Page 31 of Old Girls Go Greek
‘I haven’t done any,’ he replied with a grimace. ‘I’ve done a couple of sketches but that’s all. How about you?’
‘Not a thing,’ I admitted happily. ‘I’ve been having too much fun to settle to anything. It’s a long time since I’ve been away on holiday like this, and I’m making the most of it. I don’t think Jillian approves at all.’
‘No, probably not,’ he agreed.
I could almost hear Effie and Anita telling me to get on with it.
‘So how did you come to be here? You’re not from Lower Begley after all.’
He shrugged. ‘Someone saw something about it somewhere. Probably on social media. And said it sounded like what I needed. I’ll admit I didn’t realise there was going to be a group. It’s a long time since I’ve been on holiday too. What with one thing and another…’
What thing? And what was the other thing? And was it a male someone or female?
I decided not to push my luck; his expression had suddenly become just a bit guarded.
‘It’s certainly a beautiful place, and I like that the hotel is so simple and unsophisticated,’ I said. ‘I don’t like a lot of fussing around with the towels being folded into animals. I went on a cruise once where the steward left a towel monkey hanging in the wardrobe. I nearly fainted with the shock.’
He laughed. ‘And chocolate left on the pillow. You get into bed and there it is, and you have to clean your teeth again.’
‘I slept on one by mistake once, and in the morning it was all over the sheets and I had it stuck to the side of my face.’
‘I bet that looked attractive.’ He chuckled.
‘Not really. My ex-husband said I was a disaster and the staff would wonder what the heck I had been doing.’
‘You’re not a disaster, I think you’re fun,’ he said.
Well, that brought the conversation to a sudden halt, and for a moment both of us seemed a bit edgy, and he moved his cutlery about and I wriggled on my chair, so that one of the front chair legs sank deeper into the gravel. This meant I was leaning slightly to the right, and I had to plant my feet on the ground at a strange angle to steady myself. Perhaps I had congratulated myself too soon and trainers would have been a better choice after all.
Luckily at that moment the waiter returned with the wine, and close behind him was another with a vast metal pan ofpaellera. This meant there was a few minutes when we juggled with wine glasses, cutlery and plates until I couldn’t wait until we were left in peace to get on with it. I didn’t know about it being a meal for two; to me it looked like a family of four would have been quite happy to share.
China fingerbowls of water and a couple of cloth napkins were put down on the table a few minutes later followed by various implements and nutcrackers. Then the waiter did the sort of flourishing things waiters do with wine bottles and white napkins and poured some out for us to try.
‘Assyrtiko, beautiful wine. An excellent choice,’ he said as we did a bit of tasting and frowning and swirling.
At last we were left alone with the hot, metal dish filled with tiny, golden orzo pasta, various things like prawns, crab claws and mussels poking out, and the aroma of saffron and seafood was divine.
‘Go for it,’ Will said.
I dolloped a big spoonful onto my plate and started digging out the interesting bits. To be honest I wasn’t entirely sure how to deal with a lot of it. I decided to watch what he did and follow his lead. In the end it was quite easy, and everything was delicious, even the bits of octopus, which I really wasn’t sure about to start with.
The wine was going down extremely well too, and after a few minutes I began to feel more relaxed and even confident. This was going far better than I had ever imagined and the possible delights of Athena’s – where the vegetarian moussaka was apparently the best on the island according to Jillian – paled into insignificance as far as I was concerned.
I stopped trying to get information out of him, and we just chatted about light-hearted things. The weather, the island, a Netflix series we had both watched, what we were hoping to see at the ancient excavations the following day, and whether it would be possible to get a bus to the north of the island where there was a bigger town.
‘I’m so glad we had this,’ I said, washing my fingers in the china bowl, and unfortunately slopping some of the water over the table. ‘I can cross this off my bucket list with a smile.’
I took my napkin and mopped the water up as best I could, stretching over to his side of the table where the rivulet was threatening to dribble onto his trousers. The leg of my chair shifted a little more, and I moved my feet again for stability. I hoped he wouldn’t notice, but I was sitting very inelegantly, leaning forward on the edge of my chair, with my knees far apart and one of my beautiful new shoes completely buried in the dusty grit and gravel under my chair.
‘I had this in Rhodes once. It was good, but this is better,’ he said.
I felt unjustifiably proud to hear this; after all, I hadn’t cooked it. Never mind, we were sharing a lovely evening, and I hoped he was enjoying it as much as I was.
‘This is so much better than sitting at home watching television,’ I said. ‘There’s just nothing on at all that I want to watch these days. Perhaps a few cooking programmes, andStrictly. But most of the time it’s just people arguing with each other.’
He didn’t look at me but concentrated on washing his fingers and drying them carefully. He had nice hands too, strong and well kept.
‘What about dessert?’ he said at last when we both had to admit that thepaellerahad defeated us. There were just a few clumps of orzo left and a lot of bits of shell.
