Page 71 of The Summer Show

I tried smiling but my lips wouldn’t work. “I need a T-shirt. My mom dumped me for a series of cults and all I got was this T-shirt and asthma.”

“That’s not true.”

“What do you mean?”

“You got more than asthma. You got empathy and strength.”

My gaze found an interesting pebble on the ground. “Being a decent person is easy. Anyone can do it with little to no effort. It takes way more energy to be a dirtbag. As for the strength, I don’t know. I don’t feel strong. I just get up and keep going because what else am I going to do? There are kids who need me, even though they don’t realize that they do.”

Nick reached back and grabbed the neck of his shirt and pulled it over his head in that irresistible, jaw-dropping way only men can achieve. He used the bottom to dab my cheeks and under my eyes. At some point during our conversation I had started crying without realizing. I stood there like I was a little kid again and let him dry my face.

“I don’t know your sister, but your mother doesn’t deserve you.”

I looked up at him, beseeching. “Then why do I never stop hoping?”

“Because you’re good, and you think everyone else is, too.”

“That can’t be it.”

A smile found its way to his lips. “Must be you’re just crazy then. You are friends with my sister.”

I took a step back and gave him my best “no eating in the library” look. He laughed.

With disaster averted and my mother far, far away in her lair, the real world materialized around us. I became aware that there was a floor show happening in the neighborhood and Nick and I were it. Up and down the road, Nera’s denizens were feigning busy work while they openly watched my meltdown. I mean, the woman across the road was sweeping, but her broom wasn’t touching the ground. Subtlety was not a Greek virtue. As bold as they were, they didn’t need tact or discretion.

“People are watching us.”

“They are, yeah,” Nick said.

Not caring that we were gossip fuel for the masses, Nick wrapped me up in his arms and held on tight like he never wanted to let go.

“Do you care?” he asked.

“No. You?”

“Not one bit.”

twenty-seven

Of course, by the time we made it to Yiayia and Proyiayia’s house, photos of us hugging were all over the gossip sites. Everyone thought we were in love, and the hot prediction was that Nick and I would be the two final contestants.

The funny thing, though? I didn’t want to be up against Nick. We were already in competition each night as it was. To have to fight him, one way or another to win the big prize, was unthinkable.

Winning seemed impossible anyway. Unless the final tasks involved reading or distributing books to children aged 5-11. If that was the case, Nick Merrick was going down in a torrent of paper cuts.

The world—at least the portion of it that watched Greece’s Top Hoplite and devoured any speck of gossip about the show—didn’t know a thing about me or the contestants yet, not really, but that didn’t stop them from having opinions about who we were. They assigned traits and motivations to us that were exaggerated or just plain fabricated (“American Teachers Are So Poor That One Is Taking Over Greek Television to Win Greek Money,” and “Greek Hunk Hits On Poor American Teacher Out of Pity.”) Look, there were a lot of articles about me being a poor teacher even though I wasn’t technically poor. Would more money be nice? Yes. Who didn’t want more money? Money was a tool to build a better life, not just for me but for my school and students. As for Nick, the idea that he was hitting on me was hilarious. I mean … look at him.

Their predictions about who would win the show were just that: predictions. Forecasts based on nothing except who they wanted to win.

But who could blame them, really? Part of the fun was guessing who would make it.

Those of us on the show didn’t have an inkling yet. Every night I was shocked by who left and who stayed. Over time, even a short period, bonds were formed, and we had in our own small way formed relationships, even if we expressed it in reassuring smiles and pained winces. So when someone was “let go,” surprise rippled through our shrinking group. Even Pretty Monkey’s elimination was a shock.

I think we all expected to make it to the final show together, even though we knew better. For there to be one winner there had to be nineteen losers.

* * *

Late one afternoon, Dora Makri, her daughter Effie, and several other cast members ambushed me. I say ambushed, but in reality they had Memo call me and invite me to Hotel Ble for drinks and snacks. Because I liked drinks and snacks, and because I was dying of curiosity, I trotted along at the agreed upon time and found them all gathered around enough food to feed Leonidas’s army of three hundred.

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