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.The rope had been knotted so tightly that his wrists had begun to bleed and the rope had been soaked black.I turned to share my outrage with Giulia, but I was alone.In a corner of the auditorium an old man was talking to a group standing around an old school desk.Andreas and Giulia were there.I walked over and stood listening at the edge of the group.—Come closer, the old man urged me.—He’s an Australian, Andreas explained, and everyone turned to look at me.I felt my flesh burning and my legs felt separated from my torso.All I wanted to do was lie on the floor, look up at the high white ceiling, and let the old man talk.—Does he understand Greek?I managed to nod.The old man proceeded with his lecture, but he remained focused on me, nodding, inviting me into the conversation.I placed a smile and an expression of interest on my face but his words were all a jumble.I was a foreigner with a stranger’s ears and I could not make out a word.But still I kept nodding.Giulia came and stood beside me and I laid my head on her shoulder.It was bliss.—My love, she whispered, come with me.She took my hand and we walked away from the group.—Did you understand any of that?I shook my head.—What did Andreas mean about this place being our sickness?—The civil war.For us it was like the Holocaust was for the Jews.When I was a child, Isaac, all that mattered was which side your family fought for in the war.Madness—we were schoolchildren and we were still carrying on our grandfather’s crusade.I balanced myself against the white wall, cooling my cheek on the brick.Above us, I could see faint etchings emerging from the scrubbed plaster.—What are these?—Is our friend sick?Andreas had placed a hand across my shoulder and I wanted to sink my head into his flesh.The old man was still lecturing to the group.—What are these? I mumbled again.—They were murals that the Right destroyed after the end of the civil war.The museum is attempting to restore them.He lowered his voice to a whisper.They are not so important, social realism, mostly rubbish.I shook my head aggressively.—No, it’s good they are restoring them.It’s great.We don’t have anything like this in Australia.This is great.This is beautiful.Andreas was laughing.He marched us out of the museum and back into the square.The diners were still arriving and the night seemed alive, sharp as shattered glass.I turned back and looked at the museum.It was framed tall and inspiring against the dark purple sky.Andreas was looking at me.—Do not take what the old comrade said too seriously.His was not a complete history.Giulia snorted.—It was complete enough.Andreas turned to her and I could see he was angry.—You think the Resistance were fighting for Greece and that it was the West that betrayed us?Giulia nodded defiantly.—Half-truth.He turned to me and there was a bitter venomous sting to his words.Yes, the English, and yes, the Americans, they did betray us.But those comrades in there, on the wall, they were not fighting for fucking Greece, they were fighting for fucking Russia.Giulia stood firm.—So why didn’t you say that to the old guy in there, why were you nodding along with everything he said?The anger disappeared from Andreas’ face.—Because he is old, Giulia, and he has seen and been through enough.He turned to me.You understood he had been away from Greece for decades?I shook my head.I understood nothing, I told him.—He had been living in Budapest since the end of the civil war.He was only thirteen when he joined the Resistance.He has only returned to Greece since the fall of communism.The Hungarians don’t want him anymore.He turned back to my cousin and resumed the argument in Greek.—What should I have said to him? That it was worth nothing, all those deaths, all those years in exile? He began laughing and I realised that for him, laughing was not joy but it was rancour and confusion.He laughed as the truck driver Takis in Agrinion had laughed when I had attempted to describe another world to him.It was the same laugh.—Come, continued Andreas, it’s all in the fucking past, isn’t it? There’s no exile any more, no civil war, no blood feuds, no more prisons and even the State builds a monument to the Resistance.We are all democrats, now, aren’t we? We followed his laughter to the car.Near the end of his life, Dad had started going a little mad.He would come home after work, have his hit, and stretch out on the couch watching endless television.He was obsessed by the collapse of history, the disintegration of Soviet Russia.I found him asleep one night, coming back from a friend’s house, asleep on the couch, an American morning news program flickering away on the screen.Mum and my sister were in bed.On the coffee table there was a full ashtray and a small plastic envelope.I picked it up, looked at it, at the dull film of powdery residue coating it, and he opened his eyes.There was a small smile on his face.He indicated the screen.—Turn it off, son.Turn off that propaganda.—You shouldn’t watch it, Dad, it just upsets you.He offered me his hand.—Help me up, Isaac, I’ve got to go to bed.I pulled him off the couch and he took the empty packet from my hand.He waved it in front of my face.—Rich man’s powder, Isaac, to keep us numb, to keep us under control, do you understand?—I know, Dad, I know, let’s get you to bed.—Jew powder, Isaac, he whispered, do you understand?I was stunned.This wasn’t Dad, this wasn’t my father speaking.—Dad, where the fuck is that coming from?Anger fought through his drug haze.He sprayed spittle across my face.—Fucking Jews, fucking traitors, they betrayed us.After all we did for them, after all the Party did for them.Fucking traitorous cunts, that’s what they are.He waved his pouch of heroin in the air.Jew powder, Isaac, don’t forget.I said nothing, stood still and silent, did not dare move until he had closed the bedroom door behind him.We drove back towards the Megalo Horio but turned off before the village and descended a small dirt road.Car after car was parked by the side of the road and everywhere there were people walking, talking, licking at ice-creams and eating bread and biscuits.Andreas edged his car between a small black convertible Saab and a flashy red Peugeot, and we got out and joined the crowd.Folk music was playing in the chaos, and I held tight to Giulia’s arm
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Tematy
IndexChristine Amsden [Cassie Scot Cassie Scot ParaNormal Detecti
Christie Craig [Divorced, Des Divorced, Desperate
Moore Christopher Ssij, mała, ssij (II)
Stasheff, Christopher Wizard in Rhyme 6 Haunted Wizard
Christine Feehan Mroczna Seri Mroczny Demon
Cidney Swanson [Saving Mars Saving Mars (epub)
Stasheff, Christopher Rogue Wizard 04 A Wizard in Peace
Feehan Christine Mroczna Seria 01 Mroczny Ksišże
Stasheff, Christopher Warlock 01 The Warlock in Spite of Himself
Christine Feehan Mroczna Seria 13 Mroczne Przeznaczenie