Polly Samson - A Theatre for Dreamers

‘If it wasn’t for Erica we could have enjoyed all of this,’ Bobby was saying, gesturing at the medieval town that we were leaving in our wake.

By the time we reached the overnight ferry at Brindisi he had stopped talking to me altogether. He was morose, hunched over the steering wheel, certain that Edie would be lost. We drove straight off the ferry, queasy after the sixteen-hour crossing, and on along the coast towards Corinth, through domed villages and past tavernas, olive trees, pine forests, the constant invitations of a milky blue sea. No, there would be nothing, not even a Greek coffee.

The first time our feet touched Greek soil was close to sundown that day. Bobby pulled over for clarification on the map. The village was deserted, bathed in dusty golden light. There was only a man who looked like he’d stepped straight out of the Bible: bearded and robed and using a staff to herd a few stringy goats up a path. Jimmy sprang from the car, stretched and leapt in one bound to the top of a wall, looked around and pulled me scrambling up after him. I followed him through the silver shimmer of an olive orchard, snivelling and crying. Eventually Jimmy noticed and stopped monkeying around, blotted my tears with his thumbs.

‘He’s been treating me this way since his fight with Dad,’ I sniffed as a volley of furious Greek broke out behind us. The bearded man was waving his staff. Had he really just spat straight at Bobby?

Jimmy turned to me. ‘What the hell…?’

Bobby had his hands to his face; the man was retreating, goat bells clanging.

‘I’m not a bloody Hun,’ Bobby shouted after him.

‘ Germanos, Germanos was all I understood,’ Bobby said. ‘That and “bastard”,’ and then, without warning, when I started to laugh, he launched himself at my arm and gave me a Chinese burn.

We arrived in Piraeus just one day later than planned. Edie wasn’t there and Bobby didn’t track her down for a further two hellish days. He had been tearing around looking for her; his T-shirt was stained with sweat. She and Janey were perched at a pavement table near the youth hostel, laughing with others they’d gathered along the way: a pretty girl with orange hair and a pair of muscular Scandinavians who looked like twins. Edie and Janey both wore French berets.

I saw my brother grinning for the first time since we left London as he crept up behind her and stooped to kiss, or maybe even lick, the innocent length of her neck. One of her companions leapt to his feet, ‘Hey, hey!’ but Edie was laughing and grabbed Bobby’s hand before even turning around. ‘I knew you’d show up eventually,’ she said.

The port of Hydra sweeps into view suddenly, dramatically, like a curtain has been raised between mountains. The symmetry of stone walls and mansions imposes a perfect horseshoe around the water where tiers of white houses rise like the seats of an amphitheatre.

It’s a magic trick from barren rock, a theatre for dreamers. The stage is lit by sun and sea and I’m gripping the rail on deck and Jimmy’s got me by the waist as though he thinks I might leap as the port and its toy town come at us out of the blue. I look from the mountains to the ziggurats of houses and back to the colourful boats in the harbour and for the first time since we left London I’m happy. I imagine myself unfolding against the island’s backdrop of green-smudged hills, finding my way among the terraces and clustered pine. There’s salt spray on my face and my mum’s words in my ears; if I had wings I’d be soaring. Spice-coloured rocks, scrub, brush, acid yellow, herb. Pitched orange roofs and salt-white houses that rise to the gods, all eyes to the port.

People pour on deck for arrival, pointing out windmills and likely swimming spots, black cannons lined up along the fortress walls. Jimmy’s been reading Henry Miller and whispers in my ear, ‘Here it is. The wild and naked perfection.’ I shake myself free of Jimmy and hug myself at the prow as Hydra draws closer.

The fumes make you cough but I’ve been up here since Bobby announced, in front of everyone, that he wished he’d simply sold Mum’s car rather than saddling himself with me. I think my crime was losing sight of Mum’s old suede bag with the traveller’s cheques inside. I found it soon enough and mended the strap and came up here with thoughts of giving up and going home. Jimmy made a lame attempt to follow me but backed away when I said I was sick that he never bothered to stand up for me.

I immediately regretted it but was glad to escape Bobby spoiling everything; to be free of the scrutiny of the black-shawled women down below with their missing teeth and trussed-up chickens. But left alone, my thoughts swelled from my problems with Bobby to an overwhelming homesickness for my mum, and I allowed myself a good Aegean-sized cry. Mum would’ve got to the root of what was bothering Bobby and I ached for the steadying grip of her hand. I even allowed myself to think my brother deserved a good beating by our dad.

The ferry lets out two long bellows on her horns. People and donkeys are gathering at the landing stage; in the orchestra pit the painted caiques have been set swaying by our arrival. In a burst of superstition and excitement I push myself past the other passengers to be first to set foot on the island.

I step from the gangplank. Stand for a breath. The polished flagstones are pink marble. Men with wooden handcarts are unloading sacks; livestock skitters; earthenware jars are passing from shoulder to shoulder; crates of loquats and tangerines; people shouting. The port is festive with flags and bunting, blue and white like the sea and the sky. I scan the waiting people for a face that might be Charmian’s. There are women with market baskets and priests in black robes and dark glasses; shops and cafés and bars; striped awnings; donkeys decorated with beads and strung with improbable loads; drums of kerosene being rolled along the waterfront; the thump of barrels of wine being stacked.

I leave Jimmy to struggle from the boat with our luggage and run off to find her. Was I supposed to meet her beneath the clock? The chip-chip-chip of workmen’s tools rings and echoes. I can smell donkey shit and diesel and fish as I race along the waterfront to the white marble tower that rises at the centre of the port. I’m ignoring Bobby, who doesn’t have an iota of faith in any arrangements his teenage sister might make. He’s yelling at me and I turn to flick him the V and catch Edie and Janey checking out a group of young seamen, dazzling in white with peaked caps.

Stonemasons are strapped to a wooden platform at the top of the campanile and, facing me, the white marble statue of the hero with his lion mounted on its pedestal, Greek flag proudly flying, and Katsikas the grocery store on the corner, Van Gogh chairs and tables on the cobbles just like she said.

I head for the entrance; she’s not out here where only one of the tables is occupied and that by two men. My eyes adjust through the doorway: oil cans, tin baths and shovels hang from the walls, bales of cotton waste. Click, click, click. Dice, tile, chessman, komboloi . A strong smell of aniseed and frying fish. Only men at the marble-topped tables and a sick feeling is dawning that Charmian Clift isn’t here and I’ll have to go back to Bobby through the Easter swarms all looking for rooms and tell him we have nowhere to stay.

At the table outside, one of the men is pushing back his chair. He unfolds like a razor, tall and raw-boned with scruffy brown hair, a jacket hanging at least three sizes too big for him.