the month. They were all very sympathetic when Jack was killed, but seemed hardened to such events. How is that possible? Her mother is right. It is simply unfathomable how losing loved ones through terrorism could ever become part of the norm.
Every day for the past six weeks, Elisabeth goes up to the sundeck during Cameron’s afternoon nap, stares out across Tel Aviv, her home for the last five years, affirming it’s time to leave. She scours maps, drilling down to street level and virtually driving cities and suburbs in the States and Europe, searching for some place that feels right. Safe. Money’s not an issue. Between the two of them, they’d put away a couple million, and that doesn’t even include Jack’s life insurance through the AP. The world is my oyster, though there is no joy in this cliché. She wants to crawl inside and close the shell. What difference does it make where she goes? Every place is like every other place without Jack.
Almost dark by the time she puts on her khaki’s and the gray cashmere sweater Cameron likes the feel of, puts him in the baby carrier, and buries his head between her breasts for safety. She ties her hair back and tries to become transparent as she walks down Ben Yehuda to get a falafel, trying to ignore that they’re about a million calories and she still needs to drop twenty pounds. She avoids eye contact, but notices everyone in Muslim garb.
Elisabeth hates herself like this.
She absolutely has to get out of here. Jack haunts every street in the city. And she feels scared a lot now. Israel has always been a dangerous place, only now, since Jack was killed, she sees murderers everywhere, on the face of every Palestinian, in the eyes of every Muslim child. She really has to leave as soon as possible.
Four doors down from the sandwich shop she notices the travel agency and goes in.
“What is the first flight out of Israel in the morning?”
The agent sits in front of her flat screen monitor, dark-skinned, plump, mid-fifties. “To what destination do you wish to travel?” Arab or Israeli—it’s impossible to tell, but she’s definitely native born. Her accent is thick, and of the area.
“Anywhere. I just want to get out of here.”
She seems unfazed by my desperate need to escape this place. “How many will be flying?”
“Just me and my one year old son. Do I need a separate seat for him, or can he sit in my lap?” The thought of putting Cameron in the car seat carrier next to her leaves her cold. Elisabeth needs to be holding him.
“You may hold your son.” The woman looks at her with the most sympathetic expression she’s gotten since Jack was killed. The agent focuses on her monitor and taps on her keyboard. “The first flight that has available seating is to Athens, Greece. It departs Ben Gurion airport at 8:45a.m. and arrives in Athens at 9:40a.m. Will that do?”
Elisabeth has been to Greece only once before, attended an art history extension program at an international college the summer of her junior year. “That’ll do.”
She boxes her portfolios and various personal treasures back at the flat that evening then gives them to Clive to mail to her parents. She leaves everything else she can’t send or carry to Clive’s cousin. When all is packed, and Cameron is down for the night, Elisabeth goes to the roof deck, stares out at the city lights, recalling her years with Jack here, silently saying goodbye to both, then sits in the lounge chair for the last time, and grieves.
Next morning she and Cameron are on their way to Athens. Cameron clings to her, wraps his little arms tight around her neck from the moment the engines start through lift off. Elisabeth strokes his head, rubs his back slowly, assures him they’re safe. She points out the window at the puffy clouds, the blue sea below, picking out islands and ships with excitement until Cameron releases her, puts his tiny hands on the window, presses his face to the small glass and stares out. All the way across the Mediterranean he’s captivated, mesmerized, and again she sees Jack in his wide brown eyes. She has to peel him away from the window to strap him in her lap, and he throws an embarrassing fit as they descend through the thick brown sky, quelled only as they land in the ancient, smoggy city.
Being off-season, she’d been able to book a room from Israel the night before for two weeks at the Best Western in Kolonaki, the upscale neighborhood at the base of the Acropolis she lived in during her summer here. If not exactly fun, at least it’s engaging toting Cameron around Athens in the carrier. Jack isn’t in every cafe and on every street like in Israel, or so many other cities they’d traveled. Though they’d been together forever, he’d been doing an internship at the New York Times and did not join her in Greece that summer all those years back. Elisabeth tours her old school, the cafes she’d frequented, turns Cameron on to her favorite pizza place, miraculously still there, and shows her son the four story walk-up on Zenocratis Street she’d rented, what now feels like a lifetime ago.
Athens is more crowded, noisy and hectic than Elisabeth remembers. The people seem angrier too, probably since Austerity took effect. Riots in the streets every few months or so now. And while it’s still only bottle tossing and a lot of bravado, it keeps her on edge when she’s out and about, especially with Cam. Her only real peace since arriving is in the mornings, at the bakery across from the Best Western. Cameron munches on his moon cookie, and Elisabeth sips espresso and stares at the poster of the island of Corfu, taped to the cracked plaster wall. It shows a pristine white sandy beach with turquoise blending to ultra-violet water lapping a lazy, deserted shore. That’s where she needs to be.
Two days later she’s with Cameron on a ferry from Igoumenitsa to Kerkira, Corfu, and booked into the Hotel Omiros in Gouvia for the next two weeks. Spend the first day exploring Corfu City, and then every morning for the next week, Elisabeth and Cameron get on a bus and discover tiny old towns to resort villages nestled in the hills and along the mostly rocky beaches of the small island.
Corfu is everything the poster represented. Stunning, full of tree-covered hills rushing down to meet the crystal Ionian and Mediterranean seas. Everywhere they venture is fairly deserted. Tourists haven’t arrived yet. Even Corfu City is mostly locals who only speak Greek, of which Elisabeth doesn’t know a word. But it feels safe here, even familiar, though she’s not been to this island before. Everyone she encounters is gracious, polite, seemingly relaxed, like the Greece she remembers from her college days.
Beginning of their second week on paradise, Elisabeth discovers a real estate office that caters to Brits and Americans. Somehow, she lets the pleasant, golden skinned, mild-mannered English broker talk her into a three-month lease on a two bedroom villa. Photos he presents on his laptop show a charming, adobe ‘saltbox,’ with a Spanish tile roof, situated at the base of a hill bordering a sandy beach north of Agios Gordios, a small resort town on the west side of the island. Summer, he’ll get five times the seven hundred and fifty Euros he’s willing to off
er her per month, which is why the lease goes only to the end of May. Still, it’s better than the five hundred and twenty-six Euros a week she’s paying the Omiros. Three months of down time should be enough space to figure out what direction to take the next phase of her life, the one with a child, and the one without Jack.
The two-bedroom could easily pass for a one-bedroom by knocking down the dividing wall between the two small rooms. But the house is clean, wood floors throughout, the living room the largest in the house with a fireplace and a big picture window framing the exquisite ocean view, the pebbled beach only a couple hundred feet down the hill. The kitchen has a vintage GE fridge and an O'Keefe & Merritt porcelain stove and oven, and enough space to put a small table and Cameron’s high chair. Formica counter tops complete the 1950’s look. Best part—the house is nestled in a small grove of pines, a mile up the beach from town, with only a few other houses behind her up the hill and to the south dotting her stretch of beach, most of which are empty until summer. She can finally be with her son and her memories, without feeling afraid.
She wishes Jack could have seen this place. He’d have loved it. He loved the ocean, any ocean, and they’d explored many together. He kept promising her they’d escape to Avila or Pacific Grove when they were ready to settle down. And she wanted to believe him, so she stayed with him in Israel, gave birth to their son while he was reporting in Beirut, and spent the last year arguing about going home to the safety of the States.
She should have laid it on the line, left without him. He would never have gone for pizza that night if not for her. Jack didn’t even like pizza. Funny how things work out. Not ha ha funny.
She sits on the patio lounge chair feeding Cameron, staring out at the sea when she first sees him. It’s mid-day, the west winds blowing in the first hint of spring. The beach is deserted as usual, so it surprises her to see him walking along the water’s edge. He’s too far away to see in detail, the sea meeting the sand well over three hundred feet from the house, but she can tell he’s fairly tall and slender, and by his cadence, which is smooth and graceful, she’s pretty sure he isn’t an old man.
She leaves Cam on the patio with his Thomas trains and gets her Nikon from the kitchen counter, mounts the 500mm lens, and comes back out to the deck. She focuses on the beachcomber, turning the lens, sharpening his profile to clarity when he turns towards her.
He’s beautiful. Young, early twenties, maybe. Stunning, like he just walked off the cover of GQ.
She drops the camera to her side and moves behind the extending branches of the pine rooted just off the patio. She doubts he sees her. He doesn’t keep looking her way. He continues up the beach, and within a few minutes he’s out of sight, around the cliff that meets the sea several hundred yards to the north.
She smiles to herself as his picture replays in her head. Soft, sculpted features framed by dark, tousled hair. His image fades and Jack comes to mind. And guilt. Then comes the void and with it the tears. She sits on the pine bench that runs along part of the back of the house and cries. Cameron doesn’t notice, lost in his toys, lining them up contentedly. As it should be. He’s safe, the patio surrounded by a three foot high pine plank fence, and a locking metal gate at the step off the deck. Elisabeth sighs heavily, takes a quavering breath to stop crying and leaves Cam to his bliss as she goes inside to make them lunch. They spend the rest of the afternoon on the pebbled sand, digging for sand crabs, searching for shells, getting soaked by the waves. The entire time, Elisabeth keeps looking for Mr. Gorgeous to reappear. He doesn’t, but she can’t let go of the overwhelming sense that she and Cameron are being watched.
In the weeks that follow, she sees him every day, running at dawn down the beach while she sits on the back patio feeding her son. She assumes he knows she’s there, watching him, but he never so much as glances her way. He comes out of the north, running south along the water’s edge, fast, fluid, full force. He’s back two hours later, right after she puts Cameron down for his morning nap, and like clockwork, she sees him through the living room picture window, his pace more casual, his intensity spent. She usually wanders out to the porch in time to watch him climb the path up the cliff and disappear into the stone house up the hill behind hers.
At first, she imagines he’s some rock star on holiday from his wild and crazy life. But as the weeks turned into the next month and he’s still out there every day at dawn, she conjures many scenarios. She likes making up stories of who he is, and what he’s doing living alone in one of the few old stone houses on the hill. He may be a recluse hiding from the wicked world, like her. Elisabeth has no desire to find out the truth. The guessing game is entertaining. She isn’t interested in talking to anyone beyond Cameron, and the vendors at the Friday street market. She just isn’t ready.
A spring storm rages. Elisabeth thinks it’s the thunder that wakes Cameron when she hears him crying late one night in early April. She goes to check on him. He’s burning up. Panic replaces every other feeling. She’s in the middle of nowhere with no vehicle. No cell service this far from town. Phone’s out, a frequent occurrence she’d come to expect with storms. She gives him some infant Tylenol to bring the fever down, and holds him to her in front of the fireplace for almost an hour but the fever remains high.
Jack. I need you. I’m scared. Jack!
Horrific thoughts of losing her son run through her head as she sits there rocking him. Closest hospital she knows of is in Corfu City, and there’s no way for her to get there.
Think!
She’d seen the runner driving a Jeep around town on occasion. Maybe he can help her. She wraps Cameron in a woolen blanket, stuffs him into her zipped North Face jacket, and climbs up the dark, winding trail, slipping and sliding and praying he speaks English, until she finally arrives at his door ten minutes later.
It’s three in the morning, and Elisabeth’s surprised to find him awake. She sees him through the large picture window, sitting cross-legged in front of his fireplace, reading. She knocks and he comes and looks through the window, then opens the door.
“I’m sorry to disturb you at this hour, but my son is sick. He has a high fever, and I have to get him to the hospital. You’re the only one I’ve seen around here with a car, and I really need your help. I live just down the hill—”
“I know who you are. Come in. The car’s in front. You can go through the house.” His accent is British. “Let me get my keys. I’ll meet you out there.”
No furniture in the living room, only a sleeping bag on the floor by the fireplace. There are books everywhere though, piles of them against the walls, some strewn about the room, others stacked along the hallway. She holds Cameron to her, feeling his hot little body, her attention focused on his labored breathing. She goes through the front door and gets into the Jeep.
Keys jingle, and moments later he comes out to the carport, pulling on a worn black leather jacket. He’s even more stunning close up—tall, trim, his tight build obvious even under his loose cotton shirt and worn jeans. He gives her a quick, warm smile. His sculpted features and hint of stubble belie his baby face. He runs his hand through his soft dark hair. It falls to his shoulders and back in his striking green eyes. He glances at her, then Cameron as he gets behind the wheel, starts the engine, and they’re on their way.
“The closest twenty-four hour medical facility I know is in South Corfu. It’ll be quicker than trying to get to the city, and from what I’ve heard the staff there is good. How long has your son had a fever?”
“A few hours, I think. I tried to bring it down with Tylenol, but it didn’t go down as much as I’d like. He’s still very hot. I took his temperature before coming to you and it was 103.” Panic washes over her again, and she can’t hold back tears.
“Hey. Your son’s going to be just fine. I don’t think 103 is all that high for little kids. When did you give him the Tylenol?”
“About fifteen minutes before coming to you.”
“Give the Tylenol a bit
to take effect and he’ll cool down.” His accent is refined, his tone soft, reassuring. He holds the wheel with one huge hand at the top; his fingers wrap around it and back over his palm. His slender form is molded into the driver’s seat as if car and driver are one. He navigates the narrow, winding road quickly and with ease. Pine trees are whipping around in the strong winds. Branches are flying everywhere, but he manages to miss hitting anything.
She unwraps Cameron’s head and kisses his forehead, and he actually feels a little cooler. “I think the Tylenol is working. Feels like his fever is coming down.” She clings to her child, pushing back her panic. “I don’t know how to thank you.”
“No problem.”
“What’s your name?”
“James.”
“I’m Elisabeth. This is my son, Cameron.”
“How old is he?”
“Thirteen months.” She stares ahead, suddenly shamed to look at him. “I know it probably seems irresponsible of me bringing an infant out here to the middle of nowhere, alone. I did check the hospital facilities on the island before renting my place. I figured if anything came up I could always get a taxi from town if I really needed to. I didn’t know I couldn’t get a cell connection, or that the phone went out with every storm. Thanks a lot for your help. I really appreciate it.”
“Really, it’s not a problem. I’m sure your son is going to be just fine.”
They pull into the driveway of a pink, two-story building. Pink cloth banner attached to the upstairs railing announces Kérkyra Nótia MediGuard. All the lights are on when they go inside. A middle-aged, compact woman with short, white hair and piercing blue eyes wearing teal scrubs rises from behind a linoleum counter and immediately attends to them.